Armed and Quite Punny
There is a first time for everything, and just like one of my fellow bloggers
admitted a week or so back, this is the first time I was stumped by two
clues. But upon loading the HTML listing all the clues and fill, I did
a head slap for missing a clever pun on a pluralized cephalopod (see
8D below). Had I sussed it, I would have simply learned that the
crossing natick was a new bit of slang for the "fuzz".
Our
constructor today
Blake Slonecker, is an LA Times veteran, having debuted on Christmas Day, 2019. He
has also had puzzles published in the New York Times,
The Wall Street Journal, and Universal Crossword. In this puzzle he presents us with a visual theme with the payloads for the 8 themers in carefully arranged
triplets of circles stacked in two rows. Given the obscurity of the reveal clue (which I did happen to
know), I think the theme would be well-nigh impossible to guess without the
circles (apologies of course to AnonymousDNLC). As the
reveal for the puzzle is the trickiest one I've ever seen, I think it's
best to start with the grid, followed by the theme clue explanations,
and then the reveal explanation (which non-geeks might want to skip!)
17A. Round bakeware: TUBE PANS. Used to make bundt cakes.
20A Only unanimous Baseball Hall of Fame electee: RIVERA. Mariano RIVERA. Here he is at the top of the list.
19A. One score: TWENTY. As in "Four score and 7 years ago ...". Let us never forget.
21A. Ride the waves: BODY SURF. "Oh fun!"
54A. Impishness:
MISCHIEF.
Here's the theme music for Til Eulenspiegel (40 sec), classical music's favorite imp.
58A. Sign up: ENLIST. I've decided to stop volunteering for things.
57A.
Use a pinch runner for, e.g.: SUB OUT.
The rules on pinch runners.
59A. Club that may get heckled when they take the field:
AWAY TEAM. Boston flies so many fans into Camden Yards in
Baltimore that the Orioles can even get heckled when they play at
home.
Here's the reveal, which I'll try to explain as
simply as possible. If your eyes glazed over when you read it, you may
want to go directly to the Across clues.
34A.
Digital ledger that stores non-fungible tokens, and what can be found in
each set of shaded squares:
BLOCKCHAIN. That is each themer circle sextet is a
franchised eatery: PANERA, WENDYS, CHILIS, and SUBWAY, i.e. a "BLOCKED CHAIN".
In a nutshell a digital ledger
distributes accounting books (electronic "blocks" of records) across a
network, instead of storing them in a central location such as a bank.
This revolutionary technology provides a high level of redundancy, makes
the current record values simultaneously visible to all interested
parties, and virtually impervious to tampering. My thanks to Teri for finding this relatively simple, "top-down" explanation for the term blockchain.
The esoteric term non-fungible tokens is a rather obscure example of something that can be stored in a blockchain, the digital currency Bitcoin being a much more familiar one. Last Friday a single Bitcoin was valued at 29,178.50 USD (dropping about $1K while I was writing this review). Here's what it's worth today.
For those of you who are interested, a non-fungible token (NFT) is IMHO
something bordering on
P.T. Barnum's dream. NFTs are used primarily for selling digital art, e.g. something
as simple as an easily copied JPEG or video. But an "original"
version of the artwork can be declared, registered, and even traded via
digital ledgers. While this sounds like a fool's game, some NFTs are
selling for literally millions of dollars. They seem in someways
analogous to Zuckerberg's virtual reality Metaverse: both
seem to derive their value from the fact that people value them.
Crossword puzzles are blockchains too and we still have lots more blocks to fill:
Across:
1. Spanish pronoun: ESO. Today's Spanish lesson.
4. "Ohio" quartet, briefly: CSNY. Crosby, Stills,
Nash, and Young. Ohio was an anthem of the 60s: "Four
dead in Ohio"; and today: Ten dead in Buffalo (video rated PG):
8. "Sounds like a hoot": OH FUN. E.g. body surfing?
13. Plastic fig.?: APR. Annual Percentage Rate on a
credit card.
14. "Salt Fat __ Heat": Samin Nosrat cookbook: ACID.
This book gets rave reviews on Amazon, but before you buy it read some of the one and two star reviews. As
a hypertensive trying to lose weight this book already has two strikes
against it for me.
15. Pen: CORRAL. Thought it might be a verb at first, e.g. to
AUTHOR. But it's an enclosure for large animals.
23. Main line: ARTERY. E.g. the AORTA, the I10, or the
I95.
24. Coppers: PO-PO. Did not know this slang for the police. Hyphenation per
the Oxford Languages Dictionary.
25. Coastal inlet: RIA. The Chesapeake Bay is one big
RIA of
RIAS.
26. __ review: PEER. The process academics use for vetting
journal articles.
27. Bouquet __: GARNI. A
bundle of herbs
used to flavor a soup or stew.
29. Small bit: SPECK. Or a MOTE.
31. Small swirl: EDDY.
32. Mine lode: ORE. Today's
geology lesson.
33. Genève's land: SUISSE.
Lake Geneva in Switzerland.
38. On the same side: ALLIED. After a long time of going their separate ways, the members of NATO seem to be once again ALLIED on the same side.
41. "That sounds painful": OOF.
42. "Mare of Easttown" Emmy winner Peters: EVAN. Mare of Easttown is an American crime drama limited series created by Brad Ingelsby for HBO. It stars Kate Winslet as the title character, a detective investigating a murder in a small town near Philadelphia. Evan Peters received the Emmy for TV Film or Miniseries Supporting Actor of the Year 2021.
46. Fare plans: DIETS. My fare plan includes no salt. As all body fluids (animal and vegetable) naturally contain 0.9% Na Cl that's enough for me.
47. __ all'Arrabbiata: PENNE. Here's a recipe.
49. Mustard family member: KALE. Best when fresh. And it's good for you.
50. Up-in-the-air fig.?: ALT. As in Altitude, as measured with an altimeter, invented by Paul Kollsman in 1928.
51. Part: ROLE. 'All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players' (Shakespeare As You Like it Act 2, Scene 7).' And here it's riffed on by Rush in the song "In the End" from their album "All the World's a Stage" (lyrics) (video rated PG). A CSO to -T:
52. River from the Himalayas: GANGES.
Aside from providing drinking water and irrigating fields, the
Ganges River is extremely important to India's Hindu population for
religious reasons as well. The
Ganges River
is considered their most sacred river, and it is worshiped as the
goddess Ganga Ma or "Mother Ganges."
61. More tart: SOURER.
62. Pixar film set in Radiator Springs: CARS. Here's the
trailer (rated G):
63. Place for "me time": SPA.
64. Itty-bitty: TEENY. WEENY, yellow polka dot, dot, dot
65. Wraps up: ENDS.
66. Chef's meas.: TSP.
Down:
1. Alt-rock's Jimmy __ World: EAT.
Here's the story of their first big hit "The Middle". Here's the video with lyrics. I didn't think the official
video would get past the censors, but it's out there.
2. Urged (on): SPURRED.
3. Went around in circles?: ORBITED. Something MOONS do
around ORBS.
4. Culinary bud: CAPER.
Everything you ever wanted to know about a CAPER. Unless of course you're planning to pull off a bank heist.
5. Next-level awesome: SCARY GOOD.
Some urban definitions for SCARY GOOD.
6. NPR legal affairs correspondent Totenberg: NINA.
Nina Totenberg is a correspondent for National Public Radio
focusing primarily on the activities and politics of the Supreme Court
of the United States.
Her reports air regularly on NPR's news magazines
All Things Considered, Morning Edition, and
Weekend Edition.
 |
| Nina Totenberg |
8. Army swimmers?: OCTOPI. Cleverest clue. Cleverer than me anyway. Also a clever clue for a very clever animal.
9. Folksy greeting: HOW DO.
10. Glenn of the Eagles: FREY. This is for our West Coast folks. Lyrics by Glen Frey, lead vocals by Don Henley, with Don Felder and Joe Walsh on guitars:
11. Banquet coffeepots: URNS.
12. Essences: NATURES.
16. Liner notes component: LYRICS. Pet peeve: recordings
(LP, CD, or online) without lyrics. They are only 50% of the song.
18. All: EVERY BIT.
21. __ vivant: BON.
Bon vivant is literally French for “good living.” The
term bon vivant is typically associated with the kind of sociable person
who's good at entertaining and can keep the party going with a good
story.
22. Imitation: FAKE. Watch out for the deepfakes.
What are they and how can you spot them?
23. Mimic: APE. Not so deepfakes.
24. Sch. for tots: PRE K. As School is abbreviated, so is
Kindergarten.
28. Halo piece: ARC.
29. __ generis: SUI. One
of a kind; absolutely unique. I think you could describe every denizen
of the Corner as SUI GENERIS.
30. Woodworker's inconvenience: PINE KNOT. My father was a
woodworker and he used carefully selected "knotty pine" boards to sheath the upper halves of the
walls in our living room and downstairs den. It was inexpensive and he
liked the look of the grain and the knots. With several coats of varnish it took on a
golden glow that deepened with age.
33. Protect: SAFEGUARD.
35. French article: LES. French plural definite article.
LE and LA are the respective masculine and feminine articles,
but LES is used for both masculine and feminine nouns.
36. Scoop holder: CONE. Refers not to something you hang the scoop from
(e.g. in a kitchen), but rather what you scoop it into, e.g. ice cream.
37. Snookums: HON.
38. "Whataya Want From Me" singer Lambert: ADAM.
Adam Mitchel Lambert (born January 29, 1982)
is an American singer and songwriter. Since 2009, he has sold over 3 million
albums and 5 million singles worldwide. Lambert is known for his
dynamic vocal performances that fuse his theatrical training with modern and
classic genres. Here's the clue song:
39. Easter blooms: LILIES.
40. "We should pass": LET'S NOT. And say we did.
43. Least clear: VAGUEST.
44. Brewpub fixtures: ALE TAPS.
These systems can get pretty complicated. I suggest that you don't sample the merchandise until everything is
installed and tested.
45. Old console letters: NES.
Nintendo Entertainment System.
47. "__ Is Not a Luxury": essay by Audre Lorde: POETRY.
Audrey Geraldine Lorde; February 18, 1934 – November 17, 1992) was an American writer, feminist,
womanist, librarian, and civil rights activist. She was a
passionate, courageous poet, who fought racial injustice all of her life.
|
|
Audre Lorde |
51. Up: RISEN.
53. Deep space: ABYSS. If you thought of this, you were looking in the wrong direction. Blake at least meant this 19,714 feet deep canyon. And if that's not deep enough for you, then you have go under water. The first and only time humans descended the 36,201 feet to the bottom of the Mariana Trench was more than 50 years ago. In 1960, Jacques Piccard and Navy Lt. Don Walsh reached this goal in a U.S. Navy submersible, a bathyscaphe called the Trieste.
55. Board game with rooms: CLUE.
56. Sign on: HIRE.
57. Cygnet: SWAN. While Finnish composer Jan Sibelius was writing his 5th Symphony he relates that he went for a walk one morning and saw 16 SWANS flying over his head. Their trumpeting inspired the majestic theme that he used in the finale (1 min.):
60. Trailhead display: MAP.
Cheers,
Whew! This puzzle tasked my memory for words from old cwd puzzles, words from foreign languages, old bands, and even ghetto slang, but somehow, with a lot of P and P, I managed to pull it all together and FIR, so I'm not just happy, I'm relieved!
ReplyDeleteGood morning!
ReplyDeleteSaw the restaurant CHAINs appearing in a BLOCK, but have only the vaguest notion as to the meaning of non-fungible tokens and BLOCK CHAINs. At the end of the day, d-o had one bad cell, and it wasn't the crossing of two proper names. It was that O at the crossing of HOW-DO and PO-PO. D-o had HOWDY, and let it stand. D'oh. Along the way, Wite-Out came to the rescue for cakE tiNS/TUBE PANS and menuS/DIETS. I won't embarrass myself by admitting the name I entered for that HOF baseball player. I remember Ron uttering "Scary Good" in one of the Harry Potter books -- whether he actually said it or not. Thanx for the abasement, Blake, and for the explication, Waseeley.
PO-PO: I remember my sister singing while changing her infant son...
"Feet up!
Pat 'im on the po-po,
And hear him laugh, ha-ha."
DNF. Filled 46 entries, all right, then remembered this John Prine LYRICS:
ReplyDeleteAnd it was twelve o'clock before I realized that I was having no fun
Ah, but fortunately I have the key to escape reality
And you may see me tonight with an illegal smile
It don't cost very much, but it lasts a long while
Won't you please tell the man I didn't kill anyone
No I'm just trying to have me some fun
Except that 1) in my case, it was seven o'clock; 2) I don't (yet) partake of the source of the illegal smile; and 3) that stuff is legal in Virginia.
I guess I'll try tomorrow, but I'm less than gruntled with the editorial direction of the LAT CW.
Yes
DeletePosting this before the other sea creature's write-up
ReplyDeleteWhew, wow. I finally finished this beast. At it from 4pm-6pm. Circles? Saved me. I'd stopped listening to Mr S, he wanted "scab" TEAM but it wouldn't perp. But…
He humbly suggested that I check out the circles: PANERA,WENDYS etc. And there was SUB???. Duhhhh!!
I just passed a Subway and thought of buying. I actually dreamed up SUB OUT but my biggest error? Spelling the gaping hole as ABBYS(Arbys).
And….
We were discussing Wordle words ending in S(S) and ABYSS was one.
I do get a kick out of non sports people clueing Sports. Sub-out is arcane and the opposing (AWAY) team is not heckled. Speaking of…
I did know Manuel RIVERA got 100%. I also know Joe DiMaggio was passed over. When the HoF was started even Cobb wasn't 100% and apparently Mays and Aaron(and Mantle) weren't either.
Lots of other fiendishly clued white space filled box by box. This was harder for me than any Saturday I can recall. But I may be slowing. I wracked my deteriateing brain for the second Indian River(besides Indus) until GANGES dropped out of the sky.
Can't wait to see other folks experiences
WC
I get a kick out of people not knowing that it's Mariano Rivera.
DeleteWhile I'd previously heard of BLOCK CHAIN technology, I didn't really know much about it, so since completing the review last week I've been reading several related articles to try to catch up. I haven't, and I'm not sure I want to.
ReplyDeleteBLOCK CHAINS, NFTS, and related technologies are collectively referred to as Web3. Here's a (long) WIRED article that will give you some idea of just how crazy this ITOPIA really is. I've already shared it with -T who calls it "80% scam". I read another article about its use to abet the collection and distribution of CSAM on the Dark web. Too depressing to share.
DNF. Friday puzzle on Thursday.
ReplyDeleteGot the rest of the grid filled, but the NE corner was 2/3rds white, and EVERY BIT that wasn't white became red! I did finish it, but with red letters on, so that doesn't count.
Several unknowns, I'll let others enumerate. I did know PO-PO.
The theme was well hidden, even with the bubbles. I didn't suss it until perps had the reveal fully filled in, and I could read that. So no win on that part of the puzzle either.
I don't time myself, but I just happened to see that I spent about 2 1/2 hours on this, including time after I turned the red lights on.
I fell again yesterday. I've been laying in bed for three or four days, and decided I needed to get up. I stood up okay, had a firm grip on my walker, and my legs just collapsed. I'm standing right next to my bed, and still fell to the floor. Once I'm down, I can't get up without help. So the paramedics came and got me back on bed, but wanted me to the hospital. Nothing they could do, so I wouldn't go. My problem is me. I'm LAZY. If I took a sudden interest in exercising, I could be normal in a month or two.
It wasn't the manatee nor octopus but waseeley in anything but a melodorous write-up
ReplyDeletePs, I too had HOWDy thus POPy. I think HOW DO is the intended colloquial greeting
WC
Took 10:24 for me to remember that I do not like circles. But, I do appreciate the shout-out in the intro to the expo today.
ReplyDeleteI'm also guilty of originally putting in "Howdy."
Lots of unknowns, including, Garni, Evan, Nina. Found the clues to be weird for: penne, alt, and eat. Not a fan of foreign words, such as Suisse and any articles (looking at you, "les").
And, to not disappoint:
Oh joy, circles....
DNF. Absolutely hate circles! But the NW corner had me totally flummoxed. So many unknowns. Some of those clues were a real stretch.
ReplyDeleteThis was a fun challenging puzzle - I almost thought I would have to stop and finish it up at lunch - but the lower half was much faster than the top for me.
ReplyDeleteI filled in OCTOPI by perps- then looked at the clue - didn't think of the Army part of the clue as lots of arms initially - but more like a group (eg a murder of crows) but LIU and it is a consortium of Octopuses.
I've been trying to understand a bit more about cryptocurrencies and NFTs as my son just started working for one in December - so I had heard of BLOCK CHAIN- but I couldn't explain the definition- thanks Bill for trying!
Thanks Bill, Teri and Blake!
There was so many , 18 names and foreign words, that I was clueless. Not fun.
ReplyDeleteDNF--Definitely DNF. I simply don't have the time to waste on something this foreign, and I'm not referring to the foreign languages. Modern tech talk is what got me today, in addition to all the proper nouns, people unheard of to me. Were CSNY really from the 60's? I don't remember being aware of them then. Most of my dictionaries are at least half my age or more, in any language. I guessed most of the block restaurants despite trouble with the accompanying clues. But only one of those restaurants is within 60 miles of where I live, so even that's a stretch as far as familiarity.
ReplyDeleteSorry to be so negative, but I'm despairing of ever becoming fluent in CW-speak again.
DNF. BIG DNF. First pass yielded eight fills. Second pass added one. Then I was stuck. I've never heard a bundt pan called anything but a bundt pan. This CW was entirely NOT in my wheelhouse. After just ten minutes I threw in the towel. I MIGHT have been able to finish, if I spent an hour or more on it, but didn't want to spend that much time on it. I am SERIOUSLY getting LESS able to do these CWs. OR they are more difficult than they used to be.
ReplyDeletePicard, did the cut and save as a jpeg work for you?
This is the kind of CW I really enjoy, not easy cuz it takes some work and thought, but challenging and educational at the same time. Managed a FIR in 26:30 today. I agree that the clueing has changed since Patti took the reins after Rich, but I like the new twists and hoping I can commit to memory the many new proper names that have recently appeared because they will show up again. Thank you Blake for your fine piece of work!
ReplyDeleteHand up for HOWDY before HOWDO, but I have heard POPO before in relation to the police. Sussed the theme after filling three entries which helped me getting PAN
ERA, without the circles I probably would have never found the BLOCK CHAINS. Is SOURER really a word? I would think the qualifier would be “more sour” 🤷🏼♂️.
Thank you Bill for another superb review! Obviously you put a LOT of time and thought into your blogs and always include illustrations, videos, links etc, all so very informative. I wasn’t aware that the stats of a pinch runner are not officially recorded as stats, seems quite unfair to me.
Good Morning:
ReplyDeleteI promised I wouldn’t mention this pet peeve again, but today’s examples cry out for attention. It’s bad enough, as so many of us have complained about, to have a grid laden with proper names, but to deliberately use proper name references in the cluing is not only unnecessary but is, IMO, unfair. Acid, Cars, Eat, and Poetry can all be clued with the appropriate difficulty level without resorting to proper nouns. I will now defer to Thumper for the second time this week.
Bill and Teri, thanks for your dedication.
FLN
Vidwan, my condolences on such sad news you received.
Misty, sorry that I got my Merlots and my Cabs mixed up! 🍷
oc4beach, glad you dropped by but sorry to hear of your serious health issues. Best wishes for successful meds treatment. Join us as often as possible.
Lucina, I’m sorry your traveling has been curtailed and I admire your positive attitude.
Have a great day.
Joining the DNF club today with big trouble in the NW corner. Had cakEPANS and didn't figure out ESO and APR, leaving them blank. Hand up for the error at POPy and HOWDy. Sigh, and a sloppy error at RiLE and PiETY. Should have thought longer about the clue "part" since I didn't know Audre Lorde. Otherwise I got the theme and saw the clever clues, solving slowly as I worked down the puzzle page. Overall more enjoyable than frustrating. Thanks, Blake.
ReplyDeleteThanks, waseeley, for reviewing and clearing up my confusion, with Teri's help. Lots of information to add today.
I'm reassured that others occasionally have trouble filling in the puzzles, too. I am optimistic we will adjust to the new constructors over time. Best wishes to us all!
Testing Thursday. Thanks for the fun, Blake and waseeley (and Teri).
ReplyDeleteBig fat DNF today. After spending more time than I should have, then resorting to Google, I still could not put that NW corner together. Then I arrive red here to discover POPO. I had Howdy, and was scratching (not scritching) my head at Popy.
Now I’m out of time for further details.
Off to do more gardening.
Read you all later.
Filled the BLOCK CHAIN before I noticed the restaurants. I FIR and while it was a tricky puzzle there were too many fills with the VAGUEST CLUEs and unknown answers.
ReplyDeletePO PO, HOW DO, GARNI in the same area? Not so BON. Worse than the unknowns Jimmy EAT and TUBE for Bundt PANS intersecting. So there's Spanish ESO, French LES & BON, German SUISSE, latin SUI & GARNI (I guess), Italian PENNE.
EVAN, ADAM, & RIVERA were filled by perps
ALTitude fill and a never heard of 'Alt-rock' clue.
HOW DO- never heard anybody say that, only howdy.
NINA bought the Anita BS hook, line, & sinker.
I still remember when Ron Swoboda, who was the sportscaster here in NOLA, and the new members were announced and Hank Aaron wasn't a unanimous pick he said: "I wonder who didn't vote for him".
The top third of the puzzle was a slog, lot of unknowns (for me), modified spellings.
ReplyDeleteNiche names, foreign words and some pretty sketchy fill. After two passes I tossed it.
ReplyDeleteHey, Anonymous DNLC (aka Speedy Solver), have you ever considered being something other than "anonymous"? You are so well liked here, it might be nice to have an actual name (of some kind) to call you by. Just a thought.
ReplyDeleteKazie @9:19 AM You are technically correct, as CSNY's OHIO was released in 1970. America's involvement in the Viet Nam war started in 1965 and ended in 1975. This era of protest songs and major shifts in music (e.g. the British invasion) is often collectively referred to as "the 60s". I agree with you about the difficulty of this puzzle. But try to hang in there. We value your input.
ReplyDeletePhil @9:30 AM I agree with you about the value of P&P in puzzles. A lot of what I've learned in the past several years comes from thinking inside the box.
I will join Irish Miss with the second THUMPER in four days. Got half-way through, gave it to DW and even she gave it a Thumper.
ReplyDeleteHa-ha! Very funny, SS.
ReplyDeleteMaybe you all need to buy some of the crossword books they sell at gas stations. Easy easy puzzles with only "old" names you've filled a hundred times before. Los Angeles Times puzzle has passed this group by now that it's in the 21st century finally.
ReplyDeleteThe word "Thumper" is not referenced in the "Comments Section Abbrs" for crosswordese terms. Can someone please explain to me what it means?
ReplyDeleteNever mind, I read further down into the "comments" on the "Comments Section Abbrs" (meta?) and got it. "If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all."
ReplyDeleteSg @11:16 Of course it's a tacit admission that you can't say something nice.😊
DeleteHola!
ReplyDeleteFor the most part, I filled this puzzle easily except for the top center. CSNY never occurred to me and neither did SCARY GOOD. POPO is completely unknown and HOWDY looked right. Though I am not a fan of the Grand Ole' Opry, I may have heard HOW DO in the few times I watched it.
When I solve a puzzle, I like to enjoy the puns, play on words, etc. But this one was a stretch and I almost lost my resolve but I persevered and finished.
My guess is that for me adjusting to the new order will take me a long while. Can you teach an old dog new tricks? Time will tell.
Hoping you all have a beautiful day!
I admire you "thumpers". I sometimes wish my mind had more control of my fingers, and my mouth too for that matter.
ReplyDelete"If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all."
As Ron White (of the Redneck Comedy Tour) said to the policeman, "I had the right to remain silent - I just didn't have the ability".
Puzzling thoughts:
ReplyDeleteMy first "thought" is that I'm glad that Bill S (and Teri) did the recap of this one; not me. Excellent recap, waseeley
As for the puzzle, it took EVERY BIT of my patience to slog through; and it still ENDS in a FIW because of the POPO/HOW DO crossing. POPY sure didn't look right to me, but I somehow forgot that HOW DO is also a folksy greeting. POPO? Really? SMH
The circles certainly helped direct me to the "Block Chains"
A few final thoughts:
I decided to cancel my newspaper subscription and go strictly digital
I'm probably going to post here less during the week, and "save my energy" for my bi-weekly Friday blog. No need to pile on with more negativity about the daily puzzles
I promise to be objective with my recaps, and hopefully keep them informative and entertaining
Crossword puzzles are meant to be challenging AND fun. Not every clue has to be like "Final Jeopardy"
Peace
BLOCK CHAIN and NFT very familiar to me and very important in the modern world. The BLOCK CHAIN of Bitcoin uses more power than entire countries. Not nice. Hand up utterly unknown cross of GARNI and OCTOPI caused me to hold off for hours until throwing in the I to FIR.
ReplyDeleteOCTOPUSES are solitary animals. I cannot find any place that refers to them in an ARMY. Can someone point to a reference?
The restaurant CHAINs in BLOCKs were crucial to solving for me. Never heard of RIVERA, but PANERA I knew. Never heard of TUBE PANS, either.
The killings at OHIO immortalized by CSNY hit close to our home. Allison Krause was one of the four unarmed students shot and killed by the OHIO National Guard. Her sister Laurel Krause was a friend of my brother in high school. I have a photo of her at my brother's wedding.
The pretty lady at the right in this wedding photo is Laurel Krause, sister of Allison Krause who was killed in OHIO.
There was never any proper compensation for the killing and Allison has devoted her life to this project.
unclefred, Jinx, OlManKeith, Yellowrocks and others who have helped with recommendations about printing the puzzle: Thank you! I think I see the problem. The LA Times web site has made the printed puzzle very wispy, perhaps to save ink. It will print on actual printers. But the conversion to PDF misses lines due to the wispiness. Fortunately, I can do a screen shot and save as PNG image file. I won't spend any more of your time or mine on it. Thanks for your help!
ReplyDeletePicard@1:01 p.m. Old friend, "army" swimmers is a punny reference to the octopus's eight arms. So it's "army" as in "a lot of arms." Get it? I admit it's very obscure, but then, many puns are.
ReplyDeleteSubgenius Ah! Thank you for the explanation! That indeed is FUNny!
ReplyDeleteIt is still a pet peeve for me that the correct plural of this wonderful animal is OCTOPUSES not OCTOPI.
Hmm,
ReplyDeleteWhat 2 say...
?????
Actually,
There is one th8ng I can say,
Army swimmers was really cute...
(I hate cute....)
Rehearsals, dinner tonite,
wedding tomorrow.
(I don't even have time to Lurk.)
Well, this was a bit of a bear, and thank you, Irish Miss, for pointing out that all those names weren't really necessary and a more manageable construction could have been a help.
ReplyDeleteExcept for that silly POPO, I liked the area right above the middle. I even got the SUISSE.
Loved the reference to Audre Lorde's POETRY essay.
We're getting a lot of ALE TAPS lately, aren't we? Too early for a morning puzzle.
But my favorite was that Snookums (never heard of it, but still got) HON.
Glad you're okay after your fall, Owen.
Have a good day, everybody.
Sorry to say I got very little pleasure or satisfaction from this puzzle, and I had to use red letters twice to get it solved. I flat out did not know the term POPO and had no idea what it meant even after getting it filled (solely from the perps of course.) As far as I am concerned, it made as much sense if it were POPY, crossing HOWDY.
ReplyDeleteIt has been pointed out here before that the plural of octopus is not OCTOPI but is octopodes, octopods, or octopusses, because the last two letters, US, are not Latin or from a Latin root. However, I held my nose and moved on.
I very much enjoyed and benefitted from your write-up, waseeley.
Subgenius: Thank you for the kind words and suggestion. For the record, the anonymous "Yes" wasn't from me (though I did find it amusing). I have, and will, continue to give it some thought, although I don't mind AnonymousDNLC and the flattering, though not always accurate, "SS."
ReplyDeletePerhaps the anonymous interloper imposter is proving that I need to obtain a moniker to avoid anonymous identity theft.
Wait, does that count as meta?
BIG disappointment in all the overly obscure proper names,
BOY do I find that annoying.
(That's for YooperPhil, who has seemed to appreciate my attempts to play on the themes.)
AnonymousDNLC (aka SS)
Re. HoF voting. As seen from waseeleys chart, Cobb and Ruth didn't get 100%. Thus perhaps a trend was born. Designated voters passed on Williams, May's etc. I think the new breed eschews that strategy hence Rivera, while worthy is not in the echelon previously mentioned.
ReplyDeleteAlso re. 60s era(50s too). The 50s began with Rock(55) and the ended with Beatles arrival. That began "the 60s"(65-74)
Picard, I was in Nam when Nixon invaded Cambodia. I thought he was mad. Then
Kent St and I thought "The World "* was mad. But a State Police classmate once told me of the pleasure he and his cohorts derived feom beating on the heads if protesters. Btw, from him I learned that 6-Jan was originally scheduled for 2017
WC
We referred to home as the World
Liked the puzzle, though not easy. By the way, Big easy, Suisse is not German for Switzerland, it is French. The German is Schweiz.
ReplyDeleteI would have known POPO from watching The Wire many years ago, but I stubbornly hung on to howdy for HOWDO. And although I got the restaurants pretty quickly, I missed the block part because I hung on to everyone instead of EVERY BIT. I need to remember to not fall in love with my answers.
I enjoyed the ride nevertheless.
Oops. Octopuses (one s).
ReplyDeleteI, too, think that maybe I'll get better at solving these Varol-edited puzzles as time goes by but my incentive for trying is rapidly waning.
Lucina, I'm sorry your legs are beginning to hurt and prevent you from walking much. I can relate, because over the past 10 years I have gotten less and less able to walk unassisted and now use two canes. In my case, it is because the disks in my lower back are shot, not so much that my leg muscles are weaker. I also have a walker, technically a "rollator," that I sometimes use, but it's unwieldy. Ah, age!
Good wishes to you all.
Proud of myself for getting POPO, but that's about as far as I stretched outside of my personal "wheelhouse."
ReplyDeleteWell, actually, I managed everything but the TUBE of TUBEPANS (in Natick with EAT) and 42A & 49A on the right side.
Oh, and OCTOPI.
I had no trouble with the theme circles.
DR: Sadly, it's an asymmetrical grid, so no diagonals today...
~ OMK
ReplyDeleteThe circles finally helped me solve some of the clues in the puzzle. When I saw that they were restaurant chains I was able to fill in a few of the blank clues. It was still not a cake walk, though. I agree with Irish Miss and others that the use of proper names was a little overdone.
It also took me Red Letters and 31 minutes to get the puzzle done. Not one of my better outings.
Even though it's in the Urban Dictionary, I don't like the term PO-PO. Some think it's disrespectful.
I also hung on to HOWDY vs HOWDO for a long time.
I want to thank Irish Miss and Yellowrocks for their kind thoughts about my medical problems. I found out that the pancreas is responsible for more than insulin in the digestive process. There are a number of enzymes that are necessary for digesting the various components in food and making the nutrients available to the body. Those enzymes are what was missing in my system. So, now I have to take pills that contain these enzymes every time I eat something. Even if I'm just having a snack. The effectiveness of the pills are short-lived in the stomach so I don't have much time to eat. A leisurely meal is out of the question. If I don't take the pills, the food literally goes straight through me and does me no good and creates other problems. Luckily they haven't found any tumors that are the cause of the problem. They are still running tests to see what the cause is for the pancreas being atrophied. As I said yesterday, I'm starting to get some of my strength back and am putting on some of the pounds that I lost (although I could do without the weight.)
I hope everyone has a great day.
Picard - I was a student at UK (in Lexington, not Europe) when the Kent State shootings happened. A couple of days later, the SDS on campus organized protest marches, and the Ky National Guard was sent in to keep the peace. I found out later that a high school chum was deployed with a rifle there, even though he had just signed up and had not received even one minute of instruction. Fortunately no one got shot, and the only significant damage was an old building, scheduled for demolition, getting burned down. The National Guard blamed the SDS and the SDS blamed the university staff, saying they burned the building to avoid demolition costs and to frame the SDS.
ReplyDeleteI remember that the Rolling Stones had a big hit with "You Can't Always Get What You Want", including the lyrics
"And I went down to the demonstration
To get my fair share of abuse
Singing, "We're gonna vent our frustration
If we don't we're gonna blow a 50-amp fuse"
Yup, I went down to the march, not to take part, but to look for ladies who might need a little consolation. I got tear gassed. My fair share of abuse, I guess.
Solved without grasping the theme. After completion I "got" the restaurant names but still could not tie them to the Block Chain bit. I gathered that they were not "one offs" so chain made sense. I left things there.
ReplyDeletePOPO I knew although I am not sure from where. Motorcycle riding, perhaps, but we usually called them Leos (law enforcement officers).
I was not at, or near, Kent State. I was at Berkeley so experienced my fair share of abuse . . . from both sides.
I was in Richmond VA, running a theater company, when Kent State happened.
ReplyDeleteBut I was only a couple of years out from my first collegiate teaching job--at Williams College in MA. I had a fair idea of how college campuses were reacting.
Generally, of course, student bodies would be split. Williams was then (in All-Male days) a feeder for government agencies, including the CIA and the Intelligence operations of various military branches. So it had a right-wing bias as a whole, but I was working in theater, so I saw the "other" students, the artists--and protesters and resisters.
What was most curious, though, was that loyalty to school dominated their political divisions.
I wonder if at Kent the students weren't brought together, at least for a time, by the assault from "outsider" Guardsmen? And I wonder if today's students bond more over their political factions or their shared school. Can't tell from the outside.
~ OMK
Speaking of the shootings at KSU, I was at a party within probably 30 miles of Kent State about 20 years ago, talking with another 5-6 other guests, when the shootings came up in conversation. One gentleman said he was a guardsman there, and another gentleman said he was a protestor there. The flowing conversation came to an abrupt and awkward halt. I had no idea what to say. Nor did anyone else.
ReplyDelete-Anonymous (the one who does not like circles) @ 7:11 am & @ 2:26 pm.
Hi All!
ReplyDeleteOy! DNF at BO_ | GAR_I, I guessed ScISSE (not giving me SUI(?)), and inked HOWDy (Hi D-O!). Duh, I know PO-PO is da' fuzz.
That was a real noodler, Blake. At least I knew BLOCK CHAIN off the blocks. I finally figured out the circles at SUBWAY which helped at CH_LIS & PANE_A. Thanks for the puzzle.
Thanks Waseeley for extended-play expo - lots of learning.
//All the World's A Stage was RUSH's first live album covering their first 7 studio albums -- including Permanent Waves which featured the song Limelight. Limelight had the LYRICS "All the world's indeed a stage / and we are merely players, /performance and portrayers,/ each another's audience beyond the gilded cage." [if you care to listen]
WOs: FRYE->FREY, LET IT [go], TEEsY
ESPs: [see: Oy!], RIA, EVAN. Many fills took much perpage.
Fav: SCARY GOOD is fresh but OCTOPI's clue more fun.
I like the band "Jimmy EAT Word," so that was a gimme. Ibid "Ohio" in quotes for CSN&Y. Whereas, the term Bouquet GARNI and foreign-language was new to me.
Non-fungible tokens, aka NFTs, explained by SNL.
Inanehiker - working for one? As long as the pay is in U$D and not scamCoins.
//there are actual uses for block-chain e.g. lot-controls, physical-transaction ledgers (think shipping, etc) but, anything you see advertised on TV, wanna buy a bridge?
{F - awful poem about an awful fall} //sorry to hear about your woes - get well soon OKL
FLN - Lucina: so sorry to read you had to cancel due to health.
My M.M.ANatee - they are CHAIN restaurants in a 3x2 BLOCK, Bro.
I learned of the Kent State incident through the song OHIO 'cuz I was not to be born for another two months.
CED - You made me think of Lou Grant
Anon@7:11am - I am disappointed... I was expecting "OH FUN, circles..." :-)
Cheers, -T
Anon-T - yes my son is getting paid in USD$ - but he had the option of getting paid in crypto currency but passed on that. I do think he gets some stock options.
ReplyDeleteI loved the HOW DO answer - because it reminded me of my granddad who would often use that as a greeting.
Hi Y'all! Thank you, Bill & Teri for the expo today. BLOCK CHAIN, the clue & explanation are beyond my comprehension, however. I didn't realize BLOCK CHAIN was a reveal altho I did get all the circle fills restaurants.
ReplyDeleteTook me 45:25 minutes with red-letters on the entire time. So many unknowns there was no chance of getting it going at all. CSNY: we've had many times. Never sticks in my brain. Didn't know the music group in its prime.
I did get POPO/HOWDO. I'd watched a Family Feud segment earlier where an answer was POPO for police which seems to be a black slang usage. I filled POPO first. HOWDO made sense to me since it was common usage by older people in my area when I was young. I had a cute little old man that would come in my first bookkeeping job office for help with a form he had to fill out. I'd look up and see him grinning and saying HOWDO. I mentioned him to one of the men who didn't know his name. Then said, "You know --HOWDO." Then he knew him so we always called the old man, "HOWDO".
OC4beach: so sorry to hear about your health problems. Prayers for you.
Vidwan: sorry to hear of your friend's loss of a child. Sometimes they are never the same after that shock. I've had several friends with that tragedy.
Today my eldest grandson, who is a college senior studying architectural engineering, posted a note informing his friends of an event using something I'd never heard of in a place I never heard of. Once more I felt incredibly obsolete.
Musings
ReplyDelete-An early tee time 60 miles away and then yard work when I got home.
-A true challenge where obscure fill was doable
-BLOCK CHAIN – Fine. Waseely’s valiant effort to explain – Over my head.
-Sports writers vote players into the MLB HOF and some take pride in saying no to obvious selections just to be contrary
AnonT:
ReplyDeleteThank you. I am slowly getting used to my disability but it is a hard pill to swallow! In my family I and my sister Yoli have always been the "strong and healthy" ones. She is 13 years younger than I am so is in good health.
Ha, ha. I had accidentally typed 113 years!
PK @ 7:35 wrote, "Today my eldest grandson, who is a college senior studying architectural engineering, posted a note informing his friends of an event using something I'd never heard of in a place I never heard of. Once more I felt incredibly obsolete."
ReplyDeleteI'm with you on that one. For me, 14A (Samin Nosrat. In heaven's name, who names a kid 'Samin'?) or 24A, or ..., did me in.
Yours in obsolescence, Michael (But cheer up, there's still beer!)