Saturday Themeless by Adrian Johnson and Brad Wilber
Two familiar constructors collaborate today on a puzzle where the SW corner challenged me. It appears that EDAM is not the only four-letter cheese and AVIAS are not the only five-letter sneakers. Coupled with my "shouldn't have been that hard" AGUA FRESCA, whatever TACOS those were and TANSY not PANSY it made it interesting but I "got 'er done".
1. Concern when merging: BLINDSPOT.
10. Texas river diverted into the Red Bluff Reservoir: PECOS.
15. Museum download: AUDIO TOUR - At the Louvre
16. Dippy: INANE.
17. Stranger in many a family holiday photo: MALL SANTA - I recall one who was in Miracle On 34th Street
18. Cake made from ground nuts: TORTE - A Martha Stewart TORTE with almonds, walnuts and hazelnuts
19. "While I Was Gone" novelist Miller: SUE.
20. Becomes, finally: ENDS UP.
22. "High Anxiety" actress: KAHN - A true comedic genius
23. Say further: ADD.
24. Corps member: MARINE.
26. Metered fleet: CABS.
24. Corps member: MARINE.
26. Metered fleet: CABS.
32. "The Cube" network: TBS - Hit Play at this link for a sample of this game
34. Delighted toddler's demand: AGAIN - I got tired before my daughters did
37. Time worth studying: ERA.
38. Gruff prescription for a minor injury: RUB SOME DIRT ON IT - "Suck it up and keep playing!" A familiar refrain in my yute.
42. Aspect: FACET.
43. Branch of Islam: SUNNI.
44. Org. whose members take hikes?: NFL - BSA? Wrong hikes.
45. Mets slugger Pete who holds the record for most home runs by a rookie: ALONSO - He broke Aaron Judge's record
47. Benefit: SAKE.
48. Irredeemable: ROTTEN.
50. Word of invitation: SIT.
52. Cheese paired with kalamata olives: FETA.
53. Do more than listen: STEP IN.
56. __ diavolo sauce: FRA - (Brother Devil) "FRA diavolo sauce is an Italian classic sauce made with juicy tomatoes and fiery chili flakes, perfect for seafood and pasta."
59. #LiveUplifted sneakers brand: ASICS - Here ya go
61. Arthroscopic procedure that may follow an MRI of the knee: ACL REPAIR.
65. Button-like flower: TANSY - Sounds like PANSY but doesn't look like one
66. Setting for some unboxing videos: TOY STORES - This man makes a living shooting unboxing videos and posting them on YouTube.
Down:
1. Some carpentry noises: BAMS.
2. Party with poke: LUAU - Poke is Hawaiian for "chunk"
3. Between jobs: IDLE.
4. Bupkis: NIL.
5. Gave a shot, say: DOSED - We have been correctly DOSED and shot three times
6. Efforts at resistance: STANDS - Custer's last one was a disaster for him and his men
7. Spot for a koi or a decoy: POND.
8. Ballpark figure: OUTS.
9. Emergency gear: TRAUMA KITS.
10. Depression: PIT.
11. Miso soup mushroom: ENOKI - From C.C.'s June 12 write-up
12. Road show necessity?: CAR ANTENNA - Or dual ones
13. Flirting with: ON THE BRINK - Top 10 animals ON THE BRINK of extinction
14. Camille Pagán's "Woman Last __ in Her Thirties": SEEN.
21. "Your table's ready" device: PAGER
23. Warts and all: AS IS.
25. Relies (on): RESTS.
26. Whoopi's birth name: CARYN.
27. Drink often flavored with hibiscus: AGUA FRESCA -(Spanish for Fresh Water) - "AGUA FRESCA is a light fruit drink popular throughout Mexico. It's simply made by blending fruit with water, a bit of sugar and a little lime juice." You're welcome.
28. Aveeno product: BABY LOTION.
30. Peer-to-peer sharing?: EYE CONTACT - You peer at me and I peer at you.
31. Add capacity to, in a way: WIDEN.
33. French composer who influenced Ravel: SATIE.
 |
| Debussy Ravel Satie |
35. Diet food choice: NO FAT.
39. Some mechanical connectors: MALES.
40. Dethrone: OUST.
46. Egyptian god invoked in "The Magic Flute": OSIRIS.
49. __ al pastor: TACOS - "Al pastor (from Spanish, "shepherd style"), also known as TACOS al pastor, is a taco made with spit-grilled meat."
51. Disinclined to form compounds: INERT - Chem 101
52. Media __: unplugged period: FAST - How long could you go?
54. Sign of hollowness: ECHO - That barrel must be empty
55. "Proof" or "Doubt": PLAY - New to me but "had to be"
56. "Point taken": FAIR.
57. Abounding (with): RIFE.
58. Review-heavy newspaper section: ARTS.
60. Trough spot: STY. - Fun clue
62. Gp. central to the 1993 Oslo Accords: PLO - A smiling PLO leader Yassar Arafat shaking hands with a reluctant prime minister of Israel Yitzhak Rabin
23 comments:
Phew as Wordle said I too bailed out on SW to save the FIR. ALONSO and OSIRIS were too solids but I labored long and hard.
I never thought of BSA, whew that was another solid
I vaguely, very vaguely recalled ASICS. When I grok'ed EYE CONTACT it gave me ROTTEN and FRESCA and FAST WAG'ed in
Tried, dared finally DOSED(Aha that kind of shot)
I thought…"I don't know any French composers but…
SATIE was a vaguely* familiar name
WC
* There's that word again
Good morning!
Nope. 'Twas not to be. Most of this puzzle was drama-free, but d-o made too many incorrect WAGs in California. It wasn't possible to see what was needed. PANSY, AVIAS, PUT SOME, SCOTT, I'm lookin' at you. Flirted with BSA, but that "?" told me it couldn't be. It was a fun trip down to the abasement. Thanx, Adrian, Brad, and Husker.
BLIND SPOT -- My side mirrors display a yellow blind-spot arrow when an "invisible" vehicle is nearby. Very nice feature.
MALE -- In my ute I visited my local radio repair shop to pick up a phono connector for my pirate radio station. The tech asked me, "Male or female?" I asked "Why do they call them that?" He said that would be a good question to ask my father.
I could hardly believe there was a person named "Scoot" but "tacos" looked pretty solid so I finally went with it. And this very challenging puzzle was finally conquered through P and P and a fair number of WAGS. FIR, so I'm not only happy, I'm relieved.
Except for FETA and STY the whole southwest was a mystery.
Don't RUBSOMEDIRTONIT until you spit on it first.
If your side mirrors are adjusted properly there shouldn't be a blind spot there, the cars to the side should be in your peripheral vision before they move out of the mirror's range.
Phew, wordle was right
Thanks HG and Brad and Adrian, A slow process and many new fill which I must write down before I forget
Happy Father’s Day
FIW. SW corner was stubborn. Did not know Scoot McNairy and my WAG was wrong. Lots of unknowns. Tough puzzle and a real workout.
Different sort of solve than most Saturdays for me - I got the long fill: BLIND SPOT and AUDIO TOUR as well ACL REPAIR and CHAIR LIFT fairly quickly but some of the other fill was slow to come around.
I had some help in the SW because I wear ASICS running shoes most of the time (even though I just walk) - DH is running Grandma's Marathon in Duluth as we speak. It's so nice now that they wear microchips on their bib numbers - so I can follow on an app where he is (just finished the first 10K in just under an hour.)
Thanks HG and Adrian & Brad!
Gary - will you go to any of the CWS games in Omaha this week?
Musings
-inanehiker – My son-in-law called yesterday saying he had tickets to go to the College World Series with him and my grandson. For the first time in my life, I said no to them as the tickets were in the full sun on a 100F+ day. I sincerely thanked him but I knew it would not work for me. If it had been for golf with a cart, I’d have jumped at the chance.
-Even with side mirrors adjusted and a blind spot warning system in place, I still quickly glance over my shoulder before changing lanes.
-The uber obscure cluing of SCOOT is exhibit A for our new editor but it had solid crossers.
-Lemon – Uh, I ain’t memorizin’ Scoot.
Hi Y'all! Moaned & groaned all the way thru this, Adrian & Brian. Thanks for some amusing SPOTS.
Thanks, Gary, for 'splainin'. Your comments on the SW was exactly like my experience. Hibiscus flavored really threw me. Don't know how they get the flavoring.
I have a very small (gift) hibiscus that has been blooming up a storm. The other day a squirrel sat on the edge of the pot with his face right up in the big flower for quite a long time, like he was smelling it. Then he settled down snug at the base of the plant for a nap.
Much of the puzzle was impossible for me. Food & drink I'd never ingested, names I'd never heard of, etc. Red-letter toeholds helped some. I did get 'er filled.
But Yay, I got PECOS & KAHN.
Jinkies = YIKES? Never heard Jinkies before, but YIKES sure expresses my feelings on this. Guess I'll RUB SOME DIRT ON IT and limp off into another hot hot day.
A Saturday struggle. DNK AGUAFRESCA and a few others. Never heard of The Cube or Tansy, and no idea what Jinkies! could mean. So….a one hour struggle. SE was the worst, until I finally gave up on OPED when the V-8 can hit with ARTS. Suddenly ACLREPAIR and CHAIRLIFT became obvious. Unboxing videos in the TOYSTORE? I do believe you’d get thrown out if you started videoing your kids unboxing things in the toy store. EYECONTACT seems like a stretch for “Peer-to-peer sharing?”. I came so close to throwing in the towel on this one, ARTS finally popped everything else in the SE into place, which also finally revealed EYECONTACT which in turn finally gave me YIKES for JINKIES!. As I said, a real slug-fest for this Saturday struggle to a one hour FIR. How are Boomer and C.C. doing?
HG, neither am I which is why I write them down. Then if they come back I might recall them if it happens often. I was told to scoot many times as a boy but I have not used that phrase except to ask someone to scoot over to make room for me to sit.
Yep, nice, on-point opening. HG.
Tansy not Pansy although we did know Asics and, fortunately, went with that and not AVIAS. In our paper the Toy Stores answer was clued in the singular - Setting not Settings. Even though Videos was pluralized we still call Shenanigans! Also, despite once having been a child and having spent countless hours in the back country never have I ever heard anyone say Rub Some Dirt On It. Jinkies!
A Saturday unsolvable-until-it-wasn't puzzle with some clever clues and a slightly-too-high dose of opacity.
For Pete's SAKE 'twas a very hard puzzle. Thought the NW would do me in but "the weather outside is frightful", So landscape chores went to the back burner and FIR😄. Typical Saturday, usual sprinkling of unknown proper names and lotsa inkovers: tried/DOSED, aster,pansy/TANSY(?), dip/PIT, loCal/NOFAT, ests/OUTS ...."party with a poke" (piñata?), LUAU? perpfit but now I see why (need to beef up on my Hawaiian). Still don't get TOYSTORES. Included in the AUDIOTOUR of the Louvre : ("Don't throw cake at the Mona Lisa, "s'il vous plait"). There is no Saint Whoopie? ( "CARYN "KAREN"variant, how ironic!!!)
Isn't it STEPup? STEP IN is what you don't want to do in a dog park🐕. PECOS came outta nowhere with just the C (kynda scary when that happens, 😳) "PECOS Bill"
"Jinkies"? wha?...Thought "hibiscus" was a large flower. Sumpthin' to be smelt not et. Guess if you can put a worm in tequila, what's a flower in water😆 (who put that TANSY in my tea?)..INERT are gasses too noble to mingle or mix with commoner elements.🧐. Our malapropic HS Chem teacher called them "inearth" (hey, that's where they come from)
Stitches.....SEWAGE
"Just ___ from Muskogee".....ENOKI
"Remaining soft Ice cream shop closes": Custards last _____ STAND
Enjoy the weekend...
I met my Waterloo this morning. Too many unknowns and misdirections for me. I loved High Anxiety and Mel Brooks movies, many starring Madeline Kahn and his lovely and super talented wife Ann Bancroft.
I really like PEER-TO-PEER SHARING clue. Very clever. Like everyone else I fell in the pansy trap. PK, i enjoyed your squirrel story.
Doubling up. Agree. SCOOT is so Patti that it made sense. We've always had pop-cul. Lemonade, I think your write-up yesterday was a solid W. And you got the "phew" on the last gasp too.
Betsy just had us running down to S. Ocala for hibiscus.
Yep, Mr S tried to stick with FASp but I told him to stickit and went with TANSY/FAST
"A Saturday unsolvable-until-it-wasn't puzzle" perfect description
RayO, tres bien adjourn hui. I'll be sharing those.
WC
Nope. Just, nope.
Hand up for a FIW today after a good week. My errors were BAth LOTION and pUt SOME DIRT ON IT. The perps didn't save me today. However, I am not complaining since I struggled long with other areas and got them right. The SE corner was especially slow. Thanks, Adrian and Brad!
Thanks, Husker Gary, for answering my puzzle questions. YIKES, maybe I will remember "Jinkies" and YAY (after trying rah and aah for "Glad to hear it!") I liked your extras, too: AGUA FRESCA looks refreshing this hot day!
Hope everyone is doing well. Looking forward to an update from C.C. tomorrow.
Not FAIR! This humbled solver was outnumbered 2 to 1 by two ACE constructors. I got nowhere for about an hour, took an hour break and after another hour I managed to finally get a foothold in the SE. But as I headed NW I encountered massive snow drifts and finally TITT. When I got to Gary's illuminating review all the blanks lit up and everything made sense. Alas, alack.
Favs of stuff I got:
16A INANE. A CSO to Dr. Hiker?
47A SAKE and ON THE BRINK. SAKE goes great with AHI tuna, but now Husker tells me it's ON THE BRINK of extinction!
33A SATIE. All you Blood, Sweat, and Tears fans will remember this one.
36A YIKES. DNK "Jinkies" and couldn't perp YIKES. Frawnch is bad enough, but now we've got to learn SCOOBYESE? It's enough to make me "Halt and Catch Fire!"
66A TOY STORES. I'm not a big fan of "unboxings", cause as Granddad I've usually got to STEP IN and assemble them. I would recommend to all you granddads that you giv'em Sleich Toys, as they have excellent instructions and don't require wire cutters to get the darn kits open.
46D OSIRIS. The Magic Flute was Mozart's last opera. It was written in German and is technically not an opera, but a "Singspiel" (sing-play), akin to our musicals. OSIRIS begins as a villain, but in the end he turns out to be the hero. Here's the overture.
Cheers,
Bill
p.s. I'm listening to the Santa Fe Opera's production of the "The (R)evolution of Steve Jobs". A visionary production of about the life of a visionary. And who says opera's dead?
p.p.s. Oh and thank you for Adrian and Brad for schooling me this morning! 🙃
A tough challenge from the Johnson/Wilber team. (Or is it spelled Wilbur, as in the LA Times?)
Well analyzed by HuskerG.
I enjoyed it, did most of it on my own, just cheating a coupla times toward the end.
(The "end"? Notice how often that is when the very best cheating occurs.)
Loved 38A, the "Gruff prescription" to RUB SOME DIRT ON IT.
Reminds me of one that was more common in my youth: "Put some spit on that!"
~ OMK
___________
DR: One diagonal, far side.
Today's diag presents only two vowels, limiting the anagram possibilities.
But one short anagram (only 9 of 15 letters), a slim choice stood out, reminding me of my days as a part time salesman in women's shoes--on Market Street in San Francisco.
We had a choice clientele, ladies with feet in all sizes, kids buying prom heels, mothers towing daughters for their first grown-up shoes, etc.
We had to be most discreet in dealing with men who would come in to our store to purchase shoes for their... er, "girlfriends."
My favorite instance was when two slightly inebriated MARINE Sgts. came in--so one of them could buy heels for a "wife" who just happened to wear the same size as he did.
I brought out several pair of high heeled "glass" evening slippers for him to try on & check in the mirrors.
In the end he purchased a pair with high but fairly thick heels, capable of supported more weight than usual for a typical female body.
I was pleased to ring up the sale for his...
"DRAG KICKS"!
FLN: Wilbur Charles: I agree that the best team won. Steph is unbelievable & so are most of his teammates. Also they were more rested because they put away their earlier teams with fewer games played. I still cringe when I see those big handsome men shoved and dumped on the floor.
Tante Nique: glad you liked my squirrel tale. Too cute not to share.
Hola!
This took me most of the day to finish because I was washing clothes in between solving. Moreover, it was RIFE with obscure cluing. PECOS was about the easiest for me but it went downhill after that filling one slow cell after another. Even AGUA FRESCA didn't pop out. I could not imagine what one would RUB SOME DIRT ON IT and wouldn't dirt cause an infection?
TACOS finally kicked in since "al pastor" is not a phrase I typically use. And I'm not familiar with FRA Diavolo sauce. It sounds ungodly hot!
ALONSO, like most sports names is unfamiliar to me. Thank you, perps!
Yum. LUAUS brings many delicious memories.
New clue for SATIE whom we've seen many times before in previous puzzles.
I don't know if I've ever seen a TANSY but of course I wanted pansy.
Right now AQUA FRESCA sounds desirable since it's 95 degrees. I keep the ice tray full at all times in summer. Mark has an automatic tray maker and he brings some over when his is full.
People who have had the procedure tell me that ACL REPAIR is painful.
I hope you are all enjoying a relaxing Saturday and that all is well with Boomer. Maybe he'll tell us on Monday.
Happy Fathers' Day tomorrow!
Yep!! I'll join the crowd...gave up after an hour of angst. In my 60+ years of "solving" I never bailed with so many "no-fills". I realize that Saturdays' offerings are historically (hysterically?) tough ...but this entry completely flummoxed me. Case in point: "RUB DOME DIRT ON IT"??? I've been involved in youth sports for 50 years and NEVER heard that said to an injured player ...if I had heard that, suspension would have been justified! Gotta ask: When there are so many "pans" on this site, do the editors' take heed??? Just wondering!
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