Themeless Saturday by Tom Pepper and C.C. Burnikel
Today brings us a lovely puzzle that frustrated delighted me tremendously. It is a joint effort by our lovely C. C. and her dear friend Tom Pepper who has been a great comfort to her in this past year. Here is what they had to say about their collaboration:
From C.C. - Tom sent me a grid with the IDLE GOSSIP/PIGEON POSE stack in place. I changed some and together we built a new one.
From Tom - When we've done themelesses, C.C. and I typically go 50/50 on the fill and 50/50 on the clues. I think this might be the one time C.C. clued the whole puzzle because I was out of commission for a while for some reason.
I got an entry point in the NE and started working and all of a sudden I had the entire Eastern side done. I shifted to the southwest and finally the NW (gotta love GLEE/GHEE) and its great wordplay succumbed to my patience.
1. Up state?: GLEE 😀
5. Had kittens: BRED - This vexed me for a while as too obvious. I never miss a chance at kitty pix!
9. Big hits, for short: HRS - A baseball clue from C.C. is as standard as a Shakespeare clue from Jeffrey Wechsler.
12. Shows emotion: SHEDS A TEAR.
14. Mary Oliver, e.g.: POET.
15. Welcome message to a waiter: NEXT PLEASE - 😀 This clever turn of phrase unlocked the last corner for me after I saw waiter was simply someone who is waiting in line and not a server
16. Goddess whose temple on Palatine Hill glowed at night: LUNA - It was burned in the great Roman fire of 65 A.D. and not rebuilt.
16. Goddess whose temple on Palatine Hill glowed at night: LUNA - It was burned in the great Roman fire of 65 A.D. and not rebuilt.
 |
| The Temple Of Sol And Luna |
17. Wreath that may be stored in a fridge: LEI - LEI, how do I clue thee? Let me count the ways!
18. "Got everything?": READY.
19. Benched way too long: RUSTY - First day on golf course after a long winter
20. Look that makes waves?: PERM. 😀
21. Places to find temples and bridges: FRAMES. 😀
23. One of Sue Bird's WNBA record 3,234: ASSIST.
26. Hardest to see: TINIEST - Be sure to read the small print
27. Runs across: SPANS - To this day my wife can't believe I talked her into walking across this SPAN at The Royal Gorge
28. Paris native: TEXAN - What a fun structure in Paris, Texas. I'll bet D-O has been there.
29. Shepherd's greeting: ARF - Would it sound the same from a German Shepard?
31. Shoegaze band Yo La __: TENGO - Yo La TENGO (Spanish for “I’ve got it,” alluding to the call of a baseball outfielder) was assembled in 1984 in Hoboken, NJ, by romantic partners (later spouses) Kaplan and Hubley. Shoegaze comes from the use of pedal boards where musicians tend to look down at their feet a lot. Yeah, I knew all that! 😏
 |
| Georgia Hubley and Ira Kaplan |
32. North Dakota Natives known as the Arikara: REE - Arikara also known as Sahnish, Arikaree, REE or Hindi are a tribe of Native Americans in North Dakota. It had to fill itself.
33. Cory Booker, once: YALIE.
35. Med. condition exhibited by Hannah on "Girls": OCD - When I saw _ _ D, I was afraid Hannah had a more personal health issue.
36. Puts on the line: BAITS - Did anyone else thinks of RISKS before you thought of fishing
38. Apt rhyme for "quake": SHAKE.
39. Like a golfer who usually shoots around par: SCRATCH - I play golf with Nebraska's former governor Dave Heineman and he is a SCRATCH player on our course.
41. Gave title to: DEEDED.
42. Churlish: COARSE - Every substitute teacher's favorite skit
43. __ Paragon: large shopping mall in Bangkok: SIAM - Like the kitties above. Thailand, of course, used to be known as SIAM.
44. Jazz combo set: DRUMS.
45. En passant pieces: PAWNS - En Passant means "in passing" in French
47. Gives clearance: OKS.
50. Fenty Beauty founder, to fans: RIRI - Rhianna has appeared here before
51. Coffee break exchange: IDLE GOSSIP.
53. Decides: OPTS.
54. Haphazardly: WILLYNILLY - A fun fill
55. Sue Bird's WNBA career 6,803: Abbr.: PTS - I'll bet this was for two of them
56. Autumn stone: OPAL.
57. Bit of trouble: SPOT.
Down:
1. Fat with a very high smoke point: GHEE.
2. Golfer Thompson: LEXI - Even Tiger Woods wrote to the PGA and said this penalty on LEXI was too severe for unintentionally moving a ball less than an inch
3. Std. that starts every March: EDT.
4. Places for hot shots: ESPRESSO BARS - Here's one for the home
5. Nonstarters: B-TEAM - My fate for a lot of high school
6. Interpretation: READ - What's your READ on this?
7. Basic solutions: EASY FIXES.
8. "Power" role for Rotimi: DRE - Olurotimi Akinosho known professionally as Rotimi, is an Nigerian-American actor and singer. He is known for his role as Darius Morrison on the Starz series Boss and as Andre Coleman or DRE on Power.
9. Soup du jour alternative: HOUSE SALAD - A minimal one I would say
10. Complex protest?: RENT STRIKE - If the whole apartment complex is upset, then...
11. Temporary reprieve: STAY.
12. NBC show with more than 950 eps: SNL.
13. Vigilant: ALERT.
14. Column of smoke: PLUME.
19. Wet periods: RAINY SEASONS.
20. Notify: PING - I have had to PING my iPhone from my Apple Watch using the upper right hand icon more times than I can count.
22. Molecule studied by Joan A. Steitz: RNA.
23. Concerning: ASTO.
24. Unsolicited screenplay: SPEC SCRIPT - TriStar initially optioned the film (Pulp Fiction) and was even in talks to produce it, but then did a 180 by declaring, “This is the worst thing ever written. It makes no sense. Someone’s dead and then they’re alive. It’s too long, violent, and unfilmable.”
25. Beach volleyball spots: SAND COURTS - I'll have to admit that the court is not the first thing I notice in this competition.
26. Nail biters: TEETH.
28. Exercise that works the upper body: TRICEP DIP.
34. Noise before a break-in: AHEM.
37. Tags someone on Twitter, e.g.: ATS - Here ya go
40. "Groundhog Day" director: RAMIS - During the making of Ground Hog Day with his friend Bill Murray the two had such terrible disagreements they did not speak for 21 years.
41. Shabby: DINGY.
43. Balloon: SWELL - After years of coaching, I can say this describes what happens to a sprained ankle
44. Go down: DROP.
46. Pasta __ Norma: ALLA - The name Pasta alla Norma is said to have originated from the cry of joy and approval that people cannot repress after they eat this Sicilian specialty: “This pasta is a NORMA!” meaning "a masterpiece" in Italian. Yeah, I knew that! 😏
47. Capital with ferry service to Copenhagen: OSLO.
48. Scottish wedding garb: KILT.
49. Plant, for one: SPY - Eight spys or plants who worked for the Soviet Union during the building of the atom bomb
51. __ Jima: IWO.
From C.C.: Tom is now a newly-minted grandpa. His cute granddaughter Mary was born on Friday May 19th.
 |
28 comments:
Good morning!
Was getting nowhere, so I put is aside for a half-hour. When I returned, things started to fall into place. Yes, d-o tried RISKS. FRAMES because GLASSES was too long. HRS (not EDT HRS) and POET were the final fill. Thanx, Tom (Cute granddaughter, congrats.) and C.C. Enjoyed the expo, Husker. (No, d-o has never been to Paris. At least, not the one in Texas. It's almost 300 miles.)
Good morning. Thank you, Tom and C.C., and thank you, Husker Gary.
Loved it.
The SW area was tough for me. My initial answers of wages for BAITS, ute for REE, and COasTS for COURTS held me at bay for the longest time. Then, it was D'OH!, BARS so BAITS (cute), ATS, TRICEP and then it all came together. COURTS made a lot more sense than COasTS, and then remembered RIRI is Rhiana's nickname. COARSE and SCRATCH then fell, and gave me TEETH for nail biters. That second E in TEETH gave me the unknown REE. Whew !
Also along the way, I also changed GLad to GLEE, Bore to BRED, scoT to POET, LedA to LUNA, inre to AS TO, ruby to OPAL and Snag to SPOT.
Tough solve. Challenging and fun clues. I loved it!
Husker, AS TO RUSTY and golf, that's definitely been me for the last 4 weeks after three plus years on the bench. Far from SCRATCH.
Thanks for expanding on REE. New to me.
I've been to Paris, France, but never to Paris, Texas. My mother and sister are native TEXANs, along with many many others, but my father and the rest of my siblings are native OHIOans. TMI? No? Then read on.
In re: Your EASY FIXES image. My shoulder pain is due to cervical disc degeneration issues, stenosis, arthritis and osteophytes. Amazing what the radiologist saw from four views. Oh, and a carotid artery issue that my GP wants to talk to me about. Doing physical therapy every day at home for the prior, and it has helped tremendously. See the doc next week about the latter.
Congratulations, Grandpa Tom!
Time to brew some coffee.
FLN: CED, the tada screen for me always comes with the close X just above the top of the screen. Just scroll up a couple lines, and there it is. Some poor design for the website's GUI, but no solution for the player simpler than scrolling.
OTOH, I've had other problems. Videos in the blog post are often wrong. One vid will repeat for the following vid, and then everything after that will be shifted to the next vid.
Also, at the LAT site, the bottom two lines of the screen will be covered by a link to a dogfood ad site. So i have to scroll up to not be able to see the top two rows of the puzzle, or not enter the letters zxcvbnm. My phone is sometimes reluctant to scroll, so it's a hassle.
I tried switching to the WaPo site, but it insists on keeping extra toolbars at the top and bottom of the screen, so either the top row of squares or bottom row of letters are covered.
I quite enjoyed this puzzle even though I hit a brick wall about two-thirds of the way in. I thought the clues overall were clever and fair. Alas, I had too many wrong answers, like “green salad” and “Mayor” for Cory Booker that I stubbornly refused to walk away from even when it was fairly obvious that they were wrong. All in all a good start to the long weekend.
FIR! Jinx! Saturday! And we're not even gonna get a blue moon this month!
Erased bore for BRED, basket for ASSIST, (hand up for) risks for BAITS, shee for GHEE, leah for LEXI, dst for EDT, and dna for RNA.
Some Irish weddings employ KILTs as well. Commando, usually.
Thanks to Tom and CC for the fun challenge that even my dumb mass could solve. And thanks to Gary for the fun review. Interesting article about the atomic spies.
FIR, but what a struggle. Clever clues and lots of unknowns for me. Nasty cross of Riri and Ramis, two proper names. Good guessing made it happen.
TTP captured my thought process almost to a “T” so I’ll just say ditto to that and FIR, so I’m happy.
Quite a jump from yesterday's friendly Friday puzzle..My usual Saturday disaster. CC I bit the dust. Your colleague is holding quite a cute little Pepper.
Sitting on the deck at camp I give up early. Going to one of our two annual lake association meetings soon. Our two lakes are small and quiet, no power boats or motors. A fellow just recently moved in who is trying to get a zone variance to put in a firewood sawing business and an auto repair shop. He said the noise will be no louder than a kitchen blender 🙄.... He's lawyered up and we're afraid the town zoning board will cave.
Here's a picture from the deck I just took as I went down in Crossword de feet
Anyway got about a third of the way thru then I caved. Lol
Pasta ALLA nonna (the way granny makes it) but who's Norma? From the opera? The fluid Druid? She made pasta?
Inkovers: dowd/DINGY, soy/SPY (Hey, it's a plant), baa/ARF
Our group reps went to the zoning board meeting last night will find out soon some news.
Have a great Holiday weekend 🇺🇸
Took 12:44 today to finish this great themeless puzzle.
I didn't know the actress/actor or their shows, "shoegaze band," "Ree," or the Bangkok mall.
My last fill was Ats crossing Baits. Not how I'd associate the use of "bait", and seeing as I don't use Twitter, I didn't know ats.
Congratulations C.C. and Tom on your 'win' over me today. I was stumped after filling BTEA for 5D, and PERM wouldn't make it because I'd never heard of Yo La TENGO. I had three blank spaces. In my thinking an alphabet run doesn't count if you don't know it. DNF.
The puzzle was tough to get started and WAGs of ESPRESSO BARS and HOUSE SALAD opened it up.
RIRI, POET, REE, DRE, RiboNucleicAcid, ALLA- filled by perps
TEXAN- not a problem for me; my aunt was from Paris, TX. It's not far from Detroit, Boston, Pittsburg, and Mt. Vernon. All are in NE Texas. And for Gary there is also a town named OMAHA. All my relatives lived in or around those towns.
TRICEP DIP- I do them at the gym on the gravitron equipment. I want to be able to push myself up to be able to get out of the bath tub.
We duffers would rarely play with a SCRATCH golfer, because they don't won't to play with us and I don't blame them. They are the cream of the crop, being less than 1% of golfers. I gave my PING irons to my grandson.
This was a fun puzzle with a trip around the world amidst the answers
I didn't get tripped up by the Paris, TEXANS answer - we also have a Paris, Missouri but I knew that wouldn't be in the puzzle
I'm in KC visiting my mom but a cousin from Arizona is coming in that I haven't seen for over 10 years so that will be fun. Part of the Memorial Day weekend routine is going to the cemetery to change the artificial flower arrangements that get changed once a year by our family. I don't know where the graves are exactly are - so don't know what we'll do when my mom is gone - I think my sis has a better handle on it
How many of you have that yearly trek - probably many are far from their roots?
Thanks HG and Tom & CC for a fun morning!
Fun puzzle! Great pic of the newborn <3 Helped get me out of my doldrums, so annoyed that I have to move water sprinklers 4 times a day after the huge reseeding job.
I got everything right except the NE corner where I lost patience finally. So, DNF this fine Saturday challenge from C.C. and Tom, the new grandfather. Thanks for the brain exercise!
Thanks, Husker Gary, for expanding on the fill and explaining in your review. I felt good about the sections I did get, moving WILLYNILLY around the puzzle.
Have a memorable weekend!
I was happy to CC as constructor ("I can do this!") and in fact FIR. Not easy, at least for me(I thought yesterday was hard)
I hope everyone loved the baseball*:CC could have clued RUSTY as LA Grande Orange(Staub who played for 3 expansion teams in NL)
V8 as Gary explains "waiter" after waiting for that SALAD
The key to SCRATCH Golf is long and straight, iron control, pitching and putting. Breaking 40 for 9 was my goal, rarely attained because of my slice
* And WNBA (Sue Bird)
DNF. Done in at the NE Corner, but I really liked this puzzle. Saturday of old tough, but with some great cluing. The "aha" and "d'oh!" V-8 can moments dropping left and right. This is why I do x-words! Thanks, Tom & CC. SPAN: Tried walking over the Royal Gorge Bridge once. Got about 50 feet out, a car went by, the thing started swaying and I chickened out and went back. Not afraid of heights, but EDGES scare me spitless!
Thank you Tom and C.C. for a challenging puzzle, which until the last fill or so I thought I was going to SCRATCH. Nevertheless, after much wailing and gnashing of TEETH I managed a rare Saturday FIR. I'll limit my comments [yeah sure!], as we're headed out the door for one of my grandsons' HS graduation (MAGNA CUM LAUDE!) party. He is the child my son and I brought back from China 15 years ago and now he's all grown up. He will be entering the seminary in the Fall.
But I do have one fav:
46D ALLA. I think Pasta Alla Norma might be a reference to the great Vincenze Bellini opera NORMA, a signature role for Maria Callas. Here she is with the ARIA Casta Diva ("Chaste Goddess").
FLN
To any late commenters who may have missed this last night - this was a comment I made to Husker about yesterday's constructor Andrew Anker ...
Husker @11:45 AM Thank you SO MUCH for that great write up on Andrew. A fascinating and entrepreneurial guy with his hands in a lot of pies, the creation of Wired Magazine to name just one. I've read the mag for years and it has published in depth articles on many tech subjects. The one that moved me most was the years long investigation by the FBI and others leading to the take-down of a group of child pornographers, who thought they could use block-chain technology to hide their tracks (long but definitely worth the time). One of the most difficult things for the investigators was their inability to UNSEE the many photographs that they had to collect and review in order to gain convictions. Incredible article. It was definitely worth a Pulitzer Prize, which I doubt that it received. I look forward to many more puzzles by Andrew.
Oh and congrats on the new granddaughter Tom!
Cheers,
Bill
Nope. Eventually completed the CW fill by doing it on the computer, turning on red-letter help, and doing multiple alphabet runs. When I do that I can’t say FIR because of the massive cheating with alphabet runs. Saturdays are just too much for this old man. Looking forward to Monday. Even then, every CW teaches me something, and doing them improves my mental flexibility, so I try. Anyway, good CW, TP and CC, thanx. Sometimes I over-think the clues: NAIL BITERS, being a good example. PLACES TO FIND TEMPLES AND BRIDGES is another. Good clue! Great write-up, HuGa, thanx for all the time and effort you put into it for our entertainment.
Maria Callas was a frequent visitor to Aristotle Onassis's yacht along with Winston Churchill. The two shared a hatred for the Kennedys. One had the money the other the connections…
Re. Xword… For virtually every Saturday xword I have a sea of white that looks unfillable. My only 'cheat' is inviting Phillip's comments. Especially anything Japanese or gaming related. My point is "Never give up"
WC
For a Saturday this one came to me fairly easily. 24 mins, 34 secs. I always use my laptop on Sats so I can check as I go, but didn’t have many errors on this one.
Husker G guides us through a Pepper/Burnikel PZL.
Sorry to report I have less and less patience with end-of-week challenges. I know that this is a main point, to test not just our capacity to connect clues with fills, but to see whether, as we age, we still have the endurance to see it through.
Well, no, I don't always find enough reward to keep me in the game.
Some of today's clues are witty, worthy of C.C. (10D & 21A), but others are pedestrian (26A, 23A, 51A, etc etc).
This takes nothing from those who completed it. I sincerely applaud colleagues who have the stamina to finish.
~ OMK
_____________
DR: Three on the far side.
The anagram (12 of 15) of the center diag refers to the best of the best when it comes to compiling one's favorite pieces.
This is a ...
"SUPER MIXTAPE"!
The California Coast did me in, somewhere between Eureka and Crescent City. "Shoegaze band Yo La ___" ??? ¡Ay caramba!
Puzzling thoughts:
FWC (finished with cheats) - as with others, the clueing made this one more difficult; as well, certain words/phrases such as SAND COURTS / RENT STRIKE / DRE (as clued) / SPEC SCRIPT made this even harder
Thanks, Tom and C.C. for the joint effort, and to HG for 'splaining everything
Re SCRATCH golfers ... it is much easier for a 20 handicap golfer to become a 10 handicap than it is for a 5 handicap golfer to become SCRATCH. Fortunately, I've had a handful of rounds that were at par or better over my 60-year golfing "career". Those rounds made me feel like a SCRATCH golfer ... for a moment, at least
I loved this puzzle and struggled mightily to figure it all out. Excellent cluing! I did have to look up Yo La, Rotimi, and Golfer Thompson, but everything else I was able to noodle out. Cory Booker as a MAYOR had to be changed to YALIE, DST to EDT, RISKS to BAITS, MEETS to SPANS, and DUBBED to DEEDED. Thanks for a really fun and well-constructed puzzle, Tom Pepper and C.C.
Excellent write-up, Gary.
Good wishes to you all.
Arggg!!! I got so far on this grid and then shot myself in both feet and couldn't move on. NW is still snowy with spots of (correct) ink at SNL and LEI.
Hi All!
Thank you Tom (aww - what a cutie you have) & C.C.. I had fun putting letters in boxes until I didn't ;-) Great themeless.
Thanks HG for showing me the errors of my ways -- I went so wrong there was no recovering...
3d ≠ DST (EDT? That's specific), 7d ≠ ALKALINES, 36a ≠ DRIES (with RT (Re-Tweet xing, why not?)). Such good answers, they had to be right, no?
WO: bugGY -> DINGY
ESP: RIRI
Fav: WILLY NILLY is so much fun.
That's not to say there wasn't tons of sparkle, especially in the NE & SW down stacks.
Fun DR, OMK. How many Mix(ed) Tapes have you made for a crush? I'll start: 4.
Paris, TX is 4.5hrs north of me. Never been.
Ray-O: Serine pic. I hope for you the board keeps it that way.
Inanehiker - Pop does that for Gramps' grave every year. And then dons his USAF dress and marches with the Italian American Vets carrying the Flag.
Eldest is lay'd over in NOLA and departs for DCA in about 15 min, Youngest is home from Ireland & in her bed having not yet reset to CDT, and I just talked to DW in Barcelona so...
Nap time!
Cheers, -T
I cry, "Uncle!"
Thanks to Tom P. and C.C. for a Saturday workout! I had a 2-square FIW with BrITS/rTS (Didn't we have something with Twitter and RTS recently?) and RIRa?RAMaS.
FAV: Noise before a break-in
Yes, hand up for trying to make "risks" work. I also dried "dries". I had "sports arenas" for 4D for a very long time.
Thank you for your report, H-Gary! Well done, as usual! Oh, that kind of waiter! Now I see why that worked.
One of DH's students is trying to find homes for kittens that look similar to the ones in your pic. Could this be a sign???
Waseeley - Thanks for reposting Andrew's info. I meant to look into it last night but #stuff.
//I've been a Wired subscriber since the '90's - I still have the "I want my .mp3" issue. It's gotten thin on content but then so has Handyman magazine :-(
Sumdaze - looks like you're getting a cat ;-)
So... Just me who made Mixed Tapes for a crush?
//For the record (#pun), DW hated the tape I gave her. Too much RUSH & The Who, I think :-)
Cheers, -T
Yo La Tengo isn’t shoegaze, though—they’re lo-fi. Similar but not the same.
Post a Comment