This is my first time blogging a Sunday, and thank you to C.C. for the opportunity. A clever puzzle idea, not that we haven't seen this "bending" part of the answer before, though I don't recall circles. Circles on a Sunday, no less. I got the theme quick because I do the DOWN fill first, and noticed TONS (97D.) of MIC fill. The MIC part "drops" down from the Across fill. I like the fact that the theme answers spread the M, I, and C in various ways. The only one I see missing is "M [space] IC". Overall I enjoyed the challenge, but there were just too many names ( I stopped counting at 20 ), and some clue/answers that I *questioned*....
22. *Wide-angle lens output: PANORAM - - VIEW - panoraMIC view
24. *Deep-fried burrito: CHIM - - HANGA - chiMIChanga
46. *Woman who was the first Black model to appear on the cover of Time: NAOM - - AMPBELL - naoMI Campbell
59. *"Why won't anyone notice me!?": "WHAT AM - - HOPPED LIVER~?" what aM I Choppped liver
79. *Paper birds in the Japanese tradition of senbazuru: ORIGAM - - RANES - origaMI Cranes
102. *Pedicure tool: PUM - - ESTONE - puMICe stone ( I used pumice to clean the soot off my fireplace stone - worked like magic )
104. Dramatically ends a performance, and what the answer to each starred clue does?: DROPS THE MIC
Physics is fun~!
And DOWN We Go~!
ACROSS:
1. 2026 Winter Olympics range: ALPS - The next Olympics is in Milano-Cortina of Italy
5. "Love your work!": I'M A FAN
11. Currency featuring activist Viola Desmond on one of its notes: Abbr.: CAD - CAnadian Dollar. The puzzle doesn't really have any "weak" fill, but it felt like too many clues-to-answers were a bit much of a stretch, like this one - I will refer to them as *cringe*
14. Peddle: SELL - One CAD = .74 US$
18. Average: MEAN
19. Widen, as a pupil: DILATE
20. "Total lies!": "SO NOT TRUE~!"
25. Tower topper: SPIRE
26. Prudent ending?: IAL - PrudentIAL
27. With 81-Across, fruity liqueur: SLOE - and; 81. See 27-Across: GIN
29. Van Gogh vaseful: IRISES
30. Comedian Wyatt: CENAC - name. Never heard of him - more here
32. Snuggle, in a way: SPOON
33. Onetime Altoids rival: CERTS - with retsyn~!
34. Javier of "The Little Mermaid": BARDEM - name. also the "bad guy" in "Skyfall", which I believe may be the best Bond film; tied with "88 Across" Royale
36. Kelly Ripa, e.g.: TV HOST
38. Partisanship: BIAS
39. Fuel efficiency mode: ECO - My Prius C has three modes; normal, ECO, and "EV" - which shuts down at 25MPH
40. Treatment that may include a mask: FACIAL
42. Embrace: HOLD
43. Fuel efficiency stat: MPG - and even when I drive like a pig, I still get 40+ MPG in my Prius
49. Double Dutch implement: ROPE - Shouldn't it be ropeS~?
51. Hesitant: TIMID
52. Big Board initials: NYSE - New York Stock Exchange
53. Soup aisle stacks: CANS
54. Adorable one: CUTIE
55. Saskatchewan people: CREE
57. "For all I __ ... ": CARE
58. Nowadays: LATELY - now this one is the opposite of *cringe*
64. Doesn't sink: FLOATS
66. Smidgen: IOTA
67. Villainous: EVIL
68. New Orleans structure: LEVEE - A musical interlude
Led Zeppelin - When The Levee Breaks
69. Pre-TiVo devices: VCRs - I still have one, and it still works
70. Actor Kinnear: GREG - name.
73. Classic skirt silhouette: A-LINE
77. Figure skating feat: AXEL
78. Actress Sorvino: MIRA - name.
82. Paul of "The Fabelmans": DANO - Ugh. name. Crossing a 'foreign' word, too
83. Coastal city in Italia: NAPOLI - the opposite of the ALPS
84. Message in a bottle, maybe: S.O.S.
85. Scary St. Bernard of fiction: CUJO - Read the book, did not see the movie; see below
86. Sound effects: NOISES - *cringe*
88. Monaco attraction: CASINO - Gratuitous Daniel Craig for C.C.
91. Give a fright: SCARE
93. Golf shirts: POLOS
94. Like an angry dog's teeth: BARED
Might be a little too gratuitous for a St. Bernard
95. Common allergens: SPORES
96. Genesis locale: EDEN
97. Air marshal's org.: TSA
99. "Barbie" director Gerwig: GRETA - name.
107. Gaps: OMISSIONS - Saturday clue/answer
108. Inherent: INNATE - *cringe* - I don't like to see an IN- clue for an IN- answer
109. Kid-lit boy detective __ the Great: NATE - name. The Wiki
110. Noir sleuths: TECS - I am just plowing my way through Rex Stout's "Nero Wolfe" detective books, they're so good - I love the Archie character
111. "Evita" narrator: CHE - narrator~? *cringe* and name.
112. Preserved in a scrapbook, say: PASTED
113. Mireille of "Hanna": ENOS - name.
DOWN:
1. Cranks (up): AMPS - "These go to eleven."
2. Big jump: LEAP
3. 2002 Jodie Foster film about a robbery: PANIC ROOM - Good movie - saw it when it came out
4. Suffered from 41-Down, perhaps: SNORED - 41. Sleep disorder: APNEA
5. Snake River Canyon st.: IDA - meh. Don't like three-letter state abbrs
6. Copy: MIMIC - the MIC part of 22A
7. Thomas __ Edison: ALVA - name. Have not seen this fill in a while; if a Tesla is "stolen", is it then called an "Edison"~?
8. Be unsuccessful: FAIL
9. Snacked: ATE
10. Survey by a media outlet, e.g.: NEWS POLL
11. "Hallelujah" songwriter Leonard: COHEN - name.
12. Young Skywalker's nickname: ANI - Short for Anakin, pre-Darth Vader. and name.
13. Home: DOMICILE - the MIC part of 24A
14. Flight segments: STAIRS
15. Dadaist Max: ERNST - name. if the clue were Blofeld, we'd be at James Bond again.
16. Olympic sleds: LUGES - see you in Italy
17. Grassy meadows: LEAS
20. "Move over!": "SCOOT~!"
21. Series of related emails: THREAD - *cringe* - a series of texts, maybe
23. Actress Russo: RENE - name.
28. The "L" of UCLA: LOS - University (of) California - - - Angeles
31. Radio letters: AM/FM
32. Layered rock: SHALE
34. Warped: BENT - like my mind
35. Berry from the Amazon: ACAI
36. Froyo franchise: TCBY - The Country's Best Yogurt; uh, well, the closest one to me is in Yonkers, in a different state - I guess you have to travel the country....
37. Competes (for): VIES
38. Great songs, slangily: BOPS - *cringe*
42. Fine-tuned: HONED - like my blogging skills....mic drop
43. Water usage measurer: METER
44. Sand bucket: PAIL
45. __ Goose vodka: GREY
47. NBA great Jordan: MICHAEL - the MIC part of 46A. and name.
48. Commercial figure?: AD RATE
49. Chophouse specification: RARE
50. Chocolate-hazelnut spread: NUTELLA - oh so good
53. Spending limit: CAP - a perpetual problem for the NY Rangers
54. Cowboy __: bean salad: CAVIAR - never heard this
56. Non-earthlings, for short: ETs
57. Licensed tax pro: CPA
58. "The Leftovers" actress Tyler: LIV - name.
59. Like fruit of the loom?: WOVEN
60. Prefix with climate or greens: MICRO - the MIC part of 59A
61. Dance set to klezmer music: HORA - Ah, Hebrew; looked German to me
62. Extra NHL periods: OTs - oh, we are so close to the start of the hockey season
63. Paper size: LEGAL
64. Mark for attention: FLAG
65. LPGA golfer Thompson: LEXI - name.
69. Trattoria menu heading: VINO - The "N" was my last fill, a Natick crossing; BTW, I now live closer to the place we get the term from....
70. Sod: GRASS - Meh. almost *cringe*
71. Like yellow bananas: RIPE
72. Targets of some trash talk: EGOS
74. 2006 Jodie Foster film about a robbery: INSIDE MAN - now this movie, I did not see
75. Sign gas: NEON
76. "Put a tiger in your tank" brand: ESSO - gas sign
78. Regal: MAJESTIC
79. Party bowlful: ONION DIP
80. Layered rock: MICA - the MIC part of 79A
82. Undue pressure: DURESS - Bzzzt; I had STRESS
85. Tender touch: CARESS
86. Points of connection: NODES
87. Flamenco shout: OLE
89. "So frustrating!": "ARGH~!"
90. At peace: SERENE - I like the Serenity Prayer
91. Ocean foam: SPUME - I had SPRAY
92. "Nancy" or "Cathy": COMIC - Strip, actually - and the MIC part of 102A
93. Pasta choice: PENNE
94. Butter up, in a way: BASTE - now this is clever clue misdirection
95. Leopard's mark: SPOT
97. Loads (of): TONS - I can never tell if it's going to be TONS or ALOT
98. Minor dispute: SPAT
100. Mambo legend Puente: TITO - name.
101. Solitaire foundation cards: ACES
103. "How lovely!": "OOH~!"
105. Genetic messenger: RNA
106. Keanu title role: TED - Dah~! I had NEO - but once I read the clue, I see it says "title".
and name.
Splynter
37 comments:
NAOMI was a woman from NAPOLI
Who was round and rolly-polly
"I cannot slim down,
All my lovers would frown.
My stature is what keeps them all jolly!"
A NEW ORLEANS STRUCTURE is obviously a FLOAT.
At Mardi Gras down the street like a boat!
But wait, that can't be!
Instead, it's a LEVEE,
And on it a different float floats!
{A, B+.}
I will have to concur with the usual assessments of IM and SS (my two best friends on this site, by the way) that circles sometimes distract from the solve. They definitely do in this case, IMHO. They lessened the challenge factor considerably (IM) besides being annoying (SS). Other than that, and a few obscure names, I don’t have too many complaints about this puzzle. FIR, so I’m happy.
Good morning!
"I'm Out" is a terrible title. If you're looking at the themer's, it's IC that's missing (but found in the down answer). Got the theme, but never figured out the title. Hand up for Spray/SPUME. Didn't know what "Double Dutch" was, so d-o wound up with ROsE where ROPE needed to go -- figured those great songs were "BoSs." Bzzzzzt. DNF. That's the reward for thinking. Thanx for the challenge, Annie. Welcome back, Splynter.
BARED: Pedalled my bike through our horse farms neighborhood, and a pit bull came racing out to the road. He chased me for a half-mile, barking all the way. Never bit me, though.
ORIGAMI CRANES: I joke that my dyslexic wife calls me "Origami" -- she thinks I'm a fold art.
Just awful all the way around the circles were a distraction. And there were way way too many proper names.
I counted at least 17 proper names.
M ade it to the finish today in 12:14.
I 'm honored by SubG. Thank you. It's mutual.
C ircles, oh joy!
I thought very clever where I grew up it was Enco not Esso Esso is still a brand in Canada
Good Morning:
As I’ve mentioned often, I’m not a fan of Sunday puzzles because, too often, they have a lame or trite theme and little to no solving satisfaction, not to mention the lengthy completion time required. That said, I thought today’s theme was well-executed and I’ll defend the circles on the basis of being necessary for the visual effect of a mic drop, although I agree with DO on the weak title). I’ll also offer props for the very low (22) three letter word count in a Sunday grid. On the negative side, I didn’t count them, but the plethora of proper names/nouns was noticeably annoying and detracting. Only two were unknown to me, Cenac and Lexi, but that doesn’t lessen my displeasure. Compounding this overload is my other pet peeve of the gratuitous use of proper name in the clues for common, ordinary words, to wit, Cad, Grey, Irises, Rope, and Levee. The clue for Cad was over the top, IMO.
Thanks, Amie, and thanks, Splynter, for a fair and honest critique, and congrats on a successful Sunday debut!
SubG @ 4:58 ~ Thank you, as always, for your very kind words. 😉
SS @ 7:51 ~ I really enjoy your clever theme tie-ins each day. I just wish you’d give yourself a worthier handle than Anonymous, or my lame SS. 🤗
FLN
Parsan, congrats on turning “Blue”. Enjoyed reading your Profile information.
Have a great day.
Have a great day.
Sorry for the dupe, I was wool gathering, I guess. 😳
FIR. Once again circles which in my opinion do not belong in crossword puzzles. And enough proper names to thoroughly cloud the solve. And the title? How is that I'm out?
I look forward to Sunday CW's as a pleasant experience of the week. But today's endeavor is wrong on so many levels. Just who is doing the editing at LA Times these days anyway?
FIR, but erased liles for IRISES, oven for ROPE, know for CARE, slate for SHALE, ore for IDA, spree for SPUME, a ton for TONS, and ennate for INNATE (bad spelars of the world, UNTIE!)
I agree with DO - the theme would be better as "Broken Devices," because they don't work with their ICs removed. Then the lame MIC drop wouldn't have been needed. WAAAY to many obscure (to me) proper names for my liking. (I also like FOLD ART.)
Today is:
National Radio Day (FM, no static at all)
National Accessible Air Travel Day (and it's associate)
International Day Of Medical Transporters
World Mosquito Day (Sorry, I'm anti-mosquito)
National Chocolate Pecan Pie Day (saved the best for last)
Averages: MEAN, median and mode
Like OKL, I thought of FLOAT for NOLA's structure.
Obligatory Police link to Message in a Bottle.
If you get the berry from the Amazon, it is best if you have the Prime.
OT in the NHL - Loves me some 3-on-3 action!
Thanks to Splynter for the fine Sunday review.
Musings
-A very fast Sunday with a fun theme, but CAD and BOPS?
-Did anyone else ever get told to “Go PEDDLE your papers!”?
-He hates these CANS!! (:35)
-Steve McGarrett to Danny Williams – “Book ‘em DANO!” Cue TV’s best theme song.
-A network can show its BIAS when it edits GAPS into an interview
-ENOS Slaughter seems to be riding the crossword bench these days
-After decades of dominating college football, the Huskers have hired LOTS of FAILED coaches
- Who starred in the 1932 film The Music Box using these STAIRS?
-An email THREAD is very useful in planning a gathering with our daughters.
Addendum
-The Title, I’m Out, is a truncated way of saying “I’m out of here!” which can be punctuated by dropping a microphone after a particularly pithy remark and leaving the stage, dais or other venue.
Desper-otto, mic drop is a way of saying, "I'm out".
I've got to say that having the circles helped speed the solving of today presentation. The puzzle title is still a mystery to me, notwithstanding HG's specious explanation.
Theme answers were very clever and consistent. Needed lots of perps so my solving was a shotgun approach. That a.lowed visualizing the theme answers more easily.
Amie and Splynter wrapped up this offering quite well.
Tomorrow is a new week for further adventures. Mush on!!
Husker and Tony Express, thanx for the enlightenment. I can see it now, but it's still too recondite for my taste. I see that I'm not alone in that department.
Pretty much what WEES. The DROPPED MIC in the theme answers speeded up the solving. A lot of names I didn’t know but perps helped. I DNF however, again one letter missing, the P of RO-E.
I think I remember Paul DANO from some other show but can’t remember which.
I have an ORIGAMI CRANE hanging from an indoor wind chime.
Jinx @9:06. I think you are making up some of those NATIONAL days. WORLD MOSQUITO day, really? Although I guess it might be to bring awareness to these pesky creatures whose rare species can be deadly. After all they used to be the cause of malaria.
Looked pretty bad after the initial across run, but the downs started filling things in. P&P, WAGs, and Witeout brought in the FIR. My take on this one pretty much Echos what IM and others had to say today. I agree with Splynter on the "iffy" clues.
Hola!
Speedy Sunday! I finished this in record time with some to spare for a Sunday! Often I don't finish before going to church.
I usually ignore the circles until it's over then I scan them. Okay. But they did not help the solve.
GREG Kennear was so good in "As Good As it Gets"
We have a new clue for GRETA. Garbo is history apparently.
I really dislike those omitted letters!
CARESS soap is one of my favorites along with dove.
My A-LINE dress is now more of an O-LINE.
I hope you enjoy your Sunday, everyone! Thank you, Splynter! It's so good to see you at the helm.
Hey Gary, didjya notice that the high-test gas was $1 a gallon?
Tante Nique - I promise I don't make them up. On the other hand I single-source them, so they don't have the reliability they should have if the days were more than a whimsy. Here's a piece from the famous American Mosquito Control Association.
Lucina, "My A-LINE dress is now more of an O-LINE." What a great line!
Another 1-box FIW day. BOPS???
FAV themers were CHOPPED LIVER and ORIGAMI. I agree with Splynter about the M-I-C separated in various ways was well done.
Other FAVs: Flight segments and GREG Kinnear (I'll watch any movie with him in it.)
I wait for brown SPOTs on my bananas before I think they are RIPE.
OwenKL. Poem #2 was today's "A".
I enjoyed your write-up Splynter! Thanks for sharing your thoughts on the clues & construction.
Thank you Amy. Loved the theme. Soon as I saw it, I (literally!) PERPED all the MIC DROPS.
Thank you Splynter for taking a load off C.C. and for giving her a gratuity. Oh, and DOUBLE DUTCH thanks for the Zeppelin.
Some favs:
All the names I knew (BARDEM, Kelly, NAOMI, MIRA, bizillionairess GRETA)and the rest I perped.
54A CUTIE. These guys are adorable (lyrics)
66A IOTA. I confess I haven't seen a smidgen of Barbenheimer.
95A SPORES. Sniff. I think my office needs dusting.
109A NATE & 110A TECS. Teri and I love mysteries. It's good to see that somebody's keeping the pipeline full.
3D PANIC ROOM & 74D INSIDE MAN. Jodie's getting a lot of fill these days. Didn't we just see her in CONTACT?
7D ALVA. Edison and Tesla were rivals. The latter invented AC current, without which we wouldn't be able live so far apart.
11D COHEN. I adore his songs, especially Suzanne. I'd play his version, but he couldn't sing.
32D SHALE & 80D MICA. SHALE is clay past it's sell date that has hardened into a ROCK. When it reaches RIPE old age it will harden into SLATE. MICA is not really a ROCK, but it is transparently one of the most beautiful MINERALS on Earth.
97D TONS. ALOT? Splynter, you better hope that Melissa is not reading this review.
Cheers,
Bill
Some say that the set of STAIRS in the Loretto Chapel in Santa Fe, NM were miraculously built. Make sure to click "Our Story" on the home page to find out why.
This was such a fun theme - the solve was faster than usual once I realized all the circles were MIC DROPs Sad to see some of the personal attacks on HG or the editor because the poster isn't familiar with a common cultural term.
He certainly didn't invent it (that was somewhere back in the '80s), but one of the most famous MIC DROPs was President Obama at his last White House correspondents dinner where the sitting president gets roasted and then the President gets to send some roasts right back.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEp9OUXix-w
Thanks for subbing Splynter and Amie for the puzzle
Congrats to Spain for winning their first Women's World Cup- I didn't get up at 5 am to watch it in Australia - but did catch the last several minutes!
Bill: IIRC, Tesla worked for Edison, and the two had a falling out over power distribution. DC is slightly less "lossy" than AC, but it doesn't work with transformers. (There is a 500,000 volt DC transmission line between Oregon and California that ends a few miles from my old GTE office. There the DC is converted to AC, stepped down, and then distributed across Southern California.)
Musings 2
-I was specious? Merriam-Webster: synonyms: misleading, deceptive, false, fallacious, incorrect, delusive, ambiguous, deceitful. Huh? :-)
Challenging, but delightful Sunday puzzle, many thanks, Amie. And your commentary was neat and helpful, thanks for that too, Splynter.
Well, as soon as I saw ALPS, I wanted to say I'M A FAN! What could be more fun than a PANORAMA VIEW, with a village not far away with a church SPIRE, and gardens covered with IRISES.
Later in the day yesterday, we took time to go to a CASINO, where we heard lots of NOISES because the TV HOST dropped the MIC. That scared everybody, but only for a minute, and after we got some CAVIAR and cookies covered with NUTELLA, and a PAIL of VINO to share, we were all totally SERENE.
Have a great Sunday, everybody.
Hmm,
Another puzzle,
Who is subgeniuses SS?
I thought I had it when IM pointed out SS @ 7:51, but the trail went anonymous...
Hah! I knew it was Splynter even before the legs at A Line dress...
Mic Drop?
do you know how expensive good microphones are?
Oh, this is a sound techs nightmare...
I had many of the same reactions to this puzzle that Splynter did.
GRASS is not sod.
I had to change KNOW to CARE. I confess I have never heard of MICRO greens.
SPUME is excellent fill.
Good wishes to you all.
Jinx, that high-voltage transmission line between Oregon and California makes so much noise that it swamped all our magnetometers on the eastern side of the Sierra Nevadas, necessitating we remove all our systems there.
Unfortunately, BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) also makes so much electromagnetic noise that we had to remove our systems from the East Bay also.
Manmade noise (here's looking at you, U.S. Navy) is also killing whales and dolphins.
CED @4:12 PM SS ("Speedy Solver") is a man of mystery, but FAST! And he's never admitted to an FIW that I can recall.
Parsan has gone blue? Where? When?
It was nice to see Leonard Cohen cross with Cad … such a talented songwriter and singer. An enjoyable Sunday solve even if there was a plethora of proper names. Thanks Amie and Splynter…..kkFlorida
Jayce, I'm surprised that the Intertie generated any noise, being DC. I would expect huge amounts of magnetic flux that would vary by the current being carried. Did you guys consider that noise? I always think of 60 Hz radiation when I think of commercial power noise.
Also, I think that there is some connection between our new wind farms and the huge increase in the number of dead whales washing up in our area. There is certainly correlation.
Jinx, when we installed our systems along the east side of the mountains we didn’t expect noise because the intertie carries DC, but our systems are tuned to frequencies lower than 1 Hz and we learned the current flowing through the line varies at those low frequencies, presumably due to varying load. Similar to BART, which is also a DC system with strongly varying current flows as the trains start and stop.
I agree with you that there is a correlation between the wind farms and beaching whales.
It took three "spurts" of solving energy today to finally finish this entry. Again, though solving wasn't a "slog" I dislike puzzle constructors who have two or three mixed themes as this one has. I think that constructors spend too much time making their fills "fit" their themes.
A fairly smooth cruise through this one, almost too easy on the clueing in a lot of cases — but once I grokked the theme (NO help whatsoever from the odd title, altho thanks to Husker Gary for ‘splainin’ it). “Flight segments”was the best one of the bunch in my book, too. FIR, so I guess I shouldn’t gripe too much.
First of all, thanks to Splynter for the killer review and that classic De Grassi gravity demo 😎👍🏽!
I’m with you as a names-hater, but have to admit these were not as obscure as usual, and weren’t a giant PITA compared to other cw’s of recent days. (BTW, if the clue was “ImplementS”, then yeah, it woulda been “ROPES”, hmm?). But your winner has got to be the stolen Tesla gag — A+ for that inside joke!
And to be truthful…I don’t really mind the circles, but I’m likely also warped and bent 😆
====> Darren / L.A.
Post a Comment