Saturday Themeless by Zhouqin Burnikel
Our gracious blogmistress offers us a challenging and clever puzzle on this last Saturday of 2023. Her long fills in the pinwheel pattern were very helpful but SAPOR and DULE along with some alternate fills were speed bumps for me. However, I persisted and earned a "got 'er done!"
Across:
1. Carne __: ASADA - I was all over Roast Meat even with the Spanish adjectives following the noun.
6. Pull: SWAY - Sometimes you need someone with real pull or SWAY
10. __-relief: BAS - This is one of many on the capitol building in Lincoln, NE
10. __-relief: BAS - This is one of many on the capitol building in Lincoln, NE
13. Short-lived business: POP UP STORE - Hickory Farms has had these for years at Christmas time
15. Minesweeper unit: CELL - Haven't we all played this addictive game?
16. Delicious desserts?: APPLE TARTS.
17. Della Warrior's heritage: OTOE - the first and only woman to date to serve as the chairperson and chief executive officer for the Otoe-Missouria Tribe
18. Romeo or Juliet: ROLE - TEEN and NAME came and went
19. Group originally called the "Jolly Corks": ELKS - Here ya go
20. Magnificent: GRAND.
21. Rugby score: TRY.
22. Orange coat: PEEL 😀
23. One paying a flat rate: RENTER 😀
24. Sings again: REPRISES - 76 Trombones is REPRISED for the big finale in Music Man
26. Fig. affected by traffic: ETA.
27. Word with ring or swing: MOOD.
29. Achievement: FEAT.
30. [I know this is wrong]: SIC - This was a grate [SIC] puzzle by our lovely hostess
31. "I have more to say": DON'T INTERRUPT ME.
35. Short chats?: IMS.
36. 1936 Cooperstown inductee: COBB
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| This ball signed in 1939 by the first 11 members 3 years after the original 6 sold for over $600,000 |
37. Obeyed a court order: ROSE - "All RISE" - Name this movie. (* answer below)
38. Place with soothing music: SPA.
39. Like some potential: UNTAPPED.
42. Magnetism: ALLURE.
44. Rough positions: LIES - Good luck in this rough
45. Punch sound: POW.
48. Witherspoon of "The Morning Show": REESE - An Apple+ series
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| Reese Jennifer Anniston |
49. Dough for pupusas: MASA - A wonderful Guatemalan restaurant makes them here in our town. I told the owner to give me something good and she got me some tasty pupusas!
50. Background for a portrait: BLUR - As seen here in this painting of Mona (Lady) Lisa Gherdinini, the wife of Francesco Del Giocondo.
51. Locks in the zoo?: MANE 😀 - Here's one in Omaha's Henry Doorly Zoo with the tram going overhead.
52. "Never been in that situation myself": CAN'T RELATE.
54. Those, in Toledo: ESOS.
55. Shell stations?: TACO STANDS ¿A quién pertenecen ESOS puestos de tacos? (Who owns those TACO STANDS?)
56. Drops in the morning: DEW 😀
57. Eclipse, in the ancient world: OMEN.
58. Gig for a model: SHOOT.
Down:
1. Split up: APART.
2. Lethargy: SOPOR - I never have seen this word and so I first had SLOTH
3. Put on: APPLY.
4. Hill of "The Wonder Years": DULE - He plays the father in the updated version of the 1988 original.
5. Dr. Zaius, for one: APE - From 1968 movie
6. Not as newsworthy: STALER.
7. Professional challenge?: WORK LIFE BALANCE.
8. Part of STEAM: ARTS.
10. Trials for errors: BETA TESTS - Hopefully all the bugs will appear to be fixed
11. Solo stretch: ALONE TIME.
12. The American Dog Derby, for one: SLED RACE - Started in 1917, it is the oldest dog SLED RACE in the lower 48. It is run in Ashton, ID in the shadow of the Tetons
14. Brew: STEEP - Zhoquin is also a tea connoisseur
15. Ear pieces?: CORN 😀
20. Waves, say: GESTURES.
22. Digital service: PEDICURE 😀
23. Nurture: REAR.
24. Spoil: ROT.
25. Spanish infinitive: SER.
27. "Can I? Can I? Can I? Can I?": MOM PLEASE 😀
28. Spot line: ON SALE NOW.
31. Turned off, in a way: DISARMED 😀
32. Zip: NONE.
33. Hashtag for retro pics: TBT - I could use this retro pic for Throw Back Thursday
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| Jim Linda Gary circa 1956 |
40. Slide whistle part: PISTON.
41. Sliced pieces on top of bibim naengmyeon: PEARS - A Korean PEAR on top.
43. Purposes: USES.
45. Texas home of Frito-Lay: PLANO.
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| 7701 Legacy Dr., PLANO, TX |
46. Better or best: OUTDO - Verbs
47. Seize by force: WREST.
49. Address with an apostrophe: MA'AM.
50. Vanilla: BLAH - Plain label unlike 49. "Eww!": BLEH we had recently
52. Exec concerned with network security: CTO - Chief Technology Officer
53. Nonprofit that administers Praxis assessments: ETS - Educational Testing Service. I had never heard of this test.
*If you can handle the truth, that is a scene from the great movie A Few Good Men
29 comments:
When I saw that C.C. had constructed this puzzle, I thought it might be more doable than other Saturday puzzles, and I was right. Don’t get me wrong; it was still a Saturday toughie. I had a lot of “white space,” at first, particularly in the Northwest corner. Gradually , however, things came together, and I managed to complete the puzzle without having to resort to any red letters. FIR, so I’m happy.
This was very straightforward for a Saturday puzzle, and it would have been a rare FIR for me were it not for the D in one across and four down.
FIR, but erased ship for CELL.
Today is:
BACON DAY (I thought this fell on all days that end in “y”)
FALLING NEEDLES FAMILY FEST DAY (serves as a reminder to clean up and recycle the Christmas tree)
NATIONAL BICARBONATE OF SODA DAY (baking soda is an extraordinary, naturally occurring substance that provides health benefits while cleaning the house)
Must have been a very easy Saturday grid, since this dumb mass was able to solve it.
I can see how CORN pieces are ears, but not how ear pieces are CORN. I guess "niblets" had too many letters. Come to think of it, "niblets" (and grits, for that matter) are CORN. Never mind. Sometimes I amaize myself.
I thought that a slide whistle might be what The Troggs used on Wild Thing. Nope, that was an Ocarina. Turns out that the slide whistle was used in Bob Dylan's 1965 masterpiece Highway 61.
Thanks to CC for letting me play on a frigid Florida day (high expected to be only 62 degrees, with a wind chill temperature of 61.) And thanks to H.Gary for the fun review, and the great picture of you and CC.
FIR. This was quite a workout for me. For a Saturday puzzle it was harder than I expected. At one point there were so many white squares I thought I was going down in flames.
Lots of missteps along the way like having lessor before renter and taco trucks before taco stands. When I finally threw down "don't interrupt me", the battle began to go my way.
Good Morning:
Compared to the last two Saturday offerings, there was no hair-pulling or teeth-gnashing or throwing in the towel today. On the contrary, there was much enjoyment and satisfaction in solving this gem from CC. There was challenge but fairness, no junk, terrific fill, and lots of clever cluing. HG 😀 highlighted several 👍 clues, but a few of my favorites were Orange Coat=Peel, Ear Pieces=Corn, Shell Stations=Tacos, and Delicious Desserts?=Apple Tarts. Whimsical wordplay! Some outstanding fill included Don't Interrupt Me, Mom, Please, On Sale Now, Can't Relate, and the star of the show, Work Life Balance. Otoe, ETS, TBT, and Pears, as clued, needed perps and two corrections were necessary, Tenant/Renter and Ruth/Cobb. The difficulty level may not have been Silkiesque, but the style and execution were, and that is high praise, indeed.
Thanks, CC, for a truly enjoyable solve and for expanding your constructing talents to themeless puzzles and thanks, HG, for your always delightful commentary and gorgeous photos, especially the one of you and CC and the one with you and your siblings. I, for one, have never played Minesweeper. In fact, I never heard of it until I saw it in crossword puzzles! 🤣
FLN
PK, sorry about your mishap but very happy to hear of your long-overdue joyful Christmas with your family.
YR, your traditional birthday celebration sounds wonderful, especially that Vichyssoise! Yum.
Bill, thanks for the CSO. 😉
Anon T, that view from your digs is spectacular. Kudos to DW.
Ray O, Talk about coincidences! I was watching a movie last night that involved a tattoo that led to identifying one of the bad guys, a former Army Medic. It was a depiction of the Rod of Aesculapius, which led to a discussion of its meaning, as well as the Cadeuces.
Have a great day.
I'm sorry somebody fell asleep and their face hit the keyboard while typing clues, one said "bibim naengmyeon" crossing "pupusas." We gotta be international chefs to solve an American crossword now?
This was a creative puzzle of extremes - some sections like NW and SW filled more quickly while the NE and SE sat with quite a bit of white for awhile.
Saturday cluing for me for Dule'Hill as our whole family loved him as Gus in the show "Psych"
but he actually started his career on Broadway at 10 years old as a tap dancer!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jiW38v6IFFE
Loved the layers on the cluing eg an APPLE TART is not only delicious to taste, but could be made with red or yellow delicious apples-though I would usually bake with Granny Smiths or Jonathans
Thanks HG for the fun blog and CC for the puzzle!
And I love pupusas made with MASA- they are the national dish of El Salvador and whenever I go down there for medical mission trips we have them handmade on the last night of clinics to celebrate
Super Saturday. Thanks for the fun, C.C. And HuskerG.
This CW required P&P but I finally finished. But a Google cheat was needed for PLANO to open up that SE corner (and change Oof to POW). But I couldn’t suss the middle letter for that security person, and ended up with P for Privacy, resulting in a Pace STAND (with misspelled Pisten). (I needed to use my Call a Friend to pick AnonT’s brain for PLANO and CTO but he is on holiday LOL)
Too much international food for my brain to handle today.
Great Saturday misdirection with POD, PEEL (I thought of Rind first), YES, PEDICURE, MANE.
I had no idea about ELKS, ETS, SER as clued. I need to learn some more Spanish, but I did wait for perps to decide between ESOS or Esas.
I wanted APPLE Pies or Crisp before TARTS perped. I like Northern Spy apples for baking.
Wishing you all a great day.
Fun puzzle, constructress CC but almost unable to WREST this one from the maw of de FEAT. Everything under ASADA in the NW corner was blank for a bit except “Romeo or Juliet”:ROLE (not teen, lover, Italian, Veronese ☹️).
Wanted torpor after “sloth” didn’t work, too long
Inkovers: goal/FEAT, lessee/RENTER, Ruth/COBB, unearned/UNTAPPED.
“Dough for pupusas” cash for Native American babies? …I’ll have a “bibim naengmyeon” to go but put the “pieces” on the side. (yes it’s definitely Saturday)
Figured “ear pieces” needed a plural till perped, 🌽 clever clue. best in show for “Dog Derby”? Nope! but YES , I liked the “no other way” clue.
Was looking for something like “pep” for “zip” but there was NONE . CFO?, COO? A Chief Technical Officer? Makes sense. We could use more than “We’ll write up a ticket on that” when we phone IT for help.
IM☘️. hmm think I’ll bail on the CT scan tattoo.
Specimen of piscine magnetism…… ALLURE
Afro….OUTDO
Blackhead….SORPOR
Humbug cure: ____ relief….BAS
“During your operation you will not be touched by human hands”
“Oh, it’s a robotic procedure?”
“ No, your surgeon, Dr. Zaius, is a monkey”
Phew! I made it. I didn’t think I would. But it turned out to be a very enjoyable puzzle, the kind where you get satisfaction from solving what at first seems impossible.
There were many very clever clues as pointed out by our great leader today, HG, and IM☘️.
I’m glad the ELKS changed their names: The Jolly Corks!
Tough but fair Saturday outing. Lots of clever misdirection and AHA! moments. Only a couple of proper names...knew one, perped one. (note to editor: obscure names are NOT needed for a great puzzle!) Got the FIR after changing Romeo & Juliette to ROLE instead of DEAD. Thanks, CC & HG for a fun start to my day.
I was elated when I saw CC's name. This was gonna be tough but fair. Plus a lot of fun and interesting. Managed to get it done in a decent amount of time. Thanks for the lack of names CC. GC
Quite a challenge for me, but FIR. I thought the CIO not CTO is responsible for NETWORK SECURITY. MANI before PEDI RUST before PEEL and BEAN before BLAH. CAN'T SAY I DO before CAN'T RELATE. Baffled by the idea that a CELL would have to do with MINES. Favorite: Clue for WORK LIFE BALANCE!
Here is my video of us watching VANILLA being pollinated by hand last year in Madagascar.
After watching this great effort, repeated over and over, I will never see VANILLA as BLAH!
From December 21:
I am still catching up on the puzzles from our travels.
waseeley Thank you for the shout out about my ENTs photo. Our young friend Mae is a brilliant artist to create that amazing Solstice ensemble.
Hand up for the critiques about that puzzle. Managed to FIR. ?OST/?EN could have been B, G, J, K or L.
FIR without red-letter help, but I needed a family-record five assists from DW, who knows techy-workplace-biz-education terms like CTO, TBT, STEAM, PRAXIS, and ETS and also knew the show with REESE Witherspoon, which was one of several clues that made potentially easy answers over-complicated. Those included Della Warrior, Dr. Zaius, Jolly Corks, the Minesweeper term, and Rugby Score. I did enjoy seeing baseball’s top two in career hits, COBB and ROSE, side-by-side, and also enjoyed noticing CORN and MASA as a team. Other issues: 1A originally looked like “came” instead of “carne,” and the Romeo and Juliet clue for ROLE was useless, making SOPOR particularly hard to suss. My knowing DULE, SER, pupusas, and PLANO helped a lot, and PISTON and PEARS perped easily enough to offset unhelpful clues.
Hi Y'all! This was a tough one for me, thanks, C.C. I had a lot of white in the top half when I finished one pass thru. Worked my way back up with red-letters to get some toe holds. Finally filled 'er. Thanks, Gary, for making it even more enjoyable.
My husband was an ELK. He also was very jolly after popping some corks. His club had stag nights when we were first married. The menu included "mountain oysters" aka bull calves' nuts. He'd bring some home for me or I wouldn't have been so happy about him going. Yum!
Thank you, IM! All my grandkids grew up while I couldn't see them. But they didn't forget me.
HI All!
Whoot! I got a FIR Saturday! No Googles, no red-letters, just pen to paper.
Thanks C.C. for a fun themeless - lots of sparkle in there.
Thanks, HG, for the excellent expo - I too had trouble with 2&3d xing 18&21a. It wasn't until walking into the kitchen for another cup of coffee did ROLE hit me (and then I was done!).
WO: WORK LIkE (a dog?), CIO -> CTO [got me a TACO]
ESPs: DULE, TRYs, TBT, ETS
Fav: it's a toss up - [Red] Delicious Desserts v. TACO [Shell] STANDS as clued.
Not that there wasn't a ton of sparkle (which HG already pointed out).
I suppose the CTO (or the CIO) might be concerned with Cybersecurity (frankly, it's everybody's job to worry about it) but most larger companies now employ a CISO (Chief Information Security Officer). Unfortunately, with new regulations, you can't pay us enough to be the fall-guy.
Oh - gotta run. We're going into SFO proper today.
Cheers, -T
DNFWC (DidNotFinishWithoutCheating)
But had fun with the reveals anyway...
Anon-T,
Saw your SF pic, you are right across the bay from where I was in Tiburon!
Two tips!
1) if you visit Muir Woods, take the Muir Beach route to avoid having a heart attack!
2) don't eat the $1- oysters at fisherman's Wharf...
SOPOR, APPLY, & DULE were my last fills. DULE was an unheard of unknown but I remembered a drug with the name SOPOR from years ago. It was the same as Quaalude. Both were taken off the market. After filling sopor the rest of the NW fell and I managed to FIR.
OTOE, ELKS, TRY, APE, SER, TBT. PEARS- filled by perps and WAGS
COBB or RUTH- waited for a perp.
Happy New Year to everybody and hope it's a great 2024.
I loved this puzzle. "Delicious" apples indeed.
Beautiful, amusing, fun, challenging -- everything a Saturday puzzle should be. Thanks, C.C.!
Bayou Tony - Yes, except that there is one router company that has a Chief Information Security Corporate Officer. Their logo is a stylized Golden Gate Bridge.
Big E - Until today I thought they were "soapers" for the way they make you feel, kinda all soapy. At least that's what I've heard.
CED - We are staying in Sausalito but will be heading to Tiberon in a bit to pickup DW's aunt and then to Paradise for dinner.
It is finally sunny this afternoon and the view is even more impressive.
Cheers, -T
To CanadianEh!
You have no email address listed, so I can only contact you this way. Sorry.
Big trouble on jumble blog. The dates have been wrong but ultimately fixed, but now there's no Dec.30, and still Dec 29, all day. Don't know if OMK is all right, but have emailed him -- no response as yet. Do you have any info?
And anyone else reading this, if you have any info or know how to manage that blog, please contact OMK, CEh, or Misty. I can be of no he!p because I know nothing about managing that blog. Owen is not doing it any more; he turned it over to OMK.
C'mon ... you mean *all of you* recognized "bibim naengmyeon" at once??
OK, now pronounce it [vast silence] ... okay, translate it [equal silence].
Jinx- From the NYT 5/27/1972
May 27, 1972 — Under the name Sopor, dosage levels of 75, 150 and 300 milligrams per capsule are sold. Arnar‐Stone Laboratories, Inc., is the manufacturer.
https://www.nytimes.com/1972/05/27/archives/a-sedative-gains-in-drug-culture-curbs-weighed-as-sopors-spread-on.html
************************************************************************************
As a legitimate pharmaceutical wholesaler I never sold much of either Quaalude or Sopor. After they became street drugs the 'legitimate' sales dropped about 90% until they were taken off the market. The pills on the street were probably either from Mexico or counterfeit.
Thanks, Zouquin for your excellent Saturday challenge! I had a DNF in the NW but I feel really good about filling in the rest. FAVs: Orange coat; One paying a flat rate (started w/ tenant); Trials for errors; Ear pieces; Obeyed a court order; whale calves; and No other choice? All of these were not immediately obvious but were fun when the aha moment kicked in.
I used to like Dule on The West Wing but did not connect him to today's clue.
Thanks to H-Gary for another helpful tour! It really comes through that you enjoy your sherpa duties.
Sandyanon- yes, I saw that there was no Dec 30 Jumble Blog created. I posted on the Dec 29 one (there are two with that date so check them both) and neither OMK or Misty have posted.
I fear that OMK is not well, as he had been having problems. I don’t think anyone else knows how to manage that blog. We have not heard from Owen for a long time, and fear that he has passed on.
If anyone has any info for us, please post here. Thoughts and prayers for OMK.
After a first pass-through, like a few other Cornerites, I had so much white I was nearly blinded. But nailing of the wall-to-wall on DONTINTERRUPTME got the old engine running and off we went.
Kudos to C.C. for her really fun, sneaky clueing — Orange Coat & Trials for Errors were brilliant, one even qualifying to be a Dad jokes (Shell Station for TACOSTANDS).
I did have pause on one clue, though: Are toes really “digits”? (I’d think only fingers are).
Like Irish Miss, I’ve never played Minesweeper (kept thinking of warship answers…) and SOPOR was a total unknown. And “bibim nang-whatsis — fuggeddaboudit!
Thank the cw gods for the perps so I could FIR.
Thanks, C.C. and Z. for a tough but enjoyable romp, and Husker G. for his usual erudite review (although I don’t see any BLUR in the background of Mona’s portrait…).
====> Darren / L.A.
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