Saturday Themeless by Zhouqin Burnikel
...and the beat goes on. Quite soon after we celebrated the publication of her 400th LATimes Puzzle, C.C. supplies us with yet another lovely exercise. Her trademark clever cluing provided a lot of entertainment and "DOH!" moments! Obscure names were mere speed bumps.
Across:1. Waldorf salad morsel: GRAPE.
6. Hardly qualified: UNFIT - My first fill was INEPT in more ways than one
11. Disney Jr. rating: TVG.
14. Fired up again: RELIT - The service module engine you see firing in the picture below had to be fired, turned off and fired up again several times to get the Apollo command module to the Moon and back to Earth. It was what blew up on the Apollo 13 mission and made NASA go to Plan B to get the astronauts back home, but that's another story.
15. Like some vintage T-shirts: RETRO COOL - Will my double knit bell bottoms ever be cool again? 😀
17. "Healthier happens together" insurance company: AETNA.
18. Grill spot: BACK PATIO.
19. Voting coalition: BLOC - It's what our Congress has become
20. Wasn't in the game: SAT.
21. Athenian lawmaker remembered for severity: DRACO.
22. "Count on me": SURE, NO PROBLEM.
26. Ethically indifferent: AMORAL.
28. Hauls: LUGS - An occupation for Sherpas
29. Badly misinformed: FULL OF BEANS - An frequent comment make by my dad
32. Pvt. trainer: SGT.
35. Some Kias: RIOS - An alternative to "Spanish rivers", I guess
36. Chaps: GENTS.
37. Kallax seller: IKEA.
38. Surgery ctrs.: ORS.
39. Activity that raises spirits?: WINE TASTING 😀
41. Verb in flour-y language: SIFT 😀
42. Drives a team: MUSHES 😀 Where the most famous ones compete and is won by the 10. Big kahunas: TOP DOGS. Current standings
43. Reptile that can weigh 650 pounds: GIANT TORTOISE - Here is a "creep" of them in the Galápagos Islands
48. Home to the University of Jordan: AMMAN.
49. Arctic diving bird: AUK - There are no penguins in the Arctic but...
50. Lump of clay: CLOD - William Blake's poem tells of the CLOD of clay that can be molded but not the pebble which is rigid and unchanging.
53. Close the deal: SHAKE ON IT.
56. Florida city where Jane Castor is mayor: TAMPA.
57. Barely shows up in a painting?: POSES NUDE 😀
58. Gel alternative: CREAM.
59. GPS figs.: STS - My STreet is Skylark
60. Suspect: SENSE.
61. Tales of Greek gods, e.g.: MYTHS.
Down:
1. Take hold of: GRAB.
2. Go for a spin?: REEL.
3. "Memory" and "I Dreamed a Dream": ALTO SOLOS - Both show stoppers!
4. Hair that may be clipped: PIN CURLS.
6. __ renewal: URBAN - Sometimes it is called gentrification.
8. Agcy. that investigates telemarketing fraud: FTC - The Federal Trade Commission and Securities and Exchange Commission didn't think much of the Wolf Of Wall Street
9. Drive up the wall: IRK.
11. The bottom line: TOTAL.
12. __ prompt: VOICE - For _____ press ___, For _____ press ___, For _____ press ___, For _____ press ___, ad anauseum
13. Bad outlook: GLOOM.
16. Keto concerns: CARBS.
20. Treat that's not meant to be shared: SELF GIFT 😀 Last year I just decided that I am 78 and I want a red car. So I traded my perfectly good white car for this.
23. Dileep of the "Avatar" films: RAO ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
24. "Dear Evan Hansen" Tony winner: PLATT ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
25. Goes wild: RUNS AMOK.
26. __-Cuban jazz: AFRO.
27. "20/20" co-anchor: MUIR.
30. Box that might contain tamagoyaki and tonkatsu: BENTO - I knew the word for the crossword fill but had no idea what the fill in the box was. 😀
31. Toronto-to-Montreal dir.: ENE - If you leave at noon, your ETA is 5:30 pm
32. Peak protection: SKI HELMET 😀
33. Unit that might be edited: GENE 😀
34. Makes out, in a way: TAGS 😀 This took me awhile but I shoulda knowed C.C. would get baseball in the puzzle! This fielder has made the runner out.
37. Admission of fear: IT'S SCARY.
39. Court reporter?: WITNESS 😀
40. Fashion designer Anna: SUI ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Some of Anna's, uh, creations
41. Reptile not found in Iceland or Ireland: SNAKE - Despite the fact that it is St. Patty's day in two days, St. Patrick did not drive snakes out of Ireland. The last Ice Age drove them out and it remained too cold for them to come back.
43. Has a sudden inspiration: GASPS.
44. "Can we turn on the AC?": I'M HOT - Around here we "turn on" the a/c and do not "put it on"
45. Build up: AMASS.
46. Crashes a Twitch stream: RAIDS - ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Here ya go: A "raid" on Twitch is a feature where a streamer sends their entire chat to another streamer's channel at the end of their stream, which can sometimes cause the receiving streamer's chat to "crash" if a large number of viewers suddenly join, overwhelming the system and potentially causing temporary glitches or lag.
47. One in a class by herself: TUTEE.
51. Moonfish or sunfish: OPAH - An OPAH can grow to be big!
52. Hydropower sources: DAMS.
54. Unified: ONE.
55. Mother figure: NUN.
56. Network that airs many RKO films: TCM - These RKO classics can be seen on Turner Classic Movies.
38 comments:
When I saw C.C.’s name,
I figured I had a good shot at this puzzle. Sure enough, little by little, it all became clear, and a number of idiomatic phrases didn’t hurt the process, either. Thank you, C.C., for a pleasant Saturday outing (for a change!) FIR, so I’m happy.
Good morning!
Hand up for INEPT at 6a. Tried RETRO CHIC before COOL elbowed in. The long in-the-language phrases made this one a treat. Are STS really GPS "figures?" D-o put this one in the win column, and it came in under 15, to boot. Yay. Thanx, C.C. and Husker.
FIR! A Saturday LAT crossword! Must have been a very easy Saturday for more competent solvers. back porch->BACK PATIO, ihea->IKEA, and im afraid->ITS SCARY.
Waited of FTC, because I thought the SEC and/or the FCC might want in on the investigation too.
DNK SELF GIFT. Maybe that's what Jackson Browne meant by his Rosie lyric "I've got to hand it to me," but I don't think so.
Also DNK Anna SUI. I just saw last night that some hoity-toity fashion show featured the latest in jeans. One leg looked traditional, while the other leg ended just below the gluteus maximus. Priced at several hundred dollars. Yet more evidence that a woman dresses for other women, unless she POSES NUDE.
Thanks to CC for a Saturday morning special that even I was able to GRAB. My favorite was TOP DOGS for "big kahunas." And thanks to H.Gary for another fine review.
Another Saturday Close But No Cigar. I needed to resort to red letters to complete the last eight clues in the midwestern section of the grid. Pincurls? All in all a fun puzzle and a great way to usher in the weekend. Add to that, my son Alden is home for Spring Break. And it was five years ago today that we drove from Concord, NH to Buffalo, NY to adopt our beloved dog Chipper, named after, of course, my favorite Atlanta Braves player.
FIR. For a Saturday puzzle this really didn't give me much trouble. A few proper names I didn't know, but nothing the perps couldn't handle.
Last to fall was " sure no problem" and when that filled all my mysteries were solved.
Overall a very enjoyable puzzle.
After about 15 minutes the grid looked like patch work but I was able to piece it together for a FIR in 25:13. As per a typical Zhouqin puzzle, it took some thought and significant perp help, but a very enjoyable challenge. ALTO SOLOS and SELF GIFT were unknowns, as were PLATT, SUI, and RAO. Corrections included top guns to TOP DOGS, and FCC to FTC (the telemarketing reference threw me off). “Florida city” that started with T was an Ektorp, the mayor is not exactly household name. I liked the clues for WITNESS and SIFT. Thanks C.C. for the morning fun, and to HG for yet another stellar recap, you and C.C. Never disappoint!
As expected, tough but fair with C.C. at the helm! Really enjoyed this one.
What does "in-the-language" mean, as it relates to crosswords?
Generally recognized phrases I think, not overly obscure
As Gary said, "Obscure names" unknown RAO, PLATT, and SUI, were speed bumps. NO PROBLEM. No doom and GLOOM in this nifty (that I changed to NEATO in 7D) puzzle. A FIR today.
My salad apple became a GRAPE after GRAB and REEL ate it.
FCC changed to FTC for telemarketing fraud? Why would anybody buy something from a total stranger making cold calls. Give them you CC number, bank account number?
My INEPT became UNFIT.
SELF GIFT- never heard that term. Just don't ask to eat some of my ice cream unless you are DW.
TAGS- it came from perps; thanks for the V8 moment Gary.
"Twitch stream" and RAIDS- no knowledge of either. Also, I don't know what a 'streamer channel' is.
CCs puzzles are always fair, but my poor speling did me in. GIANT TORTueSE, didn't look right, but I thought AMOK had a U and the unknown fashion designer had to be SUe. Bzzzzt! Wrong answer!
Otherwise, how was the play? Coming down from SGT and IKEA, I first entered "I'm afraid" and "SKI patrol" before coming to my senses.
Took 14:09 today to avoid the doom and gloom.
I didn't know today's actors (Platt & Rao), the fashion designer, sts, and pincurls.
Very nicely done, C.C.
39A "Activity that raises spirits" (WINETASTING) is a cute inference that wine is a spirit. Nope; spirits are drinks that are distilled, like gin or whisky or rum.
Good Morning:
CC (and perhaps Patti) provided us with some very clever cluing and lots of lively and fresh fill, not to mention her trademark declaratives, e.g., It’s Scary, Sure, no problem, Full of beans. I did go astray at Inept/Unfit and was truly bewildered by Big kahunas being Toy Dogs, due to the fill of Back Yards, until Back Patios surfaced. IMO, Back Patio is green paint, the only blemish in an otherwise impressive grid.
Thanks, CC, for a challenging, yet doable and fun solve and thanks, HG, for the overview and commentary. I enjoy your highlighting the clues you think are clever, as well as the ones that puzzle you (and us!).
Have a great day.
Thanks. So I would think that many if not most idiomatic expressions would be considered "in-the-language," because most people understand their non-literal meaning. But an idiom like "pull out all the stops" or "sticky wicket" or "dyed in the wool," say, might not earn the "in-the-language" rating if most folks find them obscure? Who is judging whether a particular expression is obscure or not?
YP here ~ I thought the same thing, but in this case “spirits” may refer to the “wine buzz” 🤷♂️
Well, rats. Almost everyone seems to have managed this CW. Not me. Started with pen-on-paper, first pass yielded so few fills I went online for red letter help. Even then, ended up with countless alpha runs. When I saw C.C.'s name I thought, "Oooh! After an extremely successful week maybe my prediction of doom and gloom for Saturday was wrong!" Well....no. BIG DNF. I mean, I persisted, and did eventually fill all the cells, but the multiple alpha runs said otherwise. Only 12 names, but DNK 7. Favorite clue: "Barely shows up in a painting". Ya got me, C.C., created a CW over my head. Thanx anyway. Thanx too to HG for the terrific write-up, and for enlightening me as to the "Tags" clue. "Necks" didn't fit, and when "TAGS" showed up, it was a head scratcher.
I got tripped up by the reptile. At first I wanted boa constrictor but no room, then when GIANT showed up I added anaconda, that didn’t fit, so I entered mongoose. Never came up with TORTOISE, therefore DNF.
The rest was easy and fun enough. Á few unknowns like SUI and PLATT.
Thanks HG. NEATO review.
Hand up for needing HG to explain TAGS for "makes out." My allergy to sports is a disability! DNK three folks at 23, 24, and 27 Down, nor the Twitch RAIDS, and never heard of a SELF GIFT, but found much here to raise my spirits. Thanks, C.C., for a challenge for which I was *not* UNFIT, and HG for SIFTing through it for us.
Well CC I gave your challenge an hour on and off. Got about 90% finished 10% of that wrong.
“Reptile” it’s almost St Patrick’s Day so we know thanks to him there are no snakes in Ireland. So if your drain gets clogged. Tough luck 😀
(No Icelander has a pet Anaconda?)
Since I feel like an idiot reading the menu at our super Japanese restaurant I simply order a BENTO Box for lunch. Have done the Toronto-Montreal trip a few times and thought I finally knew a “direction” answer but first put NNE.
fooled blind for “misinformed” looked good and fit but was wrong.
Are wines spirits? Agree with both Anonymi
GIANTdormouse? C’mon, TORTOISE. (With the perps I had, it woulda worked 😃).
awkwardly first spelled the “arctic bird” answer wrong. Had BACKyards till I saw that the clue wasn’t plural. Add TOPcats wrong species. saleGIFT
“Kallax”? “Twitch”? (Video game?)
I’m filling in for a colleague for a few hours later today so of course it’s the first bright sunny Saturday in months.
39A was perhaps a PC, aka a Patti Clue; regardless, "raises spirits" was clearly referring to the intoxicating effect of wine. "Tipsy" or "buzzed" or "three sheets to the wind" would have worked, but the cluer attempted a cute misdirection by instead using "spirits." Fine, except that wine is not a spirit; it is fermented, not distilled.
Many times i do not work Saturdays puzzles, but not today. Great job CC. My favorites were "Peak protection" and "Barely shows up in a painting" LOL And Gary great job on your "self gift". Thanks for sharing.
Does Chipper react when he hears Crazy Train?
For my first fill, I so wanted the 650-pound reptile to be a Komodo dragon, but I would have needed an ‘s’ that the clue didn’t call for.
Nevertheless, I got all my early traction in the South and worked up. The TAMPA mayor helped. Other early toeholds were BENTO, SHAKE ON IT, and two cleverly clued entries, for POSES NUDE and SIFT. The clues for GASPS and MUSHES were pretty good too.
My FIR, once I discerned that some people put GRAPEs in a Waldorf Salad, ultimately came down to solving problems in the NE corner. I finally had to concede that RETRO CHIC wasn’t the answer and that the seemingly green-paintish BACK PATIO was correct. DW pointed out that not all patios are in the back these days.
DRACO, David MUIR, and AFRO-Cuban helped me along elsewhere.
I loved RUNS AMOK, a shoutout to my favorite Cambodian dish, the pate Catfish Amok.
Nobody “makes out” in Baseball. You make “AN” out.
When they win a squeaker, some baseball players appear to “make out” 😀
Yay!! FIR! Only the second time in the many years I’ve been doing these LA Times Crosswords. Probably a little on the easier side… but I still feel pretty good about it!
I meant to say only the second Saturday puzzle
There’s the rub, “obscure “ is subjective, what may be well known to you, I may have no knowledge of. Obscure to me means practically nobody is familiar with something.
How exciting to get a C.C. Saturday puzzle--tough but delightful, a real treat. Many thanks, C.C. And your commentary was a pleasure, thanks for that too, Gary.
My favorite item in this puzzle was the GIANT TORTOISE. My sweet late husband Rowland got a tortoise when he was 22 years old and we sadly lost him at age 81 ten years ago. But the 70 or so year old turtle, Gophie (species Gopherus Agassizii) is still with me, napping in the corner of her outdoor structure every night and coming out to get her lettuce and fruit meal in the early afternoon. I'm glad she's not as GIANT as the ones in Gary's photo, but she's pretty big and still totally healthy, and there's a chance she may outlive me. So this is a pretty amazing species of tortoise.
Well, enough about the giant tortoise, since it's time to get her her lunch. Have a delightful sunny day, everybody.
Hola! I was supposed to go to a funeral today but my alarm failed to go off! So, what to do but work on the puzzle. Thank you, C.C., for a doable Saturday puzzle. Often I don't finish these but today the GLOOM was lifted and success prevailed even with some wite-out evidence of my errors. I've not had too many Waldorf salads and CROUTONS didn't fit so waited until GRAPE emerged with GRAB in place. PIN CURLS are a flash to the past. I did that every night as a teenager. VOICE and GLOOM slowly appeared as I don't know of many PATIOs not located in the BACK YARD. Not here, anyway.
GIANT TORTOISE emerged quickly as i am an avid fan of Saturday's documentaries with Sir David Attenborough. He visits the most remote and exotic places with interesting details of the animals, their circumstances and living conditions. I have learned so much from watching his shows.
Have a great weekend, everyone!
Nice one, CC...thanks!
Retro Cool, not
Because this is a Zhouqin Burnikel puzzle I just had to work it, and solve it I did.
As with Gary, I had to change INEPT to UNFIT.
I really enjoyed seeing the following extra special fill: RETRO COOL, BACK PATIO, DRACO, FULL OF BEANS, WINE TASTING, GIANT TORTOISE, SHAKE ON IT, POSES NUDE, ALTO SOLOS, PIN CURLS, RUNS AMOK, and IT'S SCARY.
I did not particularly like TUTEE, though.
Thank you for another masterful and pleasant puzzle, C.C.
Misty. I always like it when you update us about Gophie!
Seeing C.C.'s name on a Saturday puzzle always gives me extra motivation because I know my persistence will be rewarded - - as it was today. Thanks to C.C. and H-Gary! Once I changed "apple" to GRAPE, the NW finally worked out. FAVs were RUNS AMOK and GIANT TORTOISE. No clue on RAIDS so, once again, H-Gary's explanations are much appreciated!
Once again, C.C., you’ve set us up with a good, fair challenge today — altho my start in the NW territory drew all blanks until I was able to reverse-engineer things from further south. As usual, Ms. Burnikel, your clues were entertaining and made me work to get the FIR (I think my fave today was the “Barely show up in a painting?” Nice!).
Hand up for trying APPLE at #1, to no avail, of course (I forgot a Waldorf also had grapes…) and FCC instead of FTC. And I only remembered DRACO from using the adjective “draconian”. Like @CopyEditor, I also really wanted Komodo Dragon until I saw I was one letter short of a full load; no cee-gar there, kid. And I kinda get the “Makes out?” for TAGS, even if it is a bit of a stretch.
Tomorrow (Sun.) I’m headed up to Mammoth Mountain CA for a week of skiing (I always wear my SKI HELMET) so I’ll probably run behind on doing crosswords for this week — although I suppose I could RAID the L.A. Times for the comics and crossword section and take it with me…
As usual, thanks to Husker Gary for the recap — Zhouqin did not leave you much to extrapolate on today, did she 😆
====> Darren / L.A.
Misty, I, too, enjoy Gophie's escapades. Thank you for that.
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