CAKE-SNIFFER~!
Carmelita Spats, from a Series of Unfortunate Events
We had a Saturday puzzle last month from Chandi Deitmer, cowritten with Erik Agard; today she has teamed up with crossword constructor Claire Rimkus, who has puzzles published in the NYT, mostly Fridays. While I found the reveal to be cute, the ridiculous number of names - person, place and thing - so many of them that I lost count, just drained the fun out of the solve. There were a few crossings that I did not appreciate, e.g. CATIO/CASABA, FARRO/SEURAT. Big, chunky triple-seven(ish) corners, no circles, a balance of 3&4LWs, but overall, a "meh" for me - YMMV. The themers, and the reveal;
16. Professional who makes a lot of scents?: PERFUMER - one of only two unique fills today, CATIO being the other. I have linked this before, but I find it fascinating that not only is it a "thing", but I bought a sample, and happen to like the cologne. Perfumer Xerjoff teamed up with Black Sabbath's riff master guitarist Tony Iommi to create a fragrance called "Scent of Dark"
The promotional video
No new friend yet, but I am Cooper-sitting while my brother is on his honeymoon next month
37. Professional who helps you breathe easy?: ALLERGIST - a physician who specially trained to diagNOSE, treat and manage allergies, asthma, etc.
53. Professional who stops to smell the rosés?: SOMMELIER - "Ro-zays", the 'pink' wines; a sommelier is a wine expert, knows how to pair them with food, etc.; my friend who runs three restaurants on Long Island started out as one; the "nose" of a wine is its scent in the glass - here's one website
And Away We Go~!
ACROSS:
1. Huge volume?: TOME - not enough to fool me, big book....
5. Animated pic: GIF - I tried "CEL" - but pic is an abbr, ergo GIF - Graphic Interchange Format
12. Cameo shape: OVAL
13. Obama-era legislation, for short: ACA - Affordable Care Act
14. Canary melon kin: CASABA - never head of this fruit
18. Lion or tiger: ANIMAL - along with these two, we have six other animals in this puzzle today
19. Pt. of some gender-affirming care: HRT - Didn't know this one, either, at least as clued - Hormone Replacement Therapy - more here
20. "The Circus" painter Georges: SEURAT - name #2; his Wiki
22. "The Elephants" painter Salvador: DALI - name #3, animal #2 - I know the painter; had the "wrong" painting
I was thinking Swans Reflecting Elephants - this one
23. Puma rival: ASICS - name(ish) - footwear
27. Chorus section: TENORS
29. Make the cut?: LOP
30. Novelist Patchett: ANN - name #4
31. Cape Cod Bay mammal: SEAL - I did not know there was such an animal - #3
32. Mayberry boy: OPIE - name #5
35. Donkeys: ASSES - animal #4
40. Dahi-based drink: LASSI - NOT the animal, but a name all the same - more here
43. Clarinet insert: REED
44. Oklahoma city: ENID - place name #1
48. Poet Limón: ADA - name #6
49. Mega Man platform letters: NES - Nintendo Entertainment System; 1987 video game
51. Like plants that grow at high elevations: ALPINE
57. Cravat alternative: ASCOT - neckwear
58. "You got that right!": "TRUE~!"
59. Color on the Qatari flag: MAROON
61. Afore: ERE
62. Inspire 34-Down: ENRAGE
66. More treasured: DEARER
67. Kind of suffix?: "ISH"
68. Textbook section: UNIT
69. Old-timey television feature: DIAL
70. GPS approximation: ETA
71. Understands: GETS
1. Tall headgear: TOP HATS - I remember being appalled the first time seeing this guy on MTV, the "cousin Itt" of Rock N Roll, and his now famous "top hat"
Slash performing at Back to the Beginning - R.I.P. Ozzy Osbourne
2. Supervise: OVERSEE
3. Tennis great Hingis: MARTINA - name #7 - her Wiki
4. Pixie: ELF - Pixie is the name of my 2014 Prius C-2; 40-50MPG, corners like it's on rails
5. Ready to dive in: GAME - this took me a while to suss; the phrase "I'm game~!"
6. Get a winter coat?: ICE UP - pondered "SLEET"
7. Grain that may be cooked like risotto: FARRO - never heard of this
8. Preserve: CAN - the verb
9. Off-mic comment: ASIDE - meh. I think of an 'aside' being an stage actor's comment to the audience
10. Open-sided shelters: RAMADAS - I was today years old when I learned this
11. Rock-clinging gastropod: ABALONE - A-buh-low-nee; animal #5 - I have heard of them, but never eaten one - the Wiki
14. Screened porch for an indoor pet: CATIO - I put in PATIO, figured there must be more to this; crossing an unknown melon didn't help - but it is a thing - animal #6
15. Sets straight: ALIGNS
17. Former country that included five -stan countries, for short: USSR - place name #2
21. Make a claim: ALLEGE
24. Sugary drinks: COLAS - I had SODAS - 60% correct
26. Filing pros: CPAs - Certified Public Accountants - crosswordese
28. La Tierra's star: SOL -Espaniol lesson; The Earth, and the Sun
33. Region in the Achaemenid Empire: PERSIA - place name #3 - sheesh, on Wednesday~?
34. Heated anger: IRE - these names are getting my IRE up, too many can "62A." me
36. Pedometer units: STEPS - On my walk last week, I ventured down the railroad tracks to take this photo
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38. Request from an underprepared actor: LINE - Pssst~! Line~! an unintended "ASIDE"
39. Ore. neighbor: IDA - plc nm #4 - Oregon & Idaho
40. Endured: LASTED
41. Covered in tinsel, maybe: ADORNED
42. Katana-wielding fighter: SAMURAI
45. "You nailed it!": "NICE ONE~!"
46. Circling: IN ORBIT - good clue/answer
47. Loathes: DETESTS - methinks most of the Cornerites despise "CrossNAMES" - I know I do . . . .
50. Bull on a glue bottle: ELMER - dont' care if I know it, name #8
52. Pool division: LANE - our blog hostess knows much about pool lanes
54. "The Stiller and __ Show": MEARA - names #9, tho I did know this one
55. Bert's roommate: ERNIE - names #10 - Muppets
56. Rule the __: ROOST
60. Dept. of Labor div.: OSHA - Occupational Safety & Health Administration
63. Mani-pedi polish option: GEL - I thought it might be the new crosswordese "OPI", then I tried "RED" - Bzzzt~!
65. Instrument that might be played alongside spoons and a stovepipe: JUG
Splynter
22 comments:
Wow! This was a tough
puzzle, especially for a Wednesday. There were so many ways it was possible to go wrong. Fortunately for me, I didn’t take any of them. FIR, so I’m happy.
Good morning!
Is it only Wednesday? I can usually put my pen down after 8 minutes midweek. Today it took almost 11. The SW caused my major stumbles with amen/TRUE, trimmED/ADORNED. Remembering MEARA set me straight. Whew. Totally missed the reveal -- thought the theme was occupations. D'oh. Thanx, Chandi, Claire, and Splynter. (Here's another hand up for RED.)
FIR, thanks to my total WAG @ FARRO x SEURAT. Nip->LOP, lean-tos->RAMADAS, lanai->CATIO, and saw->JUG. Not a lot of joy for me either in this one.
The last time I stayed in(n) a RAMADA, my shelter had four walls and a minibar.
I may have linked this Def Leppard hit a few days ago when we had ANIMAL as fill.
All the gender-affirming care I need is showing me the Sydney Sweeney jeans commercial. YMMV.
ETA, AKA "time to beat."
Thanks to Splynter for the chuckle-worthy review.
Pretty tough midweek puzzle for me with the unknowns FARRO, CARA, CATIO, and LASSI. ‘Lean tos’ gave way to RAMADAS, which I’d never heard of, and the three A’s fit ‘cabanas’ but that didn’t perp either. In the end I prevailed with a FIR but it took me 16:09. Thank you Chandi and Claire for the grid, and to Splynter for your honest take on the puzzle.
A DNF today. I also wanted CEL but ICE UP wouldn't allow up. Unlike Splynter, I knew CASABA but had never heard of FARRO. I'm with him on HRT and RAMADA; both new to me. I made an abc run but GAME never made the list. Couldn't think of "I'm GAME" in that way.
FIR. The number of obscure proper names and bizarre answers was overwhelming. For a Wednesday puzzle this was extremely hard.
The only good thing about today's puzzle was a theme that was manageable. Beyond that this was absolutely no fun at all.
Overall a most unenjoyable presentation.
Musings
-Areas already mentioned made this a real slog for this solver
-DIALS – We have a very large volume of remotes in this house
-I try to maximize my STEPS even when I use a golf cart. There will be none today as it is cool, rainy and windy on the plains.
Took 9:42 today to turn my nose up at this puzzle.
For the aforementioned reasons, I didn't care for this one.
On the bright side, it didn't have any circles.
To quote dour Mister Horse from The REN and Stimpy Show, “No sir, I don’t like it.”
same process as you on CEL and CATIO/CASABA. Honestly shocked that nih.gov even has any mention of HRT left on its website, albeit not in the context of gender affirming care. All things considered did not mind this puzzle at all, although my mood certainly was buoyed by a mention of my beloved Mega Man haha
For some reason, I found this puzzle quite easy to solve. I loved the theme and filled the answers right off. Among the rest, what I didn’t know like CARA, ASICS, MEARA and NES, perps revealed.
My only objection is the inclusions of phrases like You got that right and You nailed it. They’re my personal pet peeve.
Thank you Splynter for the review and the dog cartoon. Funny. I do find that picture of CARA Delevingne kind of disturbing.
Good Morning:
Other than Police Dog, the themers were only one word which is unusual but, in this case, fitting with the surprise (to me) reveal. Never heard of Ramadas, as clued and also needed perps for Maroon, as clued. My only w/o as Tassi before Lassi, inexplicably. I guess I’m in the minority as I enjoyed the solve and didn’t find it difficult at all.
Thanks, Chandi and Claire, and thanks, Splynter, for your slant on the puzzle. Loved the Doggie comics!
Have a great day.
Great review. I had CASAvA (which is something else entirely), but ABALONE fixed it for me. It helped that I have seen ADA Limon and the beverage LASSI in other crosswords, so I found this one enjoyable.
Meh 🫤
A cute theme with a few clever clues.
However, this one has Patti’s “scent” all over it. Sigh ! Another ruined puzzle.
An awesome recap Splynter. Thank you.
Overall I give today's puzzle a thumbs-up. There were definitely some obscurities (I'd never heard of a PERFUMER, e.g.), and names of models and so forth that are not in my league.
Someone commented that they could see Patti's hand in some of the cluing. Well, perhaps. I remember that one of today's constructors, Chandi, co-constructed a puzzle with Erik Agard about a month ago, and she joined us in the Corner that day to clarify that she was as mystified by the clues as we were. I wonder if Chandi noticed such a similarly heavy hand today from Patti.
I'm with Monkey on trivial verbal utterances like "Gotcha," "You nailed it," "You got that right," and "Nice one." If these are considered acceptable "in-the-language" phrases, I vote to take them out of the language of crossword puzzles.
I enjoyed Claire and Chandi's theme today. It was properly clever and amusing. And they showed their construction expertise with the lovely all-white four corners. I love those triple 7's back-to-back.
Nice Wednesday-appropriate challenge, Chandi and Claire. And thanks, Splynter, for your entertainingly frank recap.
My big mistake to start with was putting LEAN TOS in where ramadas was supposed to be. The mistake started to be rectified by casaba, animal and Dali which I knew and revealed ramadas as the correct answer. Otherwise , the rest was pretty simple as the perps took care of stuff I did not know right away.
I couldn't get over the hump today and FIR. I don't know what my wheelhouse is, but this puzzle exposed what it isn't. I made one bad guess after another, culminating in with PETIO (why not?) instead of CATIO. Yuck.
Luckily, Splynter saved it with his doggy posts!
Fun Wednesday puzzle, many thanks, Chandi and Claire. And your commentaries are always a help and much appreciated, Splynter.
Well, my favorite clue in this puzzle was ANIMAL, since I love critters, and it was so nice to see a POLICE DOG, right down a bit below. But sadly, that was about it for me, since I'm not a great fan of ASSES, and I would have loved to have gotten a few DEARER little beasts some where. Still, all in all this puzzle was a NICE ONE and I enjoyed it.
Have a good rest of the day, everybody.
DNF. Another crossNAME puzzle. *sigh*. The trouble with crossNAME puzzles is the lack of "Aha!" or "V-8can" moments when a completely unknown or obscure name is filled solely by perps. No feeling of accomplishment or enjoyment, thus, no fun. TITT, and proceeded to Splinters review, which WAS fun!
Hola! For a midweek puzzle this one was quite a slog but I did finish though needed help with spelling of SEURAT. ALEXA to the rescue!
My last fill was GIF which ultimately replaced CEL, and I came to terms with GAME. I'll have to enter GIF in my crossword dictionary. I've had to start a new one with all the current technical terms now in use.
Thank you, Chandi, Claire and Splynter for the nice distraction. Enjoy your day, everyone!
I made some good guesses except with "catio" and "casaba". I put patio hoping I'd get lucky, but no. All in all I give it a thumbs up. Thanks for the recap Splynter
FIR in 12, despite the ridiculous number of names, 17, of which I DNK 8. I was surprised to complete this CW at all, but especially as quickly as I did. And, what do you know, I even got the theme. Clever theme, but far too many names. Only W/O = CASAvA:CASABA. Thanx for the entertaining CW, CD&CR. Try to construct a CW W/O names. Names = either you know the name or you don't, there is no logic-ing it out. Great write-up, Splynter, truly fun. And great legs on that model.
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