Wyatt Johnston is a PhD student in Operations Research at UT Austin who creates and publishes his own custom crossword puzzles. Today he makes his LAT debut. Congrats!
No revealer, just clues that pit one entity against another, and answers that end in synonyms for "conflict."
17. Gas vs. electric?: OVEN BROIL. BROIL is an outdated word for an argument. And ovens have a broiler, so there's that. This one had me speculating if the "B" was added to ROIL as part of a theme, but that was a red herring. In and of itself, OVEN BROIL isn't anything but it does characterize the gas vs. electric debate.
24. Kenwood vs. Sony?: RADIO STATIC. On the other hand, RADIO STATIC is a real thing and also depicts an argument between stereophiles.
41. Old World vs. New World?: CONTINENTAL RIFT. Here he's changed the rules and dropped a letter to create a pun. Instead of continental Drift, we have CONTINENTAL RIFT.
51. Montagues vs. Capulets?: ITALIAN BEEF. Now we're back to a real thing again. The Montagues and Capulets are rival ITALIAN families in Romeo and Juliet. Their feud may be described as a BEEF.
66. Carnivore vs. vegetarian?: FOOD SCRAP. A SCRAP over FOOD. Although after dropping a letter in "drift," and possibly adding one for "roil," I wondered if this should be SCRAPE, which also can be a fight.
These themers seem to be all over the place. Real phrases vs. meaningless ones, and complete vs. omitted letters. I also found this puzzle to be a little tricky because of the afore mentioned odd phrasing. So, I'm a bit conflicted but it's still a valiant first effort.
Let's look at the rest:
Across:
1. __ bass: SLAP. SEA was too short so we're talking about a percussive playing technique on a bass guitar. Well-known examples of SLAP bass are the scene transitions in Seinfeld.
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| My trusty 1976 Rickenbacker 4001 bass |
5. Support before a run, perhaps: T-BAR. A T-BAR is a surface lift that
9. One way to take the bull by the horns?: LASSO. Fun clue.
14. Gilded element in some religious art: HALO. A gold HALO in paintings represents divine light, holiness, royalty, and spiritual illumination. One often appears magically above me in my photos.
15. "The Good Dinosaur" dinosaur: ARLO. ARLO Guthrie may be old, but I wouldn't call him a dinosaur...
16. In base eight: OCTAL.
17. [theme]
19. Play lightly: STRUM. While I sometimes STRUM, I'd rather play lead. 🤘
20. Course selection for a student with senioritis, maybe: EASY A. A "gut" course in my old college parlance.
21. Mind: OBEY.
23. Hose shade: NUDE. Designed to look like you're not wearing hose. Go figure.
24. [theme]
27. Benders: SPREES.
31. Ruling to restart court proceedings: LET. On a tennis court, when a served ball strikes the net but still goes in, it is a do-over called a LET.
32. Arctic Monkeys lead singer Turner: ALEX. The Arctic Monkeys are an English rock band that has won seven Brit Awards (like Grammy Awards) and has sold over 30 million records. ALEX also cowrites the songs.
33. Denny's rival: IHOP. The International House Of Pancakes rebranded itself as IHOP because they were paying by the letter on signage. Probably.
37. Subtle vibes: AURAS. These are often depicted in art as a luminous cloud or ring (like a HALO) around the head or body of a deity or sacred figure.
41. [theme]
44. Katana, e.g.: SWORD. A katana is a traditional Japanese sword characterized by a curved, single-edged blade with a long grip designed for two-handed use.
45. Average: MEAN.
46. Home of the Taj Mahal: AGRA. Luckily for xword constructors, the Taj Mahal will always be in AGRA, no matter how they clue it. And this one was as straightforward as they come.
47. The whole lot: ALL.
49. Country legend Willie: NELSON. In the '60s, Willie played a Baldwin 800C acoustic-electric guitar. In 1969, a drunk person accidentally stepped on and crushed it during a performance in Texas. When he found it couldn't be fixed, his repairman sold him the now-famous Martin N-20 classical guitar that he named Trigger.
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| Willie back in the '60s with his Baldwin 800C |
51. [theme]
57. Sufi mystic who wrote the six-volume poem the Masnavi: RUMI. A masnavi is a poem written in rhyming couplets. It is the workhorse long form of Persian poetry, the most famous of which is the Masnavi-ye Ma'navi, a spiritual epic by the thirteenth-century Persian poet Jalal al-Din RUMI.
58. See 48-Down: POOL.
59. "You got that right": FACTS. FACTS is slang to express strong agreement. FACTS!
64. Green shade: OLIVE.
66. [theme]
68. Stanley's "The Devil Wears Prada" role: NIGEL. Stanley Tucci portrays NIGEL Kipling, the sharp-witted Art Director at the fashion magazine Runway.
69. Not on board with: ANTI.
70. Whipped up: MADE.
71. Twitch: SPASM.
72. Overflow (with): TEEM.
73. Quaint cry: EGAD.
Down:
1. Card dispenser: SHOE. A dealer's SHOE is a gaming device used mainly in casinos to hold multiple decks of playing cards.
2. Heavy-duty soap made by WD-40: LAVA. The key natural ingredient of LAVA is pumice (ground volcanic ash). It works very well to remove heavy grease and even TAR.
3. Some drafts: ALES.
4. Petting zoo ride: PONY.
5. Paving gunk: TAR. If you get some on your hands, try using LAVA.
6. Clutch: BROOD. These aren't quite the same. A clutch is a group of eggs laid together in a nest, while a BROOD is the group of young offspring that hatch from those eggs.
7. "I was home watching TV all night," e.g.: ALIBI. "I was watching crime dramas."
8. Birling contest: ROLEO. Birling is commonly known as logrolling. It is an event at a lumberjack ROLEO (a twist on a RODEO).
9. Spanish article: LOS.
10. "Quick, look like you're not up to something!": ACT NATURAL. "Hey, I'm just watching TV!"
11. Confident gait: STRUT.
12. __ Arabia: SAUDI.
13. Early Mesoamerican civilization: OLMEC. Like last week, the answer wasn't Aztec (which I tried) or Mayan. The OLMEC civilization was the first major culture in Mesoamerica (southern Mexico), dating approximately from 1200 to 400 BCE.
18. Expose: BARE.
22. Runway letters: YSL. Yves Saint Laurent.
25. "That is to say ... ": AS IN. This one doesn't quite click either.
26. Aqua kin: TEAL.
27. Egg pouches: SACS.
28. Snowbank creator: PLOW. In South Florida, our garbage trucks double as snowplows.
29. Silver State city: RENO.
30. Boosts in some games: EXTRA LIVES.
34. Cutting edge of fashion?: HEM. Winner: Best Clue. 🏆
35. Common Scrabble tile value: ONE.
36. School org.: PTA. Parent-Teacher Association.
38. Semis: RIGS. Semi-trailer trucks are big RIGS.
39. Curly coif: AFRO.
40. Superfan: STAN. I'm finally getting the hang of this one. It only took twenty-five years.
42. Asian rice cake: IDLI. "An IDLI cake is the devil's food." Or something like that.
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| IDLI is a traditional South Indian steamed rice cake |
43. Green Gables girl: ANNE.
48. With 58-Across, exercise venue: LAP.
50. Really bad grades: EFFS. Why no "E"s on a report card? I once got straight "E"s and I told my parents that meant Excellence, not near failing. They almost bought it.
51. Does a laundry chore: IRONS. I wrote FOLDS at first, which briefly screwed up the SW corner.
52. Spring bloom: TULIP. Last March, my son and DIL visited the Skagit Valley TULIP Festival near Seattle. Amazing fields of color!
53. Latina friend: AMIGA.
54. Like some lean products: NO FAT.
55. Yankees manager Aaron: BOONE. The former infielder has been the Yankees manager since 2018.
56. Street corn often topped with cotija: ELOTE. ELOTE is a popular Mexican street food consisting of grilled or boiled corn on the cob slathered in a creamy sauce and topped with cheese and spices.
60. Cartoon supplier of instant roads: ACME. ACME also makes Portable Holes.
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| I think that's where our highway department gets them. |
61. Steep rock: CRAG.
62. "I did it!": TADA.
63. Went fast: SPED.
65. Shade tree: ELM.
67. Darken: DIM.
Be good. RB
It was pretty tough,
ReplyDeletebut my favorite clue/answer?
“Act natural.”
Anyway, FIR, so I’m happy.
FIR, but icon->HALO, and anna->ANNE. Too many unknowns to list.
ReplyDeleteIn whodunit novels, "I was home watching TV all night" means "no ALIBI."
I still don't know how STAN, portmanteau of "stalker" and "fan," is allowed to be clued "superfan."
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy competes in ROLEO, as well as other lumberjack events.
FLN: Ray-O, I think the damage to your RAV4 isn't gonna buff out.
Thanks to Wyatt for the second Friday-level puzzle of the week. And thanks to Rusty Brain for another interesting tour. I'd like to see a poster with your picture of NELSON with the caption "your music," and another showing NELSON today captioned "your music on pot."
STAN comes from a song of the same name by Eminem, in which he reads a series of fictional letters from an increasingly obsessed fan. The portmanteau thing is a widely believed theory but has never been confirmed.
DeleteRE: STAN. I'm with you, Jinx. Gemini has this: ''The term "stan" comes from the 2000 hit song "Stan" by Eminem, which tells a dark, fictional story about an overly obsessed, unhinged fan named Stan who writes increasingly frantic letters to the rapper. When Eminem fails to reply, the character spirals out of control and drives a car off a bridge with his pregnant girlfriend inside.'' Talk about obscure.
DeleteGood morning!
ReplyDeleteD-o was SORTing the laundry, not IRONing. Fixed. That was the only Wite-Out mishap. Caught the theme. Finished in good Thursday time. What's not to like? Thanx, Wyatt (nice debut) and Rusty.
I spent 6 hours and two trips to Best Buy yesterday before I was able to exchange my 8-day-old Iphone. I had attempted to open a text attachment from my dentist. The screen got screwy and then turned black. After that, the phone wouldn't do anything. It'd effectively become a doorstop. Don't know why, but before BB would exchange it, I had to remove it from Consumer Cellular. That required a trip home to reconnect the old Iphone7 to CC. Then 20 miles back to BB to wait through the Geek Squad queue a second time. Fun day. Apple devices hate me. A few years ago my IMac threw up the blue screen of death and gave up the ghost a few days out of warranty. Repair estimate: $700. Nope. Rant over.
I had the opposite experience with my Mac. Many years ago it gave up the ghost one month before the warranty expired.
DeleteGood morning:
ReplyDeleteI agree with our blogger that some of the clues don’t really jibe with the entries. Because of this and the slightly unusual theme, I wasn’t quite sure of the theme until RB’s explanation. I did see the synonymous last words, but broil was an outlier to me. I FIR but didn’t enjoy the process very much.
Congrats on your debut, Wyatt, and thanks, RB, for enlightening me about the theme and its execution. Tummy rubs to Buster.
DO, sometimes It seems as though there is a black cloud over your head!
Have a great day.
FIR. What a workout! I thought some of the clues were not quite spot on, for instance T-bar being a support, which in a strange sort of way it is, but wildly inaccurate.
ReplyDeleteAlso for me the theme seemed a bit of a stretch. I get the concept but once again the clues seemed somewhat off.
Overall not even close to an enjoyable puzzle.
A wild bronco rodeo ride that threw me all over the place in todays offering from Wyatt Johnston.
ReplyDeleteStrangely … I kinda liked it.
On the TV series Pawn Stars some of the katanas that would come into the shop were worth thousands of dollars and were masterful craftsmanship.
Thanks RB for sorting out and explaining the themers.
DNF. The North got me. T__AR crossing ___OOD and didn’t know ARLO.
ReplyDeleteI kind of got the theme at ITALIAN BEEF, but BROIL didn’t seem to fit. EXTRA LIVES filled correctly with perps but I’m not familiar with this phrase as clued.
I was drying the laundry before IRON(S)ing it. Does anyone still iron today?
Perps got me ALEX, IDLI, STAN. I know we’ve had the latter before, but can’t remember it, but I did remember ELOTE, probably because we had it yesterday.
I visited RUMI’s tomb in Konya, Turkey. It was very crowded.
Hook ‘em horns Wyatt Johnston.
Thank you RB for a great review.
brutal fill in this one, but the only one that really annoyed me was LA POOL (although I guess it was supposed to be read as LAP POOL?). Seems unfair to have a letter with no cross at all that comes from any other clue.
ReplyDeleteDo want to note that CONTINENTAL RIFT is a real term in itself -- it's the valley that forms between two continents that are undergoing continental drift in opposite directions!
Thanks for the clarification on CONTINENTAL RIFT. That is helpful.
DeleteNot quite the correct definition of CONTINENTAL RIFT. Not all rifts occur between continents. The Rio Grande Rift in New Mexico and Europe’s Rhine Valley are examples of continental crust that is thinning due to divergent plate boundaries.
DeleteTook 6:44 today to join the dog fight.
ReplyDeleteWhile I would prefer to see themeless puzzles (at least some) throughout the week, I think we're being too hard on this theme. Now, for some of the fill, such as "idli," "Rumi, "Alex," and "Nigel," I hear you and I agree.
In my high school, a failing grade was an "E", not an "F." We may have been the only HS to do that though.
Musings
ReplyDelete-RB’s summative paragraph and Irish's always spot on comments reflect my feelings about some of the randomness of the fill
-IDLI, RUMI paralleling NIGEL, many laundry options and LILAC/TULIP slowed the SW corner for me
-The first group with a SLAP bass player that came to my mind
-While growing up my dad was never really on a SPREE, he was just never sober
-ANTI – We are getting bombarded with political ads that tell voters all that is wrong with government and how the candidate with fix them all
-I well remember Buck Owens’ 1963 original version of Act Naturally
-With Yankee’s early departure from the playoffs, Mr. BOONE is on the proverbial hot seat
-My school tried to switch grades from A’s – F’s to 1’s – 5’s and it only lasted two years.
A relatively easy Wednesday bodes bad for Thursday … proved true. Lotsa blanks during the first run. The theme was clever. Once I completed one answer the others fell into place.
ReplyDeleteThought SLAP bass might be a kinda fish
ITALIAN BEEF. So we Mediterraneans s’posed to have OLIVE 🫒 skin. Last time I looked in the mirror I definitely wasn’t “green”
A less obscure but still challenging clue for ALEX would have worked, “Arctic Monkeys”? Same for ARLO. “benders” are alcohol related. Shopping SPREES.
Some left over ELOTE still tasty . folds or IRONS the laundry. RUMI? “birling”/ROLEO?
Hard to believe “The Devil Wears Prada” movies were 20 years apart, “Stanley” Tucci played NIGEL in both. Most of the rest of the cast composed of the original actors.
Nice debut WJ.
Finally a sunny day bringing out the brilliant fall colors 🍂🍁 Enjoy the rest of the day. 🙂
This had a little crunch which is par for later week, but not real difficult as I managed a FIR in 13:53, my last full being three blanks in EXTRA LIVES. AURAS is on of those words that the S can be replaced with an E to denote the plural form. An example of how the English language can be hard to understand ~ referring to music BASS is a long A, referring to fish, a short A. I remember ELOTE, mostly cuz we just had it yesterday I think, now I need to instill IDLI in my memory bank, we’ve seen it before and will again. Persian poetry not being my thing, RUMI was all perps. NIGEL was also unknown. I went to a Catholic grade/middle school, their grading system had no EFFS, a ‘U’ was the worst, for ‘unsatisfactory’, can’t remember if I had any of those…lol. In my public high school (like SS), we had no EFFS there either, ‘E’ was a failing grade, and I did get one of those in geometry sophomore year. Unlike a few others, I thought this was a fine, enjoyable solve, congrats on your LAT debut Wyatt. Thanks to RB, your blogs are always a Thursday bright spot!!
ReplyDeleteHola! Not too easy, not too hard, just right. That's how I feel about this puzzle. Thanks to Wyatt Johnson. The NW was my last fill because SHOE did not occur to me, but when it emerged, I recognized it. The same with KATANA, which I've seen before in other puzzles. My ALEXA helped me with ALEX.
ReplyDeleteI'm not a fan of country music but some of Willie NELSON's songs really get to me.
One of my friends gifted me a copy of RUMI's poems.
Have a fabulous day, everyone!
I enjoyed this Thursday-level puzzle with fresh fill (ACT NATURAL, EXTRA LIVES) and clever misdirection in the clueing (T-BAR, LET).
ReplyDeleteCongratulations to Wyatt on your LAT debut, and thanks for the fun. Also thanks to CED for the enjoyable recap. ROLEO was new to me and you found the picture that was worth 1000 words to explain!