Saturday, October 20, 2018, Lewis Rothlein

Themeless Saturday by Lewis Rothlein 

Tonight is International Observe The Moon Night sponsored by NASA. This NASA educator and you are all encouraged to go out and look at the second brightest object in our sky and Earth's only natural satellite. Here in Eastern Nebraska the Moon will rise shortly after 5 pm tonight and should be a magnificent sight after the Sun has set. I invite you to identify as many features of the lunar surface as you can, including, but not limited to, the magnificent Tycho crater and the Sea Of Tranquility that was visited by Neal and Buzz on July 20, 1969 - Houston, Tranquility Base here, the Eagle has landed.

Today's constructor is Lewis Rothlein whose last puzzle appeared on August 28 of this year and was well-blogged by Steve. Lewis currently lives in Asheville, N.C. and teaches this course at UNC-Asheville. I wonder if I could take it online?

In a lovely note to me Lewis said he started doing crosswords a dozen years ago and constructing four years ago. His vocations include having been a magazine editor, a syndicated newspaper columnist (SF Chronicle) and an elementary school teacher. He added that he owned a yoga studio for 10 years and decided to stretch his mind with crosswords the way he was stretching his body with yoga.

Lewis's offering today stretched me especially in the SW. I will explain my perils with those fills as I blog this wonderful puzzle and prepare to look at the Moon tonight:

Across:

1. Name derived from a Kyrgyz word meaning "sea of islands": ARAL - A "big boy" clue for our old friend ARAL. The Kyrgyz word for sea of islands is "Aral-denghiz" which has lost much of its water between 1989 to 2014 as shown below

5. __ therapy: GENE - Not help for Messers Autry, Rayburn and Hackman

9. Food quality: SAPOR - A quality perceptible to the sense of taste

14. Makes a play for: MOVES IN ON - You'd have to be my age to remember the Everly Brothers lyrics, "Johnny is a joker that's a'tryin' to steal my baby" and the title of the song.

16. Patriotic nickname: U.S. OF A

17. Start of many a puzzle: ONE ACROSS - I commented there already

18. Enjoys a course: GOLFS - Just a minute, I have a tap in

19. Stopped using: KICKED THE HABIT 

21. Addie's husband in "As I Lay Dying": ANSE.

22. "Our acts make or __ us": Victor Hugo: MAR, "we are the children of our own deeds"

23. Fee: Abbr.: CHG - I wonder if Lewis has a Lab CHG for supplying crosswords for his class

25. "The Night They Invented Champagne" musical: GIGI.

27. Curved sword, to Brits: SABRE.

29. Elver, e.g.: EEL - At the bottom right of this cycle 

30. Bug: DEFECT - _ _ _ E C T cried out for INSECT and was my first roadblock. 

32. In a happy place: GLAD.

33. __ Fridays: TGI - We drive by one on our way to our favorite restaurants 

34. "Seriously?": IT IS  - IT IS? is synonymous and IT IS answers the question 


35. Hard-to-find items, to collectors: RARES - Do you really think this RARE, an 1895 Morgan Silver Dollar, just happened to walk into a Las Vegas Pawn shop?

37. Teller's output: YARN - Yeah my first teller first output was CASH. 40. "No more!": STOP IT, Lewis! 😉

38. Sydney's st.: NSW - The state of New South Wales is in Australia not Sydney in NEBraska's panhandle

39. Strong reaction: RISE - Some kids just want to get a RISE out of a teacher.  Good teachers follow the advice below

42. First cloned mammal: EWE - We all remember Dolly and I propose we clone C.C.

43. Increased: UPPED - Since becoming the Saturday blogger, I have UPPED my game and learned to be more 59. Quick to recover: RESILIENT 

45. Shaded: HUED - I have had a rose-HUED face from embarrassment on occasion 

46. Noël Coward, for one: SIR - S _ _ cried out for SPY which SIR Noël was during WWII. Churchill fought granting him a knighthood.

47. Proverbial team feature?: NO I 

48. Where Zeno taught: ELEA - On the west coast of current day Italy

50. Experimental vehicle: SELF DRIVING CAR - Hmmm... 

56. "Twilight" author Stephenie: MEYER - No idea, which did not help my SW ills

57. "Nurse Jackie" Emmy winner: EDIE FALCO - A lovely harvest of vowels

58. Compensate (for): ATONE  - A _ _ _ _  is not ALLOW. More SW issues! 

60. Wet: DOUSE - There was a time when this was a habit at Husker games

61. Spotted: SEEN  - Not PIED

62. Refusals: NOES - They all mean NO


Down:

1. Out of control: AMOK - Always sounds like AMUK to me

2. Pasta __: food brand: RONI - Rice-a-RONI was introduced in 1958, Noodle-RONI in 1964 and became Pasta-RONI in 1995

3. "__ plaisir!": AVEC - J'ai blogué ce puzzle avec plaisir (I blogged this puzzle with pleasure)

4. Auto fluid problems: LEAKAGES - What fluid is that on your garage floor?

5. Braces (oneself): GIRDS - Florida has had to GIRD their loins twice this hurricane season

6. Online reminders: E-NOTES.

7. It can tide you over: NOSH - How 'bout 9. Like many donuts: SUGARED.

8. Harmonious outfit: ENSEMBLE - Pronunciation? 

10. Tell __ story: elicit sympathy: A SOB - "Tell me again why you don't have your project done that I assigned 10 weeks ago"

11. Legal barrier: POLICE TAPE - You can have your own 1,000' for $19.29

12. How some survivalists live: OFF THE GRID - OFF THE LAND didn't cut it!

13. __ al-Khaimah: UAE emirate: RAS - In a very strategic location 

15. __ route: SCENIC 

20. Hound: HARASS - A questionable joke comes to my mind but I'll spare you.

24. Sparkle: GLINT - John Marshall forever changed the west when he saw the GLINT of gold flakes in a creek named for his boss  John Sutter on January 24, 1848

25. Sees through: GETS WISE TO - Too late, you voted for him/her

26. "Here's my advice ... ": IF I WERE YOU - A British comedy about a man and wife who change bodies and get a different 51. Viewpoint, metaphorically: LENS in the second act

28. Go along: AGREE - It's usually not a hill worth dying on!

30. Patronizes, with "at": DINES 

31. Word from the Greek for "three-footed": TRIPOD - I first learned this word in P.E. class 

36. Wannabes: ASPIRERS 

37. "I thought we were done": YOU AGAIN - Some in the above crowd follow the auditions from city-to-city despite being rejected

39. What animals do in the wild: RUN FREE - No more train rides for this elephant as Ringling Bros. retired all of them in 2015

41. Roger Goodell's gp.: THE NFL - The $30M dollar man who has tried to 44. Work out: DEVISE ways to keep players safer

49. Protest where people do and don't take a stand?: LIE IN - Ah, the 60's with John and Yoko

52. One from a penseur: IDEE - L'IDEE de Rodin était de faire une sculpture appelée "Le Penseur" (Rodin's idea was to make a sculpture called "The Thinker")

53. "Pinocchio" goldfish: CLEO - A charming example of Disney anthropomorphism starring CLEO and Figaro 

54. Often embarrassing outbreak: ACNE.

55. Doesn't keep: ROTS

56. __ money: MAD - He's not right all the time!

Before you try the "Down Dog" to honor our constructor or get out your binoculars and telescope for Moon viewing tonight, please take time to comment:

DA GRID

Thursday, August 29th 2018 Lewis Rothlein

Theme: Cloth Ears. My mother used to tell me I had "cloth ears" if I misheard something. Here we have four potential "oh, I thought you said ...."

17A. Fabricated "Murphy Brown" star?: CANVAS BERGEN. Actress Candice.

23A. Fabricated "Help!" star?: JOHN LINEN. Beatle Lennon.

Here are the Fab Four, with Lennon in a linen suit, narrowly avoiding death by a Number 39 bus (en route from Willesden to Waterloo) on their return journey across the Abbey Road zebra crossing. Paul might already have been dead, if you believe the stories. If you squint your eyes and look to the right of the bus you can see the road that I used to live on. I used to walk across Abbey Road to get to the pub where I had an evening job pulling pints of Guinness and serving up shots of Bushmill's whiskey.

50A. Fabricated "Girls" star?: LENA DENIM. Actress Durham.

56A. Fabricated "La La Land" star?: RAYON GOSLING. Actor Ryan.

and the unifier across the middle:

33A. Clergy ... and four answers in this puzzle?: PEOPLE OF THE CLOTH

Another odd-shaped puzzle Thursday, perhaps Rich has a new trend going? That's three in a row this month. The unifier here is 16 letters, so if you want to keep that as a grid-spanner, then something has to give, and that something is the traditional 15-wide constraint.

This looks to be Lewis's LAT debut, he's been in the NYT before, once with this moniker and twice with a middle "E" initial.

Full disclosure, I'm not a fan of "sounds like" themes; the kinda-sorta-homophone thing is way too subjective for me. There's a world of difference between LINEN/LENNON (close)  and DENIM/DURHAM (miles apart) but that's just me. I do like the "Fabricated ..." cluing though, that's very neat.

The fill is full (!) of nice stuff. Let's go look:

Across:

1. Sickly complexion: PALLOR

7. Eugene of "American Pie" movies: LEVY

11. Grand Canyon hrs.: MST. Mountain time. Funny that a canyon is on Mountain time, no?

14. Current unit: AMPERE. Amp for short and convenient.

15. Finnish telecom giant: NOKIA. Bumps in the road for these folk. Anyone have a Nokia phone?

16. Something to slip on?: ICE. The question mark is a little odd, it's not exactly misdirection. I get "slip on" in the "lingerie" sense, but I think it's a reach for a checho with 35D.

19. Omega-3 source: ROE

20. Ongoing: ACTIVE

21. It can get you down: SKI RUN

26. Scents: ODORS

27. Coalition creators: UNITERS. No, flat out no. Never been used in common parlance. Oh! You Uniters! You creators of coalitions! Nope.

28. Olympians using boards: DIVERS. Fun clue. Lugers, snowboarders, skeleton folks ... no, no and nope again. Oh! Summer Olympics!

30. Often-injured knee ligament, for short: MCL. I went with ACL first, didn't we all? Anterior, Median, and no doubt posterior ligaments. The ACL seems to get the worst of sports injuries. I love it when people say they ruptured their "crucial" ligament. Most of them are. The knee ligaments are "cruciate" ones. They cross over.

31. Illinois River city: PEORIA

41. Fragrant blooms: LILACS

42. MLB scoreboard letters: RHE, or more accurately, R    H    E. Not a word. Runs, Hits and Errors. Would you accept PINR in your crossword?

43. Metallic sounds: CLANKS.

45. Like some relations: SPATIAL

49. Language student's challenge: SLANG

52. Knocks their socks off: WOWS 'EM

54. Soccer star Messi: LIONEL Vote now: Messi, Maradona, Pele,  Best, Ronaldo, Puskas, Buffon, Cryuff. GOAT. Write-in votes welcome.

55. Whichever: ANY

61. Urban center?: BEE. The letter "B". It's in the middle of "urban".

62. "Your game": I LOSE

63. Paradise: UTOPIA

64. Old union member: Abbr.: SSR. A soviet socialist republic, no longer a member of the "U" in USSR.

65. Sicilian volcano: ETNA

66. Studio dweller: TENANT. Can't I own a studio? Weird clue.

Down:

1. __-Man: PAC

2. Q&A session on Reddit: AMA. Ask Me Anything, apparently. Good to know.

3. Clinic worker: Abbr.: LPN. Licensed Practical Nurse. Where do the theoretical ones go to get certified?

4. Eastern Mediterranean region: LEVANT. With "The", usually. Egypt to Turkey and eastwards to a loosely-defined area of Saudi Arabia and Iraq. It's that "loosely" that usually starts arguments.

5. Expert in futures?: ORACLE. The Oracle at Delphi. The jury is out on the accuracy of Pythia. She might have been taking the ....

6. Mix again: RE-STIR. Take verb. Add "RE". Done and done.

7. Frequent Mastroianni co-star: LOREN. Sophia. Marcello co-starred in many of her movies.

8. Ticker tape, briefly?: EKG. Nice.

9. Goes (for): VIES

10. Grammy-winning satirical artist Al: YANKOVIC

11. Magnet for a narcissist: MIRROR

12. Searches high and low: SCOURS

13. Winter temp range: TEENS. Terrible clue. It depends where you are. You don't write directional clues relative to where you are, you don't write time-based clues depending on what year you are in, you certainly don't write this clue.

15. Campbell of "House of Cards": NEVE.

18. Storage spots: BINS

22. Noble objective: IDEAL

23. Checkers move: JUMP

24. Whenever: ONCE. "Whenever upon a time". "Whenever, I met the president". "It happened whenever that I ....". Really?

25. City whose state's postal code is half its name: HILO. Thumper.

28. "Shoulda thought of that!": DOH!

29. Slight reaction?: IRE

31. One-striper: Abbr.: PFC

32. "The X-Files" subjects: ETS

34. Thinks ahead: PLANS

35. Something to slip on: LINGERIE. See 16A grump.

36. Large deer: ELK

37. Allied gp. since 1948: OAS. Organisation of American States. Tip of my tongue.

38. "Are you out __?": OR IN. I'd say "IN" first before "OUT". There's a few fills here which stretch the "in the language" rule, this is one. You can't just swap stuff around. "Feast or famine" doesn't really work as "Famine or feast". 

39. Drunken noodles cuisine: THAI

40. Nautical wheel: HELM

43. Duplicates: CLONES

44. Billy McBride on "Goliath," e.g.: LAWYER

45. Smooch in a lift: SNOG. Lift = elevator in the UK; Smooch = snog. Fair. When I was a yoot, smooching was slow-dancing, snogging frowned upon.

46. Prove successful: PAN OUT

47. Carol beginning: ADESTE. Fidelis. Oh come, all ye faithful.

48. Rat out: TELL ON

49. Clinic supply: SWABS

50. Writer Mario Vargas __: LLOSA

51. A, to Merkel: EINE. Angela Merkel. She might have said that "A" was her vorname initial.

53. __ liquor: MALT

57. "Round __ virgin ... ": YON. A Christmas mini-theme in August! How nice.

58. Pub initials: IPA. India Pale Ale. We've been over this before.

59. Diarist Anaïs: NIN

60. Noir pistol: GAT. Quite what makes it "noir" - I'm open to suggestions. Is it always black? Always used in French movies? Is there a super-villain named "Noir" who uses a "gat"? I need to know, if only for next time.

And that .... is that. Well, it would be if I posted the grid, so here it is::

Steve