Friday, January 26, 2024, Luke Schreiber

Good Morning, Cruciverbalists.  Malodorous Manatee here with today's pacer.  Excuse me, recap.  Our puzzle setter, Luke Schreiber has executed a pretty straightforward theme.  Or is it  a straightbackward theme?  At four places, Luke presents us with single-word clues followed by a question mark.  To answer these clues we are required to reverse the letters of the clue, place that reversed rendition at the end of the allotted squares, conjure up something that explains the reversal and then place that explanation at the head of the answer.  The four themed answers are found at:

21 Across:  EMIT?: TURN BACK TIME.  Turn TIME backwards and you get EMIT

39 Across:  LOOP?: REFLECTING POOL.  POOL as seen in a mirror, or reflecting pool, will appear to be reversed.  It won't read LOOP but the letters will be in that order.

52 Across:  SPOT?: FLIP TOPS.  Flip TOPS around and you get SPOT.

63 Across:  RAW?: REVOLUTIONARY WAR.  This one is a bit less straightforward but Luke has made up for that by having the answer span the entire grid.

The grid is 16 squares wide, instead of the usual 15, and the symmetry is atypical and really quite elegant in and of itself.

Here is how all of this appears in the grid:

Here are the other clues and answers:

Across:

1. Moussaka ingredient: LAMB.  Eggplant was too long.

5. Harmonious church groups: CHOIRS.  Singing in harmony.

11. Parachute necessity: CORD.  Do not forget to pull the ripCORD.

15. Cookie with a Java Chip flavor: OREO.  My niece recently sent me a link to a puzzle source and, in one of those puzzles, there was a great clue for OREO:  Cookie whose clue is almost moot since you likely knew what the answer was after reading "cookie".

16. Solitary sort: HERMIT.  We could go with a song by Herman's Hermits but this fits the clue pretty well:

Johnny Cash

17. Mind: OBEY. Do you mind (care)?  No.  What's on your mind (brain)?  No.  "You will do as I say!"

18. Wolverine, for one: XMAN.

19. Esoteric information: ARCANA.  Specialized knowledge that is mysterious to the uninitiated.

20. A few: SOME.

24. Not quite aligned: OFFSET.

OFFSET Wrenches

26. Inventor who said, "I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work": EDISON.  Thomas Alva EDISON.

29. Slugger Judge who was AP Athlete of the Year in 2022: AARON.  A baseball reference.

30. Ankle-length attire: MAXI.

34. Mouthwash brand: SCOPE.  Listerine was too long.  Act was too short.

35. Feudal estate: FIEF.

36. Selena or Selena Gomez: LATINA.  SINGER would have fit.

38. Katniss Everdeen portrayer, to fans: J LAW.  a "Hunger Games" reference.  The character is portrayed by Jennifer LAWrence.

42. Overhang: EAVE.  EAVEs hang around our puzzles quite regularly.

43. Midwestern Native: SAUK.  New to this solver.  Those in the Green Bay, Wisconsin  or Northern New York State areas may be more familiar with the SAUK.

44. Five-time Olympic gold-medal swimmer Ian: THORPE.  Jim Thorpe, it turns out, was a member of the SAUK (aka Sac and Fox) peoples.  Luke, however, has gone with Ian who is Australian.

47. Comes down hard?: SLEETS.  A hard rain's a-gonna fall.  Literally.

Figuratively

51. "Just a Geek" memoirist Wheaton: WIL.

57. Tate Modern filler: ART.  A museum reference.

58. Verdi aria that translates to "It was you": ERI TU.

60. Lisa Halaby's royal name: NOOR.  An American-born Jordanian who was the fourth wife of the late King Hussein of Jordan.  She was Queen NOOR of Jordan from 1978 until the king's death in 1999.

61. Sunlit lobbies: ATRIA.  Plural of ATRIum.  Stadium / Stadia

66. Intense: KEEN.  What do you call someone who really likes to talk about cereals?  A KEEN oat speaker.

67. Some green sauces: PESTOS.  Rarely seen pluralized.

Basil and Roasted Tomato PESTOS

68. Senate position: PAGE.  Go-fers, albeit esteemed, for the senators.

69. Divisions in an outdated atlas: Abbr.: SSRS.  Soviet Socialist RepublicS

70. Plumes: CRESTS.

Mount CRESTed Butte, Colorado

71. Exxon constituents?: EXES.  In the middle of the word.  Often clued with reference to past partners.

George Strait

Down:

1. Bagel topping: LOX.

2. Branch: ARM.  The U.S. Army is a branch of the armed forces.

3. Vegetarian: MEAT FREE.  A woman came up to me and said that she recognized me from the local vegetarian restaurant.  This confused me as I had never met herbivore.  Perhaps it was a missed steak.

4. Pot sweetener: BONUS OFFER.  Hand up for trying to think of something related to poker.

5. Root words?: CHANT.  As in to root for your favorite sports team.

6. Cilantro, e.g.: HERB.  I really need to plant some HERBs of my own.  I have been living on borrowed thyme.

7. Wolf of the sea: ORCA.  They swim through our puzzles on a regular basis.

8. Apple since 1998: IMAC.  Not a fruit reference.

9. Curling spot: RINK.

The Physics of Curling

10. Washington, but not Washington, D.C.: STATE.  Nor George.

11.  Life itself, to a crepehanger: COSMIC JOKE.

12. Recital piece for a double-reed woodwind: OBOE SOLO.

13. "Collapse Into Now" band: REM.  The clue is the name of one of REM's albums.

14. Go green, perhaps: DYE.  Hand up for first trying to think (overthink?) of something ecologically related.

22. Kylo __: "The Last Jedi" villain: REN.  A Star Wars reference.

23. Picks out, for short: IDS.  We had IDS as, IDentufieS in the puzzle that I recapped two Fridays ago.

24. Lummox: OAF.  What do you call a healthcare worker who does not self isolate after contracting COVID?  A Hippocratic OAF.

25. Just: FAIR.  Not "Just" as in merely.

27. Iridescent gem: OPAL.

28. Not old: NEW.  Now, this one is straightforward.

30. Spice cookie spice: MACE.  Also, a brand of self-defense pepper spray.

31. QB stat: ATT.  A football reference.  Passing ATTempts.

32. Roman dozen: XII.  Roman Numeral

33. Accommodating places: INNS.  Places to procure accommodations for the night.

36. Flatten: LEVEL.

37. Shocked: AGASP.

40. Squiggly baby, to a sitter: LAPFUL.  Nice wordplay employing babysitter and anyone who happens to be seated.

41. Radio wave-emitting star: PULSAR.

44. Dances provocatively: TWERKS.  Today's let's pass on the video moment.

45. New faces in the staff lounge: HIREES.

46. "Last Week Tonight" host John: OLIVER.

48. Swab target: EAR WAX.  A Q-tip™ reference.  

49. Emergency priority system: TRIAGE.

50. Unblinking looks: STARES.

53. __ Miami CF: INTER.  A Major League Soccer reference.

54. Self-composure: POISE.

55. Friendly horn sounds: TOOTS.  As opposed to an unfriendly horn sound?

56. " ... but I could be wrong": OR NOT.  "I take back everything that I just said."

59. Heavy weights: TONS.  SNOT?

62. Variety: TYPE.

64. Lines at the register?: UPC.  Universal Product Code aka Bar Code

65. Donkey: ASS.

Well, that will wrap things up for today.   Time, now, to get my donkey back on the slopes.

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Friday, June 23, 2023, Luke Schreiber

 

Good Morning, Cruciverbalists.  Malodorous Manatee here, once again, with a Friday recap.  Today's puzzle setter is Luke Schreiber.  As seems to be more common recently, I could find no previous reference to Luke here at the Corner so this may be his L A Times debut.  In any event, today, Luke has elected to do a riff on RIGHTs.  Right turns, Right angles, human Rights.

Two weeks ago I recapped a puzzle in which the theme answers were placed vertically in the grid in lieu of the more often seen horizontal placement.  Today, we get yet another approach.  At five places in the puzzle, all identified with circles, Luke requires us to make a right-angle (90 degree) turn to the right in order to get the right answer to the Down clue.  The answer to that clue requires the combining of the Down clue's answer with the corresponding Across clue's answer. Here are the five places that make up the themed answers:

1 Down:  Bounces back: RALL with 20 Across:  "It's all untrue!": LIES.  RALLIES  I imagine that most everyone went "Huh!?" when 1 Down filled.  Or did it?

7 Down:  Some Arctic Cats: SNOWMOB  with 35 Across:  Gymnast Simone: BILES.  SNOWMOBILES

10 Down:  RuPaul's competition: DRAG with 22 Across:  Coup de __: GRACE.  DRAG RACE  This one confused yours truly for a bit as the down answer, DRAG, is able to stand alone as a real word, a feature exhibited at none of the other four theme-word combinations.  After scratching my head for a while I assumed that RALL and SNOWMOB (which had previously been filled in) were, indeed, the right answers and that it was time to stop overthinking things and move right along.

26 Down:  Extremely beautiful, perhaps: HEARTST with 54 Across: Froyo choice: TOPPING.  HEART STOPPING.  A little bit odd as FROYO was a "truncated" clue (FROzen YOgurt) but the answer was a complete word.

48 Dwon:  Quilting technique: APPLIQ with 71 Across:  "¿__ pasa?": QUE.  APPLIQUE

The unifier comes at 64 Across:

64 Across:  Freedoms protected by the Equality Act, and an apt title for this puzzle?: LGBTQ RIGHTS.  Note that, when taken in order, the pivot points spell out LGBTQ.

Here is how all of this looks in the grid:

Here are the rest of the clues and answers.  Content warning:  Roughly a dozen or so are proper names.  Some additional theme-related answers also appear here and there:

Across:

1. Noisy toy: RATTLE.  Shouldn't RATTLEsnake warnings be called "Cautionary Tails"?

7. Went fast: SPED.

11. Oroville structure: DAM.

14. Legends on the road: ACURAS.  An automobile make/model reference.

15. Depilatory brand: NAIR.  Was it going to be NEET or VEET?  Nope.

16. Post-op area: ICU.  The Intensive Care Unit at a hospital.

17. Beatles song with the lyric "Sunday morning creeping like a nun": LADY MADONNA.  I strongly suspect that the Beatles imagery was not meant to evoke anything quite like these self-described "nuns":

.

19. Fistful of bills: WAD.  A wad of cash.  I guess the Times wished to avoid paying a royalty on this clue.

21. Possess: OWN.

24. Remorseful: ASHAMED.  Why was the pterodactyl not ASHAMED to use the toilet?  Its "P" was silent.

28. Nobelist Wiesel: ELIE.

29. Epicurious.com offering: RECIPE.  A very good web site to visit when you are looking for a RECIPE.

32. Lucille Clifton's "Homage to My Hips," for one: ODE.  In puzzles, the poems almost always turn out to be ODEs.

33. Lab container: VIAL.  Why are almost all test tube manufacturers single?  People seem to find them VIAL.

34. Bright bloom: DAHLIA.

37. "Rules __ rules": ARE.    . . and they are meant to be followed,  we are told.

 

38. Hesitant sound: ERM.  Punt!

40. Minor matter: NIT.  Idiomatic, unless you are, perhaps, a chimpanzee.

41. "Delish!": YUM.

44. SLR setting: F-STOP.  A photography reference.  The aperture setting on a Single Lens Reflex camera.

46. Halloumi, e.g.: CHEESE.  If it were Monday the clue might have been Cheddar.

48. Québec chum: AMIE.  Français dans l'indice donc Français pour la réponse.

51. Early Beatle Sutcliffe: STU.  Sometimes referred to as "the fifth Beatle".  We sometimes see this clued along the lines of "letter run after R".

52. Got bronze?: TANNED.  Not an Olympics reference.

53. Window part: PANE.  My stupid, hungry donkey decided to eat a window.  It was a pane in the ass.

56. Subject of many June parades: PRIDE.  Continuing with the theme.

58. "Awesome!": RAD.  "Bitchin'!"  "Groovy!"  "Far Out, Man!"  "Phat!"

59. Exercise aftermath: ACHE.

63. Cap: LID.  Remember when a LID cost $10?

68. "__ say!": I'LL.

69. Pouty face: MOUE.

70. Backup squads: B-TEAMS.

72. Cheek: SASS.

73. Attend without a partner: GO SOLO.

Down:

2. Berry that's a superfood: ACAI.  Frequently served in our puzzles.

"3. Truculent behavior, informally: TUDE.  Derived from attiTUDE.  "Don't Cop a TUDE, bro."

4. Seafarer's choice during a storm: TRYSAIL.  New to this solver.  "A TRYSAIL is a substitute mainsail designed solely for storm conditions. Setting independently of the boom it is loose-footed and designed to sit above the stack of your mainsail using a long tack strop."  Got it?

5. On the __: LAM.  Fleeing from the law.

6. Finnish conductor __-Pekka Salonen: ESA.  He led the Los Angeles Philharmonic from 1992 until 2009 when Gustavo Dudamel succeeded him.

8. Prepared for a close-up shot: PANNED IN.  A pan shot is a horizontal camera movement in which the camera pivots left or right while its base remains in a fixed location.

9. German article: EIN.  Was is going to be DER?  Nein.

11. South Asian festival of lights: DIWALI.  A bit obscure (to us North Americans) but we have seen this reference to the Hindu Festival of Lights a few previous times.

12. Tree favored by giraffes: ACACIA.

13. Bottom-dwelling fish: MUD EEL.  Also known as Heterenchelyidae but that would not fit the allotted space.   

18. __ double take: DO A.

23. Cranks (up): REVS.

25. Spots: SPIES.  Used as a verb.  Not, for example, a Dalmatian dog reference.

27. Corpus __: prosecutor's concern: DELICTI.

29. Nutrition fig.: RDA.  For those of you who have may not read a food product information label in the last twenty or thirty years, Recommended Daily Allowance.

30. Sideburn neighbor: EAR.

31. Michael of "SNL": CHE.

36. Actor Hawke: ETHAN.

39. Tour vehicle, quaintly: MOTOR BUS.

41. Osaka currency: YEN.  Money in Japan.

42. Exploit: USE.  Used as a verb.

43. __ school: MED.  DAY?  OLD?  LAW?  ART?  At least those are not abbreviated as is MEDical in response to a non-abbreviated clue.

44. Satellite signal: FEED.

45. Leaves the larval stage: PUPATES.  Rarely seen in our puzzles as a verb.  More often we see PUPA as in the insect stage between larva and adult.

47. Ties up: ENGAGES.  Perhaps a new take on an ENGAGEment announcement?

49. Henner of "Taxi": MARILU.  A TV sitcom reference.  There should be no trouble picking her out in this photo:

50. Warming up the car, say: IN IDLE.

55. ASAP kin: PDQ.  Pretty Darn Quick

57. Trees with many streets named after them: ELMS.  And streets with many movies named after them.

60. Rosalind of 2020's "Mulan": CHAO.

61. Web page standard: HTML.  HyperText Markup Language is used, among myriad other applications, to produce our daily Crossword Corner blogs.

62. Petro-Canada rival: ESSO.  A reprise from two weeks ago.  This time without the "petrol" reference.

65. Indian state known for white-sand beaches: GOA.  At 18 Down we had DO A.  Do these fit ___  T?

66. First member of SCOTUS to officiate a same-sex wedding: RBG.  Supreme Court Of The United States justice The "Notorious" Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

67. Manga artist Junji: ITO.  Often clued with reference to Judge Lance ITO.

As I am otherwise engaged, this seems like the right time to bid adieu for this morning  . . .

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