Thursday, December 22nd 2016, Bill Zagozewski

Theme:  Ringmasters ... The circles in the corners of the "boxing ring" grid contain the names of four professional world champions.

We've got:

Max BAER - American heavyweight champion in the 1930's. Famous for defeating Max Schmeling, who was Hitler's favorite fighter and promoted as an example of the superiority of the Aryan race. He lost his title to James Braddock in one of the biggest upsets in boxing history.

Muhammad ALI - no introduction required for a second American heavyweight world champion. He defeated the next corner occupant for the title in 1964, and retained the title in their 1965 rematch. This photograph, by Neil Leifer for TIME magazine stands as one of the most famous sports images of all time. I've got a monochrome reproduction on my wall.

Sonny LISTON - a third American heavyweight world champion in the 1960's, beating Floyd Patterson for the title in 1962 before Ali took his place.

And finally, a fourth American heavyweight - no wait, we've got Roberto DURÁN, a Panamanian fighter who held world titles in four weight divisions in his career, from lightweight to middleweight, He was famous (or notorious) for quitting during his 1982 title defense against "Sugar" Ray Leonard in the 8th round, saying to the referee "No más". That was his 74th fight. He retired after 119 fights, so seemingly there was "poquito más" left in him.

There are four companion entries to the corners

25A. Prize for today's puzzle's circles : CHAMPIONSHIP

52A. Introductory words for each set of puzzle circles : IN THIS CORNER

5A. With 71-Across, event for today's puzzle's circles : TITLE and

71A. See 5-Across : FIGHT

This looks like an LAT debut for Bill, so congratulations for that achievement.

Now I'm going to rain on the parade - I didn't like this much - I can't see any connection between the boxers other than they won a world championship. Only LISTON "fills" his corner - it just seems so inconsistent. Throw in a slew of  three-letter abbreviations and partials and prefix/suffix stuff and the whole thing seems forced.

There is some nice stuff in the downs, so let's go look at what we've got.

Across:

1. Beginning of space? : AERO

10. Sea that's a shrinking lake : ARAL

14. Jazz Age toon : BOOP. Betty. Boop-boop-be-doo.

15. Comes (from) : HAILS.

16. Roast, in Rouen : RÔTI. Rouen has a magnificent cathedral, and a belfry full of very loud bells, as I discovered when I stayed at a little hotel in the shadow of the spires and was woken up on Sunday morning.

17. __ about : ON OR

18. "Miss __ Playhouse": jazz CD for kids : ELLA'S. Learning moment. Miss Fitzgerald.

19. Fishing, perhaps : ASEA

20. Outlaw Belle : STARR. Convicted of horse theft in 1883. New to me.

22. PBS funder : NEA

24. Tally : SUM

29. Org. with a snake in its logo : A.M.A.

31. Detestable sort : TOAD

32. Late 19th-century presidential monogram : CAA. Chester A. Arthur. President from 1881 to 1885.

33. Family babysitter : NANA

35. Cut : SLICED INTO

40. Dignify : EXALT

42. Fireworks reaction : OOH!

43. Starters : A-TEAM

44. Curaçao's capital : WILLEMSTAD. Another learning moment. The former capital of the Netherlands Antilles, betraying the Dutch origin of the name.

47. Conclusion preceder : IF SO ..

48. Andean tuber : OCA

49. Turkmenistan neighbor : IRAN

51. Want-ad letters : E.E.O. Equal Employment Opportunity.

56. Titled rapper : DRE. Dr. Dre.

57. Radical '70s org. : S.L.A.

58. Teen superhero's family : KENTS. Superman.

60. Pupil's place : UVEA

62. "You __ one!" : OWE ME

65. Nantes nothing : RIEN.

67. Disencumbers : RIDS

68. Sacks : FIRES

69. Conductor Klemperer or an emperor : OTTO

70. Reformed demon on "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" : ANYA. Thank you, crosses. I'm not up on my "Buffy" characters.

72. Place to find bullets : LIST

Down:

1. Blood system letters : ABO. This fill probably wouldn't fly in Australia.

2. Ages : EONS

3. Ordeal at the dentist's office : ROOT CANAL

4. Oxygen network co-founder : OPRAH

5. Soup container : THERMOS

6. Proverb ending? : IAL

7. Up to, commercially : TIL

8. Southwestern plain : LLANO

9. Perfume : ESSENCE

10. Altar in the sky : ARA

11. Mantegna's "Criminal Minds" role : ROSSI. Thank you, crosses. I only saw one episode because one of my friends was guest-starring.

12. Really enjoyed : ATE UP

13. Singer Payne of One Direction : LIAM. Boy Band fave. He's apparently planning to go solo, according to the Brit tabloids. Stop the presses!

21. Proverbial deserter : RAT. I'm not sure that you can blame the rats when the ship is sinking.

23. Grilled, in Mexican fare : ASADA. Food! Usually skirt steak presented as carne asada.

26. California's __ Verdes Peninsula : PALOS. Pete Sampras learned his tennis at a club here.

27. Beyond silly : IDIOTIC

28. Golfe de la Gonâve country : HAITI. WAG with "H" in place, but I couldn't come up with many other french-speaking countries beginning that way.

29. From the top : ANEW

30. Modest skirt : MAXI

34. Mete out : ALLOT

36. "Cuchi-cuchi" celebrity : CHARO.  María del Rosario Mercedes Pilar Martínez Molina Baeza to her friends.

37. Akhenaten's queen : NEFERTITI. I can't think of any alternative Egyptian queens, to be honest. Oh wait, Cleopatra!

38. Subdue, perhaps : TASE

39. Melville novel : OMOO.

41. Staffers of Apple's Genius Bar : TECHS.

45. Send : MAIL OFF

46. Least lit : DARKEST

50. Butte-to-Helena dir. : N.N.E.

52. NFL Network analyst Michael __ : IRVIN. Legendary Dallas Cowboys receiver who won three Superbowl rings in the 90's.

53. Unable to make ends meet : NEEDY

54. Slasher film sequel of 2005 : SAW II

55. Become a member, in Manchester : ENROL. One "L" in the British spelling. There's a very (very!) short street in Manchester named for my paternal grandfather, apparently.

56. Commercial prefix meaning "long-lasting" : DURA-

59. Places : SETS

61. Hard-rock link : AS A

63. Unit of work : ERG

64. Verbal shrug : MEH. Keeping quiet on this one.

66. "Tricked you!" : NOT!

That about does it for me. In the United Airlines in-flight magazine they've started publishing a New York Times Sunday puzzle - the one I found a couple of days ago on the way to Honolulu was missing about 25 of the "Down" clues. Made finishing it something of a challenge!

Aloha, and Mele Kalikimaka!

Steve

Thursday, December 15th, 2016 Bruce Haight

Theme: Oh Captain! My Captain! Four of them lurking in the grid:

17A. D-Day code name : OMAHA BEACH. Ahab. He of the pathological preoccupation with Moby Dick in Herman Melville's book.

24A. Again : ONE MORE TIME. Nemo, Jules Verne's skipper of the Nautilus. He also popped up in the movie "The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen" - a fun flick from 2003.

49A. Cleaner with a blade : SQUEEGEE MOP. Queeg. Ineffectual captain in The Caine Mutiny. SQUEEGEE is a great brand name.

58A. 1957 #1 song title that appears in the line after "I'm in love" : ALL SHOOK UP. Hook. Another monomaniac, this time in J.M.Barrie's Peter Pan. With pleasing symmetry for this puzzle, Melville provided Barrie with the inspiration for the character.

35A. Indication of cooperation with ones hidden in this puzzle's four other longest answers : AYE, AYE, CAPTAIN!

Very nice effort from Bruce, I wonder if QUEEG was the seed that germinated the idea for this puzzle? Enjoyable romp through a selection of Masters and Commanders. Let's see what else we've got.

Across:

1. Moves with effort : PLODS. Also a mildly derogatory term for British policemen, from Enid Blyton's character "P.C. Plod"

6. Golden Fleece ship : ARGO. Aye, aye, Jason!

10. Tach nos. : RPMS. Should be RsPM in Steve World. I find it funny that cars with a fully-automatic transmission have a tachometer in the dash. It serves no useful function whatsoever.

14. Any "30 Rock" episode, now : RERUN

15. Trial version : DEMO. Had "BETA" first. That didn't stay in too long.

16. Tahari of fashion : ELIE. Thank you, crosses. I discover he is an Israel-Iranian fashion designer.

19. Carroll specialties : PUNS. The Mock Turtle's teacher was nicknamed "tortoise, because he taught us". Most of Carroll's puns are homophones - he was writing for a ten-year-old and kept the humor simple.

20. Got elected : WON

21. Influence : PULL

22. Loaf : DOG IT

23. Official lang. of Trinidad and Tobago : ENG. The Queen's version, naturally.

27. Oktoberfest souvenirs : STEINS. Cheers!

29. Actor Stephen : REA

30. Clear : NET

31. Balkan native : SERB

32. "Key Largo" co-star : BACALL. Had the "B", but had to wait. Could be BOGART.

40. Red hair and green eyes : TRAITS

41. Some PX patrons : NCO'S

43. George Lucas' alma mater: Abbr. : USC. University of Southern California here in Los Angeles. His family foundation gave the film school $10m a couple of years ago. He graduated in 1967.

46. Having one sharp : IN G

47. It makes a lot of dough : BAKERY

53. Bishops and pawns : MEN. Chess people, not chess men. After all, there's a couple of queens in there.

54. "The Last Supper," for one : MURAL. Leonardo's masterwork at the convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie, Milano.

55. NBA part: Abbr. : NATL.

56. Keep __ distance : AT A

57. Pains : AILS

61. Hunted one : PREY

62. Security lapse : LEAK

63. Dr. Evil portrayer in Austin Powers films : MYERS. Funny guy.

64. Lab fluids : SERA. Que sera, sera - whatever lab fluids will be.

65. Garage sale caveat : AS IS

66. Capital on the Aar : BERNE

Down:

1. Masterful ability : PROWESS

2. Soothing brew : LEMON TEA

3. Citrus greenhouse : ORANGERY. Kensington Palace in London have converted theirs to a restaurant. Nice place for a cup of soothing lemon tea. Posh digs. The Peter Pan statue is close by. Our 58A captain would not approve.

4. "I can't believe I missed that!" : DUH!

5. Wisconsin-based tool manufacturer : SNAP-ON

6. Young adult fiction writer Griffin : ADELE. Fresh new clue. Gives Fred's sister, the singer and Jane Eyre's charge a break from crossword duty.

7. Sphere of influence : REALM

8. Sierra or Yukon : GMC.

9. "I'm impressed!" : OOH!

10. Move, roots and all : RE-POT

11. Connect to a power source : PLUG IN. The mobile worker's perennial problem. It's getting easier to find laptop power at airports nowadays though.

12. Dr. Evil's cohort : MINI-ME

13. Italian sonnet closing : SESTET. Italian referring to the word, not the sonnet itself. The second part of the sonnet being the closing six lines. The first eight are called the octave. Here's Bill the Bard with the closing of Sonnet 18:

But thy eternal summer shall not fade,

Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st,

Nor shall death brag thou wand’rest in his shade,

When in eternal lines to Time thou grow’st.

     So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,

     So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

18. Subject that may come up in a frank discussion? : BUNS. Nice clue. I like Hebrew National franks.

22. Provided the hands : DEALT

25. Ocean predators : ORCAS

26. Garner : REAP

28. "Su-r-r-r-re" : I BET

32. Pantyhose shade : BEIGE

33. Vegas routine : ACT

34. Tall and thin : LANK

36. Disney daughter of King Triton : ARIEL. The Little Mermaid.

37. Masculine principle : YANG

38. Fridge convenience : ICE MAKER. My fridge doesn't have one. There's no water line to the fridge location, so there's not much point.

39. Point at which commitment occurs : NO RETURN. I'm flying to Honolulu on Sunday. 1,260 miles out from LAX is just about PNR for that trip.

42. Neural junction : SYNAPSE

43. Some road atlas pgs. : U.S. MAPS

44. Knight's attendant : SQUIRE

45. Stone-pushing Winter Olympian : CURLER. I love watching curling in the Olympics. You only get to see the sport once every four years, unless there's an ESPN 24-hour curling channel that I'm missing.

47. Those two : BOTH

48. Self-possession : APLOMB

50. Cushy class : EASY A. This was a struggle - I was trying to think of a luxurious cabin class.

51. Zhou __ : EN LAI

52. Mardi Gras purchases : MASKS

58. Harper Lee's home st. : ALA.

59. Avignon article : LES. Avignon's got a 12th century bridge that only spans a small part of the Rhone. It kept getting washed away in floods and eventually the good burghers of Avignon got sick and tired of rebuilding it so it was abandoned in the mid 1600's.

60. Santana's "__ Como Va" : OYE. Came a little too late for a music link so I'll save it for next week.

And with that, here's the grid!

Steve

Thursday, December 8th 2016 Jerry Edelstein

Theme: Waxing and Waning - as the reveal neatly explains.

18A. "Next subject" : MOVING ON

22A. Historic Potomac estate : MOUNT VERNON. The cupola is to help ventilate the attic, apparently.

38A. With 40-Across, NPR broadcast since 1979 : MORNING

40A. See 38-Across : EDITION. Clever way to span the grid without having 15 letters to do it with. Will irritate cross-reference dislikers, but I thought it was neat.

49A. "Life of Brian" comedy group : MONTY PYTHON. Quite a few Brit references in the puzzle today. Before satellite TV was common, Michael Palin paid to install a dish at the local pub here in Studio City so he could watch the English soccer over a beer or two. Nice chap.

and the reveal:


61A. First or last quarter ... and, literally, what can be found on either end of 18-, 22-, 38-/40- and 49-Across : HALF MOON . Here's the lovely Half Moon Bay near San Francisco: It waxes and wanes with the tides.

Nice theme from Jerry and a good-looking grid with some solid blocks in the NW and SE. Let's see what else we've got:

Across:

1. Throws the first pitch : STARTS

7. Find fault : CARP

11. Bygone Ford : LTD

14. They may be hard : CIDERS. The first alcohol we started drinking as teens. The sweet varieties would give you a headache. The dry ones were better. They both got you looking sideways.

15. Tavern : ALEHOUSE

17. Hunt's TV co-star : REISER. Helen and Paul in "Mad About You". Funny show.

19. Made dinner at home : ATE IN. Something I'm quite partial to. I love spending a couple of hours in the kitchen.

20. "Sold!" : DEAL!

21. CIA predecessor : OSS. Office of *ahem* Strategic Services.

25. Son-gun connection : OF A

26. __ land: disputed territory : NO MAN'S

31. Rueful word : ALAS

35. Quick snack : NOSH.

37. Simple home : TEPEE

42. Word with box or light : IDIOT. I had an idiot light in my old Jaguar to alert me to the fact that the gas tank was close to empty. It didn't mean a great deal as the gauge didn't work at all, so the light was always on. I used to fill the tank when the trip-meter ticked over the 200 mile mark. I averaged around 8MPG. That's one big carbon hoof-print.

43. Levelheaded : SANE

45. Timer drizzler : SAND

46. Mussel habitat : SEABED. We used to pull them off the pier supports when I was a kid. No sand.

48. Uno plus due : TRE

56. Plant studied by Mendel : PEA.

59. With 41-Down, tries for a long pass, in football lingo : GOES

60. Odor : AROMA. Morning coffee! Yay! My morning soundtrack is the coffee grinder setting me up for the day. Peet's Coffee, Major Dickerson's Roast. Whole Bean.

63. Action scenes : CHASES

64. Get-out-of-jail card? : BAIL BOND. I'd love to claim that I've never needed one of these. Youthful indiscretions, and all that.

65. Museum guide : DOCENT

66. 32-Down contents : ORE

67. Fruity coolers : ADES

68. "Nothing to it!" : SO EASY!

Down:

1. Make a run for it : SCRAM!

2. Connect with : TIE TO

3. Parting mot : ADIEU. En Paris.

4. Lacquer ingredient : RESIN

5. Former Senator Lott : TRENT

6. Lat. or Lith., once : S.S.R. Latvia and Lithuania were Soviet Socialist Republics. Seems a long time ago now.

7. Traffic enforcement devices : CAMERAS. I got nailed for a "California Roll" leaving Malibu Canyon State Park and not coming to a complete halt at the stop sign. I paid for an hour or three of the cost of keeping the park open, which was ironic as I wasn't actually allowed to stay there - the place had been booked out by a movie shoot. I wish they'd posted that at the entrance where I put my $5 in the honesty box before being asked to leave.

8. Take out __ : A LOAN

9. Love Is On makeup maker : REVLON. Thank you, crosses.

10. Upsilon follower : PHI

11. Hauls : LUGS

12. Menu possessive linked to the Qing dynasty : TSO'S. The General's famous chicken.

13. Place in the woods : DEN

16. Tokyo-born artist : ONO

20. Gets the mist off : DE-FOGS

23. World Cup skiing champ Lindsey : VONN. I'd have liked to show a shot of her skiing, but after scrolling down about 300 pictures of her in a swimsuit, I gave up. Great (skiing) talent.

24. "Moi?!" : NOT I!

27. Citi Field squad : METS

28. Polynesian capital : APIA. Nailed it!

29. Bright sign : NEON

30. Text command : SEND

31. "Time's Arrow" author : AMIS. English novelist Martin. The story runs backwards in time - it seems common now, but was very unusual when I first read the book.

32. 66-Across source : LODE. The discovery of the Comstock Lode in Nevada in 1858 precipitated large-scale silver mining across the US. I read once that the miners were looking for salt, but found something a little more shiny.

33. Covent Garden solo : ARIA. London's opera house. I used to drive a truck part-time to pick up produce from the old fruit and vegetable market right across the street. The market buildings are still there, but the stores are all craft and trinket shops now.

34. Pretentious sort : SNOB

36. Eight British kings : HENRYS. "I'm 'enery the eighf I am, 'enery the eighf I am I am, I got married to the widder next door ....."

39. Agenda listing : ITEM

41. See 59-Across : DEEP

44. Shows up : ATTENDS

47. Give to charity, say : DO GOOD

50. Peter of Herman's Hermits : NOONE. Another Brit. He clapped a lot. Coincidentally, Herman's Hermits recorded the "I'm Henry" ditty above.

51. Webmail option : YAHOO

52. Copy exactly : TRACE

53. Old Testament prophet : HOSEA

54. Future foretellers : OMENS

55. Really bad : NASTY

56. Carson forerunner : PAAR. Jack before Johnny on "The Tonight Show".

57. Nobelist Wiesel : ELIE

58. Duck mascot company, on the NYSE : AFL

61. Starz rival : HBO

62. Kellogg School deg. : M.B.A. At Northwestern U.

63. Some retirement acct. holdings : CDS. Certificates of Deposit. I always thought these kinds of abbreviations should be rendered as "CsD" for example, but no-one agrees with me.

Just time to tack on the grid and that should do it for me today.

Steve

Note from C.C.:

Happy birthday to our cool Jazzbumpa (Ron), who's taking December off from blogging to focus on his rehearsals and other activities. Hope you don't mind, Ron, I snipped this picture from your Facebook. It's taken by one of his friends. Ron often posts sweet pictures about his family on Facebook, so does our Steve. Wish you could see his Mexico beach & swim-up bar pictures.

Thursday, December 1st, 2016 Bruce Haight

Theme: Siteswap Eight - or Juggling Jive. The word JUGGLING is spelled out by the circles, starting with the J at the bottom and progressing clockwise in a circle, cascade-style.

17A. Elaborate costume parties : MASKED BALLS

53A. Places for seeing stars? : BOXING RINGS

11D. What can help you avoid getting stuck changing diapers? : SAFETY PINS

28D. Groups with a piece-keeping strategy? : CHESS CLUBS

and the reveal:

48D. Nonsense talk, whose circled letter is the start of what might be done with items in the four longest puzzle answers : JIVE. Cue those falsetto-singing Australians. Get your disco on.

Wow, what a nice puzzle! This one presented three challenges for me - the puzzle itself, trying to figure out what the reveal meant, and finally seeing the juggling theme in the circles. The way I see it, the word JIVE is the juggler (as I've colored in the grid at the bottom). Fine work from Bruce today.

The first known juggling image comes from a wall painting in the tomb of an ancient Egyptian prince c. 1750 BC. The lady on the right doesn't seem to have much to juggle, but the one next to her is doing a cross-handed bedazzle. Neat!

I learned to juggle at a trade show in Maastricht back in the 80's. I was on booth duty and the show was very poorly attended, so customers were few and far between. One of the vendors had hacky sack giveaways, so we all took three or four and learned to juggle. By the end of the week the only activity to be seen across the floor was about 100 people doing three and four siteswaps. Fun times.

Across:

1. Asset for Sherlock : LOGIC

6. Fast : RAPID

11. Additional information? : SUM. Fine example of clue trickery. 1+2 = 3.

14. Important period : EPOCH

15. Eat into : ERODE

16. What makes a deal ideal? : AN "I". Love it.

Coach: There's no "I" in "Team"!

19. Pickle : FIX

20. "Zip it!" : SHH!

21. Prosperity : WEAL. This was new to me - I thought at first I'd made a mistake in the crosses. It seems to be a pretty obscure usage, dictionary searches don't bring it up at first pass, and it's buried pretty deeply in the thesaurus. Nice learning moment.

22. "Blah, blah, blah," for short : ETC, ETC

24. Golden __ : AGER

25. "I used to be Snow White, but I __": Mae West : DRIFTED. She was pretty racy for the times. Still would be, judging by this picture:

26. Part of the pelvis : SACRUM

29. In essence : MAINLY

30. "Bor-r-ring" : HO-HUM

31. LPGA great Lopez : NANCY. During her "farewell" season on tour, one rather famous player could be heard one Thursday: "I'm so sick of this. Every week it's the same thing. Nancy shows up, Nancy gets a plaque, Nancy cries, Nancy misses the cut. Call it a career already". Made me laugh.

32. Green shade : PEA

35. Rare blood type, briefly : A-NEG

36. Shakespearean barmaid : WENCH. 

"Oh, ill-starred wench! Pale as your smock!"

Othello

37. Picky details : NITS. We never see any of those around here, right?

38. "But __ got high hopes ... ": song lyric : HE'S

39. Neutral tone : BEIGE

40. Prefix with -gram : PENTA

41. Like angel food cake : SPONGY. I had SPONGE first until MANGY corrected me. MANGE didn't work as an adjective.

43. Curry favor with, with "to" : KISS UP

44. Ill-mannered : UNCOUTH

46. Veers suddenly : ZIGS. Z_GS and wait for the cross.

47. Distance runners : MILERS. I was a pretty OK distance runner, the longer the better - I was too stubborn to admit defeat. The sprint finishers always did for me though - I had no fast gear. Not too sure I've got much of a slow one any more, come to think of it.

48. First name in folk : JONI. Mitchell.

49. How it's always done, initially : SOP. Standard Operating Procedure. The crosses filled this one in for me - I had to think quite hard as to what the acronym stood for. In fact, I had to think so hard that I had Google do the thinking.

52. Heat meas. : B.T.U. British Thermal Unit. The British are very understated with their "thermal units" of weather. Icicles hanging from your ears means "it's a bit chilly out". Hurricane-force winds are "breezy". The opposite applies with heat, as there is rarely any of it. Any day above 70F is "a scorcher". Two consecutive scorchers constitute "a heatwave" and attracts comparisons to the weather in Spain. Three in a row and the Town Hall issues a three-week hosepipe ban.

56. CSA soldier : REB.

57. Green shade : OLIVE. Two shades of green today.

58. Fragrances : ODORS

59. Pack animal : ASS

60. Snooped (around) : NOSED

61. "Check" : NO BET. Poker term. When you decline to open the betting in a particular round and pass to the next player.

Down:

1. NASA vehicles : LEMS. Lunar Exploration Modules.

2. Fish with vermilion fins : OPAH. Reminds me of the toasts in "My Big Fat Greek Wedding". Ώπα! 

3. "Jeepers!" : GOSH

4. "Ugh!" : ICK

5. Enjoy Orbit : CHEW GUM. 

6. Masonry-reinforcing rod : REBAR. From "reinforcing bar", which is too much of a mouthful.

7. Inland Asian sea : ARAL

8. D.C. player : POL. Got me with "NAT" first.

9. Set-for-life set : IDLE RICH

10. Lot : DESTINY

12. Form a coalition : UNITE

13. Personalized collection of love songs, say : MIX CD. Mix tapes in my day. The main character in Nick Hornby's book "High Fidelity" makes mix tapes for any girl he's trying to date. John Cusack starred in the movie. Jack Black has an outstanding performance, one of his early successes.

18. Consider : DEEM

23. Toronto Argonauts' org. : C.F.L. Canadian Football League. Nine teams, currently.

24. "... bug in __" : A RUG. As snug as a ..

25. Hustle or shuffle : DANCE

26. Former Mideast ruler : SHAH

27. Tops : A-ONE

29. Like many a stray dog : MANGY

31. Bay sound : NEIGH

33. Incredulous dying words : ET TU?

34. "Hurry!" letters : ASAP! Not STAT. Wait for the crosses if you've just got the A.

36. Tried to make it on one's own : WENT SOLO

37. Storied loch : NESS. More than 22 miles long. Spectacular views too.

39. New Orleans' __ Street : BOURBON, I went for an early-morning run down Bourbon Street one Sunday morning. Let's just say it wasn't one of my better ideas.

40. Crude smelting product : PIG IRON

42. "Once upon a midnight dreary" poet : POE.

43. Two-checker piece : KING. I think this fella can jump backwards, but I haven't played checkers since I was five.

44. Eclipse shadow : UMBRA

45. Times in ads : NITES

46. Daydreamed, with "out" : ZONED. Sorry, what was that?

49. Stuffed shirt : SNOB

50. Brutish one : OGRE. I read "British one" first, and wondered why OGRE? We're not all meanies.

51. "You there!" : PSST

54. Ones following the nus? : XIS. It's all Greek to me.

55. Court promise : I DO. As in promising to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but. We geeks learn the meaning of third normal form in a relational database by memorizing: "The key, the whole key and nothing but the key, so help me Codd".

And with that, I think I'm done. Time for some caffeine.

Steve

Thursday, November 24th, 2016 Nora Pearlstone

Theme: The Puzzle That Keeps On ..

1A. Giving __ : ADVICE

17A. Giving __ : PERMISSION

40A. Giving __ : CONSENT

63A. Giving __ : DIRECTIONS

71A. Giving __ : THANKS. I assume this is the reason for all the "giving" today.

11D. Giving __ : ASSISTANCE

25D. Giving __ : LESSONS

27D. Giving __ : BLOOD

29D. Giving __ : ABSOLUTION

33D. Giving __ : BIRTH

Happy Turkey Day!

A thumping 74 theme squares in this one. With themage this heavy in a 15x15 with 36 blocks, that leaves a challenge to fill the remaining white squares cleanly without the whole thing feeling forced. I confess I didn't really enjoy this experience. There's nothing to relate the theme entries to each other except for the fill-in-the-blank clue unless there's some meta-element to the puzzle that I've missed.

Given there are ten fill-in-the-blank clues in the theme, I'd have tried very hard not to have any more of those in the puzzle, but there are another three in the across set.

Throw in an unhealthy dose of IT A/EWW/OHO/AS I/PHI/PSIS/TNPK/EPI/ISM/OTS/PYS and I'm feeling more BLAH than anything else. I'm not sure the "Thanksgiving" payoff was really worth the stuffing that went into this.

Alrighty then! I got that off my chest. I'm having a few days of downtime in Mexico this week. Here's the sunrise this morning while I was walking on the beach - now I know where the namesake tequila cocktail got its name. Cheers!

Let's see what else we've got going on:

Across:

7. High ick factor reaction : EWW

10. "Misery" co-star : CAAN

14. Title teen in a '90s-'00s sitcom : MOESHA. Passed me by. Thank you, crosses. The last episode aired back in 2001.

15. Key letter : PHI. The symbol of the Phi Beta Kappa fraternity is a key. Of course it is.

16. Regarding : AS TO

19. General __ chicken : TSO'S

20. Actor who gave up wearing his trademark gold jewelry after Hurricane Katrina : MR T.

21. Kingston Trio hit with the line "He may ride forever 'neath the streets of Boston" : MTA. Fresh in the memory from 1949.

22. Stew : AGONIZE

24. While : SPELL

26. Places to unwind : SPAS

27. Boring : BLAH

30. Eggs from the sea : ROE

31. Can opener : POP TAB

34. Chad neighbor : LIBYA

36. Coveted award : OSCAR

38. "__ said earlier ... " : AS I

39. Brief game deciders? : OT'S. Overtimes. Just one in the NFL, as many as it takes in college football until there's a winner.

42. "Morning Edition" airer : NPR

43. "So that's your game!" : OHO!

44. Williams of "Happy Days" : ANSON. "Potsie" portrayer.

45. Ref. to a prior ref. : OP. CIT. "Opere citado" - "In the work cited"

47. Put one over on : DELUDE

49. '60s-'70s protest subject : 'NAM

51. __-savvy : TECH

52. "Battle Cry" author : URIS

53. A lot : SCADS

55. Make a pretrial determination : SET BAIL

58. Sch. with a Shreveport campus : L.S.U. Louisiana State.

59. Longtime Richard Petty sponsor : STP. The second-longest sponsor-driver relationship in motorsports.

62. Samoan port : APIA

66. Sign gas : NEON

67. Outback bird : EMU

68. They have many arms : OCTOPI

69. Trait transmitter : GENE

70. Hound : DOG

Down:

1. Clock radio toggle : AM/PM. Not AM/FM.

2. Evil end? : DOER

3. Dial on old TVs : VERT. Vertical Hold. I couldn't find an image of the control, but I did find the packaging for a spare.

4. Believer's suffix : -ISM

5. Congo River area denizen : CHIMP. Not worthy of the full "chimpanzee" today?

6. Spring festival : EASTER

7. Center opening : EPI-

8. "Hold on!" : WHOA!

9. Flying statistic : WINGSPAN

10. Afternoon refresher : CATNAP

12. Including everything : A TO Z. The London street atlas was the A-Z. Everyone had an A-to-Zed before Google Maps made it all a little, sadly, obsolete.

13. Difference in a close race : NOSE

18. Oater settings : SALOONS

23. Iberian coastal city : OPORTO. From whence "port" wine.

24. Retiring : SHY

28. Like ballerinas : LITHE

32. Cold mold : ASPIC

35. New England's only National Park : ACADIA. OK, now I know.

37. Traditional Jerusalem site of the Last Supper : CENACLE. New to me. It doesn't look like it's ever been used in the LAT crossword before (nor the NYT), so I imagine it might be new to a few of us.

41. Not close at all : ONE-SIDED

46. Bookie's spread units: Abbr. : PTS. Points. The points spread in gambling to even out the betting on the favorite and the underdog.

48. Suave : URBANE

50. Michigan State's Sparty, e.g. : MASCOT. Imagination at work in the mascot-naming stakes. Not.

54. How a couple might go for dinner? : DUTCH. 

55. Squealed : SANG

56. Olympian's blade : ÉPÉE

57. Prom rental : LIMO

59. "It's next on my list" : SOON

60. East-west Mass. artery : TNPK

61. Penultimate Greek letters : PSIS. Right before Omegas. I suppose.

64. Decorator's suggestion : RUG

65. Call-day link : IT A

And .. I'm calling it a day with this one. My Tequila Sunrise awaits! If you are celebrating Thanksgiving today, I hope you have a happy and safe one!

Steve

Thursday, November 17, 2016 Jeffrey Wechsler

Theme: THE SOUNDS OF SILENCE.

The circles, if you got to see them, are located in quasi-symmetrically placed vertical words. In each case, they contain the letters P I N, in that order.  If we start with the unifier, all will become clear.  This is the first puzzle I know of with a split unifier since the first one that C. C. and I did together.  

7 D. With 36-Down, what you can't do regarding this puzzle's circled letters : HEAR A.

36 D. See 7-Down ... or, with "a," what you can see in this puzzle's circled letters : PIN DROP.

If it's really quiet, you can HEAR A PIN DROP.  But you can't in this puzzle, since it's the written, not the spoken word.  [Though reading aloud is allowed.] The theme entries each contain the word PIN, and in the vertical orientation, the PINS are DROPPING.

2 D. Flooring wood : PINE.  Pretty common.  I prefer oak.

5 D. Custody : KEEPING.  As in safe KEEPING.

49 D. One of a gripping tool pair : PINCER.  Half of this item.

Operates like scissors

59 D. Go around : SPIN.  Demonstrated here by our oldest granddaughter.

Another unusual aspect of this grid is the bilateral vertical symmetry.  [There is neither horizontal nor rotational symmetry.] This, along with the very careful placement of the theme entries allows for 5D and 49 D to have a characteristic I don't recall ever seeing before - similar right-left placement, with vertical displacement and different length. This is a very unusual and creative construction.

Across

1. Touch off : SPARK.  To begin something, but since the implication is something inflammatory, it's generally not pleasant.

6. Electrical unit : OHM.  Are you resistant to this entry?  Did you want AMP?  That's more along the lines of current events, for which there will be a charge.

9. What wind ensembles usually tune to : B FLAT.  This hung me up.  Not my most typical playing venue.  In orchestra we tune to A.  In jazz band we tune the reeds to A and the brass to B FLAT.  Of course, the trombone has the infinite capacity to play any note out of tune. Meanwhile, the whole NE corner gave me fits.

14. Actress Anouk whose last name means "beloved" : AIMEE.   [b 1932] Starting her career at age 14, she later appeared in La Dolce Vita, 8 1/2, A Man and a Woman, and 67 other films, mostly in French, and won many awards.

Glamor shot

15. Place for grazing : LEA.  A meadow. This relates back to Old English, German, and ultimately Sanskrit words for an open space.

16. Appreciative cry : BRAVO.

17. Travelocity ad figure : GNOME.

18. "Hotel du __": Anita Brookner novel : LAC. A story of disappointment and self-discovery set in a hotel on the shore of Lake Geneva.

19. Still : QUIET.  Like a time when you can hear the sounds of silence.

20. Fabulous writer? : AESOP.  Author of many fables.  In this one we see the silence of the lambs.

21. Roth __ : IRA.  Subject to strict contribution limits, but not subject to mandatory withdrawal.

22. Washer function : RINSE. The soap removal cycle.

23. Production capacity review : LINE AUDIT.  For trouble shooting or improving the efficiency of a manufacturing production line.

26. Refused : SAID NO.

29. Very deep places : ABYSMS.  I had forgotten that this archaic word exists, and was perplexed that ABYSSES didn't fit.  It goes back to medieval Latin and came into English ca. 1150, somehow acquiring a Greek ending along the way.  It refers to hell, the bottomless pit, the great deep, the primal chaos.   Nietzsche advises us to not stare into it.

33. Shore soarer : ERN.   Sea eagle.  Paleo-crossword vocabulary.

34. Bellyachers : GRIPERS.  Complainers, not to be confused with grippers, which are PINCERS, nor Ronald Reagan, who played the Gipper.

38. Excessively : TOO.  As in TOO much of my siliness.

39. Work (on), as 9-Down : GNAW.  A fine old Anglo-Saxon word meaning to bite and chew on something.

The words

41. "__ Romance": Jerome Kern song : A FINE.  Some better music.

42. TV princess : XENA.

43. Radamès' love : AIDA.  From the opera.

44. Cover letter letters : ENClosure.

45. Far from bold : MEEK.  Opposites.

46. Pentax competitor : LEICA.  Cameras.

48. Cholesterol initials : LDL.  Low Density Lipoprotein.  You want your LDL to be low, and your HDL to be high.

49. Hides : PELTS.   Animal skins.

50. "U slay me!" : LOL.  Texters argot, abbrv. for Laughing Out Loud.

51. Chorus syllable : TRA- la-la.

52. Travelers' bus. : INSurance.  Company name.

53. Teddy's Mount Rushmore neighbor : ABE.   Faces on the mountain.

55. Kitchen appliance : GAS OVEN.

58. Inflation fig. : PSI.  I wanted CPI, but it's tire pressure, not economics.

61. Office fasteners : JUMBO PAPER CLIPS.

Is this what they mean?

64. Like battleships : ARMORED.

65. Get by the sentry : SNEAK IN.

66. Looked inside, in a way : X-RAYED.   Medical imaging.

67. Show the ropes : ORIENT.   Help someone get acclimated to a new position or circumstance.

Down

1. It's a long story : SAGA.  Or EPIC.  Needs perps.

3. "The Cookie Never Crumbles" co-author Wally : AMOS.  [b. 1936] Talent agent who started selling cookies in L.A. in 1975.

4. Alter the shape of : REMOLD.

6. Kukla cohort : OLLIE.  Along with Fran Allison.




8. Portuguese territory until 1999 : MACAU.  Autonomous region on the south coast of China, across the pearl River delta from Hong Cong.

9. Pitmaster's offering : BBQ RIBS.

10. Like dessert wines : FRUITY.

11. "... this skull has __ in the earth ... ": Hamlet : LAIN.  Not to be confused with Nunckle Tim's shin.

Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio: a fellow

of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy: he hath

borne me on his back a thousand times; and now, how

abhorred in my imagination it is! my gorge rims at

it. Here hung those lips that I have kissed I know

not how oft. Where be your gibes now? your

gambols? your songs? your flashes of merriment,

that were wont to set the table on a roar? Not one

now, to mock your own grinning? quite chap-fallen?

12. Urban rtes. : AVES.  AVEnues are routes, not rites.  I was off in the wrong direction.

13. Membership drive gift : TOTE.  carry-all bag.

24. "The Thin Man" role : NORA.  Nick and NORA Charles, from the indicated 1934 comedy-mystery movie that was based on the novel of the same name by Dashiell Hammett.  
25. Have what it takes : DARE.  Having the courage to do something.  If you have what it takes, you might succeed.  Otherwise  .  .  . ?

26. "The Goldbergs" actor George : SEGAL.  A program that not only have I never seen, but before now never knew existed.  Based on the childhood and 80's family life of the show's creator and producer Adam F. Goldberg.

27. Links legend, familiarly : ARNIE. Palmer

28. Conflicted : IN A DILEMMA.  A choice between unpleasant alternatives.

30. Classic golf shoe feature : STEEL SPIKE.  For gripping the turf.

31. "Haystacks" series painter : MONET.  Claude [1840 - 1946].

32. Overcharges : SOAKS.  

35. "That really depressed me" : I FELT SAD.    Expression of woe.

37. Isolated communities : ENCLAVES.  A place different in character form the surrounding area.

40. City south of Fort Worth : WACO.  

42. Magneto's enemies : X-MEN.  A group of superheroes from the Marvel Comic universe.  Each is a mutant with a unique special ability.

47. Sharer of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize : AL GORE. [b 1948] Former U.S. vice-president.

53. Trojan War hero : AJAX.  Fought with Hector several times.

54. "Hamilton" role : BURR.   Aaron. [1756 - 1836]  He was sitting vice president at the time of their famous duel.

56. Mocked : APED.  Made fun of.  Not so much fun on the receiving end.

57. Puzzlemaker Rubik : ERNO.

60. Hall & Oates' "Say It __ So" : ISN'T.   Not a fan, so no link.

62. Son : BOY.

63. My __, Vietnam : LAI.  That village that had to be destroyed in order to be liberated.  Kind of a downer to end on.

Well, that wraps it up.  Hope the silence wasn't oppressive.

Cool regards!
JzB

Thursday, November 10th, 2016 Matt Skoczen

Theme: Sponsored by Betty Crocker. Four "cake" mixes are presented in four theme entries arranged pinwheel fashion .

17A. Very close : NECK AND NECK. I'm glad I wasn't the one who had to sort this lot out at the 2004 Athens Olympics TRACK EVENT:

11D. Dash, but not dot : TRACK EVENT. A friend dog-sits for a family of pit bulls named Dot, Dash and Bracket.

60A. Holiday to-do list task : BAKE COOKIES. I tried "MAKE" first which meant figuring out the auction site was a little trickier than it could have been. I think this might be a little too close to the "cake" theme, but that's probably just me being grumpy today.

28D. 1954 Best Actress Oscar winner : GRACE KELLY. She went on to marry Prince Rainier III and became Princess Grace of Monaco.

and the reveal:

38A. Birthday party staple, and a hint to this puzzle's circles : CAKE MIX. Is the cake mix the party staple, or the cake? Methinks the latter.

You can make 24 varieties of CAKE with your figurative mixing bowl and whisk; Matt's picked four of them and slotted them across word boundaries in the four theme entries. There are some nice expanses of white space, especially in the northwest and southeast.

Let's see what else we've got:

Across:

1. Powerful watchdogs : AKITAS. My mind was well down the "consumer rights" type of watchdog before I managed to reel myself back in. Even seen the movie "Hachi - a Dog's Tale"? Two packs of Kleenex, minimum.

7. Silk Road desert : GOBI

11. Pulls a Halloween prank on, for short : TP'S. Do you really TP a house on Hallowe'en? I'd have thought there were too many people around to get away with it.

14. Put a new handle on : RENAME

15. "... wish __ a star" : UPON

16. Part of the fam. : REL. ative. We call them "relations" in England, it looks odd to my eyes now.

19. Police blotter letters : AKA

20. Daughter of Polonius : OPHELIA. No better excuse to link the song from The Lumineers.

21. Dependable source of income : CASH COW

23. Tearful queen : NIOBE. Quite why I knee-jerked SHEBA in here when I had the B I can't really tell you. Fixed it eventually.

25. Short strings? : UKES

26. More skittish : EDGIER

29. Dark mark : SMUDGE. Nice word.

33. Admonish : WARN

34. Artisan pizzeria feature : STONE OVEN. Food! Yum! I don't eat a lot of pizza, but thin crust like this - yes please!

37. Seventh in a Greek series : ETA

40. Big Band __ : ERA

41. Pastoral residences : RECTORIES. For some reason, I knew what Matt/Rich were getting at right away here. Technically, a rector lives in a rectory and a pastor in a pastorium, but we won't let that get in the way.

43. Huff : SNIT

44. Self-involvement : EGOISM

45. Williams of talk TV : MONTEL

47. "The Square Egg" author : SAKI. Hector Hugh Monroe to his formal friends. Ronald Searle also wrote a book with this title - I remember enjoying it some years ago. If you're not familiar with Mr. Searle's artistic talents, here's a taste:

49. Square, e.g. : SHAPE. See shape above.

51. Former Jesuit school official : PREFECT. We had prefects at my grammar school, but it certainly wasn't Jesuit.

55. Stretch : EXPANSE

59. Sushi selection : EEL

62. "The Miracle Worker" comm. method : ASL. How to fingerspell:

63. 2016 MLB retiree : A-ROD

64. Online newsgroup system : USENET. Is this still a thing? I thought Blogger, Facebook, LinkedIn and all the others would have consigned this to the technology scrap-heap of history.

65. Pop artist Lichtenstein : ROY. All I need to say is "WHAAM" and you can see the diptych.

66. Sun., on Mon. : YEST. Hmmm. Make a sad face and move on.

67. Mother in Calcutta : TERESA. Now promoted to Saint.

Down:

1. Ponte Vecchio's river : ARNO. Florence's river. Back in the day when we weren't such seasoned travelers, I remember a colleague returning from an Italian vacation raving about an unknown city he'd discovered called "Firenze".

2. Conserve : KEEP

3. Foot part : INCH. Tried ARCH. Was eventually proven wrong.

4. Hornswoggled : TAKEN IN

5. Charlotte __ : AMALIE. I thought this was either a movie character or an actress. Now I discover it is the capital of the US Virgin Islands. Learning moment.

6. Frequent discount recipient : SENIOR. I get a 5% discount at my local hardware store. Apparently 55+ is the new magic number - I get a discount at the swimming pool too.

7. Word with water or air : GUN

8. Energy org. since 1960 : OPEC. The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries.

9. Florida city, familiarly : BOCA. Raton.

10. They're kept in pens : INKS. Didn't hesitate when K was already there.

12. Orange __ : PEKOE. Fill-in-the-blank avoids the awkward "type of tea" discussion/argument.

13. Picnic dishes : SLAWS Food! Can't beat a nice, crisp, freshly-made coleslaw. My coleslaw recipe has shredded carrots, cabbage and a dressing with a couple or ten ingredients, something like that.

18. Smidge : DAB

22. Sci-fi award : HUGO. Great-looking things.

24. Values highly : ESTEEMS

26. Spouted vessel : EWER. I hesitated over this for a while until the crosses made it obvious - I think of a spouted vessel more like a teapot, and a ewer to have a pouring lip, not a spout.

27. Palm fruit : DATE

30. Some den leaders : MOMS

31. Cycle starter? : UNI

32. Showtime title forensic technician, familiarly : DEX. From the show "Dexter", as you would assume.

34. Aspen gear : SKIS

35. Scary-sounding lake : ERIE

36. NASA part: Abbr. : NATL.

38. Soft sound : COO

39. Meyers of "Kate & Allie" : ARI. Thanks, crosses.

42. Certain happy hour exclamation : TGIF!

43. Bit of 11-Down gear : SNEAKER. Bit of retro 11-Down gear. I'm not sure those hi-tech Nikes, Reeboks and what-nots are called sneakers any more.

45. Borrow the limit on : MAX OUT

46. Combat : OPPOSE

47. Sharp weapon : SPEAR

48. "You __ grounded!" : ARE SO

50. '70s TV lawman Ramsey : HEC. Thank you, crosses. Before my (US) time. Hec Ramsey.

52. Auction venue : EBAY. Not EMAY as my MAKE COOKIES insisted that it was.

53. Bit of TLC? : CARE

54. WBA decisions : TKO'S

56. Muse count : NINE. I'm going to learn them one day. Calliope, Clio, Euterpe, Thalia, Melpomene, Terpsichore, Erato, Polyhymnia and Urania.

57. Goes with : SEES

58. Spanish pronoun : ESTÁ.  Comó?

61. D.C. summer hrs. : EDT. Most of us waved goodbye to EDT just last weekend for another six months. It's about time we stopped messing around with the clocks, although it's less onerous than it used to be. The only manual adjustments I need to made are the analog kitchen clock and the microwave. Obviously I have a technologically-challenged zapper. It doesn't even have it's own IP address.

The sun came up again today - woo hoo!

Here's the grid!

Steve