Thursday, January 30th 2020 Dan Margolis

Theme: That's that - the theme entries are clued literally with a description of each one:

20A. "That's fine": POWDERED SUGAR. Very fine indeed. The Brits call it icing sugar, also known as confectioner's sugar in these parts.

27A. "That's all folks": THE HUMAN RACE. This was my first theme solve which put on the right wavelength. I noticed the missing comma from the Looney Tunes hook line. Very nice cluing.

49A. "That's not the point": PENCIL ERASER. I seem to use all the eraser before I've used all of the pencil which probably says more about my inaccuracy than the design of the pencil. I've got stand-alone backups.

58A. "That's rich": CHOCOLATE CAKE. Chocolate and kale in the same puzzle - as I said last week why do I crave chocolate, and not kale?

So, a nice theme and .... and? The fill is pretty sluggish, there's not a lot to admire. A workmanlike puzzle, but too many obscure names for me and too many throwaway entries to get too much enthusiastic about. It's a shame because there were some great clues for an otherwise dull fill. Let's go explore!

Across:

1. Healthful berry: ACAI. It could be GOJI so wait for a cross to confirm.

5. Sommelier's concern: NOSE. Why don't we just say "this wine has a fine smell?" A sommelier's nose could also be an asset.

9. San Antonio cagers: SPURS

14. Bananas: LOCO. Crazy like a ... chicken? I like El Pollo Loco's grilled chicken.

15. "... the __ blackness of the floors": Poe: EBON

16. "The Fox and the Grapes" storyteller: AESOP

17. Dutch cheese: EDAM

18. Way to go: ROAD

19. Queen's milieu: DRAMA. Drama queen. This one made me smile.

23. Get going: HOP TO

25. "Knives Out" Golden Globe nominee de Armas: ANA. Thank you, crosses. I'm not familiar with the movie and checking her credits on IMDb, I've not seen any of the movies she's appeared in.

26. Lansing-to-Flint dir.: ENE

32. 1960s chess champ Mikhail: TAL. Crosses to the aid again. I'm sure chess enthusiasts will know all about this gentleman, but a little before my chess-conscious time.

33. Mustard family member: KALE

34. They're tapped: KEGS

37. Bundle: PILE

39. On the money: RIGHT

42. Kentucky coach with 876 victories: RUPP. I went with RUUP first for no good reason, which made SUREE look a little strange. Easily fixed. Legendary basketball, fifth on the all-time wins list.

44. Foolhardy: RASH

46. __ avis: RARA. "Rare bird". I learned this from crosswords past, thankfully, as it helped with the crossing proper names.

48. Mex. title: SRA. Señora (from Sonora!)

53. Withdrawal site: ATM

56. Carnival city: RIO

57. Words before "so sue me": I LIED

63. Polynesian language: MAORI

64. Sitar music: RAGA. Here's a raga mix of "Uptown Funk"; you just cannot watch it without smiling!

65. Yemen's Gulf of __: ADEN

68. Conclude with: END ON

69. Indicator: SIGN

70. Feet-first race: LUGE

71. Video chat choice: SKYPE

72. "What __ is new?": ELSE

73. MP3 player: IPOD. Do Apple even make these any more? It seems your phone does everything that an iPod did, with the added bonus of, well, being a phone.

Down:

1. Cream __: ALE

2. Fish that's salted and dried to make bacalao: COD. Originally from the Portuguese, where bacalhau is the name of the fish.The Norwegians have assimilated the dish into their national cuisine where it is now spelled "bakalau". There's more to a bit of dried fish than meets the eye. Here's balalau con tomate.

3. Like Pentatonix numbers: A CAPPELLA

4. Flying insect with prominent eyespots: IO MOTH. Not sure that I knew this. ACAI and LOCO helped me out though.

5. Bookish type: NERD

6. Wind up on stage?: OBOE. Nice clue!

7. Fly like an eagle: SOAR

8. Win over: ENDEAR

9. Hapless sort: SAD SACK

10. Ucayali River country: PERU. The main headstream of the Amazon river, it becomes the Amazon at the confluence with the Marañón.

11. Grammarian's concern: USAGE

12. Type type: ROMAN. Times New Roman, for example, which was commissioned by the London Times newspaper in 1931.

13. Just-in-case item: SPARE

21. "The Caine Mutiny" novelist: WOUK

22. Paternity identifier: DNA

23. Web address letters: HTTP

24. Atheist activist Madalyn: O'HAIR. A new name to me. I'm familiar with the golfer Sean O'Hair, not so much atheist activists.

28. Deface: MAR

29. "When We Were Kings" boxer: ALI. And Joe Frazier; the movie covers the famous "Rumble in the Jungle" heavyweight championship fight from Zaire in 1974.

30. Pola of the silents: NEGRI. Another proper name requiring crossing rescue for me today.

31. Poetic contraction: E'ER

35. Dressed to the nines: GUSSIED UP

36. Wild period: SPREE

38. Uncommon sense: ESP. It looks like it has lost its "abbreviation" status.

40. Actor Holbrook: HAL. Another unknown proper name for me today, hence grateful for the "RARA" cross.

41. Amount past due?: TRE. "Uno, due, tre, quattro ...." Nice cluing again for a little word.

43. Ranch bud: PARD

45. Wonder Woman, for one: HEROINE

47. Plot-driving song, perhaps: ARIA. I assume arias drive the plot lines of operas?

50. Zilch: NIL

51. Rough around the edges: COARSE

52. High-pH compound: ALKALI

53. Summits: ACMES

54. "__ goodness": THANK

55. Temperamental: MOODY

59. Edit for size, as a photo: CROP

60. Follow: TAIL

61. Confident juggler's props: EGGS

62. Candy __: CANE

66. It may need a boost: EGO

67. Flanders who inspired the band Okilly Dokilly: NED of "The Simpsons" fame. There's a band from the UK called "Ned's Atomic Dustbin" who named themselves for a sketch from a BBC radio comedy show which aired in the 60's.

And with that, it's okilly dokilly, here's the grid!

Steve

Thursday January 23rd 2020 Bruce Haight

Theme: Cash Up - Five theme entries in the downs contain currencies running south-to-north:

3D. New Year's Day event in Pasadena: ROSE PARADE. Peso, or $ in most Latin counties (the Philippine Peso symbol is ₱.) There's what possibly is an urban legend that there is an upsurge in U-Haul rentals in the East and Midwest after the Rose Parade when the lovely Californian weather is usually on parade, along with the floats and people decide to move.

10D. Finish impressively: END WITH A BANG. Baht, or ฿.

21D. Lamb Chop puppeteer: SHARI LEWIS. Lira, or ₺. The Italian Lira is now defunct, having gone the way of the Euro, but Turkey still has theirs.

25D. It helps you go places: TRAVEL BUREAU. Ruble, or ₽. The symbol was officially adopted in 2013 following a public poll.

34D. Get support, in a way ... and what the puzzle circles do: RAISE MONEY. Yen, or ¥. I like how this is both the reveal and a theme entry in its own right.  Clever.

Another solid puzzle from Bruce, and again, we're looking at a 16x15 grid; I think this is the third Thursday in a row sporting that grid configuration. It's not impossible to place the two 12-letter theme entries in a 15x15 grid, but adding the extra row gives a little more elbow room and potentially a less scrappy fill. Bruce is just a "J" short of a pangram here, when I see Q, X and Z in a puzzle I start to look out for the J's, K's, V's and W's.

Let's take the grand tour:

Across:

1. Spunky: SCRAPPY

8. Longest-serving Japanese prime minister: ABE. Shinzō Abe, who is the current prime minister and has held the office since 2012.

11. Ave. crossers: STS.

14. Steel foundry input: IRON ORE

15. Traction-improving: NON-SLIP

17. "Try some!": TASTE IT! I need no further encouragement.

18. Lamaze class attendee: DAD-TO-BE

19. Expectant time: EVE.

20. One of the family: SIS

22. About 24% of the U.S. Congress: WOMEN

23. Stations: DEPOTS. Are these synonymous? To my mind, stations are for passengers and depots are for freight or stabling locomotives on the rail network.

26. Place for choppers: HELIPORT

29. Not quite right: AWRY

30. Oodles: A LOT

31. Broadway song that begins, "The most beautiful sound I ever heard": MARIA. From "West Side Story".

33. Brief encounter: BRUSH. Brush off, brush by and a brush with the law are all brief encounters of different types.

34. Flag thrower: REF. American Football. I can't think of another sport where a flag is thrown to indicate that an infringement has occurred.

37. Co-tsar with Peter I: IVAN V. Nice clue, I enjoyed the "co-star" play on words.

38. Saucepan cover: LID

39. Missile Command game company: ATARI

41. Place to stay: LODGE

42. Newcastle Brown __: ALE. A very famous beer in the UK. Like the Bass "Red Triangle" symbol, the iconic blue star logo, which was introduced in 1928, is instantly recognizable.

43. Starts bubbling, maybe: BOILS

44. Fleecy one: EWE

45. Loafs: LAZES

47. Strong suit: ASSET

48. Lost, as a big lead: BLEW

49. Way back when: ONCE

50. Rum drink: DAIQUIRI. I wasn't sure how to spell this, I had to let the crosses help me out.

54. Competition that includes snowboarding: X GAMES

57. Pianist Rubinstein: ARTUR

58. California's __ Gabriel Mountains: SAN. The backdrop to the Rose Parade. Pasadena is in the San Gabriel Valley.

60. Egg cells: OVA

61. Like the most busy busybody: NOSIEST

64. Mid-Michigan city: SAGINAW. I first learned this city from Simon and Garfunkel's song "America" from their Bookends album.

67. Uganda's capital: KAMPALA

68. Accessory for an Aquaman costume: TRIDENT

69. Before, in poems: ERE. 

Maid of Athens, ere we part,

Give, oh, give me back my heart!

Or, since that has left my breast,

Keep it now, and take the rest!

Hear my vow before I go,

Ζωή μου, σᾶς ἀγαπῶ

Lord Byron - Maid of Athens

I'm not sure I understand the device of the last line in Greek - it translates as "My life, I love you!" but it doesn't rhyme with "go", neither in Greek nor English. Any scholarly folk have any idea what Byron was doing here?

70. Coffee hour sight: URN. It was a vase with feet last week.

71. "Sounds right to me": I'D SAY SO

Down:

1. Positioned: SITED

2. Really want: CRAVE. Why can't I crave kale? It's always fried chicken or truffles.

4. Tiny toiler: ANT

5. Name in eerie fiction: POE

6. Proper to a fault: PRISSY

7. Himalayan legend: YETI

8. "Furthermore ... ": AND

9. Fluffy wrap: BOA

11. Sportscast technique: SLO-MO

12. River near Vatican City: TIBER. Rome's river. The name of Trastevere, one of my favorite districts in Rome, comes from the latin Trans Tiberim, "beyond the Tiber".

13. Exhausted: SPENT

16. "Hold it!": STOP

24. Short, in a way: OWING

27. Gives the slip: ELUDES

28. Part of LAPD: LOS. Because none of the alternatives of Angeles, Police or Department would fit.

31. Pedometer unit: MILE. This is a little odd, I think. I wanted "step" at first, because that's what pedometers measure. A pedometer, strictly speaking, doesn't measure distance although it can provide an estimate based on an individual's stride length.

32. Swear: AVOW

33. Sport coat: BLAZER

35. Writer Gardner: ERLE

36. Rock that, oddly, loses to paper: FIST. I was trying to think of a type of rock at first, something along the TALC lines, then the penny dropped.

40. Puccini opera: TOSCA

46. Boxer Laila: ALI

49. Ventura County city: OXNARD

50. German word of gratitude: DANKE

51. Wildly cheering: AROAR. I've grown to like this word, I thought it was a little contrived when I first encountered it.

52. Knocker's words: IT'S ME!

53. Zinger: QUIP

55. Chris of "Captain America": EVANS. Thank you, crosses.

56. Handled: SAW TO

59. Wine made from Muscat grapes: ASTI

62. Camera type, for short: SLR. Single-Lens Reflex. When introduced, allowed the photographer to frame the picture looking through the lens of the camera, rather than a separate viewfinder lens.

63. You basked for it: TAN

65. USO show audience: GI'S

66. Wyo. neighbor: IDA.

That just about wraps it up for today!

Steve

Thursday, January 16th 2020 Bruce Haight

Theme Side of Beef - the six theme entries sit on the sides of the plate - as the reveal entries suggest:

41A. With 45-Across, meat cut that suggests six aptly placed puzzle answers: FLANK and 45A. See 41-Across: STEAK

So we go look for the flanks of the puzzle, and sure enough we find:

1D. "Squarely unconventional" Nissan: CUBE. Cube steak isn't steak, cubed - it's the shape of the holes that the tenderizer makes which brings us to ....

13D. __ chocolate: SWISS. Cube steak and Swiss steak are really the same thing - cube steak is put through a tenderizer known as a "swisser", and guess what, so is Swiss steak. The result though, as chicken-fried steak, is rather lovely. My gravy is a basic white sauce, garlic powder, a ton of dried sage and cracked black pepper. I believe KFC stole my recipe :) This is not KFC:

26D. Tavern order: ROUND. The nicest words to hear - "My round!".

38D. Slacks alternative: SKIRT. Ever had steak fajitas? You've had skirt steak. The old "butcher cuts" are the cheapest, and best, you just have to know how to cook them. The Interwebs are your friend.

56D. Vegas __: STRIP. Usually a New York Strip, but here decamped to Las Vegas!

67D. Keister: RUMP.

Another 16x15 grid this week to accommodate the theme, which I liked - Food! But a couple of minor nits for me, the repeat of the SWISS/CUBE themers and, when we get to 17A, the other niggle. All minor though. I like Bruce's puzzles, usually a solid theme, some misdirection, and some entries to discuss (or argue!) about. Let's go and see what's in store:

Across:

1. Barbecue remnants: COBS. This one puzzled me. I know the answer from crosswords past, but I wanted to look up the etymology of the word and I drew a blank. I assumed it had got something to do with coal cobs, but I couldn't find a reference to burned-out barbecue coals - then Lemonade came to the rescue, he pointed out that the clue is referring to corn cobs! Silly me.

5. Personal identification?: ITS ME!

10. Rolaids rival: TUMS. I prefer this clue to last Thursday's.

14. Iris layer: UVEA

15. Part of a "Star Wars" name: DETOO. R2-D2.

16. "__ it first!": I SAW

17. Tower of London guards: BEEFEATERS. It's a nice word, but there's steak in the theme, so I would either have tried to avoid this fill or tried to find a "matching" entry at 69A to complement it.

19. Local bond, briefly: MUNI

20. PC key: ENTER

21. Classic car: REO. Ransom E. Olds' car company, based in Lansing, Michigan.

22. Frozen floaters: BERGS

23. Celebratory smokes: CIGARS

25. 2019 awards for Giannis Antetokounmpo: ESPYS. He won both "Male Athlete of the Year" and "NBA Player of the Year" hence the plural.

26. Elaborate style: ROCOCO. A little over-elaborate for my taste, but you can't deny the artistic brilliance:

29. Checks out: EYES

31. Artist Yoko: ONO. I think YOKO/ONO or ONO/YOKO has rescued more crosswords than can be counted in grains of sand.

32. "Nashville" actress Judith: HOAG. Who she? See 18D.

35. Currently: AS IT IS

39. Vases with feet: URNS

43. Understand, in slang: GROK. Well known in these parts, as we often find people "grok the theme".

44. Kremlin refusal: NYET in denial as is ...

46. "Me? Never!": NOT I! denial again!

47. Original "Star Trek" studio: DESILU

49. Princess from Alderaan: LEIA. One of the few "Star Wars" characters I don't have to think too hard about.

51. Links standard: PAR. Not my standard, that's for sure. Why is it called "golf"? Because all the other four-letter words were already used.

52. Manilow song site: COPA. I'll spare you the earworm.

54. Giants' div.: NL WEST. Baseball's San Francisco Giants

56. Mopes: SULKS

59. __ bag: DOGGIE. Not Doggy?

62. Sporty car features: T-TOPS

63. To's partner: FRO

64. Fitting tool: SIZER. Rings, I think.

68. Lower-APR deal: RE-FI

69. Restaurant list not for everyone: SECRET MENU. Fun, but generally not so secret - pretty much anyone who eats at the In 'N Out burger chain knows about "animal style"; there's a similar secret item at Disneyland's Tomorrowland, the Galactic Burger "alien style".

71. Shiraz's land: IRAN. Nailed it! Not IRAQ! I'm off to do a lap of honor around the FLANKS.

72. Giants and Titans: TEAMS. I'm going to guess the New York Giants in this case, to match the NFL's Tennessee Titans. We've had both GIANTS today.
* So, name the other five pairs of team names across Hockey, Football, Baseball and Basketball. 30 seconds, go!

73. Physics matter: ATOM

74. Nectarine centers: PITS

75. Donkeys: ASSES

76. Filing tool: RASP

Down:

2. Baker: OVEN

3. Vegetable that may stain a cutting board: BEET

4. Seattle-based insurance giant: SAFECO. I had no idea this lot were an insurance company, I've even been to Safeco Field in Seattle and it never crossed my mind to wonder about the company with the naming rights.

5. Mont. neighbor: IDA.

6. Colorful fish: TETRA

7. Range rover: STEER. Home, where the deer and the antelope (and apparently the steer) play. No discouraging words though, to make you feel ...

8. Gloomy: MOROSE

9. Daybreak deity: EOS

10. One involved in multiple problems?: TIMES SIGN. Did you learn your Times Tables by rote? I can still chant "One 12 is 12, two 12's are 24,  .... "

11. Take by force: USURP

12. Shabby: MANGY

18. "The Art of Loving" author Fromm: ERICH. With Judith HOAG at 32A, this was a near-Natick for me, I'm not sure I've heard of either. "H" seemed the best guess, and so it was.

22. Honey bunch: BEES

24. Blunders: GOOFS UP

27. Deli specification: ON RYE. Yes please, I love a deli sandwich on rye, preferably pastrami from Katz's in Manhattan's Lower East Side. What a great Food! puzzle today!

28. Traffic markers: CONES

30. Talking on and on: YAKKING

33. __-rock: ALT

34. Highlander: GAEL

36. Overused theme: TROPE. Nope, a cliche is an overused theme. A trope is the use of figurative language, an image or a figure of speech, which may be commonly recurring.

37. Bits: IOTAS

40. Map markers: STICK PINS. I thought these were called push pins - stick pins are much more decorative and used as costume jewelry or lapel decorations. Would you put these in a map?

42. Scottish rejection: NAE

48. Result of a poor investment: LOSS

50. Crème de la crème: A-LIST

53. Commercial charges: AD FEES

55. German city where the Bauhaus movement began: WEIMAR. And the Weimar Republic.

57. Where embryos grow: UTERI

58. Like much diet food: LO-FAT

60. Black-and-white whales: ORCAS

61. Grammy winner Eydie: GORMÉ. Thank you, crosses.

65. Letter that rhymes with three others: ZETA. Not Catherine Zeta-Jones?

66. Nephew of Cain: ENOS

69. Transit map abbr.: STA.

70. Snaky shape: ESS

Today I learned that Safeco is an insurance company, and I learned the name of a Grammy winner. File away for for future use!

* From 72A earlier, the teams are:

Cardinals - Arizona (NFL) and St. Louis (MLB)
Kings - Sacramento (NBA) and Los Angeles (NHL)
Panthers - Carolina (NFL) and Florida (NHL)
Rangers - Texas (NBA NFL) and New York (NHL)
Jets - New York (NFL) and Winnipeg (NHL)

I hope I got that right, I was testing my own memory!

And hopefully, accurately, the grid:

Steve

Thursday, January 9th 2020 Christopher Adams

Theme: ? When Victor Hugo sent an ingenious telegram to his publisher to ask how sales of  his new novel "Les Miserables" were going, to save money he sent just "?" He received the reply "!" Which leads us in a roundabout fashion to ...

19A. Big musical number ... or what 60-Across is to four puzzle answers?: SHOW STOPPER

and when we navigate downtown, we find:

60A. Decisive ending: EXCLAMATION MARK

So let's see what this is all about:

16D. Musical revue performed in the nude: OH! CALCUTTA! Two show-stoppers here, I guess, one in the first act and one at the end. The title of the show is a play on a French phrase which you'd use to be complimentary about someone's - ahem - derrière.

18D. Musical whose first run won 10 Tony Awards: HELLO, DOLLY! 

38D. Musical featuring ABBA songs: MAMMA MIA!

39D. Musical awarded a special Pulitzer in 1944: OKLAHOMA! The Pulitzer jury was a little vague about why the prize was awarded, the citation just says "A special award for Oklahoma".

So we've got an unusual grid size (15x16) and East-West symmetry only. Why? To accommodate the theme. The 15-letter reveal needs to live alone, so in a regular puzzle it would have to occupy the middle row, and you can't fit the other themers around it, neither across nor down. So stretch the grid and abandon the N-S symmetry. Is this a bad thing? Not necessarily, as long as the concessions to the theme don't reflect badly in the fill. In this case, I'm not sure.

Purist's section - you certainly shouldn't have OH! CALCUTTA!, and you shouldn't have any other exclamation marks anywhere else. (Hello, 6D and others.) If you want to build a puzzle around a punctuation mark, you have to be consistent. If you can't find four theme entries that work with your reveal, either toss the puzzle away with a "ah, well, I tried" or think of a new way of tying those musicals together.

With that, let's see what's in store as we go down the aisles, not stopping to pick up any one of the 17 three-letter words littering the shelves:

Across:

1. Coffee holder: CUP. Not URN nor MUG then. I think we need a campaign to stop coffee appropriating tea's vessel of choice. It's a cup o' tea in my book.

4. "Top Chef" host Lakshmi: PADMA

9. Droop: SAG

12. Tapped-off remnant: ASH. Hopefully not seen around for much longer.

13. Thread holder: SPOOL

14. T'ai __: CHI. Fill in the blanks and move on.

15. Club condiment: MAYO. Do you need mayo with a club sandwich? Mayo-be you do.

17. "Fiddler" meddler: YENTE

18. Chemistry Nobelist Otto: HAHN

22. "My Friend" title horse: FLICKA. I read this book as a kid, I remember very little about it, it seemed a little formulaic maybe? Boy loves horse, horse is sick, boy gets sick, boy gets well, horse lives.

24. Coral creatures: POLYPS

27. "A Legacy of Spies" author: LE CARRÉ

29. Makes a mess of: FOULS UP

30. St. Teresa's town: AVILA

31. VII x XIII: XCI. The desperate act of a constructor. Short of options? Throw a roman numeral in there, no-one will notice. I know, I've done it myself.

33. Rodeo performer: ROPER

34. Catchall abbr.: MISC. ET AL is a temptation here.

35. Pool tool: CUE

36. Eat in style: DINE. That would preclude dining at the diner, which is amusing. I read recently that Amtrak are doing away with the dining car on most of their services, a shame. There's definitely something stylish about dining on a train. When I commuted into London as a youth, my train had a bar car. The journey home was an hour and one minute, and a very convivial hour it was too. Some folk were known to miss their stop intentionally to have "one for the road" and then catch the next train back.

37. Dramatic accusation: ET TU

38. Paris transit: METRO. I love the art deco signage on some of the stations - I think this one is just below Montmartre.

40. Deca- minus two: OCTA-

41. GPS part: Abbr.: SYST. Global Positioning System.

42. Smart __: ALECK

43. Eco-friendly certification letters: LEED. Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, as we all know. Or not.

44. Tablet named for an organ: TUMS. My "tum" is an organ? I guess. "STOMACHS" doesn't fit. Not sure I like the twee euphemism here.

46. Kosher food carrier: EL AL

48. Preserve, in a way: EMBALM

51. "The Joy Luck Club" novelist: AMY TAN. On my "to-read" list. My dad taught me how to play mah-jong with a set he brought back from Hong Kong when he was stationed there with the British army in the 20's and 30's. Many years later in Beijing in 2008 I joined a pop-up game in a little square near the Drum Tower. The locals were surprised that I knew how to pick up the tiles, let alone play the game (albeit very slowly!)

55. Philosopher __-tzu: LAO

56. Short rest: NAP

58. Word for a woman: SHE

59. Hosp. area: I.C.U.

64. "I like that": NICE

65. Cool beans or warm fuzzies: IDIOM

66. Great Lake city: ERIE

67. MC alternative: AMEX. I didn't get the "MC" at first, so this needed some help from the crosses. MC : Mastercard AMEX : American Express

68. Yoga pose: ASANA

69. Word for men: LADS. It's a bit of an oddity, this clue. "Word for ..." doesn't add anything and doesn't misdirect either. Curious.

Down:

1. Dash attachment: CAM

2. NATO founding member: USA

3. The Curies, e.g.: PHYSICISTS

4. Propaganda battle: PSYWAR. Psychological Warfare.

5. Tarzan raisers: APES

6. "Cut it out!": DON'T!

7. Con __: briskly: MOTO

8. Syrian city: ALEPPO

9. Member of a 1990s girl group: SCARY SPICE which ties in with 63D later on.

10. Spa sigh: AHH!

11. Martini default: GIN. You'd think so, but I bet a dollar to a donut that if you ordered a martini and didn't specify, you'd get vodka, or at least be asked which vodka you wanted. The "James Bond" martini has both gin and vodka, and lilet blanc.

20. Gumbo pod: OKRA. Tends to be a little polarizing, this innocent vegetable, due to the "slime" factor. I use it regularly when I cook Indian food.

21. Refill a glass, say: POUR

22. Fire sign: FLAMES. I get the wordplay here, but aren't flames the fire itself, not a sign of fire? I'm not sure, perhaps someone can explain the chemistry behind the plasma.

23. Flippancy: LEVITY

25. Mambo legend Tito: PUENTE. "Oye Como Va".

26. Nutella, e.g.: SPREAD

28. Shines: EXCELS

29. Cutthroat, as competition: FIERCE

32. Meet-__: romcom device: CUTE. Totally unknown to me.

45. Radius neighbor: ULNA

47. "You said it!": AMEN!

48. Justice Kagan: ELENA

49. Pithy saying: MAXIM

50. Lawn game: BOCCE

52. Wonder Woman topper: TIARA

53. Pungent: ACRID

54. Zaps for dinner: NUKES

57. Sketchbooks: PADS

58. "The Da Vinci Code" priory: SION

61. Supervillain Luthor: LEX

62. Hermana de la madre: TIA. Aunt. A certain proficiency in Spanish required for this one - "Sister of the mother".

63. __ B: 9-Down's professional name: MEL

So here's the grid in all its 16x15 mirror-symmetry glory ...

But first, I learned "LEED", "PSYWAR" and "MEET-CUTE today. Always a good day when you go to bed more learnèd than you began it. The problem is that I think my brain was already full, and those three new 'uns just pushed some important stuff out, although I think I'll try and forget "MEET-CUTE". Now, where did I leave my car?

... as promised the grid - and where the heck did I leave the corkscrew?

Steve

Thursday, January 2nd 2020 Derek Bowman

Theme: Sewing class - the theme entries all refer to the reveal answer later in the puzzle:

17A. One who leaves garments 50-Across: SEAMSTRESS. Probably a little old-fashioned now; I'd probably use "tailor" to describe needle-wielding men or women.

25A. One who leaves audiences 50-Across: STAND-UP COMIC. I worked with a guy once who was an IT consultant and had a stand-up comedy act riffing on  .... IT consulting. It didn't strike me as something that would exactly leave you rolling in the aisles.

38A. One who leaves patients 50-Across: BRAIN SURGEON. Very, very small ones, I hope.

and the unifier ...

50A. See 17-, 25- and 38-Across: IN STITCHES

A high-quality puzzle from Derek for the second day of the New Year. There's some real sparkle in the fill and some very elegant construction with the stacked 9's and 8's in the downs in the northeast and southwest. Nary a clunker to be seen, there's plainly a lot of effort that's gone into this one. A lot of the markers for this puzzle are more "Saturday-like" - average word length, number of blocks, those kind of things.

Let's see what else jumps out:

Across:

1. Common email attachments: PDFS

5. Fired (up): AMPED

10. Tablet with Siri: IPAD

14. Singer between Melanie and Joan at Woodstock: ARLO. Arlo Guthrie appeared between Melanie and Joan Baez's sets at the 1969 festival at Yasgur's Farm, which was actually nowhere near Woodstock being a good 60 miles away.

15. Drag one's feet: TARRY

16. Prepared-salad seller: DELI

19. www addresses: URLS

20. Feel compassion for, with "on": TAKE PITY

21. Some are imperfect: TENSES

23. "Louisiana Real & Rustic" chef: EMERIL. One of his first cookbooks, published in 1996. Lagasse and his mentor, Paul Prudhomme were responsible for the creation and development of what was described as "New New Orleans" cuisine.

24. Plot: CONNIVE

28. "It's all false!": LIES!

30. Chilling: EERIE

31. Yoga surface: MAT

32. Kid around: JEST

33. Formerly employed by The Company: EX-CIA. I think this might have been my favorite clue of the day.

34. Campsite bunks: COTS

35. Longship propeller: OAR. Hopefully more than one.

36. Playwright Chekhov: ANTON

37. Cold Stone buy: CONE. The Cold Stone Creamery ice-cream parlor franchise, not without its critics in the franchise world.

41. Approach stealthily, with "on": SNEAK UP

42. Can't-miss: NO-LOSE

46. San Diego County racetrack: DEL MAR. "Where the surf meets the turf". It certainly is a lovely spot, but I think Santa Anita, with its backdrop of the San Gabriel mountains is prettier.

47. Violent storms: TEMPESTS

“Full fathom five thy father lies;

Of his bones are coral made;

Those are pearls that were his eyes:

Nothing of him that doth fade,

But doth suffer a sea-change

Into something rich and strange.

Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell: Ding-dong

Hark! now I hear them,—Ding-dong, bell.”

- William Shakespeare, The Tempest

49. Point after deuce: AD IN. Advantage to the server in tennis. I didn't know this before crosswords taught me.

52. He reveals the Wizard: TOTO

53. Bite like a puppy: NIP AT

54. Air filter acronym: HEPA or High Efficiency Particulate Arrestance, which his something of a mouthful. This fixed my "CON LECCE" mistake at 34D. Not quite sure what I was thinking there.

55. Several: A FEW

56. Full of hot air: GASSY

57. "Not so fast!": EASY!

Down:

1. Tomato __: PASTE. Had PURÉE first. Was wrong.

2. Fantasize: DREAM

3. Raisin bran tidbit: FLAKE

4. Bath's county: SOMERSET. You can't bathe in the baths in Bath, sadly. They say the water quality is not safe as it's untreated. Didn't seem to do the Romans any harm though.

5. Number one Hun: ATTILA. I don't think I could name another Hun if my life depended on it.

6. Convenience store: MART

7. Salmon, to bears: PREY

8. Ambulance destinations, briefly: E.R.'S

9. "The Hunger Games" setting: DYSTOPIA. A great word, but I'm not sure I'd use it to describe the "setting" for the Hunger Games movies. I'd say the setting was the locale, which may have been dystopian. Minor niggle.

10. "Search me": I DUNNO

11. Orangey fruit: PERSIMMON. The wood of the tree was used to make golf clubs back when woods were made of wood. Would Woods' woods be wood? Tiger should tell us.

12. Make easier to bear: ALLEVIATE

13. Studies in detail: DISSECTS

18. Rods for roasting: SPITS

22. Suffix with persist: -ENCE. Least favorite of the day, but sometimes you need a crutch.

24. Smokehouse process: CURING

26. On deck: NEXT UP. Baseball.

27. House Beautiful subject: DECOR

28. Got word about: LEARNED OF

29. Biblical descendant of Jacob: ISRAELITE. And a great excuse to listen to some ska courtesy of Desmond Decker and The Aces.

32. Employment statistics: JOBS DATA

33. Not leaving to chance: ENSURING

34. How café is often served: CON LECHE. Usually espresso and scalded milk mixed 50/50.

36. "My Way" lyricist: ANKA

37. Appropriate: CO-OPT. Later-in-the-week example of cluing. Are we looking for the verb or the adjective?

39. Grumpy response to "Are you awake?": I AM NOW

40. Bad blood: ENMITY

43. Actor Milo: O'SHEA

44. Pedometer count: STEPS

45. Long exam answer: ESSAY

47. Baking amts.: TSPS

48. Greek vowels: ETAS

51. Long of "Third Watch": NIA. A very useful name for crosswords. There were only four three-letter entries today, as I mentioned at the top of the blog word lengths tend to get longer as you progress through the week.

And that wraps things up for this Thursday. I hope you all had a good New Year, onwards to 2020!

Steve

Thursday, December 26th 2019 Jeff Stillman

Theme: Dance Moves

I've highlighted the four dances in the grid for you in case you didn't see them during your solve. The reveal rather painfully spells out what to look for, I'd have been inclined to leave out the row numbers and just let the solver go dance-hunting.

Let’s go clue-hunting!

Across:

1. [This is so frustrating!]: ARGH! Not the best of starts

5. Ceiling: LIMIT

10. Mail often diverted to a separate folder: SPAM. Microsoft's spam filter gets a little over-enthusiastic, I make a point to check my junk mail every couple of days, there's often something in there I should read. I had a couple of emails from Lemonade a few weeks ago that got the Microsoft treatment and he probably wondered why I was ignoring him.

14. Sainted pope called "the Great": LEO I. There were 13 Popes Leo, therefore ending with Leo XIII. All sorts of opportunity there for crossword compilers stuck for an entry. If you think about it, Leo I would never have heard the term. By the time there was a II, the original had joined the choir celestial a good couple of hundred years before.

15. Modern Persian: IRANI. I want the next pope to style himself "IRAN I" just to cause confusion.

16. Celestial bear: URSA

17. Mosque bigwig: IMAM, "I, Mam" the sequel to "I, Carly", featuring her mother.

18. Daring move: BOLD STROKE

20. Barnyard mom: SOW

21. Bath-loving Muppet: ERNIE

22. Priest's robe: ALB

23. KITT on "Knight Rider": TRANS-AM. Not necessarily. There are two KITT characters, the first from the original 1982 series which is a Trans-Am, and the second from the 2008 TV pilot for the series reboot which was a Ford Shelby GT500. This is the kind of obfuscation that causes fights during trivia contests.

25. Hanging Gardens site: BABYLON

29. "You can tell me": SAY IT

30. Inhabitants of a myrmecologist's farm: ANTS

32. Big time: ERA

33. Thompson of "Thor: Ragnarok": TESSA. Who knew? Not me.

35. Getty and Rockefeller: OIL MEN. Because "CENTERS" doesn't fit.

38. Street moves since the '70s ... and what the black squares on rows 3, 5, 11 and 13 do: BREAK DANCES. Remember "b-boys" from a couple of weeks ago?

40. Unfolds: BLOOMS

42. Pertaining to the small intestine: ILEAC. A bit odd really, as the ileum is one of three sections of the small intestine.

43. Chest bone: RIB

44. Fling: HURL

46. Hardship: RIGOR

50. Judicial self-disqualification: RECUSAL

53. Zoe of "Avatar": SALDANA. I had a sulk around this section. The mess of SALDANA, ILIAC, ICARLY, LECID, ATNOS and AMATO seemed very clumsy, and just inviting cries of "Natick Foul".

55. Genetics lab material: RNA

56. Ragged: TATTY

58. Floral garland: LEI

59. Three-flavor block: NEAPOLITAN. This was such a treat when we were kids. Chocolate, strawberry and vanilla ice cream ALL AT THE SAME TIME! I think we had to go to confession after eating it and plead forgiveness.

62. Mount Olympus group: GODS

63. "You Needed Me" singer Murray: ANNE. Thank you, crosses.

64. REO Speedwagon guitarist Dave: AMATO. Ditto

65. One is often hard to resist: URGE

66. Site in a Steinbeck title: EDEN

67. Network points: NODES

68. Financial aid criterion: NEED

Down:

1. Top celebrity groupings: A-LISTS. A-LISTER last week, A-LISTS today. Can be tricky to parse, especially in the downs.

2. Ride-hitching fish: REMORA

3. "Scram!": GO AWAY!

4. Word for a guy: HIM

5. Scales aloft: LIBRA

6. Facial apparatus in a Dumas novel: IRON MASK

7. Neighbor of Mauritania: MALI

8. Behind on bills: IN DEBT

9. Poetic contraction: 'TIS

10. Like a sourpuss: SURLY

11. Math test parts: PROBLEMS

12. Inquire or require: ASK

13. Novelist Rita __ Brown: MAE

19. File folder feature: TAB

21. Prize: ESTEEM

24. Explosion maker, briefly: NITRO

26. Not separately: AS ONE

27. Mine find: ORE

28. A Bobbsey twin: NAN

31. Rock bottom: NADIR

34. "Rizzoli & Isles" actress Alexander: SASHA

36. Nickelodeon sitcom starring Miranda Cosgrove: I, CARLY

37. Massenet opera about a Spanish hero: LE CID

38. "Hogan's Heroes" star: BOB CRANE

39. Auto insurance giant: ALLSTATE

40. Cold call?: BRR!

41. Fabrication: LIE

45. In the prior month: ULTIMO. Instant and proximo are its temporal cousins.

47. In great numbers: GALORE

48. Stressed out: ON EDGE

49. Elevated: RAISED

51. Let loose, as hogs: UNPEN

52. __ Tomé and Príncipe: SÃO. I discover this island nation is located off the central equatorial coast of west Africa. I was guessing that they were two islands off Brazil or Portugal. Wrong!

54. Chem. class data: AT. NOS. Atomic Numbers, apparently. I thought the Atomic Number abbreviation was simply "AN" but that appears to have been a figment of my chemistry teacher's imagination.

57. Not very much: A TAD

59. Rob Roy's refusal: NAE. When Kirkintilloch founded their football (fitba') team in 1878, they named themselves "Kirkintilloch Rob Roy" in his honor, and are still known thusly today, which I find rather splendid.

60. Boundary: END

61. PC-to-PC hookup: LAN

62. Rev: GUN. As in engine. If my last name were Gunn I'd become a preacher just so I'd be called "Rev Gunn". Or Counter. "The sermon was given by Rev. Counter".

Thursday December 19th 2019 Gary Larson

Theme B-ing - punning on the B-present participle riff:

18A. Flashy accessories for a vagabond?: BUM BLING

37A. Barn extension where pack animals sleep?: BURRO WING. This was the one that set me on the theme path.

61A. Heckle musician Gordon Sumner?: BOO STING. A lot of musical references from my youth today. Sting was a substitute teacher before the Police broke, my sister worked with him at a comprehensive school in South London.

3D. Owner of the most pubs in town?: BAR KING

45D. Warning at a spelling contest?: BEE PING. That reminds me, I must change the batteries in my smoke detectors.

When I collected the theme entries together, I just wanted a "BI-" to complete the vowel set, but it was not to be. Understandable, the only candidate I could find was replacing "BUMBLING" with "BIASSING" and I'm not sure how to clue that one. So fair enough, Gary, a good puzzle with a nice theme.

Let's tread the boards:

Across:

1. Troubleshoots, as programs: DEBUGS. Been there, done that. Back in the day, it was also known as "dump cracking" which involved going though a two-foot pile of fan-fold paper with a highlighter and a ruler looking through the memory dump of the mainframe. I got pretty good at it. Probably because I was pretty good at putting the bugs in there in the first place. The very first program I wrote had an infinite loop, but I still managed to make a career out of IT. I laughed when I first went to present at Apple HQ, their address was "One Infinite Loop", I felt they'd named the campus for me.

7. Sharp humor: WIT

10. Rain protection: TARP

14. Marked by twinkling: STARRY

15. Brian of ambient music: ENO. U2 producer of note, and elevator music king. He was a founder member of Roxy Music, here playing synth in spangly gloves with a youthful Bryan Ferry. Talented chap.

16. Diaper cream ingredient: ALOE

17. Like nickels, to dimes: LARGER. Yes, why is that? I want my currency to get heftier the more valuable it is.

20. Swedish retail giant: IKEA. I went to my local IKEA a couple of weeks ago. It's legendary that the store is impossible to find your way out of, but on the way back to my car a lady asked me how to get out of the parking lot. I tried to explain, but realized I had no idea either. I did help her figure out which of her stop lights was out though, so something good came of it.

21. Runs of luck: STREAKS. Good or bad.

22. "Moonlight" Oscar winner Mahershala: ALI. Thank you, crosses.

23. Most smooth: SUAVEST. Nice word.

25. Put to use: TAP. As "tap into".

28. Most likely to snap: TENSEST. Two "mostests" within a couple of entries.

30. One-named singer with 15 Grammys: ADELE. She helped fix my ALL-STAR/A-LISTER mess at 11D

32. "By that logic ... ": ERGO ...

33. Wrongdoing: SINS

36. Ventricular outlet: AORTA

40. Martin Van __: BUREN

43. "Heavens to Murgatroyd!": EGAD!

44. Trails off: EBBS

48. Astrologer to the rich and famous: O'MARR. Known to me only from crosswords.

49. Tasty bites: MORSELS

51. Boston's Back __: BAY

52. French chef's "Ta-da!": ET VOILA!

56. Years on end: EON

57. Potato gadgets: MASHERS. I use a ricer, a little more effort but a lot smoother result. If I want chunky mash I use the old fork technique.

59. Crunch at breakfast: CAP'N

63. Sex therapy subject: LIBIDO. Rich is getting racier in his editing.

65. Mom's sister: AUNT

66. Greek letter: ETA

67. Close soccer score: ONE NIL To the Arsenal. Last week's "Man. U." rivals reappear. If you want to know what Arsenal, One-Nil, the USSR and the Pet Shop Boys have in common, then you either have too much time on your hands, or you will Google "One-Nil to the Arsenal" as I did.

I'm usually judicious with my links, but this week there's too much good music, or weirdly awesome music, to ignore.

Producer: What effects do you want in this video?

Pet Shop Boys: Yes!

68. Calf-length skirt: MIDI

69. French film ending word: FIN

70. Packed (in): WEDGED

Down:

1. Broadband initials: DSL. Digital Subscriber Line. It seems a little old-fashioned, but I still have DSL broadband.

2. Online seller: E-TAILER

4. Impel: URGE

5. Musical set at Rydell High: GREASE. Los Angeles does have some wonderful Art Deco public buildings, this is Venice High School, one of the locations used in the movie to represent Rydell High.

This is my local power distribution station built in 1949 on Cahuenga Avenue in North Hollywood. We don't build 'em like that any more, more's the pity. I admire it every time I drive past.

6. Turk. neighbor: SYR, Syria, to Turkey.

7. Streaming services, e.g.: WEB TV

8. Accustom (to): INURE

9. Some library volumes: TOMES

10. Chitchat: TALK

11. Big-time celeb: A-LISTER. I went with "ALL STAR" first, then gradually backed off as it slowly didn't work with anything else.

12. Youngest Weasley brother: RON. I didn't know he had brothers. Not a problem, I doubt any of the siblings are well-known enough to make the crossword.

13. Mastermind game piece: PEG

19. WWII Philippine battleground: BATAAN

21. Genre with bite: SATIRE

22. Had a bite: ATE

24. KGB country: USSR. "Go West! (with the Pet Shop Boys), Go West!"

26. Bottom-row PC key: ALT

27. Samosa veggie: PEA

29. Like a designated driver: SOBER

31. Venetian magistrates of yore: DOGES. Nice living quarters, too.

34. Holiday quaff: NOG

35. Hindu masters: SWAMIS

38. Turmoil: UNREST

39. Show that launched Clay Aiken's singing career, familiarly: IDOL. The "American Idol" talent show. I'm sure that I must have heard some of Mr. Aiken's output, but I couldn't name a song from him if my life depended on it.

40. Move up and down: BOB

41. Actress Thurman: UMA. One of those entries you might as well just print in the grid and have done with it.

42. Novelist Chandler: RAYMOND

46. Deborah Harry's band: BLONDIE. I saw Blondie live at Hammersmith Odeon in 1978. I was quite taken with Ms. Harry. I think it's OK to confess at this temporal distance that I was smoking weed before the gig which might have something to do with me thinking they were the best band I'd ever seen. I was distressed to discover later that she was dating the guitarist. Oh, the innocence of youth.

47. Tax form ID: SSN

50. Wisconsin city north of Chicago: RACINE. Aren't all Wisconsin cities north of Chicago? Just wondering ... I suppose north and north-west.

53. Fence supplier: THIEF. Nice clue. A fence traffics stolen goods, hence "thief".

54. Starbucks size: VENTI. I always forget the sizes in Starbucks, or maybe never bothered to remember them. "Small", "Medium" and "Large" work just fine.

55. "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" instrument: ORGAN.

Producer: How many solos do you want on the track? 

Iron Butterfly: Yes!

58. Spot of wine?: ASTI. Nice clue for an old crossword staple.

60. Under the covers: A-BED. Best use of the word comes in the eponymous monologue in Shakespeare's "Henry V"

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;

For he to-day that sheds his blood with me

Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,

This day shall gentle his condition:

And gentlemen in England now a-bed

Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,

And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks

That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.

61. Collision sound: BAM

62. Arles assent: OUI

63. Almost empty: LOW

64. Ancient: OLD

And with that, I think I'll disappear down the YouTube rabbit hole for a while and re-live the 70's and 80's.

Here's the grid! Et Fin

Steve

Thursday, December 12th 2019 Joe Deeney

Theme: A Call to Arms Rams Mars

20A. Mars: FOURTH PLANET. The "Mars" part of Gustav Holst's "Planet Suite" is a cracking piece of music, and probably inspired more "Star Wars" and "Star Trek"-type themes than any other. Lots 'o notes in the score shown below:

33A. Mars: CHOCOLATE BAR. In the great Anglo-American confusion stakes, the Mars Bar and the Milky Way provide yet another example. The UK Mars Bar and Milky Way are similar to the US Milky Way and Three Musketeers respectively, while the US Mars Bar is similar to a Snickers bar, which until recently was called a Marathon bar in the UK. Clear? There'll be a quiz at the end.

41A. Mars: POP STAR BRUNO. I like Bruno Mars. This track from British producer and songwriter Mark Ronson  is actually credited "Mark Ronson featuring Bruno Mars", but of course everyone thinks of it as a Bruno Mars song. It's hella catchy though! The video was filmed on 20th Century Fox's "New York Street" set in LA, you can see the lighting mounts on top of the buildings in a couple of the shots.

53A. Mars: SON OF JUPITER. God of War, too.

Fun theme from Joe today. There seemed to be quite a few proper names in the fill, but if the crosses are solid for names unknown I've got no problem with that. SPARTACUS and EXORCISMS in the downs are excellently done, crossing no fewer than three theme entries each.

Four entries not seen before in the LA Times, including RUTHIE which surprised me.

Let's see what else there is to muse on:

Across:

1. Baseball Hall of Famer Speaker: TRIS. Note the capitalized "S" in "Speaker" that tells us we're looking for a name. Tris Speaker, of whom I had never heard until today. Tricky start at 1A, but the crosses were solid.

5. Big name in interstellar communication: UHURA Lt. Uhuru, communications officer and translator on the starship "Enterprise" in Star Trek. Nice clue to this useful crossword name.

10. Window part: SASH. Tried "PANE". Was wrong.

14. Rope fiber: HEMP

15. Weighs an empty container on, as a deli scale: TARES. I got there in the end, but I'd not heard the word used before. I wanted something on the "zeroes out" line like your kitchen scales. The crosses let me to the "oh!" moment.

16. Oberlin's state: OHIO. A town best known for its liberal arts and music college.

17. "Frozen" sister: ELSA. I must get around to watching "Frozen" one day, then I might not having to keep guessing at the frequent references to the characters; two in today's puzzle.

18. Early 2010s Mideast anti-government movement: ARAB SPRING

22. American Red Cross founder: BARTON. Clarissa Harlowe "Clara" Barton, American Civil War nurse and ... patent clerk? What is it with patent clerks - Einstein was one too.

23. Silently understood: TACIT

27. Creative nuggets: IDEAS

28. "Me too": AS AM I

32. "Te __": Rihanna song: AMO

36. Giants manager before Bochy: ALOU. Felipe of the Alou clan. He's still associated with the club in a "Special Assistant" capacity.

39. "Two Women" Oscar winner: LOREN

40. Valentine letters: XOXO

44. Number one woman?: EVE

45. Plan B lead-in: IF NOT

46. CBS news anchor Barnett: ERROL

50. It's in your jeans: DENIM. Hmm, I get the wordplay with the clue, but denim isn't really "in" your jeans, more "is" your jeans. Bar the zipper, buttons, optional rivets - and currently hipster slashes.

52. Gap: LACUNA. Often a gap in a text or manuscript.

58. Yellow mollusk that became the U.C. Santa Cruz mascot: BANANA SLUG. "Best nickname in College Basketball" according to ESPN.

61. Booted, say: SHOD

62. __ rug: AREA

63. Oozy stuff: SLIME. You can buy Banana Slug merchandise with "I've Been Slimed" on it.

64. "Hands off!": MINE!

65. __ chic: GEEK. A fashion trend, or a now-defunct manufacturer of high-end gaming tables.

66. Big name in baseball cards: TOPPS

67. Fortuneteller: SEER

Down:

1. DOJ division since 1908: THE FBI. Bit odd this one, with "The" tacked on the front, no? I think the clue would be better written as "A DOJ division ... " to include the article.

2. Browser's circular arrow function: RELOAD

3. "No doubt about it!": I'M SURE!

4. Gladiator played by Kirk Douglas: SPARTACUS

5. Jazz aficionado?: UTAHN. Basketball team from Salt Lake City. I like the word, it's got a nice unusual letter progression.

6. Angelic strings: HARP

7. Risk territory between Ukraine and Siberia: URAL

8. First name in country: REBA

9. Org.: ASSN.

10. Ish: SORTA

11. Big tuna: AHI. I've got some in my freezer right now waiting to be sushi'd for Christmas Day family pot-luck.

12. Do wrong: SIN

13. Refuse to share: HOG

19. __ four: small cake: PETIT

21. Peter of reggae: TOSH

24. Mexican resort, for short: CABO

25. Big-screen format: IMAX

26. Capa attacker: TORO. Bullfighting, the bull attacking the matador's cape. Also the best cut of tuna for sushi - the fatty part of the belly.

28. Some kind of a nut: ACORN

29. Kevin who played Hercules on TV: SORBO. Thank you, crosses.

30. On one's toes: ALERT

31. Premier League rival of Arsenal, familiarly: MAN. U. England soccer. I won't go on a bore-fest here, but Manchester United and Arsenal are not really rivals, they compete in the same league, that's all. The real rivalry for Arsenal is with Tottenham Hotspur, their North London neighbors. Man. U's true rivals are the other mancunians Manchester City and fellow Merseysiders Liverpool.

I don't know when you cross over from competitor to rival - it's the same here, especially in college sports. Take the PAC 12 - Oregon/Oregon State, Cal/Stanford, USC/UCLA are all rivalries, but none of the schools would consider fellow-confererence member Utah a rival.

34. "Frozen" snowman: OLAF

35. Ways of dealing with inner demons?: EXORCISMS. Is the red cartoon fellow on your shoulder with a trident whispering temptations in your ear an outer demon?

36. Made like: APED

37. Word with bird or nest: LOVE

38. Go first: OPEN

42. Pumbaa's "The Lion King" pal: TIMON. Where would we be without Disney crossword clues? Athens, that's where.

43. __ tide: NEAP

47. Foster of folk music: RUTHIE. Thank you, crosses. I should buy Crosses a drink today for all the help.

48. Impossible NFL score: ONE ONE. Any other score "non-one" score is theoretically possible in football, although in some cases highly unlikely. I did see a scoreboard reading "2-4" a few years ago where a college game was well into the second quarter and the only points registered at that stage in the game were three safeties.

49. Pantry: LARDER. There's an oh-so-subtle difference between the two - a larder originally was cooler than a pantry and used to store meat, milk and other foodstuffs likely to spoil faster. The pantry was where you kept your dry goods, spices and what-not. Nowadays synonymous, and perfectly OK.

51. "Wicked Game" singer Chris: ISAAK. I always want to call him ISAAC until a cross clunks me (cluncs me?) on the top of the head and tells me not to be so silly.

52. Olympic racers: LUGES. Want to slide at 80 miles an hour downhill, feet-first lying on a tray? No, me either. The doubles event is even crazier.

54. Condé __: NAST

55. Nobel ceremony city: OSLO

56. Lose one's cool: FLIP

57. Leap: JUMP

58. Carry-on unit: BAG

59. "__ you serious?": ARE

60. Used to be called: NÉE

Well, I've run out of stuff to talk about, so I'd better stick a fork in this one and call it done.

Steve

Thursday, December 5th 2019 Mark McClain

Theme: Dog Show

17A. *Line never spoken by James Cagney: YOU DIRTY RAT! Well, "you dirty yellow-bellied rat" comes close. c.f. "Play it again, Sam".

23A. *Rock pile at a prehistoric gravesite: BURIAL CAIRN. There are some fine cairns, none prehistoric, in my neighborhood at the tree near the top of Mount Lee, better known as the "Hollywood Sign" hill. I hope there aren't bodies buried underneath. We used to picnic and play on Stonehenge before everyone got serious about the stones. Not cairns, I know, but happy memories of climbing a sarsen stone or two.

40A. *Like Juárez, vis-à-vis El Paso: ACROSS THE BORDER

50A. *Far-fetched, as a story: COCK AND BULL. There are arguments aplenty about the origin of this phrase, most involving two inns on the coaching route from the Midlands to London. However, it's difficult to argue that these lines from John Day's 1608 play Law Trickes were not the first usage - "What a tale of a cock and a bull he told my father".

Which brings us to the, quite frankly, inexplicable reveal:

64A. "__, Batman!": Robin's cry upon spotting the ends of the answers to starred clues?: HOLY TERRIER

So ... we've got four dog breeds which happen to be terriers - fair enough, so far. Now how to tie them together? How about an entry which has TERRIER in it, and has nothing to do with anything else in the puzzle, neither was the phrase ever used in the comic books, nor the TV shows nor the movie series?

I'm completely baffled by this one. I can't see a play on words with "HOLY", there's nothing to tie "YOU DIRTY", "BURIAL", "ACROSS THE" and "COCK AND" to each other. It's totally random. Honestly, this is "*Far-fetched, as a crossword theme" as you can get.

Maybe "YOU DIRTY RAT" was meant to clue us into the reveal was a line never spoken? Or was it all just COCK AND BULL?

There is plenty else to like though, I just wish Mark and/or Rich had been able to come up with a better reveal, or even go with no reveal at all and just find a substitute for that awful 64A.

That being said, let's see what else we've got, and please, if I'm missing the blindingly obvious, let me know via the comments.

Across:

1. Distillery mixture: MASH. Tried BRAN. Was wrong. Always good to get off on the wrong foot.

5. The Flyers' Gritty, e.g.: MASCOT. He's got about as much to do with Philadelphia and hockey as "HOLY TERRIERS!" Maybe this is the theme?

11. Poke fun at: RIB

14. __-inflammatory: ANTI

15. Corrida figure: EL TORO. Denizens of Southern California will remember the "El Toro Y" traffic warnings, a junction between the 5 and the 405 which every day caused alarums and excursions at rush hour.

16. Important card: ACE

19. Cutting remark: DIG

20. 4,300-mile range: ANDES

21. Novelist Waugh: ALEC. A very talented family. His brother Evelyn wrote two of my favorite novels, "Brideshead Revisted" and "Scoop!".

22. "In __ of gifts ... ": LIEU

26. Protect with a levee: EMBANK

30. Canon SLR: EOS. That's one high-end camera. I have a Canon Rebel, mostly to take pictures of my N-scale model railway - you just can't get the depth of field with the iPhone, although in some (bad modelling!) cases that's not such a bad thing!

31. Gorilla expert Fossey: DIAN

32. A pop: EACH

36. Sail (through): COAST

43. MGM part: METRO. Movie studio Metro-Goldwyn-Meyer, with Sam Goldwyn's name in eye-catching italics. The consummate self-promoter that he was, as Sam Goldfish, formed "Goldwyn" as a co-partnership with Edgar and Archie Selwyn. The name was to be either "Selfish" or "Goldwyn", so not hard to figure out which was the preferred choice. Immediately after the partnership was formed, Sam legally ditched his last name, and replaced it with "Goldwyn". The rest, as they say, is history.

44. Cork's place: EIRE

45. Racing legend Earnhardt: DALE

46. Brouhaha: ADO

48. Held to account: LIABLE

56. Car rental giant: AVIS

57. "Royal" seaside bird: TERN. Here's a turn for the better:

58. Spare: EXTRA

63. GQ or EW: MAG. A magazine. "EW" is "Entertainment Weekly", and though "GQ" purports to be "Gentlemen's Quarterly", it's published monthly. I'm not sure the full name has been used since the mid 60's. and certainly not since 1970.

66. Lyft driver's ballpark fig.: E.T.A.

67. Café option: AU LAIT. Coffee with hot milk added. I'm not sure what would happen if you ordered coffee with cold milk in France, the entire world is quiet on the subject. Here's the hot version:

68. Real estate ad number: AREA

69. Anthem contraction: O'ER

70. "Hard to Stop" air conditioners: TRANES

71. Use one's outside voice: YELL

Down:

1. "The Good Place" Emmy nominee Rudolph: MAYA, Minnie Riperton's ("Loving You") daughter. Who knew? No me, I just looked her up.

2. In a trice: ANON. I'd rather go with "soon" than "in a trice". If I want something "anon", it's "soon" - not right now, but not next February, more when it's convenient for the giver. If I want something "in a trice", it's more demanding "now", "ASAP" or "STAT". Funny how the "now" words are very recent.

3. Poker choice: STUD. A variant of the gambling game. Most of what you see today is Texas Hold 'Em.

4. Keep out of sight: HIDE

5. Debussy's "La __": MER. An orchestral piece. It takes a little while to get going, so you can listen to it "anon". Actually, it's been playing for 15 minutes while i work my way down this blog, and it's never really ever got started. Not on my favorites list to this point.

6. Chancel feature: ALTAR

7. Tablet accessories: STYLI. They still exist, mostly in the electronic form to draw on your iPad or other "small, portable, electronic devices" as the airlines like to call them.

8. Chick with Grammys: COREA

9. Soothsayer: ORACLE

10. Little one: TOT

11. Circle lines: RADII. Bones, too.

12. Less approachable: ICIER

13. Started: BEGUN

18. Library ID: ISBN. What happened to the good old Dewey Decimal System? Do librarians still use it?

22. Hall of Fame Dodger manager Tommy: LA SORDA

24. Luau strings: UKES

25. Estée contemporary: COCO. Lauder. Chanel.

26. Mild cheese: EDAM. I tried BRIE first, all the time grumbling that it's not always mild. Then I was wrong, so I ungrumbled. (Degrumbled?)

27. Nursery rhyme trio: MICE. Not PIGS then. A lot of backspacing/wite-out today.

28. Frequent prank caller to Moe's Tavern: BART

29. Arctic garb: ANORAKS

33. Snacked, say: ATE

34. McBride of "Hawaii Five-0": CHI

35. Sailor's pronoun: HER. "Thar she blows!" and sundry other stuff.

37. Very little: A DAB

38. Market: SELL

39. Walnut or pecan: TREE

41. Bar mixer: SODA. Not on my bar. Tonic, please!

42. Round signal: BELL This is quite nice - the end of a round in a boxing contest, but alarm bells tend to be round too.

47. Like a band in a bus: ON TOUR. Jackson Browne's paean to his tour team, recorded across the street from where I used to live - at the BBC's Maida Vale studios. I often used to pop in on my way back from work to see what was going on, sadly I missed this session in the (very tiny) auditorium.

49. "The Sopranos" actor Robert: ILER

50. Brief appearance: CAMEO

51. Egg-shaped: OVATE. Darn, I confidently put OVOID and then backed off, letter by letter.

52. Cuban export: CIGAR

53. Street of mystery: DELLA

54. "Trumbo" Oscar nominee Cranston: BRYAN. More famous for "Breaking Bad", a title I have tried on numerous occasions to make into a crossword theme. Never got there!

55. Set free: UNTIE

59. CT scan component: X-RAY

60. Run out of gas: TIRE. People tire, cars stop. I had a Jaguar XJS which had a gas gauge that never worked (quelle surprise!) and I had to estimate when I needed to fill up based on the mileage since the last time I topped up the tank. Sure enough, I ran dry on the 134 freeway in Toluca Lake - directly on an overpass above a gas station. A quick scoot down the embankment, a gallon in a plastic can and I was on my way in about five minutes flat.

61. Traditional dance: REEL

62. Mostly depleted sea: ARAL

64. Party accessory: HAT

65. UFO passengers, supposedly: ET'S

A sad day for grammarians everywhere, the Apostrophe Protection Society has this week disbanded, saying that "ignorance and laziness have won".

D'oh! May the greengrocers' plural live forever.

Steve

Oh, sorry, here'res' the grid. I like posting grid's.