Theme: Different Strokes
18A: *Dangerous snake of the Southwest: SIDEWINDER
24A: *Fortification about four feet high: BREASTWORK
39A: *Chaos theory principle: BUTTERFLY EFFECT
53A: *Road less traveled: BACK STREET
61A: *Area where electricians can't stand to work?: CRAWL SPACE
The BREASTWORK fortification is new to me. 61A is the only theme answer with a question mark.
Nice tie-in fills at the very beginning and the end of the grid:
1A: With 71-Across, extracurricular group concerned with the starts of the answers: SWIM
71A: See 1-Across: TEAM
And two more sets of cross-references in the grid:
43A: With 10-Down: "Collages" author: ANAIS
10D: See 43-Across: NIN
35D: See 55-Down: ELS
55D: With 35-Down, two-time U.S. Open winner: ERNIE
I got ERNIE ELS immediately. Struggled with ANAIS NIN. I only knew and read a few pages of her "Delta of Venus" (too erotic and exotic for my mind). We don't see those two full names and ESO BESO (21D: Paul Anka love song with a Spanish title) in the grid often. Refreshing!
Neat pangram as well, all the 26 letters are used.
Across:
9A: Split up: END IT. And DIVVY (16A: Split (up) & FLEE (51A: Split). I totally dig these "split" clues. Awesome!
14A: "Voilà!" relative: TADA
15A: What, in Tours: QUOI. Tours is French city. On the Loire River.
17A: "Terrible" tsar: IVAN. OK, IVAN the Terrible. Peter the Great. Dennis the Menace.
20A: Surreal: EERIE
22A: Home run pace: TROT. The best feeling in the world is probably the incredible high baseball players experience immediately after they hit a home run. Then the lazy TROT.
27A: Swear: CUSS
28A: Silver salmon: COHO
29A: Altair, for one: A STAR. The bright star in constellation Aquila. V-8 moment for me.
31A: CD players: DJS. My favorite clue.
36A: Arm bones: ULNAE
44A: Shore pounder: SURF. Thought of WAVE.
45A: Stutz contemporary: REO. Learned about Stutz from doing Xword.
46A: Rub it in: GLOAT. Are they really exchangeable?
49A: For men and women, in a way: COED
58A: Awed response: OOH. My awed response is always "WOW".
59A: __ -McGee, energy company that employed Karen Silkwood: KERR. Know the company, not Karen Silkwood.
60A: Tennis opening: SERVE. Wimbledon: strawberry & cream & Roger Federer.
65A: Have __: know someone: AN IN
66A: Warbuck's favorite: ANNIE. "The sun'll come out, Tomorrow..."
67A: Reptilian logo brand, once: IZOD. What does IZOD mean?
68A: Copier company: MITA
69A: Projecting shelf: LEDGE. Window LEDGE I suppose.
70A: Scriptural passage: TEXT
Down:
1D: '80s-'90s Toronto pitcher Dave: STIEB. Uh oh, I've never heard of this pitcher. Wiki says he was a seven-time All-Star and his autobiography was titled "Tomorrow I'll Be Perfect". How would you title yours?
2D: Vacillate: WAVER
4D: Stark raving type: MANIAC
5D: Mensa concerns: IQS. Mensa means "stupid" in Spanish.
6D: Rapa __: Easter Island: NUI. Nailed it this time.
7D: Bob one's head at: NOD TO
8D: Mountain chain: SIERRA
9D: Rewrite, maybe: EDIT. Or "Emulate Rich Norris".
11D: CPU drive: DVD BURNER. Had difficulty obtaining the answer.
12D: "Riverdance" fiddler Eileen: IVERS. She is foreign to me. That's a very rare surname, isn't it?
13D: Novices: TYROS. Also TIROS.
19D: Chinese cookware: WOKS
26D: Fairy tale meany: WOLF. From the "Little Red Riding Hood".
27D: Pasture arrival: CALF. "Arrival" stymied me. I need "newborn".
30D: Low stools: TUFFETS
31D: Corp. alias letters: DBA (Doing Business As). I forgot. It's clued as "AKA's commerce cousin" in our old puzzle once.
32D: Flag Day mo.: JUN
33D: Theater worker: STAGEHAND. So simple in retrospect.
37D: Snoopy, in his WWI fantasies: ACE. Love the clue.
40D: Mah-jongg piece: TILE. My neighbors in Guangzhou used to drive me nuts by playing mah-jongg in the evenings.
42D: Fertility god: EROS. Thought of ISIS, who is an Egyptian fertility goddess. I couldn't even tell a he from a she, for Pete's sake.
48D: La Brea attraction: TAR PIT. Nice to see La Brea as clue rather than answer.
50D: Imagined: DREAMT. We had discussions about DREAMT being the only English word ending in mt.
51D: The "f" in f-stop: FOCAL
52D: "SNL" producer Michaels: LORNE
56D: "Don't Cry for Me, Argentina" singer: EVITA. Hmmm, shouldn't it be Governor Sanford? Romantic, impossible, forbidden love!
57D: Common break hr.: TEN AM
59D: Kandinsky friend: KLEE (Paul). I am not familiar with the Russian painter Kandinsky, who is credited with painting the first modern abstract works, according to Wiki. He and his buddy KLEE both taught at Bauhaus (Germany), which is perhaps most famous for having our crossword stalwart Mies van der Rohe as their director of architecture in 1930's.
63D: "Friends" costar Courteney: COX. She played Monica.
Answer grid.
C.C.
18A: *Dangerous snake of the Southwest: SIDEWINDER
24A: *Fortification about four feet high: BREASTWORK
39A: *Chaos theory principle: BUTTERFLY EFFECT
53A: *Road less traveled: BACK STREET
61A: *Area where electricians can't stand to work?: CRAWL SPACE
The BREASTWORK fortification is new to me. 61A is the only theme answer with a question mark.
Nice tie-in fills at the very beginning and the end of the grid:
1A: With 71-Across, extracurricular group concerned with the starts of the answers: SWIM
71A: See 1-Across: TEAM
And two more sets of cross-references in the grid:
43A: With 10-Down: "Collages" author: ANAIS
10D: See 43-Across: NIN
35D: See 55-Down: ELS
55D: With 35-Down, two-time U.S. Open winner: ERNIE
I got ERNIE ELS immediately. Struggled with ANAIS NIN. I only knew and read a few pages of her "Delta of Venus" (too erotic and exotic for my mind). We don't see those two full names and ESO BESO (21D: Paul Anka love song with a Spanish title) in the grid often. Refreshing!
Neat pangram as well, all the 26 letters are used.
Across:
9A: Split up: END IT. And DIVVY (16A: Split (up) & FLEE (51A: Split). I totally dig these "split" clues. Awesome!
14A: "Voilà!" relative: TADA
15A: What, in Tours: QUOI. Tours is French city. On the Loire River.
17A: "Terrible" tsar: IVAN. OK, IVAN the Terrible. Peter the Great. Dennis the Menace.
20A: Surreal: EERIE
22A: Home run pace: TROT. The best feeling in the world is probably the incredible high baseball players experience immediately after they hit a home run. Then the lazy TROT.
27A: Swear: CUSS
28A: Silver salmon: COHO
29A: Altair, for one: A STAR. The bright star in constellation Aquila. V-8 moment for me.
31A: CD players: DJS. My favorite clue.
36A: Arm bones: ULNAE
44A: Shore pounder: SURF. Thought of WAVE.
45A: Stutz contemporary: REO. Learned about Stutz from doing Xword.
46A: Rub it in: GLOAT. Are they really exchangeable?
49A: For men and women, in a way: COED
58A: Awed response: OOH. My awed response is always "WOW".
59A: __ -McGee, energy company that employed Karen Silkwood: KERR. Know the company, not Karen Silkwood.
60A: Tennis opening: SERVE. Wimbledon: strawberry & cream & Roger Federer.
65A: Have __: know someone: AN IN
66A: Warbuck's favorite: ANNIE. "The sun'll come out, Tomorrow..."
67A: Reptilian logo brand, once: IZOD. What does IZOD mean?
68A: Copier company: MITA
69A: Projecting shelf: LEDGE. Window LEDGE I suppose.
70A: Scriptural passage: TEXT
Down:
1D: '80s-'90s Toronto pitcher Dave: STIEB. Uh oh, I've never heard of this pitcher. Wiki says he was a seven-time All-Star and his autobiography was titled "Tomorrow I'll Be Perfect". How would you title yours?
2D: Vacillate: WAVER
4D: Stark raving type: MANIAC
5D: Mensa concerns: IQS. Mensa means "stupid" in Spanish.
6D: Rapa __: Easter Island: NUI. Nailed it this time.
7D: Bob one's head at: NOD TO
8D: Mountain chain: SIERRA
9D: Rewrite, maybe: EDIT. Or "Emulate Rich Norris".
11D: CPU drive: DVD BURNER. Had difficulty obtaining the answer.
12D: "Riverdance" fiddler Eileen: IVERS. She is foreign to me. That's a very rare surname, isn't it?
13D: Novices: TYROS. Also TIROS.
19D: Chinese cookware: WOKS
26D: Fairy tale meany: WOLF. From the "Little Red Riding Hood".
27D: Pasture arrival: CALF. "Arrival" stymied me. I need "newborn".
30D: Low stools: TUFFETS
31D: Corp. alias letters: DBA (Doing Business As). I forgot. It's clued as "AKA's commerce cousin" in our old puzzle once.
32D: Flag Day mo.: JUN
33D: Theater worker: STAGEHAND. So simple in retrospect.
37D: Snoopy, in his WWI fantasies: ACE. Love the clue.
40D: Mah-jongg piece: TILE. My neighbors in Guangzhou used to drive me nuts by playing mah-jongg in the evenings.
42D: Fertility god: EROS. Thought of ISIS, who is an Egyptian fertility goddess. I couldn't even tell a he from a she, for Pete's sake.
48D: La Brea attraction: TAR PIT. Nice to see La Brea as clue rather than answer.
50D: Imagined: DREAMT. We had discussions about DREAMT being the only English word ending in mt.
51D: The "f" in f-stop: FOCAL
52D: "SNL" producer Michaels: LORNE
56D: "Don't Cry for Me, Argentina" singer: EVITA. Hmmm, shouldn't it be Governor Sanford? Romantic, impossible, forbidden love!
57D: Common break hr.: TEN AM
59D: Kandinsky friend: KLEE (Paul). I am not familiar with the Russian painter Kandinsky, who is credited with painting the first modern abstract works, according to Wiki. He and his buddy KLEE both taught at Bauhaus (Germany), which is perhaps most famous for having our crossword stalwart Mies van der Rohe as their director of architecture in 1930's.
63D: "Friends" costar Courteney: COX. She played Monica.
Answer grid.
C.C.
