Theme: None
Total blocks: 40
Total words: 70
Are you surprised that HOSTILE TAKEOVER (31A: It might involve a proxy fight) is Mr. Wiesenberg's seed entry? I'd have guessed JAVA APPLET (16A: Small program with a browser interface), my favorite out of the 9 long & lively Across entries.
I was actually thinking of the Board of Directors control, you know, like the proxy fight William Achman launched against Target, so the answer did not jump to me immediately.
Pleasant solving experience today. I was able to fill in most of long fills on the first pass, thanks to the accessibility of the crosses. Normally I feel lost and hopeless on Saturdays without theme as my Sherpa. Those multiple-word entries just do not pop up as easily to me as they do to others.
But then I struggled mightily with HAS A SHOT AT (54A: Might achieve) and lower right corner. Still cannot believe my eyes that THIRTY NINE is the answer for 59A: 78 half. How could it be so simple?
Across:
1A: Largest oceanic dolphin: ORCA. Yep, it's not really whale.
5A" "__ consummation devoutly to be wish'd": Hamlet: 'TIS A. No idea. It's from his famous soliloquy "To be, or not to be".
9A: Hi-tech battler: BOT. Short for "robot". It's "a software program that imitates the behavior of a human, as by querying search engines or participating in chatroom or IRC discussions."
12A: Wood finishing tool: BELT SANDER. Here is an electric Bosch BELT SANDER.
15A: Brooklyn, say, briefly: BORO (Borough)
17A: Surrealist Tanguy: YVES. Obtained his name from Down fills. I don't get his "Indefinite Divisibility" at all.
18A: Long-distance messages?: SMOKE SIGNALS. Great clue.
20A: Prepare for a storage, as a carpet: ROLL UP
23A: Barry who played Lt. Gerard on TV's "The Fugitive": MORSE. Complete stranger to me. I've only seen Harrison Ford's "The Fugitive".
24A: "Rumor has it...": I HEAR. "Rumor has it..." is also a Jennifer Aniston/Kevin Costner movie.
25A: 1876 Twain hero: TOM SAWYER
29A: Health insurance giant: CIGNA. Thought of AETNA first.
30A: Incredulous dying words: ET TU. Caesar's last words" "ET TU, Brute?".
39A: Memory principle: MNEME. Muse of Memory as well.
40A: Ice cream flavor: PISTACHIO. Have you tried mochi ice cream? It has PISTACHIO flavor as well.
45A: Minor, legally: PETIT. Same as "petty"?
46A: When Ovid's "Ars Amatoria" is believed to have been published: ONE BC. Just fill in ONE BC whenever you are not sure of those Roman years.
47A: Notable show biz sisters: GABORS. Zsa Zsa, Eva & Magda.
48A: Home of NBA's Thunder: OKLOHOMA CITY. Completely unknown to me. They were Seattle SuperSonics before 2008.
53A: Landing: PIER. The clue just does not feel complete. Shouldn't it be "Landing place"?
58A: Letter-bottom abbr.: ENCS
60A: "Silent Spring" subj.: DDT
61A: River to the Seine: OISE. See this map. It's pronounced like wäz.
62A: Singer born Eithne Patricia Ní Bhraonáin: ENYA. Well, 4-letter singer, who else could it be? Maybe SADE. Wikipedia says ENYA is an approximate transliteration of how Eithne is pronounced in her native Irish.
Down:
1D: Part of a propositional phr.: OBJ (Object).
2D: "The Crying Game" actor: REA (Stephen).
3D: XXXI x V: CLV. 31x5= 155
4D: Obliquely: AT A SLANT
5D: About 1/3 of Maine's I-95D: TNPK (Turnpike). Big stumper. No idea, sir.
6D: Hanging out, say: IDLE. Had trouble understanding the grammar of the clue/answer.
7D: Spies: SEES. Verb.
8D: Drawing intro: ART I
9D: Flaubert heroine: BOVARY. "Madam BOVARY". The only Flaubert novel I've actually read. Don't we all want things we can't or shouldn't have?
10D: Words implying consequences: OR ELSE
11D: One pitching: TOSSER
13D: Japanese warrior: SAMURAI. Japanese kanji for SAMURAI 侍 is the same as Chinese character, simply means "servant" (noun) or "to serve" (verb).
14D: For one: A POP. And ANY (56D: At least one). Clue echos.
15D: Yet: BY NOW
19D: Early ABC show, for short: GMA. D'oh, "Good Morning, America". I had G?A sitting there forever.
21D: First state admitted to the Union from the Northwest Territory: OHIO. Again, 4 letter, it's either OHIO or IOWA.
22D: Longevity: LEGS. Tricky clue.
25D: Saw things? TEETH. I feel so clever to have nailed this one. The question mark indicates that "saw" is not a past tense of "see" here.
26D: Emperor who deposed Pope John XII: OTTO I. The first emperor of the Holy Roman Empire. Easy guess.
27D: Mindanao peak: Abbr.: MT. APO. Dan Naddor clued it as "Philippines' highest peak: Abbr." last time. APO simply means "master" or "grandfather".
28D: Czech composer Josef: SUK. Nope. It's pronounced like "sook". And Josef is "yaw-zef". He looks like a politician.
32D: Europe's __ de Genève: LAC. LPGA's annual Évian Master is played on the shores of Lake Geneva. Very pretty golf course.
33D: Vicarious feeling: EMPATHY. This word is bandied a lot during Justice Sonia Sotomayor's confirmation hearing.
34D: Singly: ONE BY ONE
35D: Nix: VETO. Latin for "I forbid".
36D: Qatar dignitary: EMIR
37D: Soaks, as flax: RETS. Learned RETS and the "Nerve network" RETE from doing Xword.
40D: Exhausted: POOPED
41D: How many Colonial debts were paid: IN KIND. Have never heard of the phrase "payment IN KIND". The Wikipedia entry says KIND (or sometimes kine) means "cattle". Kine is an archaic plural of cow.
42D: Choose: SELECT. Penned in OPT FOR immediately.
43D: Slope contractions: T-BARS
44D: Bavarian beef?: ACH. German for "Oh!" /"Oh no!"/"Alas". I was stumped.
47D: Nub: GIST
49: "__ Be Back With You"" Steve Forbert song: OH, TO. No idea. Could not even find a YouTube clip.
50D: Half a fish: MAHI. Literally, "strong" in Hawaiian. Red Lobster's seared MAHI-MAHI is pretty good.
51D: Just like that: AS IS. The sale tag words.
52D: Supervision: CARE
55D: Woodsman's makeup: TIN. The TIN Man in "The Wizard of Oz". Did anyone think of the hot-tempered Welsh golfer Ian Woosman first?
57D: Hot spot?: TEA. Mine was SPA.
Answer grid.
Picture of the Day: Here is great photo of our fellow LAT solver Embien standing by part of wood pile. He and his wife heat their house with a wood stove. Here is a beautiful view of his front deck. Embien said: "Doesn't look its best this time of year as the crop out there (purple vetch) was harvested in July and it's too dry to plant winter wheat yet. We live waaay out in the country, about five miles west of Banks, Oregon, in the foothills of the Coast Range."
C.C.
Total blocks: 40
Total words: 70
Are you surprised that HOSTILE TAKEOVER (31A: It might involve a proxy fight) is Mr. Wiesenberg's seed entry? I'd have guessed JAVA APPLET (16A: Small program with a browser interface), my favorite out of the 9 long & lively Across entries.
I was actually thinking of the Board of Directors control, you know, like the proxy fight William Achman launched against Target, so the answer did not jump to me immediately.
Pleasant solving experience today. I was able to fill in most of long fills on the first pass, thanks to the accessibility of the crosses. Normally I feel lost and hopeless on Saturdays without theme as my Sherpa. Those multiple-word entries just do not pop up as easily to me as they do to others.
But then I struggled mightily with HAS A SHOT AT (54A: Might achieve) and lower right corner. Still cannot believe my eyes that THIRTY NINE is the answer for 59A: 78 half. How could it be so simple?
Across:
1A: Largest oceanic dolphin: ORCA. Yep, it's not really whale.
5A" "__ consummation devoutly to be wish'd": Hamlet: 'TIS A. No idea. It's from his famous soliloquy "To be, or not to be".
9A: Hi-tech battler: BOT. Short for "robot". It's "a software program that imitates the behavior of a human, as by querying search engines or participating in chatroom or IRC discussions."
12A: Wood finishing tool: BELT SANDER. Here is an electric Bosch BELT SANDER.
15A: Brooklyn, say, briefly: BORO (Borough)
17A: Surrealist Tanguy: YVES. Obtained his name from Down fills. I don't get his "Indefinite Divisibility" at all.
18A: Long-distance messages?: SMOKE SIGNALS. Great clue.
20A: Prepare for a storage, as a carpet: ROLL UP
23A: Barry who played Lt. Gerard on TV's "The Fugitive": MORSE. Complete stranger to me. I've only seen Harrison Ford's "The Fugitive".
24A: "Rumor has it...": I HEAR. "Rumor has it..." is also a Jennifer Aniston/Kevin Costner movie.
25A: 1876 Twain hero: TOM SAWYER
29A: Health insurance giant: CIGNA. Thought of AETNA first.
30A: Incredulous dying words: ET TU. Caesar's last words" "ET TU, Brute?".
39A: Memory principle: MNEME. Muse of Memory as well.
40A: Ice cream flavor: PISTACHIO. Have you tried mochi ice cream? It has PISTACHIO flavor as well.
45A: Minor, legally: PETIT. Same as "petty"?
46A: When Ovid's "Ars Amatoria" is believed to have been published: ONE BC. Just fill in ONE BC whenever you are not sure of those Roman years.
47A: Notable show biz sisters: GABORS. Zsa Zsa, Eva & Magda.
48A: Home of NBA's Thunder: OKLOHOMA CITY. Completely unknown to me. They were Seattle SuperSonics before 2008.
53A: Landing: PIER. The clue just does not feel complete. Shouldn't it be "Landing place"?
58A: Letter-bottom abbr.: ENCS
60A: "Silent Spring" subj.: DDT
61A: River to the Seine: OISE. See this map. It's pronounced like wäz.
62A: Singer born Eithne Patricia Ní Bhraonáin: ENYA. Well, 4-letter singer, who else could it be? Maybe SADE. Wikipedia says ENYA is an approximate transliteration of how Eithne is pronounced in her native Irish.
Down:
1D: Part of a propositional phr.: OBJ (Object).
2D: "The Crying Game" actor: REA (Stephen).
3D: XXXI x V: CLV. 31x5= 155
4D: Obliquely: AT A SLANT
5D: About 1/3 of Maine's I-95D: TNPK (Turnpike). Big stumper. No idea, sir.
6D: Hanging out, say: IDLE. Had trouble understanding the grammar of the clue/answer.
7D: Spies: SEES. Verb.
8D: Drawing intro: ART I
9D: Flaubert heroine: BOVARY. "Madam BOVARY". The only Flaubert novel I've actually read. Don't we all want things we can't or shouldn't have?
10D: Words implying consequences: OR ELSE
11D: One pitching: TOSSER
13D: Japanese warrior: SAMURAI. Japanese kanji for SAMURAI 侍 is the same as Chinese character, simply means "servant" (noun) or "to serve" (verb).
14D: For one: A POP. And ANY (56D: At least one). Clue echos.
15D: Yet: BY NOW
19D: Early ABC show, for short: GMA. D'oh, "Good Morning, America". I had G?A sitting there forever.
21D: First state admitted to the Union from the Northwest Territory: OHIO. Again, 4 letter, it's either OHIO or IOWA.
22D: Longevity: LEGS. Tricky clue.
25D: Saw things? TEETH. I feel so clever to have nailed this one. The question mark indicates that "saw" is not a past tense of "see" here.
26D: Emperor who deposed Pope John XII: OTTO I. The first emperor of the Holy Roman Empire. Easy guess.
27D: Mindanao peak: Abbr.: MT. APO. Dan Naddor clued it as "Philippines' highest peak: Abbr." last time. APO simply means "master" or "grandfather".
28D: Czech composer Josef: SUK. Nope. It's pronounced like "sook". And Josef is "yaw-zef". He looks like a politician.
32D: Europe's __ de Genève: LAC. LPGA's annual Évian Master is played on the shores of Lake Geneva. Very pretty golf course.
33D: Vicarious feeling: EMPATHY. This word is bandied a lot during Justice Sonia Sotomayor's confirmation hearing.
34D: Singly: ONE BY ONE
35D: Nix: VETO. Latin for "I forbid".
36D: Qatar dignitary: EMIR
37D: Soaks, as flax: RETS. Learned RETS and the "Nerve network" RETE from doing Xword.
40D: Exhausted: POOPED
41D: How many Colonial debts were paid: IN KIND. Have never heard of the phrase "payment IN KIND". The Wikipedia entry says KIND (or sometimes kine) means "cattle". Kine is an archaic plural of cow.
42D: Choose: SELECT. Penned in OPT FOR immediately.
43D: Slope contractions: T-BARS
44D: Bavarian beef?: ACH. German for "Oh!" /"Oh no!"/"Alas". I was stumped.
47D: Nub: GIST
49: "__ Be Back With You"" Steve Forbert song: OH, TO. No idea. Could not even find a YouTube clip.
50D: Half a fish: MAHI. Literally, "strong" in Hawaiian. Red Lobster's seared MAHI-MAHI is pretty good.
51D: Just like that: AS IS. The sale tag words.
52D: Supervision: CARE
55D: Woodsman's makeup: TIN. The TIN Man in "The Wizard of Oz". Did anyone think of the hot-tempered Welsh golfer Ian Woosman first?
57D: Hot spot?: TEA. Mine was SPA.
Answer grid.
Picture of the Day: Here is great photo of our fellow LAT solver Embien standing by part of wood pile. He and his wife heat their house with a wood stove. Here is a beautiful view of his front deck. Embien said: "Doesn't look its best this time of year as the crop out there (purple vetch) was harvested in July and it's too dry to plant winter wheat yet. We live waaay out in the country, about five miles west of Banks, Oregon, in the foothills of the Coast Range."
C.C.
