Thursday, January 12, 2012 Gareth Bain

Theme: He took a hundred pounds of clay, and he created...A Crossword Puzzle!!

18A. *Publicist, often : SPIN DOCTOR. Not a DJ?

23A. *Have nowhere to go but up : HIT BOTTOM. I could go DF, but it's too early...

34A. *1952 Cooper classic : HIGH NOON. Actor Gary Cooper in one of his most intense roles.

40A. *Shared : IN COMMON. We have a lot in common on this corner. Crossword puzzles, music, books, food...

55A. *Place for a row of potted plants : WINDOW BOX. HaHa, I was thinking this was a misdirection for "marijuana".

And the unifier:

61. It suggests the vowel pattern in the five starred answers : ONE HUNDRED. Ironic, because Rich would never accept a grid entry which represents 100 as "IOO". So this theme is quite unusual in that regard.

We also have a bonus entry with

2D. "101 Dalmations" mother : PERDITA. Notice it was put into the commonly abbr. clue for the film, instead of using the full name "One Hundred and One Dalmations", which would repeat words from the unifier answer. Maybe this clue should have been "IOI Dalmations" mother??

Marti here, to expound on this fun diversion. There was nothing that really made me stumble here, so it was an unusually fast Thursday time for me.

Across:

1. Certain blocker's target : SPAM. I use Postini to filter e-mail before it even hits my computer.

5. Chaste : VESTAL. In ancient Rome, the vestal virgins served a term of thirty years: IO as a student, IO in service, and IO as a teacher.

11. Spotted, to Tweety : TAW. "I tawt I taw a puddy tat!"

14. Fix : MEND

15. "Finished!" : I'M DONE. (Why no, I'm just getting warmed up!)

16. Lacto-___ vegetarian : OVO. They consume no flesh of animals, but do consume milk and eggs. A vegan, on the other hand, consumes no animal products at all.

17. Spring blossom : IRIS. A pretty sight to us New Englanders.

20. QB's scores : TDs. Touchdowns. Like those scored by quarterback Tom Brady of the New England Patriots against the Broncos this coming Saturday...

21. Actress Zadora : PIA. Her film career never took off. (Well, what can you expect, if your debut film was "Santa Claus Conquers the Martians"?) But, her fame lives on in crossword puzzles!

22. At the pawn shop : IN HOCK

27. Miniscule bits : IOTAS

28. Represented, with "for" : STOOD

29. Jewish wedding favorite : HORA. I thought it was the liverwurst?

31. "Star Trek: DSN" character : ODO. (DSN = Deep Space Nine). Odo was the Chief of Security on the ship, and was a changeling who could morph into any shape. I want to be a changeling, so I can morph into a size 2.

32. Oakley with a gun : ANNIE

37. Shore scavenger : GULL

39. "Git!" : SHOO. I have been saying that to the cats all night - they are very interested to know what I am typing.

44. One of a Dumas trio : ATHOS. Remember our lesson from last Thursday? Athos, Porthos and Aramis were the Three Musketeers. D'Artagnan traveled to Paris to join them. Would you believe, I'm listening to the 1948 version on TCM right now, with Lana Turner and Gene Kelly!!!

47. Sun, in Sonora : SOL.

48. One of two elimination games : SEMI. -final. Timely, while we are waiting to see who goes to the Super Bowl!

50. Carried : BORNE.

52. Foreshadowers : OMENS. Do you believe in omens?

57. Everything, so they say : TIMING. I'd tell you a bad joke to illustrate, but I can't type that fast...

59. Small songbird : TIT. Have atit, guys...(Grumpy 1, that means everyone)

60. Place for drips, briefly : ICU. Anyone think "bar"?

64. Mil. plane requiring minimal runway space : STOL. "Short Take-Off and Landing", like this. (0:30) I bet my buddy Dudley could do that!

65. Cooler : PEN. Hoosegow, klink, stir, crowbar hotel, the joint, up the river...

66. What Bonnie and Clyde came to : BAD END. They never made it to the PEN, but were killed in an ambush by law enforcement officers in Louisiana.

67. Maidstone's county : KENT. Geography lesson.

68. Some MIT grads : EEs. Electrical Engineers.

69. Beau : STEADY.

70. Mid-month time : IDES

(Entr'Acte...) (4:16)

Down:

1. Metalworkers : SMITHS

3. "Bruce Almighty" actress : ANISTON. Jennifer Aniston, Jim Carey and Morgan Freeman team up in this funny movie. (0:29)

4. Docs : MDs

5. Call on : VISIT

6. Sci-fi psychic : EMPATH. Like Star-Trek's famous Deanna Troi of crosswords.

7. Star Wars abbr. : SDI. Duh, I was still on the sci-fi train above, and forgot that this refers to "Strategic Defense Initiative", proposed by Ronald Reagan in 1983. Perps nudged me back to the correct answer.

8. Mounds of pounds : TON. Cute clue. But, I would rather have pounds of Mounds!

9. "...___quote:" : AND I. Phew! I really had to pay attention to all the punctuation in this one, in order to suss the answer. Ellipses, blank, colon, and quotes!

10. Actress Téa : LEONI. Pretty. I remember her from "Fun With Dick and Jane".

11. Glinda's reassurance to Dorothy : TOTO TOO. Hard to parse. From the final scene in Oz:

Glinda: ...Now those magic slippers will take you home in two seconds!
Dorothy: Oh! Toto too?
Glinda: Toto too.

12. Guacamole fruit : AVOCADO.

13. Attempts to sway : WORKS ON. When you were a kid, did you work on your father or your mother first?

19. Comic Margaret : CHO.

21. Conductor's place : PODIUM.

24. Drum heard around a fire : BONGO. Like these. (0:53)

25. "I'm impressed!" : OOH. "I'm really impressed!":ooooooooooooh.

26. Some hosp. pics : MRIs.. Magnetic Resonance Imaging (s?)

30. Muslim official : AGHA.

33. Bark beetle victims : ELMS.

35. Search engine launched by Wired magazine in 1996 : HOTBOT

36. "Ain't gonna happen" : NO HOW. Not to be confused with know-how.

38. MGM co-founder : LOEW. I always want to write Leow, for some reason.

40. Tritium, to hydrogen : ISOTOPE. Hydrogen is the only molecule that has different names for its isotopes. ²H is known as "Deuterium" and ³H is known as "Tritium" etc., up to ⁷H. Memorize these names. (They may come back to haunt you in one of my puzzles...)

41. Oscar night hopeful : NOMINEE. George Clooney is the predicted winner for best actor in "The Descendents" this year. Have you seen it yet?

42. Twain, at birth : CLEMENS. Samuel Langhorne...

43. Abbr. between a first and last name, maybe : NMI. No Middle Initial.

45. Revolved around : ORBITED.

46. Gelid treat : SNO-CONE. "Gelid" looks like a funny word to me.

49. Mean : INTEND.

51. Revels : EXULTS. Did everyone exult on New Year's Eve?

53. Biomedical research org. : NIH. National Institutes of Health. I spent a lot of time talking to the researchers there, deciding what new products our biotech company should develop.

54. Leaves off the guest list : SNUBS.

56. Rapper who said, "the 'P.' was getting between me and my fans" : DIDDY. AKA Sean John Combs.

58. Annoying insect : GNAT

62. Two-time ETO commander : DDE. (European Theater of Operations) Dwight David Eisenhower. Did not remember that he was a two-time commander. But "ETO" had to be DDE...

63. Blues-rocker Chris : REA. One of his early "On the Beach" recordings.

64. Word with run or jump : SKI. Yay, one for me!! I will be running and jumping this weekend in Stowe, VT. I'll try to get online to say "hi", though.

Answer grid.

Hugs,

Marti