Saturday, March 21, 2020, Joe Deeney

Themeless Saturday  by Joe Deeney

A favorite picture of Joe's taken at the San Francisco Exploratorium

Joe's gracious response to my email about this puzzle:

Gary,


Thanks for reaching out! I'm glad you enjoyed the puzzle. Hope all is well with you.

I built this grid in early 2019. Rich requested a revision of the SE in late August and accepted the puzzle in early October. Original SE stack was LET IT SLIDE, IRON-WILLED, and MANGO SALSA, with QAEDA and 44-Down, which in hindsight isn't a very good answer. I'm glad Rich pushed for a revision here. 

I hadn't tried making many puzzles with stair-step 13's before and wanted to give it a go with this puzzle. SAID NO ONE EVER was one of the seeds I played around with and when I found this stack it seemed like it had a lot of potential to build off of.

I hope everyone gets a satisfying Saturday workout with this one.

-Joe

Take it away Joe:

Across:

1. Cathartic magnesium compound: EPSOM SALTS - My lovely gardener wife uses EPSOM SALTS to supply her tomato plants with a cathartic release from soil depletion

11. Bygone Bulgarian bigwig: TSAR - Bulgaria's last TSAR was Simeon II whose office was abolished four days after my 9/11/46 day of birth.

15. Some drag racers: ROCKET CARS - For every action...

16. Scott of "Arrested Development": BAIO  - 21 years after he was Chachi in Happy Days 

17. Comment denying kinship: NO RELATION - Latin variation of "post hoc, ego propter hoc" in this witty 1:43 West Wing scene

18. Bob Ross painted with one: AFRO - Soft spoken artist

19. Dog follower, maybe: SLED - Nome or bust!

20. "Disturbia" singer, familiarly: RIRI - Nickname for Rhianna 

21. Raise: ERECT.

22. "The Cocktail Party" monogram: TSE - A T.S. Elioplay based on Alcestis by the Greek playwright Euripides. You're welcome! 😏

23. Former Carson Daly employer: MTV  - Curious?

Parker Sibley at UNC

24. Horn for Parker: SAX - Our grandson's father is a professional musician and named his two sons for famous jazz sax musicians, one of which was Charlie "Bird" Parker. Grandson Parker is now on a drum (not a SAX) scholarship at The University of Northern Colorado

26. Where to find Ruth and Aaron: Abbr.: HOF and 51. Came clean: ADMITTED IT - If Pete Rose had just ADMITTED IT (he bet on baseball), he would be in the Hall  Of Fame by now. 

27. West in old movies: MAE.

28. Small book size: OCTAVO.

30. Words that contradict what preceded them: SAID NO ONE EVER - And yet they continue

34. Perpetual loser: CELLAR DWELLER - Another phrase for a team that is in the bottom of the standings like the 1966 Cubs

35. Game time?: HUNTING SEASON.

36. Hydrocodone, e.g.: OPIATE - Threw mine away after surgery

37. "Too Many Rappers" rapper: NAS - Okay

38. Holstein's hi?: MOO.

39. "Flags of Our Fathers" setting, for short: IWO - A Clint Eastwood film

41. Vegas summer hrs.: PDT - Same as Los Angeles

42. Windy City train org.: CTA.

45. "Baywatch" actor: EFRON.

47. Superman's mom: LARA - Wife of dad Jor-El on Krypton. Stepmom on Earth was Martha Kent who was married to Johnathan Kent

49. Physics Nobelist the year after Einstein: BOHR - Every physical science teacher in history has had his students make a model of the BOHR atom. Science peeps will know what atom this is. (*Answer at bottom of write-up)

50. "Count on me!": I'M IN 

53. "Aww!": CUTE.



54. Source of some long flows: HEADWATERS - The HEADWATERS of the Mississippi River are in Minnesota's Lake Itasca where you can wade across Old Man River

55. Freezer aisle brand: EDYS.

56. At risk: IN JEOPARDY - Corona Virus seems to have us all IN JEOPARDY 


Down:

1. __ Blofeld, Bond bad guy: ERNST 

2. Combines: POOLS - Some workers POOL their money and buy large amounts of lottery tickets

3. Slope of loose stones: SCREE - I showed a man skiing down SCREE in Austria last week

4. Passed: OK'ED.

5. Sideshow __ of "The Simpsons": MEL - If you're really that interested

6. Gave it another go: STARTED ANEW - I retired but then taught six more years after a year away from the classroom  

7. When Prospero says, "We are such stuff / As dreams are made on": ACT IV - Sam Spade's version

8. Hideaway: LAIR.

9. Dix moins sept: TROIS - 10 - 7 = 3 in any base ten math language 

10. I-9 ID: SSN.

11. Uphill aid: T-BAR.

12. Sanctuary: SAFE HAVEN - A controversial topic these days

13. Protection from planes: AIR COVER - Below is the prayer commissioned by George Patton during a run of bad weather. The entreaty was answered with clear skies and AIR COVER that was able to support his troops in the Battle Of The Bulge on 12/23/44. Patton gave Chaplain James O'Neill a bronze star for this prayer.

14. Support: ROOT FOR - Only families of players and coaches were allowed in to ROOT FOR their team at the Nebraska Boys State Championships last week

21. Does very well: EXCELS AT.

23. Do the bare minimum: MAIL IT IN - What many NBA players do until the playoffs which may not come this year

25. Welk intro words: A ONE AND A TWO.

27. Mediterranean country in which English is an official language: MALTA - My first five-letter country starting with M is a 22 hr flight away. The official languages in Macao are Cantonese and Portuguese but English is common too but no where near the Mediterranean 😜  

29. Final purpose, to Aristotle: TELOS.

30. Factor in committee assignments: SENIORITY - Competence? Not necessarily!

31. Houston's __ Stadium, named for an energy company: NRG A lovely drone tour if you're interested 

32. Has too much, briefly: OD'S.

33. Run a tab, say: OWE.

34. Coffee, in diner slang: CUP OF MUD - Diner vernacular for coffee 

35. Hockey advantage: HOME ICE - Of the last 17 Stanley Cup playoffs, the 13 champions had the advantage of playing on HOME ICE

40. From days past: OLDEN.

41. __ parade: PRIDE.

42. Python pro: CODER - A sample of what a CODER might produce in Python language

43. Bronze ordinal: THIRD - Will there be a summer Olympics?

44. Like Taos, say: ARTSY.

46. Folks: ONES

48. Key of Mozart's clarinet concerto: Abbr.: A-MAJ - The clarinetist starts playing after a 2:00 intro:

49. Version to debug: BETA - It appears The Iowa Caucus app needed to be debugged 

51. Sashimi selection: AHI.

52. Light knock: TAP - For $650 you can have this note with the first stanza about TAPPING written in the author's own hand.

Comment at will:

* That is a model of a Carbon Atom - Atomic #6