Wednesday, March 2, 2022, Ed Sessa

Title: Do you see what I see? LYRICS+

Happy Mittwoch, Lemonade filling a blogging gap and returning to the day of the week of my first blogging gig here, sharing Wednesday with Melissa B. I do not get another rookie setter but the great Dr. Ed Sessa. It may not be a Friday, but it is not a walk in the park. It is a visual theme without normal theme symmetry or exact theme fill. Instead you need to study the grid and "see" what picture appears when you not only highlight the double Os (no James Bond theme here) but highlight each BUS above the Os.  So today we start with the highlighted grid and work backwards.

Using your childlike imagination which may be a little dormant, you can see a yellow school bus on its two round wheels. There is overall puzzle symmetry including the two grid-spanners, but that does not help locate a theme.

The magic pairs are:

18A. Catskills restaurant job for young Jerry Lewis:     B U S BOY.

19A. Acted with total independence: ANSWERED   TO NO ONE.

This is a challenging 15 letter fill, but crucial to the plan. Lewis was a soda jerk but never a bus boy. Now his name reappears as an alleged sexual predator.

24A. Farm units:                         BUSHELS.   Doris Day

29A. Some wind components:  OBOE REEDS. They make the sound.

31A. Smooch:                                 BUSS.   kiss, kiss

38A. Melville sequel to "Typee": OMOO. This is classic crosswordese for the vowels.

45A. Garment aptly named for where it's worn:        BUSTIER. 

50A. What the filled-in circles do, in a tots' song: GOROUND AND ROUND.  Another 15 letter fill which plays double duty a reveal and part of the theme. Quite clever.

I will not touch the bustier reference, (have to be careful learning from Bill Cosby and Jerry Lewis) but will continue to the rest of the fun.

Across:

1. Animal fat: LARD. Once controversial, is it making a comeback?

5. Mer, here: SEA. French lesson.

8. Business entities: FIRMS. When used in a title, "firm" is typically associated with businesses that provide professional law and accounting services, but the term may be used for a wide variety of businesses, including finance, consulting, marketing, and graphic design firms, among others.

13. State as fact: AVER. A popular law word.

14. Photo: PIC. Nic?

15. Patronize a bistro, say: EAT OUT. I think the bistro reference was to make getting the "out" part more easily as they often offer both inside and outside dining.

16. Cover for a king: ROBE. Especially if it is an Emperor who ordered new clothes.

17. Onassis, familiarly: ARIstotle.

22. Parrot's screech: AWK. Not really. LINK. It is more well known word to computer programmers now. Right -T?

23. Voiced sounds: SONANTS. Hmm,  (ˈsəʊnənt) / adjective. phonetics denoting a voiced sound capable of forming a syllable or syllable nucleus. inherently possessing, exhibiting, or producing a sound. okay. Friday word at least. 

28. Yeoman's "yo": AYE. So many ways to say yes. I did a list years ago but now wiki will do it for you.

35. Fluids used for blood typing: SERA. plural noun: this 

an amber-colored, protein-rich liquid that separates out when blood coagulates.

36. Theater reservations: SEATS. Can you reserve standing room? Keith?

39. Rep on the street: CRED. Reputation gives you credibility. Both abbreviations.

40. Delay one's decision: SLEEP ON IT. This procrastintor's phrase has an early example which can be found in the State Paper of Henry VIII (1519): "His Grace…sayd that he wold slepe and drem upon the matter." Yes, that Henry the VIII.

42. Camera variety, initially: SLR. Single Lens Reflex. I will defer to Picard and waseely and others who like taking pictures and are much better at it than I.

44. Fills with passion: ENAMORS. Merriam Webster (MW) says, this is from the Middle English enamouren, from Anglo-French enamourer, from en- + amour first used in the 14th century meaning to inflame with love. Anyone here been inflamed recently? Splynter?

49. Smack-__: DAB. Not David Aldred Bywaters but a phrase from the 1890s meaning "exactly, squarely." Do you like:

Version 1                                                        Version 2

55. React to with a belly laugh: ROAR AT. Yay! NOT aroar!

56. New start?: NEO. Has anyone watched the new Matrix movie?

57. Inside information?: X-RAY. A really fun clue/fill as that is where docs findout what is going on inside.

58. Queen of puzzles: ELLERY. There are so many famous female detectives, but this time it is these GENTLEMEN who were the Queen.

59. Big name on Wall Street: DOW. Dow Jones is a combination of the names of business partners Charles Dow and Edward Jones who along with Charles Bergstresser founded Dow Jones & Company in 1882.  

60. To be, to Livy: ESSE. His HISTORY. Esse is "to be" in Latin.

61. "__ what I had in mind": WASN'T. This is the happy response to  my passive/agressive "I guess I should go."

62. Stop on the road: INN. A place to say. 

63. Some coll. requirements: SATS. The Scholastic Aptitude Test  is a standardized test designed to measure basic critical reading, math and writing skills. No longer universally accepted but still offered.

I used to teach an LSAT prep class. If you want to try a new SAT I will send you a practice test, send me your answers and I will tell you how well you did.

Down:

1. Mother on Krypton: LARA. Lara (née Lara Lor-Van) is a fictional character who appears in comic books published by DC Comics. She first appeared in the Superman comic strip and was created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster. Lara is the biological mother of Superman, and the wife of scientist Jor-El. They like hyphenated names.

2. Big name in romance fiction: AVON. Avon has been publishing award-winning romance since 1941. It is recognized for having pioneered the historical romance category and continues to publish in wide variety of other genres, including paranormal, urban fantasy, contemporary and regency. It is now owned by Harper Collins.

3. Civil War soldiers: REBS. Them damn rebs! Or those gallant boys.

4. Overtook, with "of": DREW AHEAD. All you need to KNOW.

5. Kills it on stage: SPARKLES. HMM. 

6. Auld land: EIRE. The language of the land

7. Essential fatty __: ACIDS. The term essential fatty acids (EFA) refers to those polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) that must be provided by foods because these cannot be synthesized in the body yet are necessary for health. There are two families of EFA, omega-3 (ω-3) and omega-6 (ω-6). NIH website.

8. Florae counterparts: FAUNAE. Plants and animals.

9. "The program's starting!": IT'S ON. Oh goody, it's time for Howdy Doody.

10. High-tech worker: ROBOT. But do they have a union? How can RAMI MALEK be a robot and Freddie Mercury? Wow!

11. Elementary particles: MUONS. As explained by the Department of Energy DOE.

12. Lid bump: STYE. Not where pigs live. STYES and CHELAZIONS.

15. Dark wood: EBONY. Back already from Monday's puzzle

20. Still-life subject: EWER. Can you pitcher that picture?

21. Newlywed, at times: TOASTEE. You bet, when he gets caught in the back with a bridesmaid.

24. Pear variety: BOSC. No relaion to Harry.

25. Lyft competitor: UBER. They raised their prices here so much I do notuse them any longer. Since I am not allowed to drive, I was...

26. Really ticked: SORE. ...and almost...
 
27. Blows a fuse: SEES RED.

30. Indian lentil dish: DAL. You want to try... RECIPE.

31. Early hip-hop hardware: BOOM BOXES. Although the Boombox has strong cultural associations with New York Hip Hop culture, the first model was in fact developed in the Netherlands. The Dutch company Philips released their first 'Radiorecorder' in 1966.

32. Curt refusal: UM NO. Whi is this Curt and why is he refusing? What is he refusing? Was it Curt Flood?

33. Evening in Avignon: SOIR. Simplement, en Francaise.

34. Tipplers: SOTS.

37. Demote to the minors: SEND DOWN.

41. Host before Carson: PAAR.

42. Comic store owner on "The Big Bang Theory": STUART.

43. Full of fuzz: LINTY. Like many belly buttons, though not belly laughs.

45. Half a Yale cheer: BOOLA. Boola boola has been around since about 1901, but it may never had a better performance'

46. Range with one end in Kazakhstan: URALS.

47. Philosopher Kierkegaard: SOREN. I will defer to Bill and others with a relationship with Christianity to discuss his writings but he was an interesting looking man. 

48. Zuckerberg Media founder Zuckerberg: RANDI. One of Mark's SISTERS. 

50. Raised on a farm: GREW. Speaking of the flora and fauna.

51. Bright light: NEON.The bright lights of Broadway is both a eupemism and a reality. How they WORK.

52. __ Major: URSA. Another bear.

53. Democratic donkey designer: NAST. Most Americans would be surprised to learn that both political symbols, the donkey and the elephant were created by the same political CARTOONIST in the late 19th century.

54. Beauty salon supplies: DYES. Can you think of another three letter beauty supply as we say adieu to to this puzzle and prepare for my next appearance at a club near you on Friday, March 11, 2022.

Grid on top so I will be saying my thanks to Dr.Ed and to all of you who read and/or write now. Maybe you can send me a joke or a cartoon I could put in here...anyway, nice to visit Wednesday and talk about this gem. Lemonade out.