Good morning. Malodorous Manatee here. Hahtoolah is still on vacation and, once again, I have the honor of filling in for her.
Today's puzzle setter is frequent contributor, Stella Zawistowski. I always enjoy solving her puzzles. Much has previously been written here on The Corner about Ms. Zawistowski so rather than repeat that let's join the festivities. Party On, Cruciverbalists!
At three places within the grid, Stella has, at the end (or BACK) of a longer answer, placed synonyms for PARTY. For our convenience, the themed answers are starred. Two of these answers are fourteen letters long and two are twelve letters long. Nice grid, Stella.
Here are the party-themed answers (and their respective clues):
20 ACROSS: *Broadcast quality determined by a car antenna: RADIO RECEPTION. Jumping right in, indeed:
26 ACROSS: *Sine or cosine, for short: TRIG FUNCTION. A TRIGonometry reference. It might have also been clued linguistically: Conjunction Junction . . .
. . . What's Your Function?
43 ACROSS: *Issue best kept within the clan: FAMILY AFFAIR.
The reveal comes after the three, party-themed answers and explains them to us:
52 ACROSS: Tongue-in-cheek description of a mullet, and of the answers to the starred clues: PARTY IN THE BACK. Hairstyles come and go. The mullet is, perhaps, best forgotten.
Here is how this all looks in the grid:
. . . and here are the rest of the clues and answers:
Across:
1. Drains of energy: SAPS.
5. Prefix with sphere: ATMO. ATMOsphere
9. Jousting weapon: LANCE.
14. Drive-__ ATM: THRU.
15. Have to have: NEED.
16. Negatively charged particle: ANION. Positively charged, it is a:
18. Surrealist Salvador: DALI.
23. NFL six-pointers: TDS. TouchDownS
24. Beer barrel: KEG.
32. Mongolia's continent: ASIA.
35. Movement-sensing game console: WII. Nintendo WII
36. Get set, casually: PREP. PREPare
Down:
1. Microwave button: START. Among others.
2. Coming up: AHEAD. What did one hat say to the other? "You stay here, I'll go on ahead."
3. Urges along: PRODS.
4. Gymnast Lee who won a gold medal at the 2020 Olympics: SUNI.
5. Nobel Peace Prize winner Sakharov: ANDREI.
6. Hard-boiled Chinese snack: TEA EGG.
8. Garfield's drooling frenemy: ODIE. That's ODIE on the right, er left.
11. Yucatán boy: NINO. One of today's Spanish lesson.
12. Last name of filmmakers Ethan and Joel: COEN. The "Best Of" clips are too long. So, let's just go with this Fargo trailer:
21. Bhindi masala pod: OKRA. A Northern Indian curried dish featuring, you guessed it, OKRA. Thanks, perps.
22. Isn't yet decided: PENDS.
27. Material in a lint trap: FLUFF. Never has anyone that I know referred to lint as FLUFF.
28. Abu Dhabi's fed.: UAE. United Arab Emirates
29. "Victory is mine!": I WIN.
30. Pigpen grunt: OINK. What's the difference between bird flu and swine flu? If you have bird flu you get tweet-ment. If you have swine flu you need OINK-ment.
31. Put the kibosh on: NIX. Remember this bumper sticker?
32. "Eri tu," but not "Eres Tu": ARIA. "Eri tu" is an aria from a Verdi opera. "Eres Tu" (It's You) is a popular song. However, ere is a version of "Eres Tu" recorded with a symphony orchestra.
33. Look like: SEEM.
37. Low-altitude airplane pass: FLYBY. The pattern is full.
39. Salsa container: JAR.
41. Formed clumps: CLOTTED.
42. Get out of bed: RISE.
45. Step-counting device: FITBIT.
49. Cosmic balance: KARMA. One person's take on this:
50. Salty expanse: OCEAN.
52. Pull's opposite: PUSH.
53. Voting against: ANTI
54. Bird in Egyptian art: IBIS.
56. "Touched your nose!" sound: BOOP. We have seen this clue/answer before. I prefer this take:
Stella, you are invited to post anything you'd like to share about this puzzle, its evolution, the theme, or whatever in the Comments section. We'd love to hear from you.
. . . . and now it is time to rest and recover from all of this partying.
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פרת ים
MM Out