Puzzling thoughts:
FIW, with my lone Natick of 23-down and 23-across.
There were several unfilled squares throughout, as I worked from top left to bottom right. It was in the very bottom right corner where the reveal: (71-Across. Work on software, and work to make sense of the answers to the starred clues?) DEBUG, resided. Once I saw that answer, I thought, OK, now the circles make sense! As I continued working at the "southern border" of the grid, I got the "aha" moment when I filled in (67-Across. *Cherry variety:) BROACHING, as I saw that when you get rid of the ROACH, what's left is the word "BING", or a "cherry variety". Very clever.
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Back to the blog ... Constructors Emet Ozar and Matthew Stock have collaborated on a Sunday puzzle @ Universal, but I think this is the first of theirs @ LA Times. Both Ozar and Stock appear to have found the crossword puzzle constructor "itch", post-pandemic. Kudos to you both, and I hope you'll visit our blog to offer some comments on what gave the seed idea for this; I promise I won't bug you further!
It's not often that you'll see SIX entries AND a reveal in a 15x15 puzzle. I know that some critics would ding them for having 17+ three-letter words; or ding them for using circles; but c'mon! This had to have been extremely tough to fill while maintaining a tight and clean "feel". What struck me is that all SIX entries with the hidden bug are all quite common (as you'll see in the explanation below).
It also appears that Patti was lenient with Emet and Matthew in the clues, as none were too obscure for a Friday. Perhaps the puzzle was tough enough. Let's look at the other five entries:
15-Across. *Like sweater weather: CHANTILLY. Remove the ANT and the word "CHILLY" definitely refers to "sweater weather"
23-Across. *Spanish verb similar to the French "être": SMOTHER. OK. The word "SMOTHER" is quite common, but when I removed the "MOTH" the word SER did not make me "see the light". Guess I should've taken Spanish as my foreign language elective instead of German!! So Lucina, if Hamlet were done in Spanish, would the soliloquy be: "¿SER o no SER?"
29-Across. *Soft drink size: LITE BEER. Take the BEE from the LITE BEER and you're left with a "LITER" of (soda, pop, tonic, Coke) ... remember, we had that discussion of what people call a soft drink the last time I blogged?
48-Across. *River through Kazakhstan: G NATURAL. Swat the GNAT from this entry and you're left with URAL - the crosswordese answer for an Asian River. Not familiar with G NATURAL? Try this, but turn the volume down on your device before playing:
53-Across. *Top: LIMITED. I HOPE none of you were "ticked" off at today's puzzle, but I MITE understand if you were! OK, Moe, put a LID on it ... zip up your FLY ... show us the grid this time ... and 'splain to us all of the other clues!
Across:
1. Cheap kegful: PABST. Oddly enought, PABST is one of the domestic, non-craft BEERs that I'll drink. LITE BEER doesn't do much for me
6. Seal hunter: ORCA. Killer whale
10. Title for Horatio Magellan Crunch: CAP'N. They made this clue weirder than it had to be, TBH. How many other "CRUNCH's" do you know other than CAP'n?
14. "With any luck": I HOPE. Different meaning than when I used this phrase in the introduction
17. __ cut: PIXIE. The upper left corner was easy to perp today. Wanna see a PIXIE cut? OK:
18. Question that may elicit "Todo bien, gracias": ¿Cómo estás?. Are you "all good" with this clue and answer?
19. "Must you be like everyone else?": ET TU. "No, I'm not a BRUTE!"
21. __ card: SIM. Having recently upgraded my iPhone 7+ to a 13 Pro, I know all about SIM cards. I got two of them in this phone
22. Four quarters: ONE. A good "Friday" clue; four 25cent pieces = ONE dollar bill
26. "Latino USA" airer: NPR. WAG. I very seldom listen to any radio airers, but NPR seemed logical once I filled in around it
28. Choice word: EITHER. Moe-ku:
The two canoeist's
Decision on who sat where?
Your choice, EITHER oar
34. Sandwich not found in a kosher deli: BLT. And yet a lot of my Jewish friends LOVE bacon
35. Sap: DRAIN. I HOPE you weren't DRAINed by doing this puzzle - quite the opposite for me ... I am pretty amped up today
37. One of India's official languages: HINDI.
38. Footnote abbr.: ET AL. Moe ku:
Israel's airport
Shows a list of carriers:
There's El Al, et al
40. Rock collection?: ALBUM. Hmm not my most favorite clue today. "Rock", of course, refers to the music genre "rock 'n' roll". I still have several ALBUMs but no turntable
42. Slender: SLIM. Both of my SIM cards are quite SLIM
43. Crew member: ROWER. Only ONE bad ROWing pun allowed per blog
45. Rink ploys: DEKES. Are any of our male cornerites members of a college fraternity? Anytime I see the word DEKES I think of this fraternity, "Delta Kappa Epsilon", commonly known as DKE - or - Deke is one of the oldest fraternities in the United States, with fifty-six active chapters and five active colonies across North America. It was founded at Yale College in 1844 by fifteen sophomores who were discontent with the existing fraternity order on campus"[Wikipedia]. Several past US presidents were DEKES, including the two Bushes and Teddy Roosevelt
47. PC pioneer: IBM. Did anyone else wonder if the "PC" in the clue meant "politically correct"? If so, FDR fits, yes?
50. Roughhouse: RASSLE. I had TUSSLE before RASSLE
52. "Real talk," from a texter: TBH. To Be Honest. Don't you hate when someone answers a question with "To be honest ..."?? My reaction is always, "well, haven't you been honest with me before?"
54. "It's all about me" attitude: EGO. Moe-ku:
You can shut down one's
EGO, by telling them to:
"Put an ID on it"!
57. Deli slice: RYE. HAM fits on RYE, too
59. Article: ITEM.
60. Sacred Buddhist symbol with heart-shaped leaves: BODHI TREE. So, isn't there one word/phrase that always seems to show up in a puzzle, just when you think you knew them all? What's a BODHI TREE? I think it's in the banyan family. This:
63. Gulf ship: OILER.
68. Petting zoo critter: LLAMA.
69. Light-footed: SPRY. There is a village by this name near to where I grew up. Misty might know it, too
70. Dole (out): METE.
Down:
1. Spot on a die: PIP. One of several meanings of the word "PIP". But if you "double" the word PIP it means "goodbye" (PIP PIP, Cheerio!)
2. Pacific tuna: AHI. SKIPJACK just wouldn't squeeze into those three squares
3. Check point?: BOX. Good mis-direction clue
4. Jordan who won the 2017 British Open: SPIETH. Golfers around the globe refer to this as The Open Championship; not the British Open, FYI ... Jordan SPIETH finished in the top ten of this year's OPEN, won by Cameron Smith
5. Raised canines, say: TEETHED. Did anyone else have a dog in mind instead of a tooth? My grandson (age two+) went through his TEETHing stage - see his canines??
6. Transpire: OCCUR.
7. Density symbol, in physics: RHO. Once again, only ONE RHOing pun per blog allowed
8. Nanny __: security devices: CAMS. If the editor/constructor had known ahead of time, this clue could've been: "Nicknames of the top two finishers at The Open Championship" (Cameron Smith - first; Cameron Young - second)
9. Formally choose: ANOINT.
10. Gender prefix: CIS. [Wikipedia] "Cisgender describes a person whose gender identity corresponds to their sex assigned at birth. The word cisgender is the antonym of transgender. The prefix cis- is Latin and means on this side of."
Moe-ku:
When a sheep explodes
In front of straight cheerleader
It goes: CIS, boom, baa
11. Type of flute: ALTO. [Wikipedia] "What is the difference between a flute and an alto flute? The bore of the alto flute is considerably larger in diameter and longer than a C flute and requires more breath from the player. This gives it a greater dynamic presence in the bottom octave and a half of its range"
12. Think ahead: PLAN. This was my PLANner of choice back when I was a working stiff
13. SEC concern: NYSE. When I first saw "SEC" I was thinking "SouthEastern Conference" of the NCAA (which would have fit into that space, BTW). But this SEC is the Securities and Exchange Commission
16. Vegan protein choice: TEMPEH. How does this compare to tofu, you ask? Well, here's what I found: "Is tempeh the same as tofu? Tempeh is like tofu that's been hitting the gym – hard. Like tofu, tempeh is still made from soy but the whole bean is used in a fermentation process. Using the whole bean gives tempeh it's chunkier texture which holds its shape better, making it ideal for crispy cubes or 'bacon' rashers"[tofoo.co.uk]
20. Veggie chip brand: TERRA. Perps filled this in
23. Actress Jean of French New Wave cinema: SEBERG. The other half of my Natick today. A brief bio
24. __ Bradley: MILTON. When I lived in Springfield, MA way back when, MILTON Bradley had a facility in East Longmeadow. I sold them some packaging materials ... click on the link to learn more about the games they created, as well as a short bio on MILTON
25. Home of the Senators: OTTAWA. NHL team, and a CSO to Canadian, Eh?
27. Clutch hitter's stat: RBIS.
29. Smear with ink?: LIBEL. TATOO didn't seem to fit
30. Arctic native: INUK. Singular form on Inuit. This word appeared just once before @ USA Today on April 24, 2021 by Erik Agard
31. Join up: ENLIST. What I would've done back in 1973 if the draft was my only other option
32. Consumer-friendly?: EDIBLE. Lots of play-on-word clues today
33. Horn-__ glasses: RIMMED.
36. Director of the final episode of "M*A*S*H": ALDA.
39. Baltic native: LETT.
41. __ badge: MERIT. Anyone know how many MERIT badges are required to make Eagle Scout?
44. Guide for grading: RUBRIC. [Utah Education Network] "a RUBRIC for an essay might tell students that their work will be judged on purpose, organization, details, voice, and mechanics. A good rubric also describes levels of quality for each of the criteria"
46. "The usual": SAME OLD.
49. Blues partner: RHYTHM. I'm thinking that several of us Boomers remember this single that reached #3 in the Top 100 tunes in 1967 and made "The Happenings" a lot of money, I suspect. And they made a George and Ira Gershwin song from the 1930's "retro"
51. Literary device: SIMILE. A CSO to Yellowrocks. How does a SIMILE compare to a METAPHOR? [Merriam-Webster says] "A SIMILE is a figure of speech that compares two otherwise dissimilar things, often introduced by the words like or as ('you are like a summer's day'). A metaphor is when a word is used in place of another to suggest a likeness ('you are a summer's day')"
53. Feudal lord: LIEGE. One definition (as an adjective): concerned with or relating to the relationship between a feudal superior and a vassal. Wonder if this is the root of the word "allegiance"?
54. Dwindles: EBBS.
55. Trail mix: GORP. An acronym for "Good Old Raisins and Peanuts"
56. Compost bin emanation: ODOR. But composting truly makes the best dirt/soil
58. Lake whose name comes from Iroquoian for "long tail": ERIE. A crossword puzzle editor (not from the LA Times) once told me "hard clues can't be made hard with factual references that many/most won't know". Sage advice
61. Part of a stable diet: HAY. OAT fit, too. Note the play-on-words in the clue. Well, TWO can play THAT game! Moe-ku, and a CSO to Boomer, an erstwhile Grainger guy:
Bostitch employees
Get a free lunch at work. A
True, staple diet
62. Thyroid specialist, for short: ENT.
64. Where lots of cultures come together: LAB. Ha Ha
65. Aussie bird: EMU.
66. Dust cloth: RAG.
Well, look at me! I'm all "bug-eyed" from looking up word meanings and images!! Don't forget to comment below ...
