Saturday Themeless by Doug Peterson
The first thing that caught my eye in Doug's grid was the 109 open squares! That's a lot of cells for his fiendish cluing to take its toll on entertain us solvers.
The entire southeast corner mocked me with white boxes and then cell by cell and I broke through where Doug was headed. Let's see what master constructor Doug has for us with special attention to that bedeviling corner.
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| Doug's collaboration with with Jeff Chen |
1. British cartoon whose logo features a curly tail: PEPPA PIG - It runs in English, Swedish and here in Welsh:
9. Company offering Viewliner Bedrooms: AMTRAK.
15. Cape Canaveral's 321, for one: AREA CODE - I don't how many of my 40 trips to KSC I had made before it hit me that its AREA CODE was part of a launch countdown.
16. Period of devotion: NOVENA.
17. Nearest the back: REARMOST - The part of the auditorium that fills first for a teacher's meeting.
18. Private __: SECTOR - Every year of my career I saw great teachers leave for the Private SECTOR
19. Tool akin to a staple gun: TACKER.
20. Shelter named for a senator: ROTH IRA.
21. Bean sprout?: IDEA - Here bean is a metaphor for head, so...
22. Printer color: CYAN.
24. Art student's subj.: ANAT - Michalangelo dissected many bodies to view underlying tissue to make his art more realistic.
25. Orthodox leader?: NEO - NEO-orthodoxy. / (ˌniːəʊˈɔːθəˌdɒksɪ) / noun. a movement in 20th-century Protestantism, reasserting certain older traditional Christian doctrines.
26. Hedgehog relative: SHREW.
28. Clog buster: SNAKE - I bought this 25' one and it did no good. My plumber said he needed 40' of his industrial SNAKE to open our drain.
29. 1993 Jack Lemmon comedy: GRUMPY OLD MEN - Yeah, right, 😯, "still hot" Ann Margaret fell for these two guys.
32. Rentals used on rugs: STEAM CLEANERS.
35. Top 40 hit on the soundtrack for "A Charlie Brown Christmas": LINUS AND LUCY.
37. Studio bed: FUTON.
40. Stock reducers: SALES.
41. "My __": Usher/Alicia Keys duet: BOO - BOO is slang for girlfriend or boyfriend. This song has a video I choose not to post here.
42. Tofu nutrient: IRON.
44. Bobby of R&B's Famous Flames: BYRD - Bobby Byrd started the Famous Flames in 1953 and one member of the group was a guy named James Brown. Hmmm... I wonder what became of him.
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| Bobby (2nd from left) James (4th from left) |
45. They swell with pride: GAY BARS - GAY pride
47. Tick by: ELAPSE.
49. Do some warehouse work: UNCASE.
50. Nick name in Paris?: PERE NOEL - These cells filled cell by cell and then BAM, Father (PERE) Christmas (NOEL) for St. Nick hit me like a ton of mistletoe! 😁
52. Venetian marketplace: RIALTO.
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| Shopping in the RIALTO Bridge area |
53. One MCU character: UNIVERSE - Another bolt of lightning hit me when Marvel (Comic) Cinematic UNIVERSE hit me!
54. Frostbite preventer: EARLAP.
55. Stood firm: RESISTED.
Down:
1. Occasion to say 3-Down: PARTING - She could have just said, "See ya, Romeo."
3. "See ya": PEACE OUT - What Juliet could have said?
2. Literary devices: E-READERS.
4. Arctic hunter's wear: PARKA 13. Arctic hunter's wear: ANORAK - We all know about a parka but an ANORAK is a pull over, waterproof, hooded jacket.
5. Culmination: ACME - Playing in the Super Bowl is the ACME of a football season
6. Barely passable: POOR.
7. Docs with DOBs, often: IDS - If you have a prolonged stay in a hospital, you'll have recited your Date Of Birth over and over.
8. Appreciate: GET
9. Actor Mount who plays Captain Pike in recent "Star Trek" series: ANSON - Not ANSON Williams for Happy Days
10. Name on some magnums: MOET.
11. Remote possibility?: TV CHANNEL - ...and so much more. Example: This red button gets me closed captioning
12. Cone holder: RETINA.
20. Reasons for grievances: RAW DEALS.
22. Sources of saffron: CROCUSES.
23. Chews out: YELLS AT.
26. Tenerife's country: SPAIN - Tenerife is the largest of Spain's Canary Island (862 miles SW of Gibraltar) and its landscape is dominated by the active volcano Mt. Teide which is also Spain's highest mountain
27. Mass performance: HYMN.
28. Fires off: SENDS.
30. Summer salad morsel: MELON BALL.
31. Locks in a barn?: MANE - 😀
33. Fortified red wine: RUBY PORT.
34. Filmmaker who helped launch the African Film Heritage Project: SCORSESE.
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| A Swiss group YODELING in the Alps |
37. Sculpture, often: FIGURE - Even if it's a bean
38. Muse on the U.S. Naval Observatory's seal: URANIA - The goddess of astronomy and stars
39. A little buggy, perhaps: TOY CAR.
43. Before going under, say: PRE-OP - I have received videos and printed literature about what I have to do before my 2/15/23 procedure.
44. Curses: BANES.
46. Hound of whodunits: ASTA - Nick and Nora Childs' pooch
47. Judgment of Paris instigator: ERIS - Gary, I'd like to know more about this
48. "The Periodic Table" author Primo: LEVI - This signed first edition will cost you $4,500.
50. Brita alternative: PUR.
51. Navigator's dir.: ENE.
