Theme: Caddy-sack - what your caddie gets when you ask him for a sand wedge and he brings you a Philly Cheesesteak.
20A. Sandwich in Denver?: MILE HIGH CLUB. Editor Rich getting a little racy here! The Mile High city. I've actually had a club sandwich in Denver. I didn't spot the fun pun at the time of consumption.
35A. Sandwich on the briny?: MARINE SUB. I looked sideways at this entry at first, but then realized the clue was referring to a member of the Marine Corps, not the "submerging" vessel.
40A. Sandwich in the neighborhood?: LOCAL HERO. A charming movie with a wonderful soundtrack composed by the guitar great Mark Knopfler, founding member and creative genius of Dire Straits. Here's the theme track played live in London in 2017.
52A. Sandwich at a church concert?: ORGAN GRINDER. The grinder is a close relative of the sub and the hero, "regionally" New England. Some say that if the ingredients are hot, it's a grinder, but cold, it's a sub.
Nice theme from Andy. Some tricky cluing in the fill too which livened things up. It took me quite a bit longer than a typical Thursday due to a couple of unknowns and some nice misdirection.
Let's go for a wander ...
1. "Amanpour & Co." network: PBS. For some unknown reason, I had "CBS" here at first, which eventually left me wondering about "CLUMP" and whether it was rather rude to call a zaftig lady "clumpy" or "a clump".
4. Enough and then some: AMPLE.
9. Strand during a hail storm, say: ICE IN.
14. GPS finding: LAT. itude.
15. Take it easy: RELAX.
16. "__ Rae": NORMA. Actress Sally Field won the Academy Award for Best Actress for her portrayal of Norma Rae in the eponymous 1979 movie.
17. Put to work: USE.
18. Small earthen pot: CRUSE. I'd never heard of this, a nice learning moment.
19. Huge success: SMASH.
23. Astronomical octet: PLANETS.
24. River Foyle's province: ULSTER. Northern Ireland, or "Norn Iron" if you want to sound like Rory McIlroy. Try it.
28. Form 1099 agcy.: I.R.S.
29. Japanese sandal: ZORI. I read and re-read "scandal", not "sandal" and was going to read up on who Zori was and what transgression he or she was involved in.
31. Hullabaloo: ADO.
32. Puts up, as drapes: HANGS.
37. Scott of "Big Little Lies": ADAM. Thank you, crosses. I know of Adam Scott the golfer - the one who, in my opinion, cheats with a long putter.
38. Examined in court: TRIED.
39. Metric prefix: DECI.
42. Like a soufflé, if everything goes well: RISEN. And not collapsed. It's one thing to get a soufflé to rise, it's another thing to get it to stay riz.
43. Busy mo. for the 28-Across: APR.
44. Senate staffer: AIDE.
45. Some MIT grads: EES.
46. Wright who quipped, "Everywhere is walking distance if you have the time": STEVEN.
48. Elaborate wardrobe: ARMOIRE.
55. Left: SPLIT.
58. Bugs with weapons: MORAN.
59. Oral health org.: ADA.
60. Musical work: PIECE.
61. Revise: EMEND. "Emend" is to correct an error, "amend" is to improve something by modifying it.
62. Casual greetings: HI'S.
63. Gets the kitty going: ANTES.
64. They may be pressing: NEEDS.
65. Neruda verse: ODE.
Maru Mori brought me
a pair
of socks
which she knitted with her own
sheepherder hands,
two socks as soft
as rabbits.
from "Ode to My Socks"
Down:
1. Zaftig: PLUMP. Not clump, then.
2. Pho garnish: BASIL. Food! There's some tremendous Vietnamese food places here in LA. My local one is Pho NoHo, which is a shame as "NoHo" doesn't actually rhyme with "pho". Here's pho (pronounced fuh), basil garnish and all.
3. Inscribed pillar: STELA.
4. Quiver carriers: ARCHERS.
5. Rates: MERITS.
6. Promotes: PLUGS.
7. Mascara target: LASH. Scurvy-ridden deckhands are targets too, me hearties!
8. Corp. bigwig: EXEC.
9. Pancreatic hormone: INSULIN.
10. "The Gift of the Magi" gift: COMBS. O. Henry short story published in 1906, and a very touching story it is.
11. Stat for Clayton Kershaw: E.R.A. A baseball pitcher's stat - Earned Run Average, the lower the number the better.
12. Online chats, briefly: IM'S.
13. "Hard pass": NAH.
21. "The Imitation Game" encryption machine: ENIGMA. Cracking of the German coded messages in WWII by cryptanalysts at Bletchley Park in the UK was the primary basis for the movie.
22. Shockingly vivid: LURID.
25. Zaps: TASES.
26. Elicit: EDUCE.
27. Sign of spring: ROBIN.
29. Former name of the Congo: ZAIRE.
30. Cookie with a Tiramisu Flavor Creme variety: OREO. Didn't I say last week that it's time to declare a period of Crossword Lent for "OREO"? I know it's handy and all to constructors, but it's a little stale. Nothing like a stale Oreo, now is there?
32. "Papa Bear" of football: HALAS.
33. Take on: ADOPT.
34. Mother-of-pearl: NACRE.
35. TV's talking horse: MR ED.
36. Acquirer of more than 1,000 patents: EDISON.
38. Doohickey: THING. Closely related to a whatsit and a thingummy-jig.
41. Ophelia's brother: LAERTES. "Hamlet" characters. Laertes killed Hamlet with a poisoned sword. I suppose it was a belt-and-braces appoach in case the sword slashing or stabbing didn't do the trick, although in most cases poisoning would just add insult to injury. Although Laertes did poison himself with said sword, so I suppose justice was served.
42. Does some jogging?: REMINDS. Another nice clue. Jogging someone's memory.
45. Task for a gofer: ERRAND. There was something wrong with my clue-parsing today. I was wondering what task a golfer might be assigned other than hitting a couple of buckets of balls at the driving range.
47. Word with mail or box: VOICE.
48. Say yes: AGREE.
49. You can cross it in about an hour on I-90: IDAHO. I tried MAINE first. Having no idea where the 90 starts or ends it seemed a reasonable guess.
50. Fixed up: RE-DID.
51. Remove all traces of: ERASE.
53. Grace period?: AMEN. I like this clue - "period" as in the end-of-sentence designator.
54. Alaskan seaport: NOME.
55. Place for a peel: SPA.
56. Map insert: PIN.
57. Service to redo: LET. Tennis.
And there we have it!
And here we have the grid!
Steve
Notes from C.C.:
Happy 72nd birthday of dear Lemonade (Jason), who's been been guiding us on Fridays for over a decade. He started his first blog post in March
2010. Thank you so much for your hard work, Lemonade! This is a picture from his trip to Oo' homeland a few years ago. Happy birthday, the king!
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| Oo and Lemonade |
Happy Birthday to the wise man Vidwan827 also! So glad to see you on the blog regularly now.
