Tuesday October 21, 2008 Verna Suit

Theme: The Man, The Myth, The Legend

17A: Scene of 38A's 63A: BEIJING OLYMPICS

38A: World's best swimmer: MICHAEL PHELPS

63A: 38A's take: EIGHT GOLD MEDALS

Do you know that his nickname is "Baltimore Bullet"?

Sensational! MICHAEL PHELPS had the audacity to dream and audacity to realize his dreams.

I believe this puzzle was created immediately after he broke the record, but our editor was not flexible enough to publish the puzzle earlier. Guess he has plenty of puzzles in his pipeline.

Great puzzle, isn't it? I really like the WELT clue (33D: Mark of Zorro?), very clever, though I always associate rapier rather than whip with Zorro.

Nice to see GOA (64D) clued as "Indian tourist haven". I never liked the "Himalayan gazelle" clue before. Without Argyle, I would not have found any picture of that mysterious gazelle.

I don't understand the PODS clue though (41D: Movable classrooms). How so? If PODS refer to "Schools of whales", then the clue need a question mark.

Across:

1A: Office clerk: FILER. None of the companies I've worked has a FILER. Secretaries do the filing job. I like the TERM clue (71A: In-Office time).

10A: Koi: CARP. Look at this huge CARP.

15A: Sound defeat: ROUT And UPSET (21A: Underdog victory).

20A: Black sea port: ODESSA. I had no idea that it belongs to Ukrain.

22A: Court figure: LAWYER. I was thinking of tennis court.

27A: Tokyo, once: EDO. Kyoto was the capital city during EDO period (1603-1867). Nobel author Kawabata wrote a book called "The Old Capital".

32A: Major bore: YAWNER. Have you seen Leslie Caron's "Gigi"? "It's a bore"!

36A: Nebraska river: PLATTE. I forgot. Saw PLATTE river as a clue somewhere before. It flows into Missouri.

46A: Sucker on a shark: REMORA. New word to me. I've heard of sucker fish though. Dictionary says REMORA can "attach itself to sharks, whales, sea turtles, or the hulls of ships." So ugly.

49A: Source of archery bows: YEWS. Can you make bows out of these YEW? They don't look good to me.

69A: Yorkshire river: OUSE. This river used to stump me. Not any more.

Down:

1D: Word for the Beatles: FAB. Do you collect FAB Four items? Here is George Harrison's "When We Were FAB".

4D: Relish: ENJOY. I was thinking of the hot dog relish.

5D: Commando: RAIDER. I always thought RAIDER is a person who RAIDS and seizes counterfeid products.

8D: Solzhenitsyn setting: GULAG. I got the answer, but I did not understand the clue. I've never heard of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn before. He won Nobel Literature in 1970.

10D: Dogpatch creator: CAPP (Al). Li'l Abner comic strip.

12D: Move like a hairline: RECEDE

19D: Undergo genetic change: MUTATE

24D: Dry riverbed: WADI. No idea. How is it different from arroyo/gully?

39D: Pest from a nest: HORNET

42D: Overcharge: SOAK. I was not aware of the slangy meaning of SOAK.

46D: Surgically remove: RESECT. New word to me.

47D: Complete: ENTIRE. I wanted INTACT.

48D: Hardly sufficient: MEAGER

55D: Smoke mass: CLOUD. See, The Rolling Stones used "Off of" in their song "Get Off of My Cloud".

59D: Oates novel: THEM. No. Have never heard of this novel before. Our editor likes to clue OATES as "Bellefleur" writer.

C.C.

Monday October 20, 2008 Michael T. Williams

Theme: Watered Down

17A: Heading for England: CROSSING THE POND

38A: Get outta here: GO JUMP IN A LAKE

56A: Very small amount: A DROP IN THE OCEAN

Will "Take Me to the RIVER" fit the above theme pattern?

This puzzle is weird. Most of the time the longest theme answer is in the middle. The grammatical structure of the above three entries felt very loose too.

I had to check the dictionary for BONESET (27D: Thoroughwort). I did not understand the meaning of "Thorougwort", thinking it's kind of disease, or something like wart. Had no idea that "wort" is a suffix for "plant".

I also forgot TARPON (31A: Florida fish). I wonder why the clue is "Florida fish"? Can't you find TARPON anywhere else? By the way, congratulations to Night Owl and other Tempa Bay fans. Matt Garza was awesome!

Across:

14A: Clarinetist Shaw: ARTIE. It's clued as "Bandleader Shaw" last Saturday. Kittyb linked Benny Goodman and Woody Herman and mentioned that they are all clarinetists and bandleaders.

20A: Plainsong feature: MONOTONE. This reminds me of Ben Stein.

21A: Carried by wind: EOLIAN. Or AEOLIAN. From Aeolus, ruler of wind in Greek mythology. New to me.

25A: North of Paris: NORD. "South of Paris" would be SUD.

37A: Ducks' relatives: LOONS. LOON is Minnesota's state bird.

41A: Rams and bucks: MALES. No alliteration any more? How about "Bucks and Boars"?

47A: "Star Trek" star: SHATNER. Captain Kirk.

54A: Of the kitchen: CULINARY. Funny how I always associate CULINARY with cooking but not kitchen.

Down:

1D: U.S. Defense group: SAC (Strategic Air Command). I got it from the across fills.

5D: Fawning subordinate: YES-MAN

7D: Inert gas: ARGON

18D: Isotope of thorium: IONIUM. No idea. Its atomic number is 90, and atomic weight 230. ION is charged article, IUM is a suffix for metallic element.

19D: Ultimate conclusion: END-ALL

22D: Paper folding: ORIGAMI. Amazing ORIGAMI flowers.

23D: Lotion additive: LANOLIN. Also called wool fat. I could only think of ALOE.

26D: Washington city: SPOKANE. Unknown to me also. Wikipedia says 1974 World Fair was held in SPOKANE and Bing Crosby grew up there.

41D: NYC arena: MSG. Are you a NY Rangers fan?

51D: "Rebel Without a Cause" co-star: MINEO (Sal). See the movie trailer.

61D: Writer Hentoff: NAT. I don't think I've read anything he has written.

C.C.