"Auto Correct"
After I first solved the puzzle and looked at the circles, I thought "cute the gear shift in order." But after I wrote them out, something wasn't right. I discussed with a Cornerite and he noted they were just "auto-corrected" e.g. Packets->Rackets. That's when it hit me: we were going for a drive.Let's take a spin with an Automatic Shifter (PRND) and (16 & 100 downs) SHIFT GEARS through the normal daily drivers.
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| The PRNDL (video) |
26. Noisy outbursts that are greatly appreciated?: WELCOME RACKETS. Welcome Packets. "Auto-Correct" took it out of Park and put it in Reverse.
44. Bird voted "Most Likely to Succeed"?: BEST OF THE NEST. Best of the Rest. Out of Reverse into Neutral.
61. Messages hidden in some brunch fare?: WAFFLE CODES. Waffle coNes. Neutral to Drive.
74. Bit of middle-school fashion?: TWEEN JACKET. TweeD Jacket. Drive going back back through Neutral.
89. Halloween rental fee?: COSTUME CHARGE. Costume ChaNge. Neutral back into Reverse.
110. Bad news at an Atlanta pie shop?: JUST OUT OF PEACH. Just out of Reach. And Reverse back into Park. There, we're back in the driveway.
See the SHIFTer going through the GEARS in order as you leave and return, top to bottom and back to top: PRN-D-NRP.
Let's take ride through the rest of the grid.
Across:
1. Ends of pens: NIBS. Think you have an ink, well... [see what I did there? Ok, I'll try to behave]
5. Approval from a Lab: WAG. That beautiful, smart, pup that sniffs your bum.
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| Tinker |
8. Like chocolate ganache: RICH. Yum!
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| Recipe |
12. Swindles: SCAMS. If someone asks you to pay in Bitcoin...
17. Sound at a barbershop: SNIP. Clip, clip. There goes your hair. I always ask them to get the gray ones first.
18. Poetic salutes: ODES. Nothing about a Grecian Urn(?)
20. Pain: ACHE. Every Wednesday & Friday after my Tuesday/Thursday workouts.
21. Stuck out one's tongue as requested: SAID AH. Do Docs do this anymore? Mostly they just take blood, urine, and hook you to a machine, no?
22. Coffee shop loyalty card reward: FREE DRINK. I frequent nothing enough to bother with 'perks'.
24. Get close to: NEAR. Approach. Cue Mel Brooks and Cleavon Little [TV - MA] //y'all know Richard Prior wrote at least half that script.
25. Japanese fish preparation: TATAKI. Original meaning is 'beat with a hammer'. In food, just seared on the outside and raw in the middle. Not good for chicken but brilliant for sushi-grade tuna.
26. [See: Theme]
28. Not very much: A BIT OF. Just a smidge.
29. Give, as a driver's license: ISSUE TO. If "they" ISSUE it, it's official.
30. Brown quickly: SEAR. [See: TATAKI]
32. Lemon scraping: ZEST.
33. Toot: SPREE.
36. __ A: Italian soccer league: SERIE. If you say so...
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| Serie A League Logos |
39. Loot: LUCRE. I wanted cache for the longest time. At least I knew it was not the verb.
41. Strikes (out): CROSSES. If I showed you my grid, you'd know what it means. DELE.
44. [See: Theme]
49. Like crudités: RAW. Food!
50. Fix, as a pet: SPAY. Poor (female) lab.
52. __-di-dah: LAH. Mr. Fancy Pants.
53. Watch closely: EYE. Gotta keep an EYE on him; He's doing crosswords during meetings (moi?)
54. Fabrication: LIE. You made that up!
55. Signed up: ENLISTED. When I bought my house I said to the title-agent, "Last time I signed this many times, I found myself in the Army."
58. Beach town west of Santa Monica: MALIBU.
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| Malibu |
60. AED administrators: EMTS. Automated External Defibrillators are carried by Emergency Medical Technicians. Clear! ?
61. [See: Theme]
63. Made sense of: SORTED OUT. And my big-fat Ink-Over. I had SussED OUT for a while.
66. Atop, poetically: O'ER.
67. Court divider: NET. Tennis, volleyball, et.al.
68. Disgusted syllable: FEH. ? OK, I had FEI
69. Wallach of "The Magnificent Seven": ELI.
70. Tot's perch on a bike: CHILD SEAT.
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| Queen of the World back there |
74. [See: Theme]
79. Grasped: HELD. Not "Understand."
80. Used a rotary phone: DIALED. Kinda funny to watch kids (these days) figure one out.
Think they can figure it out in 10 minutes?
82. When the dinner bell rings: MEALTIME. Nothing to do with Pavlov's dog.
83. Not online, online: IRL. In Real Life.
84. Truck's tankful: GAS.
86. Rollaway, e.g.: COT. Army cots don't exactly roll up nor are they a comfy bed.
87. Crack a book: READ. I wanted study.
88. Actor Chaney: LON.
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| Master of the Grotesque |
89. [See: Theme]
93. Connect with: TAP INTO. Your social/professional network.
96. Writer Calvino: ITALO. Italian writer.
97. Like ta moko and the haka: MAORI.
99. Indy 500 family name: UNSER. This name I knew.
100. Chutzpah: GALL. Anyone want sass?
103. Govt.-issued IDs: SSNS. Social Security NumberS
105. Oft-removed throat tissues: TONSILS. Do DRs still do this? I have mine.
108. Delights: ELATES.
110. [See: Theme]
116. Garb: ATTIRE. Clothes.
117. App buyer: USER. If you USE a Smart Thing(tm) you buy APPlications to make it more USEful.
118. Fishy scoopful at a deli: TUNA SALAD. Food!
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| Recipe |
119. Large-horned mammals: RHINOS.
120. Agitate: RILE. Get your Irish up.
121. "__ Brockovich": ERIN.
122. Teacher from the old school?: MARM.
123. "Yesterday" and "Tomorrow": SONGS. Beatles (Fab Four) & Annie (orphan kid with Daddy Warbucks).
124. Long fish: EELS. Gars fit too.
125. Vote against: NAY. Anti.
126. Apple Watch assistant: SIRI. The voice assistant on your iThing and why all AI assistants are female. //DW's is set to an Aussie bloke. Should I be worried? :-)
Down:
1. Blue tag?: NSFW. Not Safe For Work is a warning before blue-humor. Our team has a discord space for NSFW content and/or to poke fun/entertain ourselves during vendor calls without $corp snooping. [Full disclosure - we are the $corpSnoops #CyberSec]
2. Pertaining to: IN RE. Regarding. As To. Pertaining to Subject. //our #discord only tangentially does; it's mostly memes
3. Jessica of TV's "The Sinner": BIEL.
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| Biel is Married to Justin Timberlake [WikiP] |
4. Genus subdivision: SPECIES. Don't know much about biology (This guy does an OK Sam Cooke in the style of Ska.)
5. Some gummy animals: WORMS. I love Haribo's Gummy Bears and sleepy time melatonin gummy worms.
6. Parting mot: ADIEU. Goodbye, Frenchman. [Cue Monty Python]
7. Art classes?: GENRES. Types, er, classes of art. You know, like Baroque. And if ain't Baroque, don't fix it [I'll see myself out soon]
8. Corporal or private: RANK. Army training sir!
9. Potential cause of brain freeze: ICEE. It's called Sphenopalatine Ganglioneuralgia
10. Exchanges: CHATS. Swapping stories.
11. Reflexive pronoun: HERSELF.
12. Onetime Volvo rival: SAAB. See: A Man Called Ove.
13. Inhabitant: CITIZEN.
14. "It's __!": A DATE. Anyone else think, "Alive!"?
Young Frankenstein
15. Predatory sharks: MAKOS.
16. With 100-Down, change one's approach, and a hint to the circled letters: SHIFT.
19. Accomplish a lot with little effort: SKATE BY. All my life. A boss-man once told me, "Get the little things 100% and people will let you slide if you mess-up the big stuff. The big stuff is hard but the little is easy." Then and there, I was a consultant :-)
21. Like potatoes: STARCHY.
23. Some tablets: DOSES.
27. Situp's target: CORE. My trainer has me working core. He said I was getting too puffy(? - I pay him for this? :-))
31. Filmmaker with a unique style: AUTEUR. Highfalutin "class of art."
33. Bit of hardware: SCREW. Saturday, week, it was a T-NUT.
34. One of yoga's five vital forces: PRANA. I'll leave this for those who know better. Lucina, you yoga, right?.
35. Piano-playing dog on "The Muppet Show": ROWLF. I need perps for spelling
Rowlf
37. Puerto Rico y Mallorca: ISLAS. Spanish Islands.
38. Abbr. in a research paper: ET AL. Latin. It means I'm only typing the first few names in my works cited or, literally, and others.
40. "The Pioneer Woman" host Drummond: REE. Sis loves her books & recipes. I have one cookbook.
42. Fragrant compounds: ESTERS. Essential smelly stuff. DW has only one perfume that doesn't send me into a sneezy fit.
43. Small detail?: SPEC. No detail is to small to do a job well. [see: my 19d comment]
45. "Makes sense now": OH I SEE. Aha!
46. Muppet with a puppy named Tango: ELMO. More Muppets!
47. In __: as found: SITU. Latin. In the original place.
48. Course obstacle: TEST.
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| Army Training, Sir! |
51. God, in Hebrew: ADONAI. My limited understanding: Saying YHWH is a sin, so Adonai is used in prayer.
56. "You win this hand": I FOLD. With these cards, I can't win.
57. Luge, e.g.: SLED.
Any Takers?
58. Convened: MET. Once, a Constitutional Congress convened...
59. Puccini's "La __": BOHEME. Puccini's opera. Got an hour? Click for Fernando & Luciano Pavarotti.
60. Fiat: EDICT. Law from a ruler. Usually, half-baked. The emperor has no ATIRE.
62. Uncouple: DETACH. Remove the drive-shaft from the joint and you've finally uncoupled it (and covered in gook).
64. 2002 American League MVP Miguel: TEJADA. Shortstop. Miguel [MLB Stats] was with Oakland when he received the Most Valuable Player. He also played in Houston '08 & '09.
65. Transport to Tel Aviv: EL AL. Standard x-wordese. Hahtoolah, I'm sure, can tell you if they lose your luggage.
68. Abbr. in an email subject line: FWD. "Forward." Like when you accidentally FWD that NSFW joke to your boss.
70. Quite smart: CHIC. Stylish.
71. Big sandwich: HERO. Is a hot-dog a sandwich? I say no and neither are hoagies nor grinders. Discuss.
72. Woes: ILLS.
73. Cars named for Henry Ford's son: EDSELS. It was totaled before it left the lot. History says a flop. Too many hands in the kitchen is the way I read the history of this disaster.
74. "Neon" fish: TETRA.
75. "Cool!": NEAT.
76. Pottery ovens: KILNS. Waseeley can tell you all about 'em.
77. Overact: EMOTE. Throwing this out there: Who's the biggest HAM?
78. Mid-range voice: TENOR. Is it weird of me to say The Great Caruso? [no relation]
No Relation
81. Fertile soil: LOAM.
84. Demolish: GUT. Raze. One GUTs the room before the re-model.
85. Accumulates: AMASSES. Gathers. Keep and take care of what you got and, soon, you've got plenty to share.
Or your SO calls you a hoarder :-) //hey, her car still fits in the garage. So there's that :-)
87. Change direction: REROUTE. GPS does this in heavy traffic.
90. Activity at windmills and pinball machines: TILTING. Think Don Quixote or cue Sir Elton John in The Who's Tommy.
Pinball Wizard
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| Don Quixote |
91. Create out of thin air: CONJURE. Make stuff up. Lying isn't good but fiction can be. //Who wrote these rules?
92. Show up for: GO TO. Showing up is half the job.
94. Destroys, as books: PULPS. I wouldn't say Pulp-Fiction destroyed books :-)
95. Pants measurements: INSEAMS. "Do you dress left or right?" said the seamstress. Wha???
98. One after another: IN TURN. My turn to comment, your turn will come in twelve more fill.
100. See 16-Down: GEARS.
101. Howe'er: ALTHO. Short for "although." Anyone else think there's TOO MUCH slang in the vernacular?
102. "Lux et veritas" language: LATIN. Where's Lemonade when you need him? I mean this is obviously LATIN, but WTH? [I LIU: Light and Truth]
104. "Fat Is a Feminist Issue" writer Orbach: SUSIE. Her WikiP page
106. Sotomayor who said, "You cannot value dreams according to the odds of their coming true": SONIA. A Justice in the minority (in more than one way :-))
107. "Unless there are none": IF ANY. IF ANY one objects to the marriage of these two 18yro kids... Nobody did.
109. Greek matchmaker?: EROS. He hit DW & me with his arrows.
111. Peddle: SELL. Pedal: Bike. Petal: Flower.
112. Número de leches en un postre específico: TRES. Spanish: Number of milks in a specific dessert. Three. We had TRES leches as 60a in Rafeael's 2/11/23 puzzle.
113. Jai __: ALAI.
114. NFL quarterback Derek: CARR. Raider's Quarterback.
115. Port on some TVs: HDMI. High-Definition Multimedia Interface. It carries digital & audio signals from box to the screen/speakers.
The Grid
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| The Grid |
I hope everyone had fun and I didn't go too far off-road with the expo.
Cheers, -T
