Friday, April 15, 2016, Jeffrey Wechsler

Title: Where R you?

JW is back in my backyard with a truly ambitious effort, built around a simple theme...take the letter "R" out of a word in a phrase and clue with hilarity. Package this in a 68 word grid with all kinds of fun fill. Quad sixes in the NW and SE Corners mixed in with double 7s over grid spanning theme fill make for a really cool puzzle. Locating two sixteen letter phrases that become  funny phrases when you remove an R is an amazing find.  Only one R per phrase, and all are removed.The 6-7-8 fill include some wonderful stuff like CABANA, AVOCET,  REVERE,  CREDOS,  DEMEAN,  MY DUST, BAD LEAD,  ADAGIOS,  TAVERNA,  ON A AND E,  CHAUCER,  NELLIES,  TIE GAME, TRIES IT and  ASSAYER. As always, some of his choices are two or more words.  Let's get 'er done.

17A. Oath sworn in a kosher kitchen? : ABOVE ALL DO NO HARM (15). Some Greek, as this hearkens to the Hippocratic Oath for Physicians but it is a popular misconception that the phrase "do no harm" is a part of the oath. Jews do not eat pork products so "do no ham" is true. The rumor about WalMart advertising is not, it was a Greenwich Village deli.

27A. Double-dealing in Delhi? : INDIAN CORN (9). I am sure there are con men in India as well. The corn was a colorful part of childhood.

32A. Cutthroat entrepreneur? : BUSINESS CARD (11). How many of you keep anyone's business cards anymore? CAD is such an old fashioned word.

38A. Demand from a Stooge fan? : SHOW ME MORE (9). A wonderful CSO to our Chairman.

54A. "Stir-frying is an option, too"? : I COULD USE THE WORK (15). Another delightful phrase emerged. We do not own a wok.

The final element of the skill JW has, is the placement of the R that is removed, as each one is in the last word of the phrase, and is the third letter in a four letter word. HAM, CON, CAD, MOE and WOK make such an appealing set of three letter words.

Across:

1. Not as available : SCARCER. Not the easiest for 1A, but fair.

8. Red herring, to a cop : BAD LEAD. Police depend on leads from the public in many investigations, enhanced in modern days by all the cameras.

15. Athens eatery : TAVERNA. I love me a good Greek TAVERNA especially the tzatziki, spanakopita and souvlaki.

16. Where to view "Duck Dynasty" : ON A AND E. This has an attractive letter string but is hardly fair as the network always uses the ampersand. Do you think puzzles should include ampersands?

19. Hightailed it : RACED.

20. Le Mans law : LOI. A French word for Law.

21. Great Plains tribe : OSAGE. One of the Native American tribes loved by CW puzzlemakers.

22. 9-Down opener : ENERO. Spanish for January

23. '50s pres. candidate : AES. Adlai Ewing Stevenson. ran agains DDE twice.

25. Long of "Third Watch" : NIA. This actress has WORKED.  She is on the left.

26. New Year's Eve get-togethers? : DATES. Meh.

30. "A symptom of man's failure as a thinking animal": Steinbeck : WAR. The LINK.

31. Old knives : SNEES. We have this 5 or 6 times a year.

36. Pool option : CRAWL. Back again, a stroke popular in swimming.

37. Six-time '70s Dodger All-Star : CEY. Ron, the Penguin, was part of a great Dodger infield, and then lead the Cubs to a rare NL championship series appearance.

40. Unyielding : SOLID. When an irresistible force...














45. Lobbying gp. : PAC.

46. Neighbor of Turk. : SYRia.

47. Place to play : ARENA. Hence this GAME .

48. Riches : LUCRE. Often called filthy...

51. Deg. for drillers : DDS. Doctor of Dental Science.

53. Unyielding : STERN. Often not irresistible

57. Nervous __ : NELLIES. Comes from the description of anxious race horses.

58. No-win situation : TIE GAME.

59. Doesn't back away : TRIES IT. Vague Friday cluing, but doable.

60. Gold rush figure : ASSAYER. Very important for they told you if you really found the gold.

Down:

1. Was googly-eyed : STARED. This and scarcer were a hard beginning for me. I think of this as what Kanye looks like when he sees Kim's booty...

2. Place to bring a suit : CABANA. Bathing suit; a gimme for a Floridian.

3. Wading bird : AVOCET. Pretty BIRD.

4. Put on a pedestal : REVERE. more Kanye and Kim?

5. Beliefs : CREDOS. From the Latin.

6. "Bambi" doe : ENA. Spoiler alert, she is in the sequel.

7. Award-winning political cartoonist Ted : RALL. No clue. he apparently won a Pulitzer, but he is hard to link in a non-political blog.









8. Word with able or full : BODIED. Sailor? Wine? Kim?

9. Munich : Jahr :: Madrid : __ : ANO: Fort Lauderdale: YEAR,

10. "Hawaii Five-O" nickname : DANO.

11. Landlocked Asian nation : LAOS. I think it is the only four letter one; all I can think of are Mongolia and Kazakhstan which may only exist in Ali G's mind.

12. Heightened : ENHANCED.  Ribbed for her pleasure?

13. Slow movements : ADAGIOS. We have lots of musical clues and many musicians as constructors and solvers.

14. Insult : DEMEAN. I didn't mean to demean.

18. Some bank files : LOAN RECORDS. I prefer Loretta's records.

24. 1980 Oscar winner who portrayed Loretta : SISSY. Spacek who also was the original Carrie. She did all of her own singing in the movie.

27. Actor McKellen : IAN. So many great roles.

28. Mandela's org. : ANC. African National Congress.

29. Exhibition funding gp. : NEA. National Endowment for the Arts (NEA). Yes another mistake on my part filled in NEA and never read the clue. Thanks anon. I liked seeing it with ENA, btw.

30. Trickery : WILES. Generally related to feminine.

32. Cabbage family member : BROCCOLI. A nephew I think.

33. Detroit labor org. : UAW. United Auto Workers.

34. Letters in personal columns : SWM. Single White Male, or perhaps swimmer who does the front crawl in his freestyle event.

35. Get : SEE. ironically perfect for a puzzle.

36. First poet interred in Westminster Abbey's Poets' Corner : CHAUCER.

38. Immobilize, in a way : SPLINT.

39. Something to eat in a Western? : MY DUST. While I ride off into the sunset.

40. Miss America contestants' array : SASHES.






41. Salsa brand : ORTEGA.

42. Room to maneuver : LEEWAY.

43. Where to emulate the natives : IN ROME, do as the Romans do; pinch.

44. More unpleasantly moist : DANKER.

49. Dominate : RULE.

50. Some Ivy Leaguers : ELIS. Yale gets more love than all the rest combined.

52. Words with limit or trap : SET A. Is this a dreaded partial?

55. Agnus __ : DEI.

56. It's in many poems : 'TIS. The anagrammatic reference even dupes the '. For both Will S., JW and I, let's end with ....Sonnet 110.

"Alas, 'tis true I have gone here and there

And made myself a motley to the view..."

Happy April 15, you have until Monday to file your taxes. Really enjoyed this one as much as I have any of JW's efforts. Lemonade out.

Thursday, April 14th, 2016 Mike Peluso

Theme: Double Crosses.

18A. Start of an old news announcement : EXTRA! EXTRA! Read all about it!

32A. Stipulation on le menu : PRIX FIXE. Food! The fixed-price menu in French restaurants; the daily specials. Most restaurants in France offer a prix fixe menu which is usually the the best value - and the best foo (as opposed to ordering à la carte).

41A. Where gas and lodging may be found : NEXT EXIT. The food! choices tend to be pretty limited.

60A. Nachos, e.g. : TEX-MEX DISH. Food! Here's a chicken fajitas, a classic Tex-Mex dish.

3D. Historic Chicago-to-Santa Monica route : SIXTY SIX. Too good to pass up for a music link. Get your kicks with the Rolling Stones before they started writing their own songs.

38D. When translated to English, beer brand that hints at the common feature of the five other longest puzzle answers : DOS EQUIS

What a great journey through 11 (count 'em!) X's and some Z's, W's, Q's and other Scrabble-tastic letters thrown in for good measure.

I loved the concept, the execution and I enjoyed the fill around those pesky X's but ..... CLANG! The reveal says "the five other longest puzzle answers" which rather insults the lovely ARSENALS and UNEARTHS which each sport eight letters - just like PRIX FIXE, NEXT EXIT and SIXTY SIX. Details, details.

Anyway - thoroughly enjoyable puzzle, thank goodness for great crosses for the obscure stuff, and a one-cup-of-coffee time for me.

Let's see what else we've got that jumps out:

Across:

1. Tousle : MUSS. No fuss with this muss.

5. F and G, e.g. : CLEFS

10. Soaks (up) : SOPS. See how you have to wait before deciding between MOPS and SOPS?

14. Bad thing to be caught in : A LIE. Because "a speed trap" or "a rip tide" didn't fit.

15. Spells : HEXES

16. Virginie, par exemple : ÉTAT. French king Louis XIV  (great crossword name!) pretty much started the wheels of the revolution turning with his assertion "L'Etat, c'est moi." - "I am the State". It all ended rather badly for the French royal family, and around 40,000 others.

17. "Need You Tonight" band : INXS

20. Frequent Lemmon co-star : MATTHAU

22. Chimney : STACK

23. Dublin-born poet : YEATS

24. AWOL trackers : MPS

26. Tiny : WEE

27. Shine, in Cambridge : LUSTRE. British spelling. For those of you that remember the picture of the crew "Boat Race" passing Chiswick Eyot on the blog a couple of weeks ago, Cambridge University was the boat on the right.

29. Ammunition dumps : ARSENALS

31. Request to Sajak : AN "I"

34. Numerical prefix : HEXA. -decimal. Base 16. I have fond(?) memories of an activity called "dump-cracking". When your IBM-mainframe program aborted, you were presented with a printed "dump" of the computer memory at the time of the error which usually measured at least a foot tall pile of of fan-fold paper, and you were left alone for a while trying to figure out what "Data Exception Error at location 9EF867D81" could possibly mean.

36. Progressive pitcher? : FLO

37. When there's no turning back : D-DAY

46. Tulsa sch. : ORU. Oral Roberts makes an appearance.

47. Brings to light : UNEARTHS

50. Pitcher, for one : VESSEL

52. Cambodia's Lon __ : NOL. Crosses, thank you.

53. Enzyme suffix : -ASE

54. Moisten, in a way : BASTE. Food! A pointless activity to spoon fat from the bottom of the roasting dish to the top of the roast. All you do is lose heat from the oven, probably burn your wrist on the oven shelf and make zero difference to the flavor of the end product.

55. Northeastern octet : IVIES. There's an acronym or mnemonic somewhere in the deepest, darkest regions of my mind to remember Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Penn, Brown, Columbia, Dartmouth and Cornell. I guess HYPPBCDC isn't it.

57. Old but coveted : ANTIQUE

64. Peach __ : FUZZ

65. Landed : ALIT

66. Ken Jenkins's "Scrubs" role : KELSO. It didn't help that I read "Ken Jennings" and was away with the "Jeopardy" thinking. When was Ken Jennings in a Scrubs episode? Crosses and sanity eventually prevailed.

67. CVI halved : LIII

68. Old map divs. : SSRS

69. "Dallas" Miss : ELLIE

70. North-of-the-border gas : ESSO. Also 6,000 miles east of the border in the UK, but it's not quite as much of a snappy clue.

Down:

1. Injure badly : MAIM

2. Radius neighbor : ULNA

4. Largish combo : SESTET. Hand up for "SEXTET" - with all the X's going on today it seemed a natural. Not.

5. Proctor's concern : CHEATER.

6. Infiniti competitor : LEXUS

7. No. after a phone no. : EXT. Are extensions still a thing? It seems an awfully long time since I asked to be put through to one.

8. Not agin : FER

9. Fed. benefits agency : S.S.A.

10. Stimulating message : SEXT.

11. Senators' home : OTTAWA. I tried to fit all kinds of Washington, D.C and other stuff into here. Finally the penny dropped.

12. Part of UPS : PARCEL

13. Betting specifications : STAKES

19. County bordering Suffolk : ESSEX. Easy for me. Tough for you. I lived in Essex - 60 miles from London, and a 2 1/2 hour commute from the office. When Warner Bros. offered me a transfer to Los Angeles it didn't take a whole lot to convince me!  Here's a snippet of the old map now hanging on my wall - my house was the little black dot in the yellow highlight beneath the "B1053" road designation. It was very quiet out there! The house was more than 400 years old.

21. Dwell annoyingly (on) : HARP

24. "Fantastic" Dahl character : MR. FOX

25. Initials on a radial : P.S.I. Pounds per Square Inch. Where's the "per"?

27. "Well, __-di-dah!" : LAH

28. Lyon article : UNE. One Feminine Article en France. I pitched a tent on a roundabout in Lyon once - I was hitch-hiking and dropped off at midnight by a truck driver. It was very dark and I had no idea I was standing on a traffic circle. When I woke up in the morning at rush hour, I was startled to find three lanes of traffic circling my campsite. The gendarmes who arrived shortly after were nice, but bemused.

29. Weigh station counts : AXLES

30. Composer Rorem : NED

33. "__ shoe fits ... " : IF THE. Cinderelly?

35. Literary assortment : -ANA. Very much in the "crosswordese" field. Shakespeareiana, Grishomiana. You get the idea.

39. "We __ Marshall": 2006 film : ARE. I cried. I cry in a lot of movies, but this one was a bawler.

40. Brynner of filmdom : YUL. Completely missed this during the solve, crosses filled him in for me.

42. Wipe off : ERASE

43. Some Cadillacs : XT'S. Not sure they'd give the XKE's a run for their money.

44. Scott classic : IVANHOE. Great book. Robin Hood's modern-day reputation owes much to this novel.

45. Try : TEST

47. Hall of Fame Colts quarterback : UNITAS. Peyton Manning? Not yet, be patient.

48. Grisham output : NOVELS.

49. Potion : ELIXIR. Lovely word.

51. Suppress : STIFLE

54. Low voices : BASSI

56. First responders, initially : EMTS

58. Israeli arms : UZIS

59. Opera star Pinza : EZIO. Along with the previous entry, a couple of Z's are thrown into the scrabble-fest today.

61. Classic Jag : XKE. The E-Type. Jaguar announced recently that they are going to complete the production run of the "Lightweight" low-drag coupe. There were plans to make 18 of these cars, only 12 were built between 1963 and 1964. Don't expect to see the missing six available for purchase on the open market. Here's one of the originals.

62. "Small Wonder" state: Abbr. : DEL. aware.

63. In need of treatment : ILL

And ... here's the grid.


Steve

Wednesday April 13, 2016 C.C. Burnikel

TITLE: SIDESHOW

C.C. supplies us with a tasty combination of second banana options as she slyly supplies SIDE DISHES that we might request at a restaurant. Further, the SIDES are on the SIDES of the theme fill. I was fortunate to have the circles you see in the grid below or would have probably needed the reveal. Of course it didn't help that I confidently entered SIDE ORDERS before some letter roulette at the bottom got me to "got 'er done" status. 

I liked all of C.C.'s OffeRINGS and thought BEAUTY ICONS may have been the toughest to generate.

Yes, I do see the irony of having Husker Gary blog on a day where the real "foodies" here would have done so much better. C'est la vie!

Let's examine the theme answers, uh, SIDE BY SIDE:

17. Impressionist who was frequently a guest of Johnny Carson : RICH LITTLE - The man of a thousand voices OR a side that can be White, Black, Brown or even Jeweled Moroccan RICE Pilaf With Pistachio Nuts

24. Greek gatherings? : FRAT PARTIES - College soiress OR a side/appetizer that can be dressed up as Poutine

34. Statute that protects source confidentiality in journalism : SHIELD LAW - Law that keeps sources private OR the favorite SLAW at our house (I heard that Steve!)

50. Marilyn Monroe and Grace Kelly : BEAUTY ICONS - BEAUTY ICONS and not BLONDE ICONS OR this side that has three types of BEANS

58. Menu listing literally represented by this puzzle's circles : SIDE DISHES - Some are a little more exotic than others

Across        

1. Like many knock-knock jokes : CORNY - PUNNY, not so much. 

6. Fit together, as some Russian dolls : NEST - Like these Matrioshka Russian Beatle Dolls

10. Commando ploy : RAID

14. Square measures : AREAS

15. Pledge : OATH

16. Magazine with annual Style Awards : ELLE - An old guy who buys his clothes at Kohl's ain't gettin' any award

19. Ink stain : BLOT

20. Quite a while : AGES

21. Org. with Wizards and Magic : NBA

22. Hard-to-hit pitch : CURVE - When it looks like it's coming for your head but winds up over the plate...

23. __ tai : MAI

27. Cleared (out) : EMPTIED

29. Clearasil shelfmate : OXY

30. Be in session : SIT

31. Less-filling brews : LITES

32. Phoenix-to-Albuquerque dir. : ENE - 6 hrs 27 min by car

33. Movie backdrops : SETS - Forbidden to film in Vatican City, Ron Howard had this incredible SET constructed in a parking lot to show St. Peter's Square. Some elements were built to scale and others were projected on green screens.

38. Column on a decision maker's list : CONS 

41. Govt. stipend : SSI - Supplemental Security Income 

42. Gem weight : CARAT - 1 CARAT = .00705 ounces

46. Copy : APE

47. Health club : SPA

48. Golfer's booking : TEE TIME - Kinda pricey at Pebble Beach

53. "Holy cow!" : MAN - Shades of Harry Caray for us baseball peeps

54. On edge : ANTSY

55. Jackie's second : ARI - How do you follow JFK?

56. Founded: Abbr. : ESTD

57. City near Tahoe : RENO -  former RENO custom - chucking your wedding ring into the Truckee River post-divorce

61. "Dancing With the Stars" co-host Andrews : ERIN

62. Tan shade : ECRU

63. Teapot part : SPOUT - "Here is my handle, Here is my 63 Across"

64. Viewpoint : TAKE - Depending on what word is stressed, you can get seven different TAKES on this sentence: "I never said she stole my money!"

65. Show sorrow or joy : WEEP

66. "101" class, briefly : INTRO - Chem 101 is a washout course for a lot of failed doctors and dentists

Down(side?)

1. Snickers ingredient : CARAMEL

2. Paper work? : ORIGAMI

3. Exchange need : RECEIPT - Costco says members don't need one

4. Slangy turndowns : NAHS

5. Paris fashion monogram : YSL - This Yves St Laurent tie is $155. Free shipping!!

6. "Pretty good!" : NOT BAD 

7. Frequent, as a diner : EAT AT

8. Mo. town : STL - ST L vs another Mo. town known by its initials   

9. With 25-Down, what America is across, to Brits : THE 25. See 9-Down : POND - Doughboys and GI Joes crossed THE POND in 1917 and 1941

10. Contradict in court : REBUT

11. Court order? : ALL RISE - "Should I RISE when you say so, Officer Bird?"

12. "This is awesome!" : I LOVE IT - Bird's boss Judge Judy has had the highest Syndicated TV ratings for years

13. Loathes : DETESTS

18. Memo starter : INRE

22. Show sorrow or joy : CRY

24. Bass, e.g. : FISH - You need this $2,000 piece of equipment to outsmart a FISH?

26. Jump on ice : AXEL - Here's a triple

28. Hardy title teenager : TESS

32. Yalie : ELI

33. Hit : SWAT

35. Road trip guessing game : I SPY - ...with my little eye

36. Morales of "NYPD Blue" : ESAI

37. Air Force heroes : ACES

38. Musical with nightclub scenes : CABARET

39. 1968 to now, in pro tennis : OPEN ERA - When pros were first allowed in Grand Slam Events

40. Fastidious sort : NEATNIK

43. Drummer's joke punctuation : RIMSHOT

44. Hobbyist : AMATEUR

45. Sees after : TENDS TO - Mom always said, "TEND TO our own knitting!"

47. Muddy digs : STY

48. Ripped to shreds : TORE UP - The Golden State Warriors TORE UP the NBA this season

49. Author Blyton : ENID

51. Me.-to-Fla. route : US ONE - Key West, FL. to Clair, New Brunswick, Canada  

52. Core group : CADRE

56. Channel with numerous sister channels : ESPN

58. Patch, perhaps : SEW

59. Diamonds, slangily : ICE

60. "Woe __": 1996 grammar book : IS I - Being a grammar cop won't make you any friends! 

Now it's time for you to get off the SIDELINE and tell us your SIDE of the story:

Grid

Note from C.C.:

The Fireball Newsflash Kickstarter missed the goal by just $96 last time. Peter Gordon is trying again. The new campaign is now halfway funded and ends on Sunday April 17. 

Please click here and be one of the backers. You get 20 puzzles from the master for $7. As I mentioned last time, Fireball Newsflash are mostly of LAT Tuesday level difficulty. Every puzzle features super fresh entries and fun clues.

Tuesday, April 12, 2016 Janice Luttrell

Theme: Somebody - Reveal word combined with theme word.

20. "Fine, don't listen to me" : "SUIT YOURSELF". Bodysuit. Google LINK (Gentlemen, please wait until you have read the blog before following that link.)

27. Lobster-steak combo : SURF AND TURF. Bodysurf. CLIP(1:52)

43. Two-rope jumping : DOUBLE DUTCH. Body Double. An actor substituted for a lead performer, especially in distance shots or nude scenes not involving the face.

52. Nonverbal communication ... and what the starts of 20-, 27- and 43-Across can be : BODY LANGUAGE

Argyle here. Janice with a Tuesday treasure.

Across:

1. Gearshift letters : PRNDL. Park, Reverse, Neutral, Drive, Low.

6. Where a baby develops : WOMB

10. Largemouth fish : BASS

14. Pianist Chick with 22 Grammys : COREA. Jazz.

15. Sheltered, at sea : ALEE

16. Johnson of "Laugh-In" : ARTE. I loved his dirty old man. (CLIP)(0:50)

17. Banjo sound : TWANG

18. Org. with many long missions : NASA. (National Aeronautics and Space Administration)

19. Whopper maker? : LIAR

23. Old TV-top receiver : ANTENNA

26. Calms : EASES

31. Prefix with -logue : IDEO

32. "Airplane!" actor Robert : HAYS. So many clips; you choose.

33. "We don't know yet," in a TV schedule : TBA. (To Be Announced)

36. Corner-to-corner line: Abbr. : DIAGonal

37. Accustom (to) : INURE

39. Timely blessing : BOON

40. Some MIT grads : EEs. (electrical engineer)

41. Tabloid twosome : ITEM

42. Lull in a cradle : ROCK

47. Texas landmark : ALAMO

51. Two-man Army helicopters : APACHES. That's a lot of fire power!

 

56. Spirited horse : ARAB

57. Like some dorms : CO-ED

58. PlugIns Scented Oil maker : GLADE

62. Multigenerational tale : SAGA

63. Sharpen : HONE

64. Haunted, say : EERIE

65. Marked, as a ballot : EXed

66. Squeezed (out) : EKE'D

67. Ward off : REPEL

Down:

1. Tipper's 15: Abbr. : PCT. (percent) Pretty low these days.

2. Use oars : ROW

3. Org. promoting hunter safety : NRA. (National Rifle Association of America)

4. Navigational hazard : DENSE FOG

5. Southern California's __ Beach : LAGUNA

 

6. Classified listing : WANT AD

7. Skin care brand with an Active Botanicals line : OLAY

8. Middle: Pref. : MESO

9. Sweetheart : BEAU

10. Lightweight wood : BALSA

11. Ram in the sky : ARIES. (March - April)

12. Like bread made into stuffing, perhaps : STALE

13. Feudal servants : SERFS

21. What a keeper may keep : INN

22. Two-legged zebras? : REFs. (referees)

23. Remark to the audience : ASIDE

24. Film with nakedness : NUDIE and little else.

25. Financial dept. : TREASury

28. Green digit? : THUMB

29. Onetime Egypt-Syria fed. : UAR. (United Arab Republic, 1958 - 1961)

30. Sandwich bread : RYE

33. Place for a crown or cap : TOOTH

34. Lawn bowling game : BOCCE. Basic Rules

35. Pharaohs' crosses : ANKHs

37. Norah Jones' "What Am __ You?" : I TO

38. Modern, in Munich : NEU

39. "Enter the Dragon" martial artist : BRUCE LEE

 

41. Hollywood favorite : IDOL

44. Praised : LAUDED

45. Waste watchers: Abbr. : EPA. (United States Environmental Protection Agency)

46. Cloak's partner : DAGGER

 

47. Put down : ABASE

48. Seuss' environmental advocate : LORAX

 

49. Words of wisdom : ADAGE

50. "Oops, sorry" : "MY BAD"

53. Yearn (for) : ACHE

54. Corner for breakfast : NOOK

55. Trait carrier : GENE

59. Dadaist Jean : ARP

 

60. Yahtzee cube : DIE

61. Slender fish : EEL

 

Argyle

Monday, April 11, 2016 Nancy Salomon

Theme: For your eyes only - Four ways to use your eyes.

17A. Understand, finally : SEE THE LIGHT

23A. Zone out : STARE INTO SPACE

38A. Revival leader's query ... and hint to the starts of 17-, 23-, 49- and 60-Across : "CAN I GET A WITNESS?"

49A. Photographer's instruction : WATCH THE BIRDIE

60A. "Didn't think I could do it, did ya?!" : "LOOK AT ME NOW!"

Argyle here with Nancy again. She was here last month and returns with a smooth offering today. No pinwheel today but still a couple of long non-theme columns to tie it together. The unifier is a grid spanner right in the middle.

Across:

1. Spaghetti or ziti : PASTA

6. In different places : APART

11. What a steamroller steamrolls : TAR

14. Moral standard : ETHIC

15. Capital of Yemen : SANA'A

16. Thrilla in Manila winner : ALI

19. Caboodle go-with : KIT. (kit and caboodle) (meaning)

20. Bill at the bar : TAB

21. Tehran native : IRANI

22. German auto engineer Karl : BENZ

27. Mined rock : ORE

28. Ticklish Muppet : ELMO

29. Boom's opposite : BUST

32. ID card feature : PHOTO

35. Point de __: opinion, in Paris : VUE

42. Corp. ladder leader : CEO

43. En __: as a group : MASSE

44. Spoken : ORAL

45. WWII female enlistee : WAAC. (Women's Army Auxiliary Corps)

47. Org. with a "100 Greatest Movie Quotes of All Time" list : AFI. (American Film Institute)

56. Had a bawl : WEPT

57. Track jockey, e.g. : RIDER

58. Building wing : ELL

59. Swiss peak : ALP

63. Under the weather : ILL

64. Speck in the ocean : ISLET

65. Beethoven's "Für __" : ELISE. A dance number?

66. Lao-__: Taoism founder : TSE

67. Heart rate : PULSE

68. Thin coins : DIMES

Down:

1. Ones who won't leave you alone : PESTS

2. Really bugged : ATE AT

3. Biblical queen's land : SHEBA

4. Little songbird : TIT

5. More sore : ACHIER

6. Lion of Narnia : ASLAN

7. Sherwin-Williams product : PAINT

8. Cardio procedure : ANGIO

9. Word of support : RAH

10. Skin art, briefly : TAT

11. Seek shelter : TAKE COVER

12. Flared skirt : A-LINE

13. Big name in hotels and crackers : RITZ

18. Buffalo's lake : ERIE

22. Emeril catchword : BAM!

24. __ de boeuf: French roast : RÔTI. (Roast beef)

25. Alien-seeking org. : SETI. (search for extraterrestrial intelligence)

26. Underhanded plan : PLOT

29. Secretly keep in the email loop, briefly : BCC. (Blind Carbon Copy )

30. Abu Dhabi's fed. : UAE. (United Arab Emirates)

31. Suspected McIntosh relative with pure white flesh : SNOW APPLE. (Fameuse) LINK

32. TD's six : PT's. (football)

33. Gives birth to : HAS

34. What borrowers do : OWE

36. __ Today : USA

37. Subj. for some green-card holders : ESL. (English as a second language)

39. Former auto financing co. : GMAC. (General Motors Acceptance Corporation, now Ally Financial)

40. A pop : EACH

41. Roulette color : NOIR. (black)

46. Verizon rival : AT&T. (American Telephone and Telegraph Company, once)

47. Aid in a felony : ABET

48. Solidified, as plans, with "up" : FIRMED

49. H.G. who wrote "The War of the Worlds" : WELLS. This gives me an excuse to post Jeff Wayne's Forever Autumn, sung by Justin Hayward and narrated by Richard Burton.

50. Internet forum troublemaker : TROLL. "Don't feed the trolls"

51. Backpacking outings : HIKES

52. Online social appointment : e-DATE

53. Jeans material : DENIM

54. Admission of defeat : "I LOSE"

55. Cary of "Glory" : ELWES

Matthew Broderick and Cary Elwes in "Glory"

56. Cool one's heels : WAIT

60. One of a kissing pair : LIP. Remember "Leo the Lip" Durocher?

61. Buckeyes' sch. : OSU. (Ohio State University)

62. Yale Blue wearer : ELI

Argyle

Note from C.C.:

Congratulation to dear Jazzbumpa (Ron) on his New York Times debut today!