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Apr 24, 2009

Friday April 24, 2009 Robert H. Wolfe

Theme: Short Paths

18A: Speed?: BURN UP THE RD (Road)

24A: Average Joe?: MAN ON THE ST (Street)

35A: Badly fluster?: DR (Drive) TO DISTRACTION

50A: Excessive charge?: HWY (Highway) ROBBERY

57A: Way out?: AVE (Avenue) OF ESCAPE

Maybe it's not structurally possible to position all the above street-type theme answers at the very end of the phrases. Or all in the beginning.

Dictionary says "man in the street" means "Average Joe", not "on the street". I found out that MAN ON THE STREET is a Bob Dylan song. Actually, several of the above theme entries are song titles.

I had huge trouble with this puzzle. I always do when I can't catch the theme earlier on. Lots of abbreviations in the grid. Robert H. Wolfe (the last one on the list) is another of Stan Newman's Newsday regular contributors. His bio says he is a veterinarian.

Across:

1A: Year in which Michelangelo began work on "David": MDI. I got M immediately from MAI (1D: Printemps month), which is French for May. Printemps is "spring". But I had trouble obtaining DI. The clue would have been a straightforward "Roman 1501" if it were a Monday/Tuesday puzzle.

4A: NCAA Mountain West Conf. team: UNLV. University of Neveda, Las Vegas. The Runnin' Rebels. Wikipedia says it's located in a Las Vegas suburb called Paradise. Here is a list of all Mountain West Conference members.

14A: Jordin Sparks duet: NO AIR. See this clip. Someone (Embien?) linked this song on the blog before. But I forgot all about it. Jordin Sparks is the winner of Season 6 of "American Idol".

16A: Place: STEAD. I was thinking of a verb.

17A: Doctrine: ISM

20A: Marching band wind: FIFE. Just learned that FIFE is rooted in German Pfeife, meaning " pipe". FIFE can be a verb also. Chinese dizi is a kind of flute too.

22A: Kept in the loop, for short: CCED. Trouble for me. I was not thinking of the email cc.

23A: Barbera d'__: Italian wine: ASTI. Easy guess, since ASTI is the wine region. I've never heard of this red wine.

26A: Center: CORE

27A: Exaggerate: OVERDO

28A: Sash insets: PANES. Oh window. I was picturing kimono obi. Obi is literally "sash" in Japanese.

29A: Jacket specification: LONG. Not large?

30A: Antique shop transaction: RESALE. Someone bought this first issue of Sports Illustrated at an antique shop for only $15. I've never had any luck there. How about you?

41A: Puts out: ISSUES. I did not know "Put out" can mean publish.

42A: "Getting to Know You" singer on Broadway: ANNA. From "The King and I". I've never heard of the song.

43A: Splendor: ECLAT. Ah, "Brilliant success". I often confuse this word with ECLAIR.

47A: In any way: SO EVER. I've never used SO EVER alone, always "What SO EVER".

49A: Collar: NAIL. Verb.

54A: "Power Lunch" airer: CNBC. I like Sue Herera. The guy on her right is Bill Griffeth. My husband watches "Power Lunch" every day.

55A: San __: REMO. Which one are we referring to here?

60A: One might be run before bedtime: TUB. Yep, every night, for me.

62A: Volley: SALVO

63A: Folded food: TACOS. Not a fan of Mexican food. Too hot.

64A: "Walking on Thin Ice" singer: ONO. I was not aware of this song. Wikipedia says Yoko Ono and John Lennon concluded the recording of this song on Dec 8, 1980. And it was upon their return from the recording studio to their home that Lennon was murdered.

65A: Colchester's county: ESSEX. Alliteration again. I guessed. I pen in ESSEX for all the 5-letter county clues. I had no idea where Colchester is. Wikipedia says it claims to be the oldest town in Britian.

66A: Ships, to sailors: SHES

67A: Dietary no.: RDA. Is it Recommended Daily Allowance or Recommended Dietary Allowance?

Down:

2D: The doghouse, so to speak: DISFAVOR. Would not have got the answer without the across fills.

3D: At hand: IMMINENT. Are they really interchangable? Can you give me an example? I thought "At hand" means "close by".

4D: Straighten: UNBEND. Mercy me! This is a real word. I thought the constructor made it up.

5D: __-turn: NO U. Boy, I felt stupid. The answer did not come to me readily at all. Need more time to adjust to multiple word fills.

6D: Tree with durable wood: LARCH. Wikipedia says it's waterproof too, hence it's used in building yachts and boats. Like teak, I suppose.

6D: Edwards who played Ben Casey: VINCE. New actor to me. Have never heard of the TV series "Ben Casey" either.

9D: Odysseus' kingdom: ITHACA. OK, here is Sean Connery's ITHACA again. Still can't believe Connery is a misogynist.

10D: "Rob Roy" actor: NEESON. Which is your favorite Liam NEESON movie? Dennis probably likes his "Les Misérables".

11D: "La Nausée" author: SARTRE. See the book cover. All SARTRE's love interests (except Simone de Beauvoir of course) seemed to be pretty but dumb. He declined the Nobel Prize. Probably mad that Camus got his first.

12D: Swirls: EDDIES

19D: Summer term at UCLA?: PDTS. PDT is Pacific Daylight Time. I outsmarted myself, thinking "summer" is a wordplay on one who sums up, so I wrote down ADD immediately.

21D: Pass up: FORGO. "Precede" is FOREGO.

24D: Form: MOLD

25D: Spelling et al: TORIS. I was trapped again, thinking of the spelling spelling, not Tori Spelling.

28D: Fan-shaped muscle: PEC. I suppose it's "Fan-shaped".

31D: Leader of Senegal?: ESS. Can't fool me! Senegal starts with letter S, hence "leader".

32D: Onetime Beatle Sutcliffe: STU. I know there was a 5th Beatle. Could not remember his name though. I am so happy that it's not clued as "Alphabet trio" again like RST (8D: Alphabet trio).

34D: Catch, oater-style: LASSO

36D: Code word: DIT

37D: Billy Blanks' fitness program: TAE BO. Portmanteau of TAE kwon do and Boxing.

38D: Market figure: INVESTOR. I was thing of the real number, not person. Good clue.

39D: 18 holes, say: ONE ROUND. More used to "A ROUND".

43D: Box up: ENCASE

44D: Boxing surface: CANVAS. Just learned this fact a few weeks ago.

45D: Risks a lawsuit, in a way: LIBELS. I often misspell this word as LIBLE.

46D: dining area, perhaps: ALCOVE

48D: Haunt: OBSESS. Wrote down HARASS, which is actually "Hound".

50D: Otto I was its first leader: Abbr.: HRE. Holy Roman Empire (800-1806). The last one is Francis II, who abdicted and dissolved the Empire during the Napolenic Wars, according to Wikipedia.

51D: Lincoln-to-Cheyenne direction: WEST. I like this clue.

52D: Character-building grps.: YMCAS

58D: Roald Dahl's "Fantastic Mr. __": FOX. The answer revealed itself. I am not familiar with this book.

59D: "Annabel Lee" poet: POE. Nice clip.

61D: Squeezer: BOA. No idea. Is it because the snake squeezes?

Answer grid.

Happy Birthday to our fellow solver Kazie!

C.C.