Thursday, 11/8/12

NYT untimed 
LAT 3:09 
Tausig untimed 
CS 4:04 (Sam) 
BEQ 13:20 (Matt) 

Damon J. Gulczynski’s New York Times crossword

Psst, Cynthia: Hi! Great to meet you today over lunch. You’ve got a great daughter (but you knew that already).

NYT crossword solution, 11 8 12 1108

If you’re going to meet a reader of your crossword blog, it might as well be one who skips the puzzles before Thursday. I did suggest that the Monday through Wednesday puzzles could be rendered more challenging by skipping the Across clues altogether. And didn’t I hear that Trip Payne likes to solve the Friday and Saturday NYT with Downs only?

Today’s theme is a MAN rebus, with the 12th MAN rebus square appearing in TWELFTH {MAN}, which is apparently a football term? Let’s see: [Home-field advantage] or, as my husband says, the fans. Never heard that one before. Most of the MAN squares actually mean “man” in at least one direction, but the ARMANI SUITS/MANES crossing is simply using that trigram. “MAN, OH, MAN,” MANLY MAN, and MAN-TO-MAN, on the other hand, use two men apiece. And is it totally nuts to have three rebus squares in that upper left corner or what? ARAL and HARI aren’t exciting fill, but they’re certainly valid and who would have expected such solid fill in a little section with three rebuses?

Trouble spots:

• 5a. [“Sweetheart” of “Jersey Shore”], SAMMI. I know there’s a Snooki and a J-Woww, and a The Situation and maybe a Mikey D, but Sammi? Not ringing bell. Might be because I’ve never actually seen the show.
• 18a. [“NFL Live” host Trey] WINGO. If you don’t know TWELFTH MAN, you might not know this either. I didn’t.
• 19a. [Mrs. Albert Einstein] was named ELSA. You don’t say. Not an easy crossing, where ELSA meets the OUSE, a [Yorkshire river].

It’s been a long day of computer malfeasance, so I’ll sign off now. 3.5 stars. Ambitious theme with plenty of lively MAN-filled phrases and words, surrounding fill less enchanting (as you’d expect).

Updated Thursday morning:

Doug Peterson’s CrosSynergy/Washington Post crossword, “What’s That Noise?”- Sam Donaldson’s review

CS solution, November 8

Today’s mailbag question comes from Ellen in Ojai, California: Dear Penthouse Forum, I always had this thing for the guy who delivers pizza to my house. I never knew he liked me, until last night when I ordered my usual–meat lover’s extreme with extra sausage–and didn’t realize until he was at my door that I didn’t have any money. How was I going to pay him? We gazed intently at each other, and right there, right then, I knew what I was willing to do to get that pizza….

Whoops, wrong mailbag! Let’s try another one, this from Eli in a former SSR: Why are your solving times so much slower than everyone else’s on this blog? Doesn’t that tell you something? Thanks for the encouraging word, Eli!

Over the years, I have made frequent reference to my comparatively slow solving times. I suspect I’m allowed to stay here in no small part because I’m the token slug. I make readers feel better about their own solving times. Think of me as the Mendoza solver.

I’m a few steps slower than the others around here in no small part because of my tendency to wander off on various tangents while I’m solving. Take today’s beaut from Doug Peterson, for instance. I can’t type the letters to AAMCO, the [Transmission repair chain] without humming the “Double A (beep beep) M-C-O” ditty to myself. And yes, visions of telephone booths with trap doors run through my mind (as does this theme song) as I enter GET SMART as the answer to [Agent 99’s series].  And I can’t just enter A WORD as the answer to [“I’d like ___ with you”] without pausing to think of some other possible answers like TO SNUGGLE and others I can’t really mention here.

It goes on. I simply have to pause to admire one of the theme entries, ROYAL RUMBLE, the [Majestically named pro wrestling event held annually since 1988], because I’m 92.2% confident (Nate Silver reference) that Doug used this theme entry just because he knows of my affection for professional wrestling. I can’t just plunk down the answer after having only the first letter in place and move on–no, I have to admire it (and the fact that it intersects HOGAN, though this one is clued as [Colonel Klink’s nemesis] and not as [First two-time winner of 46-Across]). Wait, did I just admit to knowing that?

So I think it’s my wandering mind, more than anything, that keeps me from clocking faster times. But I’m fine with that. First and foremost, this whole crossword thing is about entertainment. And it’s the little diversions like those listed above that allow me to enjoy this craft even more.

But back to Doug’s very fine puzzle. The theme involves expressions that end with “noisy” words:

• 17-Across: One who is [Handing down punishment] is LOWERING THE BOOM. 
• 27-Across: The [Black Tuesday disaster] refers to the stock MARKET CRASH. Other market crashes tend to happen whenever I make a new investment.
  
• 46-Across: ROYAL RUMBLE. (See supra.)
  
• 59-Across: A [Baffling problem] might be a TOUGH NUT TO CRACK. And yes, Inner Beavis noticed both “nut” and “crack.”
  

I loved the fill in this one. I’ve already mentioned GET SMART, but we also have RUN D.M.C., PRESS KITS, FARMYARDS, I SPY, RUBIK, TUPAC, BRASS HAT, ARTIFACT, and RHEAS (okay, maybe not that last one). I didn’t know CALEB Carr, author of “The Alienist,” but I guess Caleb Madison isn’t quite famous enough yet to find his way into a puzzle clue.

Favorite entry = PAY STUBS, the [Employees’ check attachments]. Favorite clue = Hands down it’s [Run out of clothing?] for STREAK. (And hey, if you’re streaking, you really should keep your hands down.)

Brendan Quigley’s website crossword, “Themeless Thursday”—Matt’s review

BEQ 11/8/12

I don’t solve many themelesses these days, but if they’re all this fun then maybe I should get back into it. Tough clues like [Printer’s blues] for CYANS and [Spraying sounds] for RAT-A-TAT-TAT sent this one well over 10 minutes for me.

Started off well in the NW corner, where I MUST BE OFF, NATE SILVER and STEAK DIANE all fell quickly and I thought I’d wind up with a solving time of 7-8 minutes. [Baby room?] for UTERUS at 3-d was cute, and I’m only right now understanding the clever [Hip joint?] for IN SPOT (a spot that’s popular, or “in,” like a nightclub). Without the ? on that one I would’ve had no chance.

Things slowed down a bit in the NE corner; knew Lawrence KASDAN but had CLOGS for CYANS which in retrospect was stupid since papers jam on a printer, they don’t clog (as far as I know). The “var.” tag on SWORDMAN also tripped me up; took a while to understand that the more common word is “swordsman.” Then things slowed to a crawl in the center, where I needed every letter to get Ruth ETTING and almost every letter to get the nice [Construction paper?] for DEED.

Bottom left took a loooong time; had the -ROCK, -ABLE and -TION of the three long downs but couldn’t make them work (thought the first might be KID ROCK, but it was ALT-ROCK) and the excellent entry TRAC II evaded me for a long time. Unusual letter combinations + tough clues = difficult!

Bottom right was the last to go; I had RED SUN instead of RED SKY for most of the solve; did an internal “d’oh!” when the penny dropped and ORIOLE PARK and GOOGLE PLAY revealed themselves.

I liked this one a lot — the tricky cluing and many multiword answers made this like solve like running though a mental minefield. 4.5 stars and I’ll have to visit Brendan’s site more regularly on Mondays.

Robert Fisher’s Los Angeles Times crossword

LA Times crossword solution, 11 8 12

Usually, I am no fan of puzzles with this type of theme—the theme clues are all the same key word and the theme answers are the sorts of phrases you might see in clues for the key word, rather than in-the-language phrases unto themselves. I really liked how this one played out, though—the theme answers would all be excellent, non-dictionaryish clues for the word [Fly]. OBSERVER ON A WALL (as in “I’d love to be a fly on the wall when they have that conversation”), SWATTER’S TARGET, SPIDER’S INVITEE, and OINTMENT SPOILER are all much less obvious than, say, [Member of the order Diptera] or [Aviate]. They all point towards the bug sort of fly (as opposed to where jeans have a zipper, to aviate, etc.) but in lively ways, rather than touching on different meanings of the word. Each theme entry had a decent “aha” payoff when it was pieced together via crossings.

The fill’s got a touch of the dull (APSE, STYE, NEAP, SOYA, ELLS) but overall is quite smooth. I’LL SAY, TAKE ON, FLIMSY, and CONFLATE were my favorite entries in this batch.

4.25 stars for a fresh take on a usually flatter theme type.

Ben Tausig’s Ink Well crossword, “Original Take”

Ben Tausig Ink Well crossword solution, 11 8 12 “Original Take”

What’s more original than taking? This theme offers a quote stolen from 65a: BANKSY: “THE BAD ARTIST IMITATES. THE GREAT ARTIST STEALS.” Just about the only clue that Ben didn’t steal from someone else is [Beginning of a quote from 65-Across]. He lists the original sources for the clues on a Tumblr page. And yes, it took Ben a lot longer to research previously published clue possibilities than it would have taken him to write his own clues, since he wasn’t just auto-cluing from a database.

Question 1: Is it still stealing if you provide the attribution?

Question 2: Is the puzzle more entertaining than the usual Ink Well because Ben curated a good set of clues from many other great minds?

Question 3: Did you notice that it didn’t feel like a standard Tausig puzzle?

My answers: (1) Borrowing with attribution is better than sheer plagiarism, but absolutely less creative than coming up with your own material. (2) I didn’t notice a real difference. The main difference from the usual Ink Well is the flatness of a quote theme building up to a single “aha” moment, rather than having to muscle through understanding how Ben’s theme works. (3) Mainly because there was a quote theme.

Three stars. As stunts go, this one is pretty unnoticeable unless you (a) look at the Tumblr page or (b) recognize some clues as your own work (or remember them from previous puzzles).