Thursday, April 27, 2023

Justin Werfel & Jeff Chen’s Wall Street Journal crossword, “Free Association”—Jim’s review

Theme: IT’S ON THE HOUSE (53a, [“No charge,” and a description of five places in this puzzle]). Five domiciles are hidden in larger words in the grid, and above each one you’ll find the letters ITS.

Wall St Journal crossword solution · “Free Association” · Justin Werfel & Jeff Chen · Thu., 4.27.23

• 17a EXITS above a CABIN.
• 27a BITS above a LODGE.
• 38a OMITS above a VILLA.
• 48a HITS UP above the HOUSE in the revealer.
• 53a IT’S from the revealer is above a HUT.

I definitely needed the revealer on this one because I reached it without a clue as to what the theme was. It wasn’t so much of an “aha” moment, as an “ah, okay” moment, though. That is to say, I wasn’t particularly wowed by the theme. Literal, punny revealers like the one today aren’t my particular favorite, but I did like looking for the hidden buildings.

Once I grokked the theme and looked for the buildings, I was surprised to see the extra IT in WITCH without a house beneath. But then again, the key letters are ITS, not IT—a distinction I didn’t latch onto at first.

The fill isn’t particularly sparkly though there are highlights FILM NOIR and DRY EYE. There are more than the average number of theme elements, so that will have put constraints on the fill.

Clues of note:

• 19a. [Order in the Supreme Court’s courtroom, e.g.]. IONIC. I’m not knowledgable enough about architecture to have heard the phrase “ionic order,” so I kept double- and triple-checking this entry. This page says there are 36 Doric columns in the Great Hall outside the courtroom and doesn’t mention what’s actually in the courtroom, but an image does show IONIC columns inside.
• 20a. [Garland, e.g.]. CABINET MEMBER. Attorney General Merrick Garland, that is, who might have been on the Supreme Court if things had gone differently.
• 25a. [The Tick’s nonsensical battle cry]. “SPOON!” Did not know this despite having seen the 2016 TV series starring Peter Serafinowicz. Was it in that show?
• 27a. [Boring parts]. BITS. As in parts of a drill.

Not my favorite puzzle of the week, but solid nonetheless. 3.5 stars.

Michael Scholssberg’s New York Times crossword — Zachary David Levy’s write-up

Difficulty: Average (10m07s)

Michael Schlossberg’s New York Times crossword, 4/27/23, 0427

Today’s theme: TAKE THE EDGE OFF (Alleviates pain a little … or what this puzzle does to certain squares for literal effect)

• DOCTORS (without borders)
• (no end) IN SIGHT
• (undivided) ATTENTION
• (baseless) ACCUSATIONS
• (topless) DANCERS

Another “proper” Thursday gimmick, and a relatively easy solve.. at least as far as the theme material was concerned.  This harkens back to more traditional “rebus” puzzles, i.e. what that word used to mean before we all fell down the xword rabbit hole: “funny funny words words words words” (too funny for words), bloodwater (blood is thicker than water), etc.  Literally reinterpreting common phrases with (at times) painfully unclever contortions.  But “painfully unclever” could be the title of my autobiography, so once again, this puzzle’s alright by me.

Cracking: ICK FACTORS — minus a few points for the awkward S that symmetry demands, and also because it’s trying a bit too hard to be in the lingo.  Even still, good show.

Slacking: UNDOCKS — i.e. the piers near Tudor City.  See above re: painfully unclever.

Sidetracking: DOCTORS (without borders) — “Ah, the old D’s without B’s.”

All joking aside, the folks at Médecins Sans Frontières are, to quote Interstellar, the best of us.  Donate @ donate.doctorswithoutborders.org

Patrick Berry’s New Yorker crossword – Kyle’s write-up

Thanks to Patrick Berry for bringing us today’s New Yorker crossword. This is a really nice 70-word grid with some sparkling longer entries.

The New Yorker solution grid – Thursday 04/27/2023 – Patrick Berry

• 19A WHAT’S NOT TO LIKE? [“Seems perfect, right?”] and 44A DO THE DIRTY WORK [Tackle unpleasant tasks that others avoid] – a wonderful pair of 14s.
• 3D CLEARING UP [Starting to get sunnier] and 27D TURNED OVER [Lost possession of, as a basketball] – nice examples of phrasal verbs ending in prepositions that are coherent units. Patrick Berry writes about the pitfalls of tacking on prepositions willy-nilly in his book on crossword construction.
• 33A CIGS [Coffin nails] – I was unfamiliar with this slang term so I had to get this through crossings. My first thought was, “there’s a specific word for a coffin nail?”
• 34D ROCHELLE [New ___ (city in Westchester County)] – granted that it’s probably a place known to many subscribers of the New Yorker, I found it strange to see this clued as a partial. Part of me wonders if CDC Director Rochelle Walensky was originally in Patrick’s mind when he chose this entry.

Sam Acker’s Fireball Crossword, “Hole in the Fabric” – Jenni’s write-up

I liked this one! It was challenging and fun and the aha! moment was very satisfying.

The revealer tells us what we’re dealing with. 56a [Multidimensional model, and a hint to the long Across answers] is SPACE–TIME CONTINUUM. Each theme answer has a SPACE rebus next to a unit of TIME. The SPACE in the theme answer is, indeed, a space; in the Down answers it’s the word SPACE. Peter’s grid shows it better than mine.

Fireball, April 26, 2023, Sam Acker, “Hole in the Fabric,” solution grid

• 21a [Paperless, in a way] is ONLIN{SPACE}E ONLY. 22d [Scatterbrain] is {SPACE} CADET.
• 33a [Motif] is COM{SPACE}MON THREAD. 4d [Where feeling pride is definitely not a sin] is QUEER {SPACE}.
• 78a [Somebody who makes the same thing every week] is a SALAR{SPACE}Y EARNER. 67a [Former social-networking giant] is MY{SPACE}.
• 94a [“The details aren’t important”] is YAD{SPACE}DA YADDA. 95a [Tile separators that leave room for grout] are {SPACE}ERS.

Nice! Solid, consistent answers with fun, fresh twist. I always (well, almost always) love a rebus. I like the fact that all the time divisions cross two words – no idea if that was intentional but I find it pleasing.

A few other things:

• 6d [School zone?] is SEA. Fish.
• 10d [Weapon that sounds like it leaks goop] is UZI. I will never not think of this when I see this word.
• I really have had enough of EMAG. See also ETAIL.
• 59d [Makes a big impact on, maybe] is T–BONES. I filled that in by crossings and was expecting a reference to steak, not collisions.
• 98a [Cervices are part of them] is UTERI. I originally filled in NECKS which would also be correct (and no one I know says “cervices” but then again we don’t usually discuss them in the plural. It’s one to a customer, usually).

What I didn’t know before I did this puzzle: that IDRIS Elba voiced Shere Khan in “The Jungle Book.”

Sam Acker’s Universal crossword, “They Sound Just Like ‘Em” — Sophia’s write-up

Theme: “Apt” cover bands, named after things that literally cover the original band name.

Universal Crossword, 04 27 2023, “They Sound Just Like ‘Em”

• 13a [Good name for a band covering the Pretenders] – ALIBI
• 14a [Good name for a band covering the Flaming Lips] – HOT SAUCE
• 29a [Good name for a band covering Heart] – RIBCAGE
• 37a [Good name for a band covering the Cars] – AUTO INSURANCE
• 46a [Good name for a band covering Blondie] – HAIR DYE
• 65a [Good name for a band covering the Beach Boys] – TAN LINES
• 66a [Good name for a band covering Queen] – CROWN

There’s an impressive amount of theme material here – 7 answers, even when some of them are short, is hard to do! It’s interesting how many different uses of “cover” Sam found here – HOT SAUCE and TAN LINES are literal coverage, ALIBI and AUTO INSURANCE are not. I’m not sure the puzzle needed the two 5 letter answers as they are the stretchiest – does a CROWN really cover a Queen? I guess it is on top…. – but that’s a minor nitpick.

Loved all four of the longer down answers – UPSIZING, NOSE GOES, YOU DO YOU and QUIXOTIC are all great. Thank goodness for the “healthful” part of the clue for NUTRIA [Large rodent whose name sounds healthful] – my large rodent knowledge begins and ends at capybara. I was so busy debating between “ekg” and “eeg” for [Heart test: Abbr.] that I was not expecting the actual answer of ECG at all. But those were the only bad grid spots; everything else was very clean for the amount of thematic material.

Also just noticed when I went to post this write up that this is a double Sam Acker puzzle day along with the Fireball! Congrats Sam!

Lance Enfinger & Jeff Chen’s LAT crossword – Gareth’s summary

LA Times
070427

Lance Enfinger & Jeff Chen’s puzzle’s theme is something of a one trick pony. The entries are four “AP-” gerunds each clued to be read as “Advanced Placement” and the rest of the word then makes a new unrelated gerund. So: APPOINTING is AP POINTING, APPRAISING is AP PRAISING, APPEALING as AP PEALING and APPROVING is AP PROVING.

The theme only occupies 38 squares, so there’s a lot of space in the grid. With that said, I don’t see a whole lot to pick out:

• [Claire of “The Crown”], FOY. I think I learnt this the hard way as it was one of my mistakes at the (online) ACPT. Puzzle five? Put FeY and didn’t check crosses.
• Another actor I didn’t know was [Gabrielle of “L.A.’s Finest”], UNION. This puzzle had quite a few proper nouns, so I’m surprised at the choice to add to the count.
• [Many entries in The Great American Songbook], SHOWTUNES. You know who’s surprisingly good at performing these: Seth McFarlane!
• [Everymutt], FIDO. The name of one my dachshunds, which he came with. It ties in with the song above in which “even Fido is afraid to bark…”

Gareth