Friday, August 4, 2023

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wendy L. Brandes and Ayesha Agarwal’s Inkubator crossword, “Me Time”—Jenni’s write-up

This one lived up to its billing of “lightly challenging.” I enjoyed the theme (which could be part of the theme…)

Each theme answer has ME added to a base phrase. Wackiness ensues.

• 17a [Credit cards in the Arctic?] are POLAR AMEXES. Polar axes.
• 26a [Freezer at a genetic lab?] is a GAMETE KEEPER. Gatekeeper. “Genetic lab” sounds odd to me. I’d say “genetics lab.”
• 44a [Falling under Zurich’s spell?] is SWISS CHARMED. Swiss chard.
• 61a [Blouse decorated with large citrus fruits?] is a POMELO SHIRT. Polo shirt.

26a and 61a made me laugh and all of them are solid with base phrases (or in one case a base word) that are solidly in the language. Nice!

A few other things:

• I enjoyed SHOE in the NW and SHUE in the SE.
• 6d [“Nothing is really lost until your ___ can’t find it” (popular wisdom)] was definitely true in my house growing up and is definitely not true in my house now. Dad is the Finder of Lost Objects around here. He’s also the one who knows where things are in the refrigerator. We’ve been subverting gender norms since 1982.
• 21a [Put on the calendar] fouled me up because I confidently dropped in SCHEDULE and then changed it to SET A TIME. The real answer is SET A DATE.
• We bought a whole lot of stuff at REI before our epic National Parks adventure this past spring. We took everything including the kitchen sink.
• There are a lot of AMCS in our area and I’ve been in two in the past week to see, yup, you guessed it, “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer.”

What I didn’t know before I did this puzzle: never heard of “The Bubble” or LESLIE Mann.

Brandon Koppy’s New York Times crossword—Amy’s recap

What an interesting grid design today. Some lively long entries stacked in the corners, a mom/dad pair of 14s (MOTHER SUPERIOR and the PATERNITY TESTS she likely doesn’t need) in rows 6 and 10, and a scattering of 13 single blocks in the midsection breaking things up into workable pieces.

My solving time was more in line with Saturday expectations. Part of that was that I did most of the puzzle with the wrong setting, and every time I used an arrow key or mouse click to change direction, I ended up in an unexpected square and typed over things. Whoops. I also slowed myself down by trying ODEA for 3d. [Some theaters] (and scowling at it) before AMCS.

Fave fill: the PLAY MONEY / HOME ALONE / EL CAPITAN stack, pop culture’s ALAN MOORE and PET SOUNDS, ON TIPPY-TOE, TRIBAL NAME (we just resumed watching Reservation Dogs on Hulu, as season 3 is out and we’re still in season 1), chatty “YEAH, WHY NOT?” and “IF I WERE YOU…”, WET NOODLES, and BITTORRENT (parse that as BitTorrent).

Did not know: People call an alley oop just an OOP (26a.
[Flashy hoops highlight, for short])? New to me: 45d.
[Children’s writer Greenfield], ELOISE. Here’s her 2001 NYT obituary. She wrote prose and poetry aimed at bringing joy and pride to Black children. It’s really a lovely obit, peppered with excerpts of poetry—do read it.

3.75 stars from me.

Taylor Johnson & Christina Iverson’s Los Angeles Times crossword — pannonica’s write-up

The theme clues are akin to the ‘container’ wordplay of cryptic crosswords.

• 17a. [Op-ed column feature?] OPEN BORDER. The first three letters plus the last letter of “op–ed column” spell “open” and they form a border of sorts.
• 25a. [Spa service feature?] SPACE CASE (spa service, where “space” is encasing the other letters).
• 35a. [Free booze feature] FREEZE FRAME (free booze, frame).
• 48a. [Lotus pose feature?] LOOSE ENDS (lotus pose, ends).
• 58a. [Chocolate mousse feature?] CHOSE SIDES (chocolate mousse, sides).

These are good finds. Fun, fun.

• 11d [Cry for attention] LOOK AT ME. It definitely is.
• 18d [Jumper cable?] BUNGEE. Nice.
• 35d [Blueprint] FLOOR MAP. Is this different than a floor plan? Is it a real term?
  
• 36d [“Black Beatles” hip-hop duo __ Sremmurd] RAE. Quite obviously ear drummers with each word reversed.
• 45d [Word game where the answer can be false, but not true?] WORDLE, because it’s always a five-letter word.
• 21a [One of a kind] UNIT. Subtly tricky clue.
• 27a [Mother clucker] HEN. Ooh, racy.
• 51a [Lyric poem] EPODE. Latin epodos, from Greek epōidos, from epōidos sung or said after, from epi- + aidein to sing — more at ODE. (m-w.com)

Rafael Musa’s USA Today crossword, “Sunny Side Up (Freestyle)”—Darby’s write-up

I’m so here for this Friday freestyle. It really highlights all of the fun things that you can do in an asymmetric themeless puzzle. The marquee answers include the following:

• 4d [Egg dish with tortillas and salsa] HUEVOS RANCHEROS
  

  Rafael Musa’s USA Today crossword, “Sunny Side Up (Freestyle)” solution for 8/4/2023

• 7d [“I can handle the whole truth!”] DON’T SUGARCOAT IT
• 19a [“This is a great development!”] WE LOVE TO SEE IT
• 51a [“How to begin unpacking this?”] WHERE DO I START?

WE LOVE TO SEE IT is such a great use of a colloquial phrase. And HUEVOS RANCHEROS always makes me think of Breaking Bad, a useful connection since I’m not a big fan of eggs. WHERE DO I START was also really fun and evocative.

The NW corner made for a solid start. I wasn’t sure which text abbreviation to use for 1a [“i can’t believe u”] SMH, so I switched to down and was very satisfied with the SLAW–MILEY–HELLO TEAMWORK there. I also really liked TOP OUT and ICONIC in the upper right section of the grid. Generally, I found LINE UPS tough when I didn’t have DON’T SUGARCOAT IT yet, but it all fell into place eventually.

A few other faves:

• 34a [Aesthetic with trademark brass goggles] STEAMPUNK
• 64a [Invincibility power-up in Mario games] STAR
• 38d [Word before “gift” or “reflex”] GAG

I also just love a puzzle book rec so I’m excited about 37a [“In the Country” author Alvar] MIA’s collection of short stories.

Sam Koperwas and Jeff Chen’s Universal crossword, “That’s How I Roll”—Jim’s review

Theme answers are phrases that feature two double-O bigrams and a separate O later on. The revealer is FIFTH WHEEL (62a, [Extra person on a double date … who’s depicted by the last O in 17-, 24-, 39- and 52-Across?)].

• 17a. [Put a pin in it!] VOODOO DOLL. Nice clue and a solidly fun entry. I wonder if this was a seed entry for the theme.
• 24a. [Car add-ons that reduce wind noise and glare] MOONROOF VISORS. Not as colloquial as the first one. Didn’t know that’s what these things were called.
• 39a. [Plan that’s sure to succeed] FOOLPROOF METHOD. Solid.
• 52a. [Writer such as Julia Child] COOKBOOK AUTHOR. Somewhat green painty, like the second entry.

Sure, the entries aren’t all as in-the-language as that first one, but it’s a really tight theme, so there aren’t that many phrases that are going to work here. I give the puzzle points for creativity to make up the difference.

The grid felt proper name heavy including a crossing in the NW corner: DEPP/PEDRO. Elsewhere we had KEN, ELBA, AIDA, IRMA, RAFA, HOMER, EDIE, TOBIAS / WOLFF, OGDEN, and KAFKA. A couple of those were clued unexpectedly (Lily-Rose DEPP and AIDA Rodriguez), which slowed things down, and the sheer number of these entries was noticeable.

Clues of note:

• 18d. [(I’m a pig!)]. OINK. I doubt that’s the literal translation, but then again, the clue has parentheses, not quotation marks.
• 54d. [Nash who said, “You are only young once, but you can stay immature indefinitely”]. OGDEN. Words to live by.
• 56d. [Pronoun pair for Ryan Gosling]. HE/HIM. Just wondering if the constructors/editors fact checked this.

3.5 stars.

Rebecca Goldstein and Adam Wagner’s New Yorker crossword—Matthew’s write-up

The lengthy revealer TWO STEPS FORWARD / ONE STEP BACK plays out on three theme entries, two of which contain TREAD and STRIDE, and one with contains ECAP – “pace” in reverse.

Fun color in this puzzle – COVID-era and still hanging on (like COVID) HARD PANTS, ACE OF BASE, and a colorful clue [Settings for bony labyrinths] for INNER EARS. Actually, a lot of fun clues in here, but I’m already a day late.