Matt Jones’s Jonesin’ Crossword, “Just Do It” — what’s the word? – Erin’s write-up
Jonesin’ solution 10/1/24
Hello lovelies! This week’s theme evokes memories of the “Schoolhouse Rock!” song “Verb: That’s What’s Happening.”
- 17a. [They don’t play their own hits] COVER BANDS
- 62a. [Personal transport that requires some balance] HOVERBOARD
- 11d. [Finch relative that can build an intricate nest] WEAVER BIRD
- 29d. [Wheel clamp for parking violators] DENVER BOOT
Other things:
- 45a. [Muppet that’s got a beef with a rock] ELMO. No idea what Elmo’s problem is with Rocco.
- 57a. [Salt ___] BAE. Turkish chef/butcher/restauranteur Nusret Gökçe was the subject of some 2017 memes in which he seasons meat by letting salt slide down his forearm.
Until next week!
Ryan Mathiason’s Wall Street Journal crossword, “Conversation Pieces”—Jim’s review
The circled squares spell out languages and are broken up by a black square. The revealer is LANGUAGE BARRIER (39a, [Tourist’s concern, and a description of four of this puzzle’s black squares]).
Wall St Journal crossword solution · “Conversation Pieces” · Ryan Mathiason · Tue., 10.01.24
The languages in question are:
- GREEK 17a / 18a: OGRE / EKES.
- GERMAN 25a / 27a: ANGER / MANKIND.
- LATIN 50a / 53a: MET GALA / TINES.
- HINDI 63a / 65a: SHIN / DIVA.
Nice. I solved this as a themeless and only noticed the final circled language as I approached the finish line, but it’s a good Tuesday theme. I appreciate the inclusion of one non-Western language.
We get four long Down marquee entries today, with three of them strangely centered around food: MARGARINE, GAS GRILL, and DIGESTIVE. Perhaps William FAULKNER was himself centered around food, but I have no knowledge of such a supposition. Did you know the Brits use the word DIGESTIVE to refer to some cookies? It sounded distinctly unappealing to me when I first heard the term, but then I tried McVitie’s Dark Chocolate Digestives which you can order on Amazon. You’re welcome.
I actually liked seeing OGS [Respected pioneers, in ’90s slang] in the grid. I’m surprised the term only has three hits in the Cruciverb database, and two of those were from this year (NYT and New Yorker), so this is a WSJ debut. I don’t know that it needs the “’90s slang” add-on because it’s still in use.
Clues of note:
- 23d. [Something needed for tracking shots?]. BAR TAB. Good clue. Had me thinking filmography at first.
- 40d. [BBQ maker]. GAS GRILL. The clue makes it sound like this is a brand, but I don’t think that’s the case. I guess a grill does “make” BBQ, but it feels off to me.
3.5 stars.
Kevin Curry & Jeff Chen’s New York Times crossword—Amy’s recap
NY Times crossword solution, 10/1/24 – no. 1001
I confess I didn’t really look at the shaded squares until after I finished solving. The revealer is CRYPTOZOOLOGIST, [Pseudoscientist investigating the “sightings” in this puzzle]. The shaded squares within TENNESSEE TITANS, MUCKRAKING, CUBIC FOOT, and COPY EDITOR spell out misspelled (“crypto”) cryptids: NESSEE for Nessie (Loch Ness monster), KRAKIN for the kraken (though the A takes a different vowel sound in MUCKRAKING and kraken and this makes me furrow my brow), BIC FOOT for bigfoot, and YEDI for yeti.
Fave fill: “SEE HERE,” NO MERCY, WASH U (I would have applied there but they made some mistakes when I put them as my first choice for a National Merit scholarship—I forgive them, but can they forgive themselves?), PINE NUT, GAG GIFT, and OPOSSUM.
Not so keen on HOORAH (don’t know anyone who says this instead of “hooray” or “hurrah”), YIPES (again, who says this instead of “yikes”?). These fall in my NOT OK category, as does AREEL, which mainstream dictionaries don’t seem keen to include. Now, if A-Rod released a line of fishing gear …
3.25 stars from me. The vowel dissonance between MUCKRAKING and kraken lowered my acceptance of the theme concept. I guess Tennessee/Nessie copY EDItor, and BIC FOOT also have sound variances, but that doesn’t make me like the theme better.
Elizabeth C. Gorski’s Cr♥ssw♥rd Nation puzzle (Week 697), “Labor of Love”—Ade’s take
Crossword Nation puzzle solution, Week 697: “Labor of Love”
Hello there, everybody! We are now in October, and let all the pumpkin spice lattes fly around you as you’re making your commutes to work or just heading outside for other errands.
Today’s puzzle, if it was confusing at the beginning, definitely has a workaround … as in, each of the words that make up the perimeter of the puzzle can come before the word WORK, which acts as the reveal (48A: [___ on the side (take an extra job … or a hint to the theme found at the puzzle’s edges)]).
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- POLICE (1A: [“Roxanne” band, with “The”])
- ART (7A: [Garfunkel who appeared in Mike Nichols’ “Catch-22”])
- YARD (10A: [Measuring stick length])
- DRUDGE (13D: [Creator of a widely-read online “report”])
- LEATHER (44D: [Sofa material])
- MASTER (69A: [Become proficient in])
- LEG (68A: [Part of a relay race])
- LACE (67A: [Add booze to the punch, say])
- SOCIAL (58D: [Word with butterfly or contract])
- PLASTER (1D: [Bandage, to a Brit])
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Outside of the execution of the theme, biggest highlight were the adjoining 8-letter down entries, and all of them hit! Initially put in weakness for WEAK SPOT (39D: [Achilles’ heel]) so that’s slowed me down a bit down there, and I loved the clue for DERRIÈRE (40D: [Elegant-sounding sitting area?]). Even ESSE has some sentimental value, given its clue, because I just came back from North Carolina (Charlotte) late Monday night and wishing for so many in the western part of the state — and many parts of the Southeastern portion of the US — for their safety and health given the horrible effects of Hurricane Helene (6D: (___ quam videri (North Carolina’s motto)]).
“Sports will make you smarter” moment of the day: AENEAS (17A: [Dido’s lover]) – Quarterbacks and wide receivers across the National Football League did not love former defensive back Aeneas Williams during his time with the Phoenix/Arizona Cardinals and St. Louis Rams. Williams was an 8-time Pro Bowler and 3-time 1st team All-Pro who finished his career with 55 interceptions and 13 career touchdowns as a defensive player. Williams, who went to college at the HBCU Southern University, was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2014. Oh, and his brother’s name is Achilles, in case you were wondering what their parents’ motivations were when naming their children!
Thank you so much for the time, everybody! Have a wonderful and safe rest of your day and, as always, keep solving!
Take care!
Ade/AOK
Robbie Cottom’s Los Angeles Times crossword — Jenni’s write-up
Fun Tuesday! And I’m mostly off the pain meds, so that’s a reasonably sober assessment. If the Fiend tags are accurate, this is a debut – welcome! Look forward to more.
The theme answers:
Los Angeles Times, October 1, 2024, Robbie Cottom, solution grid
- 17a [*Scoop] is INSIDE INFO.
- 23a [*One in a chain west of mainland Greece] is an IONIAN ISLAND.
- 35a [*”I like the way you think.”] is INTERESTING IDEA. To me that’s not usually a positive response. It’s more a sidestep – I don’t agree and I don’t want to engage.
- 50a [*Medium for a junior coder] is INVISIBLE INK. “Junior” as in kid with a spy kit.
And the revealer: 59a [Startling revelations, or what the answers to the starred clues have, phonetically] is EYE–OPENERS. Cute! Solid theme answers.
What I didn’t know before I did this puzzle: that PETA has a rabbit in its logo.
Patrick Berry’s New Yorker crossword — pannonica’s write-up
New Yorker • 10/1/24 • Tue • Berry • solution • 20241001
This ‘moderately challenging’ crossword went down as smoothly and sweetly as a nice cup of mocha.
- 1a [Maker of hit music?] DRUM. I immediately suspected what turned out to be the correct answer, but was prudent enough to wait for a crossing.
- 16a [Middle-of-the-road feature?] YELLOW LINE. Because I’d misspelled 5d [Cousin of Juliet who is slain by Romeo] TYBALT as TIBALT, I first thought that this entry might be ISLAND-something.
- 22a [Post boxes’ contents?] CEREAL. Another not too tricky question-mark clue.
- 27a [Fifties film format revived for the 2012 short “In the Picture“] CINERAMA.
- 34a [Poe poem describing its subjects as silver, golden, brazen, and iron] THE BELLS.
- 40a [Person likely to be at the top of a sign-up sheet] JOINER. Uh, ok.
- 45a [China’s southernmost province] HAINAN. It’s an island.
- 47a [They sometimes take down paintings] ART CRITICS. Cute.
- 51a [Author of “Foucault’s Pendulum” and “The Prague Cemetery”] UMBERTO ECO. 29d [“Breathing Lessons” novelist] ANNE TYLER. Full names.
- 2d [High school in a 1982 comedy] FAST RIDGEMONT. Of the fast times.
- 10d [Tennis return that passes through the legs] TWEENER. New to me.
- 11d [Leafy promenade] ALAMEDA. Good to learn this.
- 25d [Oven controls] DIALS. Most modern units have touch panels, right?
- 40d [Shakespeare contemporary who contributed prefatory verses to the First Folio] Ben JONSON, one of the candidates sometimes proffered as the ‘true’ author of Shakespeare’s works.
Leo Dudley’s Universal Crossword, “Long Shots” (ed. David Steinberg) — Matt F’s Review
Universal Solution 10.01.2024
Revealer:
- 56A – [Deep throws in basketball … or what the answers to this puzzle’s starred clues comprise?] = THREE POINTERS
Starred clues:
- 3D – [Digit often held up to indicate “one”] = INDEX FINGER
- 7D – [Large canine with a sensitive nose] = HUNTING DOG
- 11D – [Useful tip to guide you along] = HELPFUL HINT
Three pointers! Nice.
NYT: This theme was a little beyond me. I have never run into the term “cryptid.” But after googling it, I still don’t quite appreciate how a mis-spelled name of a mythical creature works as a theme. I associate “crypto” with “code,” not mis-spelling, so I spent some time trying to find some message in the mis-spelled letters in the themers, but couldn’t come up with anything. Maybe there’s something I’m missing.
I generally like Jeff Chen’s puzzles, so this was a little disappointing.
Some puzzles aim for clever and playful, but it’s a matter of taste whether people resonate or find them a little off.
While solving I found the cluing disorienting, and the misspelling perplexing. I got the intent at the end, and I can see how clever it is. But I personally didn’t get a lot of joy out of it.
I also did not love the theme. It would have been better if either the misspelled letters or the original letters had spelled out something. This felt random-ish.
This one mystified me too. CRYPTOZOOLOGIST is a real (albeit dubious) thing, but the connection to misspelling is unexplained. I don’t understand what the puzzle was aiming for.
Jim Horne’s explanation: “The creatures are misspelled because you didn’t quite seem them through the gray shadows. They were false sightings.”
So maybe the grid shading is a visual pun. As I said before, it’s an OK theme but not my favorite.
Hmmm… That’s, um, imaginative, I guess.
crypt- means hidden or obscured, and has many applications. This is not meant to exonerate the crossword’s theme.
NYT: Thank you Gary. I agree almost word for word with your review. I completely missed the point of this puzzle, which I guess was that the answers were deliberately misspelled. I kept staring at “Bicfoot”, figuring that “Circuit” was somehow wrong, even though I knew that answer was correct. Sigh. I am waiting for Wednesday’s puzzle
NYT: I had ENE and ISAYNO instead of ESE and ISAYSO. Bad clues.
The theme is also bad, with the misspellings.
A lot of Wordplay commenters mentioned getting tripped up by the N/S possibility. My trouble there was that I wanted 15A to be I SAid SO, which to me sounds more natural. (The parent has already told the kid at least once to do or not do whatever, so the non-reason reason ought to be past tense.)
Compass direction answers are basically boring. I much prefer a clue like “Los Angeles to Dallas direction” because there’s usually no ambiguity. My geography, at least in the lower 48 states, is good enough that I usually get those on the first try. And when I don’t, I learn that my mental map is not 100% accurate — that, for example, Reno is further west than LA.
I thought first of I Said So too, adjusting easily enough, and NO never occurred to me as appropriate. FWIW a copy editor isn’t a proofreader, works on a manuscript (or app document), and is likely to be gone from the job by the time proof comes.
Yep. I have worked with both editors and proofreaders (and appreciate the number of times they kept me from embarrassing myself), but they are very different jobs.
I hate city to city directional clues.
NYT: I think the misspellings are purposeful, since the sights are all in question. Like is that NESSY? No, it’s NESSEE.
The constructor notes on Wordplay suggest that Kevin Curry came up with the idea of Bigfoot hiding in the grid, but couldn’t make it work until Jeff Chen suggested CUBIC FOOT.
The misspellings didn’t bother me. I saw what was going on when I got to MUCKRAKING. It’s not my favorite theme, but it’s OK.
WSJ 40D. I too was prepared for a brand name of some super expensive outdoor grill set I’ve never heard of since WEBER wasn’t it. Surprised by the simple answer GASGRILL!
NYT: A pleasant, interesting solve, and like Amy I had not looked at the theme squares during the solve.
Ultimately I thought the theme of misspelled nonexistent animals was not adequately justified in the puzzle, so is just weird.
Creative idea, though.
PS I have definitely heard of CRYPTOZOOLOGy, but this is my first encounter with CRYPTOZOOLOGIST. (I suspect that cryptozoology departments exist only in cryptocolleges and cryptouniversities.)
And maybe you get to pay tuition in cryptocurrency?
Good one. Got a chuckle outta me.
Amen to that!
I found TNY very easy, although not without interest. For music to accompany “The Bells,” do leave room for Phil Ochs, who set the poem to music and brought such an unusual voice.
Phil Ochs – new to me, but I just listened. Good recommendation – thanks!
I attended a Phil Ochs concert in Boston, fall of 1964. It was terrific!
NYT: To me it’s another example of putting too much BS into a puzzle.
‘Bravo!” constructor.
“Take that!” solver.
The New Yorker: For me, it was lightly challenging. But it’s full of answers that I don’t remember seeing before and has some nice clues (particularly the one for ART CRITICS).
I loved the NYT. I enjoyed the solve throughout, realizing fairly early on that we were meant to be just barely misidentifying parts of everyday things as cryptids. Great way to kickoff Spooktober!