Alex Murphy’s New York Times crossword—Amy’s recap
NY Times crossword solution, 10/25/24 – no. 1025
Hey! A Friday NYT that strikes me as having the modest difficulty level I’ve long expected from Friday NYTs. And it’s got lots of fun entries in the grid, to boot.
Fave fill: The 1a/1d combo of flavorful ROBUST and RIBALD, MASTER CLASS, CONE OF SHAME, BRAIN FREEZE, Lily TOMLIN, GRANITE, SEX TOY, BRO CODE, BESTIE, a rating of TEN OUT OF TEN, etymological FALSE FRIEND ([Misleading cognate, like the German “Gift” which actually means “poison”]), OVERSELLING, DRAMEDY (I deplore Wikipedia’s eschewal of this descriptor!), and “OH, PLEASE.”
I cast a jaundiced eye at TUNA OIL. Apparently this [Canned liquid rich in essential fatty acids] is sold as a dietary supplement?
Messed with my head: 52a. [Another name for C##], which I misinterpreted as the programming language C++, and the answer was starting with DNA … but no, it’s musical terminology, D NATURAL. (See also: 16a. [Cello parts are written in it], BASS CLEF.) One of my least favorite categories of fill! Your mileage may vary wildly.
Four stars from me.
Hoang-Kim Vu’s Universal crossword, “Sound Check”—Jim’s review
Sight rhymes (or eye rhymes) are on order today. Each theme answer is a made-up phrase consisting of three words that look like they should rhyme, but don’t.
Universal crossword solution · “Sound Check” · Hoang-Kim Vu · Fri., 10.25.24
- 17a. [*Danger of an extremely hot day?] GREAT HEAT THREAT
- 24d. [*”Which person gave you that gift, Mr. Hanks?”] “FROM WHOM TOM?”
- 26d. [*Result of a slow day at the pet store?] ONE BONE GONE
- 32d. [*Question for a hitting coach?] “SWAT AT WHAT?”
The phrases are a little tortured, but I found this kind of cute. The first one felt the most natural to me so I liked that one best, but the bone one is pretty good too. Nice theme.
Impressive stacks down the middle of the grid, too. We have POWER SEATS and UNSANITARY sandwiching a theme answer, plus CHEW TOY as a crossing entry. Very nice. Other goodies: TRICKSY, HIDEOUT, and “NO FAIR!”. Did not know sculptor Ruth ASAWA, but that was about the only hangup I had.
Clues of note:
- 1a. [Org. concerned with NIL policies for student athletes]. NCAA. NIL is in the clue mainly to indicate that the answer is an initialism, but I looked it up and it stands for Name, Image, and Likeness.
- 35a. [Surprised, slangily]. SHOOK. I like this modern usage.
- 60a. [Knot again?]. RETIE. Cute way to redeem a blah entry.
3.5 stars.
Nipples! Breasts! Sex Toys! Raunchy NYT today.
The SW corner was toughest for me. BROCODE and CREPEMIX (like pancake mix, only more lah-di-dah, I guess) took me a while to figure out. C## was a mystery to me too, though I made sense of it eventually. Solid Friday puzzle overall.
The NW and SE corners were fast for me (BASS CLEF and D NATURAL helped a lot), and that SW corner was the last. After SEX TOY it all worked out pretty well. I also blanched at TUNA OIL. Quite the RIBALD NYT…
BRO CODE came surprisingly easily, but SEX TOY was a major hesitation given the clue.
TUNA OIL! Had to swallow cod liver oil as a kid. Torture! And I have no clue how that was a thing in Syria in the middle of the 20th century!?
NYT: Semi-tough for me. Feeling stuck at the end, I looked up the Mozart opera, which did the trick.
I was certainly disappointed with the completely sex-free SE corner of the puzzle (:-))>.
LAT – Bruce Dickinson and Gene Frenkle are pleased