Thursday, January 30, 2025

Note: Fireball is a contest this week. We’ll post a review after the submission period closes.

Kelvin Zhou’s Wall Street Journal crossword, “Penned In”—Jim’s review

We don’t see a straight-up rebus puzzle in the WSJ too often, so this made for a nice change of pace. Theme answers all have the word BALL squeezed into one square. The revealer is BALLPOINTS (62a, [Some Pilots, and a hint to five squares in this puzzle]).

Wall St Journal crossword solution · “Penned in” · Kelvin Zhou · Thu., 1.30.25

• 1a. [Monarchs, presidents, prime ministers, etc.] GLO(BAL L)EADERS crossing (BALL)ETS.
• 22a. [Flying into a rage] GOING (BALL)ISTIC crossing (BALL)OON.
• 33a. [Typical number of troubadours?] (BALL)AD crossing (BALL)AST.
• 39a. [You can cast this] (BALL)OT crossing ODD(BALL).
• 45a. [Oscar-winning role for Anthony Hopkins] HANNI(BAL L)ECTER crossing LOW(BALL).

This is a debut puzzle and I’m mightily impressed. Not only do we have the BALL rebus smoothly executed with both Across and Down components, but we have stacks of 10s in two corners which is crazy to see when they involve theme answers. I don’t know that I’ve ever seen a long theme answer involving a rebus at 1a. Who does that? But it’s pulled off with very little in the way of clunky fill. And how fun was it to find HANNIBAL LECTER as a theme answer? Nice.

Yes, there’s GDPS, OGEE, RUMI, and RESNAP as some of the crosses, but they’re all gettable, and it is Thursday, so some challenging fill is par of the course. All in all, big thumbs up from me.

Fill highlights: DIGESTIVES (make sure you try McVities Dark Chocolate variety) and DRAFT BILL. I gave UNALARMING the side-eye, but as I look on it more, I find it less objectionable.

Clues of note:

• • 30a. [Lot site scheduled for demolition?]. SODOM. Maybe this clue’s trying a little too hard. I know it’s Biblical and it’s trying to direct us away from Abraham’s nephew, but why would you demolish a vacant lot?
  • 59a. [End for who, what, when or how]. EVER. “Where” didn’t make the cut? I think it’s high time we created the word “whyever”. Who’s with me?! Edit: Turns out “whyever” is already a word. I had just assumed it was always written as two words and didn’t bother to check. But we definitely need to drastically increase its usage, perhaps as an interjection accompanied with an eyeroll. Thanks to commenter Dan for correcting me.
  • 21d. [Where Anna Leonowens taught]. SIAM. Needed every crossing before realizing this was a The King and I reference.

Lovely debut puzzle. 4.25 stars.

Joe Marquez’s New York Times crossword — Zachary David Levy’s write-up

Difficulty: Average (9m20s)

Joe Marquez’s New York Times crossword, 1/30/25, 0130

Today’s theme: UPS AND DOWNS (Uncertainties of life … or a feature of four answers in this puzzle?)

• SOLDIE(R OF FO)RTUNE
• HE(ART TR)ANSPLANT
• US(ER RE)SEARCH
• CAN(T SEE S)TRAIGHT 

Up, up, down, down (left right left right BA start).  Lost my sense of direction at THEFTS, which I wanted badly to be THIEVES based on the cluing angle (They might sound the alarm), and then briefly toyed with the idea that THIEFS is a word.

Cracking: TED LASSO, even though the show kind of fell flat after the first few episodes

Slacking: IST UTA EST, which is Latin for “the fill has been cast”

Sidetracking: sunrise at MESA arch, Canyonlands National Park, Island in the Sky 

Dylan Schiff’s USA Today Crossword, “Homestyle Food” — Emily’s write-up

Order up!

USA Today, January 30, 2025, “Homestyle Food” by Dylan Schiff

Theme: each themer begins with a type of food

Themers:

• 17a. [Restaurant chain that serves the All-Star Special], WAFFLEHOUSE
• 36a. [Restaurant chain that once served the P’Zone], PIZZAHUT
• 62a. [Restaurant chain that serves ‘Shroom Burgers], SHAKESHACK

What are you in the mood for? This themer set has you covered for some classic fare: WAFFLEHOUSE, PIZZAHUT, and SHAKESHACK.

Favorite fill: ITWASME, CURRIES, INDIRA, and UNWISE

Stumpers: STILTS (“poles” made me think of trapeze artists), SUBLIME (needed a few crossings), and LOOPIER (need crossings)

A solid puzzle with a fantastic grid, fresh fill, and great cluing. A nice challenging level for me today yet still felt like a smooth solve, which is just what I needed today. Plus, if the themer set didn’t fill you up, there are so many other foods and drinks throughout this puzzle—what a treat!

4.5 stars

~Emily

Brendan Quigley’s website crossword, “Thank You, Main”–Amy’s theme recap

BEQ crossword solution, 1/30/25 – “Thank You, Main”

OK, let’s figure out how these theme entries work:

• 17a. [Bitcoin and Ethereum yarn?], CRYPTO SKEIN. Take crypto scam, give the second word a long A sound and change the terminal M sound to an N sound, and adjust the spelling as needed to get a real word.
• 53a. [Smuggle old magazines that were similar to Sassy?], TRAFFIC JANE. Traffic jam, less hijinks required to produce Jane magazine of yore.
• 11d. [Abdicate the throne?], DODGE REIGN. Dodge Ram, the old name for what is now Stellantis’s line of just plain Ram Trucks.
• 28d. [Unreliable senator Tim?], SHAKY KAINE. Shaky cam, a film technique.
• Plus the revealer: 36a. [“Careless Whisper” band, only if you change it the way you do with all the other theme answers], WAYNE, from Wham! That doesn’t feel like a compelling impetus for a theme.

Lots of tricky crossings for me, and iffy bits of fill like EFAX and DITTOED. Three stars from me.

Brendan Emmett Quigley’s Crossword #1753 “Thank You, Main” — Eric’s bonus review

Brendan Emmett Quigley’s Crossword Puzzle #1753 — 1/30/25

Thanks, Amy, for writing this one up. I wish I’d seen your review before I wrote mine, but that’s on me.

Today’s theme is, as far as I can tell, a loose sound-switching trope, hinted at by the title, in which “man” becomes “main”:

• 17A [Bitcoin and Ethereum yarn?] CRYPTOSKEIN I’m assuming this is a play on cryptoscam, which is a term I’d not heard before. I admit that I’ve never understood how cryptocurrency is supposed to work, but ever since I became aware of it, it’s seemed like it’s all a scam.
• 36A [“Careless Whisper” band, only if you change it the way you do with all the other theme answers] WAYNE Wham! I didn’t recognize the title, and Wikipedia says the record was credited to George Michael.
• 53A Smuggle old magazines that were similar to Sassy? TRAFFIC JANE Traffic jam I’d also never heard of Jane magazine, but I was never their target demographic.
• 11D [Abdicate the throne?] DODGE REIN Dodge Ram
• 28D [Unreliable senator Tim?] SHAKY KAINE Shaky cam Yet another base phrase that I wasn’t familiar with, but it’s easily inferable from the filmmaking equipment known as a Steadicam. It didn’t help that I blanked on any senator named Tim; Kaine is, of course, best known as Hillary Clinton’s running mate in 2016.

The theme didn’t do much for me. “Am” to “Ain”? Maybe if the consonant sounds were the same, I’d have liked this better.

The theme answers are sort of pinwheeled through the grid, which doesn’t leave much room for any longer non-theme answers. A few that stood out:

• 1A [Supreme Court with a recusal, e.g.] OCTAD I got off to a slowish start by putting OCTET there until 4D [Roadie’s box] AMP cleared things up. In any event, we get some bonus Supreme Court trivia with 59A [Jurist Fortas] ABE.
• 26A [Converts chips] CASHES That clue could use “with ‘in”.”
• 29A [British mid-size luxury car] JAGUAR XJ I was pretty sure 30D [Tree tissue] was XYLEM, but the X_ in 29A didn’t look right until it was.
• 39A [Titular opera character who, in the last act, jumps off a parapet to her death] TOSCA Apparently, the oft-told tale of the bouncing Tosca is not an urban myth.
• 41A [Reddish-brown steed] BAY HORSE That answer strikes me as green-painty; I think most horse people would just call it a “bay.”
• 57A [Judah’s wife in the Old Testament TAMAR crossing 39D [Simple flute] TONETTE In the interest of time, I ended up revealing the T in TAMAR. The instrument doesn’t sound (or look) at all familiar, and my Old Testament trivia is pretty weak.
• 10D [0Weak or insubstantial] TENUOUS I just like that word.
• 12D [Lake in mysteries?] ERIE I’m guessing that this is just a play on “eerie.” I was expecting the answer to be the first name of some fictional detective named Something Lake.
• 29D [“Dubliners” author] JOYCE If the 700+ page Ulysses seems too intimidating, you might try some of the stories in Dubliners.
• 40D [Kind of X-ray image] CAT SCAN Every time I’ve had one of these, it’s been called a CT scan.

No video tonight; just not gonna do Wham!. I kinda like the song “Antihero” but the video is pretty dumb.