Way to stream Game of Thrones / WED 9-7-16 / La Boheme soprano / Genre for much Top 40 radio, for short / We convenience store sign / Singer of 2016 #1 hit Cheap Thrills

Constructor:Kary Haddad

Relative difficulty:Easy (very)


THEME: I CAN'T COOK (60A: Explanation one might give for following the directions of 18-, 24-, 39- and 47-Across)— answers are easy-to-fix foodstuffs, clues are [cooking instructions]

Theme answers:

• HOT POCKET (18A: [Place in crisping sleeve; microwave fo 2 minutes])
• RAMEN NOODLES (24A: [Boil contents for 3 minutes; stir in seasoning packet])
• LEFTOVER CHINESE (39A: [Put yesterday's General Tso's in microwave; heat for 2 minutes]) 
• MAC AND CHEESE (47A: [Boil contents for 8-10 minutes; drain; add butter; stir in bright orange powder])

Word of the Day:ALT-right(69A:___-right (modern conservative movement)) —

The alt-right is a segment of right-wing ideologies presented as an alternative to mainstream conservatism in the United States. It has been described as a movement unified by support for Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, as well as by opposition to multiculturalism and immigration. // The alt-right has no official ideology, although various sources have said that it is associated with white nationalism, white supremacism, antisemitism, right-wing populism, nativism, and the neoreactionary movement. // The alt-right has been said to be a largely online movement with Internet memes widely used to advance or express its beliefs, often on websites such as 4chan. (wikipedia)

I like this. I like this revealer. It's awkwardly straightforward and not-at-all-corny, so I'll take it. The instructions-as-clues bit is pretty clever too. Sure, LEFTOVER CHINESE is an outlier since its "cooking instructions" are just reheating instructions and don't come on a box / bag, but I still think it fits nicely with the basic idea. Fill on this one is pretty clean overall, if not ... let's say, sizzling. There's a good dose of modern stuff in the grid, like HBOGO and SIA and Kendrick LAMAR and EDM (which I always forget is a thing). Despite the fact that the grid breaks down a bit in and around the revealer, with abbr. on top of abbr. on top of prefix all covering a revealer that's kind of tricky to parse—despite all that, I crushed this one in something just north of an average Monday time (i.e. just north of 3). Once again, gimme-ing 1-Across propelled me to a fast solve (knocked out the first five Downs in order, no problem). I am not a fan of ON LIVE :( and I don't have a ton of love for BETIDE, but all told this was solid, strangely funny work.


I'd probably steer around the contemporary white nationalist / antisemitic political movement if I were cluing ALT, but that's just me. As someone I know just pointed out to me, you do have CSA in there, so it's not like movements with disgusting beliefs are forbidden. Still, CSA is bygone, whereas the ALT-right might take the White House. Am I offended by ALT-right's being in the puzzle? Uh, no. It's just ... f*&% them, everything about them, and every little thing that mainstreams and normalizes them. . . Yes. That's good. I feel better now. Put them in the puzzle, fine, but make the clue more accurate. Maybe crossreference with MESS and/or MORON and/or ODOR and/or OOZE? So many options. Be creative.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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