Old city in Kyrgyzstan / SAT 11-12-16 / Lachrymatory agent / Precept about idol worship / Dirty snowballs to some astronomers / 6 11 Kanter of NBA / End of match in rugby / Common database system program

Constructor:David J. Kahn

Relative difficulty:Easy-Medium

THEME: comma— in center square: as punctuation mark going Across, spelled out going Down (not actually a theme—more a feature)

• "NEW YORK [,] NEW YORK" (33A: Sinatra/Bennett duet on the 1993 album "Duets")
• SECOND [COMMA]NDMENT (15D: Precept about idol worship)

Word of the Day:OSH(46A: Old city in Kyrgyzstan) —

Osh (Kyrgyz: Ош) is the second largest city in Kyrgyzstan, located in the Fergana Valley in the south of the country and often referred to as the "capital of the south". It is the oldest city in the country (estimated to be more than 3000 years old), and has served as the administrative center of Osh Region since 1939. The city has an ethnically mixed population of about 255,800 in 2012, comprising Kyrgyz, Uzbeks, Russians, Tajiks, and other smaller ethnic groups. (wikipedia)

Saw the constructor name and knew it wouldn't be a straight themeless. Turns out it's also not themed, really. It's just got the comma thing going on there, in the center. I don't mind that kind of throwaway, decorative trick, I guess. Wasn't too hard to uncover. It's a bit sad, though, to see an idea that clever but to have it expressed only once. Half-hearted. Weak. Seems like you might've saved it for some puzzle where you could built a coherent theme around it, instead of just dumping it in a Saturday puzzle. But no matter. It's cute for what it is. The rest of the grid, though, is pretty dull overall, and the fill way too creaky. Also, this puzzle should've been D.O.A. with a grid that has both ESTATE and TESTATE in it. That's ridiculous. It's one thing to replicate letter strings (you usually don't do it for strings longer than four letters). But that's practically the same *longish* word. Just put a "T" on the front. It's like ESTATE is wearing a really bad fake mustache and going, "What do you mean this is my second time in the grid? Why, that's preposterous, sir. How dare you!" Really, really bad form. The rest of the bad fill is just bad fill (OSH ASLOPE HET RIDA ROOS ASRED (ugh) REGNAL ORONO EXE  ... and then ENE *and* ENES? Oy).


I stumbled into this grid, moving from one answer to the next via crosses, but somehow not staying put in one part of the grid. This is my opening gambit:

Normally I don't meander this much. Stay put. Work crosses. Make steady progress. That's my m.o. But sometimes you just gotta let the flow take it where it takes you. You can see here that I thought DARN (like a sane person) and figured out the REG- part of 27A: Monarch-related but really didn't know what to do when REGAL wouldn't fit.


I'M GLAD there are some good parts, notably the hilariously incongruous TEAR GAS / SEX SCENE stack in the NE. That's like the answer to the question: What is the least sexy kind of SEX SCENE? Didn't really have any trouble with this puzzle at all, except with the DERN clue, which ... ugh. Come back to the present, little Sheba! I've seen "Dad-blamed" soooo many times in crossword clues. And. Only. In. Crossword. Clues. DERN is an actress. And an actor. It is not a hick form of "darn." That is insane. A gaggle of AMYS shopping for RCAS coulda told you that.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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