Constructor: Peter Wentz
Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium
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THEME: none
Word of the Day: CADENT (19A: Rhythmic) —
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Woo hoo. Nice to end the week on a high note. Lots of lovely fill here, and that center section is really impressive—a stagger-stack of 11s crossed by a 3-wide block of 7s, and everything squeaky clean! That's just nice. The only thing that made me even half-grimace today was the weird word forms like CADENT and INCANT, which are much more familiar to me as *other* words (specifically "cadence" and "incantation"). But they're just unusual, not bad, and most everything else in this grid is either solid or sparkling. DIGICAMS feels like one of those neologisms no one actually uses. They're "digital cameras." That's how they're sold, that's what people call them. DIGICAMS sounds like your dad trying to sound with-it. Maybe I coulda done without so much definite article-ness. THE FEDS! THE BEEB! Two THEs is probably one past my THE limit. But at this point I'm actively *trying* to be a HATER, when actually I am a lover ... of this puzzle.
My time might've been much faster if I hadn't succumbed to frustration mulishness—this is when I know that I know something but can't remember it, but instead of moving on and coming back, I just sit there staring at blanks and getting angry at myself that my stupid brain won't work right. This happened right off the bat today, as I was certain I knew the mascot of Ohio University (1D: Ohio University player). I wanted FLYER ... and then something to do with tires or rubber, but that was some dumb Akron trivia interfering with my reasoning. So it turns out that Dayton (a city in Ohio!) is the FLYERS, and, well, Ohio University = the BOBCATs, and so ... yeah, I didn't know that at all, so my frustration mulishness was (as it always is) misguided. Once I let it go (finally), whaddya know, I got every single Down I looked at from TEN over to ZEDS and that NW corner opened right up. Could've saved myself some time and GRIEF if I'd just moved away from the Ohio U clue and let the rest of the grid help me out. But no.
Center was oddly easy to get into. Got both EGO TRIP and ENROBED off their first letters, and only MAJOR and DART gave me any trouble (had back ends of those answers, but needed help coming up with the fronts). SW corner was Tuesday-easy, but I screwed up turning the corner into the SE—couldn't get anything from the "T" at 50D: What suggestive dialogue may result in. Considered the dreadful and possibly not real TEHE (shortened tee hee), and semi-confirmed it with EBONY at 61A: Black piano key (G FLAT). But then nothing worked. Had to go and ride "EASY RIDER" down into that section, which then became much, much easier. Finished up in the NE corner, which, like its SW counterpart, was ridiculously easy (HATER AZERA ZAHN EPEE ... the whole thing went down fast).
Bullets:
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Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium
Word of the Day: CADENT (19A: Rhythmic) —
adj.1. Havingcadence or rhythm.2. ArchaicFalling, as water or tears. (thefreedictionary.com)
• • •
My time might've been much faster if I hadn't succumbed to frustration mulishness—this is when I know that I know something but can't remember it, but instead of moving on and coming back, I just sit there staring at blanks and getting angry at myself that my stupid brain won't work right. This happened right off the bat today, as I was certain I knew the mascot of Ohio University (1D: Ohio University player). I wanted FLYER ... and then something to do with tires or rubber, but that was some dumb Akron trivia interfering with my reasoning. So it turns out that Dayton (a city in Ohio!) is the FLYERS, and, well, Ohio University = the BOBCATs, and so ... yeah, I didn't know that at all, so my frustration mulishness was (as it always is) misguided. Once I let it go (finally), whaddya know, I got every single Down I looked at from TEN over to ZEDS and that NW corner opened right up. Could've saved myself some time and GRIEF if I'd just moved away from the Ohio U clue and let the rest of the grid help me out. But no.
Center was oddly easy to get into. Got both EGO TRIP and ENROBED off their first letters, and only MAJOR and DART gave me any trouble (had back ends of those answers, but needed help coming up with the fronts). SW corner was Tuesday-easy, but I screwed up turning the corner into the SE—couldn't get anything from the "T" at 50D: What suggestive dialogue may result in. Considered the dreadful and possibly not real TEHE (shortened tee hee), and semi-confirmed it with EBONY at 61A: Black piano key (G FLAT). But then nothing worked. Had to go and ride "EASY RIDER" down into that section, which then became much, much easier. Finished up in the NE corner, which, like its SW counterpart, was ridiculously easy (HATER AZERA ZAHN EPEE ... the whole thing went down fast).
Bullets:
- 22A: Chaser of un trago de tequila (AGUA)— I wanted LIMA here (is that Spanish for "lime"?), and then I wanted whatever the Spanish word for "salt" is. "Trago" means "drink" (or "gulp," but not "shot," which is apparently "chupito," unless Google Translate is lying to me)
- 44A: Writing form even more constrained than a tweet (HAIKU)— this is not nearly precise enough. How can you compare a letter-count constraint with a syllabic constraint? Apple, meet orange.
- 24D: Something only I can go on? (EGO TRIP)— man, I love this clue. Love it.
- 56D: "Wide-staring" one in a Wordsworth poem (OWL)— found out earlier today that Arden Reed, the professor who taught me Romantic poetry (including Wordsworth), died on Dec. 20 from an aggressive form of cancer. His criticism of my writing was invaluable, and his encouragement gave me the confidence to pursue a Ph.D. and become an English professor myself. I'm very sad that he's gone.
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