Constructor: Josh Knapp
Relative difficulty: Challenging (for me—slowest time in four+ months) (8:15)
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THEME: none
Word of the Day: WET CELL (37D: Battery type) —
Just one of those grids that had nothing to do with me. No pleasure for me anywhere, no cluing that entertained or seemed clever. I think the grid is just fine, but the solving experience just wasn't pleasant. A lot of trivia, and a lot of short stuff, and then longer answers that were solid but just sorta ... sat there. Also the idea that a TOW is a [Fate worse than a ticket] is pretty stupid. I mean, yes, you'd rather get a ticket than have your car be towed, but I think of a TOW as a vital thing, a helpful thing, a thing you *need* when your car breaks down, so the cutesyish clue was just annoying. And nothing clever ever really landed. Even an original answer like GO-ROUND had this fussy clue and was thus really hard to come up with (7D: One of a series of attempts). Also, GO-ROUNDs can be actual events, not just "attempts" at events. M-W has it as "one of a series of recurring actions or events"; what is "attempts" even doing in this clue? Weird. Some kind of TREE ... was a not-fun answer to try to come up with. I don't know. There's nothing special in this grid, nothing snazzy or new or ... it's just blah to me. Again, it's not a weak grid, it's just an old and boring-seeming grid. To me. Again, I'm in super "IMO" mode because I believe decent people can disagree on this one. I mean, if you're the kind of person who knows and enjoys the term TENT BED (???) (35D: Comfry safari digs), maybe you were on cloud nine.
All my trouble came in the highly sequestered NW and SE corners. I have marked my printed puzzle in green ink, and almost all the ink currently resides in those regions. I guessed DISC straight away (1A: LP, e.g.) but couldn't confirm any of the letters. Got RES and ELLE and still had no idea about any of the Downs, and was pretty sure one of the first three answers I got must be wrong. Just couldn't come up with IN A HOLE (had the IN and then, nada). A colon might denote EYES. I mean, yes, but I was never going to get that. A villain could have a SCAR, but so could anyone who had been cut (I had LEER here) (5D: Mark of a villain, maybe). My first known actual right answers were, weirdly, ACETIC / OTT. Tried to back into the long Acrosses, but TREE was zero help, and then -L-CK at the end of 14A: Getting paid, say (ON THE CLOCK) had me thinking about the money, thus ... IN THE BLACK. Now, for the whole stretch of puzzle from NW to SE, the only issues I had were with VOLE (I somehow wrote in MOLE) (18A: Field mouse) and VENT (I understandably wrote in RANT) (49A: Go on a tweetstorm, say). Then came the SE, where I couldn't get HOBBIT (39D: Fictional figure whose name means "hole dweller") because "figure" implies a specific figure, not a type. If the word had been, say, "creature," I think HOBBIT would've come faster. PBR was brutal because how would I know it's "cheap," I've never bought one (also, for those of you who are like 'wtf is that?', it's Pabst Blue Ribbon). What is "broomball"? Unnecessarily hyperspecific clue for something as basic as RINK (45D: Venue for broomball). TENT BED, again, ridiculous. WET CELL, I didn't really know what that was, despite having heard of dry cell / WET CELL re: batteries before. It sounds gross. O'REILLY was never (John) Stewart's "sparring partner" in any regular sense of the word, i.e they didn't share a show; he was a recurring guest, but tons of guests "recurred" over the years. Ugh. Be accurate, puzzle (36D: Stewart's onetime TV sparring partner). Cluing matter, this cluing was (to me) bad. The only reliable day of the week fails to deliver. Sad.
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]
Relative difficulty: Challenging (for me—slowest time in four+ months) (8:15)
Word of the Day: WET CELL (37D: Battery type) —
noun
• • •
 |
| JANET |
All my trouble came in the highly sequestered NW and SE corners. I have marked my printed puzzle in green ink, and almost all the ink currently resides in those regions. I guessed DISC straight away (1A: LP, e.g.) but couldn't confirm any of the letters. Got RES and ELLE and still had no idea about any of the Downs, and was pretty sure one of the first three answers I got must be wrong. Just couldn't come up with IN A HOLE (had the IN and then, nada). A colon might denote EYES. I mean, yes, but I was never going to get that. A villain could have a SCAR, but so could anyone who had been cut (I had LEER here) (5D: Mark of a villain, maybe). My first known actual right answers were, weirdly, ACETIC / OTT. Tried to back into the long Acrosses, but TREE was zero help, and then -L-CK at the end of 14A: Getting paid, say (ON THE CLOCK) had me thinking about the money, thus ... IN THE BLACK. Now, for the whole stretch of puzzle from NW to SE, the only issues I had were with VOLE (I somehow wrote in MOLE) (18A: Field mouse) and VENT (I understandably wrote in RANT) (49A: Go on a tweetstorm, say). Then came the SE, where I couldn't get HOBBIT (39D: Fictional figure whose name means "hole dweller") because "figure" implies a specific figure, not a type. If the word had been, say, "creature," I think HOBBIT would've come faster. PBR was brutal because how would I know it's "cheap," I've never bought one (also, for those of you who are like 'wtf is that?', it's Pabst Blue Ribbon). What is "broomball"? Unnecessarily hyperspecific clue for something as basic as RINK (45D: Venue for broomball). TENT BED, again, ridiculous. WET CELL, I didn't really know what that was, despite having heard of dry cell / WET CELL re: batteries before. It sounds gross. O'REILLY was never (John) Stewart's "sparring partner" in any regular sense of the word, i.e they didn't share a show; he was a recurring guest, but tons of guests "recurred" over the years. Ugh. Be accurate, puzzle (36D: Stewart's onetime TV sparring partner). Cluing matter, this cluing was (to me) bad. The only reliable day of the week fails to deliver. Sad.
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]