Millennials in relation to their parents / FRI 10-12-18 / Relative of philia agape to Greeks / Reduplicative dance name / Seafood known for its sweet taste delicate texture

Constructor: Erik Agard and Bruce Haight

Relative difficulty: Easy (4:55)

THEME: LIGHTBULB (49A: Item suggested visually by the black squares in this puzzle's grid) — yeah, the black squares mostly do that, though I don't really buy that the ones in the far E, W and N actually "suggest" anything. I assume WHAT'S THE BIG IDEA? (17A: Question after "Hey!") is also a themer

Word of the Day: Enid BAGNOLD (32A: Enid who wrote "National Velvet") —

Enid Algerine Bagnold, Lady Jones CBE (27 October 1889 – 31 March 1981) was a British author and playwright, known for the 1935 story National Velvet. (wikipedia)

You know I'm not a big fan of themed Fridays (or Saturdays), but this theme managed to stay the hell out of my way—cutely decorative without in any way interfering with my always much-anticipated themeless Friday feast. Black squares make a LIGHTBULB, and a LIGHTBULB can represent an idea, as in "WHAT'S THE BIG IDEA?" Great. Also, not taxing on the grid and not asking a lot of me in terms of theme comprehension, i.e. the theme is transparent, and also you don't even have to know there is a theme to finish. Weird grid shape was a ton of fun to navigate—I thought the center might get very dicey, but LIGHTBULB to SNOWCRAB to MCS to MEGADETH, 1 2 3 4, meant that that whole section just lit up (!). I can count on one hand the number of places I made initial mistakes or struggled in any way. 1. I had SERIES and SERIAL (?) before SATIRE at 4D: HBO's "Veep," e.g.; 2. I misspelled SELINA (had the "I" as an "E") at 42D: ___ Kyle, Catwoman's alter ego (this despite being a regular reader of Catwoman); 3. Wrote in RIIS instead of RHYS (thinking Jacob and not Jean) at 30A: Jean who wrote "Wide Sargsasso Sea"; and, off the FA-, wrote in FAVOR instead of FANCY for 48A: Like.


But just because it was easy doesn't mean it wasn't fun. I mean, there's a BADASS LATINO AVENGEr in this damn thing, what more do you want? My proudest moment was remembering JUBA, as I am godawful at remembering world capitals, or ... well, lots of things that I don't actually use on a regular basis. But world capitals, for sure. The worst thing about this puzzle, by a country mile, is ECHOBOOMERS, which couldn't be less of a real thing if it tried (2D: Millennials, in relation to their parents). This is the NO BRA DAY of today's puzzle (please see yesterday's puzzle if you're not following). Nah and nope. I don't even know why such a term would exist; like, why would anyone think it necessary? What kind of relationship is being suggested? Also, isn't "Millennials" bad enough? Do we really need yet another stupid label for this unfairly maligned, ridiculously amorphous group of people? Don't put these trash ephemeral concepts you saw once in some think piece in your puzzles; it's embarrassing.

Five things:

• 60A: Reduplicative dance name (NAE NAE) — seriously considered NEH NEH and NAY NAY there for a bit
• 32A: Enid who wrote "National Velvet" (BAGNOLD)— really all she's famous for. She is one of the more common ENIDs of puzzledom, up there with the ENIDs of Arthurian legend, Oklahoma, and Blyton
• 31A: [Don't you think you're milking it a bit too much?] (MOO) — this is bizarre, in that it is a "?" clue inside of an imagined cow-thought clue. I can accept that a cow's MOO might mean a lot of things, but that the English translation of that thought would involve a "milking it" ("it"?) pun, no, I can't accept that. Sincerely bad.
• 40A: Focus of Boyle's law (GAS) — learned it from crosswords and somehow remembered it today
• 44D: Go on and on (JABBER) — had -ABBER and somehow wasn't sure what letter went in the first position. Words like YAMMER and NATTER and probably GAB (8D: Go on and on) were creating a lot of interference.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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