Arrives 1967 soul album / FRI 10-26-18 / Funny Martha / Hilton alternative / Trendy salad type / Cable inits popular with female viewers

Constructor: Evan Kalish

Relative difficulty: Easy (4:19)

THEME: none

Word of the Day: Kansas' Fort HAYS (22D) —

Fort Hays, originally named Fort Fletcher, was a United States Army fort near Hays, Kansas. Active from 1865 to 1889, it was an important frontier post during the American Indian Wars of the late 19th century. Reopened as a historical park in 1929, it is now operated by the Kansas Historical Society as the Fort Hays State Historic Site. [...] 
Fort Hays became a key Army installation in the Indian Wars, serving as a base of operations for combat forces and a supply point for Fort Dodgeand Camp Supply to the south. Maj. Gen. Philip Sheridan, supported by Lt. Col. George Custer and the 7th Cavalry Regiment, used it as his headquarters during his 1868-1869 campaign against the Cheyenne and the Kiowa. Both Buffalo Bill Cody and Wild Bill Hickok served as Army scouts at Fort Hays at points during this period. (wikipedia)

So normally when I solve just after waking up, the results are semi-disastrous. There's usually some residual brain fog, even if I've gotten up and splashed water on my face and had a drink of water etc. I'm definitely faster at night. So tonight was particularly weird, because I (accidentally) fell asleep on the couch for like three hours this evening and then woke up ... but it was still nighttime. So "just woke up" (slower) + "nighttime solving" (faster) = somehow astonishingly fast. A few seconds off my record for this year. Now I'll never know if the marathon nap helped or hurt. Would I have smashed my record if I'd solved it at night without the nap? Or did the nap actually propel me, helping me to a faster time than I would've had without it? Also, who cares!? I loved this puzzle. I know, I know, it's easy to love a puzzle that you Krush, but this one is really fantastic, everywhere you turn. BWAHAHA made me laugh (apt!) and PHTEST has that insane consant-heavy opening, which is cool, and SIDEARMED is a nice verbing of baseball term, and PERPWALK and BIG PHARMA and I'VE CHANGED are all just great, in-the-language terms and phrases. I do think it could've been toughened up a little, especially in the NE, which I took down like it was a Monday (ARETHA, then all the four-letter Acrosses, then all the long Downs, without hesitation). And the crossreferenced clue at 33A: See 47-Down (SKUNK), which I cracked just by getting a few crosses, pretty much handed me PEPE in the SE, making that corner much easier than it might've been. But when "too easy" is your sole complaint, you know you've got a good puzzle on your hands.


Update: apparently everyone is setting personal records on the Friday puzzle today, so I'm gonna say my nap actually *hurt* me, and I would've solved this in sub-4 time without it, so now I'm officially mad. Mad at sleep!
I struggled a tiny bit getting into the SW, which is probably what kept me from a record time. The hardest clue in the whole puzzle, for me, was 28A: Selection ___ (BIAS). I am notoriously bad at fill-in-the-blank clues like this, and I honestly had no idea what could follow "Selection." Couldn't come up with a single idea, of any letter length, let alone four. Maybe Selection Sunday (when they reveal the NCAA Men's Basketball brackets)!? I'm not even sure I know what "Selection BIAS" means. I know what "Confirmation BIAS" is. Selection BIAS appears to be a problem in the gathering of evidence in a study, where "selection" of samples is not proper randomized, thus invalidating or calling into question the findings of your study. Anyway, tripped on that, and then had a bunch of trouble with LINT, because the clue made it look like the answer was a plural, when it wasn't (32A: Fluff pieces). Since BIAS and LINT were doorway answers (i.e. I had to go through them to get into the next big section of the grid), solving the SW took a little work. Always dicey backing in from the east, which is what I had to do via SPARE SET. Very proud that I also was able to back in SAMOSA off just the final "A" (I eat SAMOSA at least once a week, at the campus branch of a restaurant called MOG(h)UL!), so that helped). So the SW was comparatively tough to get into, but the toughness didn't last. Love to close the work week out with a huge win. Now I'm gonna try to sleep sleep ... if the 3+-hour nap hasn't made that impossible. Good night.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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