Twins Phil Steve who won gold silver in Sarajevo / SUN 1-20-19 / Spanish pastries often dipped in chocolate / Sartorial choice for Columbo / One of fish in Italy's Feast of Seven Fishes / Banking org since 1933 / Stock valuation phrase / Duke basketball legend informally / Occasional aid in crossword solving / Bridge historic span across Mississippi / Title film character with catchphrase very nice / Moistened finger in another's ear

Constructor: Richard Crowe

Relative difficulty: Medium (11:16)

THEME:"Question of Responsibility" — so I guess the idea is that the theme answers are familiar interrogative sentences clued (based on the reorienting of key words in the answers) via the profession that might be (wackily) saying them:

Theme answers:

• "IS THAT A FACT?" (23A: Copy editor)
• "WHERE'S THE PARTY?" (33A: Political strategist)
• "HOW'S IT HANGING?" (45A: Museum curator)
• "WHOSE SIDE ARE YOU ON?" (63A: Football line judge)
• "WHO'S CRYING NOW?" (80A: Maternity room nurse)
• "WHAT'S EATING HIM?" (96A: Parasitologist)
• "ANYBODY HOME?" (108A: Baseball scorekeeper)

Word of the Day: EADS Bridge (64D: ___ Bridge (historic span across the Mississippi)) —

Eads Bridge is a combined road and railway bridge over the Mississippi Riverconnecting the cities of St. Louis, Missouri and East St. Louis, Illinois. It is located on the St. Louis riverfront between Laclede's Landing, to the north, and the grounds of the Gateway Arch, to the south. The bridge is named for its designer and builder, James Buchanan Eads.

Opened in 1874, Eads Bridge was the first bridge erected across the Mississippi south of the Missouri River. Earlier bridges were located north of the Missouri, where the Mississippi is smaller. None of the earlier bridges survive, Eads Bridge is the oldest bridge on the river. (wikipedia)

Kept trying, and failing, to find the joy in this one. Took me a while to figure out exactly what was going on with the theme, and even then, it felt hit-or-miss. Not very coherent. You just need a bunch of questions? You could've kept this theme going for a long, long time. "WHERE'S THE BEEF?" [Rancher] or [Mediator]. "AIN'T THAT A KICK IN THE HEAD?" [Soccer referee] Etc. Also, the title "Question of Responsibility" seems only to fit for the "Who" questions. Not sure how "responsibility" fits in with most of the themers. Is it that the clue professional in the clue is the one "responsible" for asking the question? That is ... tenuous, and rough.


EEW is always eww (as in it's gross and also I never know how to spell it). Ditto the tilde-less ANOS. ASASON is bleeping ridiculous, especially crossing TOAMAN which is crossing NOPAR (???). That SE corner needs lots of help. INKA? There's no call for stuff like that. What does ADA-compliant even mean? Compliant ... with the American Dental Association? Oh, the Americans with Disabilities Act. Wow. OK, if you say so. CLAMS and CHI-CHI had me wondering what year it was. GLI x/w GARY is some nonsense. Tertiary SpongeBob character and Italian def. article? GOAS is awkward. SSR RRS ENNE SYNS. . . There's just nothing very pleasing about this. It's a puzzle to be endured, not savored. It's not that there's zero charm in the theme, it's just not very tight, and the answers are more polite-nod or maybe light-chuckle. Not wacky enough to carry the day. Also, I could really have done without cat poop in my puzzle (40D: Where to get the latest poop?). And "the latest"? Like you're just hanging out by your cat's LITTER BOX waiting for the fresh stuff? We've done cat feces, like, well, at least twice in the past couple months (remember that "litter box" puzzle a while back?). I wonder what new and glorious types of feces we have to look forward to in the new year. I mean, the seal's broken on feces-land, so why not go nuts?


Five things:

• 57A: Sartorial choice for Lieutenant Columbo (RAINCOAT)— that's not a TRENCHCOAT he's wearing? RAINCOAT just sounds way too pedestrian. He's a detective. Detectives wear TRENCHCOATs. Which are a type of RAINCOAT, it's true ... still.
• 33D: Year of the ___ (2018) (WOMAN)— yeah, no, that was 1992. You can look it up. There's zero consensus that 2018 was the Year of the WOMAN. Why isn't this even attributed? It seems dumb and condescending, like "here's your one year, enjoy it, ladies, see you in another quarter century! [burp!!]." I wanted this to be MONKEY but it wouldn't fit and also that was 2016. 
• 37D: Thrilled cries (OOHS)— oof. I had OLES
• 39A: Make toast? (DOOM) — this stumped me and is also a good clue
• 5D: Fab Four name (STARR)— so bad did I want RINGO that I literally just now wrote in RINGO as the correct answer in this bullet point

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld (Twitter @rexparker / #NYTXW)

P.S. 2019 constructor count—Men: 19 / Women: 1

P.P.S. the NYT eds. really have to stop tripping over themselves with their race / gender / sexuality cluing. Check out this gem from a recent mini:

You could've just Stopped The Clue after "pronoun." Just stopped. There, it's accurate. After that, it is fundamentally inaccurate. Fuddy-duddy prescriptivist sticklers are not "grammarians."Actual grammarians have no problem with THEY as a singular pronoun. No problem. No "chagrin." None. Zero. The American Dialect Organization MADE SINGULAR "THEY" THEIR GOSH DANG WORD OF THE YEAR in 2015. This clue has not only gone and made something normal look like it's "controversial," it has gone and done it with a stupid, inaccurate clue. Total own goal. Mysteriously incompetent cluing. Baffling.

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]