Gossipy schoolmate on Facts of Life / SAT 2-9-19 / Servant to Queen Amidala / Manor occupant of yore / Prefix with spore sperm / Popular 1950s vehicle making comeback in 2010s / Lucky Rabbit's name in early Disney films / Tree pictured in van Gogh's Starry Night / Chinese snack with marblelike patterns on outside

Constructor: Ryan McCarty

Relative difficulty: Medium (7:54)

THEME: none

Word of the Day: TEA EGG (14D: Chinese snack with marblelike patterns on the outside) —

Tea egg is a typical Chinese savory food commonly sold as a snack, in which a boiled egg is cracked slightly and then boiled again in tea, and sauce or spices. It is also known as marble egg because cracks in the egg shell create darkened lines with marble-like patterns. Commonly sold by street vendors or in night markets in most Chinese communities throughout the world, it is also commonly served in Asian restaurants. Although it originated from China and is traditionally associated with Chinese cuisine, other similar recipes and variations have been developed throughout Asia. (wikipedia)

This one WHIFFS pretty bad, which makes this week's themelesses a complete disappointment for me. I rely on these days to be good. Great even. Yesterday's was more a matter of taste—the puzzle wasn't empirically bad, it just missed me. Today's puzzle, however, has real problems. Constructors have to stop convincing themselves that stuff like IBANKS and CSCALE are good. I have seen IBANKS precisely once before, and I complained about it then, and I'm doing it again, both because it's not a great abbr. and because I want to soak in the world of investment banking about as much as I want to bask in the presence of the white supremacist terrorist organization that is the NRA (19A: Its PAC is the Political Victory Fund). What the hell kind of "comeback" is the TWO-TONE CAR making?! Where?! Also, further, what the hell is a TWO-TONE CAR?! I mean, I can infer that it is a car whose surface is painted two different colors, but honestly, that answer, especially as one of only two very narrow ways out of the NW corner, can go beeeeeeeeeep itself. Who's up for a fun day out of BAYONETING!? (a ridiculous present participle). The ABS are SCULPTED? I'm squinting up my nose at that. WASHBOARD ABS is a tight phrase. SCULPTED ABS ... is just a phrase. DESSERT crossing DESERT? Make better choices!


But IBANKS and CSCALE are both *gold*, however, compared to the stuff that's waiting for us in the SW. DOAFAVOR teeters on the edge of stand-alone-worthiness and is definitely about to fall off. THE NILE is superdumb with the definite article. INAREA is the worst thing in this grid and possibly any grid. And "WHAT A LOSER!" is just mean. More: TORCH RELAYS are in no way "preparations." They "prepare" nothing. Antecedence is not "preparation."UDON NOODLE is redundant, and also hilarious in the singular. There's more, but I'm done. So grateful I know something about baseball, as INDIANS really helped me out. Same thing with Dickens / "Little DORRIT" (2D: Dickens's "Little ___"). But mostly I solved this from the corners in. Got NW, then nothing; NE, then nothing; SW got me TORCH and then BUSHLEAGUE, which then got me the SE corner. And finally "WHAT A LOSER!" gave me the "S" I needed to see CYPRESS, which finally give me real traction in the center (where I finished).  Oh well at least I learned what a TEA EGG is. See you tomorrow.

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

PS speaking of MEN (20A: Some couples)—we are now up to 36 puzzles by MEN to just 4 by women for the year 2019. 90% MEN. Ninety. Percent.

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