Constructor: Ned White
Relative difficulty: Hard
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THEME: P AND G— Theme answers start with P and contain G.
Theme answers:
Word of the Day: GHETTO (42D: Run-down area) —
Bullets:
Also, yeah, I know you all know what ghetto means. I just thought it was a good word to pause on for a minute. Help your community, even those who live in run-down areas.
Signed, Annabel Thompson, tired.
[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]
Relative difficulty: Hard
THEME: P AND G— Theme answers start with P and contain G.
Theme answers:
- POINT GUARD (18A: *Basketball position for Magic Johnson or Steph Curry)
- PAY GRADE (20A: *Level on the military wage scale)
- PAINT GUN (26A: *Alternative to a brush when coating the side of a house)
- P AND G (36A: Consumer products giant, for short...or a hint to the answers to the eight starred clues)
- POP GROUP (41A: *The Beach Boys or Backstreet Boys)
- PEA GREEN (52A: *Shade akin to olive)
- PARTY GIRLS (54A: *Sorority types who go out a lot)
- PUB GAMES (4D: *Darts and snooker)
- PAN GRAVY (37D: *Roast accompaniment prepared with drippings)
Word of the Day: GHETTO (42D: Run-down area) —
A ghetto (Italian pronunciation: [ˈɡetto]), often the ghetto, is a part of a city in which members of a minority group live, typically as a result of social, legal, or economic pressure.[1] Ghettos are often known for being more impoverished than other areas of the city. Versions of the ghetto appear across the world, each with their own names, classifications, and groupings of people. The term was originally used for the Venetian Ghetto in Venice, Italy, as early as 1516, to describe the part of the city where Jews were restricted to live and thus segregated from other peoples. However, early societies may have formed their own versions of the same structure; words resembling "ghetto" in meaning appear in Hebrew, Yiddish, Italian, Germanic, Old French, and Latin. Ghettos in many cities have also been nicknamed "the hood", which is colloquial slang for "neighborhood" after it is shortened to 'hood.[2]
(Wikipedia)
• • •
Hey, it's a surprise Annabel Monday! Cool huh? Rex asked me to fill in this week, which is why he filled in for me last week. Happy to be here! I went camping this weekend. Also, my summer job is going great! I love working at the library. I've been doing some filing, analyzing some data...it's really cool.
Anyway, this week's puzzle! I had a surprisingly difficult time for a Monday. Too many proper nouns, I think; that always throws me off. By the way, what are GRAN and NANA doing right next to each other? Who says POP GROUPS rather than BOY BANDS? I mean, I don't know that I'd call the Beach Boys a BOY BAND but hey, they're a band, they're all boys. I do have to note that nobody has said IMING since long before Myspace died. And do people actually say PAN GRAVY? I always just say gravy. Anyway, you can probably tell I can have a bunch of little gripes about the puzzle (and not just because of the Eagles reference!) so I'll tell you my absolute favorite thing about it: between AABA and ENGELS it briefly gave me a chance to flex my English-major muscles. Oh, so briefly.
The theme was fun, even if I found the corporation aspect a little weird. It helped me confirm PEA GREEN and solve PAY GRADE, so that was nice. And you have to give Ned White props for sneaking Products Giant into P AND G's clue. I do have one question: What exactly are, uh...PARTY GIRLS? Like, just girls that go out to party? Would PARTY BOYS be a potential clue? I dunno. Just seems weird. But hey, it was a Perfectly Good theme for a Monday! Simple and Monday-y, just how I like 'em.
- OREO (31A: ____ O'S [breakfast cereal])— When I had almost all the letters of OREO (forget which ones I had missing) I was wracking my brain trying to figure out what the answer could possibly be instead. Surely they hadn't made a cereal that was literally just Oreos? But yeah, this is a thing, and I hope I'm never in any store that has it or else I have no idea how I'm supposed to stick to any sort of diet that isn't composed entirely of Oreo products.
- PROM (52D: School event with a king and a queen)— I was going to post an embarrassing prom picture, but I don't have any because I've always looked cute. So instead I'll share my new favorite musical:
- PRIUS (39A: Toyota hybrid) — This is the kind of car I have!! Her name is Rey (after the Star Wars character) and she's turning fifteen next year and I love her so much.
- PAINT GUN (26A: *Alternative to a brush when coating the side of a house) — Seems like a pretty weird way to paint a house but ooookay?
Also, yeah, I know you all know what ghetto means. I just thought it was a good word to pause on for a minute. Help your community, even those who live in run-down areas.
Signed, Annabel Thompson, tired.
[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]