Philistine-fighting king / THU 8-8-19 / Tin has been in them since 1929 / Angola's northern neighbor once

Constructor: Timothy Polin

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium (5:24)

THEME: THINK / TWICE (60A: With 19-Across, reconsider ... or a hint to the starts of the five starred clues) — starred clues start with a word that you have to double in order to make sense of the clue:

Theme answers:

• WILD PITCH (17A: *Boo during a baseball game)
• COMIC STRIPS (25A: *Tin has been in them since 1929)
• DENTAL HYGIENIST (37A: *Tar remover)
• LOGIC PUZZLE (51A: *Ken, for one)
• HIGH KICKS (62A: *Can components)

Word of the Day: PEPE (1A: José, to amigos) —

One story, I guess nobody can say whether this is true or not, is that Pepe comes from the initials P.P. from the Spanish term "padre putativo" (putative father) an old way of referring to Joseph, the husband of Mary from the Bible.

A more believable explanation is that José entered Spanish as Josef or Josep.From Josep to Josepe (to avoid a final /p/) to Pepe is not a big jump as it is not uncommon for names in Spanish to form nicknames from the last phonemes of the original: e.g. Felipe to Pipe, Enrique to Quique, Guillermo to Memo, Santiago to Diego (now a name of its own).  

From Pepe we have also Pepito (i.e. little Pepe), Chepe (that's how people called my father) and Chepito. (Rafael Nájera, in response to Quora question, "Why is 'Pepe' a nickname for 'Jose'?")

Bizarre solving experience, where I had no idea what the theme was and just sort of meandered around the grid is a sad, lost way, but not in a desperate Oh-God-Help way, just in a kinda "I know the light switch is here ... somewhere ..." way, and sure enough, when I'd wandered all the way to the bottom of the grid (interlocking answers the whole way down), there it was: the switch. HIGH KICKS. So "Can" is actually "can-can." And instantly, all the other themer clues made sense, and the Thursday became a Monday, and I tore this thing apart. Scorched it. But slow start meant just a somewhat better-than-average time. The theme is so-so (!). At times, the cluing was super-clever, with great misdirection (e.g. 17A: *Boo during a baseball game). At other times, the cluing was sad and weird, with terrible misdirection (e.g. 25A: *Tin has been in them since 1929—this is not a plausible clue for anything involving the element "tin"). What took this from middle-of-the-road into negative territory for me was the revealer. That's just such a godawful, puzzle-wrecking way to place your revealer—split and upside-down. Bad enough to get a [See...] clue anywhere, ever, but to have it be up top, and yet the *second* part of the revealer, with the first part down below ... it's so ugly. So inelegant. And so (seemingly) unnecessary. Build a grid where your revealer is displayed in the order that English-reading humans actually read, preferably with pride of place in your grid—central or final, or maybe symmetrical top-to-bottom ... something, anything, but this ungainly mess.





No clue, none, that PEPE was a familiar form of José. Thought a DOG or CAT made the muddy footprint. Weird to claim a PAW made a footprint. Feet make footprints. You're thinking of a paw print. But OK. POLER and POLEBEANS should not not not be in the same grid. I have real beef with the clue for COMIC STRIPS, largely because I think of "strips" as "those things in newspapers that are actually in the form of strips," and I've never seen "Tintin" presented like that. Certainly never ever ever in American COMIC STRIPS. In the U.S., those stories come exclusively in complete book form. In the most general sense of COMIC STRIPS as just ... comics (i.e. sequential art), then sigh, fine, this clue works. I teach this stuff, so I'm definitely overthinking it, but ... "Peanuts" and "Cathy" and "Curtis" and "Baby Blues" are COMIC STRIPS. "Tintin" is something else, imho. Remembered MATTBIONDI somehow, so yay me (30D: Winner of five swimming gold medals at the 1988 Olympics) ... but had ACT before OPT at 9D: Not dither despite already having ACT in the grid (6D: Be dramatic?), so boo me. Boo-boo me, in fact.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

P.S. 14A: Company with a for-profit foundation? is AVON because AVON is a make-up company and therefore a manufacturer of ... foundation. I'm assuming.

P.P.S. 13D: Hearts that don't beat very much? ... is a very good clue (the reference is to cards, in case that somehow eluded you)

P.P.P.S. Hey, next weekend (Sat. Aug. 17) is Lollapuzzoola, one of the biggest annual crossword tournaments in the country, and the only one (that I know of) in NYC. There are still some spaces left for those who want to participate in some hardcore, in-person nerddom (actually a very fun tournament with a low-key vibe and hundreds of lovely people). But if you just want to see what tournament puzzles are like without the fear of public humiliation*, then there's also the Solve At-Home Division of the tournament, which you should get in on. Lolla and Indie 500 (in DC) are my favorite tournaments, and the only ones I participate in regularly. So come solve and say hi. Or solve at home and wish you had. Whatever. Just sign up! INFORMATION HERE.

*there's no public humiliation except that which you heap on yourself, trust me

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]