Coin in Potterverse / SUN 9-28-19 / End of oyster season / Lead-in to ville in children's literature / Central region of Roman empire / Banker in Penny Lane never wears one in rain very strange / Voice role for Beyonce in 2019 Lion King

Constructor: Tom McCoy

Relative difficulty: Medium (10-something on the timer)

THEME:"Now Weight Just a Second" — familiar phrases are made wacky by changing a single two-syllable word from one whose stress ("weight") is on the first syllable to one whose stress is on the "second":

Theme answers:

• SHIP OF THE DESSERT (22A: Cruise that specializes in baked alaska, e.g.?)
• NOBEL-MINDED (33A: Like ambitious scientists?)
• THE MORALE OF THE STORY (49A: How everyone on this floor is feeling?)
• IT'S NOT ROCKETTE SCIENCE (68A: "Our lab studies regular dance moves rather than high-kicking"?)
• I CAME I SAW I CONCURRED (86A: Summary of an easy negotiation?)
• SEMI COLOGNE (105A: What a truck driver puts on before a date?)
• MAJOR THOREAUFARE (116A: The main food served at Walden Pond?)

Word of the Day: KNUT (94A: Coin in the Potterverse) —

Wizarding money is [...] old-fashioned; whilst Muggle Britain was decimalised in 1971, Magical Britons continued with their system of 17 silverSickles to a gold Galleon, and 29 bronze Knuts to a Sickle. Also, magical currency is all metal coins, and there is no paper money. (wikipedia)

Didn't care for this much as I was solving, as I had no idea what was going on, and didn't find the puns that funny. As soon as I finished, it dawned on me what the "weight" in the title of the puzzle meant. First themer looks like an add-a-letter theme, and the third themer (which I ran into second) seems to confirm this. But then I got NOBEL but didn't know the second part and didn't know NOBEL was the altered word, so that was no help. So I stumbled to the end never once really being amused by the themers. Then, when I figured it out, I dunno, something about the way not just the stress ("weight") but the vowel sound seemed to change in the second syllable of COLOGNE and MORALE really bugged me. But I was primed to be bugged because the theme just never clicked for me (I can see already from early social media reaction that I won't be alone in this). At least I figured it out eventually, I guess. I think it's very clever, but the solving experience was kind of a dud for me, despite some real winning moments in the fill. I think this is one of those days where the puzzle is probably actually good, but just not for me.


Here's what I quite enjoyed: GADGETRY (16D: Fancy gizmos) and DEATHSTAR (108A: Massive weapon of sci-fi)! I also enjoyed seeing HEARST(100D: Leader in yellow journalism and an inspiration for "Citizen Kane"), whose name is oddly rare given what looks like such a favorable letter combination (hasn't appeared in the NYT in four years). Did you know "yellow journalism" had its origins in the comics pages with the Yellow Kid, the world's first comic strip star, whose iconic color came to stand generally for newspapers' willingness to do anything to sell papers? The Yellow Kid was the star of a strip called "Hogan's Alley," which started in Pulitzer's New York World, but then HEARST bought it for his New York Journal. Pulitzer then responded by running his own Yellow Kid (copyright laws involving comics not being very well defined, apparently). The Kid was thus a central figure in the newspaper sales wars of the late 19th century, and since the comics pages and sensational, muckraking journalism came of age together, the yellow of the Yellow Kid became symbolic of drive to sell papers at any cost, no matter how cheap and tawdry! Extra, extra! Lesson over!

I really really liked COURT / ORDER, which is probably the only time you'll hear me say I liked a [With such and such a clue / See such and such]-type pairing (43D: With 44-Down, judge's mandate / 44D: See 43-Down). Normally I resent having to go hunt down the second (or first) half of some split answer, but here, today, the two halves stand right alongside each other like a couple of pals, each word the same length. There's something very neat and elegant about that. Here's where I struggled: first, GLASSWORK, specifically the -WORK part (30A: Tiffany lambshade, e.g.). Had GLASSW- and wrote in (I think) GLASSWARE, which actually worked with LAHORE (7D: Capital of Punjab), but then SETTO seemed right but wouldn't work, and then I somehow opted for EVENNESS at 8D: State of stability (EVEN KEEL), so there was a lot of writing and unwriting going on there for a bit. Also had no idea about BILL TO; I had SELL TO, then realized I had no idea what that answer could be (29D: Words on an invoice). I also could not get / understand 29A: Quickly go through the seasons, say (BINGE). It's a great clue, though the "the" there is kind of a cheap way to get your misdirection (making you think of winter spring etc. and not TV, where you would only say "the" if it were clear what show you were talking about, and maybe not even then). Anyway, I wanted FLY BY. Like ... Time ... quickly goes through the seasons? Throw in odd ELFIN clue at 14D: Diminutive, and you've got a real mess (in "The Hobbit," elves are far less "diminutive" than hobbits and dwarves, so I don't put smallness and elfinity together). Bottom half of the grid didn't offer any equivalent challenges.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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