Constructor: Ed Sessa
Relative difficulty: Easyish (timer didn't start, so I don't really know)
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THEME: AHA MOMENT (64A: Sudden insight ... with a hint to 17-, 24-, 40- and 50-Across) — two-word phrases / names where first word starts A- and second starts HA-:
Theme answers:
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Started out kinda rough, with a cutesy-quaint clue for an alcoholic (WINO) and an evocation of lynching (NOOSE), but once I got out of that NW corner, I was surprised to find that things smoothed out and settled down, and by the end of the solve, damned if I didn't think this was a pretty solid Monday puzzle. It's got all the makings of a very dull grid—ultra-conventional shape means we are "treated" to (roughly) nine (roughly) 4x4 or 4x5 sections, which is never conducive to good fill, and usually invites a kind of crosswordese creep that is never pleasant. But, though the fill is typical and familiar throughout, it's never irksomely weak—like, never, not once—and the revealer, when it comes, provides a genuine, if gentle, AHA MOMENT. Nice little self-reflexive touch, with the AHA MOMENT coming with the answer AHA MOMENT. Are there a ton of potential A- + HA- answers? Is this theme too loose? I don't know, and since the answers that I *get* are solid, varied, and interesting, I don't much care. This Monday puzzle did its Monday job. It didn't dazzle, but it most certainly didn't flop. It Mondayed.
Not a lot to say about the finer points of the grid. Four long Downs provide color (and help offset the ordinariness of the bulk of the fill). Every one of those Four adds interest to the grid. It's a vivid and varied set. I'm seeing trapeze artists dressed as Odysseus and Achilles throwing open their arms to catch one another during a circus act ... and the circus is in ANCHORAGE, I guess. I always have trouble with ISIAH, or, I at least have to think about it, since the more common spelling (I think) is ISAIAH ... which honestly looks wrong if you stare at it too long. That -AIA- vowel string is like "you can't be serious." But no, that *is* how you spell it most of the time. Interestingly, when I try to google "Isaiah," the predictive text feature believes I'm looking for ISIAH Thomas, so people must misspell his name constantly. I hesitated at LEAR thinking it might be LEER (?!) (18D: Big name in jets). I thought maybe DESI before getting LUCY (29D: Ethel's neighbor/pal, on 1950s TV), which, now that I read the whole clue, and now that I think about the fact that DESI was the actor, not the character, is absurd. Though I was very fast with this one, I had to steer around ANN'S (39D: St. ___ (common church name)) (clue too vague for me) and SHINE (52D: What stars and bootblacks both do) (clue too thinky for me). Everything else fell in easily. Really wish the ARSENIO HALL clue (50A: Talk show host who won a season of "Celebrity Apprentice") had done him and everyone else the favor of remembering his historic run as a late-night talk show host instead of remembering him as having once been on the reality show of the world's vilest and stupidest person (it's really the whitest clue I can imagine), but otherwise, as I say, this one held up well.
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]
Relative difficulty: Easyish (timer didn't start, so I don't really know)
Theme answers:
- ANGEL HAIR (17A: Thin variety of pasta)
- ACE HARDWARE (24A: Competitor of Home Depot and Lowe's)
- ACCIDENTS HAPPEN (40A: "Don't worry, it's not your fault")
- ARSENIO HALL (50A: Talk show host who won a season of "Celebrity Apprentice")
Sir Frederick Henry Royce, 1st Baronet, OBE (27 March 1863 – 22 April 1933) was an English engineer famous for his designs of car and aeroplane engines with a reputation for reliability and longevity. With Charles Rolls (1877 – 1910) and Claude Johnson (1864 – 1926), he founded Rolls-Royce.Rolls-Royce initially focused on large 40-50 horsepower motor cars, the Silver Ghost and its successors. Royce produced his first aero engine shortly after the outbreak of the First World War and aircraft engines became Rolls-Royce's principal product.Royce's health broke down in 1911 and he was persuaded to leave his factory in the Midlands at Derby and, taking a team of designers, move to the south of England spending winters in the south of France. He died at his home in Sussex in the spring of 1933. (wikipedia)
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Not a lot to say about the finer points of the grid. Four long Downs provide color (and help offset the ordinariness of the bulk of the fill). Every one of those Four adds interest to the grid. It's a vivid and varied set. I'm seeing trapeze artists dressed as Odysseus and Achilles throwing open their arms to catch one another during a circus act ... and the circus is in ANCHORAGE, I guess. I always have trouble with ISIAH, or, I at least have to think about it, since the more common spelling (I think) is ISAIAH ... which honestly looks wrong if you stare at it too long. That -AIA- vowel string is like "you can't be serious." But no, that *is* how you spell it most of the time. Interestingly, when I try to google "Isaiah," the predictive text feature believes I'm looking for ISIAH Thomas, so people must misspell his name constantly. I hesitated at LEAR thinking it might be LEER (?!) (18D: Big name in jets). I thought maybe DESI before getting LUCY (29D: Ethel's neighbor/pal, on 1950s TV), which, now that I read the whole clue, and now that I think about the fact that DESI was the actor, not the character, is absurd. Though I was very fast with this one, I had to steer around ANN'S (39D: St. ___ (common church name)) (clue too vague for me) and SHINE (52D: What stars and bootblacks both do) (clue too thinky for me). Everything else fell in easily. Really wish the ARSENIO HALL clue (50A: Talk show host who won a season of "Celebrity Apprentice") had done him and everyone else the favor of remembering his historic run as a late-night talk show host instead of remembering him as having once been on the reality show of the world's vilest and stupidest person (it's really the whitest clue I can imagine), but otherwise, as I say, this one held up well.
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]