Edwardian era transport / THU 7-9-20 / It comes on little feet per Carl Sandburg / German city where Einstein was born / Sound followed by whistle in cartoons / Colorful bit of cereal / Face of modern technology

Constructor: Joe Kidd

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium (?) (somewhere in the 5-minute range, didn't put anything in the theme squares because I think the shapes speak for themselves)

THEME: O boy — "O" shapes in four squares stand in for various "O"-shaped things: a RING, a CIRCLE, a LOOP, and a ... ROUND :(

Theme answers:

• DOESN'T RING TRUE (19A: Sounds a bit off) / SPY RING (5D: Network of secret agents)
• CIRCLE DANCE (26A: Hora, for one) / CIRCLE THE WAGONS (26D: Unite in defense)
• FROOT LOOP (49A: Colorful bit of cereal) / THREW FOR A LOOP (10D: Caught off guard)
• THIS ROUND IS ON ME (55A: Offer at the bar) / ROUND OUT (57D: Bring to fullness)

Word of the Day: HANSOM (51A: Edwardian-era transport) —

: a light 2-wheeled covered carriage with the driver's seat elevated behind 

— called also hansom cab (merriam-webster.com)

Got the gimmick quickly but didn't *fully* get it because I seriously thought they were all just gonna be "CIRCLE"—I got CIRCLE DANCE first, and then at 5D: Network of secret agents, I got the SPY part and thought, "sure, SPY CIRCLE, that's a thing..." This is why it took me a bit to get DOESN'T *RING* TRUE—I was a little miffed on the clue there, since ... I dunno, somehow I always think contracts should be indicated in the clue (?). I just couldn't see / anticipate DOESN'T. Had DOES and figured that was the entirety of the verb. The contraction possibility just didn't (!) enter my head. But once that was all straightened out, the rest of the theme stuff was easy ... well, LOOP was easy. ROUND was ??? because man that is a horrible final themer. No one is going to look at "O" and say "look, a ROUND," whereas they might indeed describe that shape as a circle, ring, or loop. I guess there are round crackers that are called "rounds," but ... I just don't think that theme square works At All. Total outlier compared to the others (which all work nicely). I've seen theme concepts like this before, and they're fine, but the clunky execution there really dropped the puzzle a notch in my estimation—and on the final themer! The worst place to blow it. The fill on this one also wasn't great. Really liked LOSE BIG (8D: Be routed), and the theme answers were very lively, but most of the rest of the fillis pretty TWO-BIT (50D: Cheap). Lots of TETES MOS EATOF OFNO IGET GOAS ERRS ESS etc.


The SW corner was the hardest for me because I had a DUH / D'OH screwup that made me repeatedly mistrust HANSOM. Don't like the clue on "D'OH" (48D: "How could I be so silly?!") which indicates something stronger than mere "silliness" on one's own part. "Stupid" is more accurate. It comes from Homer Simpson, after all. Really hated that that corner had not one but two "words in quoted phrases by famous people"-type clues. I don't want more than one of those per puzzle, if possible, and I definitely don't want two in the same damn corner. There's gotta be better, more interesting ways to clue both DESTINY (43D: "___ is not a matter of chance; it is a matter of choice": Willliam Jennings Bryan) and FOG (54A: It "comes on little cat feet," per Carl Sandburg), although the FOG quote is at least ... interesting. Leave the Sandburg, ditch the Bryan. I also don't think LINEN is a [Bit of bedding]. It's not a "bit" of anything. It's a general term for bedding, or just fabric-y things. No one says "oh look, a LINEN." Bit, shmit. Anyway, this is all to say that that corner was yucky. But overall the puzzle was on the easy side. It's a middling, passable Thursday effort.

"Am I ... FOG?"

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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