Constructor: Kameron Austin Collins
Relative difficulty: Medium (untimed)
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THEME: none
Word of the Day: ADIA Barnes, W.N.I.T.-winning coach (6D) —
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Really enjoyed this one for the most part. Did not, however, enjoy finishing with an error. I just spelled "AY, CARAMBA!" the way I heard it ... with a "U" ("carumba"). And as for the cross ... yes, ADIA does look, in retrospect, more like a human name than UDIA, but the clue made the answer so obscure-seeming (winning the N.I.T., or W.N.I.T., is not a thing anyone knows you for, whoever you are), that I figured the name could very well be something deeply unusual like UDIA. So, "AY, CARUMBA!" / UDIA. Wah wah. That's on me, but if I'm the only solver to do that today, I'll eat my hat. This is one of those times when good ol' crosswordese cluing (i.e. [1998 Sarah McLachlan hit]) would've been a big help, especially when crossing a foreign word that isn't even really a word (?) (wikipedia says caramba is a euphemism for carajo). Failing to solve a puzzle correctly because I screwed up a clue about "The Simpsons"!? A show I watched worshipfully for its entire first decade? This is a career low point.
Relative difficulty: Medium (untimed)
Word of the Day: ADIA Barnes, W.N.I.T.-winning coach (6D) —
Adia Oshun Barnes (born February 3, 1977) is the head women's basketball coach for the University of Arizona. She played at the collegiate level for the University of Arizona, then seven seasons of professional women's basketball with the Houston Comets, Seattle Storm, Minnesota Lynx, and Sacramento Monarchs in the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA). She has played internationally with Dynamo Kiev in Ukraine. Barnes has also served as a TV color analyst broadcasting WNBA Seattle Storm games. Barnes is married to Salvo Coppa, a basketball coach she met in Italy. The wedding date was July 4, 2012. (wikipedia)
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But the rest of it was cool. Not IBANKERS, which will always suck (in life, in the grid) (11D: Many workers on Wall Street, informally), but the rest of it, yeah. I like to think of this puzzle being loosely about a married couple who are in therapy but sincerely working on the relationship and, well, by god, things are going pretty well! From TRUST EXERCISE to CUDDLE BUDDY to SAFE WORDS, that's a good day! I love Buster Keaton. I call my cat "Buster Keetin," which apparently a well-known humorist has also done with his cat, but I did it independently of him, so shh. Are there really people who calculate the exact shape and size of the earth? Like, every day? Once a year? This is a job? I inferred GEODESISTS from Buckminster Fuller's "geodesic dome" (16A: Experts in determining the exact shape and size of the earth) That answer helped me change Spanish MAIN to Spanish MOSS (7D), but alas, it did not help with UDIA.
I had CUDDLEBUNNY before CUDDLE BUDDY, which is cuter, but also wronger. I also had YUK YUKS at 45A: Hearty har-hars (BIG YUKS). So, as if in some ridiculous nightmare or animated television series, BUNNY & YUKYUKS chased me around the SW for a bit, with a little help from a shape-shifting GABBANA (which is to say, I couldn't remember if it was two Bs one N or two Ns one B). Only other trouble spot was ERHARD (43D: German leader after Adenauer), a name I somehow don't know *and* wrote in after just the ER-. So I did know it. Or I "knew" it, I guess. Good thing I got that area sorted, because I was getting tired of guessing song titles at 54A: "Kiss Me ___ the Phone" (2009 #23 hit). "'Kiss Me, I'M IN the Phone'!? What kind of horror-story song ...!?"