Judith who was second American woman in space / SAT 11-21-20 / Annual mass event in Nevada's Black Rock Desert / Machine in particle physics lab in brief / 3x platinum Kendrick Lamar song with the lyric I was born like this / Longtime locale of Mideast conflict / Composer whose name is one letter off from an international peace grp / Ally of Britain during the Seven Years War / 1980s cable competitor of CMT

Constructor: Sam Ezersky

Relative difficulty: Medium (untimed)

THEME: none 

Word of the Day: LINAC (10D: Machine in a particle physics lab, in brief) —

A linear particle accelerator (often shortened to linac) is a type of particle accelerator that accelerates charged subatomic particles or ions to a high speed by subjecting them to a series of oscillating electric potentials along a linear beamline. The principles for such machines were proposed by Gustav Ising in 1924, while the first machine that worked was constructed by Rolf Widerøe in 1928 at the RWTH Aachen University. Linacs have many applications: they generate X-rays and high energy electrons for medicinal purposes in radiation therapy, serve as particle injectors for higher-energy accelerators, and are used directly to achieve the highest kinetic energy for light particles (electrons and positrons) for particle physics.

The design of a linac depends on the type of particle that is being accelerated: electrons, protons or ions. Linacs range in size from a cathode ray tube (which is a type of linac) to the 3.2-kilometre-long (2.0 mi) linac at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory in Menlo Park, California. (wikipedia)

This felt very Saturday-y. Struggle struggle progress struggle progress progress progress late struggle finish. As happens so often for me, the NW was the toughest place for me to get traction, and a total dud the first time around. First thing in the grid: "HAKUNA / MATATA," which was a guess, but an ... I want to say "educated" one, but in context that hardly sounds right. Or ... I guess my ears have been "educated" enough to allow me to "guess" that answer, so OK. Educated guess. It was a song from that movie, and since "CAN YOU FEEL / THE LOVE TONIGHT?" didn't fit, I went for "HAKUNA / MATATA," and then immediately checked some of the short crosses to see if I could confirm its rightness. ASP and NUM told me I was probably correct, and I loped along from there. Actually, "HAKUNA / MATATA" wasn't the first thing in the grid, just the first correct thing. I wanted INCH and ARCH at 6D: Part of a foot (HEEL) before realizing there were way too many possibilities to blindly guess there. I also wanted LIEU (duh) at 1D: In ___ of (WANT), which is one of two deliberate fill-in-the-blank traps in the puzzle (see also 14D: ___-fi, which is somehow not SCI-) (SPY-). This is an incredibly cheap way to add difficulty to a solve and thanks but no thanks I always hate it. Ambiguity of a sort is fine, but when you suggest a very common thing but then provide a super-uncommon thing, in what purports to be a common phrase (common enough to be a fill-in-the-blank), then that is cheap. You can do Extremely Difficult without doing cheap. Come on. Anyway, my first real foray into the grid was in the SE, off of "MATATA," as my total-stab guess of THE (ugh) SINAI ended up being right, and then the GOTHS and the POET collaborated to help me sew up that corner in no time.