Constructor: Kameron Austin Collins
Relative difficulty: Medium-Challenging
THEME: none
Word of the Day: REVET (3D: Strengthen, as an embankment) —
This didn't start out well at all. Super-isolated corners, on Saturdays, tend to be miserable affairs, and that NW corner definitely threatened misery. When the only way into a corner is by desperately clinging to your roster of "60 Minutes" correspondent names ("SAFER! ... no, STAHL!"), you're in trouble. What I'm wondering most is how (in the world) I a. remembered that Verdi had an opera called "ATTILA" and b. (more amazing still) got it off just the "L" from STAHL (!?). Without that bit of dumb trivial luck, that corner gets a lot more deathly. As it was, I crawled through it at a fairly typical Saturday pace (OMELETTE helped a lot), and finally pushed the HUT in BEACH HUT down into the middle of the grid, giving me very meager purchase on whatever lay ahead. Looking back at that NW corner, yeah, I would not willingly go there again. SOGS and REVET are the kind of answers that, look, you can point at the dictionary all day long, but I am not loving (let alone ever using) those words. Aesthetically displeasing. But I survived, and there was nothing genuinely repulsive up there, plus I had a vast swath of puzzle yet to do, so things could've been worse. Started to get a little momentum with THOU (26A: It's often seen beside art) (nice clue), which gave me OATS (sea OATS being something I *definitely* learned about from crosswords) (28D: Sea ___ (grass seen in sand dunes)) and then Chaka gave me AIN'T (don't worry, yes, I am going to post the song, just hang on) and bam, HEN'S TEETH. But then just when I think we're cooking with gas ... I somehow stall (STAHL!) out. INTER and ASHE and LEE and pffft. It's 5am, I haven't had coffee, and the Saturday puzzle is now just sticking its tongue out at me (OK, OK, I'll play the song now).
Relative difficulty: Medium-Challenging
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| Just ignore all the little blue eyes; I closed my puzz file before taking a screenshot of the finished grid and just didn't want to bother rekeying the whole thing, so I hit "Reveal: Entire Puzzle" instead :/ |
Word of the Day: REVET (3D: Strengthen, as an embankment) —
v.tr.To retain (an embankment, for example) with a layer of stone, concrete, orother supporting material; provide with a revetment. (thefreedictionary.com)
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| O-REN |
But then the dam broke. Out of nowhere. Just as I'm thinking, "ugh, how am I supposed to know Boston medical centers, we didn't all go to *$&%ing Harvard, you know!," the two "S"s sitting next to each other in the grid all of a sudden go "psst ... (because two "S"s naturally say "psst") ... psst! Try MASS something. MASS GENERAL, maybe?" And there it was, and there went CAMBODIA and TRIAL RUNS and then, the answer that really turned the puzzle on its axis from sad to happy: CREATURE FEATURE! (31A: "The Fly,""The Host" or "The Thing"). Not sure I've ever had a single answer flip a puzzling experience upside-down like that; and it's sitting dead center, too.
Such a fun marquee answer! And all of sudden my mood was lighter, and though the puzzle remained Saturday tough, I was able to enjoy its delightful parts, like the clue on TOKE, or the sick MARINERs burn (24D: Member of the only M.L.B. team never to have played in a World Series), or the alternate-universe rickrolling (billybaiting!?) that forced the lyrics of "We Didn't Start the Fire" into my head against my will—of course "against my will," how else do those lyrics get in anyone's head!? ROY COHN, JUAN PERON, TUSCANINI, DACRON, you see, it's like my brain is having a fit, it's awful! ... and yet it got me ROY COHN, so some element of sadomasochistic pleasure was involved in the whole episode. You make me think of the execrable ROY COHN *and* the execrable Billy Joel song *and* you make me kind of like it?! Impressive.
[48A: McCarthyite called out in Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start the Fire"]
Got stuck a little bit trying to get up into that NE corner. Just dead-stopped in the middle because I don't know what follows HAM and I can't figure out the Poe title and it seems like ___ FOR could be a million things (I considered PINE for a bit). It was only by realizing that "Beg pardon..." was not someone asking you to repeat what you just said, but someone trying to get your attention, that I got AHEM, which somehow solved all my problems there. Mad at myself for not (exactly) remembering the FISA part of FISA COURT ("FICA ... VISA ... what the hell is that court called?"), but luckily I grasped all the FISA crosses, including EPPIE, which is where I finished things off (14A: ___ Lederer, a.k.a. Ann Landers). What else to say? I don't know exactly what a D. LITT. is, but I have a Ph.D. in literature so I've seen the designation enough times for it to be familiar. Not sure I love it as fill, but I did love that my professional background ended up being useful For Once. Scott LITT produced some of the biggest albums of the '80s and '90s, including six R.E.M. albums and Indigo Girls' self-titled major-label debut (1989). And he solves crosswords! (don't ask, I just know). Anyway, just throwing that out there in case you are ever looking for an alt-LITT clue.
It ended up being one of those workouts that I appreciate when I'm done with them. A very worthy challenge, loaded with the cinematic (LEE!) / literary ("TO HELEN"!) / philosophical (IDEALISM!) stuff I have come to expect from a KAC puzzle—stuff I happen to like very much. I think DEETS! is my favorite answer of the day, though (42A: Demand during a gossip sesh). I had the "D" and thought "DISH!? DISSH!? ... DIRT!? DIRRT? ... DO TELL!? DO TEL!? ..." But then when I got DEETS! (short for "details!") I thought, "well, yes, that is better." Gave the puzzle a nice colloquial snap, which was very welcome among all of the more recondite stuff. Overall, a proper Saturday challenge.