Constructor: Laura Taylor Kinnel
Relative difficulty: Medium (11:43 on the NYT site, which has an interface I'm not used to, so I felt like I was stumbling around a lot)
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THEME:"Season to Taste"— two-part cookie names have their first and last parts clued separately, and the two parts appear on either side of an image; these images turn out to be COOKIE CUTTERS (11A: This puzzle's images, in two different ways), because the image both "cuts" (i.e. divides) the "cookie" name in two and is itself a common Christmas cookie cutter shape (note: the cookie cutter image doesn't have any letter value in the themers themselves, but does in the Down crosses):
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Theme answers:
This was one of those puzzles where I coulda / shoulda just jumped down to the revealer to get a leg up on what the hell was going on, but I'm stubborn, so I just let it unfold top to bottom. Took me longer than it probably should have to realize that the cookies were cookies (PEANUT BUTTER doesn't really scream cookie if it's not in a clearly cookie context), and took me even longer to realize that the shapes were related to COOKIE CUTTERS. Not sure I *fully* grasped that until I hit the revealer at the very end. It's an impressively complex theme, involving a double meaning for "cutter" as well as a double use of the "cutter" square (mere image in the Across, actual answer component in the Down). It's true that you would not use COOKIE CUTTERS on most of these cookies, but that's not really the point. The cookie cutter shapes literally cut cookie names in two. It's wordplay, and that's all it has to be! My only real problem with the theme was that "elf" shape, LOL, what in the world? I mean, look at the grid, above, and you can see *exactly* what the image looked like on my screen, and what it looked like is a chick emerging from an egg? Some weird eagle? It's definitely avian. That square was the last thing I got because a. it looks almost nothing like an "elf" and b. TRUE S(ELF) was somehow hard for me to come up with. Normally when something is hard to come up with, you look to the cross, but in this case the cross was just some weird chicken image, so ... no help. The other images were all pretty self-explanatory, and visually discernible. But "elf," woof, wow. Also, I don't think of "elf" as an iconic cookie cutter shape. I bet if I go downstairs and look at our COOKIE CUTTERS, there's not an elf in the bunch. So the "elf" can take the long-tailed monkey and get the f*&% out of Dodge, as far as I'm concerned, but the rest of the puzzle can definitely stay.
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
Relative difficulty: Medium (11:43 on the NYT site, which has an interface I'm not used to, so I felt like I was stumbling around a lot)
- PEANUT [bell shape] BUTTER // RU(BELL)A (23A: Little tyke / Flatter, with "up" // 6D: It was eliminated from the U.S. in 2004)
- SNICKER [heart shape] DOODLE // (HEART)FELT (33A: Relative of a tee-hee / Bit of marginalia // 36D: Genuine)
- GINGER [tree shape] SNAP // S(TREE)T ART (43A: Pep / Onesie feature // 40D: Some graffiti)
- TOLL [angle shape] HOUSE // T(ANGEL)O (52A: Ring / Hold, as inhabitants // 48D: Citrus hybrid)
- THIN [star shape] MINT // RE(ST AR)EA (69A: Reduce in volume / As new // 58D: Where to go on a trip?)
- FIG [elf shape, allegedly!] NEWTON // TRUE S(ELF) (85A: Kind of leaf / Scientist born on Christmas Day in 1642 // 56D: Personal essence)
- SHORT [cane shape] BREAD // BUC(CANE)ER (93A: Possible result of getting one's wires crossed / Moolah // 77D: Pirate)
- OATMEAL [man shape] RAISIN // TOO (MAN)Y (102A: Breakfast dish / Fruitcake tidbit // 88D: More than enough)
noun
- noun A South American monkey of the genus Cebus in a broad sense. See synonyms under saguin. (wordnik)
• • •
To Will Shortz's enormous credit, he single-handedly and mercifully put an end to the SAI craze of the 20th century. Looks like SAI appeared in two 1994 puzzles, which Shortz probably inherited from Maleska, and then poof, gone, nothing, nada, Never To Return ... until today. That damn monkey roamed the grid with impunity in the last century, with 66 appearances through 1994. And then: *zero* appearances for the next 27 years. And then, tragically: today happened. This makes me sad. But again, though the SAI-less streak has come to an end, it's probably best to focus on the 27-year achievement rather than the one-day failure. So kudos on over a quarter-century sans SAI. It's something to be genuinely proud of.
The fill gets awfully rough in a few places, most notably the west, where there's an awful ENG ANAT RAWR STAUB (?) EYER (!?) avalanche. The less said about Cy the SAI, the better (yes, I named him, now say goodbye to him). But the long Downs today are real winners, and the theme is pretty complex and dense, so I can tolerate the patches of rough fill better than I might have under normal grid conditions.
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I had AIRS before ACTS, AN "M" before AN "I" , TIA before AVE, and DANE before FINN (before DANE decided to actually show up later in the solve, with the same clue). Also had WET before SOT because WET is a 1000% better answer and also I can't believe we're still doing SOT (120D: Teetotaler's opposite). Had trouble parsing DR. FAUCI (because of the DR. part) and had less than zero idea what a JASON'S Cradle was (100D: ___ Cradle (maritime rescue device)). That's it for non-thematic struggles, though. Solid, solid Christmastime work.
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
P.S. today is the last day to support the Kickstarter for Peter Gordon's next round of Fireball Newsflash Crosswords (2022!)—20 high-quality current events crosswords focused on names and topics that are in the news at that moment. It's a great way to keep abreast of current events as well as learn names / places / topics before they start showing up in mainstream crosswords. The puzzles are very doable, with any significant difficulty coming primarily from the potential unfamiliarity of much of the newsworthy stuff in the grid rather than from brutally tricky cluing. And in my experience, all the potentially unfamiliar stuff is very fairly crossed, so you're unlikely to get truly stumped. If you're up for an entertaining and informative solving experience, I definitely recommend the Newsflash puzzles. More info here.
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