Lowest part of a glacier / THU 11-17-22 / Flax fabric / Anxiety about not being included in modern lingo / Body parts that are rested at the optometrist's / Mount that inspired the song Funiculi Funicula / French-developed form of cooking in a precisely temperature-controlled water bath / Serving that might have a solid heart or simple tulip design

Constructor: Hoang-Kim Vu and Jessica Zetzman

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME:"LEAVE ME / OUT OF IT" (45D: With 42-Down, "I don't want anything to do with this!" ... or a hint to the answers to the starred clues) — you have to ignore all the "ME"s in the grid in order to make sense of the answers in which they appear; that is, "ME" has been added to a number of words, creating phantom (unclued) words—if you "leave ME out of it" ... now all your clues make sense:

Theme answers:

• LINEMEN (4D: *Flax fabric)
• REMEDIAL (20A: *Call again, on a rotary phone)
• MEAD (24A: *Promo)
• MELEE (18: *Spike ___)
• LO MEIN (26A: *Cut of pork)
• MENORAH (37A: *Grammy-winning Jones)
• EMENDS (22A: *They may be split or bitter)
• FOMENTS (10D: *Courier and Papyrus for two)
• DEEMED (48A: *Important closing document)
• "I'M HOME!" (51A: *Lead-in to texter's perspective)
• NAMES (59A: *#5 on Billboard's Best Rappers of All Time list)
• MERV (64A: *One parked at a park, in brief)

Word of the Day: SERRA da Estrela (25D: ___ da Estrela (Portuguese mountain range)) —

Serra da Estrela (Portuguese pronunciation: [ˈsɛʁɐ ðɐ (ɨ)ʃˈtɾelɐ]) is the highest mountain range in Continental Portugal. Together with the Serra da Lousã it is the westernmost constituent range of the Sistema Centraland also one of the highest in the system. It includes mainland Portugal's highest point at 1,993 metres (6,539 feet) above mean sea level (although the summit of Mount Pico in the Portuguese Azores islands is higher). This point is not a distinctive mountain summit, but rather the highest point in a plateau, being known as Torre ("Tower" in English). Torre is an unusual summit in that it is accessible by a paved road. The peak has a topographic prominence of 1,204 m (3,950 ft) and its parent peak is Pico Almanzor, in Spain. [...] The Cão da Serra da Estrela (Estrela Mountain Dog) is a breed of livestock guardian dog that takes its name from this region.  

Queijo Serra da Estrela (Serra da Estrela cheese) is a soft cheese from the region of Serra da Estrela. The recipe is more than 2000 years old. It is made from cardoon thistle, raw sheep's milk and salt. The cheese is soft and gooey. The cheese becomes harder and chewier as time goes by. (wikipedia)

One of those puzzles where I was tempted to go down and find the revealer early, just so I could get the gimmick quicker and move things along. Actually, I *did* go down to find the revealer, but I just looked at the clue, saw it was long and complicated and two-part, and just went back to hacking away at the grid up top. Puzzles with unclued answers are always (well, often) a bear of a challenge. You kinda sorta expect the clues to play fair, and for the answers to match the clues. The answers do, of course, match the clues ... eventually ... once you figure out the whole "ditch ME" angle. But getting started without any guidelines—rough. I knew something very gimmicky was afoot pretty early, as the NW corner was super easy and then ... nothing. Thankfully, the stars on the relevant clues let me know that the answers I couldn't get were tough *for a reason*. A truly tough version of this puzzle wouldn't have bothered to star the clues. I think I would've respected that version more, but it definitely would've taken me longer. As for the theme, well, there's a lot of it. I'd put this in the category of More Constructionally Impressive than Fun To Solve, though it wasn't a drag, by any means, and there was something ... original and engaging about the particular challenge of seeing around the ME's. Mostly adding ME's doesn't really add any enjoyment—it just changes the word—but there was one big exception: "I'M HOME!" I actually laughed at that one. That is some very creative, completely transformative ME-adding. You've really gotta break up the "real" answer (IMHO) and repunctuate it and turn the letters into actual words and everything. Just Add "ME" and watch your overfamiliar texting initialism take exciting new form! I also kinda liked the conversion (!) of NORAH Jones.I must have seen that REDIAL was "hidden" or involved in some way in 20A: *Call again, on a rotary phone (REMEDIAL), and then seen that ME's were also involved in the NE part of the grid as well, though when I took this screenshot, I hadn't worked it all out perfectly (you can see I have AMENDS instead of EMENDS in there—probably just a hasty first stab). Once the theme dropped, the difficulty dropped as well. There were a few things I didn't know, but they didn't hold me up much. Never heard of that Portuguese mountain range, or of LOLA Kirke (50A: Actress Kirke of "Mozart in the Jungle"). LOLA had me slightly worried for a bit, since four-letter women's names can go All Kinds of Ways, and she appears in a thickly thematic area *and* crosses another answer I was having trouble seeing (48D: Put out = DOUSED). But it all came steadily together. I just circled that section until the letters were undeniable, and then finished up in the SE, where ... look, I know I have complained in the past about duplicate clues (where often one of them feels forced) and cross-references (which can awkwardly send you all over hell and gone just to find the second part of your answer), so this may sound weird, but I can't believe that the clue on ENVY didn't get the same treatment as the clue on EMMY (67A: Award that sounds like two letters of the alphabet). I mean, they cross each other. They both sound like two letters of the alphabet. That's a paired cluing opportunity made in heaven. But instead of [Sin that sounds like two letters of the alphabet], ENVY just gets the dullish [Member of a noted septet]. I can't believe the puzzle has me out here advocating for cutesy clue twinning, but times are strange, what can I say? See you tomorrow.