Constructor: Daniel Bodily
Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium
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THEME: RUN UP A TAB (36D: Accumulate charges ... or what you must do to answer four clues in this puzzle) — "TAB""runs""up" (i.e. heads north) in four answers containing the letter string "TAB" (the latter parts of the words (i.e., BOWL, BABY, BARS, and BROAD) are all clued separately as well):
Theme answers:
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The revealer may be wonky (to my ears, anyway), but the concept is fresh and fun to work out. I found it pretty easy to uncover, in that there was no way [Postseason game played in Phoenix] was gonna fit in five squares, no matter what the answer was, especially since the answer probably ended in BOWL. I realized quickly it was going to be FIESTA BOWL, and that only FIEST was going to fit, so I just wrote it in and waited to see what happened. Later on, another obvious non-fitter showed up ("SANTA BABY"), so now I was just on the hunt to see where the rest of the answers were going to pop up. Once I got BABY (23A: Pamper), I put two and two (TWOS!) together and figured out the "TAB" connection. The only bit of puzzlement I experienced after that came when (of course) I completely forgot about the theme and was wondering why WENT was an acceptable answer for (68A: Traveled to another country). "WENT!? That's awful. Just ... WENT!?" Well, no, not just WENT: WENT ABROAD. I think I only noticed that that was a themer much later, maybe after I was done, and I saw that the puzzle said that there were *four* TABs that had been run up, but I remembered only three. The cluing on the fill seemed reasonably tough, but for some reason it didn't hold me up much. It was a toughness I could see through without much struggle.
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Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium
Theme answers:
- FIESTA BOWL (20A: Postseason game played in Phoenix)
- "SANTA BABY" (31A: Holiday hit by Eartha Kitt)
- PASTA BARS (57A: All-you-can-eat venues with elbows and bow ties)
- WENT ABROAD (68A: Traveled to another country)
Esau is the elder son of Isaac in the Hebrew Bible. He is mentioned in the Book of Genesis and by the prophets Obadiah and Malachi. The Christian New Testament alludes to him in the Epistle to the Romans and in the Epistle to the Hebrews. [...] Esau, a "man of the field", became a hunter who had "rough" qualities that distinguished him from his twin brother. Among these qualities were his redness and noticeable hairiness. Jacob was a plain or simple man, depending on the translation of the Hebrew word tam (which also means "relatively perfect man"). Jacob's color was not mentioned. Throughout Genesis, Esau is frequently shown as being supplanted by his younger twin, Jacob (Israel). [...] In Genesis 27:5–7, Rebekah is listening while Isaac speaks to his son Esau. When Esau goes to the field to hunt for venison to bring home, Rebekah says to her son Jacob, "Behold, I heard thy father speak to thy brother Esau, saying: 'Bring me venison and prepare a savoury food, that I may eat, and bless thee before the Lord before my death.'" Rebekah then instructs Jacob in an elaborate deception through which Jacob pretends to be Esau, in order to steal from Esau his blessing from Isaac and his inheritance—which in theory Esau had already agreed to give to Jacob. Jacob follows through with the plan to steal his brother's birthright by bringing the meal his father Isaac requested and pretending to be Esau. Jacob pulled off his disguise by covering himself in hairy lamb skin so that when his blind father went to touch him, his smooth skin did not give him away as an imposter of his hairy brother. Jacob successfully received his father Isaac's blessing. As a result, Jacob became the spiritual leader of the family after Isaac's death and the heir of the promises of Abraham. (wikipedia)
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The only problem with this one is that the more common variation of the revealer phrase is simply "RUN A TAB," so the "UP" feels unnatural / forced to me. "RUN A TAB" googles way better, and most of the top hits for "RUN UP A TAB" are (surprise) now crossword answer-bot sites. But RUN UP A TAB is listed in idiom dictionaries as a variant, and it's certainly intelligible, so ... just roll with it, I guess.
There was some stuff I didn't know (exactly) but could piece together. Never heard of [Kinderklaviers] but "kinder" means "children" in German and "klavier" is ... a keyboard instrument of some kind, right? (see Bach's "The Well-Tempered Clavier"), so with a few crosses, I could infer TOY PIANOS. Poker slang shmoker slang, "ducks" schmucks, no idea there, but TWOS was still relatively easy to pick up (7D: Ducks, in poker). Forgot Mr. Fonsi's first name, but had the "L" and after LEON proved impossible, LUIS just came to me (41A: "Despacito" singer Fonsi). Had the usual SODOI/SOAMI kealoa* hesitation down there in the SE. Would've struggled a lot with 53A: Want (DEARTH) since the clue is so ambiguous, but I came at it from the back end, and even though coming at an answer from the back end *usually* makes it harder to see than coming at it from the front, in this case, that -TH was invaluable for ticking my brain over to the noun meaning of [Want]. Also, DEARTH is one of those words that lives in the Word Museum of my brain full time because I tried to be fancy and use it in a paper when I was fairly young, but I'd only ever *heard* it (thanks, mom), so I figured "mirth,""girth," ... DIRTH. My teacher at the time was like "uh ... nice word ... but no." I had a similar school-related fiasco in the other direction once—had only *seen* the word "episcopal" and in U.S. History I was called upon to read a passage containing a related word, "episcopacy," which came out "epi-SCOP-a-see" (again, inferring "episode,""epidermis," etc., where the stress goes on the *third* syllable). Has DEARTH VADER ever been a theme answer—seems like you could do something with that. [The Force was really, really not with him?].
I wanted the [High degree] (PH.D.) to be NTH, but that's the only other slip-up I remember. Oh, same section, I had some trouble with DEMO (short for "demolish"), as my brain wanted only RAZE, even though that's not an "informal" term (38A: Bring down, informally). If you don't know SYFY it's a good channel to commit to memory. I'd've been (briefly) lost without it in the NE. Thrilled to learn that PEZ were "originally marketed as a smoking cessation aid" (63D). Where was this useful information when I was quitting!? You know what my "smoking cessation aid" was? Crossword puzzles! I had no idea what you were supposed to do with your hands when you were sitting there drinking your coffee in the cafe in the morning, so ... hey, they have newspapers in this cafe, maybe I'll just ... hmmm, an empty grid ... well, *someone's* gotta fill it in." And off I went. And now off I go. See you tomorrow.
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
*kealoa = short, common answer that you can't just fill in quickly because two or more answers are viable, Even With One or More Letters In Place. From the classic [Mauna ___] KEA/LOA conundrum. See also, e.g. [Heaps] ATON/ALOT, ["Git!"] "SHOO"/"SCAT," etc.
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