Platte River people / WED 2-1-23 / 2018 John Travolta flop / Half of D

Theme answers:

• Science fiction vessel-- FLYING SAUCER
• Trash hauler [Mooooooo!]-- SCOW
  
• Science fiction vessel-- MOTHERSHIP
• Place for a drink while traveling [Hoooonk!]-- BAR CAR
• Science fiction vessel-- SPACE CRAFT
• 1976 hit by heart [Heeeelp!]-- MAGIC MAN
• Science fiction energy rays that may suck up earthly bodies, as depicted three times in this puzzle-- TRACTOR BEAMS

Word of the Day: IMAGO (Adult stage in insects) —

In biology, the imago (Latin for "image") is the last stage an insect attains during its metamorphosis, its process of growth and development; it is also called the imaginal stage, the stage in which the insect attains maturity. It follows the final ecdysis of the immature instars.

Hello besties! Thanks in advance for tuning in to another Malaika MWednesday. I'll start with a little update... Last time I was here, I speculated that I knew one of the constructors of the puzzle from elementary school. Well, I was right! She read the post and reached out to me, and now perhaps we will record a crossword puzzle podcast together. That was a fun reminder for me that these blog posts are nice because they allow us to use a fairly individual activity in order to make connections with other people.

Other things.... My solving snack for today was plain potato chips sprinkled generously with chaat masala. And my solving music was this SZA song which makes me want to weep in the shower. Onwards!

Y'all, I struggled so much with this. And actually, I'm still not 100% sure I got everything that's going on. If I've missed an aspect of this puzzle, please correct me in the comments-- I read every single one of them. Lots of things slowed me down here.

First of all, we had some long across answers that had nothing to do with the theme at all-- KLEPTOCRATIC was brand new to me in a way where I thought maybe the theme was going to be invented words. (BALLET DANCER made me realize these were just there as non-theme entries.) And then SCOW was also new to me!! I've never heard this word in my life. So I wondered if maybe the vertical "beamed" answers were going to be nonsense words.

Once I was able to click COW with the [Moooo!] in the clue, I felt like the next "beamed" entry should be another animal-- a goose, obviously, to go along with [Hoooonk!]. Boy was I wrong. An added element of confusion for me was the way these "beamed" entries were hidden. A COW has nothing to do with a SCOW at all-- it's just some letters inside the word. By contrast, a BAR CAR is indeed a CAR and a MAGIC MAN is indeed a MAN. Some people nitpick a lot about these inconsistencies, and some people not at all-- I only do so when the inconsistencies greatly slowed down my grasp of the theme, and that was the case here.

And the kicker for me was that I have never heard of the term TRACTOR BEAMS. So then I was trying to reckon TRACTOR with CAR, and getting nowhere. I am a huuuge fan of revealers, because they tie the puzzle together. But this revealer didn't do that for me, and so I think I would have preferred the puzzle without it! (The visual of a UFO beaming up an earthly item feels pretty familiar-- I don't need an explainer.) What do y'all think? Was this term known to you? Did it help you "get" the puzzle?

Bullets:

• [Ingredient in a hurricane] for RUM— This was easy for me since I am very familiar with the hurricane cocktail. In February 2020 I made several gallons of hurricane punch (pictured above) for a big house party we had and it was a hit.
• [East Coast Amtrak service with the fastest trains in the Americas] for ACELA — My favorite depressing fact about the ACELA is that, while it is the fastest train service in the US, only 10% of it is fast enough to qualify as high speed rail. I went to high school in Italy and would frequently take (as a 15yr old!!) the amazingly efficient Frecciarossa and Frecciargento trains. I wish we had anything like that here.
• [1976 hit by Heart] for MAGIC MAN —1976?? Phew!! That is trivia that is not for me. I had "Manic Man" here at first, since the crossing (IMAGO) is a word that's totally new to me. I know exactly one song by Heart and the only reason I know it is because Fergie covered it when I was in elementary school.
  

xoxo Malaika

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