Constructor: Chase Dittrich
Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium
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THEME:"... with or without the shaded letter"— four answers start with shaded letters (circled letters in the above grid), and the answer fits the clue whether you include that initial letter or not:
Theme answers:
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Was awakened at 2am by the crying of the cat. A needy, desperate crying that was coming from downstairs, which made me worried that she was sick or hurt. Why wasn't she climbing the stairs and coming into our room to bother us like a normal cat, like her brother typically does around 4am? I got worried and hauled myself out of bed and sleepily tottered down the stairs and found the cat (so white she glows in the dark) just sitting in the middle of the living room. She looked at me and was like, "Oh, cool, let's go get me some food" and trotted off to the kitchen. So it seems I have adopted a terrorist and a con artist. Ah well. Lost a full hour of sleep just lying there trying to go back to sleep (with that feeling where you want to sleep but you can hear and feel Everything, ugh). And then once I finally fell asleep the alarm went off, huzzah! So back downstairs, heat up a mug of water, give each cat a handful of kibble to keep them quiet (they don't get fed til I'm done writing!) and now here I am. Tiredness affects me in weird ways. Like, I can be tearing through the grid (as I did through most of this grid) and then hit a clue like 56A: Chardonnay, for one, and have no idea what it could be. "Starts with 'G' ... nope ... 'GRA- ... nope, better come back to it later ... [comes back to it later] ... GRA*E ... what, GRACE? What does that even m- ... oh ... GRAPE ... yes, they do make wine from GRAPEs, I suppose. Fair."
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ALOE ALOU SET-TO before we've even gotten in the room!? I MEAN COME ON! That's awful. Sorry AWFUL (32D: Not just bad). I mean, SET-TO, LOL, that's a word I wouldn't even know existed if I hadn't solved crosswords in the early '90s. I thought it had gone the way of the ADIT, but here we are, SET-TO-ing in the 2020s, great. REI on top of YSL, ARLO duetting with ENYA, INRE NIA PFCS ESSO ALPO ASIAM (ARE NOT!) ASEA. It's a bit wearying. But as I say, those long Downs do a lot to alleviate the pain, so the overall experience was tolerable enough. I think that's all. Little white paws are trying to scrape their way underneath my office door. Luckily they are wee soft paws and she seems to have tired herself out ... for now. I better go before ... god knows what. See you tomorrow.
Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium
Theme answers:
- GOAT MILK (17A: Alternative to 2% ... with or without the shaded letter)
- FACE CARD (31A: It may be half of a blackjack ... with or without the shaded letter)
- EMOTIONS (45A: Things that might be raised in court ... with or without the shaded letter)
- PLAYOFFS (62A: They might eliminate teams ... with or without the shaded letter)
William Theodore Walton III (born November 5, 1952) is an American television sportscaster and former professional basketball player. He played college basketball for coach John Wooden and the UCLA Bruins, winning three consecutive national college player of the year awards (1972–1974), while leading UCLA to NCAA championships in 1972 and 1973 and an 88-game winning streak. After being selected as the first overall pick in the 1974 NBA draft, Walton led the Portland Trail Blazers to an NBA championship in 1977, earning the NBA Finals Most Valuable Player Award that season. He won another NBA title in 1986 as a member of the Boston Celtics. Walton was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 1993. He was named to the NBA's 50th and 75th anniversary teams. [...] After retiring from the NBA, Walton overcame stuttering and embarked on a second career as a sportscaster, working both as a studio analyst and color commentator, mostly for ESPN, with stints for several other networks and teams. He earned an Emmy Award in 1991. Walton is a noted fan of the Grateful Dead, as a self-described "Deadhead", and often mentions them in his broadcasts. He has hosted several podcasts and satellite radio programs featuring the music of the Grateful Dead. (wikipedia)
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Maybe if these "shaded squares" had spelled something, I could've seen the point, but they don't, so I don't. Is "GFEP" something? I pray not. I guess the cluing is kind of inventive at times (with the last two themers, specifically), but the first themer clue involves no effort at all (two kinds of milk, shrug, OK), and I'd say the same about the second themer clue as well ... and throw in the fact that ACE CARD just sounds stupid. Do you really not just call it an "ace"? I thought "lingo" was supposed to abbreviate, clarify, shorten. ACE CARD does none of those things. Of course it's an ACE CARD, we're playing blackjack, what was it going to be, an ACE VASE? An ACE DUNE BUGGY? There's just a so-what quality to the whole theme, and the puzzle seems to know it and is trying real hard to distract you from it with a barrage of long Downs that just scream "look at me! pay no attention to the SO-SO theme!"BUTT DIAL, JAW-DROPPING, "I MEAN COME ON!" and UNDEROOS completely upstage the theme answers as a set. I want them to be the theme. $20 to anyone who can find a theme in BUTT DIAL / JAW-DROPPING / "I MEAN COME ON!" / UNDEROOS, I'm serious.
The lovely set of long Downs were unfortunately offset by a deluge of olden stuff that comes at you right out of the gate. Once again, I stopped and screenshotted the NW corner before I ever left it, so ill-omen-y did it seem.
