Hexagon bordering two rectangles / THU 3-16-23 / Kayak alternative / What Do You popular modern party game / Creatures described as anguilliform

Theme answers:

• SPEEDWALKING (17A: Form of racing that requires one foot on the ground at all times)
• TANGLED WEB (26A: Complicated situation)
• "WOULD WE EVER!" (38A: "Count us in!")
• TWEEDLE-DUM (52A: "Through the Looking-Glass" character)

Word of the Day: "What Do You MEME?" (1A: What Do You ___? (popular modern party game)) —

What Do You Meme? is a humorous party card game from Jerry Media in which players propose caption cards as a match to a designated photo (or meme) card. The judge of the round chooses the caption that they think is the best match to photo card, and whoever played that card gets a point. The name of the game refers to internet memes and is a play on the phrase what do you mean. The game has been compared to Cards Against Humanity. The game was created by Elliot Tebele and Ben Kaplan in 2016. It was launched on Kickstarter on June 14, 2016, and it exceeded its goal of $10,000. The following year, in 2017, it was the 9th best selling game on Amazon. (wikipedia)

I like the idea of a WEED tumbling across the grid a lot, but there's a question of ... I DUNNO, physics? ... that is making me dizzy as I try to follow the "tumbling." So ... there are three different kinds of movement involved, by my count. There's our movement through the "WEED," which is west to east / left to right, with that little two-letter jump (up over and down) every time we hit a "WEED." Then there's the "WEED" itself, which you read clockwise, but which tumbles counterclockwise. So, 1. us moving through it 2. the movement of "WEED" itself in any given configuration, and 3. the tumbling. All different. Madness. The only thing about it that I really don't like is that the "WEED" is allegedly "tumbling" through the grid (according to the revealer clue) but if it's "tumbling" in a counterclockwise direction (which it is) then that means it should be moving west / left at all times, so ... how does it get from the NW corner to the NE corner. You can see how it "tumbles" very nicely from NE corner to SW corner, as the letters in "WEED" rotate counterclockwise, but that first "tumble" makes no sense to me. You cannot call attention to the mechanics of tumbling and then not have the "tumbling" make physical sense. Well, you can, and you have, but it's maddening. Maybe the "WEED" tumbles off-grid and back on again? Again, I DUNNO. I've seen this up and over and down again thing done with theme answers before, in other themes, but the revealer puts a cool twist on the concept. I just wish the "tumbling" made a bit more visual sense to me.

That said, I like the theme answers themselves a lot. "WOULD WE EVER!" is particularly inventive—and very hard to parse (the toughest themer to get, for me, by far). Other "inventive" answers in the puzzle weren't always as pleasing. Along with "WOULD WE EVER!," these other "inventive" answers were the toughest things in the grid, but unlike "WOULD WE EVER!," they didn't quite hit the mark, seeming more "made up" than "inventive." I would absolutely buy "PUH-LEASE" (or even "PUH-LEEZE" or "PUH-LEAZE" or something nuts like that), but I am not really buying "SUH-WEET." I mean, yeah, I can hear someone holding the "S" part longer, for emphasis, but this spelling feels jury-rigged. I just don't hear the "UH" sound so much—it's more like the "S" gets its own syllable, and then the "WEET." Anyway, I had "SO SWEET!" there at first, as did probably a lot of people. This made the NE a bit hard. [I made it harder on myself by confusing ELSA and ILSA (again!) (10A: Who says "Play it, Sam" in "Casablanca").] But even if the spelling on "SUH-WEET!" is suspect to me, I like its moxie. I cannot say the same about MIDGUT, which is just awful. I don't believe in it, in that I don't believe it is a place that is real. Further, that clue, what the hell. [Intestine's place]? First, which intestine?, and second, your intestines are alllllll over your "gut." I would argue that they *are* your gut, are synonymous with your gut (with your guts, for sure). It sure would be nice if "gut" were an actual medical term, because maybe that would lend some clarity here. The point is that I had the "M" and needed almost every single cross to get ... well, an answer that I've never heard (despite having a father who was a physician and a mother who was a nurse and a stepmother who was a nurse and a sister who *is* a nurse). It gave me an unpleasant feeling in my MIDGUT, that one.

There are six cheater squares in this one, which is a lot, under normal circumstances. Cheater squares are the black squares that do not add to the word count and have no bearing on theme answer placement—unnecessary black squares that are there solely to make filling the grid easier. Today, see the black squares immediately after ARK ARGON and ADLIBS (and their symmetrical counterparts). In a theme this dense and complicated, I have absolutely no problem taking pressure off the grid with cheaters in order to make the fill come out clean. There are times when cheaters can seem like crutches, but I don't think that's the case today. Anyway, that's why the grid looks kind of choppy and black square-riddled toward the center there. 

Once again we have two UPs in the grid (MEET-UPS, STAY UP), and once again I don't care. Aside from the "inventive" answers mentioned above, the only trouble spots were the "popular modern" party game at 1A (proving once again, as if proof were needed, that I am neither popular nor modern (nor invited to many parties), and EDWIN, who I very much forgot existed (4D: Singer McCain with the 1998 hit "I'll Be"), though man that song is now in my head and I'm none too happy about it. One of them waltzy sea-chantey-esque songs like "Iris" by the Goo-Goo Dolls (also 1998! it was a fad!). OK, I'm gonna play "Dancing Queen" to get it out of my head now. See you tomorrow.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld 

P.S. [Kayak alternative] is EXPEDIA because here Kayak refers to the travel booking website

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