Merry Christmas, everyone! It’s Clare for the last Tuesday of December, which is coincidentally the day after Christmas. Hope everyone had a lovely holiday and has a great New Year. I solved this with a margarita in one hand while typing with the other, so take things I say with a grain of salt. My family and I did a lot of cooking and watching football and … drinking :) I’ve got next week off of work, so that’ll be pretty great. But I have a hearing at 8:30 a.m. on January 2, so that’ll be fun!
Anywho… onto the puzzle
Relative difficulty:Medium (depending on number of margaritas)
GRID
THEME: TOY BOXES (62A: Places for playthings, with a hint to this puzzle's shaded squares)— Each of the four gray squares form the name of a toy/object
Theme answers:
- KITE
- BIKE
- DRUM
- BALL
- DOLL
- YOYO
Norma Kamali is an American fashion designer. She is best known for the "sleeping bag" coat, garments made from silk parachutes, and versatile multiuse pieces. She reached a peak of fame during the early 1980s with her 1980 "Sweats" collection, a variety of casual garments done in sweatshirt fabric, most famously flounced, hip-yoked miniskirts called rah-rah skirts in the UK, a style she had first presented in other fabrics in 1979. Her work is included in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. (Wiki)
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The puzzle — a debut for the constructor — was pretty fun! I didn’t use the theme at all, but looking back, it was nice to see the different types of toys/gifts one might give or receive on Christmas. TOY BOXES worked as a revealer. There weren’t a ton of long answers for this puzzle, and it felt like there was a lot of crosswordese — DONS, APOP, DADA, END, ING, TOP, CUE, SOD, etc… There just weren’t a lot of other memorable words in this puzzle. LIKE LIKE (10D: Have a crush on, cutesily) was one of the longest answers, and I really didn’t like like it. And I strongly disliked OTPIMUMS(41A: Best-case scenarios). That’s not a plural you ever see. Hated BUB (1A: Fwlla), though maybe that’s just me.
But having BUGLES (1D: Some military brass?) near BEAGLES (3D: Long-eared hound) and then PALES (8A: Lightens up?) above ALBINO (15A: Lacking pigment) seemed deliberate, which I liked. Also, having DODOS (56A: Extinct birds of Mauritius) (who were doomed) above MT DOOM (60A: Volcanic peak ruled by Sauron in "The Lord of the Rings") and GRANDKID (16A: Frequent object of doting attention) above LEGO SET (19A: Gift for a budding architect, maybe) were nice. I enjoyed the little legal answers in the puzzle, with PLEAS (8D: "Not guilty," e.g.), ABETTOR (9D: Partner in crime), and DAS (35A: Govt. prosecutors). And I liked the clues for some of the typical words. Like TEN (62D: What's rolled to get from Free Parking to Go to Jail, in Monopoly). SAG (62D: What's rolled to get from Free Parking to Go to Jail, in Monopoly), and SAD (7D: Disconsolate).
It’s still Christmas, so that’s about all I have to say. Off to continue watching the 49ers lose to the stupid Ravens and to watch the Doctor Who Christmas episode! Happy holidays, everyone.
Misc.:
Signed, Clare Carroll, the ghost of Christmas future
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Misc.:
- My dad kinda babysat my friend’s kid and now says he wants a GRANDKID. My sister and I will get right on that, Dad!
- I think this Christmas break calls for a re-watch of all the Lord of the Rings movies (extended editions, of course) to see all about MT DOOM and how it was destroyed.
- I still remember dressing up as minions to go see “Despicable Me 2,” where GRU (32D:"Despicable Me" protagonist) tries to give up his life of crime. My sister, friend, and I wore overalls, yellow shirts, and black round glasses. We looked pretty epic, if I do say so myself.
- YOU’RE IT (58A: Words that start a game of tag) and GRANDKID worked well with the theme of TOY BOXES.
See you in the new year!
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