Constructor: Enrique Henestroza Anguiano and Matthew Stock
Relative difficulty: Easy
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THEME:"Rack 'Em Up" — Scrabble-themed puzzle where blue squares represent TRIPLE LETTER SCOREs (65A: Scrabble bonus seen six times in this puzzle), i.e. in the Across answers, you have to count that letter three times). The blue squares spell out POINTS, which is ... a Scrabble-related term (of no particular relevance to how the theme actually works):
Theme answers:
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Scrabble themes. They ... won't go away, apparently. I don't enjoy Scrabble, but still I'm vaguely aware of how it works, and I don't quite get what "SCORE" (or "POINTS") has to do with the theme. You have to triple the blue letters in order to make sense of the Across answers in which they appear, but there's no "SCORE" involved. No scoring. Are the values of the letters involved relevant? If you triple the point values of the actual Scrabble tiles involved, do you ... get something? Do you unlock the secret of the universe? Is the total 42? The revealer clue says that TRIPLE LETTER SCORE is a "bonus seen six times in this puzzle" but I don't see the SCORE part. Seems like the clue should have a "?" on it. You mean (I think) that there's a "triple letter" involved. Maybe "SCORE" is being used very very loosely here. Like, you have to "score" the letter (i.e. "interpret" it?) as three letters. I dunno. The whole thing felt very basic, and the blue-letter revealer (POINTS) felt extremely anticlimactic. Again, maybe there is some numerological stuff going on and I'm just not seeing it because I don't play Scrabble and don't care. If that's so, I'll add something to the write-up later about how there's math I didn't get. Wouldn't be the first time I'd missed some aspect of the theme.
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Relative difficulty: Easy
Theme answers:
- IN-APP PURCHASE (22A: Extra lives or additional gems, for a freemium game)
- "I'M TOO OLD FOR THIS NOW" (31A: "The kids these days have gotten way better than me")
- HAWAII ISLANDERS (48A: Former minor-league team that played at Aloha Stadium)
- CNN NEWS HEADLINE (84A: Something delivered by Jake Tapper or Anderson Cooper)
- KRISTIN SCOTT THOMAS (98A: "The English Patient" actress)
- BUSINESS SENSE (115A: Executive's acumen)
Eve Jihan Cooper (née Jeffers; born November 10, 1978) is an American rapper, singer, and actress. Her debut studio album, Let There Be Eve...Ruff Ryders' First Lady (1999) reached number one on the Billboard 200—making her the third female rapper to accomplish this feat—and received double platinum certification by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). The album spawned the hit singles "What Ya Want" (featuring Nokio), "Love Is Blind," and "Gotta Man." That same year, she guest featured on The Roots' Grammy Award-winning single "You Got Me" as well as Missy Elliott's single "Hot Boyz," which peaked within the top ten of the Billboard Hot 100.Eve's second studio album, Scorpion (2001) was released to similar success. Its lead single, "Let Me Blow Ya Mind" (featuring Gwen Stefani) won her and Stefani the inaugural Grammy Award for Best Rap/Sung Collaboration and an MTV Video Music Award, while peaking at number two on the Billboard Hot 100. Her third album, Eve-Olution (2002) found continued success and yielded the single "Gangsta Lovin'" (featuring Alicia Keys), which likewise peaked at number two on the chart. The album also spawned the Dr. Dre-produced single "Satisfaction," which, along with her 2007 single "Tambourine" and guest performance on City High's 2001 single "Caramel," peaked within the top 40 of the Billboard Hot 100. She also guest featured on Gwen Stefani's Grammy Award-nominated 2004 single "Rich Girl," which received double platinum certification by the RIAA. After parting ways with Interscope Records, Eve released her fourth studio album, Lip Lock (2013) as her first independent project.
As an actress, she starred as Terri Jones in the comedy drama films Barbershop, Barbershop 2: Back in Business, and Barbershop: The Next Cut, and played the lead role of Shelley Williams on the UPNtelevision sitcom Eve. Eve also had supporting roles in the drama film The Woodsman (2004), the comedy film The Cookout (2004) and the horror film Animal (2014). From 2017 to 2020, she co-hosted the CBS Daytime talk show The Talk, where she was nominated for two Daytime Emmy Award. (wikipedia)
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I started the puzzle in Black Ink (my solving software of choice) but the notes said something about "blue squares" and I could see no blue squares in my grid, so I dutifully switched over to the NYTXW website in order to solve the puzzle. I didn't really need those blue squares—that is, the puzzle seems like it would've been easily solvable without them, but with them, it was a cinch, especially once you picked up on the gimmick. My main issue with the theme execution is how made-up some of the themers seem. HAWAII ISLANDERS? Does anyone know what that is? Who the hell knows former minor league teams that well. It was easy enough to piece together, but generally I think that if the answer wouldn't fly in a non-thematic context (and HAWAII ISLANDERS definitely wouldn't), it doesn't have much business in the puzzle as a themer either. I gave serious sideeye to "I'M TOO OLD FOR THIS NOW" as well. The "NOW" part is ... struggling. Very forced. "I'M TOO OLD FOR THIS" works great on its own. Add the "NOW" and you've got an obvious case of "I had to make this answer match the length of corresponding theme answer, for symmetry's sake." What I really wanted to write in was "I'M TOO OLD FOR THIS S***!" (mostly because that was how I was feeling as I solved yet another Scrabble-themed puzzle—live long enough, and they just keep coming at you). CNN NEWS HEADLINE also feels entirely made-up. Like, yes, that is a thing, but it's not nearly enough of a thing to be a standalone answer. I mean, by definition, the thing they say is a CNN NEWS HEADLINE because they are CNN NEWS anchors (???). Bizarre.
Had BUSINESSSAVVY before BUSINESSSENSE and was much happier that way. SENSE was yet another anticlimactic moment. Why couldn't you make SAVVY work there. It's a much snappier word than mere SENSE. Sigh. There were some answers I did enjoy. I think KRISTIN SCOTT THOMAS is the best of the themers. I enjoy her in anything I see her in, the latest thing being the Apple TV series "Slow Horses." I also like SWEET CORN and BRUSCHETTA and MAPLE GLAZE, yum. And overall, I thought the quality of the fill was pretty strong, or at least solid. I don't recall wincing very much, if at all. Oh, that clue on TSE, yipes (97A: Cyrillic letter pronounced like the "zz" of "pizza"). I might've winced at that. The most obscure clue, and you put it on the absolute worst bit of fill you've got? Why? Why would you do that? Don't put a flashing neon sign on the bad stuff. Just let people get it with the most ordinary of clues and Move Along. Cyrillic letter!? LOL, no. You've already got another foreign (Greek) letter in the grid (ETA), you don't need more.
Not many trouble spots today. Struggled with both DNA (35A: Two-million-year-old discovery in 2022 in the frozen soil of Greenland) and MOP (41A: Shaggy hairstyle), but thankfully DMITIRI Mendeleev came to the rescue. Had LEASH at 1A: New dog owner's purchase (CRATE), but discarded it as soon as I realized I couldn't get any of the crosses to work. After that, no wrong guesses that I can recall. Oh, nope, spoke too soon. I definitely had "NOT SO!" before "BUT NO!" at 11D: "Au contraire!" but BTS came to the rescue (weird how I can know virtually nothing about a band and it will still come to my rescue—solve crosswords long enough and you get very friendly with answers you actually know nothing about!) (11A: Pop group with an "army"). This puzzle added to my store of EMU lore, which is nice. They're tall, they run fast, they're from Australia, they lay big green eggs ... and they have "deep booming calls." I'm curious, now, about what that means. Let's see if we can find out ... ah, cool, here we go. And this video contains even more lore—two sets of eyelids, what!?
Speaking of birds ... check out this Sri Lankan money someone sent me earlier this year, during my annual $$$-raising week!
I can't really spend it, but I can admire it. I wish we had birds on our money. Besides the eagle, I mean. Wait, is the eagle even on our money, or is that just the quarter? Oh yeah, there it is, right across from the loopy one-eyed pyramid on the $1 bill.
Still, though, we can do better than an oddly splayed eagle. Realistic portraits of different birds are so much nicer than portraits of dour old white guys. And why do we still have monochrome money!? So boring. Now that no one uses cash anymore, I say it's time to mix it up. I want orange crows, blue owls, purple condors! We've had this off-green crap long enough.