Constructor: Kate Chin Park
Relative difficulty: Medium
![]()
THEME: none
Word of the Day: TAI (45D: Language group of Southeast Asia) —
![]()
This one felt hard, but I think that's because I've been plowing through Easy after Easy for so long that I forgot what Normal felt like. Most of my trouble today involved getting started—as usual, the back half was much easier than the front, the top much harder than the bottom. But once I did get started, the answers started to pop like pop corn. You know how when you start popping popcorn (I'm thinking microwave here, but however you make it) and at first there's nothing. No pops. And then you get one, and then three, and then a whole bunch in rapid succession. That's what solving felt like today. Is it ever gonna pop!? And then it did a little. And then it did a lot. And much of what was popping was indeed tasty, which made the initial struggles seem mostly worthwhile. I tried working the short stuff in the NW at first, and got nowhere. 1A: Carrier letters (USS) did nothing for me (much later, when I had U-S in place, I still wanted a wrong answer: UPS). Then in the next block over, the only short thing I could get for certain was OBI (6D: Adornment for a kimono). I inferred the "S" at the end of 8D: Decides to leave and from there wrote in SPA DAYS at 26A: They might be booked for getaways (SITTERS); that was brutal. First long answer I put in the grid and it's wrong. But it got me SPY (27D: Plant with bugs, say) ... but then that got me SEEDY, which was also wrong (34A: Run-down = RATTY). So my first two answers of over four letters were both wrong. Nice! Luckily I figure this out reasonably quickly and from SIC (21D: Bracketed qualification) and CATNAP (31A: Forty winks) I start to make progress, and then eventually pop! pop! I got POINT TAKEN (10D: "Fair enough") and "I'M NOT A ROBOT" (9D: Testament to human nature?), huge helpers which were also huge winners. From there, it felt like I had my bearings and the rest of the puzzle was not such a struggle. I took a weird route (NE, NW, SE, SW), but I never really got stuck again.
More:![]()
[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]
Relative difficulty: Medium
Word of the Day: TAI (45D: Language group of Southeast Asia) —
The Tai, Zhuang–Tai, or Daic languages (Thai: ภาษาไท or ภาษาไต, transliteration: p̣hās̛̄āthay or p̣hās̛̄ātay, RTGS: phasa thai or phasa tai; Lao: ພາສາໄຕ, Phasa Tai) are a branch of the Kra–Dai language family. The Tai languages include the most widely spoken of the Tai–Kadai languages, including Standard Thai or Siamese, the national language of Thailand; Lao or Laotian, the national language of Laos; Myanmar's Shan language; and Zhuang, a major language in the Southwestern China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, spoken by the Zhuang people (壯), the largest minority ethnic group in China, with a population of 15.55 million, living mainly in Guangxi, the rest scattered across Yunnan, Guangdong, Guizhou and Hunan provinces.
• • •
I love that the boldest answer of the day is sitting dead center. "IS PEPSI OK?" feels risky, somehow. It's so situation-specific, so on the edge of "is this a thing?" I'm glad she pulled the trigger on it, though, 'cause I think it's great. Like, when I imagine the situation (someone ordering a Coke at a non-Coke-having restaurant), that response from the waitress (or waiter, server, whatever ... in my head it's a waitress) is dead-on. Perfect. Exactly what she would say. And then the customer either says "sure," or sighs sadly and says "sure," or else makes a disgusted face and says "god no" and orders a Sprite. Some people are Very particular about Coca-Cola, what can I say? I don't get it, but I respect it. The colloquialness felt less apt at 20A: "I'll take the blame"("IT'S ON ME"). The basic idea definitely tracks, but the phrase I hear in my head is "THAT'S ON ME." Whereas "IT'S ON ME" still feels like a treating phrase—something you say when you pick up the tab. Also, while I don't think it's wrong, I am unfamiliar with however ITERATE is being used today (42D: Develop through experimentation). ITERATE to me conveys repetition, not experimentation. I guess that you repeat ... experiments. And you bring out different iterations of products, presumably making them better as you develop them. But the connection between clue and word felt tenuous, or like a step was missing. ITERATE = repeat. If you don't have the idea of "repetition" somewhere in your ITERATE clue, I'm not gonna get it. I had ITER- and stared like "well, it can only be ITERATE but ... I better wait and see."
There was the usual handful of Things I Don't Know today. The only one of these I actively resented was 18A: Stanley Tucci's character in "The Devil Wears Prada" (NIGEL). A secondary character in an eighteen-year-old movie I never saw in the first place? Bah. TUCCI I know, NIGEL no. But at least it was a name I could infer (which I did, off of --G-L). Didn't know the ROSEN guy either (61A: Nathan ___, physicist who collaborated with Einstein on a theory of wormholes). Wanted to put BOSON in there, thinking of (maybe?) the Higgs-BOSON particle, is that a thing? ... Yes! Though it's just Higgs boson or Higgs particle, and BOSON is not a guy's name, sigh. I did not know Maya Angelou's "STILL I RISE" was a "classic poem," but I guess it fits. I know about the poem primarily from the Clinton inauguration, though maybe it's been featured in ads or other things I've seen on TV. The only Angelou I've ever read is I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. My ignorance of modern poetry, and "STILL I RISE" in particular—that's on me (!). Way more mad at NIGEL than I am at "STILL I RISE" (at which I'm not mad at all).
More:
- 4A: Stuff of substance? (ATOMS)— really hurt me. Just couldn't make anything out of it for a while. It's in a SUPER-important position—a short answer at the front ends of a bunch of other short answers that cross the longer answers in the NW—and getting it would've been huge. But nope. Locked out. For a while.
- 50A: Part of a violin quartet? (PEG) — not really sure why there's a "?" on this clue. There are four PEGs on a violin. A group of four is a quartet. I get that you're doing a misdirection thing (playing on the idea of a "quartet" as a piece of music), but you're going to misdirect a lot more effectively if you just leave the "?" off. The clue is literally accurate with it off, so leave it off.
- 55A: Preference for long-legged types, maybe (AISLE) — as a long-legged type myself, I have historically preferred the AISLE, it's true, but you have to have a pretty high tolerance for being run into by the drink cart etc. as well as a high tolerance for getting up and down as you let the other people in your row get up to use the bathroom. My general experience with airplane seats is that they're all uncomfortable so it doesn't really matter. I often sit in the middle seat because my wife prefers the window, and I have no real preference.
- 5D: 10-digit no. (TEL.) — anyone else want SSN and then count it out and realize you're off by one? No one? Oh well.
- 13D: Card letters (STL) — one of those old trick clues that I saw through instantly, which gave me a Desperately Needed toehold in the NE. The St. Louis Cardinals (also called "the Cards") have the letters STL on their (baseball) caps.
- 63A: Something made for a dinner, for short (RES) — short for "reservation." Seriously (if briefly) thought "What the hell kind of food is RES?"
- 8D: Decides to leave (STETS)— "STET" is an editorial mark, reversing a deletion. I like that STETS is alongside SIC (21D: Bracketed qualification). "Leave it as it was" alongside "I left this as it was, I know it's a mistake, don't blame me, it's the original author's error."
- 53D: Alt tab? (LSD)— is the idea that a "tab" of LSD alt...ers your perception? That LSD is a mind-"alt"ering drug? It's a stretch, but as with "IS PEPSI OK?," I have to admire the daring on this one. Nice surface level misdirection, clever wordplay. I'll take it.
[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]