Discontinued competitor of Coke Zero / MON 8-12-24 / When repeated, sound effect for Cookie Monster / Cryptid in the Scottish Highlands / "Ho, ho, ho!" hollerer / Bluey or Snoopy / Indian yogurt drink / Arkham ___ institution for many Batman foes / "Billions" airer, for short

Theme answers:

• TOOTH FAIRY (17A: *One leaving money under a pillow)
• IMAGINARY FRIEND (22A: *Hobbes, vis-à-vis Calvin)
• LOCH NESS MONSTER (46A: *Cryptid in the Scottish Highlands)
• SANTA CLAUS (53A: *"Ho, ho, ho!" hollerer)

Word of the Day: PEPSI ONE (10D: Discontinued competitor of Coke Zero) —

Pepsi One, corporately styled PEPSI ONE (so named because it contains one calorie per eight-fluid ounce [230 ml] serving), was a sugar-free cola, marketed by PepsiCo in the United States as an alternative to regular Pepsi and Diet Pepsi. // On June 30, 1998, the artificial sweetener acesulfame potassium (Ace-K) was approved for use by the Food and Drug Administration. PepsiCo responded within one hour, announcing the introduction of Pepsi One (which reached store shelves the following October). The original formulation was sweetened with aspartame and acesulfame potassium. This new variety was based upon an earlier product (sold in other countries) called Pepsi Max, but it featured a formula and flavor profile developed specifically for the U.S. market. // The launch of Pepsi One included an advertising campaign featuring the slogan "just one calorie." Subsequently, comedian Tom Green appeared as the spokesperson in a series of television advertisements that began airing in April 1999 [...] In January 2014, Consumer Reports magazine tested levels of the chemical 4-methylimidazole (4-MeI) – a potential carcinogen – in various beverages in the United States and found that Pepsi ONE was one of two drinks that contained the chemical in excess of 29 micrograms per can or bottle, with that being California Proposition 65's daily allowed amount for foods without a warning label. // In mid-2015, after its sister product Diet Pepsi had changed to using sucralose and Ace-K as sweeteners instead of aspartame, Pepsi One was discontinued. PepsiCo wrote on its website that "Pepsi ONE has been discontinued. We regularly evaluate our product portfolio to find efficiencies, and we have decided to remove Pepsi ONE from the marketplace. Pepsi ONE has very limited distribution and will be out of the marketplace by start of the year 2015, and in some markets product inventory has already been exhausted." (wikipedia)

[at Moby Dick restaurant on the pier (please note  looming stranger / serial killer in background)]

Hello, solvers. We now return you to our regularly scheduled program, i.e. me writing this blog every damn day! I can't say I missed it ... no, that's not true. I did miss it. A lot. I didn't miss getting up every day at 3:30am to write, true, but I did miss writing. And solving. And complaining and what not. I'm at a bit of a loss without my daily ritual. But if you gotta be at a bit of a loss, I'll tell ya, Santa Barbara is the place to do it. Perfect weather Every Single Day. Some morning fog, sure, but that just gave the seaside some ambience, and made running / walking by the ocean (every morning!) very, very comfortable. It was nice to see my parents, and my sister, and nephews nieces etc. We've been doing these family summer trips for over twenty years, and everyone's Slowing Down now, which is Just Fine with me. I like my vacations to feature a few scheduled events and then a whole lot of nothing. I walked a ton (very very walkable city), ate a ton (very very eatable city), and read a ton (well, two books—that's pretty good!). Mainly I made friends with birds. Every day we'd go down to the beach and hang out with the birds. You've got your usual gulls, and crows (everywhere!), and shorebirds (like curlews), and then egrets and pelicans and kingfishers and swallows (under the pier), but my favorite of all were the very visible, very sullen, occasionally loud black-crowned night herons, who hung out in numbers right by the running path. I don't think I'd ever seen one before. The first one I saw, I thought it was hurt, because it seemed too close to people, but nope, there were a bunch of them hanging out right by the street, around an abandoned pool of some sort, I think. Anyway, they look like grumpy old men, which may be why I related to them. Adorable.

Other than black-crowned night herons, the most interesting thing I saw in Santa Barbara was seals (or maybe sea lions—a bunch of them, just hanging out in the water about 10 yards or so from shore ... lurking ... plotting). Oh, and Julia Louis-Dreyfus, who was right in front of me in line for ice cream. Wild. Don't ask me what she ordered because I do not remember. I was too busy thinking, "Wait, is this real?" But it was. She was. More real than the TOOTH FAIRY, I assure you.  I ended up ordering Honey Almond Crunch and it was delicious. The ice cream place was called RORI'S, which is one of those names that gets crossword constructors thinking, "Be more famous! I could use you!" Neither RORI nor RORIS has ever appeared in the NYTXW. For good reason. Too regional. But if RORI'S ever went national, I guarantee you'd start seeing it in grids almost immediately. A name built for crosswords. Crossword Crunch would be a good ice cream flavor. What flavor would Crossword Crunch be? Suggestions welcome (though if your ingredient list doesn't include OREO, don't expect to be taken seriously).

Today's theme didn't feel like much of a theme. I mean, the core of it is just "imaginary creatures," which is too insubstantial to qualify as a theme, so I guess it's the revealer ("ARE YOU FOR REAL?") that is supposed to put this one over the top. I dunno. I guess. I can't say I disliked it, but it did seem pretty, uh, vanilla (ice cream callback!). I think the puzzle kind of lost me with the "bonus" themer (MYTHS). You can feel the puzzle really straining to convince you that the theme is legit. Feels like an answer that was maybe incidental / accidental, that they then tried to conscribe into thematic service. The revealer was OK, but that one went too far. Felt forced. "... or are they?" Yes, they are, they are MYTHS, what are you doing? 

As for difficulty ... well, technically I failed the Downs-only assignment today. I had LADED at 46D: Filled with cargo (LADEN), which gave me DONE instead of NONE, and since DONE is a perfectly ordinary word, I didn't blink. Until I didn't get the "You Completed the Puzzle!" message. Then I had to hunt my mistake. Bah. But besides that one square, I got through it OK, with two significant sticking points. The first, lesser sticking point came around TSKS (ugh) SKIER KERRY, the last of which I wasn't sure how to spell (KERRI?), the second of which had a "?" clue (7D: Person who might need a lift?), and the first of which is just a horrid piece of (plural!) crosswordese (hence the "ugh") (6A: Reprimanding sounds). The bigger sticking point was NEW MOM / BUM / BUNION, with BUM being the real issue. Could not get a word meaning [Backside] from -U-. I think of BUM as primarily British, so ... yeah, a hint there ("to a Brit") would've been helpful. Also, working Downs-only, I though NEW-OM was NEWSOM (as in California governor Gavin), so NEW MOM (!) came, eventually, as a big surprise (38A: One on maternity leave). But I weathered that part and finished without further incident (except the LADED incident). Had ATAD before ABIT, but that's ordinary stuff (36D: Ever so slightly).

Notes:

• 10D: Discontinued competitor of Coke Zero (PEPSI ONE) — very on-brand for the NYTXW, debuting an answer only after it is well and truly bygone. Mwah! Never stop being your beautiful belated self, puzzle!
• 31D: When repeated, sound effect for Cookie Monster ("NOM!") — a fine answer, but oof, a truly horrible dupe of "Monster" (which features prominently in one of the theme answers: LOCH NESS MONSTER.
• 55D: Summer Olympics powerhouse (USA) — a fitting clue for this day after the Summer 2024 Olympics closing ceremonies. The USA was indeed a powerhouse once again this year, finishing with more medals (by far) than any other country (126, including 40 gold, to 2nd place China's 91). I didn't catch much of it, though I did get to watch crossword favorite Simone BILES (5) dismantle the competition in the women's all-around. She seemed to be on a different plane. Unreal. Mythical, almost. (just trying to tie it in, here...)

• 47D: Olympic snowboarder White (SHAUN) — it must be pretty hard to lay off signing your name to your grid. I mean, the grid comes together in a certain way, you get an opportunity, you gotta take it, right? Or no? Anyway, yes, I noticed. My best friend's name is SHAUN, so in her honor, I'll let this bit of self-indulgence slide.
• 43A: Frozen ocean water (SEA ICE) — when you solve Downs-only, you get to discover little flukes in words and phrases that you might not notice otherwise. For instance, the fact that SEA ICE is  just one letter off from SEANCE, which is what I Really wanted this answer to be for a bit (before A BIT made it impossible).

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld 

P.S. just a few more vacation highlights

[at the New Beverly Cinema in Los Angeles]

[some off-the-menu mezcal deliciousness that my bartender called "Agua Bendita" ("Holy Water")]

[Santa Barbara has a Goodwill]

[with my sister, Amy]

[from my balcony]

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]