Constructor: Andrea Carla Michaels and Kevin Christian
Relative difficulty: Medium (solved Downs-only)
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THEME: P-SS vowel ladder — themers start with PASS, PESS, PISS, POSS, and PUSS, respectively
Theme answers:
A 74-worder today, which is slightly on the low side for a Monday, and you can feel it, especially if you are solving the puzzle Downs-only. Big corners, lots of white space, and lots and lots of long Downs—twelve (12!) answers of 7 letters or longer. Generally, the longer the Down, the harder it is likely to be to get without any crosses, and while most Downs didn't give me any trouble at all, my big trouble did indeed come from long Downs in the corners. Actually, the first corner went remarkably well. First five Downs went in 1-2-3-4-5, so I was feeling pretty good about myself, but then in the NE, things didn't go so well. First of all, PROVOST and TRUSTEE have the same number of letters, I just found out (10D: Member of a college's governing board). Only one of them truly fits the clue, but when it comes to levels of university admin, it all kind of blurs together in my head, so PROVOST went in first, and TRUSTEE only later. Next door was HEMLINE, which has a hardish "?" clue on it (11D: Height of fashion?). Feels old-fashioned, this idea of HEMLINE height being the thing that changes from year to year, dividing old from new fashions, but then the puzzle feels old generally. Lots of olden fill, very little contemporary about it. The HEMLINE clue is clever, though. Just tough for me. But I got it, eventually.
Relative difficulty: Medium (solved Downs-only)
Theme answers:
- PASSING FAD (16A: Trend that's here today, gone tomorrow)
- PESSIMISTIC (23A: Seeing the glass half-empty)
- PISSED OFF (33A: Beyond irritated)
- POSSIBILITY (47A: Potential option)
- PUSSYFOOTS (56A: Tiptoes, as around a touchy subject)
Glenn Lewis Frey (/fraɪ/ FRY; November 6, 1948 – January 18, 2016) was an American musician. He was a founding member of the rock band Eagles. Frey was the co-lead singer and frontman for Eagles, roles he came to share with fellow member Don Henley, with whom he wrote most of Eagles' material. Frey played guitar and keyboards as well as singing lead vocals on songs such as "Take It Easy", "Peaceful Easy Feeling", "Tequila Sunrise", "Already Gone", "James Dean", "Lyin' Eyes", "New Kid in Town", and "Heartache Tonight".While Eagles were on hiatus from 1980 to 1994, Frey embarked on a successful solo career. He released his debut album, No Fun Aloud, in 1982 and went on to record Top 40 hits "The One You Love", "Smuggler's Blues", "Sexy Girl", "The Heat Is On", "You Belong to the City", "True Love", "Soul Searchin'" and "Livin' Right". As a member of Eagles, Frey won six Grammy Awards and five American Music Awards. Eagles were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1998, the first year they were nominated. Consolidating his solo recordings and those with the Eagles, Frey had 24 Top 40 singles on the Billboard Hot 100. (wikipedia)
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| [PUSS 'N' BOOTS fit!] |
Weirdly, the thing that baffled me the most up in the NE was EXPECTS (12D: Anticipates). In retrospect, it makes no sense that I had trouble—the clue and answer are pretty clearly synonyms. But I had -ECTS and just couldn't make a word that I wanted. Even when I mentally inserted the "P" in there (to make HUMP in the cross), it took me a few beats for the "X" to come to me. The other tough Down for me was GAVE OUT, specifically the GAVE part (41D: Dispensed, as Halloween candy). I think of GAVE OUT as "died." Halloween candy, I hand out. Maybe pass out. Dole out? Mete out? "GAVE OUT" certainly tracks, but the only reason I eventually got it was that I needed a four-letter past tense verb that (because the fourth cross was T-RI) ended in an "E" (or an "O," but that seemed unlikely). The rest of the grid pretty much whizzed by, but the NE and SE had me sweating a little.
Bullets:
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
The theme is rudimentary. I've seen a million of these. Hell, I made one once (actually, mine was more vowel sound progression (STALE, STEAL, STYLE, STOLE, STOOL), but it's in the same ballpark). I guess PISSED OFF is supposed to be the scene stealer, the marquee themer. It's too bad that the only thing that passes for contemporary or modern in this puzzle is this crudeness. I don't mind PISSED OFF in my grid, but I wish the other themers, and the grid as a whole, had a little more zip and zing about it (although, OK, I do kinda like PUSSYFOOTS). The grid on the whole isn't bad, but it is awash in repeaters: PSST EST ASAHI ANI TERI TODO ASHE IRULE ERIE SSN. I enjoyed HAS AN IN (38D: Knows somebody who might help) and HEMLINE, whereas SUPERSIZE did nothing for me, and "THIS IS FUN" was far less fun than the first thing I wanted there: "LET'S PARTY!" (15D: "Wheeeeeee!"). Overall, solid if staid work, with a bit more bite than the usual Monday, if only because of those open corners.
Bullets:
- 24D: Old LP format (MONO)— I have a lot of LPs and yet I still stared at this answer like "???" I had to fill four letters with an "old ... format?" But "LP"is the "format." So I was confused. Turned out to be about the recording (or sound) format—before the advent of stereo recording, music was recorded in MONO:
Mono (monophonic) sound is single-channel audio where all the instruments are mixed into one signal, intended to be heard as if emanating from one position.
Stereo (stereophonic) sound is achieved by using two audio channels feeding 2 separate speakers. This creates a more three-dimensional sound, and better resembles how we hear things in the world at large. (dittomusic.com)
- 49D: Kids make them for Santa (LISTS) — "COOKIES" wouldn't fit. Did you do that? Make cookies for Santa? And then leave them out and in the morning they would be gone, or there'd be a big bite out of one? Because Santa and/or your parents are real? This was definitely part of my childhood Christmas experience, but I don't remember doing the cookie thing with our kid. We probably just told her that Santa was phony and Christmas was a capitalist ruse. Whatever, she survived. In fact ...
- 55A: Group born between 1997 and 2012, for short (GEN Z) — our daughter, born 2000, came home for the Thanksgiving holiday last week. Over the weekend, things got festive.
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| [Merry Capitalist Ruse!] |
Speaking of festive, it's officially Holiday Season! This means two things for this blog. First, starting next week (Sunday, Dec. 8) and for at least one Sunday after that, I'll have a Holiday Gift Guide, featuring crossword and other puzzle-related gifts you can get for the puzzle-lover in your life (or for yourself, why not?). So if you have something puzzle-related to sell, or you have a puzzle-related gift suggestion, please pass that along to me. Second, also starting Sunday, Dec. 8, and then continuing for as long as I've got material, I'll be posting Holiday Pet Pics—send me pictures of your non-human loved ones in festive settings (dressed in a Santa hat, playing with a dreidel chew toy, whatever) (crossword content optional), and I'll post a few at the end of my write-up every day throughout the Holiday Season. For both gift suggestions and Holiday Pet Pics, you can reach me at rexparker at icloud dot com.