Early text messenger / THU 1-2-25 / Flower whose name means "flame" in ancient Greek / Start of a quip by comic Steven Wright / Epic with the line "Come, friend, you too must die" / Urban addr. specification / Youngest golfer to score below his age in a P.G.A. Tour event

Constructor: Robert Charlton

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME: F/PH— eight squares contain both "F" and "PH" ("F" for the Down answer, "PH" for the Across); the reason for the F/PH confusion is expressed by a quip running across three lines of the puzzle: "WHY ISN'T THE WORD / [PH]ONETICALLY / SPELLED WITH AN 'F'"(20A: Start of a quip by comic Steven Wright)

The eight "F/PH" squares:

ALPHA / FRAYED
IPHONE / FELTS
PHOTO / FUTON
PHONETICALLY / FILIPINO
GRAPHED / "AFRAID SO"
PHLOX / ELF
NYMPHO / DWARF
PHASE / HALF

Word of the Day: TELEX (49D: Early text messenger) —

Telex is a telecommunication system that allows text-based messages to be sent and received by teleprinter over telephone lines. The term "telex" may refer to the service, the network, the devices, or a message sent using these.^[1] Telex emerged in the 1930s and became a major method of sending text messages electronically between businesses in the post–World War II period. Its usage declined as the fax machine grew in popularity in the 1980s.

• • •

Had little hope for this one at first. Finished the NW corner without much trouble—ALFA seemed like a perfectly good answer for [First in a series] (it stands for "A" in the NATO alphabet) and so that particular trick square was lost on me (seems like you'd clue that one [___ male] or something, just to make the distinction clear, but ... moving on). After that corner was done, I hit the themer, read the clue, and let out a low, soft, defeated groan: "great ... a quip puzzle." We haven't seen one of these in a while. For a reason. Because they're bad. You used to see them a lot, and they'd just be quips. Often by Steven Wright, actually. Things he said that ... were kinda funny? ... and just happened to fit symmetrically in the grid. And that was it. That was the "theme." So I was like "what are we doing here? is it 1996 all over again?"

[the moment hope left my body]

And of course with quips, who knows what the words are going to be—the quip itself is no help most of the time, since the clue does nothing for you, so the crosses become harder because you're getting less help with them. Quip puzzles are just chores, with very little payoff. Historically, this is the case. Today, however, there's an added element. Thank god. Not that the added element was so entertaining—hunting down a bunch of F/PH squares isn't exactly my idea of a good time—but at least the puzzle is aspiring to do something beyond making me wryly chuckle at an old "quip." There's an actual thematic concept here. The quip deals with the fact that "F" and "PH" are pronounced the same way, and this fonetic fenomenon is represented by eight squares in the grid, where "PH" works in one direction, and "F" works in the other. I appreciate the way the quip actually tied to a concept, but I can't say solving the puzzle was made that much more interesting. Tougher, a little, maybe, but it was just a matter of looking for "F"s–or looking for "PH" answers that were one letter short—and filling the squares accordingly. Since most of the "F/PH" squares were shoved against the edges of the grid (top and bottom), they didn't interfere with the solve as much as they might have, and were relatively easy to find. I got so lazy with the gimmick that I neglected to see that the final "F" square (the one at the end of the quip) did *not* also contain a "PH," so I ended with an error, technically. I have "LOL" written next to that "F" square on my print-out. Guess that's my solving grade today. A wryly chuckleworthy punchline to a so-so solving experience.

Since this puzzle is architecturally fairly demanding, the grid isn't exactly sparkling. It just gets by. Except when it doesn't. MIASMAL is grim. Truly grim. I mean, I thought the answer was grim when I had MIASMIC in there, but MIASMAL ... somehow, grimmer (MIASMIC googles ~20x better). But that was the only moment where I really grimaced at the fill. The rest of it seems OK. I don't love MEN ON as a standalone answer, but yes, when there are people on base, that is a phrase you sometimes hear. "He's hitting .350 with MEN ON." Wasn't a big fan of the NORM clue either (14A: Average Joe's name (that's not Joe)). I see what you're trying to do there—"NORM" *mean* "average," so you're kind of punning on the name—but NORM has never been an "Average Joe's name." Joe has always been way, way more popular. Even at its most popular, NORM was never that popular. My brief perusal of baby name sites yielded this NORM fact:

It was a Top 100 name for more than half a century, hitting a high in 1931 at Number 36, but today it's nowhere near one of the most popular boy names starting with N. (nameberry.com)

Number 36 is ... not that high. Don't say it's an "Average Joe's name" when it's not. And if you want to pun on "NORM," go ahead, but put a "?" on the clue then. It's only fair.

More things:

4D: Prefix with sexual (AMBI-)— gonna confess right here that I do not know the difference between AMBIsexual and mere (?) BIsexual. To the search engines! Aha, I don't know the difference because [drumroll] there isn't one. Wow. OK then. Moving on.
27A: Adjust on the timeline (REDATE) — left this one out when cataloguing grimaces. Definitely grimaced here. Not a MIASMAL-style grimace, but a grimace nonetheless. I wrote in REDRAW at first (that would work for [Adjust the timeline] but not [Adjust on the timeline])
32A: ___ Robinson, mother of Michelle Obama (MARIAN) — not a fact I tucked away. How deep does my knowledge of presidents and first ladies have to be? I guess she *did* live in the White House, helping raise the grandkids, and she *did* pass away very recently (just last year), so I probably should've known her name.
5D: Possible response to "Where are you?" ("I'M IN HERE!") — easily my favorite answer in the grid. It's got some life!
29D: Head liners? (HAIRS) — easily the most baffling clue in the puzzle, for me. You have HAIR on your head, not HAIRS. Not in common parlance anyway. Also, you would never say that HAIRS"line" your head, but technically, I guess it's accurate enough.

57A: Youngest golfer to score below his age in a P.G.A. Tour event (SNEAD) — one of those clues where all I see is "blah blah golfer blah blah blah." So ... some golfer. What golfers do I know in five letters? Sam SNEAD. Does he fit? He does? Great, next! (The crossword golfer Hall of Fame includes Michelle WIE, Ernie ELS, Mark O'MEARA, ARNIE Palmer, and Sam SNEAD ... oh, and ISAO AOKI, of course, can't forget him—he's Lifetime Chairman). New Zealand golfer LYDIA Ko is not only the reigning Olympic gold medalist, she is also the reigning LYDIA crossword clue (the only one used for LYDIA since 2013). So tuck that info away ... somewhere.
34D: Urban addr. specification (BLDG) — hard for me. Was not getting what was "urban" about the abbr. (this abbr. for "building" hasn't appeared in the NYTXW for over seven years)

Trying to get through all the leftover Holiday Pet Pics by Saturday, so ... here are some more.

Pepper patiently awaits presents...