I've already added Patrick Berry to my list of favorite constructors, and now I can add this puzzle to my favorites. The title WORLD PAY made me think the theme answers would have to do with foreign currency, and I knew I'd be sunk. I should have known better. I mean, we're talking Patrick Berry.
What we have is a bit of WORD PLAY, where the L gets moved from one word of a common phrase to another. The theme answers...drum roll, please.
23A: Run away from chewing-tobacco users? (FLEE SPITTERS).
25A: Alexander the Great's ambition? (TO SLAY THE EAST). I had this but wasn't seeing the original phrase. It came to me in the hot tub earlier tonight. It was almost too obvious...to say the least.
37A: Problem for a sweaty-handed Tarzan? (VINY SLIDING).
56A: One who's crazy for a sharp-dressed man? (FOP LOVER).
66A: Shakespearean prince who's handsome and muscular? (STUDLY HAL).
78A: Fish-worshiping groups? (COD CULTS). This is where I finally cracked the theme...not that it made future theme answers any easier to get.
92A: What a magician might do with a big saw? (HALVE THE GAL). Probably the weakest entry...have the gall just doesn't seem like an in-the-language phrase...but I'm willing to let just about anything slide because of the overall quality.
107A: How to avoid getting tipsy on hard liquor? (PACE YOUR BELTS). If I had to choose, this would be my second favorite.
113A: Designed jeans? (PLOTTED PANTS).
15D: Oil spill? (SEEPING SLICKNESS). My absolute favorite...the way it rolls off your tongue, plus the visual...almost too much.
36D: Macho beer-drinker's outerwear? (COAT OF MANLY COORS). This one is pretty good, too.
Ava would be distraught if I didn't point out 100D: Bandleader Shaw (Artie), one of the lucky men who had the privilege of being married to her.
One of my favorite answers...and a gimme...is 82A: Novelist Jamaica __ (Kincaid). Here's a short bio that really doesn't say enough about her life or her writing. Her turbulent relationship with her mother is apparent in all of her stories. The best paper I wrote in college English was about mother-daughter relationships, tying in Jamaica Kincaid's own relationship with her mother as she revealed it in her short stories. I got an A+...from a professor who didn't give them out. I managed to get two more that semester...I think my writing style was enough like his that he had no choice.
22A: Nebraska town, named after an Indian tribe, featured in "Lonesome Dove" (Ogallala). I got this with only the final A in place...a very good guess, as opposed to a gimme.
42A: Much of Anaïs Nin's work (erotica). I don't have time to search out an excerpt...plus I'd get all kinds of hits on this site that I'd rather not have. Here's a very good non-erotic quote. "We don't see things as they are, we see things as we are."
58A: Moved two chessmen in one turn (castled). I'm not familiar with this term, but it was easy enough to get from crosses.
76A: At great length (on and on). Like that because of my affinity for multiword answers.
83A: You might hear it going up and down (Muzak). I immediately knew they were doing the elevator thing, although I had music at first.
105A: Mr. Bean (Orson). I wanted Rowan...the real Mr. Bean.
60D: Perceptive person's detection (nuance). Just a beautiful word.
67D: Little green man (Yoda). In case you didn't know...the U.S. Postal Service invited the public to vote online for its favorite of the 15 images on the Star Wars stamp sheet. More than half a million votes were cast, and Yoda was the winner. They were released last month, although I haven't yet seen them at the post office.70D: Popular sleep aid (Unisom). Not something I've ever needed in my life, but I've seen enough magazine ads that it was easy enough.
74D: Words mouthed to a camera (hi mom). That's one you could have guessed without seeing how many letters it had.
Things I didn't know and had to get from crosses:
8A: "__ at Large," 2003 Fox sitcom (Wanda). Never heard of it.
13A: El __ (Peruvian volcano) (Misti). I know all the ones in Hawaii, but it's time to broaden my volcano knowledge base.
122A: Producer of the Keystone Cops films (Sennett).
24D: "Man is by nature a __ animal": Aristotle (political). I think I should have known that.
50D: Greek god of ridicule (Momus). Didn't know there was such a thing.
94D: With 52-Down, "Symphonie Fantastique" composer (Hector / Berlioz).
A few more multiword answers that I liked. 27A: Leading the field (on top), 89A: Beguiles (leads on), 119A: Flat remover (tire iron), 4D: Dresses down (yells at), 14D: Following behind (in tow), and 90D: Gets one's food on a tray, say (dines in).
118A: "Ready __" (or not). Instead of, "On your mark, get set, go" we simply said, "Ready, set, go." Which explains why I had set go as my answer.
I like to do things in threes, but I can't think of a third picture. We'll have to call the grid a picture tonight. Here it is...
...and I'll see you tomorrow.
Linda G
10 comments:
i really enjoyed this puzzle, too. at my leisure. isn't tridactyl a cool word?
(sorry for the lame post last night, linda. i swear i'm not usually such a slacker.)
66D Sand blind?
Am I missing something?
Sorry, that's JD
This one was a lot of fun. Finally got the theme from STUDLY HAL. My favorite was COAT OF MANLY COORS.
Sand blind made me scratch my head too. I thought that maybe it was the same as being snow blind, but from being lost in the desert. Maybe because last night we watched Man vs. Wild, with Bear Grylls in the Sahara.
Actually it means partially blind, and comes from Middle English samblind. See
http://wordsmith.org/words/sand-blind.html
Thanks, Annielee. I appreciate the explanation. I never heard that term before.
Thanks, annielee. I'd never heard of it, either. When I was solving, I thought it might be one of the theme answers....but no question mark. Besides, what would SLANDBIND mean?
Loved this puzzle. "Or not" reminded me of playing hide and seek on muggy summer nights until it was too dark to see. Ready or not... here I come.
Linda, I thought we were going for currencies too, at the beginning. Great minds?
Loved the puzzle. Lots of laughs, ahas, smiles, 'wtf's, a few wrong turns, but overall an exceedingly pleasant experience.
I have to admit I know nada about Star Wars (yeah, I know), so 'little green man' was not a gimme, but I did see those stamps at my post office branch last weekend. I bought the Polar Lights and holiday ones instead ;)
We have a Cafe MOMUS here on the campus of the University of Akron. The owners are under the impression momus is the god of merriment, whereas my dictionary says it refers to the god of mockery and censure. Should I tell them?
Good judgment on Anais Nin, which *was* a gimme. I saw her in person before her death; she was quite eccentric to say the least. I might have mentioned this before, but in case not - she stood on the stage with a long purse dangling from her wrist the entire time she was speaking. I was like, are you afraid someone's going to steal that thing? I don't know why that's such a memory for me, but it is. EROTICA intersecting with COO and VAMP was a nice touch.
I didn't mean to imply that I know anything about Star Wars ; )
I had bought some of the stamps and later learned about the Yoda stamp from my sister. She's a postmaster and her grandson is a Star Wars fan...like his father before him.
Very definitely great minds. And a good Anais Nin story.
In Shakespeare's "Merchant of Venice" Lancelot Gobbo's old father staggers on stage and asks his him if he knows whether his son is still alive. Lancelot says, "Do you not know me, father?" His dad says, "Alack sir, I am sand-blind. I know you not. Neither Gobbo, needless to say, is a studly Hal . .
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