Well, I got that answers were going to turn right after going down, thanks to the title, but even when done I had no idea what the hell EL CID had to do with anything. Have a safe weekend everyone, and make sure you use a CONDONE. This lovely little Violin Sonata, KV 31, was composed by Mozart at AGE TEN. That's why Romans started to use the phrase "There is CRISIS IN DAR FUR." hibernus for of winter, as in Hannibal hibernates in BEAR FUR. aestas, aestivus meaning summer, of summer, the flip side of hibernate, from Lat. I had log roller before HOG CALLER, but learned a few new words: ABSCISSA, PICARO and ESTIVATE, this last one quite inferrable: from Lat. Kaput, PFFT.ĭo you remember the book "I'M OK, You're OK" and its sequel, "I'M OK, You're Not"? When I saw "Not flat nor sharp" I was sure it was going to be NATURAL. What makes such turns a little easier to solve is that the letters in the tail end of the phrase are triple-checked, with the exception of the corner letter.īut what the heck are SPIKED ACES? Never heard of such fishes. The theme was great, and the best part, it took some work to get to aha! I had to work my way to the very bottom when I finally figured out the EL-shaped C*I*D* down&right phrases with CONSIDER IT DONE and said: aha! See what I mean?Īll the theme phrases worked perfectly, the only thing missing was the lack of symmetry for COVERED IN DUST and CANON IN D, a small price to pay for such a severely restricting design. Outside of VIKE, HSIA, AAAA, BBB, A NEGG and a few GEDS, ESPs and ISPs here and there, this was an absolutely enjoyable puzzle. When I saw Byron Walden's byline, I HAD A HUNCH this will be a duesy and my early ESTIVATE was spot on. Nearly every week I find myself solving AVC and Fireball and thinking, "this would've made a good NYT Thursday." But Fireball puzzles (also great) tend to be routinely Saturday-hard, so the two puzzles contrast one another a bit, and together provide nice coverage of the themed puzzle difficulty gamut. Not that American Values Club puzzles are "easy"-they tend to run in the Wed.-to-Fri. Cleverness and easiness are tough to combine. Easy- to Medium-difficulty themed puzzles are some of the hardest to do well. You can't ask much more from a themed puzzle-especially from a relatively easy themed puzzle. Zoe's puzzle just has a perfect reveal-theme elements are a great visual representation of a well-known expression.
The AVC is starting to pull away from the pack a little in terms of overall quality (though every week Fireball is right there too). Puzzle of the Week goes to Zoe Wheeler this week for her American Values Club Puzzle, "Flexibility" (get it here for $1 / read about it here). Highly pleasing-one of the best NYT Sundays I've done in a while (not the highest bar, but still, dang good). Imagined Hollywood was in CA and not FLA. I can see a "due" misdirect coming a mile away, but got blind-sided by the Spanish word for "fifteen." Had BANTER for BICKER. Right out of the box I face-planted on 4D: Quince, e.g. There were all kinds of pesky little stumbling blocks in this one. PAC-MAN and I HAD A HUNCH and PADDED BRA and HOG CALLER and MOSH PIT and whatever SEA HOLLY ( 12D: European coastal plant once thought to be an aphrodisiac) and SPIKED ACES ( 17D: Ray-finned fishes of the Southwest U.S.) are (whoops, that's just one word: SPIKEDACES). There's also tons of interesting little tidbits throughout, like MS. The fill here is mostly solid and graceful (I'm just ignoring AAAA … though it pairs nicely with BBB). phrases), I am happy to let those pass right on by. CRISIS IN DARFUR and COVERED IN DUST felt a *little* contrived/arbitrary as self-standing phrases, but not so much that it hurt, and considering the very high bar set by the theme ( six C.I.D. This is all to the good, though, as I found the solving experience predominantly enjoyable.
Anyway, the whole thing felt like a bit of a minefield, plus the cluing was on the tough side. CANON I … sounded plausible as an answer for 13D: Pachelbel classic, familiarly, even though that usage wasn't "familiar" to me. I didn't see the EL CID thing til the very end, so I had no idea how many of these right-turners were coming or even exactly where they were. And turns out I was right-took me somewhere north of 14, longish for me.
As I wrote on my Facebook page last night, I was all set to knock this one out while the pizza was in the oven (timer on 11 minutes), but then I saw Byron Walden's name and immediately aborted that plan.