Thursday, April 21, 2022, Stella Zawistowski

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Good Morning, Cruciverbalists, Malodorous Manatee here with the post-puzzle summary.  Today marks my first puzzle recap featuring a puzzle for which Patti Varol served as the Editor instead of as the Assistant Editor and I am looking forward to taking a look at this puzzle.  Here is a link to the Tribune syndicate announcement:

Patti Varol Announcement

Patti obviously has a wealth of experience as does today's puzzle setter, Stella Zawistowski.  Here is a link to an August 2021 interview with Stella:

Browser Interview With Stella Zawistowski


We'll go with Ernie Banks' oft' cited quote to introduce today's puzzle:

LET'S PLAY TWO.  

At three places within the grid our constructor has placed the names of two popular tabletop games back-to-back.  The reveal employs a baseball reference - Doubleheader (two games played on the same day) - to clue us in as to what is going on.  The reveal:

58 Across:  Doubleheader feature, and what are literally found in 17-, 23-, and 44-Across: BACK TO BACK GAMES.

...and the application of this clever theme:

17 Across:  Mission to go after imaginary germs?: COOTIE OPERATION.  Cooties being imaginary germs and operation being a synonym (more or less) for mission.


23 Across:  Military vessel in terrible condition?: SORRY BATTLESHIP.  A warship in a SORRY state.  I always think of Bill and Ted when the Battleship game is mentioned.


44 Across:  Antitrust lawsuit, perhaps?: MONOPOLY TROUBLE.

And now for the rest of the story:

Across:

1. Epic __: FAIL.  A relatively modern bit of slang.


5. Family unit: CLAN.

9. App with Social and Promotions tabs: GMAIL.  The clue is a bit obscure but, hey, it's Thursday.  Adding Primary to the two listed categories would have made things a bit less obscure.  GMAIL sorts email into various piles.  

14. Instrument for a Swiss mountaineer: ALPENHORN.  A clever bit of misdirection.  Not gear for a mountain climber.  A musical instrument.


16. "The Big Bang Theory" co-creator Chuck: LORRE.  The first of (too?) many proper nouns used in this puzzle (YMMV).  The prolific Mr. Lorre also created MomTwo and A Half MenDharma & GregYoung SheldonBob Hearts AbisholaGrace Under FireCybillDisjointed and The Kominsky Method.  If you take a meeting with him, allow him to pick up the lunch tab.

19. Perfume samples: TESTERS.  The small spray bottles.  Not the people checking out the scents.

20. Loads: OCEANS.  Not the transitive verb.

21. Old French coin: ECU.  A rare coin that turns up (more often than rarely) in crossword puzzles.

22. "I'm so mean, I make medicine sick" boxer: ALI.  Muhammad ALI.  A pugilist often seen in crossword puzzles.

32. Calendar col.: TUE.  A bit of a punt.  One of seven days.

33. Sporty Camaro: IROC.  International Race OChampions.  My auto racing friend, Eric, uses Iroc in lieu of his name as his online "handle".



34. Huge herbivore: RHINO.  Elephant would not fit.  Hippo would fit but would not work out . . . except for the last letter.

35. Site to find a handmade wedding dress, perhaps: ETSY.  Site to find a handmade anything.  We've seen this type of cluing before where the clue refers to something very specific but the answer demands something far less so.

37. Powerful sharks: MAKOS.



39. Ventura County tourist town: OJAI.  Obscure, perhaps, unless you're familiar with SoCal geography.  Sometimes we see "Oh, Hi" as an answer to a clue such as "greeting upon running into someone unexpectedly."

40. Parting word: ADIOS.  We had to consider, and then discard, ADIEU although the first three letters worked just fine.

42. Epic party: BASH.  GALA   RAVE   BALL   FEST   FETE

43. __ Toy Barn: "Toy Story 2" shop: AL'S.



48. Hard water?: ICE.  Nice (not Nice, France) wordplay.

49. Abbr. on a pill bottle: USP.  A unit of potency.  United States Pharmacopeia.

50. Crowning point: ZENITH.  Also, a brand of electronics.


54. Break down: 
ANALYZE.  Not as in an emotional state.  More like, in current jargon, to do a deep dive and unpack it.   Still, evocative of this:

Tom Petty - Live At The Wiltern Theater Los Angeles, 1985

61. Benefit: AVAIL.  A computer teacher asks the class to turn to page 404.  The students search feverishly.  To no AVAIL.

62. Feature of many a TV show summary: SCREENCAP.  Screen Capture.

63. Aptly named novelist Charles: READE.  Born 08 June 1814 -  Died 11 April 1884.  Having failed to recall his appearance ten days ago (in precisely the same location within that grid) I was forced to suss this one out.  Fortunately, doing so was not difficult.

64. "I feel __": "It's like you know me!": SEEN.  A new idiom to this marine mammal.  Quite zen.

65. "Madam Secretary" actor Tim: DALY.  Sister of Tyne.


Down:

1. No mere opinion: FACT.  Where do facts come from?  The factory.

2. Part of a sunburn treatment, often: ALOE.  Often, indeed.

3. Deprivatization events, for short: IPOS.  Initial Public OfferingS.  Selling shares of stock in a company.   I had never before come across the word deprivatization but it was self defining.  Reminded me of antidisestablishmentarianism.  Another instance of a pluralized abbreviation.

4. Alphabet soup bite: LETTER.



5. Guardians of the Tree of Life: CHERUBIM.  The Tree of Life is a motif referenced by multiple cultures.

6. "Gigi" playwright Anita: LOOS.  A true pioneer.

7. Dada pioneer Jean: ARP.

Head With Mustache - 1926

8. 22.5 deg.: NNE.  North North East on the 360 degree compass.

9. Montana's __ National Park: GLACIER.  I have been lucky enough to ride the Going to the Sun Road on a motorcycle.



10. Sunbeam speck: MOTE.  Not photon.

11. Number for soprano Pretty Yende: ARIA.  An opera reference.

12. Hemoglobin mineral: IRON.  The combination of this answer and ORGAN MUSIC (as an answer last Saturday) brought this to mind:


The Simpsons -  "In The Garden of Eden" by . . .

13. Optometrist's concern: LENS.  Hand up for first thinking EYES.

15. Nash of "When They See Us": NIECY.  Unfamiliar with her.  Thanks perps.

18. Hand __: sushi order: ROLL.  An option other than a cut roll.

Cut Roll and Hand Roll

22. With no overhead added: AT COST.

23. Cook, as bao buns: STEAM.


24. One-up: OUTDO.

25. Piney ooze: RESIN.


26. Good for farming: ARABLE.  By definition.

27. Hungarian wine: TOKAY.  Also spelled TOKAJI.  A naturally sweet wine from the Tokaj district of northeastern Hungary.

28. "The Chi" airer, briefly: SHO.  A television/streaming reference.

29. Traditional religious garment: HIJAB.



30. As a whole: IN ALL.

31. Composure: POISE.

36. Fashion designer Jenny: YOO. Who?  Seems to be big in bridal gowns.

38. No longer large: SHRUNKEN.  Perhaps no longer as large.  Whatever was SHRUNKEN could still be quite large.  A star with a mass equal to our sun will leave behind a remnant white dwarf about the size of Earth.  Bigger than a bread box.

41. Angry speaker's droplet: SPITTLE.  Discomforting imagery to start the day.

45. Tres y cinco: OCHO.  Our combined Spanish and mathematics lesson for the day.

46. "August: __ County": OSAGE.  A book.  A play.  A motion picture.


47. Plateau: UPLAND.  Also a city in San Bernardino County, CA.

50. Energy snack brand for kids: ZBAR.


51. Nesting site: EAVE.  A bit of not-quite-misdirection.  Tree?  Limb?  Often clued with a reference to wasps.

52. Frozen Four org.: NCAA.  The Final Four refers to the NCAA basketball playoffs.  Frozen Four riffs on that for the NCAA ice hockey championship.


53. "Joke, joke": I KID.

Triumph The Insult Comic Dog

54. Hobby farm measure: ACRE.  Or a "real" farm measure.

55. Where it's fun to stay, per the Village People: YMCA.  I will pass on posting an audio/video clip of this bit of Americana.

56. Evangelist's quality: ZEAL.


57. 2021 award for Naomi Osaka: ESPY.  An award frequently handed out in crossword puzzles.  It helped if you knew that Naomi is a tennis player.

59. Degrees for EEs: BSS.  I didn't get this one.  I took EE to mean electrical engineer.  BSS most often refers to Bachelor of Specialized Studies or Bachelor of Social Studies or Bachelor of Social Sciences.  There are, I am sure, people here who are far more familiar with the application of the BSS designation than I am.

60. Unreturned serve: ACE.  A tennis reference.


I hope everyone had a good Easter week and/or is having a good seven (or eight) days of pesach or month of Ramadan. 

____________________________________________


_____________________________________________

- This Year's Seder Plate -
Exhibiting A Bit Of Improvisation


From the X (word) Files:  Last night I picked a NYT puzzle book off the bookshelf.  The collection contained 250 puzzles originally published in 2000.  I randomly opened it to puzzle number 199.  The constructor?  Rich Norris.

... and on that note

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