Jump to: Today’s Theme | Tricky Clues
WEDNESDAY PUZZLE — If you think of the crossword as a mental workout, it follows that you might want to prepare your mind with a warm-up activity. Some view the Mini as their friendly on-ramp to the day’s puzzle. My own routine consists of a cup of coffee and a long, absent-minded stare out of my apartment windows with a glazed-over look in my eyes. If I can, I like to go completely empty-headed before solving: no thoughts, just vibes.
After today’s puzzle, though — constructed by Matt Fuchs and Victor Sloan in their collaboration debut — I think I need a better warm-up. No vibes could have prepared me for the challenge of these clues. I certainly worked up a sweat, but I’m cramping all over from a lack of preparation. Oof.
Is there such a thing as a foam roller for your brain? (I hear you saying it’s something called a “martini,” and I’ll be seeking one out after the sun goes down.)
Today’s Theme
Today’s themed entries come in pairs, and they cross each other in a way that evokes a common expression. For example, at 3-Down: “With 14-Across, first (and last) gift of a seasonal song.” Most of us are familiar with the Christmas carol “The Twelve Days of Christmas,” where the singer receives a PARTRIDGE (3D) in a PEAR TREE (14A).
Cross 10D with 15A, and you discover the “cause of some hoarseness”: a FROG in one’s THROAT.
It so happens that all of the expressions contain animals, too — a lovely flourish, but not necessary to appreciate the visual wordplay.
And speaking of crossword warm-ups: If you’re a beginner solver who found this grid tolerable, consider trying your hand at Thursday’s puzzle. Today’s theme and clues require some of the same lateral thinking required of later-week puzzles. Just consult this guide to using our “Rebus” function first, because Thursday themes occasionally cram more than one letter into a single square to achieve their desired effects.
Tricky Clues
17A. Not all “Cold sauces” are AIOLIS, but all AIOLIS are served cold, being that their base ingredient is mayonnaise. (Hot mayonnaise sounds like the stuff of nightmares, or the name of a punk band I don’t need to see.)
25A. A “Former Mideast alliance, in brief” was the UAR (United Arab Republic). “Brief” might also describe the UAR’s life span: The alliance, which was a political union between Syria and Egypt, lasted only three years.
40A. We say that one who “Loses everything” GOES BROKE. We also say that one who risks everything “goes for broke,” though the latter phrase has echoes of victory rather than failure.
44A. The “Fruity red” referred to here is not a wine variety but a color: CERISE (from the French for “cherry”).
63A. EURO AREA has appeared only once before in the New York Times Crossword and was entirely foreign to me as a “Currency zone.” I didn’t even know there was such a thing! (What currency do they use in the “Twilight Zone”? Do you have to unlock it with the key of denomination? I’m done; I’ll stop.)
1D. Representative of the sound made by rain or light footfalls, “Pit-A-PAT” makes for a lovely, if impossible to guess, onomatopoeia. I suspect that, like me, some of you were thrown by the invisible hyphen or the existence of alternate forms such as “pitter-pat.”
11D. You really have to sit with “Flat sign, maybe” before you realize that the “flat” in question is an apartment, and that a “sign” in front of it would read TO LET. (I spent far too long trying to figure out a rebus that would turn this entry into TOiLET — as if that answered the clue in any way.)
15D. The use of Japanese “Straw mats,” known as TATAMIS, dates back to eighth-century Japan. In the 21st century, these mats are not only a common form of décor, but also a handy word for the Spelling Bee whenever you find yourself with a T, A, M and I.
46D. While I accept that “HI, MOM!” is the correct fill here, it wasn’t first to come to mind. The scene I think of as most “stereotypical” for a Jumbotron is the Kiss Cam, wherein a candid camera compels spectators to lock lips at the behest of a screaming crowd.
Constructor Notes
Matt: I’m excited to see this puzzle run on my birthday! After my previous Times puzzle, Victor wrote me with an interest in crossword construction and had no shortage of theme proposals. After he identified phrases like “Pigs in a Blanket,” it occurred to us that we could represent those expressions using Across and Down crossings.
Since my last puzzle, I’ve started graduate school in architecture and hope to find more time for creating crosswords.
Victor: This puzzle is dedicated to the memory of my father, Gilbert Sloan, who died peacefully on May 24 at the age of 94. While he didn’t see the puzzle in print, he knew it had been accepted. Whenever we would visit, we would work on the puzzle side by side. I got the theme idea from a book about English language curiosities, and realized there were a number of animal idioms in the same form. Matt graciously agreed to work with me. I learned so much in our collaboration.
I am a rheumatologist working for the Peace Corps (I was a volunteer from 1981 to 1983). This October, my wife, Sandra Gong, and I will celebrate our 35th wedding anniversary. We are the proud parents of two amazing daughters, ages 24 and 19.
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