17A. "Alice in Wonderland" critter known for disappearing : CHESHIRE CAT. Great start - here's John Tenniel's original illustration:
27A. Painting partly shown on the original cover of "The Da Vinci Code" : MONA LISA. I was fortunate to see Leonardo's original in the Louvre many years ago - here's the selfie version:
36A Ubiquitous Mad Magazine guy : ALFRED E. NEUMAN. Way too many picture hits on Google to choose from. Today is "Make your own Mad Magazine Link Wednesday".
47A. "Batman" villain : THE JOKER. I'm not sure what Jack is so happy about - he has court-side season tickets for the Lakers.
59A. Some emoticons, and defining features of 17-, 27-, 36- and 47-Across : SMILEY FACES and what a nice motto for this Wednesday!
Hi everyone - Steve here having fun with Mr. Blais's puzzle today. I loved the clever theme and the long downs around it. ANALOGOUS TO had me watching each letter fill in with the crosses, and I was convinced that I'd got something wrong until finally I saw it with only the "N" to go.
I'm time-shifting again today - I'm back in Rio de Janeiro until Saturday. If only I could time-shift a week or two backwards and I could have watched some World Cup games! I didn't plan this trip very well at all. My bad. Let's head onwards:
Across:
1. Auto whose griffin logo was recently discontinued : SAAB. I think it's more than the logo that was discontinued - didn't the entire brand get 16A'd?
5. Log on to : ACCESS. After at least three failed userid/password combo attempts in my case. I locked myself out of my own laptop yesterday.
11. "Family Guy" daughter : MEG. Thank you, perps!
14. Beige cousin : ECRU
15. Hail from a distance : CALL TO. Hey, Bubba! The Swiss yodel, it seems a little more poetic.
16. Lumberjack's tool : AXE. The "E" can be chopped off with no hard feelings, but then it loses it's crossword-qualification letter count.
19. Cousins, say : KIN. Because KISSING doesn't fit.
20. Lost it : HAD A FIT
21. It may be bulletproof : VEST. If I was in the line of fire, I'd be worried about the "may" qualifer.
22. Free-for-all : BRAWL. Donnybrook in the land of my fathers.
25. Hates : DETESTS
31. Half an etiquette list : DON'TS. I prefer the Do's.
32. Free TV ad : P.S.A. Public Service Announcement. Check out the UK''s Road Safety mascot "Tufty the Squirrel" from the 1960's and 70's. I think Policeman Badger needs a course in immobilizing an accident victim before dragging him to the sidewalk.
33. Pepsi, e.g. : COLA. And 29D, and a cross too! These always have me worried that I'm seeing double.
35. In favor of : FOR
41. Cry to a toreador : OLE. Or a cry to a soccer team.
42. Clumsy boats : ARKS. Why clumsy? You're a craft filled with all the world's species, you're bound to be a little sluggish making a sharp turn into Port Mt. Ararat.
43. Part of an ear : COB
45. Getting on in years : AGING. What, me?
50. Tummy-showing shirt : CROP-TOP. There was an article in the NYT this week about how much tummy was acceptable to show wearing one of these. The jury was out, but the photo-examples were fun.
52. "__ obvious!": "Duh!" : IT'S SO
53. Aussie sprinters : EMUS
54. Blue Staters, collectively : THE LEFT. No comment. One of the rules of this blog. Read 'em - they're up there on the right.
58. __ Cruces : LAS
63. Sinusitis-treating MD : ENT
64. Requiring less effort : EASIER. Not so much this crossword today. Thanks, Steve for a fun challenge!
65. Bend : WARP
66. Sci. course : BIO
67. Stick : ADHERE
68. Haywire : AWRY
Down:
1. Short time : SEC. Small word, and a great and clever clue. I love these gems.
2. Günther's gripe : ACH. Some German today. "Oh"!
3. "Blessed __ the pure in heart ..." : ARE
4. Poppycock : BUSHWA. AESL (American English as a Second Language) for me today. I resolve to use this in a sentence as soon as possible.
5. Biting, as wit : ACID
6. Siena sweetie : CARA. Italian - it's language-fest in the down clues today!
7. Staff notation : CLEF. Do-re-me ..... Marti? Singalong?
8. Spanish folk hero : EL CID. Canadian-eh's folk hero - The Sid:
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| How aboot some hockey, eh? |
10. Lush : SOT
11. Gets a move on : MAKES TRACKS. Nice!
12. Is more than a dream : EXISTS. Whenever I see or hear "a dream" I can hear The Cure's Robert Smith's vocals on "Just Like Heaven" and his apparent flat note. It's a great song, but the "dream" at 2:14 always sounds like nails on a chalkboard to me. What say you musicians? It's still on my Top 10 song list on my iPod but that "draaam" always wakes me up.
13. Classy guys : GENTS. Classy john too.
18. Site of many school lockers : HALL
21. Rattler's poison : VENOM. I have to watch out for these little buggers when I'm out hiking. The babies are the most dangerous, they give you the full plunger of poison, they haven't yet learned to give you just enough to get you to go the heck away.
22. Image file letters : BMP. Bitmap. Basically this was a full pixel-accurate copy of the image that took up a boatload of file space. The JPEG format and derivatives made life a lot easier.
23. Flor del amor : ROSA. A rose, by any other name.
24. Corresponding with : ANALOGOUS TO. My star of the week, month or possibly all-time. As a down, you can't really recognize the letter sequence as it fills and you're trying to break the string into all kinds of unworkable segments. Brilliant!
26. Protein source for vegans : TOFU
28. __ hockey : ICE. Canadian-eh must be happy today. Eh? Tin-man - don't look.
29. Pepsi, e.g. : SODA. I hear a clecho. And a blogcho - Tin-man - don't look.
30. Watchful : ALERT
34. Egyptian cross : ANKH
37. Decides with a coin : FLIPS. We toss in England.
38. Monthly expense : RENT
39. Flagstaff-to-Roswell dir. : E.S.E. 8.7 light-years via Alpha Centuri. Remember that the next time you run out of fuel for your warp drive in Area 51 when you were just out for a quick galatic-joyride.
40. Rejections : NOES
44. Pal : BRO
45. Big name in high fashion : ARMANI
46. Lost one's temper : GOT MAD
48. Short time : JIFF. Clecho-echo-oooo. Yodelling clues today. Where's the Alpenhorn?
 |
| I hate it when I lose my iPhone |
50. Walk of Fame honoree : CELEBrity. Is CELEB common enough now for no abbreviation or shortened indications in the clue? I guess so.
51. Engage in online fraud : PHISH. Help. I am stranded Rio with brasil police arrest and no wallet my hotel have my bag and will not release unless I give deposit money and they then give me phone and my possesses so I can wire me bail out of prison from bank. Wire now and I pay on sunday. Today is march and it rainy. I won Nigeria lottery on twesndsday.
55. Nobelist Wiesel : ELIE
56. Creepy look : LEER
57. Literary governess Jane : EYRE
59. Poseidon's realm : SEA
60. Cornfield call : CAW
61. Take a wrong turn, say : ERR. I've never heard that from the passenger seat before - "Oh, I think you erred - we're going the wrong way". It's more like "WOOOOAHH - San FRANCISCO?" What kind of BUSHWA driving is this?"
62. Binoculars user : SPY
Well, that was fun. More fun than spending an unexpected 24 hours in Houston airport on Thursday/Friday because my connection from LA was 2 hours late and I missed my Rio flight. Oh well!
Bom dia! My hovercraft is full of eels.
Steve.
