I will not comment about the weather, how late in the year it is, or that there are oh-my-god only 12 days left until Christmas. I’ll just say that I am happy to be able to type this at you, as I woke up this morning with an achy wrist that I could barely move without spouting expletives, which got worse throughout the day. I got it checked out and all seems fine so far, but still I needed a couple of pills to dull the pain enough to hunt and peck at the keyboard. I don’t think it affected my solve, but let’s dig in and see.
- Name: Gifted People
- Size: 15×15
- Entries: 72
- Difficulty: Medium Hard (my solve time: 7:31)
The title didn’t mean much to me, especially since Barb told me she changed it about 30 seconds before I solved the puzzle. No worries, it’s more a pun on the theme than a real clue to the theme itself, and while I like puzzles that have titles, it would have been easy to figure out even without the title. In any event, the themers are all things that are not normally gifts, clued punnily as if they were appropriate gifts for specific types of people:
- 19A: [Gift for a carpenter without a hammer?]: PRESS ON NAILS – Well, I guess nails that didn’t need a hammer to be used would be, uh, useful? And when the carpentry work is done, and they want to go out in style and save the time of actually growing and painting fingernails, they could use press on nails.
- 27A: [Gift for a well-dressed track worker?]: RAILROAD TIE – I know a lot of railfans (virtual and otherwise) who would love one of these. However, railroad ties are a critical part of railway infrastructure, so they may be pleased to get a few of those as well.
- 34A: [Gift for an after hours golfer?]: NIGHT CLUB – I haven’t even searched yet but I bet I can find a golf club with a flashlight attached. Yep – but it actually has a legitimate use. Darn, I was hoping to find a gag gift, or ridiculous “gift for the golfer who has everything.” I guess the 19th hole of a nighttime golf course would appropriately be called the Night Club.
- 45A: [Gift for a baby plumber-to-be?]: RATTLE SNAKE – I guess a plumbers snake with a rattle on it might be some fun for a baby. But a rattlesnake definitely would not be.
- 52A: [Gift for a Glaswegian angler?]: SCOTTISH REEL – I guess a Scotsman might prefer locally-sourced fishing gear, though I don’t know if Scottish fishing gear is better than that made elsewhere. And if you want to know all about reels, Scottish and otherwise, this seems like a good place to start.
This was a pretty straightforward solve for me, though the fill was on the more difficult side and I jumped all over the place so my solve time was in the bottom half (42nd percentile) of all my solves.
Canadian content:
- 12D: [“O Sole ___” (aria Bryan Adams once sang with Pavarotti)]: MIO – You must watch this.
- 21A: [Place for a double-double]: TIMS – At first I was thinking this was some sports thing – a “double-double” is an achievement in basketball. But after I got the first three letters, I had a vague memory of something you could get at Tim Hortons, though I didn’t remember what until I looked it up, so I just added the “S” and hoped for the best.
- 25D: [Geddy who wrote “My Effin’ Life”]: LEE – I was a big fan of Rush growing up, so I’m hoping someone will buy me a copy of this book for Christmas.
- 28D: [Prov. holiday mo.]: AUG – I wasn’t aware that the first Monday of August is a holiday in many provinces.
- 37D: [Article in “Le Devoir”?]: UNE – This one had me flummoxed and I didn’t really get it until I searched and found that “Le Devoir” is a French-language newspaper published in Montreal and distributed throughout Canada. It’s clued punnily since “une” is an article of speech in French, and a publication contains “articles,” i.e. stories, so there is the double meaning.
- 59D: [Queen’s Park gallery in T.O.]: ROM – Another one that flummoxed me, and unlike many others I was unable to parse it without looking it up. I knew it was in Toronto and was an abbreviation, but had no idea it was the Royal Ontario Museum.
- 60A: [“The National” anchor ___ Arsenault]: ADRIENNE – Adrienne Arsenault is chief correspondent of CBC News, as well as anchor person for “The National.”
Other stuff:
- 7D: [Rapper nicknamed Humble the Magnificent]: EDAN – While I was looking into this to see if he was Canadian, I found out he’s not, but he is from where I grew up. Also, I think his nickname is actually “The Humble Magnificent” though I like “Humble the Magnificent” a lot better. And a complete tangent – it’s a cocktail as well.
- 16A: [Ear inflammation]: OTITIS – I had OTI and knew that was a prefix for ear (kind of), but had no idea what the malady was named so needed all the crosses.
- 51D: [Of Mars: Comb. form.]: AREO – I’m a bit of a fan of astronomy and space exploration, but I don’t recall “areo-” anything relating to Mars in my readings and watchings.
- 55D: [Mlle, across the Pyrenees]: SRTA – I read this as “Mile, across the Pyrenees” and briefly tried to think of the Spanish word for the unit of distance. Luckily I didn’t waste too much time on it and moved on; only on review after finishing did I catch that it was the abbreviation for “mademoiselle”.
Quote of the week:
“Perfectly ordered disorder designed with a helter-skelter magnificence”
– Emily Carr (born 13 December 1871)