Well, winter is definitely here with our first real snowfall last week and several days of below freezing temperatures this week. I took a short work trip last week; my first train ride in nearly two years. But with the explosion of omicron cases, I don’t think I’ll be traveling anywhere else soon.

• Title: Split the Difference
• Grid size: 15×15
• Number of entries: 78
• Difficulty: Medium (my solve time 7:30)

I believe I’ve seen this theme before, but not in a while and it’s a pretty theme-ful grid so a satisfying solve. I have to say I didn’t really see the gimmick until after I’d solved and was reviewing the grid before I realized it was right there in the title: The starred clues are for adjacent entries with very “different” meanings that are “split” by the black square between the two entries:

• 17A: [*Ailment causing stuffiness]: HEAD COLD & 18A: [*Scientist associated with an apple]: NEWTON – Old and new.
• 22A: [*Windsor, Ontario’s “Heritage Tree” type]: SYCAMORE & 24A: [*School period]: LESSON – More and less.
• 36A: [*Makes funky-coloured fabric]: TIE DYES & 39A: [*Bridge work for a plastic surgeon]: NOSE JOBS – Yes and no.
• 48A: [*Killer cocktail, maybe]: POISON & 51A: [*Crimes and misdemeanors]: OFFENSES – On and off.
• 59A: [*Just about]: NEARLY & 62A: [*Cross-field football passes]: LATERALS – Early and late. This one almost got me as I had POP for 63 down and was trying to put PASS at the end of 62A, thinking maybe the gimmick was that “ALL” was hidden in the themers (though that doesn’t work either, so I don’t know what I was thinking).

This was a pretty quick solve for me, and if I didn’t have a couple of trouble spots I’d actually classify this one as medium easy.

Canadian content

• 6D: [Hockey’s Connor McDavis is one]: OILER – He is also captain of the Edmonton Oilers.
• 8D: [Place of “sober second thought”: Abbr.]: SEN – Canada’s first prime minister, Sir John A. Macdonald, described the Senate as a body of “sober second thought” that would curb the “democratic excesses” of the elected House of Commons.
• 22A: [*Windsor, Ontario’s “Heritage Tree” type]: SYCAMORE – Also a themer, this heritage tree is over 225 years old.
• 53D: ___-Sky Highway (Vancouver-Whistler route)]: SEA-TO – It’s a beautiful drive – I highly recommend it.
• 56A: [Pt. of BCIT or CNIB]: INST – I had to look up the British Columbia Institute of Technology and the Canadian National Institute for the Blind but I guessed correctly that the I in each was “Institute.”
• 63D: [Juno genre]: RAP – I confidently put POP in here which caused problems later (see 59A above).

Other stuff:

• 29A: [Pampered poodle name, maybe]: FIFI – The American Visionary Art Museum runs a kinetic sculpture race every year and one of the perennial entrants is a large dog named Fifi.
• 33A: [Palindromic pop band]: AHA – I had to run the alphabet to get this one – I had no idea what the “Seuss title verb” was and had MOP there for a while.
• 38D: [Blake’s black]: EBON – I initially read the clue as “Blake’s back” and was racking my brain trying to figure out how a poet would say “back.”
• 54D: [First name of talk TV]: ELLEN – I was afraid this would be the host of a Canadian talk show and I would have no idea who it was.

Quote of the week:  “When you’re in jail, a good friend will be trying to bail you out. A best friend will be in the cell next to you saying, ‘Damn, that was fun’.”
― Groucho Marx