Happy last day of January everyone! We’re definitely having winter here – while the snow has melted, it’s still nice and cold and there have been snow flurries in the weather forecast for a few days. I do miss sitting on the deck, but it looks like it may be warm enough to do so (maybe with the heater going) this weekend, so I’ll take it. Otherwise, the world keeps turning, news keeps happening, and work keeps me busier than I like, so let’s turn to this week’s puzzle for a little break.
- Name: You Don’t Say!
- Size: 15×15
- Entries: 80
- Difficulty: Medium Hard (my solve time: 7:37)
It took me a while to get the theme, even with a pretty straightforward title and after getting the revealer, which is more of a hint than a true revealer. I expected the circled letters to spell something or be part of a longer word or some other gimmick, so I wasn’t prepared for the actual theme: all the circled letters are “silent” as used in both directions in the grid:
- 1A: [Peace sign finger count]: TⓌO/2D: [Twists in pain]: ⓌRITHES – “Too” and “rithes” are how they’re pronounced.
- 10D: [Embarrassing to-do]: SⒸENE/16A: [Popeye’s pride]: MUSⒸLES – “Seen” and “mussels” – I really wanted to put GAFFE in 10D but couldn’t make it work with the crosses, thank goodness or I’d have really had a hard time figuring things out.
- 5D: [First time shows]: DEBUⓉS/25A: [Après-ski A-frame]: CHALEⓉ – “Daybew” and “shallay.”
- 23D: [___ chamber]: ECⒽO/32A: [Therapy session length, often: ⒽOUR – “Eco” and “our” – If by “hour” you mean 50 minutes.
- 35D: [Accordion music dance]: POⓁKA/45A: [Aid for the poor]: AⓁMS – “Poka” and “ahms” – I actually think the “L” is kind of pronounced in both polka and alms but maybe it’s just me. Lots of French-Canadian music uses accordions, but I couldn’t find a specific term for it.
- 53D: [“Survivor” setting]: IⓢLAND/58A: [Earthquake rubble]: DEBRIⓢ – “Eyeland” and “debree” – I once worked with an otherwise well-spoken colleague who insisted on pronouncing it “deb-riss.”
- 51D: [Not blatant]: SUⒷTLE/57A: [Nativity scene animal]: LAMⒷ – “Suttle” and “lam” – I put “covert” in for 51D but again couldn’t make it work and quickly changed it. I had to recall the lyrics to the most despised Christmas carol to remember “the ox and lamb kept time, [hideous nonsense works].”
- 59D: [Sound of relief]: SIGH/68A: [Bearded grass grazer]: GNU – “Scythe” and “knew.” Ha! just kidding; “Sy” and “new.”
This was just as difficult as it felt – challenging but not overly so, though I had a scare when I didn’t get the “congrats!” pop up. I had to find my error which it turns out was in the revealer: I had entered “SSH” and 43D looked perfectly fine as “sailing” until I saw it made no sense with the punny clue “Falling down hard?” Otherwise I think the lack of many long entries – the longest two were only 8 letters – resulted in a lot of shorter fill which takes longer to work through. But there were also a few minor head-scratchers and the usual misdirection – all fair of course, so no real complaints.
Canadian content:
- 3D: [July 1 song]: O CANADA – I like to sing along with “O Canada” when it’s played before Blue Jays-Orioles games. But I don’t shout out the “O” like I do for the Star Spangled Banner.
- 6D: [Its cap. is Regina]: SASK – Regina is indeed the capitol of Saskatchewan.
- 13D: [Vancouver-to-Seattle dir.]: SSE – As long as you’re talking about Vancouver. BC and not Vancouver, WA.
- 17A: [Winnipeg-born Valdaros]: NIA – While I knew Nia Vardalos was Canadian, I thought she was from Vancouver.
- 52D: [Singer with a lowercase-letter name]: KD LANG – Even though the convention for presenting crossword entries is to use upper case, I feel bad putting her name in all caps. Apologies, k.d. lang!
- 64A: [Anchor Hanomansing]: IAN – Ian Hanomansing was born in Trinidad and raised in Sackville, New Brunswick. He hosts CBC News’ flagship program THE NATIONAL from Vancouver on Fridays and Sundays, and is also the host of CROSS COUNTRY CHECKUP on CBC Radio and CBC News Network.
- 71A: [Raptor’s stat]: HGT – I thought this would be something related to the game of basketball, like points per game or assists. But instead it’s about the player – their height, which is important for basketball players like those on the Toronto Raptors.
Other stuff:
- 7D: [Willie Nelson’s honour: Abbr.]: CMA – Willie Nelson has won 11 Country Music Awards from 48 nominations. Barb said she bet she knew who I would quote in the blog and now I’m deciding whether it will be Willie or k.d. lang. Skip to the end to find out 😉
- 21D: [Warner who played Chan]: Oland – Hoo boy – I didn’t realize the actor who made Fu Manchu and Charlie Chan famous on screen wasn’t even close to being Asian. While it appears he approached his Asian roles seriously, it’s still a pretty egregious example of “yellowface” or “whitewashing.”
- 28D: [Top-tier group]: A ONES – Had “A-Team” in here for a long long time.
- 35A: [Stench]: PONG – Whew – I really really tried to make ODOR work here – when I should have known right off it would’ve been “odour” if it was actually used. Today I learned that pong is “UK, Australia, New Zealand, slang – To stink, to smell bad.”
- 37A: [“What did I ___ deserve this?”]: DO TO – This was harder than it should have been for me as I skipped over the “I” in the clue and tried to fit I DO TO into 4 squares.
- 38D: [Dutch dialect of South Africa]: TAAL – Wow – not sure I’ve ever come across this in any puzzle before, though I must have with those very useful letters. Luckily, it didn’t really pose a problem, as all the crosses (except 51A) were pretty straightforward.
- 51A: [Drink in an o-choko]: SAKE – For some reason I had in my head that an o-choko must be the word for a Coke bottle somewhere in the world, due in no small part to having entered “covert” in 51D.
Quote of the week:
“Ninety-nine percent of the world’s lovers are not with their first choice. That’s what makes the jukebox play.”
– Willie Nelson