Daisy Mae's love in funnies / WED 12-3-14 / Mongolian for red / Jason who was 2000 A.L. M.V.P. / Nonpolygamous grouping / Swing
THEME: PANDA (38A: World Wildlife Fund logo … or a three-word hint to the answers to the four starred clues) — two-word phrases: first word P-, second word A- …
Theme answers:
- PARTY ANIMAL
- "PATCH ADAMS"
- PARK AVENUE
- PENNY ARCADE
Jason Gilbert Giambi (/dʒiˈɑːmbi/; born January 8, 1971) is an American professional baseballfirst baseman and designated hitter who is a free agent. In his Major League Baseball (MLB) career, which began in 1995, he has played for the Oakland Athletics, New York Yankees, Colorado Rockies and Cleveland Indians. Giambi was the American League MVP in 2000 while with the Athletics, and is a five-time All-Star who has led the American League in walks four times, in on-base percentage three times, and in doubles and in slugging percentage once each, and won the Silver Slugger award twice. Giambi took performance-enhancing drugs during his career, for which use he has publicly apologized. Giambi was named one of the Top 10 Most Superstitious Athletes by Men's Fitness. (wikipedia)• • •
A light romp. Did it about a minute and a half faster than I did yesterday's puzzle, which is to say, I did it in reasonably normal Wednesday time. This feels like more of a Tuesday than a Wednesday concept; with a little cluing adjustment, this could've played yesterday and yesterday's could've played today, and while that would not necessarily made yesterday's puzzle more pleasant, it would've made it slightly more explicable. But enough about that, let's talk about this. It's very straightforward. It's a theme type I know I've seen before, possibly with CANDY (or the like) as the revealer. This is wordplay 101—take a common word, and then parse it differently, imagine it as multiple words, see where it leads you. Patrick's brain has been doing this in its sleep (and out of it) for years and years. There's nothing mind-boggling about this concept, or this grid, but the fill is reasonably clean and there are some interesting words and longer phrases, and so, as easy puzzles go, this seems like a success to me. I'm trying to think of other P and A phrases—seems like there should be a bunch—but I'm not having much success. PAUL ANKA, PLATE APPEARANCE (15!), PAPER AIRPLANE …
There's an added level of constructing difficulty here, as the themers cross. This is the reason that *these* themers (and not others) were chosen—they fit symmetrically in the grid. On the one hand, this gives the grid an interesting shape, with giant NW and SE corners (leaving only tiny NE and SW corners, and a rather choppy middle diagonal section connecting them). Sometimes it's nice not to have the themers be in the more predictable Across places. "PENNY ARCADE" is a popular, long-running webcomic, but I'm guessing that's well outside the knowledge base of your average NYT crossword solver. I'd've appreciated the comics clue, but only about a dozen other people would've felt the same, so oldey timey clue it is! I resent having to remember that "PATCH ADAMS" exists (not the way I want to remember Robin Williams), but having it in the grid did add to the list of potential answers for my "hidden African countries" puzzle (along with ANIMAL INSTINCTS (15!), that brings total such answers to two—I'm on my way!)
NYT still having issues with turnaround time. This puzzle was made in 2009 …
Patrick Blindauer has his own puzzle site where you can get a new free puzzle on the first of every month (which means there's a new one I haven't done yet … whoa … I'm doing it right now. The trick with the main theme answers is pretty amazing … go get it (under "Play")). He's also got a new Space Puzzlefest coming out later this month: a dozen puzzles that are part of a larger metapuzzle. Check it out.
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
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