The Wellington Files

  • All Hope, No Blame

    At 46D today, the clue was “Modern suffix with situation,” and the answer was SHIP. Situationship. Here’s a string of comments it inspired:

    SharonAK: ??Situationship?? Is this really a word? How is it used and by whom?

    Anony Mouse 1: Situationship is a very common current term (prob the most current in this puzzle). It’s when you are hooking up and going on dates with someone but there’s no formal label or commitment so you are sitting in limbo.

    Anony Mouse 2: Situationship is Gen Z slang. Its something in between “friends with benefits” and an all out relationship.

    Anony Mouse 3: Situationship is a real term! It means like a temporary relationship that works for the time being, it’s kinda the new “it’s complicated.”

    Liveprof (me!): It’s a naval term describing the conditions on board a vessel. The captain will often ask his second in command to provide him with the situationship each morning.

    This poem is called “The Age of Reason.” It’s by Mary Jo Salter, below, and is from today’s Writer’s Almanac.

    “When can we have cake?” she wants to know.
    And patiently we explain: when dinner’s finished.
    Someone wants seconds; and wouldn’t she like to try,
    while she’s waiting, a healthful lettuce leaf?
    The birthday girl can’t hide her grief—

    worse, everybody laughs. That makes her sink
    two rabbity, gapped teeth, acquired this year,
    into a quivering lip, which puts an end
    to tears but not the tedium she’ll take
    in life before she’s given cake:

    “When I turned seven, now,” her grandpa says,
    “the priest told me I’d reached the age of reason.
    That means you’re old enough to tell what’s right
    from wrong. Make decisions on your own.”
    Her big eyes brighten. “So you mean

    I can decide to open presents first?”
    Laughter again (she joins it) as the reward
    of devil’s food is brought in on a tray.
    “You know why we were taught that?” asks my father.
    “No.” I light a candle, then another

    in a chain. “—So we wouldn’t burn in Hell.”
    A balloon pops in the other room; distracted,
    she innocently misses talk of nuns’
    severities I never knew at seven.
    By then, we were Unitarian

    and marched off weekly, dutifully, to hear
    nothing in particular. “Ready!”
    I call, and we huddle close to sing
    something akin, you’d have to say, to prayer.
    Good God, her hair—

    one beribboned pigtail has swung low
    as she leans to trade the year in for a wish;
    before she blows it out, the camera’s flash
    captures a mother’s hand, all hope, no blame,
    saving her from the flame.

    Today’s puzzle was all about the Sondheim musical Sunday in the Park with George. There were circled letters we were to connect to spell out “Look, I made a hat,” and they formed the shape of a hat. (See it?)

    “Look, I Made a Hat: Collected Lyrics (1981–2011) with Attendant Comments, Amplifications, Dogmas, Harangues, Wafflings, Diversions and Anecdotes” was the second book of two covering SONDHEIM’s lyrics. The two volumes were packaged together as Hat Box: The Collected Lyrics of Stephen Sondheim. “Look, I made a hat where there never was a hat” is also an actual lyric from the song “Finishing the Hat” from Sunday in the Park with George.

    Commenter Danny added: George Seurat, the main character of the musical at hand, was a pointillist—so the dots/circles are incredibly apt! 

    Sondheim was an avid fan of puzzles and games. He is credited with introducing cryptic crosswords, a British invention, to American audiences through a series of cryptic crossword puzzles he created for New York magazine in 1968 and 1969. Sondheim was “legendary” in theater circles for “concocting puzzles, scavenger hunts and murder-mystery games”, inspiring the central character of Anthony Shaffer’s 1970 play Sleuth. Sondheim’s love of puzzles and mysteries is evident in The Last of Sheila, an intricate whodunit written with longtime friend Anthony Perkins. (Wikipedia)

    Bernadette Peters was in George. Phil complains that it’s hard for the camera to pin down how beautiful she is. Still, gotta try, buddy.

    At 51A, “Unappetizing gruel” was SLOP. SLOP was the “Word of the Year” for 2025, per the editors at Miriam Webster. They define it “digital content of low quality that is produced usually in quantity by means of artificial intelligence.” The flood of slop in 2025 included absurd videos, off-kilter advertising images, cheesy propaganda, fake news that looks pretty real, junky AI-written books, “workslop” reports that waste coworkers’ time… and lots of talking cats. “AI Slop is Everywhere,” warned The Wall Street Journal, while admitting to enjoying some of the cats. 

    Speaking of George, we had to wake up our own George early today to open up the Owl Chatter Hall of Fame for the immediate induction of T. J. Sabula, the Ford employee who shouted “pedophile protector” at Trump yesterday. Sabula was immediately suspended by the toadies at Ford but donations in excess of $500,000 have already gushed in for TJ from admirers.

    TJ, 40, and a proud union man, says he has no regrets. “I don’t feel as though fate looks upon you often, and when it does, you better be ready to seize the opportunity,” he said. “And today I think I did that.” So do we. Scoot over folks — make room in our Hall of Fame for him. And get him a beer, George.

    Closing up shop a little early tonight. Tired from a hunting/gathering outing to Costco. See you tomorrow!

  • Stayin’ Alive

    On the third anniversary of Susan’s death: a motto associated with her:

    Even a Monday puzzle can have a WOE or two. That’s an XW acronym for “what on earth?” Yesterday there was “Leaf on a sushi tray.” You know, that little green leaf next to or under the wasabi? In gas station or supermarket sushi it’s plastic. Otherwise it’s SHISO. Here’s how to use it in a sentence: I’m so hot for her and SHISO cold. Don’t the gents look young here?

    Everybody’s favorite clue/answer yesterday was “Put in a good word, perhaps?” Answer: EDIT. Here’s Commenter Lewis: Here’s a word appearing more than 700 times in the NYTXW, and you’d think the well would have run dry on new clues. But this one is not only terrific, it’s a debut. Mwah!

    We love this: Did you know that in many sites when CPR is performed the music used to provide the rhythm is “Stayin’ Alive?” We learned that from the clue for CPR at 28A today: “E.M.T. process often administered to the beat of ‘Stayin’ Alive.’”

    Anony Mouse contributed the following: Before “Stayin’ Alive” (we’re talkin’ the ’70s), CPR was taught to the tempo/rhythm of “My Melody of Love” by Bobby Vinton. Thankfully, the docs discovered the pace was too slow to revive enough patients, and we moved on from slow polka to disco!

    Sticking with music for a bit, we bid goodbye to Bob Weir of The Grateful Dead. Bob passed away on Saturday at the age of 78. He met Jerry Garcia when he (Bob) was 16 (and Jerry 21). Bob followed some banjo music into a music store where Jerry was about to give lessons. Bob had his guitar with him and they started jamming. They teamed up to form a jug band which later morphed into The Dead.

    Bob married very well and had two daughters (Monet and Chloe) with his wife Natascha, who was 20 years his junior. You can see below how pretty she still is as he grew into some sort of rock formation (pun intended).

    In 2024, Bob and the Grateful Dead became Trump-Kennedy Center honorees. They were inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1994 and given a lifetime achievement Grammy Award in 2007.

    The dreadful news of the day seeped into the crossword today at 43D where the clue was “Vice-presidential candidate of 2024.” TIM WALZ, of course.

    It set Rex off:

    TIM WALZ is an interesting full name to squeeze in there, though at the moment all it does is remind me of the Siege of Minneapolis (ongoing). Would be nice if Walz and other elected officials had any kind of answer for the violence being perpetrated by the federal government. Give a bunch of weak, poorly-trained, sadistic CLODS (37A: Buffoons) automatic weapons and body armor, set them loose to terrorize ethnic Somalis and other non-white immigrants (so—virtually any non-white person), and let them know in no uncertain terms that they are above the law … and presto, you’ve got yourself your very own Gestapo. That is what ICE is at this point. Bizarre to pretend otherwise. Buncha dudes too incompetent and cowardly for actual war, doing their little war cosplay games in American cities with live ammunition, gleefully, boastfully hurting people. You’re either into it or you’re not, but … Gestapo is the correct analogy. 

    [ICE was also in the puzzle, at 12D, “Bartender’s supply.”]

    I liked the theme today. It centered on the iconic Queen song: WE WILL ROCK YOU. Three theme answer were things that rock you. NEONATAL NURSE, MECHANICAL BULL, and TECHTONIC PLATES.

    Boop!

    I loved 9D today too. The clue was “Yogi, once.” Answer: BEAR CUB.

    At 59A, “Birthplace of Marlon Brando and Warren Buffett,” was OMAHA. It’s also where John and Linda live in this exquisite John Prine song. Joe is somewhere on the road.

    Aside from Congress, there is probably no group as dedicated to nonsense as the Dull Men’s Club (UK Chapter). DMC Member Andy Spragg posted the following recently:

    As the result of a bout of interior window-cleaning on Friday, I discovered that our long-serving grey plastic bucket had not one but two holes in it (dear Liza). Fracture “stars” in its base to be precise, so that its lack of hydraulic integrity was not visible initially, and only became apparent when it started to leave recurring small puddles on the bedroom floor and window ledge. To my surprise, Asda did not sell a satisfactory replacement, so I was obliged to head for B&Q where they had loads at £1 each. So I bought two, one orange and one black, allowing us to allocate each one by colour to different duty categories yet to be determined.

    Le bucket est mort. Vive les buckets!

    Jim Dunbar: At the risk of causing a heated debate i feel i must pull you up on the use of the word hydraulic when just referring to water in a bucket.

    Andy:  I’ve carried out a quick review and I’m going to take this as a lesson learned. Seems the word, correctly used, has more specific connotations than I realised. That said, I found this example of use in the Cambridge English corpus, which corresponds closely to the intended sense in which I used the word: “Melted paraffin wax was poured over the agar to provide an effective hydraulic seal.”

    Andy: however, I feel I must also pull you up, not only for twice failing to capitalise your first person singular pronoun, but also for failing to enclose the word ‘hydraulic’ in speech marks. A comma after ‘debate’ would have been nice too. Small points in comparison, I readily concede, but no less valid for that.

    Jim: i’ll give you the capitalisation issue, however in casual texts it is allowed. I didn’t use inverted commas as i am not quoting your actual speech, just merely what you typed. (Technical get out😁)

    Can’t accept the Cambridge English example as being close though. The fact that they mention a “seal” via use of wax indicates some form of pressure involved, hence hydraulic.

    I did tell you this may cause a heated debate. Not dull but enjoyable. It has resulted in me still being in my PJ’s past midday though.

    Andy: Not technical get-outy enough! I said “speech marks” rather than ‘quotation marks’ precisely because you weren’t quoting my actual speech. Technically, what you wrote is grammatical nonsense without the use of some device to indicate that the word in question (‘hydraulic’) is not being used as a word in the context of the sentence in which it finds itself, but rather as a reference back to a previous sentence.

    As for the Cambridge English example, there can’t be a lot of pressure involved, agar being a jelly, as used in Petri dishes. There’s not a lot of pressure involved in water in a bucket, either, just the hydraulic head (which is what effects the movement of water through the fractures). So I take it back; I now believe my use of the word was technically correct 🙂

    This is a most enjoyable debate! Please change out of your PJs before replying, though; we don’t want to frighten the children

    Jim: kids long grown up and gone.

    I thought speech was talking. The word hydraulic as many words do, has greek origins. Hydro (water) and aulos (pipe or tube). I didn’t see a pipe or tube and i don’t think a crack counts. As for the last paragraph, you lost me when i saw grammatical spelt incorrectly.

    I really must get dressed.

    Andy: aaargh! Careless old me. I shall correct “gramatical” forthwith. You are of course right about the origins of the word “hydraulic.” but the word has multiple meanings these days, and pipes and tubes are not involved in all of them, for example: “of, concerned with, or employing liquids in motion.”

    Now for goodness sake, soldier, get dressed!

    Jim: Ha ha. I am now dressed and i’m in my garage doing some dull woodworking making a 5-drawer cabinet for my woodworking gear.

    Sorry about your bucket situation. It’s not easy finding a strong plastic one nowadays.

    See you next time, Chatterheads. Thanks for popping by.

  • Ragdoll

    Happy birthday, Alex. On this date in 1755, Alexander Hamilton was born. He wrote:  “The sacred rights of mankind are not to be rummaged for among old parchments or musty records. They are written, as with a sunbeam, in the whole volume of human nature by the hand of the divinity itself and can never be erased or obscured by mortal power.”

    Well, that’s pretty much what we’re going to be testing these next few years, isn’t it? We’ll see what we can do. In the meantime, anyone got two tens for a twenty?

    I started taking Zepbound recently and have lost 12 pounds since December 4. I feel good about it. So the obit of Dr. Joel Habener, who died in Newton, MA, at the age of 88 two weeks ago caught my eye. He discovered the stuff, but it’s one of the oddest-ass obits I’ve ever seen.

    It spends a lot of time on the discovery, of course. It was almost by accident. (That seems to occur often. For example, Pringles were discovered by accident. They were trying to invent tennis balls.) He planned to work with rats, but found anglerfish to be much more suitable subjects. Happily, one of the folks in his lab had a brother who was a commercial fisherman.

    When the key discovery was made, he joked to his wife: “I’m going to Stockholm.” In fact, his team and he won an assortment of prestigious awards, if not the Nobel.

    And then the following appears:

    In 2005, The Boston Globe reported that Dr. Habener had been accused of attacking his wife. He was indicted on charges of assault with intent to murder a victim over age 60, assault with a dangerous weapon of a victim over 60, and illegal possession of a firearm.

    He waived his right to a jury trial and was found not guilty of assault with intent to murder, guilty but not criminally responsible for the other assault charge, and guilty of illegal firearms possession. He went on a medical leave of absence after the incident and returned in 2006 to continue his research.

    Despite the above, the doc and his wife remained married. She died in 2017. His sole immediate survivor is his brother. And, of course, all of us fatties who are beyond thankful for his work. Rest in peace, doc.

    Love the grid art in the puzzle today. That’s the Greek letter PHI, represented by an overlapping O and I. See it? — formed by the black squares in the center? ϕ.

    Along with the art, eight times in the puzzle there was an answer pair with the letters PHI in one square going one way and the two letters I and O going the other way. For example, at 97A and 99D, Regis [PHI]LBIN was crossing FLIP-FLOP SANDALS (FL[I/O]P SANDALS). Very impressive construction, IMO, Dylan Schiff.

    Stuff I learned from the puzzle today: 25A, “Sound from a ragdoll.” Answer PURR. What? A ragdoll is a breed of blue-eyed cat. So this doll is not Raggedy Ann (or Andy). Gorgeous.

    Also learned that a division sign (in math) is not called a gozinta (as in five gozinta 20 four times). It’s called an obelus. You know, ÷.

    The compound that ripens bananas is ETHENE. And as JonB3 explains: Ethene is a shortcut for ETHYLENE, H2C=CH2, a known plant growth regulator which hastens ripening.

    Know what CONTES are? The clue was “Short adventure tales.” New to me. Conte is a literary genre of tales, often short, characterized by fantasy or wit. They were popular in the 17th and 18th centuries, until they merged with the short story in the 19th century.

    Here’s a conte about NYC in which nothing profound happens, except that it does. It’s from today’s Met Diary and is by Malory Hom.

    Dear Diary:

    It was a Tuesday night, and I was headed home after teaching my adult literacy class.

    I got on the subway at Wall Street. The man sitting across from me was noticeably dancing in his seat. When he got up to get off at his stop, he bumped fists with the man sitting next to him.

    A few stops later, the second man asked if I wanted a bag of high-end hair products. He had just come from an event and didn’t need them because he was bald.

    I accepted and asked if he knew the man who had fist-bumped him.

    “No,” he said. “But he was grooving out.”

    From The Onion:

    DHS Releases Watchlist Of Mothers Driving Cars

    “If you see a minivan with a ‘Baby on board’ sticker, do not engage—many of these women are armed with juice boxes and will not hesitate to use a wet wipe on your face. Maintain a safe distance from any compact SUVs playing Bluey on their entertainment systems.”

    See you tomorrow! Thanks for dropping in.

  • Friend of Dorothy

    The White House released this latest video of the ICE killing in Minnesota, supporting its claims that the agent was acting in self-defense. Readers should be warned, the footage is fairly chilling.

    Three notes from today’s Writer’s Almanac, in lieu of a poem.

    From WWII historian and writer Stephen E. Ambrose, who was born on this date in 1936 and died in 2002. “The number one secret of being a successful writer is this: Marry an English major.”

    Jewish Detroit poet Philip Levine, who was born on this date in 1928 and died in 2015. Levine fell in love with poetry as a student at Wayne State University. He worked in auto plants as a student and after graduating, and said it was so loud in there that he could recite poetry without anyone hearing.

    Last, it’s the birthday of poet Dorianne Laux, Augusta, Maine, 1952, photo below. She is still with us. Whew. She said (and we agree): “Any good poem is asking you simply to slow down.”

    We don’t ever sit our children down and tell them, but we should try to illustrate it by how we live our lives. We try to show them that a good career, a good profession, is not pursued for money, as much as we love money and our toys, but because it’s meaningful to us. It allows for creative expression and beneficial human contact. And we try to show them, if we can, if we are lucky, that you need to place your heart in the hands of someone who will cherish it and protect it. It’s more fragile than you can imagine. My parents and older siblings did their best: I have no complaints, zero, only gratitude. And we tried too. I don’t lose sleep over it.

    The puzzle was brilliant today. So much crisp, lively material.  Kameron Austin Collins. Mwah!

    First, to get a song in, at 29A the clue was “Without revealing one’s true intentions, maybe,” and the answer was COYLY. It was enough to move Son Volt to share this song, Shiny, with us. It’s about a visitor to a gypsy fair who falls for one of their girls. She keeps swindling him, but he doesn’t care because he’s so taken by her beauty, especially her dark eyes.

    A tawny gypsy girl, sleeping blanketed by stars
    Beneath the tilt-a-whirl
    Where we were coyly caught alone
    All fumbling with your blouse

    Tell me why you lied
    And what it is you do to keep your eyes all shiny.

    But let’s not stereotype. Here’s a pretty gypsy girl who is not a swindler. Phil asked her to marry him. She thought he was joking and hasn’t answered.

    Our favorite clue/answer ran entirely down the center of the grid. It was an expression I don’t think I’ve heard before. The clue was “Gay man, per historical slang inspired by Judy Garland.” Answer: FRIEND OF DOROTHY.

    And how’s this for a combination at 37A and 37D? BEER and BRISKET.

    For us disgusting old men: NOSE HAIR, at 42A (“Trimmer target”), crossing VITAL SIGNS, at 25D (“Figures checked by nurses”).

    But don’t worry too much about it, gentlemen: at 1A: YOU LOOK FAB! (“What a darling outfit!”)

    I was flummoxed at 6D. For “That dis was goo-ood!!” the answer was OH SNAP! “Dis” here means insult. “Oh snap” is an exclamation of agreement or acknowledgment, often (but not exclusively) used in response to an insult.

    Whatsername posted: “Best illustration I ever saw of OH SNAP was at my orthopedic sturgeon’s office where the staff wore T-shirts with those words spelled out under a picture of a fractured bone.”

    I replied: LOL (x2).

    At 41D, for the clue “Poles can be found next to them,” the answer was CZECHS. Commenter Jazzmanchgo said “the bass player George Mraz, who was born in then-Czechoslovakia, was nicknamed “Bounce” by pianist Jimmy Rowles. He asked Rowles why, and Jimmy replied, ” ‘Cause you’re a b-a-a-d Czech!”

    A confession of sorts by Chris James of the Dull Men’s Club (UK): When the kitchen egg tray is found lacking symmetry I have to intervene…

    (Additional photos omitted.)

    Annabelle Sara Wells: I’m glad I’m not the only one. I also cannot have an odd number of eggs. 

    Nigel Kingsley: You need your head examined.

    Chris: It is.  It has an annual CT with contrast scan.

    Ruth Hunt: And I bet it’s beautifully symmetrical too (just like my egg box).

    Mark Redford: Careful, looks like you’re sending coded messages. Le Carré would’ve loved this.

    Chris: Yes it’s the exact time and date the US will invade Greenland.

    John Hodgson: So glad you’re including rotational symmetry. Too many people only consider reflection in these situations.

    Mark Anderson: Two rows of four, surely?

    Karen Wilkin: I do this for balance purposes – to reduce the likelihood of the tray tipping over. So, without looking at your other pics, pics 1 and 2 are risky.

    Rohan Thorn: I went to the farm shop for eggs yesterday and made sure I had arranged the remaining eggs symmetrically in the tray after I took mine.

    Robin Cooney: Spot on.

    Gord Lynch: I hope you never get white eggs in the mix

    Chris: Sadly, we do.

    Avi Liveson: Egg racist!!

    Andrew Jackson: So glad you don’t keep them in the fridge.

    Chris: Why would I? These are UK eggs.

    See you tomorrow! Thanks for dropping by.

  • Frozen Iguanas

    Credit where due: All it took was the invasion of a sovereign country and the brutal senseless murder of one U.S. citizen to get Epstein off the front pages. Well done, team!

    Here is Renee Nicole Good. May she rest in peace.

    Renee’s Instagram account displays a pride flag emoji and she describes herself as a “poet and writer and wife and mom.” Oddly, she forgot to include domestic terrorist. She has a degree in English from Virginia’s Old Dominion University. She was a Coloradan for most of her life. Her ex-husband described her as a devout Christian who loved to sing, and said she wasn’t an activist. Trump, Vance, Bondi, and their ilk couldn’t stumble over each other fast enough to tar her as a terrorist in defending her murderer.

    Jesse Watters, FOX News asshole, felt it was important for his audience to know that Good had preferred pronouns in her bio and self-identified as a poet, no doubt implying it was okay to kill her. “Pronouns in her bio? A POET?!?!!” comedian Patton Oswalt noted.  “Why didn’t that brave ICE agent empty his full clip?”

    Her murder, and the clear visual evidence of the blatant lies of the administration, are terrible markers of how debased our government has become. America is shrieking in pain.

    May your memory be a blessing Renee.

    In the puzzle yesterday, starting us off at 1A was “______ canto,” with the answer BEL. Commenter Pablo said he had no trouble with it because there is a group with that name in his area. He said they were good singers who were also known as the “Can Beltos.” (Hi Pam! Good one?)

    The theme was GRADE INFLATION, and in each theme answer you had to raise a letter grade by one. E.g., at 63A the clue was “Results of wearing some uncomfortable shoes.” You think the answer will be BLISTERS, but you need to inflate the B to an A, for the answer A-LISTERS.

    The two best non-theme answers were at 47A, where “Tea traders?” was YENTAS. Get it? Tea is gossip. And at 32A, where “Benefactor with a limited number of grants,” was GENIE.

    Do you know the Jewish genie joke? This little old Jewish guy rubs the lamp and a Jewish genie pops out. He says, you just get one wish, so be careful. The guy thinks a bit and then opens his wallet and takes out a little piece of paper. It’s a map of the middle east. He shows it to the genie, explains the situation with Israel and its neighbors and says his wish is for there to be peace in that region.

    The genie explains that that sort of wish falls into the geo-socio-political area. He says most people wish for personal stuff like wealth or fame, and he asks the guy to reconsider. So the guy thinks a bit more, opens his wallet again, and this time he takes out a little photo of a wrinkled old lady and shows it to the genie. “This is my wife Sadie,” he explains. “For 60 years, she’s been the best wife a man could ask for, and I love her dearly. But she’s always been reluctant to engage in oral sex. So my wish is for oral sex with Sadie.”

    The genie thinks for a minute and says: “Let me have another look at that map.”

    The Palm Beach Cardinals of the Florida State League (minor league baseball) will adopt an “alternate identity” for their Saturday home games this season. Alternate uniforms, alternate team logo, etc. They will be the Palm Beach Frozen Iguanas.

    Of course, in Florida, “frozen” doesn’t really mean like ice frozen. Here’s the story.

    Iguanas are all over Florida. One thing they like doing is climbing trees. Who wouldn’t? But they are cold-blooded. And when the temp drops to 45 they go into a (frozen) coma. It happens suddenly so those who are up in trees just plop out (see video, below). It’s not like: Ooh, it’s getting chilly, I better calmly climb down from this tree. It’s thud.

    So, to honor these Floridians, the team will be the “Frozen Iguanas” at their Saturday home games. OC sports consultant Sarah Fillier loves it. “A different kind of frozen from hockey, but still good.”

    How’s this love note sound?

    “Every day and every night I want to see you and be with you. Yet I have no feeling of selfish ownership or jealousy. Let’s go for a long ride Sunday; let’s go to the mountains weekends; let’s read books in front of fires; most of all, let’s really grow together and find the happiness we know is ours.”

    Who wrote it to the woman he eventually married?

    (a) Aaron Rodgers

    (b) Richard Nixon

    (c) Jimmy Fallon

    (d) Mickey Rooney

    Answer down below, after a while.

    At 1D today, “Small bit, in Bogotá” was POCO.

    The love note answer from above is Nixon. Yup. Written to his Pat, of course. It’s the man’s birthday today. Born in 1913, Yorba Linda, CA.

    Here’s Pat. He could have done worse. Not sure she could have.

    Tom Cruise is flappin his lips about still expecting to work with Ana de Armas and maybe having another chance at romance. But our Phil and George find it laughable and delusional, two of their areas of expertise. “If he bothers you at all, Armas,” they calmly stated, “he will quickly learn how much expensive photographic equipment will fit up his ass.”

    No! Not the cameras, Phil!

    See you tomorrow, Chatterheads!

  • Pickles

    We’re starting a new department here at Owl Chatter we’re calling “No Sh*t, Sherlock.”

    The first entrant is this hysterical headline from yesterday’s NYT, which I promise I did not make up. “Conservative Justices’ Rulings Increasingly Favor Rich, Economists Say.”

    The second is the title of economist Eduardo Porter’s blog post: “The U.S. Has Lost Its Credibility.”

    Ya think?

    Monday’s puzzle included the great film TAXI DRIVER. Commenter Pablo noted that he thought De Niro’s iconic “You talkin’ to me?” might have been an ad lib. No one picked up on it, but I replied today:

    My exhaustive research (you know, a minute or two online), reveals that it mostly was ad lib. Scorsese directed him generally to talk to himself in the mirror, and De Niro took it from there.

    BTW, De Niro’s classic line should not be confused with my teenage daughter’s from around the same time: “I’m not talking to you, Dad. You’re an idiot.”

    Pablo responded thanking me. I appreciate the courtesy.

    If you, like me, look at a jar of pickles and see pickles, you should note the passing last month of artist Janet Fish, at the age of 87, at her home in Wells, VT. She studied art at Yale under de Kooning and Pollock, but resisted the pull of abstract art in favor of still lifes. She was drawn to the play of light upon objects, fruits and vegetables on a table near a window at first, and then plastic-wrapped food and bottles of various liquids — Windex, vinegar, salad dressing, jelly, honey, liquor. As Michael Rosenwald put it in Fish’s obit in the Times, she transformed jars of pickles, bottles of vodka and bowls of fruit into vessels of dazzling light and unassuming beauty.

    Her dad was an art historian and her mom a sculptor. She considered no other career. “It was never in my head that I wasn’t going to be an artist,” she said.

    Self-portrait of Fish.

    Janet is survived by her husband, the artist Charles Parness, who paints self-portraits exclusively, and two siblings.

    Here’s Charles. Rest in peace, Janet.

    At 31D today, “Bottom line?” was HEM.

    The missed field goal that cost Baltimore the game and a playoff spot Sunday night (wide right, Tyler Loop) had a domino effect. John Harbaugh, long-time Ravens coach, was fired. Hard to imagine that occurring if the birds had a playoff game to attend to this week. But you never know. There’s some talk he “lost” the locker room and relations with QB Lamar Jackson were queasy. We love John. Among other things, his bro is Jim Harbaugh who led our Wolverines to the national title in 2023. The brothers faced off in Super Bowl 47 when Jim was with SF. John’s Ravens won. We were rooting for John because Jim seemed like a lunatic and John like a mensch. But as soon as Jim took over at UMich we loved him: he was our lunatic.

    We predict John will wind up as head coach of the Jints, with a boatload of money and a long-term deal. He won’t even consider the Jets: Who in his right mind would?

    Here’s John, in happier times.

    See you next time!

  • Wide Right

    The champagne flowed freely in the Jets locker room yesterday! The season of grim torment finally dribbled to an end, AND it ended with an impressive loss by less than 30 points! Buffalo 35, NYJ 8. The Jets actually won the fourth quarter 8-6.

    When Ralph Waldo Emerson submitted his first collection of poems to his publisher, he was sent the galleys to review by the printer. Emerson noticed that his middle name was omitted on the title page. So he noted in the margin: “Where’s Waldo?,” thus launching the popular series of children’s puzzle books.

    Owl Chatter’s rigorous, scientific poll reveals that only 156 Americans support the U.S. takeover of Vuvuzela. Of the remaining population, 522 are opposed, and the rest think it’s in Africa.

    Our intrepid war correspondent George Santos along with brave photo-journalist Phil flew down to Caracas in advance of the operation. At great personal risk, Phil got these shots for us as the operation began.

    In the puzzle yesterday, the answer BRUTUS appeared twice, as explained below. In discussing that, Rex wondered parenthetically whether the plural might be “Bruti.” And Commenter Colin had this to say about that:

    As a wannabe Latin scholar, I looked up Brutus (and brutus) in my Cassell’s Latin dictionary. Yes, the plural would be Bruti / bruti; “brutus” appears to be a second declension masculine noun. Many folks think that any Latin word ending in -us in the singular would end in -i in the plural, and that is often correct but that’s only for second declension nouns. Some nouns ending in -us are actually fourth declension, in which case the nominative plural would end in -ūs (note long ū, pronounced like a long u or “oo”). Ductus (as in patent ductus arteriosus) in the plural would be ductūs (and ductus arteriosus would be ductūs arteriosi). Manus (“hand”; the MIT motto is “Mens et manus” or “Mind and hand”) is another example of a fourth declension noun, and so the plural of manus is manūs.

    I commented: Thanks for clearing that up!

    The puzzle was all about double crossing, in a neat way. It had five figures who were betrayed by somebody (double crossed), and the name of the bad guy “crossed” him twice in the puzzle. Get it? “Double” crossed. For example, OTHELLO, at 119A, was crossed twice by IAGO: once at 105D as the parrot from Aladdin, and again at 107D, with the clue: “Driven by envy toward his comrades, he fabricated events that led to their downfall.” Similarly, CAESAR was crossed twice by BRUTUS; JESUS by JUDAS, MUFASA by SCAR, and, less famously, OSIRIS by SET.

    Here’s some early Clapton with John Mayall, alav hashalom, followed by Van, who was lost, double-crossed!

    John Mayall.

    Last night’s Ravens-Steelers game was do or die. The winner would advance to the playoffs: money, fame, loose women, rich desserts. And the loser would go home shattered, vilified, and ruined. It was a bruising heavyweight fight with the two great behemoths trading blows until the final seconds ticked down. The Steelers pulled ahead with a TD, but their kicker, Chris Boswell, missed the extra point. So they were only up 26-24 as Baltimore drove up the field with the game clock bleeding out. They set their kicker Tyler Loop up well. His 44-yard field goal with the clock hitting zero would give the game to the Ravens. Instead, . . . well, take a look.

    I thought of my old Brandeis friend Lance, alav hasahlom, when I heard the church organ play in that video. I would get to my office at Hunter Monday mornings in the fall, after a typical Jets loss, and there’d be a phone message waiting for me. It was Lance somberly intoning the Kaddish . . . Yisgadal v’yiskadash, shmei rabah. . .

    Services will be held for the Ravens’ hopes and dreams at Temple Beth Hatikvah at 10 am tomorrow, and the entire city of Baltimore will be sitting shivah for the remainder of the week wherever fans can be found.

    What an assortment of guests we had in the puzzle today! KEANU Reeves, MR T, AARON Burr (sorry Hank, you’re on the bench today), Mark Twain, General LEE (maybe next time Spike), Fanny BRICE, Yoko ONO, Crazy Horse, ROSA Parks, IGOR Stravinsky, ERIC Carmen or Clapton (your choice), EWAN McGregor, Bob De Niro (in the clue for TAXI DRIVER), and EMILY Dickinson.

    Remember how gorgeous Cybill was with De Niro? She was at her most drool-inducing during that period. Did you know that during the shooting of Taxi Driver De Niro asked her out and she said no? From then on, he refused to speak to her except in character. She later said she regretted saying no.

    Cybill’s from Memphis and is 76 now. She has three children, including Clementine Ford, an actress, 46, who seems to have received a good helping of her mom’s good looks.

    Let’s end with another tune, if it’s okay with you. What? You talkin’ to me?

    See you tomorrow, Chatterheads. Thanks for stopping by.

  • Talking Turkey and Bad Apples

    It’s New Year’s Day, as I write this, but it probably won’t be published for a day or two. Happy New Year!

    Did you see the 1997 film Bean with Rowan Atkinson? It had some very funny moments. Bean is a security guard in an art museum and when left alone with Whistler’s Mother, he accidentally sneezes on the painting, then stains it with an ink-soaked handkerchief while wiping away his sneeze droplets. He then attempts to clean it with lacquer thinner, causing the figure’s face to dissolve and prompting him to replace it with a cartoon face.

    Was it based at all on the story of Cecilia Gimenez who died on Monday at the age of 94 in Borja, her hometown in Northern Spain? A prized fresco of Christ by Elias Garcia Martinez called Ecce Homo in a local church had started to flake. Cecilia attempted to restore it but it came closer to Bean’s work than that of the original artist. Take a look:

    Ouch!

    Vandalism was suspected at first: The delicate misery on the face of Christ en route to the crucifixion was replaced by a misshapen head. Cecilia said the priest knew about her efforts and none of her acts were hidden. Nevertheless images of the botched job spread online and she was mortified. She couldn’t stop weeping and couldn’t eat. She was portrayed as a crazy old lady who desecrated a masterpiece.

    Then something happened. People started visiting Borja to see the “famous” artwork. Lots of people. And they brought tourist money with them. Lots of tourist money. Restaurant business boomed. Visits to a nearby museum of medieval art saw its annual attendance jump from 7,000 to 70,000. And get this — local vineyards fought over the rights to put Cecilia’s Christ on their wine labels. Competitions were held in which young artists tried their own hands at the work. She became a beloved local hero.

    Rest in peace, Cecilia Gimenez. You meant well, you had a good heart, and it all worked out for the best.

    In the puzzle yesterday at 43A, “Spray in the kitchen” was PAM. Glad the veteran constructors Adam Wagner and Rafael Musa didn’t go with “AG Bondi” as the clue. Blecch. Have I mentioned before that she turned sixty last November? No shit. What’s your secret, girl?

    At 2D, for “Default outcomes, perhaps,” the answer was REPOS. Get it? If you are in default on your car payments the REPO man will come for it.

    We heard of a poor girl who was possessed by satanic demons. In desperation, her parents sought the services of an exorcist. His fee was $25,000, but he agreed to accept payments over an extended period. Thankfully, the exorcism was successful and the girl resumed a normal life. But the parents suffered some financial difficulties and couldn’t continue paying the exorcist. What can I tell you? There’s no happy ending. The poor girl was re-possessed.

    I tried to share that joke with Rex’s Commentariat but it was rejected! Is it anti-Catholic?

    5D in the puzzle today: “Symbols of love on some bridges,” was PADLOCKS. You ever see this? A couple would write their initials and the date on the lock and fasten it to a bridge. The problem is, if it gets to be excessive, it’s adding weight to the bridge. In some jurisdictions, the authorities make periodic sweeps to cut them down. (Boo.)

    And since we’re in France all of a sudden:

    Oddly, the clue at 45D was “Where French fries are ‘frog sticks.’” It seems to be endorsing reference to the French as frogs, or am I missing something? That’s a derogatory term, so I was surprised to see it in the NYT.

    17A was sweet. The clue was “Save me!” Answer: LAST DANCE.

    At 13D, for the clue: “Words on an incriminating email, perhaps,” the answer was DELETE THIS. Here’s Rex on it: if you are ending your “incriminating emails” with DELETE THIS, allow me to suggest that you are not very good at crime and should maybe consider going straight. At this point in our surveillance society, I just assume that every single word I type into a computer leaves a trace that someone somewhere can find if they really want to. Deleting means I don’t see it, but … it’s probably stored somewhere; some autosave or archiving feature will get you in the end.

    Do you know this one? At 19A, for “Really went for” the answer was LIKE LIKED. It’s an expression used to distinguish between enjoying someone’s company and being interested in someone romantically.

    On Seinfeld, Elaine is in art class sitting next to a woman who has dated George, and wants to find out her level of interest: “Do you like him, or like-like him?” “Like-like.” And she adds: “Looks aren’t that important to me.” (The whole thing is acted out just as if they were in high school, even to the point where Elaine is ordered to spit out her gum by the art teacher.) Later, Elaine happily reports to George that she really likes him, but unfortunately included what she said about looks, and George gets upset, “I’d rather she hate me and think I was good-looking!”

    Right off the bat at 1A, “Spoilers that ruin a whole lot.” That’s a good clue but it’s also a pretty good distance from it to the answer: BAD APPLES.

    Very happy to note that our Sirens have quietly put together a sweet three-game winning streak. All wins by one goal. It’s early, but they’re tied for second place. We’ll see them face off against a tough Montreal squad in two weeks. And our Sarah is back. She notched an assist in the last win. Yay!

    Casey O’Brien is one of girls who’s been killin’ it for us. Radiant.

    See you tomorrow!

  • Don’t Try To Mail A Letter In Denmark

    Well, as the year seeps out, we notice the NYT reporting on another federal judge upbraiding the government for improperly pursuing poor Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, DOJ’s favorite punching bag. Apparently, he’s being charged now with cheating on his SATs, peeing in the pool when he was 12, and making way too many errors chanting his Bar Mitzvah portion. Lock him up!! (To quote OC friend Michael’s son Gabe, who looked up from the Torah during his reading and said to us all: “This is hard!”)

    Owl Chatter is helping raise funds for Kilmar’s defense by selling “I Was Wrongfully Deported to a Hellhole of a Prison in El Salvador and All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt” t-shirts. The price is $20, or $25 if you mention Owl Chatter. Or you can buy this one from the estate of the beheaded woman.

    Kudos to Illinois for their gutsy win over Tennessee last night in their bowl game in Nashville. A good win for the Big Ten over the SEC. Tenny had home ice advantage and was favored by a couple. Illini QB Luke Altmyer looked cool in leading his men down the field with 2 minutes remaining, using up the clock wisely, setting up the game winning field goal. Tenny had just taken the lead for the first time late in the second half, by one point. But Altmyer calmly went about his business. Excellent game.

    Luke is very private about his personal life. Either that, or he doesn’t have one. So Phil was unable to come up with anything on a girlfriend for us. His mom’s pretty hot, though. And Dad’s probably an alcoholic. Couldn’t put his drink down for two f*cking seconds.

    In the puzzle today at 6D, “Wander aimlessly” was ROVE. (I tried roam first.) Who’s Planxty? Actually, it’s “what’s Planxty?” They were a very popular Irish folk music band, one of whose members was Christy Moore, whom we featured before on Owl Chatter. They were formed in 1972, broke up a few times, and last re-uned in 2005. According to our friend Miriam, “planxty” means “an Irish melody for the harp written in triplets and slower than the jig.”

    Steve Bowe of the Dull Men’s Club (UK) posted the following, with the photo:

    “Maybe it’s my innate dullness coming to the fore but I’m struggling to imagine any possibilities other than the obvious.”

    Denmark is ushering in a bleak future by closing down its national postal service because nobody writes letter anymore. Yikes! They will only deliver packages now. A private company will take over for folks who are still archaic enough for letter-writing. So these gorgeous red mailboxes were removed from the nation’s streets. When 1,000 were offered online recently they sold out in three hours for about $300 each. I’d buy one for sure.

    Postal news in the U.S. — Muhammad Ali stamps should be available in a few weeks. It’s about time, no? They’ll be unveiled in Louisville, his birthplace.

    As you can see, it notes he was a boxer, activist, and humanitarian. But he said he didn’t want to be remembered for that. He wanted to be remembered for how pretty he was. I quoted him on that when I said a few words at our friend Susan’s memorial service in Vermont. Everyone was, rightfully, speaking about what an extraordinary woman she was, a devoted friend, a wonderful artist. But I spoke about how pretty she was, to quote Ali. And I noted that the last time I saw her, about a month before her passing, she was so ravaged by disease it took me aback at first. But I felt a click in my brain, and I realized she was still as beautiful as ever — it was just a different kind of beauty. Miss you, S.

    Today’s puzzle was a New Year’s Eve party complete with party hats and balloons. The hats and balloons festooned a whole bunch of the black squares. And the theme answers were a SQUARE, BOX, CELL, and BLOCK combined with a type of get-together: SQUARE DANCE, BOX SOCIAL, CELL RECEPTION, and BLOCK PARTY. Here’s how pretty it looked:

    BTW, ALI was in it at 2D, clued with “Sports star who said ‘It’s not bragging if you can back it up.’” (Dizzy Dean also said that, a commenter noted.)

    Yesterday’s puzzle included the phrase “and [blank] bed,” for the answer SO TO. Commenter Germanicus wrote: “And so to bed” is the most famous catchphrase in the Diary of Samuel Pepys. I replied: Are there other less famous ones? Perhaps “Time to get up.” “Rise and shine!” or “Ready for lunch?”

    Big sports day for us. Michigan’s holding its own so far against Texas. And our Sirens scored a big win over Vancouver on the ice in Newark. Our Sarah Fillier was out, though, and is day-to-day, from this vicious shot (see below) she took last game. TBH, Sarah started it with a pretty good hit just as this video begins. But the retaliation by Seattle’s Tejralova (to Sarah’s head!) was way out of line, and she was rightfully ejected and charged with a major misconduct penalty. It’s a tough business and these girls don’t screw around.

    We’ll end today, and this difficult year for America, by wishing the Kennedy family peace, upon the passing of JFK’s beautiful granddaughter Tatiana Schlossberg, Caroline’s daughter. She was only 35. Our Phil was pretty close to Tatiana, of course, and thought this first shot showed her personality. And the second, her beauty. Rest in peace.

    Happy New Year Chatterheads! See you in 2026!

  • Rags of Wind

    This poem is called “Proposals.” It was in The Writer’s Almanac today and is by Cecilia Woloch, a Pittsburgh girl, 69, who lives in LA now. She’s part Roma, and an alum of Transylvania U in Lexington Kentucky. How’s that for creepy? (The college part, not the Roma part.) It’s a real college: Kentucky’s oldest university. It’s the alma mater of two U.S. vice presidents, two U.S. Supreme Court justices, 50 U.S. senators, 101 U.S. representatives, 36 U.S. governors, and 34 U.S. ambassadors, making it a large producer of 19th-century U.S. statesmen. Its sports teams are “the Bats.” Just kidding. Should be the Bats, but they are the Pioneers. Bore-ring.

    Here’s what Cecilia looks like. You may want to know after reading her poem.

    Mistaking me for someone else, he asked me to marry him. This has
    happened more than once. The first time, I was eighteen and the boy had
    a diamond ring in a box. It was the Fourth of July, it was dark, he said, Happy
    Independence Day    . Of course, the ring was too large and slipped right off
    my finger into the grass. (It belonged to someone else: the woman he
    married, eventually.) And when I was twenty-one, that redhead, sloe-eyed
    and slinking out of his grief, said he’d imagined I’d be his wife. But he was
    mistaken. It wasn’t me. Then a drunk who drove too fast, who threw the
    proposal over his shoulder like some glittering, tattered scarf. I staggered
    out of his car, saying, No thanks, No thanks, No thanks. And the man over
    eggs one morning, in the midst of an argument, saying he planned to wait
    for spring to ask for my hand, then he never asked. (So of course, I married
    that one for a while; spent years convincing him I was not his cup of coffee,
    not his girl.) And in Prague, on a bridge called the Karlův Most, a stranger,
    a refugee, who mistook the way I stared at the river for thinking of suicide.
    Who mistook my American passport for his ticket out of there. And
    others-the man whose children grabbed the food off my plate, called me
    her; the man in Chartres Cathedral humming the wedding march into my
    ear. And tonight, at dinner with friends, happy, discussing their wedding
    plans, a man I’ve known for a couple of hours turning to ask me to marry
    him. I don’t know who they think I am. Do I look like a bride in these rags
    of wind? Do I look like the angel of home and hearth with this strange green
    fire in my hands?

    If you think you had mean or strict parents (I don’t – quite the converse), consider Rudyard Kipling, who was born on this date in 1865. He was British, born to British parents in India, where his dad had a teaching assignment as an artist. To protect him from a pandemic, they sent him back to England where he was in the care of a mean couple who once made him go to school with a sign on his back that said LIAR. Ouch! The closest I came was when a group of us took to slapping KICK ME signs on each other’s backs. Good times.

    As I’ve noted before, the commenter Son Volt regularly includes links to songs that are connected in some way to clues/answers in the day’s puzzle. Today, grimly, in connection with WENT PFFT, he linked Leonard Cohen’s “Democracy.”

    In connection with SQUALL, he shared this Guy Clark song. (Click.)

    At 2D, the clue was “And _______ bed.” Answer: SO TO. I knew it, but didn’t know it comes from Samuel Pepys’ diary. Also learned that Pepys is pronounced Peeps. (Not kidding.) Pepys was second cousin to Edward Montagu, the first Earl of Sandwich, who played a large role in his life. Edward was not the Sandwich after whom the sandwich is named. That was John Montagu, the fourth Earl of Sandwich.

    This may be how it happened: Lord Sandwich was a very conversant gambler, the story goes, and he did not take the time to have a meal during his long hours playing at the card table. Consequently, he would ask his servants to bring him slices of meat between two slices of bread, a habit known among his gambling friends. Other people, according to this account, began to order “the same as Sandwich!,” and thus the “sandwich” was born.

    The Carnegie Deli on Seventh Avenue in Manhattan closed about ten years ago. If you ordered a corned beef sandwich there, it was a bit pricey, but here’s what you got (he wrote, wiping away tears).

    Here are the first three lines of a poem that did not make it past the Owl Chatter guard puppies.

    ice in the grass of want:

    queen of leaf-

    rot, I’ve let go—

    Let’s finish today with the story that was selected by readers as the best Met Diary entry of 2025. It’s by Richie Powers and is called “Unacceptable.”

    Dear Diary:

    I went to a new bagel store in Brooklyn Heights with my son.

    When it was my turn to order, I asked for a cinnamon raisin bagel with whitefish salad and a slice of red onion.

    The man behind the counter looked up at me.

    “I’m sorry,” he said. “I can’t do that.”

    See you tomorrow Chatterheads! Thanks for stopping in.