The young constructors often take it upon themselves to bring us old codgers up to date on internet slang. But the one that appeared in Monday’s puzzle seems ridiculous. The answer was IT ME, and it’s slang for “it’s me.” It’s used, e.g., when you see a meme that you really relate to. So you point it out and say to your friend “it me.” Seriously? (I do like the expanded use of “seriously” — I’ll give them that.)

But for me the sparkle in the grid on Monday was the Say Hey Kid — Willie Mays — placed right there where the batter’s box would be if the grid were a ballfield. In George Will’s book on baseball, Men At Work, he writes at length about Willie. If Mays were facing a young pitcher late in a game with the outcome already pretty much determined he’d on purpose let the pitcher strike him out. It planted in the pitcher’s mind the idea that Mays couldn’t hit that pitch. Years later they might face each other in a situation in which the game was on the line. Mays would know that the pitcher remembered getting him out with that pitch and would try it again. He waited for it, and this time drive it over the fence.

Monday’s puzzle was good-humored. The theme was introduced by the clue: “You have my full attention,” and the answer was I’M ALL EARS. Then it had four long answers which were characters known for their ears — Mickey Mouse, Mister Spock, Alfred E. Neuman, and Bugs Bunny.

The question was raised whether it was impolite to call attention to someone’s unusual body part, in this case, their ears. Was it, you know, like fat shaming? But then it was noted that all four here are fictional characters so it’s okay.

So, you know, Mickey Mouse and Minnie were getting divorced and partway through the trial the judge called Mickey over to the bench and said, “Mickey, I’ve been listening to all the evidence and I don’t see how you’re establishing that Minnie is mentally unbalanced.” And Mickey said, “I’m not claiming she’s mentally unbalanced — I said she’s fucking Goofy.”

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Some posters on the Rex Parker blog like to use the answers in the grid to tell their own silly stories. They are usually pretty weak (IMHO), but I liked this use (or misuse) of three answers: UTILE, RELAY, AND LAYMEN. What do you do after the shower plumbing is in place? UTILE. What if it doesn’t look good? RELAY. Who could do that? LAYMEN.

Tuesday’s puzzle brought us back some old-time comics. Mort Sahl was in it — remember him? And, indirectly, the answer HIPPY DIPPY had to remind us of early George Carlin — his weatherman.

Sahl only died a year ago — October 2021, at age 94. He was the first entertainer ever to appear on the cover of Time Magazine. Here’s a small Sahl nugget: After sitting through three hours of a screening of director Otto Preminger’s 3.5-hour film Exodus (1960), Sahl turned to Preminger and said, “Otto, let my people go.”

In response to the answer SAND, Rex poster LMS shared: “When I was a kid, I thought that quicksand was gonna be a much bigger problem than it turned out to be.” Yup.

A big hoo-ha arose over the spelling of GINGKO in the puzzle. It was viewed as an out and out error on the part of the NYT editors, since the correct spelling is Ginkgo. But some sources (e.g., wikipedia) allow both spellings. Some folks noted that if a word is misspelled often enough and long enough, the error may become acceptable as a variant.

David Sedaris tells a story about a French dish that Americans typically mispronounce when ordering it in restaurants. He lived in France long enough to know the correct pronunciation, and ordered it correctly. The waiter, in confirming the order asked, “So you want [xxx]?” using the common American mispronunciation. Sedaris realized that his correct French was being “corrected” by the waiter to the incorrect pronunciation.

That’s about all the nonsense I can handle right now. See you next time.