There’s so much going on in today’s puzzle. First, at 78D, the clue was “1994 single by Hole whose cover art depicts a miniature wedding dress and veil.” The answer was DOLL PARTS. Apparently it was a big hit and a major cultural moment that sailed right by me. I’ve never heard of Hole, let alone any of their songs.

This is from Rex’s write-up, quoting Wikipedia. (He made it his “word of the day.”)

“Doll Parts” is a song by American alternative rock band Hole, written by vocalist and rhythm guitarist Courtney Love. It was their first single to be released following the death of bassist Kristen Pfaff in June 1994. Love wrote the song in late 1991, soon after she met Kurt Cobain, and has admitted that its lyrics were about her insecurity of his romantic interest in her. (The album it was on came out the same week Cobain died.) It became one of the band’s most popular songs, peaking at number 4, and is considered one of Hole’s signature tracks. Rolling Stone ranked it #208 in their list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.

The music video for “Doll Parts” was directed by Samuel Bayer, who said that he wanted it to “evoke the feeling of death” and used ideas conceived by Love throughout the video: a large amount of doll imagery, herself “in a babydoll dress looking demure while playing guitar on a bed” and “walking in a bleak backyard passing a children’s table set for a tea party.” Bayer designed the garden scenes to be “decaying” and added “a hundred plaster-wrapped dolls dangling from trees.” Other scenes feature a young blonde boy, meant to invoke Cobain. It was nominated for Best Alternative Video at the 1995 MTV Video Music Awards but lost to “Buddy Holly” by Weezer.

I want to be the girl with the most cake . . . .

I am doll parts, bad skin, doll heart.

---

The puzzle was not nearly as dark. In fact, it was clever and fun. The theme was revealed in two long linked answers: I HEARD IT THROUGH and THE GRAPEVINE. And the print version (which is the one I do on Sundays) had a pretty green vine running all the way down the center column of the grid. You were supposed to fill in (writing over it) three grape varieties: MERLOT, CONCORD, and MUSCAT. Last, crossing those grapes were blocks of letters in shaded squares comprising words sounding like gossip: e.g., ROOMER (rumor); DERT (dirt); TOCK (talk), and NUES (news).

Here’s CCR’s treatment of the great song. Rex shared Gladys Knight’s. I came close to going with Marvin Gaye. And did you know the very first recording of it was by Smokey Robinson? I was just about to lose my mind!

At 72A, the clue was “Like Loki,” and the answer was NORSE. Commenter SJ lamented: “It didn’t help that I don’t know if Loki is a NORSE god, a suburb of Oslo, or something they might eat there for dessert.” As a god, Loki was a shape shifter, but that can backfire from time to time. According to Wikipedia, “in the form of a mare, Loki was impregnated by the stallion Svaðilfari and gave birth to the eight-legged horse Sleipnir.” God, I hate when that happens.

---

Last Thursday, the funeral of Cecilia Gentili, an activist transgender individual identifying as a woman, was held in St. Patrick’s Cathedral in NYC. Gentili was an atheist and former sex worker. It was an unusual funeral. Archdiocesan spokesman Joseph Zwilling said that “a funeral is one of the corporal works of mercy,” which are “a model for how we should treat all others, as if they were Christ in disguise.” 

Over 1,000 mourners, several hundred of whom were transgender, arrived in daring outfits — glittery miniskirts and halter tops, fishnet stockings, sumptuous fur stoles and at least one boa sewn from what appeared to be $100 bills. Mass cards and a picture near the altar showed a haloed Ms. Gentili surrounded by the Spanish words for “transvestite,” “whore,” “blessed” and “mother” above the text of Psalm 25.

Throughout the liturgy, the presider, Father Edward Dougherty, referred to Gentili with feminine pronouns and “our sister.” During the prayers of the faithful, one reader prayed for gender-affirming health care, while attendees frequently and approvingly referred to Gentili as the “mother of whores.”

Later in the day, several people who attended a Mass at the cathedral said they were pleased it had hosted Ms. Gentili’s funeral. Carlos Nunez, 43, who lives in Manhattan and works in customer service, said he thought the funeral was proper. “Why not?” he said, leaving the cathedral. “Everybody has the right to come to church. Everybody is a child of God.”

It didn’t take long for the backlash to hit and it was very ugly. The church took time off from its busy schedule of molesting children placed in its care for moral upbringing (and then protecting the abusers) to rail against the outpouring of love and tolerance that the funeral engendered.

According to today’s NYT, the RC Archdiocese of NY, of the church whose priests throughout the world molested thousands, if not tens of thousands, of innocent children, condemned the funeral as “an insult to the Catholic faith,” thus raising the notion of chutzpah to a new level.

CatholicVote called the funeral “unbelievable and sick” and said it was “a mockery of the Christian faith.” The Rev. Nicholas Gregoris, a co-founder of the Priestly Society of Saint John Henry Cardinal Newman, called it “revolting,” a “blasphemous & sacrilegious fiasco” and “a deplorable desecration of America’s most famous Catholic Church.”

OK, but how do you really feel about it, Rev?

The Gentili family was incensed by the church’s criticism and accused the archdiocese of “hypocrisy and anti-trans hatred” in a statement. “Cecilia’s heart and hands reached those the sanctimonious church continues to belittle, oppress and chastise,” the family said. “The only deception present at St. Patrick’s Cathedral is that it claims to be a welcoming place for all.”

You tell ’em, folks! Hrrrrrrrumph.

What a beautiful woman. Rest in peace, Cecilia.

---

You may recall, we attended a women’s basketball game at Oregon State U last month in Corvallis. Well, the #11-ranked Lady Beavers were in a hell of a predicament Friday night against #9 UCLA. The Bruins had just sunk a big basket to take the lead 77-76. Not insurmountable, you say? But there was only 1.1 second left. What are the odds? Take a look.

---

From Oregon to New Hampshire. How do you pronounce the capital of NH: Concord? Do you have it rhyme with “bored?” Or do you pronounce it “conquered?”

New Hampshire folks pronounce it “conquered” and state Rep. Eric Gallager, a Democrat from Concord (voo den?), is seeking to amend state law to provide for that as the official pronunciation. While he’s at it, he’s also seeking to codify the pronunciation of New Hampshire to end as “shure” and not “shire.” He proposes including the official pronunciations written out according to the international phonetic alphabet in a section of law that lists state symbols such as the official state sport (skiing), song (10 different tunes including “Old New Hampshire”), and spider ( daring jumping spider ). (Don’t tell me you didn’t know NH has a state spider — that’s like not knowing what a logarithm is.)

Rep. Dianne Schuett, a Democrat from Pembroke, asked Gallager if he discussed his bill with “old Yankee folks” who pronounce the capital as “Con-kid, New Hamp-shah.”

“I’ll tell you, I’m fearful that some of them may be offended if we mandated a specific pronunciation that doesn’t jibe with their heritage,” she said.

Gallager said his bill would not be a mandate, just as the other state symbols are not universally embraced.

“Even though the state fruit is the pumpkin, you can still grow other fruits besides pumpkins, which I’m sure our apple growers appreciate,” he said.

Gallager conceded the legislation may appear trivial to some.

Ya think?

Wait — grow fruits other than pumpkins? Unheard of! Unthinkable!!

---

See you tomorrow folks!