Today’s NYTXW beat me up pretty good, but I staggered out of the ring a winner. The constructor was Sam Ezersky who has bloodied me plenty in the past, so I was braced for at least a few hard blows. It was one of those solves that required me to put it down, tell my brain to keep working on it while I busied myself with something else, and go back to it later several times. But I found something neat in it that I shared with the Rexites. At 40A the clue was “Just ‘done’ with something,” and the answer was SO OVER IT. Then, the next across clue was “Development area” and the answer was UTERUS. So I posted:
Having just come back from visiting my new grandson Harold (middle name Barney) in Michigan, I enjoyed the line in the puzzle that contained: SO OVER IT, UTERUS.
One category of clue that made the puzzle hard for me was names of people I never heard of under my rock. E.g., “Second woman, after Kathryn Bigelow, to win a best director Oscar (2020).” Confession: throwing Kathryn Bigelow into the clue was no help. Some of you are going, How could he not have heard of CHLOE ZHOU? Well, I just didn’t is hou. At least I saw Nomadland, which was the film that won her the Oscar. Oh, here she is! Hi Clo! Georgie! — a couple of Diet Cokes for us please. Take a load off, girl. You’re lookin’ good.
BTW, if you were wondering, Bigelow won hers for The Hurt Locker.
Until I intuited the Z from ZHOU, I struggled with the long crossing down: “Ancient figure called the ‘huey tlatoani’ by his subjects.” WTF!! That’s a clue that looks like Zoey’s cat Emily walked over the keyboard during its creation: tlatoani? The answer was AZTEC EMPEROR.
I liked how the answer for “Refuse to eat?” was SLOP. (See the wordplay? refuse = garbage.) Rex noted that SLOP was in the puzzle two days in a row, and asked: What kind of cafeteria is this?!
Also learned that another term for MOB RULE is “ochlocracy.” Here’s how to use it in a sentence. The one time I tried (and failed) to teach a Hebrew Sunday School class in our temple, it turned into a study in ochlocracy.
At 25D, “Iconic bit of media merch” was NPR TOTE BAG. It reminded me that the great Steve Post (alav hashalom) used to refer to the NPR journalist Nina Totenberg during fundraisers by saying donors would receive Nina Totenbags as thank you gifts.
Hey, look who else popped by!! Annie, how’ve you been? It’s been months, amirite? George — make it three! You know Clo, right? Settle in. Anne came by the grid via the film She Came To Me, the 2023 rom-com, which, of all things, was used to clue the word SHE. (Annie was in the cast.) Exquisite, as always, Babe.
Rule #1 of being a New Yorker is, of course, never establish eye contact. Why ask for trouble? So any contact with a stranger becomes a noteworthy event. As in this Met Diary story from tomorrow’s NYT by Brad Rothschild.
Dear Diary:
I was waiting in line to pick up a prescription at a crowded Duane Reade. An older woman who was clearly exhausted left the line to sit down in a nearby chair. When it was her turn to get her prescription, she stood up, left her belongings on the chair and went to the counter.
While waiting for the pharmacist, she turned and looked at the man who was sitting next to where she had been.
“You know what’s in that bag?” she asked, motioning toward her stuff.
The man shook his head.
“My husband Jack,” she said. “He died last week, and I have his remains in there.”
[OC note: I’m guessing the Rx was not for Jack.]
As I was flipping around the sports stations today, I came upon an ice hockey match. Nothing unusual there — the NYC region has three pro teams — more than you can shake a stick at — ha! But this game was between the NY Sirens and the Minny Frost of the PWHL — women’s pro ice hockey. There are six teams and this is the second season. There seemed to be a good crowd. The Sirens play in the Pru Center in Newark — now that I’m retired we’ll try to take in a game.
As I was watching, Sarah Fillier scored a goal for us (NY). She’s the team’s leading scorer and was the first overall draft pick this season out of Princeton where she majored in Psych. She was spectacular on the ice in college and hasn’t skipped a beat transitioning to the pros. Yikes! A knockout too.
The scene shifts to the bedroom where Sarah’s boyfriend, overcome with desire, spends 45 minutes trying to get 37 items of interlaced hockey gear off of her, and finally collapses on the floor weeping. (And you thought you had trouble with bras, guys?)
I perused the Sirens roster. I’ll admit it, I was cruisin’ for Jewish names. (Jewsin?) And I scored! — so to speak. Abigail “Abbey” Levy, from Congers NY. Played college hockey for Boston College. Her Wikipedia page confirms that she is Jewish. It also states she’s a member of the LGBT community, not that there’s anything wrong with that. A goalie. Her dates have found it’s nearly impossible to get anything past her. Here’s a pretty sexy shot of Abbey (if you find the idea of a girl in an ice hockey uniform sexy — and who wouldn’t?).
Did you hear about the minor league ice hockey goalie who let in twelve goals and caused his team to lose a crucial playoff game? He was so despondent that, on his way home, he threw himself in front of a bus. Luckily, it went through his legs. (Just one of those nights, eh, Marcel?)
See you next time, Chatterheads. Thanks for popping in.
The Wellington Files 