Saturday, September 23, 2017

My time: 24:34, exactly ten seconds slower than my record.

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A sweet, clean themeless by Robyn Weintraub, and a welcome relief from Thursday's and Friday's very tough slogs.

For "question after a rant," I kept thinking of what the ranter would be asking --- "So you get my drift?" or "Capisce?" or something --- but it's the calm interlocutor who deflates/enrages the ranter with a sneering, ARE YOU DONE?

The wordplay this time around was eminently guessable: "boring things in shops" is too short to be drills, so it's AWLS; "friend of note" is obviously PEN PAL; "elevated lines?" is the near-daily ODE; etc.

I've heard of BEBE Neuwirth, but not IRENE Neuwirth, jewelers to the stars.

I did not know Davy Crockett's rifle was known as Old BETSY (and he later had a "Pretty Betsy," both named after his sister), but it's not exactly a surprising name.

Good solid unambiguous clues like "perfect place" for SWEET SPOT or "opposite of schadenfreude" for PITY really helped with that quick time, too.  I probably burned the most time on "Grp. that takes on pirates," not being able to decide if it was *RIAA or MPAA ("And so what is a *BROVIE," I thought to myself.... perhaps a bro movie --- like a rom-com for dudes?  Nah.  It's B-MOVIE.)

Best joke: "potential perch" is ROE.  Har!