Monday's New York Times puzzle solved: February 19, 2018

My time: 6:11.

--

For the Presidents' Day HOLIDAY, Bruce Haight gives us sort-of anagrams of presidents' names, plus one letter, for some reason!  I really don't understand the point of it at all.  Why the extra letter?  The new word formed doesn't have any relationship to the president.  For example, "Garfield + U = beach V.I.P." is LIFEGUARD.  "Fillmore + V = movie buff" is FILM LOVER.  But why, though?  "Harding + P = squeezable exercise tool" is HAND GRIP.  What's the point?  Frankly, I bet a lot of people are confused.  AND SO AM I ("Madison + A")!

I know the RHINE is a German river, but being a geography numbskull, I could not have told you that Cologne is on it.  Do you know what else is on the RHINE?  Worms, Strasbourg, and Basel.  This is an interesting blog post about visiting Vater Rhein.

The National Mall is the SCENE of many a presidential inauguration.  The recent one, by the Russian-backed moron Trump, had a far smaller crowd than the one for the intelligent, thoughtful president Obama.  MARLA could tell you about various small things Trump has.

A lot of familiar faces in this puzzle:

Dickens' Little NELL, from The Old Curiosity Shop, appeared September 19, 2017.

Famed opera house in Milan LA SCALA appeared November 25, 2017.

Pontiac GTOS appeared October 9, 2017.

The Ford MERC appeared October 28, 2017.

I had very little trouble with the fill of this puzzle, but the perplexing and apparently pointless theme held me back.  I DIG the attempt at some kind of nod to the presidents on this day, but this was not well executed.