Tuesday's New York Times puzzle solved: May 29, 2018

My time: 5:03, pretty good!

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John Lieb has fun with the word TRIDENTS.  Five themed answers have triple letters, but not just any letters --- taken in order north to south, they spell D-E-N-T-S.  The themed answers are ODD DUCKS, FREE EMAIL, SUE ANN NIVENS ("Betty White's role on 'The Mary Tyler Moore Show'"), PITT THE ELDER, and DRESS SIZE.

For "fedEx alternative" I fell into the *UPS trap but it's DHL.  A German company headquartered in Bonn, it was founded by Americans.  The name is a combination of their last names' initials.

LATTE ART is "craftsmanship from a barista." I like that fill.

A SONATINA is just a shorter, lighter, easier sonata.

October has two choices for birthstones: you can go for tourmalines or OPALS.

DANA Perino is another of those blonde eye candy talking heads on Fox.  Ugh.

The SAAR Coal District is a region in the state of Saarland.  Changing hands with French a few times in its history, was famed for its coal production.  Not so much anymore.

I saw the movie Rent but I'm not a BOHEMIA nut or anything.  MIMI Marquez is the character who is the HIV-positive junkie exotic dancer who pairs up with Roger.

"Cherish those hearts that HATE thee" is advice Wolsey gives Cromwell in Shakespeare's "King Henry VIII."

UNIcode is a computing industry standard for the consistent encoding, representation, and handling of text expressed in most of the world's writing systems.  The system is maintained by the creepy-sounding Unicode Consortium.

Clever clues: "Place for a sweater" is SAUNA.  "Snitch" is SING.

Fun, pretty easy puzzle with a very pleasing theme.  I didn't get the record, but you have to try hard and ERN that.