Tuesday's New York Times crossword puzzle solved: October 16, 2018

My time: 6:02.

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Ed Sessa, whose name has appeared on this blog only once before, channels Frank Sinatra and tells us THAT'S LIFE!  What is Life?  Well, a BOARD GAME, BREAKFAST CEREAL, and PICTURE MAGAZINE.

It sure is.

"CARA Mia" (Italian for "My Darling," and Spanish for "My Face"), a song written in 1954, was a #4 hit for Jay and the Americans in 1965.

I watched a fair amount of "Bewitched" in syndication as a kid, but I had forgotten ENDORA, Samantha's mother (and thus Darrin's battleaxe mother-in-law).  Her chronology is... undefined.

The REO is a car that I know of (as in the famous REO Speed Wagon), but I had not heard of its contemporary auto-making rivals, Essex and the wonderfully named Hupmobile.

I guess I just wasn't sure enough that RHO is shaped like a P.

We all know who NERO was, but I am not fully up on the details of the Year of Four Emperors.  This was 69 AD.  The suicide of the emperor Nero in 68 was followed by a brief period of civil war, the first Roman civil war since Mark Antony's death in 30 BC. Between June of 68 and December of 69 the emperors Galba, Otho, and Vitellius successively rose and fell.  The period ended upon the July 69 accession of Vespasian, who founded the Flavian dynasty.

OTOE is a tribe that comes up a great deal in this puzzle, but today is clued as "Siouan people."

MELDS in canasta was covered on January 11.

That's all she wrote.  A quick quiz with a fun theme and no particularly clever, vague, or amusing clues.  TANKS for the Tuesday treat, Ed Sessa!