Tuesday's New York Times crossword puzzle solved: October 20, 2018

My time: 6:25.

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Jules Markey gets a head start on Halloween with a pun on the GRAVEYARD SHIFT (clued punnily, albeit technically incorrectly, as "late night for a working stiff").  Six Across clues have the tombstone inscription "RIP" in them: RIPOSTES, EGO TRIPS ("narcissists' excursions?"), TRIPTYCH, MR. RIPLEY, GIVE A RIP ("care about something, in slang"), and SUN-RIPEN (put on a windowsill to mature, say").

The fill is otherwise decent.  I like STYLIZED (like P!nk and Ke$ha's names), GO FLY A KITE, and MYRIAD.

ORONO, home to the University of Maine, appeared way back on March 13.  Today it is clued as "university town named for an Indian chief."  The New York Times puzzle is often surprisingly tone-deaf when it comes to Native American affairs.  Chief Joseph ORONO, the blue-eyed Penobscot chief, corresponded with George Washington and sided with the Americans in the War of Independence.

In other Native American news, "Delaware Valley tribe" is LENAPE.  This tribe is originally from what is now New York, Delaware, and New Jersey.  Present-day Delaware tribespeople live in Oklahoma and Kansas.

While "JFK alternative" is LGA, "JFK alternative in 1960" is RMN, which I thought may refer to Stafford Regional Airport in Virginia?  But LaGuardia was open in 1939, so I just didn't get it. Then it hit me: this isn't about airports!  RMN is Richard Milhous Nixon! Ha.

"Removes, as from a fixed rate" is UNPEGS.  Pegged is an investment term of art.  A fixed rate is just that, fixed to a stable rate, like gold, or other currencies to the dollar.  A pegged rate is a hybrid of fixed and floating exchange rates.

On October 2, "Lady of Spain" was dona and I mistakenly put DAMA.  Today, DAMA is the right answer to that same clue.

Author EDA LeShan appeared just the other day, October 24.

Schubert's "The ERL King" appeared on August 21.  I still didn't remember it right away, but at least this time I knew it wasn't elf!

Clever clues: "Like a river at its mouth, not at its head" is BROAD.  "Hog heaven?" is STY.  "Like ghosts and goblins?" is PLURAL --- that's a devious one.

This was a great Tuesday.  Timely, not too tough, but with some tricky clues.  This one gets an AYE vote from me; no BOO.  It is A-OKAY.  I'M A FAN?  No, that's going too far.