My time: 12:53, about three minutes faster than average.
Today's theme: REMOVE THE / LETTER W / FROM CLUES, or NO W (clued as "present... or a concise explanation of this puzzle's theme"). Today is the 23rd, and W is the 23rd letter of the alphabet. Is the date this ran a coincidence? Probably.
What does this mean for you, the solver? It means that on every clue with a W, you must read it as if there were no W. So "sewer" is read as seer and is thus ORACLE. "Wedgy" is read as edgy and is TENSE. "Fist frequently caught by newts" is read as ...caught by nets and is TUNA (filling this in, I felt one of the first nagging itches of puzzlement... newts eat tuna? I'd better check that later). "Swaying just before a disaster" is read as saying and it's UH-OH. "Major source of wheat" is read as ...of heat and it's SUN. Clear?
So this was quite a challenge when you didn't know what the theme was and the clues are deliberately misleading. The one that really got me was "AWOL part," for which I dutifully put *WITHOUT, because it fits. I didn't know about the theme then. It's read as AOL part and is AMERICA.
My favorite is "Hawn the of silver screen." It's SOLO, because the clue is actually Han.
I couldn't decide if Algeria was neighbors with MALI or Chad. It's the former.
"Image on the Missouri state quarter" is ARCH, of course! The St. Louis Jefferson National Expansion Memorial Gateway Arch! Personally, I'll be deep in the cold, cold ground before I recognize Missourah.
ELIHU Root was a statesman who served under Theodore Roosevelt and William McKinley. He won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1912 for his efforts to get nations to work together (it didn't take in the long run).
"Special Agent OSO" is a Disney educational animated series about a bear spy.
Clever clues: "Donna's predecessor?" is PRIMA. "Labor day event" is BIRTH. "Dough used in a taqueria" is DINERO. D'oh!
This was a such an original, witty, and well-executed puzzle! I enjoyed the challenge.
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