My time: 10:41, five minutes faster than average.
We open with EMMA Chamberlain, a YouTube social influencer! That will enrage the traditionalists who are still fuming that "The Simpsons" is ever referred to in the puzzle! Such PHILISTINES the puzzle panders to! Apparently EMMA just posts funny videos.
"Abbr. on a family tree" is DESC. This is short for descent.
Perhaps Will Shortz felt that the election dispute would be at its BITTER END by the time this puzzle was published. Well, it isn't, and the answer is a little too raw, Will Shortz!
I was thinking something like pottery for "crafts created on a rotating platform" but it's SPIN ART.
The answer to "easy-listening music" turns out to be EAR CANDY. I don't see those as having a huge amount of overlap, though. EAR CANDY is pleasant but perhaps shallow music, bubblegum pop. I think of easy listening as 70s type of AOR rock, like standards and vocal rock.
I dislike bland clues like "political ____" for ARENA. Or "____value" for RESALE. What a nothingburger of a clue. BLAH. Or the worst offender, "now ____ the future" for OR IN. Not challenging, just frustrating, teaches nothing.
"Rutherford and Shackleton, for two" is ERNESTS. Ernest Rutherford was a British physicist who is considered the father of nuclear physics. He discovered the concept of radioactive half-life and came up with the model of an atom that bears his name.
My knowledge of roots led me to pretty quickly get NAVELGAZERS for omphaloskeptics. The first part is straightforward; "-skeptics" might make you think that it refers to people who don't believe in bellybuttons, but it comes from a Proto-Indian root meaning "to observe."
"!, in some programming languages" is NOT. For example, in the C languages. I don't know anything about programming.
"ACC basketball powerhouse" is UVA, a periodic answer in this blog. Their sports team is the Cavaliers, like their newspaper.
Clever clue: "Loaded questions?" is BAR TRIVIA. "Strip at the beach?" is TAN LINE. "Sides of a conversion" is FAITHS. Take a long, good look at yourself" is EGOSURF. "Pickup order?" is TAXI.
Well, CIAO. I hope the country doesn't succumb to Vatican Law enforced by fascist redcaps by the end of the year.
No comments:
Post a Comment