Thursday's New York Times crossword puzzle solved: November 12, 2020

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My time: 9:41, five minutes faster than average.

Theme: phrases with the word "to" plus a word that is a homophone of a letter, but then written, Prince-style, with the letter in place of the word, and then, even more cryptically, the "to" being thought of as 2, so the letter doubled.  So "to be" = "2 B" = "BB."  Got it?

The first one I got was "famous question asked around 1600," when I saw it begin with two B's, both of which I was fairly certain were right.  It's To be or not to be, rendered as BB OR NOT BB.

I like TALK UU LATER (talk 2 u later), and appreciate the Shelley quote of AA SKYLARK (To a Skylark).

In the fill:

I knew that SNL had some special taped shows due to the coronavirus, but I didn't get it from the clue "_____ At Home."  But, that's what they were called.

Never heard of TASHA Alexander, writer of mystery historical fiction, best known for her Lady Emily series.

Megan Rapinoe won an ESPY in 2018, but I'm not sure that's worth taking note of. 

Pope John Paul II's laic name was KAROL Józef Wojtyła.  He's a saint now!

I know Jessica TANDY but not that she played the original Blanche DuBois on Broadway.

Apparently HIT AND RUN is a strategy in baseball.  It uses a stolen base attempt to try to place the defending infielders out of position for an attempted base hit. The hit and run takes advantage of this difference by having the baserunner attempt to steal as soon as the pitch is thrown; the batter then attempts to hit the ball into one of the resulting gaps in the infield defense.  The name "hit and run" is therefore a potential misnomer in that the chronological order of the offensive play is "run and hit," with the runner beginning the steal attempt before the batter makes contact.

Utah must be one of the puzzle's very favorite locations (California might be the first).  MOAB is clued here as "near Canyonlands and Arches National Parks."

The connective tissues known as IT BANDS, or iliotibial band, so carefully watched by long-stance runners, came up on February 13, 2019.

The oddly-spelled singer EYDIE Gorme last appeared on September 7, 2017.

Thick soup noodle UDON hasn't been in the blog since November 29, 2017.

Clever clues: I was puzzled by "Parts of come circles, in France" because I had an A and I thought, *ARC is the same in French and English.  But it's AMIS, as in a circle of friends.  "Skinny?' is DERMAL.

And that concludes this entry.  I think this was a fun Thursday.  Now I'M GONE!  TALK UU LATER!