Jump to: Tricky Clues | Today’s Theme
SUNDAY PUZZLE — Will Shortz, in his print introduction to this grid, writes: “Rich Katz, of Park City, Utah, does freelance work in corporate restructuring. This is his third crossword for The Times — all Sundays. The puzzle started when Rich was ruminating on the expression ‘Two wrongs don’t make a right.’ One thing led to another, then another. This punny puzzle was the result. Rich does all his constructing at home on a table overlooking a gorgeous Rocky Mountain vista.”
We are lucky to have constructors like this, who can make puzzles that are challenging enough for the weekend, but still pepper solvers with their silliness. As delightful as its secret is when it emerges, there are so many other entertaining moments in this grid that my solve simply floated up, as if buoyed by helium.
Today’s Theme
Eight entries in the theme set today — at 21-, 38-, 55-, 77-, 91- and 112-Across and 30- and 51-Down — appear with italicized clues. As written, they really don’t make much sense; there’s no revealer entry, and the title of the puzzle, “Double Talk,” could mean any number of things, like repeated syllables, repeated letters, or words with two meanings. I love to cogitate over a theme from the get-go, but I’m also fine with solving a lot of a puzzle, to the point where I might get a theme entry or two just from crossing letters, if that’s what it takes for an “aha” moment.
That was certainly the case here. I was at least halfway through before I deduced 77-Across, clued as “Air rights.” The entry is CORONATIONS. What does the crowning of royalty have to do with the machinations of urban real estate developm — aha! “Air rights” is “Heir rites.” So “Double Talk” describes homophones. Each of the eight clues in the theme set has two words, which need to be sounded out to make a new clue that works.
Why does 112-Across, “We won!,” solve to KINDERGARTENER? Because it’s actually “Wee one!” Why is 30-Down, “Flew by,” ROBITUSSIN? Because the clue is “Flu buy.”
I think that’s all you need for the rest of the puzzle. This is definitely one of those themes that is brilliant for its simplicity, once the trick becomes clear. I’m not even going to mention my favorite.
Tricky Clues
1A. The question mark in “Pulled one’s pants up?” indicates wordplay, and the rest of the clue indicates pulling up one’s pants, so I jotted in “belted” and went on my merry way, because that’s a decent pun, in my opinion. The entry is actually HEMMED, which also works, of course; you’re pulling up the ends of your pants when you hem them.
33A. I love a wild clue for something mundane. I’m sure some people glossed over this one, and I’m not completely sure I have it right, but “Broad key” solves to ENTER. This, I think, is because the ENTER key on a keyboard is wide, or “broad.” I’ll still love it if I’m wrong.
108A. This entry has appeared in the Times puzzle before, but never with this piece of trivia as its clue. “Air-______ (extra-secure, as a computer)” is GAPPED; a computer in this state is physically isolated and has no wired or wireless connections to outside networks. How does one get data out of it? You might need to rappel.
26D. I made an odd assumption here, in retrospect. “Commit a holiday etiquette no-no” had me thinking “pig out,” which has two letters in common with the right answer: REGIFT.
77D. “Sources of winter strains” is another seasonally appropriate clue. Fortunately, in this case, the strains are musical, from CAROLS, not viruses (or “Covids,” which seemed possible for a moment).
Constructor Notes
This puzzle, like so many others of mine, benefited greatly from my son Teddy’s input. I created and sent him a list of roughly 750 homophones and asked him to find common English expressions composed of any two of them. That created a lot of options, and the editorial team helped me identify a few others. The best themer, in my humble opinion, is [But wait!] cluing JUNK IN THE TRUNK. I nearly dislocated my shoulder patting myself on the back for that one. (A couple of crossworld friends were skeptical that The Times would accept a body image pun; I’m glad they were wrong. But I definitely pushed my tushy-humor luck too far when I tried to clue ASS as [Split end?]. That was a no-go.)
I think the most questionable theme entry is [Bare feet] cluing SUPER BOWL WIN. The Chicago Bears? Yeah, I know.
Selections from the cutting room floor:
[Pour forth] = BOTTOM QUARTILE
[Cereal aisle] = WESTEROS
[Course not!] = SHOTGUN WEDDING
[Real steal] = MAGNOLIAS
[Waste not] = ROPE BELT
Peaking Aloud:
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