Category Archives: Monday

One of the problems with doing a comp lit degree in three non-English languages + Shakespeare is that you see a clue like today’s: “The Faerie Queene” woman

And first think – oh, is this the Midsummer Night’s Dream queen… Titania? No, that’s more than five letters.

And then you get 4 of the five letters — IR_NA — and instinctively drop in I because that’s how I spell Irina. And look, the Wikipedia article doesn’t even mention any Irena!

But then you can’t make out what E_UDIPARFUM is. Although I’m pretty sure it’s ADONAI for the Hebrew god. Although still have no idea why ONEA is fit for military service.

Ok, so here’s who “Irena” is:

Anyway, a sad performance for a Monday at 11:03, but my excuse is that it’s the 4 day Easter weekend here and although I finished Friday’s puzzle early Saturday morning, I barely got Saturday’s puzzle started, and didn’t even open Sunday’s. But hey, that’s 126 Mondays in a row!

5:37 – record time for my current 106 day streak, and 13 seconds over my fastest Monday. Also, my 500th puzzle solved!

I love a nice and breezy easy Monday solve. I got up extraordinarily early to embark on a work trek to the mountains, only to find it was canceled due to weather just as I was about to walk out of the elevator at my apartment.

So, instead of packing, like I should have, I went back to sleep, dealt with some annoying Erbil Apartment issues, and dashed this off. Proud of myself for getting the first themer right off the bat, and over half the puzzle on the first across pass. I still don’t really know who Tyler Perry is, so will never remember MADEA, but lots of other little nuggets that I was able to fish out of my pre-holiday mind…

When I was a kid, CRUELLA De Vil was, hands-down, the scariest Disney villain. She easily still is! I mean, she turned puppies into fur coats! I’m fairly positive that they wouldn’t ever be allowed to put that into a children’s movie these days. I’m actually pretty horrified right now thinking about her Dalmatian fur coat. I mean, a puppy jacket?! 🙁

Anyway, the puzzle today was not nearly as scary as CRUELLA. I finished under 6 minutes, which is lightning fast for me. I don’t actually think it’s possible for me to finish a full sized puzzle on my phone much faster.

The theme was lacking a bit, as I had to look back over the puzzle afterwards to figure out if there was, in fact, a theme. I might be missing something, but I think the four themed answers are plural noun phrases that comprised of any “PLACE NAME + COLOR” and are 15 letters. That’s it, that’s all.

There was some fresh fill though, such as ED HELMS and THE WAVE. ELNINOS isn’t bad, either. I learned about NILS Lofgran and Currier and IVES today.

I missed out on doing the Saturday and Sunday puzzles this week as the ultra proved to require a bit more “recovery” (read: cycles of trying to eat, vomiting, and sleeping) than I expected.

I’m pretty sure that if I had properly trained for the race and taken a few more of the well-known ultra marathon precautions seriously (such as replacing the salt my body was rapidly hemorrhaging around mile 33), I wouldn’t have needed 60 hours to be a functional human again afterwards. But, I will get my crossword streak back in good time and also decide in good time if torturing myself for 12 hours is really the most productive way to spend a Friday.

So, stay tuned for some fun/funky/belated Saturday and Sunday commentary! Unless, of course, Carol PERKs up and writes an entry or Bella decides to make her xnerdi.es ALOHA!

What a hard puzzle for a Monday! My counter is still running (at 20:00) because I’ve given up finding my error. The NW was my last corner to fill. Does anyone still play bridge? Has anyone under the age of 65 ever abbreviated “numbers” as NOS? I do suspect, though, that I’m in the sweet spot of ages that was able to get NES on the first pass.  

Just found my error. Turns out a pun can’t evoke LAUGS. News to me! 21:16. I’m on a crusade to normalize crossword times over 20 minutes (I’m looking at you, crossword Twitter!)

Good to see ELTON, OTIS, and ANI in the puzzle, and CRACK IS WACK made me smile. ATHENS might be the birthplace of democracy, but when will they start cluing WASHINGTONDC as its place of death? 

Mini time: :32. I GOOFed up on PLUTO. 

First blog post done! Time to address this SNACK ATTACK!