hargitay may wanna let gubler know cause idgaf who f a ll s - Law And Order: $vu to $uv A Nu bred Don ob r

Saturday, October 12, 2013

Criminal Minds agent with I.Q. of 187 / SAT 10-12-13 / Singer of #1 single Try Again 2000 / Treaty of Sycamore Shoals negotiator 1775 / Glenda Jackson Ben Kingsley film scripted by Harold Pinter / Musical with cow that's catapulted over castle / Morsel for guppy / Word spoken 90 times in Molly Bloom's soliloquy / 1986 Indy 500 champion

Constructor: John Farmer

Relative difficulty: Easy

THEME: none

Word of the Day: FRA Mauro (44A: Venetian mapmaker ___ Mauro) —

Fra Mauro, O.S.B. Cam., (died 1460) was a 15th-century Camaldolese monk who lived in the Republic of Venice. He was a monk of the Monastery of St. Michael, located on the island of Murano in the Venetian Lagoon. It was there that he maintained a cartography workshop.

In his youth, Mauro had traveled extensively as a merchant and a soldier. He was familiar with the Middle East. He entered monastic life at a late stage in life. In the monastery, he became a mapmaker. Although he was no longer free to travel, due to his religious status, he would frequently consult with merchants of the city upon their return from overseas voyages. By 1450 he composed a great mappamundi (world map) of the Old Worldwith surprising accuracy, including extensive written comments reflecting the geographic knowledge of his time. The map is known today as the "Fra Mauro map". A critical edition of the map was edited by Piero Falchetta in 2006. (wikipedia)

• • •

Easy but not terribly enjoyable puzzle. I just don't believe in 1-Across. I don't believe it is a thing. Never heard anyone, child or adult, say it. Feels horribly made-up and stupid. So that's how I feel about that. "Criminal Minds" agent? (7D: "Criminal Minds" agent with an I.Q. of 187) How obscure a clue do you need for REID? People watch "Criminal Minds"? OK. Speaking of obscure, "TURTLE DIARY" (23D: Glenda Jackson/Ben Kingsley film scripted by Harold Pinter). You can put all the famous names you want in that clue—still won't make the movie famous. The rest of the puzzle is pretty inoffensive, but there's not much (if anything) I haven't seen before. I think I like CAMERASHY the best, largely because it was (for some reason) wickedly hard for me to parse. My last letter was that "C," which I originally had as an "N" (because of SNARF/SCARF confusion). I had been trying to think of what word ends in -RASHY (besides, say, "TRASHY"). So it was nice to get pleasantly fooled there at the end. And that "?" clue was a good one (34A: Not likely to be a "cheese" lover)—unlike 10D: Vacancy clause?, which makes no real sense for "NOBODY'S HOME" unless you put "clause" on the rack and stretch it til it screams.

Nice tricky clue on ELENA (32D: John Paul's successor)—think Supreme Court Justice, not Pope. I thought "one" in German was EINS, and it is, but apparently it's also EINE (?) (13D: One in a Kindergarten?). I don't know from German. I think I would've struggled quite a bit with this one had there not been such a huge lot of gimmes. "SPAMALOT"! YES! TED! RED ZONE! STP! SDI! GEHRY! 'STRO! (my friend Robert is the play-by-play guy for the 'STROs—have I mentioned that? I like to mention that. He's a good guy, and a crossword solver). Major mistakes of the day were AS A RULE for USUALLY (29A: In the main), S-SHAPED for F-SHAPED (39A: Like the sound holes of a cello), and ... I think that's it. I enjoyed remembering the GOATEE on Duchamp's parody of "Mona Lisa." But otherwise the enjoyment level wasn't terribly high. Just not to my taste. That SE corner looks pretty nice, though, I will say that. Proof that your stacks don't have to be exceedingly long to be entertaining.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

Rex Parker at 12:00 AM

82 comments:

Jason Gideon12:02 AM

Criminal Minds has been on for over eight seasons now. Still averaging 10M+ viewers an episode. Deal with it.

Anonymous12:05 AM

My previous best Saturday time ever was 24:36. This one came in at 16:34, with zero write-overs, which has also never happened before. I started filling in answers immediately and just kept going.

I agree that the clue for NOBODY'S HOME was literally tortured.

NASTYGRAM is a very real thing. I loved it.

Hung up at the end with GIL / SNEE / GOATEE. Scrolled the alphabet and guessed right.

jae12:12 AM

So, yesterday's was challenging...Huh? Must have been a wave house thing for me?

I also found this one to be on the easy side. Easy-medium for me mostly because I went from @Rex aSaruLe to aSUsual before USUALLY.

WOEs: ZIA and AALIYAH - Did not see Romeo Must Die but I've probably heard the song. Just never knew who the artist was. She died way too young in a plane crash. The cross with YSIDRO might be tough.

I've also never seen nor heard of TURTLE DIARY which @Rex is obscure enough not to show up on Netflix.

Random observation: SDI got it's nickname from the 66a movie.

Unlike Rex I found to like here...SPAMALOT, OMAHA BEACH, NOBODYS HOME, NASTY GRAM, DEATH STAR, RED ZONE... A fine Sat. Judge Farmer!

Anonymous12:17 AM

My husband always suggests a nastygram when I'm unhappy with a product.

Questinia12:32 AM

*A NASTYGRAM*

Dear Mr. Farmer,

YES,

Magritte's "Rape" comes to me YES before Dali's "Mona Lisa" and YES, vagina before GOATEE. Then will I YES to solve the NW corner? First I fill YES and

{{{{{{ ripple screen }}}}}}

YES chased me across the blank NW tundra. YES my heart was going like mad and YES... your puzzle told me "no". YES I don't finish. ANAL YES. IN THE REAR YES. oN THE REAR. No.

Aaliyah Camerashy Mrs12:33 AM

@jae

Are you confusing John Farmer with Judge Vic Fleming?

Or is John Farmer a judge, too?

Fave CAMERASHY because it was so hard to parse.

Couldn't get past 'stache to get to GOATEE for so long, nice visual! Even thought about LHOOQ. Overthink!

Lots of two word phrases...DIDTO, ADAPTTO, STEPIN, GRASPSAT... Not criticising just noticing.

I liked @Rex saying no matter how many names you throw at it, TURTLEDIARY is obscure. I have to agree.

Surprised to see ANAL... Slippery slope (ahem)

From NASTYGRAM to DEATHSTAR...fun

retired_chemist12:35 AM

Enjoyed this easy puzzle. A full 3 minutes faster than yesterday.

1A started as poison pen. Since it had ZERO crosses in common with NASTYGRAM, it didn't last long.

AALIYAH - WTF. Interesting to read about her though. Do tablets use STYLI anymore? Haven't seen a stylus since my Treo. EYE test @ 45A complicated life briefly. Never heard of SÃO Bento - a holy Japanese boxed meal. UNSER doesn't win 'em all (41A) - RAHAL won this one. I know him only from crosswords, but he went right in once UNSER was ruled out.

54A was my go-to 3 letter Indian tribe OTO (or maybe UTE), except it turned out to be ZIA. Now I have three.

Daniel BOONE negotiated a treaty? Why isn't he in Congress now? Oh yeah, he's dead. And it was Davy Crockett who was a US representative (from Tennessee) anyway.

Thanks, Mr. Farmer.

Evan12:48 AM

Also on my easy side. It didn't hurt that I got OMAHA BEACH with no crosses and BAD END right off of that. My only first mistakes were EYE TEST before EXAM and PROMINENT before PROPONENT. This is the second weekend in a row where I've reached my top five fastest times for a Saturday, so maybe, just maybe, I'm getting pretty good at themelesses. Gimme two more months, and I'll get back to you on that.

I'm with @jae on the liveliness of the fill -- and would add SLY FOX to the bunch. NASTYGRAM does seem a bit odd in that it only nets about 50,000 Google hits in quotes. I'd guess that it's a new term, but I can picture it being outdated as well -- I sorta like it either way. I'm definitely with Rex on TURTLE DIARY. Only 538 ratings on IMDB? That's nothing. I have obscure, terrible horror movies in my collection that have about the same number of ratings, with no one close to even D-list star level in them.

And since I have little else to say, I'll just say, read @Questinia's comment. Then read it again.

jae1:14 AM

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jae1:17 AM

@Aaliyah Camershy Mrs -- In the words of Questina, YES, YES I believe I did confuse the two gentlemen. John Farmer is in the telecom biz in LA (you know where that's at). Sorry about that. Still a fine Sat. Mr. Farmer!

Clark1:20 AM

"Eins" is used in isolation as the numeral "one." ("Wir haben mit der [Linie] eins gefahren." "We took the one [tram].")

"Einer" and "eine" can be pronouns, masculine and feminine, respectively. ("Da war nur noch eine." "There was only one [girl/woman] remaining.") If the context were such that you were thinking numbers rather than people, you might say "Da war nur noch eins." I think.

I DNFed on the AALIYAH/YSIDRO cross. Hate it when I just know that I don't know.

August West1:24 AM

This comment has been removed by the author.

August West1:40 AM

Yesterday I was eleven minutes faster than THU; today, two minutes faster than yesterday. Just chock full of hanging curveballs. Easiest Saturday in recent memory.

And such great stuff! I now and again must send NASTYGRAMs to adversaries in litigation. That went in first, off the clue. It's danglers fell like drops from an icicle, 1-5, 7, 9. GRAbsfor momentarily before GRASPSAT, quickly corrected by SDI, STP. Thought INTHEREAR must be wrong, as I couldn't imagine anyone's name might begin with AALI. Next saw San YSIDRO, and AALIYAH emerged from the dark, dank recesses of my wife's pop collection. Blecch.

Didn't meet the "as a rule" trap, as i'd already entered USOPEN. Didn't know FRA, ZIA, SAO, or TURTLEDIARY, for that matter, but didn't need to, as they all easily filled from their crosses. Didn't know Bobby RAHAL won the '86 Indy, but I did know that he'd won it, sometime...back then.

No other hiccups. Loved the clues for NOBODYSHOME (c'mon, Rex, it's good!), ENTOURAGE, PROPONENT, POOLHALLS and STEPIN.

Chris SNEE, an anchor of the Giants offensive line for a decade, is a personal friend from town, son-in-law to Coach Coughlin, and unfortunately facing likely career-ending hip surgery next week. I'm sick over it. Ironic he should turn up in today's puzzle, as he'll be meeting with team doctors later to discuss surgical options. My heart goes out to Chris and Kate today. This whole Giants...thing is giving me an ULCER.

Noam D. Elkies1:52 AM

Another vote for 1A:NASTYGRAM. Example: "grow a spine!" is a nastygram of "Spiro Agnew" ;-)

Mad? OK, senile.

[Yes, I know Dick [sic] Cavett's canonical nasty anagram for SPIRO AGNEW, and I know that a "nastygram" is not actually a nasty anagram. This word is a fun 1A, and has the nice feature that even if a Saturday solver somehow hasn't heard of that word for a nasty missive and has to guess it from the crossings it looks like a good match for the clue.]

chefwen2:56 AM

It seemed a lot more difficult while I was solving it than it does now looking back at the outcome. Had to look up a couple of things 8D 41A and 65A were total unknowns, and I didn't have my friend here to help. He's getting pretty good at the theme-less puzzles. Although, I do have to question his intelligence, he flew from Kauai to Baltimore to attend the Packer/Ravens game?????

Maybe he could not have helped me here.

Hi to @Gil I.P. at 21D and to me @34A. Get that camera out of my face!

Rex Parker3:17 AM

This Halloween I'm gonna go as "Angry 'Criminal Minds' Fan":

"Trick or treat ... What do you mean you don't know who I'm supposed to be? I'm f***ing REID!? What do you mean, 'who's that?' From 'Criminal Minds,' man. What do you mean you've never heard of it?! It's been on for 15 years! It's the greatest show on television, you idiot. Almost 3% of America watches it! [sigh] Just gimme some candy."

Dr. Johnny Fever4:14 AM

Rex is right. Probably should have clued it with my buddy who played Venus Flytrap. Now that guy was funny.

Anonymous5:04 AM

ANAL crossing IN THE REAR... I had a good chortle that that passed the censor!

JenCT5:43 AM

@August West: I feel your pain...

@Questinia: Whaa?

Too Old to Care6:15 AM

To @so many of you: Saturday is for the obscure. You all sound like you've been eating SLY FOX's sour grapes. NASTYGRAM has been around for a long time, but it isn't related to the anagram. Telegram is the progenitor. Now AALIYAH is what I call obscure, but I'm not complaining. As for Criminal Minds, Rex, it has been around for years on prime time major network CBS, leads off for CSI, and reruns can be seen almost continuously on several cable channels. Previous star Mandy Patinkin, and current star Joe Mantegna aren't exactly unknown.

Since I am in a rare foul mood, a nastygram is in order. @ retired chemist, part of the fun of crosswords is learning something from the answers. It's good to know that OTO and UTE are Native American tribes; better to know where they range. Thus armed, you probably wouldn't think of them first, when you think of New Mexico, or New York, for that matter.

Lots of fun, even though I all I know about the obscure AALIYAH is her name and that she died in a plane crash.

jburgs6:54 AM

I think this was one of the easiest Saturdays I've ever done but still get a DNF because I went with iSIDRO. Had no idea who AALIiAH was. Settled on it thinking it was some foreign spelling of a name. Otherwise,most of the more challenging answers were easily got because of the many gimme crosses.

mathguy7:02 AM

I wouldn't call it easy. Ten words I didn't know not quite balanced by eight gimmes. Plus I didn't like three of the clues: 10D, 32D, 57D. Oh, I just got 57D -- window blinds. I was thinking about duck blinds.

retired_chemist7:44 AM

ELENA made no sense to me either. Googled and found that John Paul Stevens's successor on SCOTUS is Elena Kagan. Thank God for crosses!

dk8:20 AM

Much ado about NASTYGRAM: Meh. Crossing ANAL with INTHEREAR to form YES ANAL! INTHEREAR MRS NIPS! Now there is a north west corner to chortle over. My inner 14 year old AROAR.

I had sea anchor for PARASAILS as I am an old school WASP and we just do not parasail. YISDRO was a hoot as I tried to recall just where that trolley went from San Diego. I have several sad smuggling stories that involve that tram that I will save for an other day.

Off to teach mass casualty management with a box of toe tags in my truck. @Rex wanna go as a DEADBODY this Halloween?

🌟🌟🌟 (3 Stars) I liked it and who cares about the rest of you.

Catherine8:39 AM

ANAL. INTHEREAR. YES, (YES, YES I WILL YES Molly Bloom). This is the hottest, most raunchy NYT puzzle ever printed. I think Will Shortz is checking to make sure we're paying attention.

Catherine8:40 AM

ANAL. INTHEREAR. YES, (YES, YES I WILL YES Molly Bloom). This is the hottest, most raunchy NYT puzzle ever printed. I think Will Shortz is checking to make sure we're paying attention.

Sir Hillary8:48 AM

This was a good one, although based on difficulty, it probably should have been switched with yesterday's.

Have more people seen "Criminal Minds" than "Midnight in Paris"? I would guess so, so why the fuss?

ELENA is my daughter's name. Good clue.

SMUG = complacent? Never knew that. Always meant "superior-acting" to me.

ANAL/INTHEREAR cross is an all-time classic. Mr. Farmer is quite the SLYFOX to, ahem, slip that one in.

FearlessKim8:56 AM

YES, SAO RAHAL MEeTs a BADEND when he STEPsINto the POOLHALL sans ENTOURAGE. GEHRY (whose STYLI USUALLY say "HUH?" to) gives RAHAL a DEATHSTARe, GRASPSAT his SNEE and (the SLYFOX!) NIPS RAHAL INTHEREAR. ELENA, AROAR at what GEHRY DIDTO her EINE PROPONENT, MRS GEHRY by an IOTA ( if only she'd had that EYEEXAM!)

jberg9:17 AM

Like that commenter whose name is so like mine, I finished with iSIDRO crossing AALIiAH. Boo-hoo.

Like @Rex, I'd never heard of NASTYGRAM either, but unlike him I loved it. Makes me want to send one myself.

Unlike everyone who's commented so far, I found this one tough -- I couldn't get anything in the NW the first time through, and there were only three ways in from crosses -- the S in STP, which isn't much help; the Y in YSIDRO, which I had wrong and in any case led to a nonsense string of letters; and PSAT, which eventually got me there -- but only after I first wrote in GRAbS AT without noticing the stray P in the middle. What finally opened the corner for me was tIPS, which made be see that far bEhiND was wrong, and gave me tASTYGRAM, which just didn't sound angry enough (but another nice word).

But why isn't everyone complaining about ALGA? I looked it up in a dictionary, which defined the plural and then added (singular: ALGA). I can't imagine a context in which anyone would ever say that.

Ah well, that's sour grapes for the error, I guess. Time go get on with the day.

Anonymous9:22 AM

too easy for a saturday.

MetaRex9:22 AM

Sigh...back to mediocrity...four minutes slower than my better tushnet today after being right on his tail Thursday and yesterday...

Thx to Questinia for supporting the cause of those of us who think that maybe ya can know too much funky stuff and be too far off the beaten track to be much good at CWPs :)

Biggest mess-ups were FRETTED for F-SHAPED and PROMOTIONS for PROTOTYPES...CAMERA-SHY took a long time..wanted UNFLASHY.

chefbea9:32 AM

too tough for me DNF

Bob Kerfuffle9:52 AM

@retired_chemist, 12:35 AM - When solving 36 A, my only thought was of clay tablets!

Carola10:02 AM

Enjjoyed seeing some of these come into focus: NASTYGRAM, CAMERA SHY, PROTOTYPES, ENTOURAGE. Feared a DNF with the impossible-looking AALIYAH sequence, but actually DNF because the incorrect oto gave me SPAMoLOT, which I never looked at again after changing the tribe to ZIo. Otherwise, same goings astray as @Rex.

I'm a llttle SLOW so never noticed the NASTY doings in the NW. Quite something.

joho10:06 AM

One very stupid wrong square at SDs/AALsYAH -- I didn't know the singer but I do know that SDs is *not* an "Antimissle plan, for short."

I had eatup before SCARF and because of that unser. OMAHAMBEACH straightened that out.

Having lived in San Diego for many years YSIDRO was a gimme.

I have to agree with everyone who got a kick out of seeing ANAL crossing INTHEREAR. I hope they didn't come to a BADEND!

I liked it, John Farmer!

retired_chemist10:10 AM

@ Bob K - I didn't think of that. but your context was probably the one intended. Thanks for the mini-satori.

Without a clue10:26 AM

I'm definitely a plodder. Hour plus is not an uncommon Saturday time for me. Done in about 20 for this one.

Never heard of nastygram? Good for you! Regrettably, I've said it, received some, and probably sent one or two. Definitely part of the vocab.

The rest of the stuff felt more Hump Day-ish (like to see that in a puzzle!).

As for your EIne, surprised a puzzle prince like you would not get that. Eins to me sounds like the verbalization when you go, eine, svei, drei...

Time left to go watch Turtle Diary! (NOT!)

Z10:46 AM

@Questina - "Isoteric" as ever. Your comment left me very satisfied, at least.

@Jason Gideon - Is "Criminal minds" the one where the creators plagiarized NCIS, basically imitating the characters and changing the setting and upping the violence quotient?

___ Mauro is a Wednesday clue, FRA _____ is a Saturday clue.

Likewise, first word of a two word place name is SAN if Spanish and SAO if Portuguese. Too easy.

Liked the longer answers, struggled in the SW (TURTLEDoves anyone?) until I finally got STEPIN, otherwise definitely on the "I'm easy" side.

farkj10:50 AM

Nastygram is a slang term and it is pretty common these days

Z10:54 AM

Hey, a NASTYGRAM picture in my Twitter feed.

Mr. Benson11:17 AM

If you folks think ANAL/INTHEREAR is pushing the envelope, consider that I initially had EINS at 13D, which gave me GOATSE at 21A. For those who don't know what that is... if you wan

#criminalminds

#svu #tieinterceptor

Preface

"I'm (point blank) the secret victim and hidden hero as villain. Double agent."

From:

"Mr. Mom! Hulk and H op e4 TH e W(e)r LEd @@ You were never less alone or with me!"

My Story:

"Ma-Eve: TheyeArS-hes—three people! A line of sight seen by different people who didn't know the government was gaslighting them. It's called E—as in NASA blunders—in the mixing bowl. An EMP contact lens over adults' eyes to get between kids. Their eyes hiding everything.

"There are two children they wanted—111—because I had them blinded first. It was a toy; now I've got to convince them I'm real and hid as reel to hero them safely. Take off your terrorist gl-assets… or don't! I recorded the entire show—from every perspective! Detective 04 911 no more!"

From:

"Ma2(n1n11) is bc on vis ion Eon or WI-N os!?"

Followed By:

"The story of four people hid as one so the world never five knew the face of why our lives intertwined and we could heal—but your giv o had a different idea. They thought... but I knew real reel snake. I'm not four or five—I'm six. That's the twist!"

Episode 1: "Vanished With a Trace"

Opening Scene: The Unseen Messenger

[Scene: A bustling street corner in New York City, seamlessly blending into Chicago's skyline through clever editing. The camera pans to an envelope being dropped off by an unseen messenger—no cameras catch the act. The envelope lands softly on a park bench, unnoticed by passersby.]

[Close-up of the envelope reveals the twisted quote written across it:]

"When you can't trust your eyes and New York-Chicago equalize you in the holy § nuse um... 2b ee con+in-hued. Except for Monday!"

[Inside the envelope is a folded note containing cryptic instructions:]

"Can you name me backwards, L? §d—outside."

[Another envelope inside holds a cipher key referencing Francis Bacon's art and philosophy, alongside a correction to the word "brainish" marked with an upside-down smile.]

Scene: Reid Deciphers the Clues

[The team is gathered in the BAU office, analyzing the bizarre collection of items left behind: a Dwayne Chapman poster with "vanished with a trace RFID scan them find me! ff" scrawled across it, a pacifier marked with "NOS," a toy bush, a Baywatch doll resembling Dwayne Johnson, a block letter with rounded wood-shaved edges, a "World's Best Teacher" card, and music sheets with thickened notes arranged in five op forms.]

[The camera pans to Reid as he examines the clues meticulously. He notices something others don't—a toy payphone placed next to a draft of the AE Act of 1973.]

Reid (thinking aloud):

"Random… or maybe not. These items are connected. The thickened notes—five op forms—they're not musical; they're coordinates. And this draft of the AE Act… it's her. Maeve. She's trying to tell me something."

[Reid hesitates, his mind racing. He recalls Maeve's cryptic messages from the past and the term "Zugzwang." Fear grips him; he knows if he acts on this, he risks looking irrational.]

Reid (closing his eyes):

"I can't… not again. If I'm wrong…"

[The scene shifts to Reid's memory—a flashback of Maeve's final moments and his inability to save her. The camera zooms back to the present as Reid clenches his fists.]

[Cut to Garcia entering the room.]

Garcia:

"Uh, genius? You okay? You look like you've seen a ghost."

Reid (quietly):

"Maybe I have."

Cipher Challenge

The team deciphers the phrase "MEET AT NOON" using the minimalist ¢¢ cipher, derived from Francis Bacon's biliteral cipher system. The encoded text is arranged symmetrically:

text

🔴🔴🔵 🔴🔵🔵

🔴🔴🔴 🔴🔴🔴

🔵🔵🔵 🔴🔴🔴

----------------------

🔵🔵🔴 🔵🔵🔴

🔴🔴🔴

This leads them to coordinates pointing to an abandoned art gallery containing hidden symbols in Bacon-inspired paintings.

Ending Hook: The Twist

As Reid deciphers more clues, he realizes that Ma-Eve has orchestrated this entire puzzle from beyond—or perhaps she never truly vanished at all.

In one final note left behind, Ma-Eve writes:

Chapter 7 - hargitay may wanna let gubler know cause idgaf who f a ll s