Friday, November 26th 2010

Solving time: 77 minutes 45 seconds
[working together]

# red squares (revealed): 5
# black squares (wrong on check): 21

I feel tired. 77 minutes was not how long it took for us to solve this puzzle. That’s not what “solving time” measures on Fridays and Saturdays. It was how long it took for us to give up on the puzzle. Luckily, we’d made some pretty satisfactory progress by then, so giving up didn’t feel like quite the kick in the pants it usually does.

SE fell first. PHD (37a Many a prof) crossed with POINTE (37d ___ shoes (ballet wear)) opened up the corner for us. So before long, we had ______ OF ZENDA (46a 1937 Ronald Coleman action film, with “the”). Unfortunately, that meant nothing to us, and the PRISONER part didn’t come until after we’d worked from the center of the grid into the SW corner and had all but the RI in place.

The theme, as far as I know, is action movies whose titles end in a Z-word (?). Three Z’s on the board altogether. ZZZ. I am feeling rather bloated and sleepy after dinner. A very subtle Turkey Day theme, perhaps?

Favorite answers on the grid:

SMASHER (13d Atom ______ ). Particle accelerator ❤

LEARN (24d Wise up). For some reason this one took me by surprise.

INDEX FINGER (17d Telephone dialer?). What year is this, 1935?

IRENIC (3d Peaceful). Always glad to learn new words.

Happy POULTry Day!

John says:

I googled to figure out what icestation meant (anything like infestation?) and I had to stare at the results for a good 10 seconds to realized that they were all for the two word phrase Ice Station. I have heard of the latter two movies, I also remember that Ronald Coleman used to be a regular on the Jack Benny program, playing his neighbor.

This puzzle was full of a lot of good words. Also there’s a distinct ring to titles that end in a Z word. I’m going to remember that.