Saturday, October 1, 2022, Matthew Stock and Pravan Chakravarthy

 Themeless Saturday by Matthew Stock and Pravan Chakravarthy


Matthew Stock has another collaboration, this time with Pravan Chakravarthy. Matthew is an 8th grade math teacher in Miami and he put me in contact with Pravan who was kind enough to tell us this:

I grew up in New Jersey and am currently a sophomore in college at the University of Chicago, where I’m studying linguistics and physics. Outside of classes I’m on the crossword team of the Chicago Maroon, and like long-distance running and writing/playing music. I’ve been solving crosswords since middle school, but didn’t seriously get into constructing until early 2020. It was around this time I met Matthew, who’s given me an incredible amount of advice on the art and science of puzzlemaking, and without whom this puzzle would not exist! 



Across:

1. Works on the margins, perhaps: SAVES PAPER - I thought of page formatters and retail sellers before this:


11. Water color: CYAN.
15. "Were you followed here?": ARE WE ALONE.

16. Hold sway: RULE.

17. Ambitious workers: CAREERISTS - I've never seen it but it makes sense

18. Wasatch Mountains resort: ALTA.


19. Oscar-nominated biopic about a Supreme Court justice: RBG.


20. "Your Movie Sucks" author: EBERT.


21. Dial on old TVs: VERT.


22. Disney princess from Avalor: ELENA.


25. Choler: IRE - I've only seen in cwd's


26. Pt. of VAT: VALUE VALUE Added Tax

27. Ditches: DESERTS.

29. Cocktails flavored with orgeat syrup: MAI TAIS Orgeat syrup

31. Actor Millen of "Orphan Black": ARI - Of all the ARI's in the world, Matt, Pravan and/or Patti chose this one

32. Change in holiday entertainment?: GELT Chocolate candy in the shape of coins, usually wrapped in metallic foil, usually eaten on Hanukkah and often used for games of dreidel.

33. "Spring forward" letters: DST.

34. Small wing nut: LEPIDOPTERIST - Getting  butterfly "nut" was the  key to my completing the puzzle 

38. "A __ upon thee!": POX - A first class literary put down

39. Checks: VETS.


40. Sticker in a cushion: PIN.

41. Black Friday exhortation: ACT FAST.

43. Made a course standard: SHOT PAR - Normal for some, a goal for me

47. Burnett who appeared on the final season of "Better Call Saul": CAROL - I can't wait to see how this came about


48. Actress Longoria: EVA.

50. Pink bear in "Toy Story 3": LOTSO - For LOTSO huggin'

51. Of all time: EVER - Candidates for best EVER in their sport


52. Puffed up: PROUD Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up. 1 Corinthians 13:4

54. __-free: container label: BPA All you'd ever want to know

55. Capital on the Gulf of Guinea: LOME - It's about a 4-hr drive from Accra, the capital of Ghana, to LOME, the capital of Togo



56. Website with a "Recipes & Menus" section: EPICURIOUS - A very nice portmanteau 

59. Son of Hera: ARES.

60. Wildly incompatible: POLES APART - MILES APART is not wildly incompatible, it's just wrong here    

61. __ control: PEST.

62. "Studying, simplified" website: SPARKNOTES This looks like a good site


Down:

1. "Is nothing __?": SACRED.


2. Ready for field work: ARABLE - Oh, the ground itself is declared ready for field work

3. Teeters (on): VERGES.

4. Meryl Sheep of "Sesame Street," for one: EWE.


5. Date: SEE.

6. Cut (down): PARE.

7. Outs: ALIBIS 


8. Someone who's all style and no substance: POSER 


9. French course final?: ENTREMET - It has become a modern French word for a small dessert


10. Musical pause: REST - Do you know what song is being referenced here (*answer at bottom): Phillips said that he wrote the song quickly, in about 20 minutes. The song includes a pregnant pause before the coda, which modulates up a semitone. 

11. Necktie: CRAVAT.

12. Icelandic gift-givers of lore: YULE LADS All you want to know about these creatures of 17th century Iceland.


13. Selfless sort: ALTRUIST.

14. Marie Kondo superlative: NEATEST.


23. With 28-Down, twice-daily occurrences: NEAP and 28. See 23-Down: TIDES. This is the TIDE chart for today at Cocoa Beach. As you can see, there are NEAP (low) TIDES at 6am and then around 7pm.


24. End of a Google Maps route calculation: ARRIVAL my 32. Way finder: GPS arrival time is sometimes too late because speed limits are just a suggestion for me sometimes

26. Bile: VITRIOL - See choler above

30. First Hebrew letter: ALEPH.

34. Neighborhood diner?: LOCAVORE - Portmanteau #2


35. Absolute ends: EXTREMES - Nebraska sumer and winter temperatures

36. Treat with DJ Tropicool and Louie-Bloo Raspberry flavors: OTTER POP - Not around here


37. Wild about: INTO.

38. Warmup stretch: PACE LAP - The red car is leading these NASCAR vehicles in the pace lap and it is not allowed to go over 45 mph


42. Sylvan area: FOREST.


43. Flying __: SAUCER.

44. WWII craft: PT BOAT - You can buy this Revell kit for $23 and build a model of the famous PT 109 that was commanded by JFK

45. Equally uncontaminated: AS PURE as the driven snow

46. Cooks slowly: ROASTS.

49. "You can clap now!": VOILA - A clear blue sky and some nice home editing allows this guy to say VOILA.


52. Fires (up): PEPS.


53. Gloaming: DUSK.


57. Akira Kurosawa's retelling of "King Lear": RAN Ran (transl. "chaos" or "turmoil")


58. Shares time, for short?: IPO - When a company goes public and offers shares for sale.

*That song with the pregnant pause is Monday, Monday written by John Phillips for The Mamas and Papas