Brian solves Wednesday, October 29, 2008.
I was so pleased to find myself completing this Steven L. Zisser debut puzzle in six minutes that I had to double-check my calendar to make sure it was Thursday.
It’s not. Six minutes is a lovely time for a Wednesday, and that is, in fact, what today is. Wednesday. All day long. Including my sleeping in, my eating leftovers, my researching recipes and my playing World of Warcraft. Yes, I’m unemployed, and my wife will be out of the house all day. What else am I supposed to do?
Mr. Zisser has given us four wonderful clues, the theme of which is hidden within our very own brains:
- 16A. Meteor shower : PLANETARIUM
- 22A. Country bowers : FIDDLE PLAYERS
- 46A. Farm towers : TEAMS OF HORSES
- 56A. South American flower : AMAZON RIVER
What, huh? Yes, I too thought that it was showers like rainstorms, towers like tall buildings, flowers like plants and bowers like whatever bowers are — but it’s OH not OW, as Jim Horne so efficiently put in the title of his blog post. (Yes, Jim is hosting a new blog over on the New York Times web site. We think Jim is great and his blog is great, so even if you like his stuff better than ours and you abandon us for all time, we will feel good inside for helping out a great guy like Jim.)
Today was “free taco day” at Taco Bell, which is apparently named for someone (46D. Glen Bell’s fast food : TACOS). I had no idea. I don’t know where I thought the “bell” part came from, but there you have it. What I didn’t have today was a free taco. Someone stole a base in the World Series, and Taco Bell gave away free tacos as a result of it. The fact that there will have been, by tomorrow night, approximately 48 hours between the top and bottom halves of the sixth inning of Game Five is unnecessarily enough for me to despise this year’s World Series. The fact that it’s the Phillies (well, okay) against the Devil Rays (I will not give into their new name, they are a fake team) is what was enough to begin with.
(My apologies here to our friend PhillySolver who, at least by virtue of his handle, might have some allegiance to the Phillies.)
The rest of the grid kind of trickled together for me. Not too exciting, not too frustrating. There was one area that caused me some grief, but I either knew the stuff or guessed right. BOLA/ALAR/LAO was a triumvirate of nonsense in my head, despite having seen at least two of those words before in puzzles.
I’m going to open the floor here to anyone’s comments, as well as the possibility that Ryan might chime in and offer a few thoughts and/or pictures. Ryan, use this font.
See you Thursday!
