Monday Puzzle #20 or "Separation of Church and Crossword"

Good morning! I have just put a pot of water to boil. I’m making steel cut oats – my grain selection today. It’s a big experiment. The wheat bread nearly sent me to bed and I’m hoping that’s an anomaly.

As I started checking my answers to Puzzle #20, I was realizing that I should be very proud of myself. I am actually regularly completing these puzzles, which is a huge improvement. In my big book of 500 easy NYT puzzles, I rarely completed one. So, I was feeling pretty good – and then I found the errors. So many errors. Here they are:

42 across, “2005 Christo display in New York City.” I’m assuming this is the big cloth/flags in Central Park? I had no idea what it was called, so relied on the answers to the other clues and got LATEC. Hah! It’s GATES. I looked it up and it is the cloth/flags (gates) in Central Park.

48 across, “Draft status.” ONEA. I had ovea. Other than being the Oregon Narcotics Enforcement Agency, Answers.com tells me that 1-a means eligible for military service.

36 down, “Workshop gripper.” VISE. I had vice. Just a silly spelling error. Did I know the two were spelled differently? Sure I did. I mean, I must know that. I think I do – and yet now I don’t know if I could pass a lie detector test on that.

42 down, “Book before Exodus.” This is the funniest one, I think. It is, of course, GENESIS. But, I had LEVESIS. That totally sounds like a bible book name, right? “And, Joe, I’m going to ask you to read a passage from Levesis for me at my wedding.” Right?

Seriously, I’m serious about this separation of church and crossword thing.

This puzzle had one tried and true clue and answer. 54 across, “Crème cookie.” OREO. That’s a tried and true answer in my life as well. Solves a lot of problems (and explains some too).

Things I got, but wouldn’t be able to actually answer, say on Jeopardy or something:

9 across, “Northern Scandinavians.” LAPPS. WikiP tells me that this term is considered to be derogatory and the better term is Sami.

14 across is a very common clue – and one that I think I am just beginning to memorize. “Toward shelter, nautically.” ALEE. MW does one of those frustrating things with the definition. “On or toward the lee.” Oh, of course. But what the fuck is a lee? (sorry – I think that’s the residual wheat speaking) A lee is “protecting shelter” or “the side (as of a ship) or area that is sheltered from the wind.” Got it.

19 across, “Desmond of ‘Sunset Blvd.’” NORMA. I have added this movie to my Netflix queue.

21 across, “1976 Hoffman/Oliver film.” MARATHON MAN. Have also added this to the queue.

62 & 63 across, “First two names of Guy de Maupassant.” HENRI RENE. I’ve heard of him. But WikiP tells me he was a French writer in the 1800’s. He is considered to be one of the fathers of the modern short story.

2 down, “Stan’s partner in old comedy.” OLLIE. That’s Laurel and Hardy (Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy).

3 down, “Title song of a 1966 hit movie.” GEORGY GIRL. You got it. In the queue.

30 down, “Brendan Behan book.” BORSTAL BOY Now, this is a book I want to read. It is about Brendan Behan’s imprisonment in Ireland for his I.R.A. activities.

34 down, “Nick Charles’ wife.” Who is Nick Charles? Aahhh. WikiP tells me that Nick and Nora Charles are the main characters in The Thin Man. It is a novel adapted to a film. I don’t know if I should read the book or watch the movie.

53 down, “Actor Ken of TV’s ‘Wiseguy’.” WAHL. Never seen the show. Wow, I read about him on WikiP and his life sounds like a mess. And, he’s married to one of the Barbi twins.

Well, I always learn interesting things doing this. It’s all a matter of retention, though.