Monday Puzzle #26 or "Oh Baby Give Me One More Chance"

Whoa. Long day. Michael Jackson died yesterday. Totally weird. I bought an electronic-techno cd in 1991 or 1992 and the first song was called, “Michael Jackson is in Heaven Now” and I can’t get that song out of my head.

Went to a dinner party and totally blew my diet/nutritional program. Wine, port, coffee, chocolate. And had a great time.

I spent 5 and a half hours in the Honda service customer lounge. 5 ½ hours. At one point, I could hear the music in the service area – it was Jackson Five or Michael Jackson “I Want You Back.” Tonight at the dinner party, one of the guys played the piano and started to play that song. Serendipity moment.

Puzzle #26 was hard – maybe because I had a totally hectic day and felt rushed. I had four errors affecting 6 answers – 15 across, “Samoa’s capital” is APIA, not Apie. And, 9 down, “Plaster backing” is LATH, not leth. 63 across, “Cries of surprise,” is OHOS, not ohss. I knew that wasn’t going to be right, but didn’t know what to put so just threw in that first s. 56 down, “Six-stringed instrument,” is VIOL, not a VISP. 54 down, “Plenty, to a poet,” is ENOW, not enon. And, 66 across, “Corduroy feature is WALE, not nape. MW learns me that wale is “a streak or ridge made on the skin especially by the stroke of a whip.” Definition 3a is “one of a series of even ribs in a fabric.”

Learned the spelling of Stephen King’s Pet Sematary. Thought it was cemetery.

Other things I learned:

33 across, “Old draft letters.” SSS. I think that stands for Selective Service System.

58 across, “Wrinkled citrus fruits.” UGLIS. According to www.thefruitpages.com, an ugli is “a specific kind of tangelo, easier to peel. A crossing between a tangerine, a grapefruit, and an orange. Looks really ugli and sometimes has brown spots. Can be peeled manually.

65 across, “Georgia and Lithuania, once: Abbr.” SSRS. SQL Server Reporting Services. Social Skills Rating System. Ok, found it. Soviet Socialist Republics.

24 down, “Miss ____ Regrets.” OTIS. It is a song by Cole Porter.

35 down, “Skater Midori.” ITO. Japanese figure skater. WikiP tells me that “in 1988 she became the first woman to land a triple/triple jump combination and a triple axel in competition.”

Tried and true clue: 30 across, “Wide shoe width.” EEE

Don’t know how much I’m going to retain from today’s puzzle. Just kinda going through the motions today.

Monday Puzzle #13 or "Veni, Vidi, Vici?"

Lucky #13! AND, it’s the 13th. Creeeepy. Not really, but you look for it where you can.

First of all, this puzzle had “Taj Mahal city” as a clue and I totally got it! (AGRA, reference puzzle #1) So, maybe this project is working at least a little bit.

Also, I completed the puzzle, had no errors, and there are just a few clues/answers that I don’t really know.

9 down, “House that’s for the birds.” I got that it was AVIARY. But, at first I put down APIARY. I changed it to the V when I did 16 across, “Competed.” VIED. But, then I realized that I wasn’t sure what the difference between an apiary and an aviary is. So, looked it up and an apiary is for bees.

29 down, “Leon ____, who wrote Mila 18.” I got URIS. I’ve heard of Leon Uris…not sure if I’ve ever read anything by him. Looked him up and recognize Trinity, but haven’t read it. I read a summary of Mila 18. Not sure if I’ll add it to my reading list just because I’ve been reading a lot about the Holocaust lately and I’m a little bummed out.

50 down, “What V-J Day ended.” Once again, I got WWII. But, I don’t know what V-J Day is. My best friend, Wikipedia, tells me it is Victory over Japan Day and is the name chosen for the day that Japan surrendered. Japan announced the surrender on August 15, 1945. But, the formal signing of the Potsdam Declaration was on Sept 2, 1945. The name is, can be, and has been attached to both dates.

I am feeling boosted and energized as I feel I am getting closer to conquering Mondays.

Ok, off to conquer the front yard and the piles and piles of crap in the house.