#ANOTHER WORD FOR KUDOS TV#

I had never watched the music video for this song, so I’m grateful to Mr. The first theme entry, at 17A, is LOW RIDER (“Top 10 funk hit from War with an iconic bass line ”). I’m going to take advantage of the fact that the Wordplay column is an online medium and embed a video for each song before we get to the clever revealer. Schmenner would elevate the theme set from a list of songs to something worthy of a crossword puzzle. Today’s Themeĭuring the solve, it quickly became apparent that the theme entries were all songs about cars, but I wasn’t sure what the twist would be or how Mr. Finally, we have another wordplay clue with “Get a round of punch?” as the prompt for SPAR (which might involve a round of punch ing). We’ve got some text-speak here! The clue “ur joking, right?!” means the same thing as SRSLY, which is “seriously?!?” with most of the vowels removed.Ģ6D. game throwing flags to indicate penalties.ġ3D. The word for a flag expert is a vexillologist, but an “Expert with flags, perhaps” is a REF, such as you might find in an N.F.L. Back to the turkeys - the clue “Turkey is on top of this” sounds like it refers to a Thanksgiving dinner plate, but instead it’s about the country, which is “on top of” (or north of) SYRIA.ĨD. You may be surprised to learn that this is the seventh New York Times Crossword appearance of the word BADASS (“Supercool individual”).ħD. I just love how many funny words we use to mean “commotions.”ĥD. “Foofaraws” is such a funny word! It just means ADOS, which itself means hullabaloos or brouhahas or rigmaroles.

For example, “Good luck on that test! You’re going to crush/kill it!”ĢD. Here, though “crush” and KILL do not necessarily mean the same thing, “crush it” and “KILL it” do. When a clue contains a word in parentheses, as we see with “Crush (it),” it’s telling you that the word must be mentally added to the entry in order for it to match the clue.

#ANOTHER WORD FOR KUDOS TV#

In selecting that image, I learned that, contrary to what the TV show “The West Wing” would have you believe, both the main turkey and the alternate are pardoned and get to live out their lives in peace.ġD. OK, so I chose the photo of the pardoned turkeys because of the clue for 7D, but I think the only time “Moistened, in a way” means BASTED is in the context of roasting a turkey. These letters, which stand for quod erat demonstrandum (Latin for “which was to be demonstrated”), are used to end a mathematical proof.Ħ5A. We’re going back to class with the RULERS for the clue “Proof finale, in brief,” which is Q.E.D. Still, this one is worth remembering.ĥ4A. I learned this one from solving numerous crossword puzzles: The clue “Cartoon collectible” will almost always refer to a CEL, which is short for CELluloid, a transparent sheet on which part of an animation is drawn (or, was drawn - CELs have largely been replaced by more modern animation techniques). The unexpected change in part of speech for the word “sticks” made this clue feel extra clever.ģ4A. Let’s dig into a few of those clues before cranking up the volume on the theme: Tricky CluesĨA. Schmenner’s puzzle is also packed with excellent wordplay - I chuckled aloud at a few clues, thinking, “You got me this time!” (More on that below.) On top of his neat theme, Mr. Today’s puzzle had me turning up the volume on my speakers and rocking out to some thematically appropriate songs. WEDNESDAY PUZZLE - Congratulations to Drew Schmenner, who is making his third appearance in the New York Times crossword.

Another word for kudos