New York Times, Jan. 31

The title kind of gave away the theme for me here, but the answers were so clever that I didn’t care.

As “Keep an eye on it!” implies, theme answers took common phrases and put an “I” on them. So the “Sorcerer behind Amin’s rise to power?” is THE WIZARD OF IDI (23 Across); “Dodging midtown traffic?” is TAXI EVASION (33 Across); a “1964 Cassius Clay announcement?” is YOU CAN CALL ME ALI (41 Across); an “Average karate instructor?” is a COMMON SENSEI (57 Across); and “‘Yummy! Here comes your tuna sashimi!’?” is another way of saying OPEN WIDE AND SAY AHI (66 Across), which conveniently crosses with SUSHI at 47 Down (“Offering at some bars”).

Others: A “Lightsaber-wielding hillbilly of TV?” is JEDI CLAMPETT (76 Across); a “Cranky question on the Himalayan trail?” is ARE WE THERE YETI (118 Across); a “Rotisserie on a Hawaiian porch?” is a LANAI TURNER (100n Across) and an “Invitation to cocktails with pianist Ramsey?” is MARTINI AND LEWIS (91 Across). That last one was the only clunker for me — never heard of Ramsey Lewis. Apparently he’s a jazz legend, according to his website, but I would have been more familiar with comedian Lewis Black or even explorer Meriwether Lewis.

The puzzle had some musical fun, too, starting with SINATRA (1 Across, “Ol’ Blue Eyes”), then doing a 180 with BAD GIRLS (8 Down, “Donna Summer #1 hit) and LALA (40 Across, “‘___ Means I Love You’[1968 Delfonics hit]) — Philly’s own Delfonics, I might add. And then there was 61 Across, “The Jackson 5 had five,” which I first thought was ALTOS. It was not. It was AFROS. Touche.

I’m going to take issue with PLAITS (121 Across, “Pigtails, etc.”) because my understanding is that plaits are braids. As any 5-year-old girl can tell you, braids are NOT the same as pigtails. But I loved the “Star Wars” reference in 95 Across (“Film character known for her buns”): LEIA.

Questions or comments? Twitter me @crosswordkathy.

New York Times, Jan. 24

Wow. I am almost speechless with admiration for the constructors of today’s crossword — not only an ingenious fold-in puzzle a la “Mad” magazine, but a 23-by-23 grid on top of that! Holy crap.

I have to say that I had an inkling about it all as soon as I saw the shaded rows, the parallel dotted lines and “Abridged” in the title; I knew for sure as soon as I got MAD MAGAZINE (83 Across, “Publication founded in 1952 featuring artwork that does the same thing as this puzzle”). It did make me wonder, though, how many other crossword buffs were also “Mad” fans as kids. Not sure those demographics cross over that much.

Anyway, “Mad” has this feature where you look at a seemingly benign drawing, only to fold it along the given lines to reveal something much snarkier. This grid does the same thing, per the instructions in 7 Down (“With 14-Down, what to do on the dotted lines to reveal six hidden things that have something in common with this puzzle”): FOLD PAGE SO A AND B ARE LINED / UP IN THE TOP AND BOTTOM ROWS.

Honestly, I couldn’t find the “A” and “B” to save my life — was I the only one who missed them? (I even checked page 2 of the main paper, where they run the corrections, but all I found was a reference to how they forgot to put in the page numbers for last week’s KenKen answers.) But the Mad reference certainly helped, and before long I had folded it to reveal a 9-by-23 rectangle with six hidden words: LAWN CHAIR, ORIGAMI, BED SHEETS, POKER HAND, LAUNDRY and NEWSPAPER — all things that, like the puzzle, are folded.

Not many individual clues caught my eye this time around. I’m pretty sure that ALOE was in the grid twice, at 67 Across (“Botanical balm”) and 135 Across (“Salve ingredient”). But with nearly 300 clues in this puzzle, I’m going to let it slide.

UPDATE: The Times crossword blog Wordplay address the double ALOE entry here.

Questions or comments? Twitter me @crosswordkathy

New York Times, Jan. 17

Before we get to this week’s theme, this puzzle has left me wondering how far ahead of publication these grids are constructed. Was anyone else stunned to find a reference to “Avatar” in the clues? There it was, 49 Down, “___ of Souls, Na’vi temple in ‘Avatar.’” Holy crap. The movie only opened, what, three weeks ago? One of its stars, Sigourney Weaver, was just on “Saturday Night Live” last night. I haven’t seen it yet, so I hope Will Shortz didn’t spoil it for me — I used crossing words to figure out that it’s the TREE of Souls.

Anyway … on to the theme. “Subtleties” was a subtle way of saying these answers are audibly slurred; they’re what’s heard when you fail to enunciate. So “Dr. Westheimer telling it like it is?” (23 Across) is the GOD’S HONEST RUTH, where the second T is dropped and/or elided over. Among other answers: “Advice to Tin Man costume designers?” (112 Across) is DON’T RUST ANYONE; a “Debugger’s mission?” (19 Down) is a WAR AGAINST ERROR; the “Result of a plumbing disaster in the apartment above?” (49 Across) is TOILET RAINING; and “Damage to a paperback edition?” (40 Down) is a SOFT ISSUE INJURY.

A few other good ones:

_ 91 Across, “Julio to julio,” refers to the months, not the Iglesias father-son team (ANO).

_ 96 Across, “‘The Office’ city” (SCRANTON). Wow — first Scranton gets “The Office,” then it gets a shout-out in the NYT crossword puzzle. Is there no end to The Electric City’s celebrity? (Note: I have had bylines from Scranton, and even had lunch at the Steamtown mall, so I can say these things.)

_ 67 Down, “___ cloud (solar system outlier)” is an OORT. Can’t believe I’ve never seen that word before; seems like it would come in handy a lot.

_ 28- and 77 Across ask for the fourth, eighth and ninth words from the original “Star Wars” opening crawl. Awesome. (“A long time AGO, in a galaxy FAR FAR away …”)

_108 Across, “Married mujer: Abbr.” Having just returned from a honeymoon that included a trip to Isla Mujeres (“Island of Women”), I can say with authority that the answer is SRA, short for “senora.”

Questions or comments? Twitter me @crosswordkathy

New York Times, Jan. 10

Hola! I just returned from a most excellent vacation (OK, it was a honeymoon!) in Mexico. The weather was colder than it should have been, and the only newspaper available at the resort was USA Today … so that’s why I missed last week’s puzzle. But lucky for me — and for you, dear reader! — the Philadelphia Inquirer gets the syndicated (read: one week late) Sunday NYT puzzles, so I have a copy of “Antique Finish” and will finish and post my thoughts ASAP.

But first let’s take a look at today’s puzzle which, honestly, didn’t really float my boat. “Cross Words” is literally what the theme answers are: two-word phrases that share a middle letter so they can cross each other in the grid, like PLANNED ECONOMY (26 Across, “With 4-Down, alternative to free enterprise”) in the upper left corner:

"Cross words" in the Sunday NYT puzzle

There were several others, including: PARTIAL DENTURE (28 Across, “With 16-Down, certain plate”); PRAIRIE PROVINCES (67 Across, “With 47-Down, Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta”); CALCIUM BLOCKER (110 Across, “With 91-Down, hypertension control option”); WEATHER STATION (114 Across, “With 95-Down, meteorological post”); and LUNAR MONTH (55 Across, “With 45-Down, about 29.5 days).

Not a bad concept, but the execution was deadly boring. Partial denture? Really? And weather station? Geez, at least have some fun with it. Puns, maybe, or even rhyming words — something. (One “cross word” did rhyme — LEGAL EAGLE [83 Across/70 Down] — but that was it.)

Other answers that caught my eye: AHORA (56 Down, “Nogales ‘now’”), mostly because of my trip to Mexico and my pitiful command of Spanish; and ALTOONA (23 Across, “Penn State campus site”), one of those beat-up former industrial towns in western Pennsylvania that rarely sees celebrity in The New York Times.

Questions or comments? Twitter me @crosswordkathy