Today’s Saturday Stumper

Because of a dumb mistake not worth explaining, I lost the content of a post about the January 9 Newsday puzzle, the first non-Stumper, by “Andrew Bell Lewis” (Brad Wilber and Matthew Sewell). The post is not available in Google’s cache.

I didn’t realize that I could get the text of this post from my e-mail:

Today’s Newsday  crossword, by “Andrew Bell Lewis” (Matthew Sewell and Brad Wilber), is titled “Themeless Saturday.” In my solving experience, the title for the Newsday Saturday puzzle has always been “Saturday Stumper.” Mother of mercy, as Rico Bandello might have asked, is this the end of the Stumper? For me, this puzzle was surprisingly easy, a Saturday that solves like a Friday, or even a Thursday. I started with a giveaway, 11-A, four letters, “Beatnik’s show of empathy,” and the answers began to fall into place. Crazy, man.

Some clue-and-answer pairs I especially admire:

9-D, five letters, “Household openers.” I was thinking of prefixes.

17-A, ten letters, “Determined to get it done.” My context for the answer reminds me: “I hate Illinois Nazis.”

22-A, seven letters, “Straw beds.” I had no idea.

25-D, five letters, “Inspirational assistance.” That’s Stumper-y.

28-D, five letters, “Alpine towers on the way out.” An example of how the most mundane answer can be made novel. I first suspected that this strange clue was a cryptic.

40-A, ten letters, “Group game with Yoshi and Luigi.” I’ve never played, but it sounds cute.

43-D, six letters, “Metaphor for fading.” I’ve always like the word that is the answer.

52-A, eight letters, “Existentialist’s void.” Remember existentialism? When I was in college, it was everywhere No void.

56-A, ten letters, “Bug out.” The answer taught me an additional meaning of bug out.

61-A, ten letters, “Mandate for maturity.” No, never.

One bit of murk: 36-A, three letters, “NYY rival.” But for many solvers, the clue and answer will be obvious. We all have our strengths and weaknesses.

No spoilers: the answers are in the comments.

*

A comment from joecab called attention to the end of the Stumper:

As of tomorrow (1/9). the Saturday Stumper will be renamed THEMELESS SATURDAY. It is now intended to be somewhat less difficult overall than before, though still the most challenging of the week. Your comments are invited; please send them to StanSaturdays@gmail.com.

https://www.facebook.com/stanley.newman.5/posts/3896325300401326

*

January 31: The Stumper will be back, at least occasionally.