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.

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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

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

Verilux HappyLight Luxe

I’ve long suspected that whenever all the leaves are gone and the sky is grey, I might benefit from what’s called a SAD lamp, a light source to combat seasonal affective disorder. In mid-December I decided to get some light. And now I can recommend the Verilux HappyLight Luxe. It’s a small tablet-like device, 11.7 × 7.5 × 0.5. (And nothing like — ugh — a tanning lamp.) I keep the HappyLight on my desk, angled and off to one side, and let it run for twenty minutes every morning. Getting the right intensity, light shade, and time takes a little experimenting. I think the benefits of this device are real: more energy, better sleep, fewer typos, less despair, even when the sky is really, really grey. Highly recommended.

This device is sold out at Verilux, but the smaller HappyLight Touch Plus is available.

[If I were speaking, I’d have to decide between \ˈlu̇ks\ and \ˈlüks\. I’d go with \ˈlüks\, which seems to me the more downhome pronunciation. Grey, as I think most writers would agree, is greyer than gray. Fewer typos: in other words, better concentration, though my iPhone is still a typo forest.]

Mr. Grip

I speak of household repair, not my hold on sanity. Woodmate’s Mr. Grip is a handy item to have around the house. That screw in the knob that attaches to the rod that holds a roll of paper towels in place in the paper towel holder, the screw that turns and turns but never engages, no matter how many prepositional phrases you add to the sentence? Mr. Grip can solve that problem. Some trial and error might be required. I’ve found that cutting a piece smaller than what I think I need works better. Any empty space can then be filled with prepositional phrases.

Better

Is the United States “better than this”? If it were, it wouldn’t be “this.”

Can the United States be “better than this”? It has to be.

Elizabeth Warren speaks

“A democracy in which the elected leaders do not bend to the will of the voters is no democracy. It is a totalitarian state. And those who pursue this effort are supporting a coup.”

The objectors included Mary Miller

The New York Times this morning lists the members of Congress who objected to certifying the results of the 2020 presidential election. Only two members of the Illinois House delegation signed on to the effort. “My” representative, Mary Miller (R, Illinois-15) was one of them.

With her objection, Rep. Miller continues to distinguish herself as a new member of the House. Yesterday she made the news for saying, to a pro-Trump* gathering, that “Hitler was right on one thing. He said, ‘Whoever has the youth has the future.’”

I hope that Mary Miller’s career in Congress is a short one. There’s already a petition calling for her resignation.

A valediction?

These are the things and events that happen when a sacred landslide election victory is so unceremoniously & viciously stripped away from great patriots who have been badly & unfairly treated for so long. Go home with love & in peace. Remember this day forever!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 6, 2021

Sounds like a valediction from a bunker.

[More: Twitter has required the removal of this Trump* tweet and two others, and has locked Trump*’s account for twelve hours.]

Impeach and remove

Bill Kristol and Ilhan Omar agree: impeach and remove him. Good.

But I haven’t forgotten Kristol’s role in the rise of a Trump* precursor.

January 6 in D.C., with Mary Miller

“This is Trump’s legacy”: Jake Tapper on the madness finding expression in Washington, D.C. today.

“My” new representative in Congress, Mary Miller (R, Illinois-15) pledged in December to object to what she called “tainted election results” and to fight against what she called “the greatest heist of the 21st century.” Like so many older hands, she too is complicit.

Miller made the news for saying yesterday that “Hitler was right on one thing. He said, ‘Whoever has the youth has the future.’” Here, watch.

Mary Miller, you’re off to a great start.

Lee Breuer (1937–2021)

The theater director Lee Breuer has died at the age of eighty-three. Among his accomplishments: The Gospel at Colonus, an adaptation of Sophocles’s Oedipus at Colonus. The New York Times has an obituary.