Today’s Saturday Stumper

Today’s Newsday  Saturday Stumper is by Stella Zawistowski, known for tough puzzles. This one took me thirty-one minutes, and at many points I thought I’d have to give up. And then something would fall into place, and onward.

Some clue-and-answer pairs of note:

4-D, eleven letters, “High-upkeep?” Read the clue carefully.

5-A, ten letters, “Removes one’s words, in a way.” My first answer. I had a hunch and played it.

7-D, fifteen letters, “It may keep you up at night.” Uh, SATURDAYSTUMPER?

13-D, seven letters, “General rearrangement.” Now I get it.

17-A, ten letters, “Originally, a river crystal.” Huh.

23-A, five letters, “Whom DiMaggio called ‘the best I ever faced.’” I liked seeing this name.

25-D, eleven letters, “Fourth-century Christian milestone.” Yep, still know it, sort of.

26-A, nine letters, “Sports pages.” I felt pleased with myself for sussing this one out right away. (I am not a sports-minded person.)

28-D, three letters, “Half a Furniture Galleries brand.” An insanely great answer.

34-D, four letters, “Tragic retiree-to-be.” Another hunch played.

57-A, four letters, “Dieter’s unit.” I had all the letters from Down answers and didn’t see how fiendishly clever this clue is.

40-D, seven letters, “Ford debut of 1930.” Must be a car, no?

42-D, seven letters, “Sempiternal.” “Midwinter spring is its own season, / Sempiternal though sodden towards sundown.” I still love Four Quartets.

No spoilers; the answers are in the comments.

Peg and Pinkie (and Floyd)

Looking into the fortunes of the Ace-Hy Sign Co., I found my way to old issues of Billboard. And somewhere on or near a page with an Ace-Hy advertisement, I noticed this item, in Bill Baker’s column “Pipes for Pitchmen”:

[Billboard, November 6, 1948. Click for a larger view.]

Two names stood out: Peg Jackson would be Arthur Jackson (1911–1977), known as Peg Leg Sam, singer and harmonica player, with a long history of performing in medicine shows. Here’s a short documentary about him: Born for Hard Luck (dir. Tom Davenport, 1976). Pinkie Anderson would be Pinkney Anderson (1900–1974), known as Pink Anderson, singer and guitarist, also with a long history of performing in medicine shows, often with Peg Leg Sam. Here’s a 1970 home recording of the two men doing medicine-show material. Here’s a sample of Anderson alone. And here’s Pink’s son, Little Pink Anderson.

Even if you think you’ve never heard of Pink Anderson, you probably have. Here he is with Floyd Council. Those two musicians were the inspiration for the name Pink Floyd.

*

And here’s a Peg Leg Sam T-shirt.

[For anyone curious, there’s much more of Jackson, Anderson, and Council at YouTube.]

In search of lost commercials

Did you know that “so many of the melodies of well-known popular songs were actually written by the great masters”?

I did, but I had no idea who was speaking those words.

One big revelation

From today’s January 6 meeting: the defeated former president’s election-night declaration of victory — “Frankly we did win this election” — was planned well before Election Day.

*

Another: The Secret Service and other agencies knew of threats of violence against the Capitol well before January 6.

*

One more: The committee plans to vote on whether to subpoena the defeated former president.

*

In related news:

The Supreme Court on Thursday rejected a request from former President Donald J. Trump to intervene in the litigation over documents seized from his Florida estate.

*

The vote to subpoena is unanimous.

*

The dfp is having a very bad day.

“What they had no conception of”

Anna, Vronsky, and Vronsky’s old associate Golenishchev are talking about the work of a painter, in particular a painting of two boys fishing.

Borometer

Elaine thought it up, but she left it for me to do the work of defining:

bor∙o∙me∙ter \ˈbȯr-ō-ˌmē-tər n [fr. Elaine Fine, composer and musician] (2022) : the little-understood brain mechanism that measures the boringness of a film or a television show <My husband’s ⁓ is functioning well, as evidenced by his falling asleep during this film>

See also humormeter.

Gabbard, Palin, Hitchens

I think this formulation works:

Tulsi Gabbard is the Sarah Palin of Christopher Hitchenses.

Or:

Tulsi Gabbard is the Christopher Hitchens of Sarah Palins.

I can see it both ways. Context here.

[I’ve already reminded myself, many times, that I once thought of Gabbard as a likely member of a Bernie Sanders administration. Good grief.]

Recently updated

As [+ adj.] a [+ n.] as Someone fixed it.

A critical reader

I just cited Bryan Garner once again, so I’ll toot my horn — just once — in this post:

<toot>
I’m a member of the panel of critical readers for the forthcoming fifth edition of Garner’s Modern English Usage. What that means: I was given a chunk of the revised text to read and edit and comment on in whatever ways seemed appropriate. My chunk: from boyish to cigaret, which seems like a chapter from my life. I also read, edited, and commented on other entries that drew my interest. The work was an exhilarating, mind-stretching joy.
</toot>

The fifth edition of GMEU is available for pre-order from Amazon.

Related reading
All OCA Garner posts (Pinboard)

[Cigaret ? A “needless variant.” That chapter closed on October 8, 1989. And yes, “from boyish to cigaret ” makes me think of “from crayons to perfume.”]

As [+ adj.] a [+ n.] as

I was surprised to see this headline in The New York Times, not because of the question but because of the phrasing:

[The New York Times, October 12, 2022.]

From Garner’s Modern English Usage:

As [+ adj.] a [+ n.] as. In AmE, writers sometimes err by inserting of after the adjective. But good usage rejects this — e.g.: “From the sidelines, Nunez became nearly as good of a cheerleader [read as good a cheerleader ] as he was a running back.” Jaime Aron, “Westlake’s Nunez Leads AP Honor Roll,”Austin Am.-Statesman, 26 Oct, 1994, at C3.

The answer to the question the Times poses seems to be “Who knows?” Because “anything could happen.”

*

What has happened: someone fixed it.

[The New York Times, October 12, 2022.]