Muzzle-loading firearm / MON 8-25-14 / Lipton alternative / Rice-shaped pasta / Second-rate prizefighter / Big pollinators / All
Constructor: Greg Johnson
Relative difficulty: Medium (for me … seems to be leaning harder-than-normal for others)
THEME: first mistake — first part of compound word can also mean "error" (wait, can "bumble" mean "error" (n.)? … yes. Not common, usually a verb, but yes. Maybe they're all verbs, but "bobble" is transitive, unlike the others, so … I dunno.
Theme answers:
- BLUNDERBUSS (20A: Muzzle-loading firearm)
- BUMBLEBEES (11D: Big pollinators)
- STUMBLEBUM (29D: Second-rate prizefighter)
- BOBBLE-HEADS (51A: Promotional ballpark giveaways)
Tetley is a British beverage manufacturer, and the world's second largest manufacturer and distributor of tea. Tetley's manufacturing and distribution business is spread across 40 countries and sells over 60 branded tea bags. It is the largest tea company in the United Kingdom and Canada and the second largest in the United States by volume. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of Tata Global Beverages (formerly Tata Tea). (wikipedia)• • •
Thought for sure I'd end up with a well-above-average time as I stumbled all over this grid, but then I finished and the clock said 2:57. That's normal for a Monday. So … maybe I just did the fast parts Real fast, because there were a number of parts where I got stuck (Monday-stuck, but still). Something about the weird "it" in 4D: Had it in mind made me refuse to pull the trigger on the full MEANT TO (I had MEANT …). Then I couldn't come up with TRAYS based on that clue (24A: Surgical instruments). Had the BLU- in BLUNDERBUSS and still needed many crosses because I thought there was some firearm I'd never heard of that started BLUE-. BLUE- something, I thought. Couldn't come up with the tea company right away, despite having the T-. Couldn't come up with the GAME part of GAME TABLE because … well, come on. That's some generic b.s. right there. What Kind Of Game!? I was lucky enough to see that (Self-confidence) led to APLOMB very quickly (even though I don't think I knew they were synonymous … I think I thought APLOMB and ALACRITY were synonyms …). I also knew Lady Gaga played the PIANO. So I made up some time on the back end, but still felt slow. Checked the times at the NYT site and they are ridiculously high. Like, I beat my normal time cohort by about a minute. On a Monday, that's an eternity.
As for the theme, it feels pretty wobbly to me. Or arbitrary … something doesn't quite gel. I see there is a kind of internal logic (words that mean "error" inside words that have nothing to do with "error"), but there seems to be some desire to unite the answers based on sound, specifically "B"s. They all start with "B"s … except one. They all have "-BLE" as their second syllable … except one. Their third syllables all start with "B" … except one. So the theme doesn't really come together that well. In another, alternative-universe version of this puzzle, there are SLIPCASES and GOOFBALLS and BONERPILLS.
In unrelated news, I saw this today, and found it quite compelling. You keep thinking it's going to retreat into cute, quirky Irish comedy, because it is very funny in places, but then … uh, no.
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
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