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Hal Moore’s Wall Street Journal crossword, “Take Notes”—Jim P’s assessment

Theme: Familiar phrases have the phrase THAT hidden inside and are introduced within the Down course. The revealer is “WRITE THAT DOWN” (19d, [Teacher’s directive, and a hint to 4-, 10-, 27- and 33-Down]). (I can’t learn that revealer with out listening to it within the voice of Mr. Johnson, my highschool geometry trainer.)

Wall St Journal crossword resolution · “Take Notes” · Hal Moore · Wed., 1.11.23

• 4d. [Origin of most hurricanes] NORTH ATLANTIC.
• 10d. [Potentially beneficial] WORTH A TRY.
• 27d. [Brit’s personal dislike] PET HATE.
• 33d. [Topper with a sloping brim] BUCKET HAT.

Solid theme. Nice alternative of entries though PET HATE was new to me. I loved studying it although because it sounds much more oxymoronic than our personal “pet peeve.”

Lovely lengthy fill in STAR WARS, TINKER TOY, BEACH BUM, ONE-SEATER, “DEAR BOY,” and ORBITER. I wanted practically all the crosses for CEREBRO [“X-Men” device], although. That’s a deep reduce, even for somebody whose seen quite a few Marvel movies and as soon as collected comedian books. (The gadget is utilized by Professor Xavier to telepathically find mutants wherever they’re on the earth.)

Sir Patrick Stewart as Professor Xavier utilizing CEREBRO

Still, provided that there are 5 theme solutions squished into the center of the grid (as a consequence of the truth that the revealer is 13-letters lengthy) with two pairs of them partially stacked, the fill is kind of clean certainly.

Clues of word:

• 14a. [Only vice president born in Washington, D.C.]. AL GORE. Nice little bit of trivia.
• 50a. [There’s one in this club]. TYPO. Haha, yeah, no there isn’t. You can’t deliberately make a TYPO.
• 42d. [Like some moody, mysterious heroes]. BYRONIC. I don’t assume this English main ever heard the time period BYRONIC Hero. Also, this English main by no means claimed to be a very good English main.

Good puzzle with very good fill. 3.75 stars.

Victor Barocas’s New York Times crossword—Amy’s recap

New York Times crossword resolution, 1 11 23, no. 0111

Perjury is the inspiration for this theme, the place the revealer is LIES / UNDER / OATH, 70a. [With 71- and 72-Across, commits perjury … or what can be found four times in this puzzle]. The circled squares highlight the phrase LIE beneath an assortment of circled OATHs of a family-friendly nature: GOSH, EGAD, DRAT, and DANG. (You’d want an indie venue to function these different four-letter oaths.)

I’m multitasking with the Golden Globes on, so I’ll be temporary. Three issues:

• 30d. [One who doesn’t have a prayer?], ATHEIST. I’m on board with that.
• 23d. [Absorbed gradually], OSMOSED. This clue feels a little bit off course to me, however Dr. Barocas teaches chemical engineering so I’ll should assume he signed off on it!
• 34d. [Some spreads for toast, informally], OLEOS. How many OLEOS is simply too many? Really, even one is an excessive amount of for me.

3.5 stars from me. It’s all the time extra enjoyable when there’s some play occurring within the theme solutions themselves, quite than “here are words and phrases that happen to have the right letter sequence in them.” I’m taking a look at you, BOND RATIO!