Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium
THEME: None — It's Saturday, duh.Word of the Day: EM'LY (66A: Mr. Peggotty's "little" niece) —
Emily (Little Em'ly) – A niece of Mr. Peggotty. She is a childhood friend of David Copperfield, who loves her in his childhood days. She leaves her cousin and fiancé, Ham, for Steerforth, but returns after Steerforth deserts her. She emigrates to Australia with Mr. Peggotty after being rescued from a London brothel. (Wikipedia)
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Hey, everybody. PuzzleGirl here, filling in for Mr. Parker while he's off gallivanting around California. And honestly, I don't know what the hell I was thinking. We just moved into a new house last weekend and I'm living out of boxes. I mean, basically scrounging for clothes every morning. It's pathetic. Still trying to take care of a few last-minute things at the old place (anyone need a huge blue filing cabinet that has to be hauled up a flight of stairs to get out of the house?) and haven't really been sleeping well because, ya know, it's just weird being someplace different. But Rex asked me to fill in and what am I going to say? No? Wait, what? I could have said no? Oh man. Sure wish I had thought of that.
As you might know, my biggest fear when I sub for Rex late in the week is that I won't be able to finish the puzzle. I've gotten a lot better at puzzles since I started solving 
The biggest trouble spot for me was in the South Texas area where it was hard for me to let go of HAVE IT DOWN where HAVE IT MADE was supposed to go. And wasn't there a presidential dog named Checkers? So you can see where that D was a problem for me. Add to that the vaguely clued crossing answers at 56D and 62A (ODDS and ENDS), and I thought I was gonna be toast. It all fell together eventually though so here I am with my head held high feeling like maybe I do know a little bit about this here puzzle business.Oh wait! Before we get to the puzzle! Did you all see the Royal Wedding yesterday?! Yeah, me neither. Here we go ….
Bullets:
- 14A: Hazzard County deputy (ENOS). First answer in the grid. No crosses. Not sure if I should really be bragging about that.
- 17A: A cowboy may have a big one (BELT BUCKLE). Heh.
- 24A: "True, alas" ("AFRAID SO"). I'm going to start saying "True, alas" from now on.
- 48A: Western master (ZANE GREY). I can never remember if he spells his last name with an E or an A. Is it true that one way of spelling GRAY/GREY is a British spelling and the other is American? Even if that's true, is there any possible way I'll be able to remember which is which? (Answer: no.)
- 50A: Inn's end (DANUBE). So the Inn is a river — a tributary to the Danube. Who knew?
- 55A: Poor (NOT SO HOT). I like to see this kind of colloquial phrase in my puzzles.
- 65A: Noted elephant designer (NAST). Please tell me you were as confused as I was about this one. I'm all, "Elephant designer? What could that even mean?"
- 9D: Wrangler (BUCKAROO).
- 11D: Dragon puppet (OLLIE). It's been a long time since I've thought about Kukla, Fran and Ollie. And I'm not sure I ever knew OLLIE was a dragon.
- 18D: "Desperate Housewives" role (BREE). I've never watched "Desperate Housewives" but I did know the show has (had?) a character named BREE. Of course, when I first entered it into the grid I spelled it BRIE and it didn't even occur to me that I was assuming she had been named after cheese.
- 25D: Brit's "guv" (DAD). I did not know this. I thought Brit's "guv" was … "guv."
- 31D: "Grace Before Meat" pen name (ELIA). One indication that it's the end of the week? The clues for crosswordese is ratcheted up a notch.
- 38D: Singer Barry (LEN). I didn't think I knew this guy, but I do recognize this song.
See you back here tomorrow.
Love, PuzzleGirl
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