Chief Theban deity / TUE 7-5-11 / Lead pumper in old slang / Lanai ladies / Winemaking province of Italy / Former Polish capital

Constructors: Andrea Carla Michaels & Johanna Fenimore

Relative difficulty: Medium-Challenging

THEME: OH SAY ... (14A: Anthem's opener) — "O" is added to familiar (-ish) phrases, creating wacky phrases, clued "?"-style


Word of the Day: WAHINES (10D: Lanai ladies) —

n.

1. Hawaii. A Polynesian woman.
2. Sports. A woman surfer.

[Hawaiian, from Proto-Polynesian *fafine.] (answers.com)

• • •

Very slow start due entirely to AMON (20A: Chief Theban deity). He's Theban? Is he different from AMON-RA? And AMUN / AMUN-RA? So confusing. If you're gonna go ancient Greek, go AGON—at least I know what that means, and there's only one way to spell it. Anyway, once I got going, things settled back down closer to normal Tuesday difficulty levels. Still, ended up over 4—slow for me, for a Tuesday. The theme is slight, and doesn't quite work. First, if your SPEEDO is indeed FULL, well, that has little to do with whether you are "chubby" and more to do with other anatomical factors. Second, DIRTY ROTTEN EGG is not a phrase. DIRTY ROTTEN SCOUNDREL is a phrase. Third, SNOWBALL IN HELLO only barely, super-tangentially, ultra-metaphorically, works with its clue. NO LEGO TO STAND ON works OK, I guess. Overall, this doesn't have the smoothness and thematic exactness that I expect from these constructors. The whole thing just feels slightly wobbly all over.



Theme answers:

• 17A: Warning about a chubby guy in some skimpy swimwear? (FULL SPEEDO AHEAD)
  
• 26A: No-good, awful frozen waffle? (DIRTY ROTTEN EGGO)
  
• 45A: Icy winter greeting? (SNOWBALL IN HELLO)
  
• 59A: Result of cleaning up some building toys? (NO LEGO TO STAND ON)
  

Three brand name-Os. One ... not. I misspelled WAHINES the first time through, confusing them with TAHINI sauce. Thought the clue on ASEA was about the hardest ASEA clue I'd ever seen (11D: Researching whales, say). Adjectival when it appears nominative. St. DENYS, IXION (27D: Zeus bound him to an eternally revolving wheel), and RINGO make an odd trio. You are reading a BLOG right now. Yoga is way way way more than "meditation." It *can* be meditaTIVE ... but I don't like the clue At All (40A: Meditation on a mat). I don't think I've ever done WASH on a Monday. Whose "tradition" is that? (10A: Do a traditional Monday chore) Really like the slangy clue on the slangy GAT (39A: Lead pumper, in old slang). BLOOPERS is my favorite word in the grid (9D: Filmed bits that don't make it on the air). The clue is not accurate, however, in the case of "The Carol Burnett Show," which was never better than when the actors flubbed lines and made each other laugh.


See you tomorrow,

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld