Triple Play

After Monday's Adventure of the Pairs, and with some unaccustomed time on my hands, I picked up Tuesday's Daily News -- with its two (count 'em!) crossword puzzles -- along with the Times. So, three puzzles for the day; four if you count the Jumble puzzle, which I didn't just because the solution was so easy it didn't even qualify as a warmup.

The first of the Daily News puzzles is an unattributed one from United Features Syndicate. Usually one has at least an editor's name on a puzzle, but this one sports neither editor nor author/constructor, as if it just came alll unbidden out of the air. Or maybe there's a lowly lonely robot locked away in an air-conditioned room somewhere programmed to push a button that spits out a puzzle a day. This puzzle was also themeless as far as I could determine. Senator (STROM) Thurmond traveled from Monday's Times puzzle to this one, there was STUFF sitting on a CURIO shelf, and EMMET was clued as "Pismire," an archaic (so says my dictionary) word for an ant ("emmet"). Um. I preferred the "Ant Acid" clue for FORMIC that I remembered from a recent Times puzzle. MOSEYS was a nice entry, though, and ELLY Mae Clampett made an appearance, munching on a BOSC pear (viz., Theresa's comment to the Plethora of Pairs post below).

The second of the News puzzles is from the Tribune Syndicate and this one carries a constructor attribution, which I much appreciate, along with a city and state which one assumes is where the constructor may be found, should one wish to find her or him (or them). This one was by someone whose name I recognized: Diane C. Baldwin, who is responsible for the Woman's World puzzles which I also often do. I expected smooth going from Ms. Baldwin, wondered if there would be a theme, and then discovered it: the three phases of liquid, in three apt phrases. The solving was indeed smooth with a bit of misdirection (I kept wanting ABYSS to be CHASM, which it wasn't) that, however, did not ADDLE me.

In a bit of crossword coincidence, SEOUL was in both these puzzles. I guess those three vowels in a row come in handy, eh?

All a nice appetizer for the Times main course, a puzzle by John Greenman, a name unfamiliar to me. Kofi ANNAN (apparently another set of useful letters) showed up here as he had in another recent puzzle, along with the themed tall, dark and handsome matinee idol. Had a UFO and a YENTA, too, perhaps standing outside Milan's La SCALA, singing the Gene Vincent hit, Be-Bop-ALULA. You know, I've often wondered about writing crossword TALLSTORIES. That one's totally FALSE, but perhaps with a little practice I can do better ...