… or breathe into a paper bag.
SUNDAY PUZZLE — Howdy! Super excited to publish another Sunday. I had a lot of fun staving off the summer brain rot with this one. If you have any corrections, comments or feedback for this specific puzzle, reach out to me at albonwu@umich.edu. For general questions, reach out to crosswords@umich.edu. Happy solving!
Tricky Clues:
14A. “Arbiter of what’s NSFW?” refers to OSHA – the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which sets and enforces federal government standards for safe working conditions. So in some sense they govern what’s not safe for work (NSFW), but they’re not concerned with your browsing history.
45A. “Abusive avian?” is not a bully, but rather JERKCHICKEN, the delicious Jamaican dish. If you’ve ever noticed that “jerk” and “jerky” are both types of meat preparation, that’s because they come from the same Spanish term “charqui.”
60A. “Area in which a scarecrow might be outstanding?” shouts out the famous dad joke with punchline FIELD – conflating its dual meanings “discipline” and “land plot.” I must be a scarecrow the way I’m outstanding in my field, the joke goes.
4D. “___ bleu!” is filled by SACRE. “Sacre bleu” is a French expression of surprise that literally means “holy blue.” It’s derived from “sacre Dieu,” meaning “holy God,” which was considered to violate the Ten Commandments by using God’s name in vain. This led to the rhyming euphemism “sacre bleu,” and now the expression is used in such artistic masterpieces as the Philosophers Epic Rap Battle of History.
32D. “Half an opinion?” describes CENT. It references the idiom “one’s two cents,” a term for someone’s (possibly unsolicited) opinion. This ties into 55D’s DIME, clued “It’s worth 32-Down tenfold,” which I guess implies that a dime is worth five opinions.
Today’s Theme:
As the title and caption of these constructor notes suggest, this week’s theme is about hiccups! Inside of each themed entry is the word HIC, placed as if one were hiccupping while saying them: 17-Across THICKSKIN, 27-Across DEMOGRAPHIC, and 45-Across JERKCHICKEN. The revealer at 62-Across is my favorite hiccup remedy: JUMPSCARE. It doesn’t seem to work when I do it, but that doesn’t stop me from using it as an excuse to startle people.
Answer Key:
