Monday December 17th 2018, NY Times Crossword

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Time: 5:15
Monday Average: 8:32
Best Monday: 4:10

I'm still very tired, recovering from my RECENT trip to Berkeley and the red eye flight back home to Indiana. Today's puzzle is exactly what I'm looking for on a Monday, a quick romp with a perfectly acceptable theme. HIJACKS was the revealer, which the puzzle tells us is a "friendly hello to the people starting" the theme answers. In this case, we are saying "hi" to Jacks SPARROW (HAWK), LONDON (BRIDGE), RUBY (SLIPPERS), and BLACK (FRIDAY). Those are some famous Jacks, but I would think that Jack Ruby is the odd one out, although who knows how much Jack London is enjoying the antics of Jack Black and Jack Sparrow.

I just watched "Hunt for the Wilderpeople" and my favorite character is definitely ZAG (to be said in your best New Zealand accent). I'm also always a little nervous seeing Sam Neill outside of a horror movie, since my main associations with him are "Event Horizon" and "In the Mouth of Madness."

I'd never heard of a SUMP pump before, but apparently it's used to prevent flooding in your basement, which I do hope to avoid.

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