Wednesday February 6th 2019, NY Times Crossword

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Time: 20:10
Wednesday Average: 17:15
Best Wednesday: 7:09

I'm late to my crosswording and blogging today since I was in the air for the 14 or so hours of this Wednesday's availability. But I got to do my patented taxi ride in India solve while waiting for the jet lag to kick in. Basically, my body is actually too confused to even begin the jet lag process, but maybe tired enough that I'll be able to sleep tonight.

Even with my crossword and kitchen only knowledge of ESPANOL, this language class notes theme (I suppose) fell well within my range. I mostly cruised through this puzzle even in my tired and distracted state, except for that NE, mostly because I don't remember when holidays occur. Of course, it is the MOTHER/MADRE that is honored in May. I also thought HALLOO was just a weird, affected way of saying HELLO/HOLA, that you might hear in the voice of Mrs. Featherbottom, say. Instead, it's the cry used to incite dogs to the chase during a hunt, which maybe I was hearing during my Downton Abbey rewatch on the plane. SUN/SOL, FIRE/FUEGO, CITY/CIUDAD, EAST/ESTE, and NIGHT/NOCHE make up the rest of the pairings. It's fun enough but I wonder if we could have gotten a more exciting Spanish word in there somewhere, even if it would have stumped me.

I was just talking with some other crossword enthusiasts about how we always forget ECRU whenever it comes up, which is all the time.

I hadn't heard of Clifford ODETS, but apparently "Awake and Sing!" is considered "the earliest quintessential Jewish play outside the Yiddish theatre." Beyond that, he was a buzzy 20th century playwright, who seemed to have the misfortune of being eclipsed by Arthur Miller, Tennessee Williams, and then William Inge, according to Wikipedia anyway. Still, that's some staying power.

I NEED A NAP may be a bit of an understatement, but maybe I should check out the SPA situation here. 

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