Spanish city enclosed with intact medieval walls / SUN 2-19-23 / Onetime Turkish title / Full house in poker slang / Presidential pet that sprouts an Afro / Disposable sock in a shoe store / Family-style meal with simmering broth / 2006 mockumentary with a 2020 Subsequent Moviefilm / Tea served with a jumbo straw

Constructor: Rebecca Goldstein

Relative difficulty: Easy

THEME: "Simile Irresistible" — answers are familiar similes clued as if the first word in the simile were not an adjective but a verb:

Theme answers:

• CLEAR AS CRYSTAL (22A: Bus?)
• GREEN AS GRASS (32A: Photosynthesize?)
• SOUND AS A BELL (48A: Peal?)
• PRETTY AS A PICTURE (65A: Photoshop?)
• SMART AS A WHIP (83A: Sting?)
• SMOOTH AS SILK (97A: Iron?)
• PLEASED AS PUNCH (112A: Quenched?)

Word of the Day: ANECDATA (39D: Evidence derived from personal experience and observation rather than systematic research and analysis) —

information or evidence that is based on personal experience or observation rather than systematic research or analysis. [wow, only the weakest attempt to change the dictionary wording on that clue, I guess ... weird] (emph. mine) (google i.e. Oxford Languages)

• • •

I usually love Rebecca's work but this one I don't quite get. Or ... I do get it, but it just doesn't feel like it works. Not consistently, and not in a way that doesn't occasionally feel tortured. So, if you look at the first themer, I think it works great. It takes a familiar simile phrase, CLEAR AS CRYSTAL, and asks you to imagine it as ... a kind of crossword clue: [Clear, as crystal], for instance, would be a perfect clue for BUS. So you've got a clue, 22A: Bus?, that functions sort of like an answer and an answer that functions sort of like a clue. You've had to reimagine "CLEAR" as a verb (instead of an adjective), and you've had to mentally add an apostrophe to your answer: CLEAR, AS CRYSTAL. So ... clear, as one might clear crystal(ware). Bus. "Bus?" = clear ... a table. Got it, got it, good. But GREEN AS GRASS? What is happening there? Is "GREEN" a verb? Does one GREEN grass? Does grass GREEN itself? How exactly am I supposed to imagine the phrasing here. If I start with [Bus?] meaning CLEAR, AS (one clears) CRYSTAL, am I then supposed to interpret [Photosynthesize?] as GREEN, AS (one greens) GRASS? Or (more likely), GREEN, AS GRASS (greens itself)? Leaving aside the total grammatical awkwardness here, it looks like in the first themer, "crystal" is the putative object of the verb "bus" / CLEAR, whereas in the second themer, "grass" is the subject of the verb "photosynthesize[s]" / GREEN[s]. Also, side note: is GREEN AS GRASS an actual simile people use? That one and SOUND AS A BELL felt ... odd to me, and not nearly in the same league of familiarity as the rest of the themers (actually, SOUND AS A BELL is real enough; GREEN AS GRASS, I dunno ... it's no PLAIN AS DAY or CLEAR AS MUD, I'll tell you that much). Am I supposed to see PRETTY as a verb in PRETTY AS A PICTURE. Because ... if I [Photoshop?] something ... I PRETTY it? I know the verb "prettify" (at least I know it exists), but PRETTY as a verb ... that, I'm less familiar with. Basically the core problem is you've got two different ways we're being asked to reimagine the similes, one that wants you to understand the answer as [verb, AS (one verbs) noun] (e.g. CLEAR, AS (one clears) CRYSTAL [Bus?], SMOOTH, AS (one smooths) SILK [Iron?]), and another that wants you to understand the answer as [verb AS noun (verbs)] (e.g. PLEASED, AS PUNCH (pleases) [Quenched?]), SMART, AS A WHIP (smarts) [83A: Sting?]. Add to that the overall awkwardness of GREEN, AS GRASS and the improbability of PRETTY as a verb, and you've got a theme that doesn't quite come together. A few of these work well, but as with many Sundays, the theme can't really go the (21x21) distance.

There are two notable original answers in the grid, but they made me wince more than smile. That's almost certainly a Me-Problem, but, yeah, CHIA OBAMA somehow doesn't do anything for me. It was easy enough to get (after the CHIA part became clear), but ... do I really wanna see CHIASHREK and CHIAGROOT and CHIAZOMBIE and CHIAHELLOKITTY in the grid? I do not. And for the record, I didn't make *any* of those up. Real chias, each and every one. And as for ANECDATA ... that one really made me make a face. Maybe it's a necessary technical term for ... someone. But I just wrote in ANECDOTE because ANECDOTE really really seemed to fit the clue (39D: Evidence derived from personal experience and observation rather than systematic research and analysis). I know the term "anecdotal evidence," but not ANECDATA, which is an ugly portmanteau. The clue here is especially ugly, in that it's long and ungainly and obviously just lifted, almost word for word, from the dictionary (see "Word of the Day," above). 

I did learn some things today, though. Like apparently "B-52s" are shots ... of some kind (82D: Down B-52s, say = DO SHOTS). [Looking it up] Hmm, apparently it's a layered shot of Kahlua, Irish cream, and Grand Marnier. Apparently it was named not after the bomber, but after the band! In 1977. Well, that's one origin story, anyway, and since I like it, I'm gonna stick with it. I also learned that BIG AIR is an actual snowboarding event and not just something a snowboarder can catch. I adored the clue on "SAVE ME..." (64A: Words stealthily mouthed to a friend while stuck in a boring conversation). LABOR OF LOVE and PARTY-POOPER are both great longer answers. ALLYSON Felix was a brand new name to me, but that was about the only sticking point in the puzzle, which was fantastically easy on the whole. Not sure anything else needs explaining. ALBS are seen at royal weddings because they are clerical garments (51A: Garments often seen at royal weddings). BOBA tea is otherwise known as "bubble tea" and you need jumbo straws because they need to be able to handle the "bubbles" (balls of tapioca starch). THE "Y" is two words (THE + "Y" ... as in "The YMCA") (109D: Place to swim or play b-ball). You'll let me know if there's anything else you don't understand. See you next time ...

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld 

P.S. some news items that may be of interest to you. First is the recent New Yorker interview with Will Shortz ("Will Shortz's Life in Crosswords"). It's wide-ranging and contains lots of crossword history. Also, it's pretty charming. Second, a NYT article from yesterday that provides some context for my (recent, ongoing) intolerance of all anti-trans rhetoric; it details the politically popular and morally abhorrent legislative war on trans kids and their parents, a war which seeks to deny trans kids the gender-affirming care that keeps them healthy and in many cases saves their lives. Importantly, maddeningly, the medical care in question is unequivocally called for by medical science and supported by major medical associations ("When Parents Hear That Their Child 'Is Not Normal and Should Not Exist'"). This is care that keeps trans kids from depression and suicide. The consequences of dehumanizing trans people are real, material, measurable, and widespread. Seems like people ought to be speaking out a hell of a lot more about this rather than (say) fear-mongering and lying about the alleged threat that trans women pose to "real" women. Lastly, there's this article from The Onion, which gets to the heart of the matter better than I ever could ("It Is Journalism's Sacred Duty To Endanger The Lives Of As Many Trans People As Possible"). Thanks, everyone. Good day.

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* This article was originally published here