
JUST THE TWO WOOFUS! Phrases that contain two ARFs, right?
Just joking! I didn't really think that!
(Okay, I did.)
I liked that Kyle stumped me at "Name that Theme." I taxed my brain for almost five minutes before giving up. Ah, two instances of ARF. GRR, I mean, US!
(See what I did there with GRR? No wonder people call me Wonder Boy.)
(Well, they should.)
I appreciated the consistency of the theme — all three themers had two words, with one US contained within each word — but it lacked tightness. If you go to our Finder and put in the search string *US*US* (the *s mean "anything"), you'll find dozens of entries that contain two USs. From our Private word list, I liked CIRCUS MUSIC, SUSHI MENUS, USUAL SUSPECTS.
It's not critical that every crossword theme is tight. This one works fine as is. But it's harder to generate a feeling of elegance without tightness.
Some delightful grid bonuses, KARAOKE with its curious / descriptive clue, "empty orchestra." ICED COFFEE. SOCCER BALL with a hilarious clue — something needed to achieve one's goals, indeed.
A lot of strong cluing work. WAX as [Material for Icarus' wings]. The drama in [Oh. My. God!] for GASP. Gives the puzzle personality.
I wasn't hot on overall execution, though. SEDUM is tough to choke down even for this die-hard solver, so I can't imagine what poor early-weekers would think. Probably something along the lines of I HAVE TO KNOW THE SPANISH WORD FOR BEAR? SRSLY? (That's what the kids say these days. Srsly.) And sadly, ST:TNG is something only old people like me know now. (Picard would kick Kirk's butt, for the record.)
A 14x15 grid sometimes brings the allure, the potential to reach for the stars, to get down to themeless-level word count. This is rarely a good idea for an early-week puzzle. A biggish SE corner + a long down in ICED COFFEE often is a recipe that requires unsavory trade-offs.
Grid concerns aside, it's still a fun, if not elegant, idea.