On to the Next Thing

Earlier this week I tried something new - isn’t that one of the exciting parts of life? Trying things, deciding whether you liked them, then making the all-important decision of whether that becomes your personality for the foreseeable future or gets left by the wayside. In my case, this new thing was baking a Beanana Loaf, something I chose to do almost entirely based on the name. Did you know you can replace flour with red lentils and it still turns into something bread-like? It feels a bit like magic, or that classic Ritz cracker “apple pie”.

While my Beanana Bread didn’t turn out spectacularly, it did turn out well enough that I’m going to try doing it again, if only so I can keep saying Beanana Bread.

Discussion (and spoilers!) below the break.

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On to the Next Thing by Brandon Cathcart

Discussion

Not a particularly difficult theme today - just a little observation rather than tricky wordplay. However, the rest of the puzzle may skew a tad more difficult because of that. I try to balance the difficulty of the theme and overall grid to make a satisfying puzzle, and keep in mind to vary up the type of theme and difficulty week to week. It’s a lot to balance, but you get the hang of it after you’ve done 80-something puzzles :)

You may have been stumped by RAYE, but you have certain heard her ask WHERE IS MY HUSBAND!

Today’s Theme

Inspecting the puzzle, we see three starred clues and a revealer, 34-Across:

[Life chapter's conclusion, or what the answers to the starred clues have]

Solving this gives END OF AN ERA, which you could say about the answers to the starred clues - each entry’s end is ERA (SPACE OPERA, ETCETERA, MONSTERA). Nice, simple one today :)

Behind the Clues

13A. So I’ve long known about the idea of a SPACE OPERA like [* Star Wars, e.g.]. But it wasn’t until this last week that I pieced together that “opera” wasn’t the singing opera, but a play on “soap opera.” Which makes way more sense if you think about it for more than half a second. I knew there wasn’t singing in Star Wars (not much, anyway), but sometimes you just don’t question things.

29A. You might have read [Number of fingers extended when making the "sign of the horns"] and wondered “What is the sign of the horns?” That’s the actual name for the “rock on” hand sign, which means different things different places.

38A. [Hoverboarding teen of Hollywood] was, on first pass, an easier clue: [McFly who goes “Back to the Future”]. That clue should have dispelled any wondering you had about the answer being MARTY, as he rides a sweet hoverboard in the first movie. However, that clue was a bit too easy, so I punched it up in the second pass.

9D. [Food court pizza shop with an odd-looking letter combo] is SBARRO, which looks wrong every time I write it. We never got Sbarro growing up, mostly because if we were getting treated to food court food (which almost never happened), why would I get pizza? Give me an Orange Julius, the only thing that made me think milk and orange juice together wasn’t a very gross idea.

19D. Everyone is always talking about what aliens would look like, but what if we were the aliens? [What we would be if we visited an inhabited planet: Abbr.] explores this profound question, whose answer is ETS, because to them, we are the extraterrestrials. 🤯

28D. I’ve always been somewhat self-conscious about the environmental footprint of YEGwords. I love giving people the pen & paper experience vs digital-only, but at what cost? That’s why the REAMS, or paper bundles I use, are 50% recycled and FSC-certified, meaning trees used are sustainably farmed. It’s the best I could find and the increased cost vs the “not good” paper is marginal.

I hope you enjoyed this puzzle!

Until next week,

Brandon

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