Rigel or Spica / WED 4-21-10 / Rap component to rapper / Woodland reveler of myth / Liberal pundit with conservative father

Constructor: Peter A. Collins

Relative difficulty: Medium

THEME: DIAGONAL PARKING (40A: Easy way of pulling in ... and a hint to the six circled words) — circles are diagonal and spell out makes of cars


Word of the Day: ALDO (68A: International shoe company) —

The ALDO Groupe owns and operates a worldwide chain of shoe and accessory stores. The company was founded by Aldo Bensadoun in Montreal, Quebec, in 1964 where its corporate headquarters remain today. It has grown to become a worldwide corporation, with over 950 stores under 6 retail banners: ALDO, ALDO Accessories, Spring, Feetfirst (FIRST in the United States), Globo, and Little Burgundy. There are also ALDO outlet, ALDO Kids, ALDO Liquidation, Spring Liquidation, and clearance stores. Canadian, American, and UK stores are corporate stores while international stores are franchisees. The company once operated the now closed or re-branded banners Simard & Voyer, Pegabo, Transit, and Stoneridge. (wikipedia)

• • •

ALDO is Gucci's first name. ALDO's was the name of a local pizza place when I was growing up, where I had my 11th birthday party, the one where Graham Gitlin got me an ABBA album (I'm pretty sure his mom picked it out) and I was (apparently) visibly ungrateful and my mom let me know that was not cool. I was 11. I was only just getting over the revelation that the Village People were gay (whatever that meant), and that consequently I couldn't openly like them any more. I just couldn't embrace ABBA at that fragile juncture. Too disco. Too Euro. Too feminine. Surrounded by other boys my age — the peer pressure was just too great. Graham was from South Africa. People would forgive his musical eccentricity — he was foreign. I had no such excuse. Don't judge me. ABBA and I are cool now.

(Ironically, or coincidentally, or at least relatedly, I also received Devo's "Freedom of Choice" at that birthday party: Approved by all boys in attendance)


This puzzle was OK, I guess. Really had only one theme answer — a phrase I didn't even know existed. Where I'm from, we don't give the parking different names based on the angle of the painted lines in relation to the curb. But the phrase was easy enough to pick up. Knowing the theme was of absolutely no use to the solving experience. I simply looked up when I was done and said, "yep, those are cars." Felt very easy, though my time says perfectly normal for a Wednesday.

Cars:

FORD, DODGE, FIAT // AUDI, LEXUS, SAAB

I tripped a bit coming out of the NW, as I couldn't see FLOW as a "component" of rap. I'm not sure it's the best word to describe FLOW (1D: Rap component, to a rapper). FLOW is rap itself. If you have no FLOW, then you are not rapping. Or you are flat-out terrible at it. FLOW is the way you put words together. Clue had me imagining some discrete entity, like a RHYME. Anyway, I also opted for PEORIA (?) at 4D: River with its source in the Appalachians (PEE DEE). Then I didn't know what a BLUE STAR was (though I guessed the "BLUE" part pretty readily — -UE were already in place when I saw the clue (29A: Rigel or Spica)). NE provided some resistance, as I went for the singular SEALANT over the correct plural SEALERS (27A: Driveway applications). I also had SIC for SIT (24A: Command to Rex) — this Rex relates much better to the former. SEALANT / SIC made MOTT'S (12D: Big name in applesauce) very hard to see at first. Lastly, trouble-wise, I had no idea what MOT was supposed to mean as an answer to 46A: Word for word? — It's a FRENCH word for "word." Don't know that I've seen a foreign word clued with absolutely no indication of its foreignness, let alone the specific language it's from. Odd. With the rest of the puzzle, I wrote (typed) as fast as I could read clues. No trouble — no, wait, I balked at LEEK (28D: Welsh national emblem). Who wouldn't balk at LEEK — the single stupidest national emblem every imagined ever. "We are a country like unto the onion ..." WTF!? Don't you all have a dragon or something respectable lying around that you could use?

Bullets:

• 14A: Voodoo accessories (DOLLS) — "Accessories" threw me slightly. To me, the pins, or whatever ornamentation you might have, *those* would be "accessories." The DOLL seems too crucial.
  
• 49A: Items for urban dog-walkers (SCOOPERS) — not sure I'd want people thinking about dog shit while solving my puzzle, but that's just me.
  
• 52A: Toga go-withs (SANDALS) — never seen "go-with" anywhere outside of crosswords.
  
• 65A: Half of a giant 1999 merger (EXXON) — never noticed the lexical similarity of EXXON and ENRON (44A: 2005 documentary subtitled "The Smartest Guys in the Room") before today. If ENRON (the word) were a cartoon character, and it got drunk, or died, it would look like EXXON.
  
• 72A: Counterparts of dahs (DITS) — I will forever think the answer is DATS, for some reason.
  
• 6D: Liberal pundit with a conservative father (RON REAGAN) — He's a "liberal pundit" somewhere. Whatever channel that is, I don't watch it.
  
• 15D: Black and white Mad magazine figures (SPIES) — as in "Spy v. Spy," which, as I've said before, I mentally confuse with Heckle and Jeckle.
• 23D: Woodland reveler of myth (SATYR) — think of them as horny fauns.
  

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter]