08.15.13 — Sounds

Sea of Cortez beach in Mexico

The Gulf of California (also known as the Sea of Cortez or Sea of Cortés or Vermilion Sea; locally known in the Spanish language as Mar de Cortés or Mar Bermejo or Golfo de California) is a body of water that separates the Baja California Peninsula from the Mexican mainland. ~ Wikipedia

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Thursday, August 15, 2013

Puzzle by Jeff Chen / Edited by Will Shortz

“What the circled letter(s) in this answer represents, homophonically” is the clue for four answers in this clever Thursday crossword, e.g., C OF CORTEZ, I OF THE TIGER, B IN ONE’S BONNET and C U IN COURT, appearing as SEA OF CORTEZ, EYE OF THE TIGER, BEE IN ONE’S BONNET and SEE YOU IN COURT.

Other — ACAI BERRY (30D. Trendy “superfood”); BANJO (39A. Something a picker picks); BOSOMED (39D. Big or full follower); CROFTS (13D. Seals’s partner in 1970s music); DAYNE Taylor who sang “Tell It to My Heart”; DJS and EMCEE; EWOK and SAGA (48D. “Star Wars” critter; 47D. “Star Wars,“ e.g.); Pop’s IGGY Pop; IGOR (58A. One with a pretty strong hunch?); Bobby MCGEE in a 1971 #1 hit; OBSCENE (40D. Disgustingly large, as an amount of money); PATSY CLINE (3D. “Walkin’ After Midnight” singer, 1957); REHNQUIST (32D. Burger’s successor); SEIZED UPON (9D. Suddenly took interest in); SERUMS (31A. Scopolamine and sodium pentothal, e.g.); TUNE (53D. Simple number).

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At first, we wondered if calling it 'Eye of the Tiger' was too obvious. The initial draft of the song, we started with 'It's the eye of the tiger, it's the thrill of the fight, rising up to the spirit of our rival, and the last known survivor stalks his prey in the night, and it all comes down to survival.' We were going to call the song 'Survival'. In the rhyme scheme, you can tell we had set up 'rival' to rhyme with 'survival'. At the end of the day, we said, 'Are we nuts?' That hook is so strong, and 'rival' doesn't have to be a perfect rhyme with the word 'tiger'. We made the right choice and went with 'Eye of the Tiger ~ Jim Peterik co-writer with Frankie Sullivan on the title of the song… ~ Wikipedia

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Puzzle available on the internet at
THE NEW YORK TIMES — Crossword Puzzles and Games.