I nearly missed it. I thought it would start toward late May and end mid-June. Usually, I receive a card from Battleview Orchards but none came. Good thing I checked their website before we left for Philly. Turns out strawberry picking started around May 8th and ends today. So, right after we came back, I headed over to Battleview and picked nearly four pounds.
My favorite thing to make with freshly picked strawberries is ice cream.
A “Black & White” Ice Cream Soda becomes a “Black & Pink.”
Theme: Bandbox/ELO
20 Down provides the clue to the puzzle’s theme: Cylindrical cardboard containers apropos for this puzzle? Answer: Bandboxes
The band is ELO, which regularly shows up in NY Times puzzles. Here, the three letters appear each time within one square or box. When the puzzle is completed, those boxes form a big box.
14A. Fruit salad item = Melon Ball
15A. Rich, cheddary party food = Cheese Log
37A. N.L. home run king until Willie Mays surpassed him in 1966 = Mel Ott
39A. Certain wildcat = Ocelot
62A. Moves = Relocates
63A. Camp employee = Counselor
Despite all the times I’ve filled in ELO correctly, I’ve never known anything about this band. So, I finally decided to investigate. First, to Wiki where I discovered that the letters stand for Electric Light Orchestra, and that it’s a British rock group popular in the 70’s and 80’s. Well, you probably knew that, but it was not an era whose rock music appealed to me. Then over to YouTube to hear their sound. Turns out, it’s not so unappealing.
Theme: US Cities where two Interstates cross
I took this puzzle with me to Philadelphia and was surprised at how easily I finished though I didn’t get the meaning of the theme clues until I was done.
The answer to 62 Across is the clue to the theme: 1969 Cream hit…or a hint to the seven “mathematical” clues to this puzzle. Answer: Crossroads. However, I figured out that the theme answers were cities before I got the answer to 62 Across. I’m not familiar with Cream, so I didn’t know the name of the song. I got “cross” first and eventually filled in “roads.”
17A. 65 + 20 = Birmingham
40A. 75 + 20 = Atlanta
4D. 55 + 40 = Memphis
11D. 5 + 10 = Los Angeles
28D. 35 + 10 = San Antonio
30D. 29 + 80 = Detroit
