NYT Sunday Puzzle – August 14, 2011

The title of this puzzle is “Hack Saws.” So, the theme clues are the first part of hackneyed sayings (old saws) that need to be completed. What made it difficult to finish them was that the answers were jokes which didn’t become apparent until enough letters were filled in.

27A: “A penny saved is… not enough to retire on”
35A: “Where there’s a will, there’s… going to be a relative.”
56A: “Where there’s smoke… there’s pollution.”
66A: “People who live in glass houses… let it all hang out.”
80A: “He who laughs last… finally got it.”
99A: “If at first you don’t succeed… redefine the mission.”
108A: “Don’t bite the hand… that hasn’t been washed.”

An ait? I’d never heard of it, but it’s the correct answer to 86A: Land in a river. I got it because I knew that all the other answers in that section were correct.

I had the most difficulty with the bottom left section and ended up guessing a few letters.
123A: Sacred city of Lamaism. Answer: Lhasa
119D: ____ Tomé. Answer: Sao
114D: Nymph spurned by Narcissus. Answer: Echo
127A: Stupid, in Sonoma. Answer: Tonto (Are you kidding me? They named the Lone Ranger’s faithful friend “Stupid”?!)

Lastly, about 93D: Hebrew letter after koph. You would think this would be a no-brainer for me since I know the Hebrew alphabet. But, no. You see for some strange reason, while I know all the letters, I know only the first ten, aleph through yud, in order. And koph comes later. So, it wasn’t until after I had filled in “s” and “h” that I came up with the correct answer: resh. (Note to self: Put memorizing the rest of the aleph-bet on the agenda.)