The New York Times Crossword
ACROSS
1 Reality checks? 9 Raze
16 Austin Powers catchphrase 17 Family tree 18 Highway crossing 19 Fail
20 NBA impossibility 21 Perp alert
23 Mob man 24 Sequentially arranged
28 Explains in detail 32 Container weight allowances
33 Clever quip
35 LAX scanners (but not lax ones, one hopes)
36 Unit of cellphone reception
37 Uncle Sam’s land, informally
40 Dating axiom
… or a hint to interpreting four pairs of answers in this puzzle 46 “Natural” at the craps table 47 “Unbelievable!,” in internet shorthand 48 Hypothetical degree
49 Road runners?
52 Jazz great Shaw 54 Like an impromptu remark
56 Keep wearing 58 Name for two Spice Girls
59 Well-seasoned 61 Mobile _ _ _ 62 Rehearsed to perfection
66 Excite, as a crowd 71 Conforming to accepted values 72 Some desert dwellers
73 Eerie
74 Many countryand-western dances
DOWN
1 Admit (to)
2 “Now I remember who sang ‘Take On Me’!”
3 “Washington Week” airer
4 One being quizzed 5 Conductors may conduct them 6 “Never ___ ever ...”
7 Boston’s Mass. ___
8 Lab liquids
9 It goes viral in winter
10 Director Justin of the “Fast & Furious” franchise 11 “Wait, there’s more …”
12 Prop used for kickoffs
13 Entering after the bell
14 Food items originally called Froffles
15 It may glow in the dark
22 Luau side dish 24 Title role for Tom Hanks in 2022 25 Scraping tools 26 Arrange loosely 27 Without ice or mixer
29 “Agreed!”
30 Where trailers wind up
31 Spanish love
34 Start to fix?
36 “You got it!” 38 Colorful Coke brand
39 End of Arthur Miller’s “The Crucible”
41 Place to put the dough
42 Email function depicted with a paper plane icon 43 Brasilia-to-rio dir.
44 Playground retort 45 “America” pronoun
50 “I wish!”
51 Jets pass in it, for short
52 Lead dogs
53 Split hairs again? 54 Where Lear exclaims “Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks!” 55 Despite the fact that, informally 57 ___ cheese
58 Video format
60 Tidy up, in a way 63 Bad-mouth
64 LGBT History Mo. 65 Mart start
67 Dog on a cat? 68 Emmy-nominated Issa
69 Economic fig.
70 End of days?