WAY OUT WEST
Daniel Mauer is a software engineer in Massachusetts. He started solving crosswords with his father when he was growing up and began making them six years ago. Two favorite activities of Daniel and his wife, Sandy, are solving the Times crossword, which they do first thing every morning, and taking road trips. The latter was the inspiration for this puzzle. — W.S.
ACROSS
1 ‘‘Meet the ____’’
(baseball fight song) 5 Pertaining to any of
five Italian popes 12 Small rodent
18 To be, in France 19 ____ Jay Hawkins, rock pioneer who wrote ‘‘I Put a Spell on You’’
20 Hardly a team
player?
21 Nickname for 114-Across coined by John Steinbeck 23 Large rodents 24 Corpse ____ (morning-after cocktail)
25 German surname
part
26 One of the Guccis 28 At the top
29 Skip or drop 31 Down-to-earth 32 Cool
35 Opposite of a
breeze
37 Instruction for some Thanksgiving cooking
38 ‘‘Downton Abbey’’
countess
39 Colorful natural attraction along 114-Across
43 An awful state to
live in
46 Twitch user,
perhaps
47 Spanish : -ando or -iendo :: English : ____
48 Attempt to grasp, as a complicated situation 49 Car-pooling inits. 50 Cuisine that includes gochujang paste
52 ‘‘Go ahead and
ask’’
56 Pastis flavorer 58 Peridot, for one 60 Smart, say
61 Bad stat for a QB:
Abbr.
64 Left
65 Tall, curved attraction along 114-Across
69 Gear for gondoliers 71 Trafficker trackers,
for short
72 Legend
73 Animal in the
genus Bos 74 Following along 75 Roux ingredient? 78 B3, nutritionally 82 Beverage with a ‘‘New England’’ variety
83 Gone to press? 86 Booked it
88 Phrase one might yell at the screen during a horror film 90 What roots are, to
powers
92 Graffitied artistic
attraction along 114-Across 94 Summers in la cité 95 ____ Austin, Biden’s secretary of defense
97 Bugs
98 Jazz bassist Carter, who has appeared on more than 2,200 recordings
99 Being treated, in
a way
101 A whole can of
worms?
102 Mamas’ mamas 106 Bug
107 Bad review
108 Component of
lacquer thinner 110 More far out 114 Theme of this puzzle, which winds its way nearly 2,500 miles through all the shaded squares herein
117 Wishy-washy
response
118 Captivate
119 The Panthers of the N.C.A.A., familiarly
120 Art in the Television Hall of Fame
121 Dislikes and then
some
122 Things sometimes named after presidents
DOWN
1 One of 50,460 in the
Chunnel
2 Actress Barrymore,
great-aunt of Drew 3 Famed fountain of
Rome
4 Half step, in music 5 Character seen on a
keyboard
6 Bile
7 Obsequious
8 Sun deck?
9 ‘‘That’s my cue!’’ 10 Actress Long 11 Component of a
bridge truss 12 Positive results of
some strikes
13 TV 6-year-old who attends Little Dipper School
14 Lead-in to ‘‘com’’ 15 Bit of writing on
Twitter or Tinder 16 Natural
conclusion?
17 Some mil. officers 19 Abbr. on many
streets in Quebec 20 ‘‘Holy ____!’’ 22 Pass
27 Not mainstream,
for short
30 Sierra ____
31 1990s film with a famous wood chipper scene 32 Word with a wave
in Oaxaca
33 Classic Camaro 34 Grant ____, northeast terminus of 114-Across
36 Kind of tape
37 $100 bill, slangily 38 Underwriting? 39 ‘‘What malarkey!’’ 40 Paid penance 41 Site of a U.C. in the
O.C.
42 Muscle-bone
connector
44 Verb in Poe’s ‘‘The
Raven’’
45 Trece menos doce 51 Many a Hollywood
worker 53 Brownish-yellow
hue 54 Big ____ 55 Monogram in the 2016 presidential election
57 Puts away 59 Suffragist and abolitionist Abby ____ Alcott 62 Georgia, e.g. 63 One of two
circling the earth 65 Decorates
deceptively
66 High part of a
deck
67 Bon ____ (fashionable world) 68 One-named New
Age musician 70 Mower’s trail 74 Means of electronic communication with restricted access
76 Ending with cash
or front
77 Self images?
79 Stevenson of
1950s politics 80 They may be
ridden to victory 81 Some co. name
endings
83 Santa Monica ____, southwest terminus of 114-Across 84 Golden rule
preposition 85 Speedskater Kramer with nine Olympic medals 87 Stir in
89 String or integer,
in programming 91 Brand with a bull
in its logo 92 Critical warning 93 Some scores in
horseshoes
96 ‘‘My Name Is
Asher ____’’ 99 Offer one’s two
cents
100 Deprived
101 You usually do this lying down by yourself
103 Naval
‘‘Negative’’
104 Singer O’Day 105 Bad messages to send to the wrong person 107 Tap-in, e.g. 109 140, in old Rome 110 Covid Data
Tracker org.
111 New Deal power
agcy.
112 Fools are often seen at its start: Abbr.
113 Peaceful,
informally
115 Partner of only 116 Posed for a
portrait
Answers will be printed in next week’s crossword puzzle page.