LETTERPLAY
Tina Labadie lives in London, Ontario. This is her first New York Times crossword. It has one of my favorite kinds of themes — one offering many different ‘‘aha’’ moments. The example at 118-Across, at the bottom of the puzzle, is a little different from the others, like the kicker of a joke. As a construction fillip, every letter in the alphabet is used at least once in the completed grid. — W. S.
ACROSS
1 Homes that may have
butlers
7 Singer Dylan of the
Wallflowers
12 Supporting beams
18 Bear or boar
19 Bees, e.g.
21 Gleaming
22 The ‘‘C’’ of AMC
Theatres
23 The whole package,
colloquially
24 Sevastopol is its
largest city
25 Not true?
27 Visitor to a website, in
analytics lingo
29 ‘‘Time ____ . . . ’’
30 Concedes
33 Santa ____, Calif.
34 m, to Einstein
35 B.C. neighbor: Abbr.
38 Think creatively
40 XL or 11C
42 Beer named for a
founding father
45 W-2, for one
47 W.W. I helmet,
informally
51 2004 Will Smith sci-fi
film
52 D.S.T. starting time
. . . or a hint to 42-Across 54 Weightlessness . . . or
a hint to 118-Across
56 ____ Compton, first woman to cover the White House for a TV network
57 Rating unit
60 Libya’s Gulf of ____
61 Reporter’s credit
62 TV tavern
64 Mimic
66 ‘‘Royal’’ bird
67 In
68 Top credit rating . . . or
a hint to 25-Across
71 23rd in a series . . . or a
hint to 27-Across
73 Trust in
76 Fails to be
78 Keen
79 Google ____
83 Holds in high regard
84 Old lab burners
86 Water bird with a
haunting call
88 Bit of HI gear?
89 Cops . . . or a hint to
115-Across
90 Club for farm kids . . .
or a hint to 97-Across
91 Pouch on a string
93 Game with L- and
T-shaped pieces
96 Locale for a West
Coast wine tour
97 Secretive
99 R.&R. settings
101 Crystal-clear
103 ‘‘O, ____ fortune’s
fool!’’: Romeo 104 Singer King with the 2014 hit ‘‘Ex’s & Oh’s’’
108 Body feature of a
mammoth
110 Holy ____
112 It might be taken to
the airport
115 Spelling aid?
118 Baseball announcer’s
call on a home run
121 Nigerian city of 3.5+
million
122 Set on the ground
125 ‘‘Jeopardy!’’ fodder
126 This evenin’
127 Video-call glitch
128 ‘‘I kid you not!’’
129 Rate
130 Like the Xbox One X vis-à-vis the Xbox One
131 Makes some Z’s
DOWN
1 Colorful parrot
2 Santa ____
3 Jazz singer born Eunice Kathleen Waymon
4 Warning sign
5 Commercial follower
of ‘‘-o-’’
6 A-game or b-ball, e.g.
7 The ‘‘you’’ of the song lyric ‘‘I’m begging of you, please don’t take my man’’
8 Part of the knee, for
short 9 D.I.Y. buy
10 ‘‘Magnum, P.I.’’
setting 11 Sauvignon ____ 12 Where one might turn
on the jets
13 D&D monster
14 Pelvis bone 15 Gregor ____, Kafka
protagonist
16 Some genealogical
work
17 Pioneering mail-order
company
19 Introductory courses
20 Mixes together
26 Not looking good
28 Ctrl + Q
31 First couple of the
early 1910s
32 ‘‘Shut your trap!’’
36 Apply with a Q-tip,
say
37 Kerfuffles
39 Wore down
41 RNA polymerase, e.g.
42 Thailand, once
43 River through
Tuscany
44 Reaches
46 Bone filler
48 No. 2 on a table
49 Bone-dry
50 A great deal
53 How-to go-to
55 Obtain
58 YouTube or Gmail
59 ‘‘Phew!’’ feeling
61 They’re filled with X’s 63 Engraving instrument
65 Lean against
69 Whirlybird whirlers
70 Like some plants and
physicals
72 Personal story,
informally
73 One calling a ‘‘T’’
74 Turnoff
75 Wash up
77 Certain fossil
preserve
80 The art of music? 81 Vegetables that make a fitting addition to alphabet soup?
82 [Oh, well]
85 ‘‘Tsk, tsk!’’
87 Classic soda brand
92 ‘‘Oh, I see!’’
94 Small-screen
entertainers?
95 Ibn ____ (former
Mideast king)
97 Responsibility of a
personnel director 98 Japanese noodle
100 Young salmon
102 Like hawks
104 Hit 1979 musical in which a character’s mistress is one of the main roles
105 University of New
Mexico team
106 Bank deals
107 ____ Vedder, lead
singer of Pearl Jam 109 111 113 Some Licoricelike Garden-variety I.R.A.s flavor 114 Rap producers make them 116 The ‘‘O’s’’ of Cheerios 117 Old ____, Conn. 119 Spinach is rich in it 120 El ____ 123 Drop o’ the mornin’ 124 Cheer to a matador