NYT Crossword 12-30-20 Complete

It’s another chilly day in Los Angeles. At 9am it’s 56 degrees outside, and even indoors, my fingers are being uncooperative as I type this. No fun. But this puzzle was pretty good for a Wednesday.

I pulled out 2D Mythological figure who’s a symbol of hubris: ICARUS because the Netflix documentary about Russian doping is insane. Calah and I watched it a couple weeks ago. It was new to her, but I’d seen it before. It starts out with filmmaker Bryan Fogel trying to understand the competitive cycling world and the role of performance-enhancing drugs within it. Then it takes a hard turn away from bikes. If you haven’t seen it yet, the only reason not to right now is if you haven’t seen Senna because Senna goes away tomorrow.

Racing bikes is something close to my heart, as I was on the mountain biking team in college. Was I the best on the team? Was I a standout on the team? Did I have fun on the team. The answer to all those is yes… except for the first two. An assessment UCSB Cycling teammate Geoffrey Bishop would agree with if he’s reading this post, and there’s a good chance of that because he reads my blog sometimes. What’s up, Geoff?

There I am! You know, not in the front.

The theme of this crossword is willpower.

14A It might cost extra at a beach resort: OCEANVIEW.
20A Clairvoyant’s accessory: CRYSTALBALL.
37A Key lime pie crust ingredient: GRAHAMCRACKER.
58A Cut above the rest?: PORTERHOUSE.

66A Nightstick … or what might form if the beginnings of 14-, 20-, 37- and 58-Across started paying dues?: BILLYCLUB.


14A BILLY OCEAN(view).
20A BILLY CRYSTAL(ball). It sounds like the 700 Sundays entire cast married all of the title characters of I Love Lucy. Also Billy Crystal and Bill Kristol put out a pro-Biden video targeted at the elderly in Florida back in October.

Oh, the banter!

37A BILLY GRAHAM(cracker).
58A BILLY PORTER(house).

Finished this one across three devices in 14:17.

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