Multi-National Venture

Difficulty ● ● ◐ ○ ○

Puzzle Notes

Greetings Friends,

Life happened recently. 

Emergency pipe repair resulted in two days of drilling, pipe restoration, carpentry work (which inspired 9-Down) and plastering. When you live in a 110-year-old apartment building, there's always a plumbing issue during the heating season!

A dental emergency -- a painful abscess caused by a broken filling -- sent me downtown to the dentist, in a hurry.

There's one good thing about wearing a mask during COVID -- the mask covers the swelled-up "blowfish face" caused by an abscess. The dentist was brilliant and good-natured (inspiration for 46-Down). All is well and healed.

When I sent this puzzle in for testing, the unanimous response was: "We solved it, but what's the theme?"

Such feedback is humbling, as our beloved testers are highly-skilled at solving and cracking themes. Clearly, I'd not written a good title, and it was back to the drawing board. Dear Solvers, there is a theme! I hope that the re-written title will provide safe passage to the Land of the Aha Moment. 

Welcome to Week 561 of Crossword Nation. We invite you to solve "Multi-National Venture" as your challenge of the week. Be well and enjoy the new month!

Thank you for subscribing and for re-upping! Until next time . . .

Cruciverbally yours, 

Liz

Solvers of The New Yorker puzzles: Themeless puzzlers, please check out my latest crossword (a "challenging" diversion, per the editors).

Mini Crossword Aficionados: For a quick solve, please try the Daily Mini Crossword in the L. A. Times. It's free! Simply bookmark and visit daily for a new puzzle.

Recovering Lost Puzzles: If, for some reason, our weekly puzzle email doesn't appear in your mailbox on Monday evenings, no worries -- you can always "re-send" the puzzle to yourself.

But first ....

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Happy solving and be well!

Liz Gorski

www.crosswordnation.com