The theme of Marti DuGuay-Carpenter's Los Angeles Times crossword today is STAMPCOLLECTION ("Philatelist's prize") and each of the first words of the four theme answers is a type of stamp: DATEWITHDESTINY, FOODPROCESSOR, RUBBERTREEPLANT and TRADINGPLACES. Yes, "rubber tree plant" is a redundancy but it's a phrase from the 1960 Frank Sinatra song High Hopes: "Anyone knows an ant...can't...move a rubber tree plant...but he had high hopes..." Trading stamps, especially Blue Chip Stamps and S&H Green Stamps, were common in the 1950s and '60s. They were given out by many markets, drug stores and department stores to customers who made purchases. The stamps were to be pasted in a booklet which, when filled, could be redeemed for dishware, small appliances and other items. I don't know if any businesses still offer trading stamps in 2015.
The Daily News puzzle included BIRDSOFAFEATHER, FLOCKTOGETHER and CLEARFORTAKEOFF...but I don't think birds ever wait for a "clear for takeoff" signal before they start flying. They do not need such a signal. After all, we never hear of any mid-air bird collisions, do we?
Today's Universal crossword includes HOWDOYOUDO, DONTKNOWHOW and HOWISITDONE. The theme is SEEINGASHOW, which can be read as "seeing a show" but in this case means "seeing as how." Very clever!
The NEA crossword is nothing to speak of. It seldom is anything to speak of. It's always 13x13 and seldom has a theme or very many long words. Today's included the usual large number of over-used words: ACE, ANTI, APT, EER, EMIT, ESE, ESPN, ESS, IRE, ONO, OPT and OSLO.
