December 13, 2020

Title: FORWARD THINKING

Constructor: Zhouqin Burnikel

Editor: Erik Agard

Theme Answers:

PASS THE BATON (19A: Hand over responsibility)

SLASH PRICES (36A: Offer big discounts)

MARCH MADNESS (55A: Spring basketball tournament)

Theme synopsis: The first word of each theme answer can follow the word FORWARD. We have FORWARD PASS, FORWARD SLASH, and FORWARD MARCH.

Things I learned:

• CEO (45A: C-suite leader) Illustrating that I have spent no time working in the corporate world, I was unfamiliar with the term C-suite. The term is used to refer to the highest-level executives, whose titles often follow the pattern "Chief ___ Officer" (CxO). CEO, COO, and CFO are the traditional officers in the C-suite, though some corporations have other roles such as CTO, CMO, or CRO. 
• MAMA (55D: "___, there goes that man!") The phrase "Mama, there goes that man!" has been used at various times in the past 85 years or so in various contexts by stand up comics and radio broadcasters. It is currently most closely associated with sports announcer, Mark Jackson, who uses it to describe the excellence of a basketball player after an incredible shot. Of course, someone has compiled a video of such commentary. 

Random thoughts and interesting things:

• PCS (1A: They often come with Windows) The capital W of Windows was the tip-off here that we're talking computers, not houses or cars.
• ALIA (16A: "Humpty Sharma Ki Dulhania" star Bhatt) Humpty Sharma Ki Dulhania (translation: Humpty Sharma's Bride) is an Indian Hindi-language movie. In addition to playing the role of Kavya Pratap Singh in the movie, ALIA Bhatt also sang one of the songs on the film's soundtrack.
• EVAN (9D: "Kajillionaire" star ___ Rachel Wood) In the 2020 movie, Kajillionaire, EVAN Rachel Wood plays a 26-year-old woman in a codependent relationship with her con artist parents. 
• ETS (29D: Ufologist's obsessions, for short) The pseudoscience, ufology, is the investigation of UFOs (unidentified flying objects) and ETS (extraterrestrials).
• CHICA (52D: Quinceanera celebrant) A quinceañera is a celebration of a CHICA's (girl's) fifteenth birthday. 

A nice, relatively straightFORWARD theme today. (Groanworthy, I know...) It was fun to see the answer TRACK MEET in the same puzzle with the theme answer PASS THE BATON. I also enjoyed the answers CAMERA SHY and YAY ME. A delightful puzzle to begin my Sunday morning.