Thursday, May 18, 2006

"Nipple" Clue Hits The USA Today Puzzle

Say it ain't so, Timothy Parker! At about 5:30 this morning I was really shocked to see a really suggestive clue in the usually milquetoast USA Today crossword.

Weeks after constructor Lynn Lempel and editor Will Shortz opened up a major can of worms with the presence of the word SCUMBAG in a New York Times grid, the USA Today puzzle by Stella Daily and Bruce Venzke yielded the clue "Nipple ring (var.)" for the word AREOLE.

AREOLE (a variant of AREOLA) is usually clued in terms of botany or general biology/anatomy, but never to my knowledge in terms of being the dark area surrounding the nipples in humans. Yes, we all have nipples (most of us, anyway), but there's a part of me that thinks this subject is still not fair game for crosswords.

My two cents.... discuss.

2 comments:

SailorCallie said...

Reminded me of a classic Match Game episode where Gene says to a female contestant: "You have pretty nipples, er, dimples."

Anonymous said...

I can't see something wrong with the clue here. Hmm.. it's kinda tricky of using the word "areole" instead of "areola".