PUZZLE #524: New Year's Presents

PUZZLE #524

NEW YEAR'S PRESENTS

It's the final puzzle of 2024, so to ring out this year, I've decided to take last year's "Christmas Presents" puzzle and change the involved holiday so that it'd be more fitting for the season (even though I have no idea if "giving presents at New Year's" is even a thing). In case you need a reminder on how to solve this puzzle type, the directions are right here:

For each of these colorful presents, you’re given clues for four words reading across and down the sides of each gift, using all of the letters in the sections of ribbon that each word crosses, like with WRAP and MINER reading across as well as WHAM and PER reading down in the provided example. After you’ve filled in these words, complete the wrapping by adding a letter that acts as a bow where the strands of ribbon cross, so that two more words are formed reading along the ribbons, as with HAVE and RAVINE in the example.

Once all of the presents have been filled out, read all of the bow letters in order to get the FINAL ANSWER: something seen at a New Year's Day celebration

PRESENT #1

• Math symbol seen in streaming services from Disney, Paramount, AMC, etc.

• Royal rank higher than viscount, but lower than marquess

• Toaster _____ (Pillsbury's version of Pop-Tarts)

• Word following "pecan", "pork", and "pizza"

PRESENT #2

• Chide and chastise

• Power of 10 and The Price is Right host Carey

• Resort with mud baths and masseurs

• Spiro who was the most recent vice president to resign

PRESENT #3

• _____-jerk reaction

• Keep tabs on

• Million Dollar Listing Los Angeles network

• Top or bottom bed

PRESENT #4

• Not quite closed, as a door

• Sleep study abbr.

• _____ vera

• White rapper whose latest album is called The Death of Slim Shady

PRESENT #5

• Antlered animal on Michigan's state flag

• Greek letter that looks like an "H" (despite not being spelled with an "H")

• Its two biggest cities are Nairobi and Mombasa

• Meeting schedule

PRESENT #6

• Corn core

• Freshwater fish that becomes a synonym for "fat" if you add "by" at the end

• Got underway

• "There's a sucker _____ every minute" (quote supposedly from P. T. Barnum)

PRESENT #7

• Cars such as the Bronco and Mustang

• Group of sheep to shepherd over

• "Some _____ of Wonderful" (Grand Funk Railroad song)

• What Rosebud was in Citizen Kane

PRESENT #8

• Bill _____ the Science Guy ('90s PBS series)

• Faint trace of color

• Pledged to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth

• Uncompromising, like a short time limit

PRESENT #9

• Avant-garde rocker Frank with children named Moon Unit, Dweezil, and Ahmet

• Like a pretentious painting, perhaps

• "Mighty" Mudville batter who struck out

• Second-to-last chemical element alphabetically, just before zirconium

PRESENT #10

• Clumsy dummy

• Latte foam that some baristas make art out of

• Rarity's pet cat in My Little Pony, for short (or October's birthstone)

• Rottweiler's restraint

Once you believe you've figured out the FINAL ANSWER, send it to either redhead64@chartermi.net or itsredhead64@gmail.com (though I'm more likely to check the second one) and I'll put your name on a solvers list once I post the answers in about two weeks. You can also use those email addresses to give me some comments and feedback (or even ask for a hint, though you'll be marked as having used one if you do so) or send me the answer to last week's puzzle, if you haven't already figured it out. If you have a printer and want to solve this puzzle on paper, just head below the break for a link to a .PDF version which you can print out!

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1-pfuKe2cMk2upP-pwkt533KARPnBKcuX/view?usp=sharing