My five favorite original clues from last week (in order of appearance): 1. Things found in a well (6) 2. Where lines may be drawn in the sand (3)(6) 3. That's an order! (9) 4. The "1" in 8-8-1, e.g. (3) 5. 'Hold please?" (1)(4)(1)(3) STAIRS ZEN GARDEN DIRECTIVE TIE I NEED A HUG
@Lewis I hope the OVAL from today one makes it onto your list next week!
I've heard yammer, I've heard jabber, but I've never heard yabber. Spent a couple minutes rechecking that area before realizing YABBER was right and my error was with TORN instead of TORE. Oh well got it eventually!
@Jones Came here to say this. Deeply annoying in that it made my Monday solve time well over five minutes!
@Patrick Ryan Came here for this one, too. In my case, I'm not annoyed, just mystified by this one. Got it by letting the crossings guide me, though, so it wasn't upsetting; just a really odd reach.
This puzzle was so delightful it has inspired me to comment for the first time! The directional clues were charming, LEFT BEHIND especially. The final across clue being TATA ended this one with a smile. Much appreciated as another week is about to begin.
Jabber, jibber ,yapper But yabber? Even autocorrect doesn’t know it!
@Jonathan Leal I'm glad to see I'm not alone in not knowing this one (Ann below agrees too), but BOOTJ didn't make sense and I don't know BOOTY as "tush" either, so I ended up Revealing the Y, a new low for a Monday puzzle.
@Jonathan Leal Agree! Jabber and Yammer I know, but never once came across "yabber."
There was no doubt that I was going to complete this puzzle once I saw STEFANI in the center of the grid. However, I was slowed down by inserting yammer for go on and on. YABBER is a new usage for me. Seeing NINA Simone as an answer took me back to my high school days in the early 70s. I used to go to sleep with radio playing set to the local alternative FM rock station on. One night I woke in the wee hours to hear Simone singing The Brecht/Weill song “The Black Freighter,” from the Threepenny Opera. I knew nothing about the music or the singer, but Simone’s ferocious rendition made my spine tingle - and frankly scared me a bit. The next day I began a quest to learn more about both Simone and the source of the music (which in pre internet days was not so easy). TLDR: I became a lifelong fan of NINA Simone, not least for the depth of emotion she could bring to any song.
@Marshall Walthew My first exposure to Nina Simone was the Sandra Bernhard movie “Without You I’m Nothing” (one of the few movies we walked out of in the middle). For years, I thought I didn’t like Simone’s music, but one day I hear “Forbidden Fruit” on the radio and was hooked. Her version of “Pirate Jenny” is definitely the spookiest one I know. We saw her once in the mid-1990s, when her voice was not what it had been. Our friend who went with us had seen Simone in the 1960s in a small club on Martha’s Vineyard. I was so jealous.
@Marshall Walthew @Eric the Durango Kid Amen. I like her bluesiest stuff the best. A live version of “Backlash Blues” is the song that woke me up and made me think, “wow, who is this?” The controlled, unapologetic ferocity and dignity. “Blues for Mama,” “Ain’t Got No, I Got Life.” A lot of covers, obviously, probably the most famous version of “Feeling Good.” Her dreamy, quieter stuff when I’m in that mood. She’s just…in charge. Makes me go “Yes, Ma’am.”
An early start for me this morning. No issues with the grid, but, what do you mean ‘I made an error?’. 5 minutes later I spotted it. Would you believe I spelled TYRES the American way, despite it clearly pointing to the British spelling. My brain has been infiltrated by the US dictionary. Out, damn you.
@Helen Wright , I was trying to remember the new word I must have learned when I first moved here many years ago, finally asked a friend who reminded me that it is simply the different spelling.
@Helen Wright Don't you mean, "Dash it!" Emulsion
@Helen Wright and suejean The new (to me) expression i learned last night while watching an episode of Vera, was "clobber" as slang for clothing.
WHAT!? I don't get it, can someone explain 64A to me. How is PANE the answer for "Widow sergeant!?" Don't worry, I jest! That's for the many, myself included, who fell victim to the tinted tilted window in Sunday's puzzle. ☺️
@HeathieJ I'm so glad I wasn't the only one whose brain really didn't want to read "titled widow" correctly!
@HeathieJ I think "tilted window" should now be NYT Xworders slang for a clue that is easily misread. Joining "natick" and "emu". I think others have been coined along the way. It is truly astonishing how so many people can misread something in exactly the same way.
I hope all the regular commenters here who live in the flooded parts of Connecticut are OK -- I know there are several. I have a friend in Bethany who sent me some images of washed out roads and bridges just to his west, and I know it was worse when you get closer to New York. Stay safe, everyone!
@CaptainQuahog - I am at a loss to understand what just happened. Total rainfall was only 2-3 inches for the weekend but everywhere is a swimming pool. I have a room full of musical instruments for my young students to play and we had gallons of water all over the place (fingers crossed no instruments were permanently damaged). All roads across town closed yesterday. Bizarre. Still more rain coming.
YABBER, dabber, doo! Meet the Flintstones, emus.😜
@Kate They're, the modern Stone Age family........from the town of Bedrock.
@Charles @kate It’s a page right out of hIstory 🐅
It’s called a “toll booth” and I won’t hear anything otherwise
@Dave Remember when those booths had TOLLGATES, and you actually had to stop and hand someone currency? Now with electronic systems like EzPass, folks just sail through, perhaps oblivious to the obscene tolls being taken from them.
Just this: YABBER?? ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️
Welp....I had entered NATTER for 46A, but when that didn't work for 25D, I thought YAMMER (definitely second best.) Not to be a NATTERing nabob of negativism, but YABBER? JABBER is a word, but YABBER ruins the puzzle, IMHO. Other than that, I completed the puzzle easily, without pause right up until that entry, which really ruins the puzzle. Haven't been in a KOHL'S in ages. Wanted LOWE'S; now, ThaT is MY kind of store.
@Mean Old Lady TIL about YABBER. from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition [From Australian pidgin, probably from a source in the Pama-Nyungan languages of southeast Australia such as Wiradhuri ya-, to talk (perhaps influenced by English jabber).]
@Mean Old Lady I imagine that somebody couldn't decide whether he wanted to say yammer or jabber, and blurted out YABBER. I wondered briefly if Gustav MAHLER played hoops.
Joining the early chorus questioning YABBER. I had YAMMER and briefly wondered if BOOTJ was a thing once the B's fell into place from the downs. Still an plenty easy for Monday, but esoteric, alt spellings are generally not found this early in the week.
An otherwise breezy Monday puzzle with a fun theme made me say UHOH in the left center section. I don’t play Minecraft, am not familiar with AMANA as a kitchen appliance brand, and have never heard the word YABBER in my life. This puzzle should have been a Tuesday. Kiss my BOOTY.
@Charles Nelson Reilly I got AMANA from the initial A. Sixty years ago, an early adopter neighbor had one of the first AMANA Radar Ranges. It could boil a cup of water in less than a minute. There was no second act. Without all of the accessories that came along later, he just used it to make instant coffee. I hope he found a another use before Mr Coffee was invented a short time later. Anyway, AMANA owned the microwave oven business for a while and is still churning out kitchen appliances.
@Charles Nelson Reilly In my experience, AMANA appears in crossword puzzles much more frequently than in kitchens. Yoga pose = ASANA
C’mon, folks! We’re supposed to be word lovers. Why all the yabbering about learning a new word? Thanks for a witty Monday puzzle.
@Anker Lerret Just a thought - if you're ever going to miss commenting for a few days because you have to go out of town, you should let us know, so we could then say... Anker's away. Ducking and running. ..
Oh, for crying out loud. Merriam-Webster cites the "first known use" of YABBER to 1855, so there goes my main complaint for the day. Different etymology from JABBER, too, if you believe them. But that doesn't mean I have to like it. Boo, yabber!
@Jeff Z Yeah, I knew someone would look it up... but We Do Not Care. It was probably a Quill-O.
Funtastic theme! Like many here, I particularly liked BOOTY and LEFT BEHIND. I noticed that ASSESS, given its placement with respect to 27D, gives us one or two right behinds. And in a similar way, THESIS is a sort of left angle. AMANA plan a refrigerator.
Please excuse my use of this forum to mourn the passing of Vertex on the 29th. Apparently it’s an irrevocable decision unless … As others have pointed out, vertex uses a different part of the brain from word puzzles. I enjoyed it very much. Burgess Voshelle is an artist. He has constructed works worthy of display in any museum in the world, using triangles, colors, and computer technology. I wish him the best in his endeavors and hope he can find another platform. I’ve complained before about the difficulty in finding it on the puzzle page, and if part of the decision was popularity, that may well have been the reason. The editors have offered Tiles as a substitute, but I ran out my string and interest there long ago. Bon voyage, Vertex. 😔
@Doggydoc I agree with you. I'm so sad to see Vertex go. I always find it so relaxing to do, and love seeing what picture emerges from all those dots. I suspect part of the reason it's going away is that most people access the games on their phone. Vertex is relatively hard to play on a small phone screen and so it doesn't get the traffic that many of the other games get. And yes, Tiles is not at all a reasonable substitute. I too quickly got bored with Tiles and almost never play it. I will really miss Vertex!
Hah! I loved this theme. I especially loved the paired theme answers in the east, south, and west, where the long phrases directionally describe the one-word partner on the edge of the grid, and yet those long phrases also stand alone with a meaning that has nothing to do with that one-word partner. That is, say, BOTTOM LINE by itself refers to the gist of something or to something financial, and nowhere does it suggest METRO. Well, that is some first-class “Hah!”-inducing wordplay, and to have it happen three times in a grid brought me great pleasure. The exception, of course, was TOP SIRLOIN, which does suggest STEAK. There are those who would say that this exception makes the theme inelegant. But I, who tend to see the glass half full, am grateful for the pleasure I’ve triply received. I also had the pleasure of learning about two things. One, YABBER, which looks and sounds terrific, and I hope to get it in my rotation. And two, the song “Video Killed the Radio Star”, which never rose above #40 in the U.S., but was number one an many other countries, and whose video was the first video ever played on MTV. Truly, the Wikipedia article on the song plunged me into a fascinating world, and I highly recommend it. Wit and spark in the box, on a day where there is no tough cluing to dilute it – Monday at its best. Thank you so much for this, KC!
"That is, say, BOTTOM LINE by itself refers to the gist of something or to something financial, and nowhere does it suggest METRO." Lewis, If METRO is supposed to be a LINE -- the [system] consists of several lines -- that much of it (within DC itself) is underground makes it a BOTTOM LINE. N.B. "Bottom line" as "the gist of something" comes directly from the "net profit or loss" shown on the "bottom line" of an income statement.
@Lewis When I was growing up in MD, the nearest METRO station (Shady Grove) was on the Red Line. I could bike to the station and be in the Smithsonian in under an hour. Mind you, most of that trip was above ground. "Next stop, Grov'nuh."
I guess people don't like having to change a word in their puzzle. I thought YAmmER at first, but since LEFT mEHIND and mALLER clearly looked wrong, I went with YABBER, which sounded familiar and is, in fact, a word. Now, that wasn't so difficult. What's the fuss? Oh well, I enjoyed the puzzle and don't mind having to reconsider a word or 2 along the way. But that's just me. Thank you for a nice Monday puzzle, Kenneth, and thank you for the NINA Simone shout out. Never enough NINA. <a href="https://youtu.be/LJ25-U3jNWM?si=Nk8wr8umggc3B0Q_" target="_blank">https://youtu.be/LJ25-U3jNWM?si=Nk8wr8umggc3B0Q_</a>
I was halfway through this puzzle and I just wasn't feeling it.... sirloin is steak? OK.... a slant is an angle? Sure, but not that clever. Then I noticed the "literally" in every theme clue and the light bulb went off (not literally). Oh, I get it! Obvious in retrospect... but it made me laugh. That's all I really want from a puzzle, to be entertained for a few moments. If I happen to learn something in the process, that's a bonus. :)
@Janine My niece, last week: "I was literally sitting in that chair five seconds ago!" My reaction was not, "Stop yelling at your sister," but rather, "Stop mis-using literally." Yes, I am the grammar police.
Something I’ve learned in the comments today is that one of the answers has struck many as a real bubber. Et tu, emu.
@Lewis - seems you hab a code id your doze.
Not a Monday puzzle. Perfectly solid Tuesday puzzle, with an entertainingly different kind of theme. Will be interesting to read the comments to see what others thought of this puzzle's relative difficulty.
@Xword Junkie Seemed solidly Monday to me. I was almost a minute faster than usual.
Delightful puzzle! Texas Roadhouse’s specialty is their ROLLS, which also fit. I guess that would have changed 17A to UPPER CRUST.
i was originally going to complain that you can JABBER or YAMMER but not YABBER but I looked it up and at least in Australia, you can. Apparently YABA means "talk" in Wuywurung (a language of the original inhabitants) so it MAY derive from a pidgin. I'll let one of our Australians expand on this (they've already confirmed that YABBER is common there.)
@RozzieGrandma I agree, I came here to Comments with this same complaint. But in Sam's column I learned how clever the puzzle was with locations of TOP and LEFT etc. I had totally missed that, so I'm left with a Wow! feeling instead
The English language, according to Oxford dictionary has 170,000 common words, and 47,000 uncommon words. Crosswords can span both a minimum of 217,000. So, YABBER counts. I felt this Monday puzzle had a couple of misdirections. Good mental workout on a Sunday night
This was tough for a Monday! Confidently put in ASS for 28a (bozo) and was delighted to erase it for BOOTY and LEFT BEHIND. Bonus points for ASSESS right next door.
[Poorly drawn circle, perhaps] solving to OVAL has to be the downright funniest solve I've experienced in a long time! But really I'm just here for The Buggles, like any proper Gen-Xer should be(!!). <a href="https://youtu.be/W8r-tXRLazs?si=iEtYVFSw929qda5Y" target="_blank">https://youtu.be/W8r-tXRLazs?si=iEtYVFSw929qda5Y</a> // I loved how the adjacencies of the theme pairs were reinforced -- to my eye -- with others. Especially OOHS over PASSIONS, but also HOT SALSA with a nice SIRLOIN strip STEAK. And then there are CURL and SALON; BALE and SILO; the Mets' SHEA Stadium and NO HIT... Or SHEA butter and ALOE vera. Any guesses on Sam's image choice? It's gotta be more than the hoop earrings, right?
@G I chuckled out loud at OVAL! Good one! And I also had video killed the RADIO STAR running through my head last night after I solved it. That was fun to immediately plunk in without even giving it any thought! This morning when I looked at it again, I saw another Gen X reference of sorts in the puzzle... <a href="https://youtu.be/iIpfWORQWhU?si=Yjt1u4c8LXkN9WfY" target="_blank">https://youtu.be/iIpfWORQWhU?si=Yjt1u4c8LXkN9WfY</a> 😉
@G AHHHHHH see this is why I like to take my time and even leave blanks on purpose so I don't fill in a whole section without reading the clues in the crosses. I totally missed that OVAL clue and it really is absolutely hilarious. I think I was too distracted for the whole second half of the puzzle trying to figure out why specifically the LEFT BOOTY? What's wrong with the right? (I know now thanks to Sam!).
A bit more challenging than most Mondays, which made it fun. I also thought YABBER was surprising, and I saw someone comment that it was Australian. I’ve been reading a series of books set in Australia (Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries) and learning lots of pretty hilarious Australian slang. It’s been a nice break from the more serious books I also read. Thanks for the Monday fun, Kenneth Cortes 😊
@Shari Coats thanks for the book ref, sounds right up my alley
@Shari Coats I agree. Yammer is a word. I’ve never heard anyone say yabber, including the aussies I’ve known
@Hi hi, I have, however, heard an Aussie refer to Speedo-style men’s bathing suits as “budgie smugglers,” which… I mean. Why doesn’t everyone call them by that name?
One of the benefits of solving left to right top to bottom is that when an unfamiliar word pops up, I just plop in the letter that would fit that square for the down clue. So, I saw YABBER evolve, without knowing it. Cuz…*cross*words… Liked this one very much! Thank you!
LMAO when I got to BOOTY/LEFT BEHIND. I'd take every nickel I have in the bank and bet that that pair had to be the original impulse behind the puzzle. Really great! By comparison, STEAK/TOP SIRLOIN was amusing, but not quite as rare a delight. The problem with the others was that you were presented with the joke in the wrong order -- that is you wouldn't see the referred-to answer first. And that was sort of a shame. Still, I really liked the concept of the puzzle, which was fun and playful. And I really appreciated the lack of junk in the grid. Very nice Monday.
@Nancy LEFT BEHIND was my favorite, too.
Sam’s mention of a brick wall brought me back to my college digs. Fifth floor walkup above a smelly deli with my bedroom window looking out across the span of a back alley just the width of the garbage trucks five floors down - looking at an unbroken, windowless brick wall 38-stories tall. But my window faced east, which meant every dawn broke gently with that great barrier in the sun’s way, and every sunset was a glory, with the light of the setting sun reflected by all those warm red bricks into my room. My housemates whose windows actually faced west never enjoyed that warm evening glow!
@David Connell Are you settling into retirement yet? Still haven't gotten around to those things that were put aside for when there would be more time? (From my experience, that's normal.) To what music are you listening? (Note the purposeful pedantic preposition positioning.)
Yabber is not a word. It's gabber or yapper.
Lres, A quick check of three dictionaries shows that YABBER is a word in English ... in Australia. Emus, please confirm this!
@Lres To my recollection, I've never heard of either gabber or yabber but I still believe they're words. Same goes with YABBER, actually... I originally had ramble, but the crosses quickly disabused me of that notion and led me to the correct answer. 🤷
@Lres Apparently it is a word, even though my spellchecker keeps changing it to jabber.
No Doubt about it, one of the better Mondays.
That was a fun Monday workout. Slow start for me, but finally tumbling to the trick was a nice 'aha' moment and I had a good time working out each of the theme answers after that. As for YABBER - for me that just came from all the crosses and I really didn't even notice it until I came here. Had a quite unusual puzzle find today. I'll put that in a reply. ..
@Rich in Atlanta As threatened: A Sunday from September 11, 2011 by Kay Anderson with the title: "Cornered." And that title was the only 'reveal' for the puzzle. In that one the theme answers were italicized, but there was no other hint as to what was going on. This one is kind of hard to describe, but here's a couple of examples: 77a - the clue was "Bracket Shape." And the answer was RIGHT. But the ending 'T' was at the beginning of 78d and the clue for that was "Fishing line fiasco" and the answer was TANGLE. So if you actually turned the corner at the 'T' the implied answer was: RIGHTANGLE And some of the theme pairs were across/down and some were down/across. A couple of other examples: GOING GRATE So the combination was GOINGRATE HUNCH HOVER So the combination was HUNCHOVER MERLOT TWINE So the combination was MERLOTWINE Here's the Xword Info link: <a href="https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=9/11/2011&g=77&d=A" target="_blank">https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=9/11/2011&g=77&d=A</a> ..
Gosh, now I’m even finding a Monday puzzle quite difficult. I was thinking there might be a chorus of “very difficult for a Monday, so loved it”. This is not to say I didn’t enjoy it, I enjoyed it a lot and was impressed by the clever theme and nice variety of entries.
Cheers to Kenneth Cortes for an enjoyable Monday puzzle. Satisfying to play. I liked the British spelling of tires and I know yabber, as in yabbadabbado. Nice to know it's Aussie. I liked the "literally" clues. Nice touch and fun to figure out. Thank you NYT and Mr. Cortes. Cheers from Texas.
I loved [Sparks that ignite a match?], but YABBER? And LEFT BEHIND is BOOTY? Isn't BOOTY both, or does it refer to position in the puzzle? And BALLERs are baseball players. No hoops so far. Otherwise, a classy Monday, crisp and fun. Thank you Kenneth Cortes. And come again, Ken.
@dutchiris The LEFT in LEFT BEHIND refers to the position of BOOTY in the puzzle, just as ROGHT ANGLE refers to the position of SLANT. TOP SIRLOIN and BOTTOM LINE work the same way with STEAK and METRO. And BALLER is basketball slang, not baseball.
Wow first Monday in a long time I didn’t breeze through. Got done in by the NW corner. I hate summer/winter time clues. I don’t know what they’re called, I just adjust my watch and and get on with it.
@Ernest I don't know if this will help or not, but you can try to think of it this way: the D (EDT, CDT, MDT, PDT) stands for daylight, and we have the most daylight during the summer.
YABBER, jabber, yammer: my Macquarie, the dictionary of reference for Australia, gives each of these a distinct meaning. Yabber, from the aboriginal, is to talk. Jabber is to talk quickly and unintelligibly. Yammer, from an Old English word meaning to complain, is to moan or complain. It would seem that [go on and on] fits the last most closely. Either other is a bit of a stretch.
@Patrick J. My American Heritage Dictionary defines YABBER as “to talk or converse rapidly or casually.” That seems to fit the clue.
A Monday puzzle with plenty of pop: half again over my usual Monday time, and I didn't fully catch the theme until about three-quarters through. Came to say all I learned about YABBER (n. and v.) in the OED, but sounds like a lot of posters already beat me to it. But I should point to @Patrick J.'s post, some six hrs. ago, from a native Strine speaker. (Also, that /Australia has a "dictionary of reference.")
Confounded by yabber, I had jabber, which gave me 'bootj', and the clue was, 'literally' LEFT behind? Is that the LEFT side, of the BEHIND? Nah, Google confirmed, sigh. I'm smarter than this, but of course, I don't know ALL the words, if it was 'literally' the LEFT behind, is there...a word for that? Okay, regroup! Hold on, running through the keyboard...y...it's yabber! Oh geez, booty, of course (eye roll). As I write this, spell check is insisting on 'yammer', but like I said, I don't know ALL the words, and that's a new one on me, so enough yamm...yabbering! Happy Monday all!
@Lar Cheeky. Should have been clued as BUTTOCK (singular), eh? Emus GAB
YABBER? As in yabber dabber do? Nice one Ken, thank you. But YABBER.
Hmmm… East of Eden Paradise South Park Playground North Dallas Forty Team with no chance of winning the Super Bowl? I’ll work on it
Solid Monday, I thought, except for the maligned jabber, which slowed my time considerably. I finally just went with it and was surprised by the success. I didn’t get how “slant” was a literal right angle, but “bottom line” was clever. Nice start to the week.
@Crevecoeur SLANT is not a literal right angle but an angle that is literally on the right side of the puzzle. Does that make more sense?
As a retired CPA, the better clue for 62 Across would have been Income statement total…
I was thinking exactly this, I was misled into thinking it would be some variation on total equity or total liabilities. Not a good clue for any versed in the subject.
@Vincent Yes. Good idea. Suggesting different clues is part of the fun here. Some have more fun than others.