"You've been fixing gas pedals all day!" "I know! I need a brake!" (I have the drive for more puns, but I'm exhaust-ed.)
@Mike Throttle that impulse. Step on it!
@Mike Another round of steerling puns, no turn indicator needed. You seemed a little tired and you're road wearier now.
@Mike This whole thread is just a vehicle for your puns, isn’t it? You and your pickup lines! We’ve been down this road before! I’ll have no truck with this humor!
@Mike You need to switch into low gear. (I know, I'm clutching at straws here).
@Mike The way people enjoy your posts makes you a real exhilarater.
@Mike Kindly pipe down!
And let's all go slow on the back-seat punning
I had the most trouble in the top half of the puzzle, specifically in the NW corner. Not knowing any Nintendo characters didn't help. WWI reminded me that back in the dark ages (1980s) when we were teaching students to do library research, looking for magazine articles in the good old Readers' Guide--we taught them that if they were looking up articles about World War I that were published in the 1910s and 1920s and 1930s, they had to look under the subject heading "European War, 1914-1918." You could see their minds being blown.
@Liz B That reminds me of an Encyclopedia Brown story where a supposed historical relic was shown to be a fake because the inscription referred to the "first" battle, when at the time they didn't know there would be a second. (I just looked it up -- supposedly presented to Stonewall Jackson at the end of the First Battle of Bull Run, which is also not what the confederates called it.)
@Liz B. In an episode of Black Sails taking place around 1715 a captain referred to the reigning monarch as George the First. It annoyed (and annoys) me no end that writers about historical eras cannot get the terminology right. I guess I’m being pedantic, but I don’t care.
@Liz B Maybe also The Great War? The War to End All Wars? I just learned that the phrase was adapted from an H. G. Wells book published following the outbreak of fighting in 1914 before the enormity of the carnage was revealed. The title was: The War That Will End War. Optimistic, eh?
This one felt tough while I was doing it, and I was genuinely surprised to finish well below my usual Saturday time. I loved EASTERCANDY for rabbit food, and IPHONECASES for apple skins.
Tonight’s mystery: why SPORCLE came right into my head despite not really knowing what it is. University of California at Sporcle. Sporcle Lombard, of Hollywood fame. Hermann Sporcle, author of Siddhartha. Sporcle, special ingredient in meringue. See? It could be almost anything!
One of the things I teach my students is actually how early we find the first reference to World War I / First World War. While it’s true that it didn’t stick until much later, the first usage I know of dates to London in the early 1920s. That soon after the Armistice, it obviously had nothing to do with the rise of Hitler or German rearmament (neither of which had happened yet). It wasn’t about the Treaty of Versailles, either. Rather, it was a label that was meant to shock, used by an American in Europe to comment on the fundamental changes of the postwar world. He wasn’t saying anything about anticipating any particular Second World War, just his confidence that there would be one of some kind, some time (and probably not that far in the future).
@Jannicut It'll be over a hundred and thirty years before the American Civil War is labelled as CWI.
Today I learned two things: that sea otters hold hands (awww) and that Deja vu has a forgetful cousin. I now have a new expression to use and a new favorite animal. Aren’t crossword puzzles great? 😊
I really enjoyed this, but given I was able to complete it, and in good time, too, I will probably see it denounced as a Monday by many commenters 🤣. I was one retail giant away from solving this without outside help. I had filled in the rest of the grid, but I only had SEA OTTER in that SE corner (one of my wife's favorite animals). I pored over it, almost remembering the Nobel author. After a minute or two I broke down and looked up COSTCO. I was able to complete the puzzle then, even though I have no idea what APS and SPORCLE are. The personally naticky crossing at A_S and S_ORCLE I had to resolve by intelligently guessing the letter, and my first choice of P turned out to be correct. Before that I struggled in the NW corner, I was happy to remember CAROLE, as she and the tasty CROSTINI opened that area up for me. It took me a while to change ohCMON to AWCMON (how this sort of thing annoys me...), and to remember WALUIGI (I'm a gamer but never played any Nintendo titles), but no lookups were necessary. It took me a while to get SITH because its clue misled me. I have always thought Star Wars was fantasy, not science fiction. There is literally nothing scientific about it. It's a sword and sorcery fantasy epic about knights (or battle mages, maybe?) storming castles, which is why I fell for it decades ago. I love both Star Wars and Star Trek, and you will never convince me the two are of the same genre. Off on holiday tomorrow. I likely won't post for three weeks.
@Andrzej CAROLE came to me immediately, but I had to get CROSTINI by the crosses. Somehow, I've never come across them, even though I was in Italy for several weeks.
@Andrzej. Sporcle.com sends me a dozen or so quizzes every day by email. It’s a very fun trivia quiz site. Check it out.
@Andrzej APs are Advanced Placement classes and exams, where a high school student can receive college credit if they score high enough on the exam.
@Andrzej Enjoy. We will keep the Comments full up.
@Andrzej When we visited the Monterey Bay Aquarium in 1993, I thought I was going to have to drag my husband away from the tank that had the sea otters. Even now, I can be reasonably sure that a cute sea otter video will amuse him even when he’s in a foul mood. I’m with you on your assessment of Star Wars. I enjoy both that franchise and Star Trek, but they’re not trying to be the same sort of thing. Still, I’ve seen Star Wars referred to as science fiction enough times that it wasn’t too hard to get SITH. Enjoy your vacation!
The first Advanced Placement exams were administered in 1954 by the Educational Testing Service (ETS) to students limited to 27 schools participating at that time. In 1955, the College Board assumed leadership of the program and testing, deciding on curricula and pedagogical approaches, while retaining ETS to design and score the tests. The exams were given nationally for the first time in May 1956, and students could take whichever tests they wanted for a single $10 fee.
@Andrzej "I likely won't post for 3 weeks" 😟 at least you hinted at your likely return. Thanks for that!
@Andrzej I also had some trouble in the SE corner, only my gimme was HESSE, who is one of my favorite authors. Glad you enjoyed the puzzle, since I know that is not a given for you. Nice way to start a vacation. I hope you have a great holiday!
I find something kind of fascinating. I think it was about the time when I could do Friday/Saturday more or less every week that I started reading the comments. There were several FriSats that I got cleanly, and I was surprised that a lot of others were saying it was a difficult one. I thought it was pretty cool that I could do a "hard" puzzle. But now, it's the opposite. I hack my way through a FriSat, barely ekeing out a clean solve, and when I come to the comments I'm surprised that most everyone thought it was easy. BTW, I don't really consider my time to be a good metric of difficulty. It's one metric, but it seems deeper than that to me in a way I can't quite describe. A little hard to figure.
@Francis Comparison is the thief of joy, maybe? Sometimes I think a puzzle is difficult, but then log in and see that there are a large numbers thinking it was easy. Naturally, I think, people will comment when they feel a puzzle was easier than when they struggle with it. But, often, if I reflect on my own accomplishment and not others' opinions, I feel satisfied with what I've done.
@Francis A sample size of one is never a good metric for assessing anything. Your solve may have been hindered by one tricky crossing you just didn't know, like the one most people are citing today (AWCMON x WALUIGI). Someone else who plays the Mario games would find that a gimme. I was somewhere in the middle, having heard of the character Wario, who is apparently the evil Mario, and just figured the same type of character existed for Luigi. (I have never played a Mario game, and have no idea what the object is.) Good solvers pick up things outside of their areas of interest. It always annoys me when I find solvers saying, "I didn't know X, and I'm glad I didn't." That attitude seems perverse to me. Anyway, the reason I reference the site xwstats.com all the time is that there you have the only reliable realtime data on the state of the solve. True, you only get the results of the subscribers, but it's actual data, not anecdotal experiences. Today's stats find the puzzle "Very Easy," with a median time of 11:53, and a median solve 40% faster than average. 95% of users solved faster than their Saturday average. 81% solved much faster (>20%) than their Saturday average. 5% of users solved slower than their Saturday average. 3% solved much slower (>20%) than their Saturday average. I'd say that those stats show that those who said this puzzle is easy for a Saturday are empirically accurate.
As much as I enjoyed this puzzle, I greatly disliked seeing YOKEL [Rube] at 42A. Just last Sunday, we got HICK [Backwoods bumpkin]. Have we really not progressed since the 1960s, when hit TV shows like Green Acres and The Beverly Hillbillies made fun of “unsophisticated” rural people? I don’t think the NYT would allow such pejorative language about other groups of people. Constructors and editors, please show a little sensitivity on this issue. Thanks.
@Eric Hougland I mean no disrespect to your opinion, so please hear me out for a sec. Do you think too many of us feel we *should be offended, just because we've become conditioned as such by the over abundance of media outlets? There are many earlier TV shows, books, songs and movies that poke fun at cultures. There are comedians that find humor in racial, gender, political, language etc. differences. Yet audiences continue to laugh at themselves and continue to be entertained at how many of us might be observed. Would it suffice if the NYT eliminated any further references you describe or should all prior references be stricken from the crossword archives? I apologize if I might be coming across harshly, but that's not my intent at all. This is the only diplomatic way I can come up with to disagree with your point of view, especially in this modern era of over-sensitivity.
@Eric Hougland Well for the record The Beverly Hillbillies, while poking fun, generally made the Clampetts wiser and kinder than most everyone else. I remember an episode where they were being sued in a car accident, and Jed offered just to give the plaintiff the money because he needed it for his “daughter” who ended up being his mistress. And it like Mr. Drysdale always was the one really made fun of. In the bigger picture, Eric, seems like you’ve reviewed enough puzzles that you’d think we need all kinds of words. I get what you are saying; but I would argue that “yokel” and “hick” are relative words. If I have a pejorative word for an ethnic or religious group, that applies to everyone so is more problematic. But “hick” or “yokel” while negatives would apply to a specific type of rural person, and I could argue to anyone who was offended that they weren’t a yokel just because they lived in a rural area. It would be like eliminating the word “idiot” in fear of offending people who were developmentally delayed. You can call anyone an idiot, and you wouldn’t necessarily call a cognitively delayed person an idiot just on those grounds (well I wouldn’t).
@Eric Hougland I'm put in mind of a movie that we saw long, long ago, when I was quite small. "No Time for Sergeants"? It was pretty much one long YOKEL joke. I forget how it ends, but I think it was something of a sidelong look at over-looked virtues that might still be found out in the sticks... That said, I agree that it's a prejudice what we can do without... unless one is a crossword constructor, mayhap.
@Eric Hougland what other words should we ban? Nerd? Dweeb? Snoot? Snob? Aloof? Etc. etc. There are thousands of words which conceptually have negative connotations. And….so what? Positive and negative language exists…too bad…deal with it. Should a word be used in a puzzle to single out a group in a negative way….no, of course not. But the existence of a word isn’t the problem.
"Just last Sunday, we got HICK [Backwoods bumpkin]." Eric, The clue wasn't [Backwoods person.]
@Eric Hougland. Born and bred in Georgia, as were my parents, grandparents, etc., all from farming families once you went back a generation, I was quite sensitive to fakey Southern accents on TV or depictions of Southerners as stupid. We also avoided shows that featured racial stereotypes of Blacks or Native Americans. Even so, we generally enjoyed Green Acres and The Beverly Hillbillies. Both shows poked fun at both city sophisticates and rural folks as being unaware of each other's worlds and misinterpreting them, and that was refreshing. Green Acres, in particular, poked fun at the sophisticated Eva Gabor character, but the humor felt generally loving. I occasionally winced at something in either show, but not as much as at the violence in the Westerns and their simplistic good/evil moralism. And not as much as when I first moved North as an adult and people would condescendingly correct my pronunciation. I would never call someone a hick or a yokel, and would be offended if it were clued "someone from Georgia," but the way these get clued in the NYT puzzles feels more like reading a definition from M-W and does not feel personally offensive.
@Eric Hougland This is a word game. You use contextual clues to deuce the word. It's not social commentary, just words and their meanings. If you're offended by seeing a word in type, I suggest maybe a number game instead.
@Eric Hougland The circle of people to whom we extend our sympathy has been widening steadily over the centuries. Steven Pinker gives a moving description of this trend in his two books on enlightenment. Your comment fits the pattern, and it makes me happy to read. (Nonetheless, I think banning words like this would be a mistake)
@Eric Hougland duly noted, thank you! To be honest I hadn't heard the word before it came up in our autofill, and when I did a quick pass I didn't realize it can be derogatory. I just (slightly) downscored it in my wordlist
@Eric Hougland Sensitivity? Not likely. This is a NYC puzzle, and New Yorkers are famously disdainful of anyone outside of the five boroughs. We're all hicks and yokels to them, out here in flyover country. Okay, maybe not so much where I live, because of all the New Yorkers who have been moving down here in recent years for the lower taxes and housing costs, but still ultra-liberal policies. (No plastic bags at the grocery store, and the straws are next. Dunno about HANGERs at the dry cleaners, but weed is now legal.)
@Eric Hougland I’m not so much surprised as disappointed to see the defensive responses to your comment. You were not trying to ban the word from Times crosswords—as though that were something within your power to do. You were raising awareness. Should someone prefer to leave their awareness in its lowered state, that’s a choice they can make. Personally, i appreciate every opportunity I get to become more aware.
Really surprised to see the THEWIRE as BBC’s no. 1. I binged it a few years ago; it is amazing but too painful to rewatch. Almost Naticked at 31 down and 41 across until the S was the only missing letter. Then I realized I know that French word; eight years of French classes wasn’t totally wasted on me. Lots of nice fill and JAMAISVU is now my favorite new expression. Loved this, just as a crossword should be, slow to get into, then takes off.
@Jeanne Did you mean 44A? If so, that was my final letter, and I did not have a lot of confidence.
@Jeanne I was also surprised to see THE WIRE as the BBC selection. I would have expected them to choose a British show. But maybe the presence of Iris Elba was enough? (It usually is for me 😉)
Congratulations on your NYT debut, Mr. Seetharam! I enjoyed the challenge. I also enjoyed seeing JAMAIS VU. I first encountered that term when I read "Catch-22," which is my favorite novel. I can easily picture Captain Yossarian sitting naked in that tree. Thanks to both of you!
@Eric Hougland I did not remember that JAMAIS VU was in "Catch-22"! I knew the word must be a version of deja vu, but didn't look it up and my French isn't that good. Thank you for the reference. I love that book too. ✌️
@Eric Hougland I read "Catch-22," but I only learned JAMAIS VU from the video game "Disco Elysium," one of the smartest and best written titles I have ever played. I highly recommend it. It's a noir detective story, set in a wonderfully constructed world. Interactions with the characters that populate it reveal its troubled history. It was a more immersive experience than most books I have ever read.
Am I the only one who was stuck in the NE with income instead of ASSETS?
@Danny Sprung Nope. I immediately jumped to that conclusion. Took some time to dislodge it, too.
@Danny Sprung Of course went for INCOME first. Nice misdirect, that. It quickly became obvious it was wrong though.
Teresa, "Fixed" could go either way, but "net" is wildly more "income" than ASSETS. IMO, of course.
As an experiment (and to improve my going to bed time), I waited for the morning to start this, and it was fun and relatively quick. Quick is not bad. Of course, the first comment I read was someone complaining that it was too easy. I politely state that the “too easy” commenters might want to keep their opinions to themselves and let the rest of us enjoy the puzzle.
@Larry Berger Why would seeing someone else share their impression of a puzzle affect your enjoyment of it? That makes no sense to me. We're in many places with regards to experience, tenacity, knowledge and many other factors, so it seems natural that we would see things differently.
@Larry Berger I agree with you. If someone has to brag, then even posting their solve time is better than these 'too easy' comments, which add no value to the thread. Imagine people thrilled that they finished a puzzle without any lookups and enter the comments to celebrate. Only to see people who condescendingly let them know that their accomplishment isn't impressive. No upside.
Larry, et al, Comments in these comments aside, here is how solvers who use xwstats.com found this puzzle: Global Stats Difficulty Very Easy Median Solve Time 11:53 Median Solver 40% faster ⚡95% of users solved faster than their Saturday average. 81% solved much faster (>20%) than their Saturday average. 🐢5% of users solved slower than their Saturday average. 3% solved much slower (>20%) than their Saturday average. Many of us are disappointed that Saturdays don't seem to be as challenging as they used to be.
@Larry Berger and CB I imagine you two are relative newcomers. If not, your gripe reads that way. Please understand that people who complain that the puzzle is too easy are longtime solvers who expect a challenge on Saturday, as it was for thirty years until the NYT decided to offer the Games subscription separately and increase revenues by making the puzzles more "democratic". They have every right to express their displeasure that the puzzle is becoming too easy, and it has nothing to do with what your solving experience is. It's easy to impute motive on other commenters' words, but it's hard to do so accurately. Do you know the ad where Doug and the emu are on the golf course, and the golfer asks Doug to tell the emu to stop ripping up the green? Doug says, "I'll ask, but he won't listen."
Regarding saying a puzzle is "too easy", I've advocated posting one's relative completion time, for example "50% less than average" which is more informative and removes any implication of bragging or complaining. Let the facts speak for themselves.
@Larry Berger The Old Guard will complain about the easy trend for the foreseeable future. I doubt the times cares much about what the peanut gallery thinks.
Ways to improve my crossword performance: 1. Play Mario Karts (preferably on the NES) 2. Follow baseball for a season (there’s often RBI, and ATBAT seems to be a thing, as are the ALOU brothers) 3. Learn a bit about American education (I guessed APS today because of so many encounters with APBIO, but it’s still all Greek to me) and universities (normally LSU, ASU, today IRVINE) 4. Get to know US retail chains (is IHOP a shop? COSTCO was mercifully easy) 5. Eat American snacks (OREOS obviously, but also I’m not really sure of the difference between a taco and a tortilla, to my shame) Any other suggestions for fertile fields of study?
@Petrol IHOP is the International House of Pancakes. It's a casual restaurant chain with an emphasis on breakfast but open all day with non-breakfast items available.
@Petrol You might make a study of American roadkill: Armadillos (often on the half-shell, so to speak) Possums (opossums, actually) Raccoons (coonskin hats, eating habits such as washing everything) Deer The occasional vulture or coyote who took off too late And visit the RoadKill Cafe on Rte 66
@Petrol Don't forget about rappers, a favorite topic of puzzle constructors but my personal kryptonite.
@Petrol Don't eat American snacks!!! Just study them online.
I never knew about JAMAIS VU. Or perhaps I did but feel like I didn't? Now I'll spend the rest of the afternoon in a mild existential crisis.
@John Appleseed I believe the correct term is déjà vu, seen already.
Well, that was my fasted Saturday ever... came in at 53% faster than my average. Dang! Fun puzzle though! I liked a lot of the clues, especially for CUTANDPASTE, EASTERCANDY, and SANDCASTLES. For the clue unhelpful response to "Why?," I tried putting: thereisnowhy, which is a thing that my husband sometimes says, and so as these things go, I now sometimes also say. Sometimes it's for a silly thing like, "Um, Heathie, why did you just try to open the front door with your car opener? (True story! Hee! 😳) But sometimes it's actually for something bigger and it's oddly comforting in an accepting "sometimes these things just happen" sort of way. Anyhow, it didn't fit, so I'll move on! I struggled mightily to resist putting urKEL in at 42A. Thankfully, I prevailed! Cheers to the weekend, as I SKULK back to my LAIR. 😊
@HeathieJ Cousin to Yoda, your husband is? Ok, I’ll admit it. I did have urKEL in that space originally, as I tried to convince myself that the character may have inspired a term. Then I realized my mistake and felt like a, well, you know.
PB Saturday. Can the NYT please dial up the difficulty a bit? These puzzles have been all too easy of late. (Famous last words)
@Jay Agreed. I come to the NYT Saturday for a challenge. The last two weeks have been Wednesday difficulty, and other puzzles of recent vintage rate similarly. NYT is losing me. I no longer visit most Mon-Wed and most Thursdays, unless it is to work on an archive puzzle of 5+ years ago. This is not to brag about my abilities, there are very many here who are better solvers. I direct this at the Editors, who seem to want to encourage less experienced solvers rather than challenge veterans. But you don't get good unless you are challenged -- end rant.
Jamais vu I got immediately, only because it happened to me once over 10 yrs ago and I looked it up because it was so weird. I was driving home from a chorus practice at night, and suddenly the very familiar street looked like somewhere I had never been. It lasted all of 10-15 seconds, just long enough to be freaky. I was afraid something neurological had happened, like a TIA, but I felt fine and it never happened again!
Haven't smoked a Saturday puzzle like this in some time. Completion time 63% less than average. Some may complain "too easy", but breezing through a Saturday puzzle every now and then gives me a good feeling.
To people who complain that puzzles are too easy, and to those who are bothered by this, here is some personal data with my thoughts on this topic. I started solving in 2021 and working back through the archives while also keeping up with current puzzles. During 2025 I've worked the 221 2025 puzzles, and 324 puzzles from 2012/13. Below is the daily percent improvement in time for 2025 vs 2012/13. I was completed these puzzles during the same timeframe, so this is not a matter of improved skill. I will allow that there are occasionally answers in the old puzzles are made more difficult because of the gap between the publish date and my completion date, but these aren't common and wouldn't move the numbers much. Monday: 12% Tuesday: 17% Wednesday: 21% Thursday: 29% Friday: 50% Saturday: 47% Sunday: 37% I believe those who want a more difficult puzzle are likely having a similar experience. I enjoy the older puzzles that are more difficult, and would like to see more of them. Fortunately, I still have many years of the archive to work through. But, someday, when I run out of archived puzzles I'll lament that there are rarely new puzzles of equivalent difficulty. My wanting more difficult puzzles is not a boast. It's commentary on how the puzzles have changed in recent times, and hoping that if I and others make enough noise, maybe we'll get more of the puzzles that bring me more than a few minutes of enjoyment.
@Aaron Go back further and I think you'd agree they get even harder. BUT it's also true that puzzle construction has improved a lot, and some of the older, harder puzzles are more difficult because they are clunkier (there are obviously more tools available now, so not the fault of the constructors).
@Aaron I’m not going to argue over whether the newer puzzles are truly easier (on average) than ones from 10 years ago, but there are reasons other than topical clues that can make older puzzles more difficult to complete now. I think there is a certain kind of temporal consistency in editing style that changes slowly over time (and maybe quickly some times) such that one is more likely to recognize the types of deceptions used in the puzzles of today than older ones, which are likely to have different ways of cluing than we have become accustomed to. Sort of a puzzle zeitgeist.
"Easy" is a relative assessment. Yes for you, no for me, sort of for some. "Offensive" is relative as well. Shocking for some, meh for others, and why for the rest. Where would we be without the confetti of opinions that fill the Comments?
I'm always excited when my alma mater gets a mention in the crossword - zot zot zot!
@Brian LOL. One of the first ones I got and thought "There better not be any others with six letters!"
@Brian Go Anteaters! Those not fond of American college team names must admit that this one is hard to forget.
Fast fun. Didn't know the Rastas had their own flag. Does Sporcle have its own flag? Here's a good bar trivia factoid: Waluigi is a name that doesn't exist outside Nintendo. It is a portmanteau of the Japanese warui ("bad") and Luigi. In the SE, the last blank area, I paused as I thought about all the four letter things one could and should climb during a WWE match, to whit, the HEAD, LEGS, BUTT, BELT, BACK, NOSE, BROW, POST, NECK, ROOF, until he were above the clouds, like Hulk Hogan, as high as heaven itself. To be honest, I don't think there's a chance in all Wrestlemania that Hulk Hogan has gone to heaven. A case could be made that he went south in the afterlife. Speaking of Bar Trivia and Hogan, here's another factoid straight outa Chatgb(ut)t: Ben Hogan is the most common proper name as an answer overall in all the Bar Trivia games ever played in America. When I asked another chatbot what it thought of that, it said no, it's Gordie Howe, that other chatbot doesn't know what it's talking about.
Might be time for me to return to my home planet. Managed to work this one out, but it was a long workout for me. Actually surprised to see that most everyone else found it unusually easy. That's all on me. Oh... and was surprised to see that some quite familiar terms were debuts in this puzzle - JUSTBECAUSE EASTERCANDY SANDCASTLES Hmmm... Oh.. and of course my puzzle finds today. First a Thursday from December 7, 1995 by Michael S. Maurer. The 'reveal' in that one was a grid-spanner across the middle: 37a. FAMOUSLASTWORDS And a couple of the theme answers: COMEBACKSHANE THATSALLFOLKS And two more with the clues: "37 Across from a raven" NEVERMORE "37 Across from a witch" IMMELTING Here's that link: <a href="https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=12/7/1995&g=20&d=A" target="_blank">https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=12/7/1995&g=20&d=A</a> Might put another puzzle find in a reply. ...
@Rich in Atlanta As threatened - one of the strangest themes I've ever encountered. A Sunday from October 3, 1971 by Alfio Micci with the title: "Arithmetricks" Some clue and answer examples: "4" SEVENMINUSTHREE "12" ELEVENPLUSONE "14" EIGHTPLUSSIX "0" FIVEXZERO And some other answers: SIXOVERTWELVE SIXTYMINUSEIGHT TENMINUSTWO THIRTEENPLUSONE And there were more. Weird. Here's the Xword Info link: <a href="https://www.xwordinfo.com/PS?date=10/3/1971&g=7&d=D" target="_blank">https://www.xwordinfo.com/PS?date=10/3/1971&g=7&d=D</a> ....
@Rich in Atlanta It was a slog for me, too. Finally got the gold star after two sessions. Now I will look at your puzzle finds, but my solving brain is worn out.
Frequently I like to do the puzzle early, after making my coffee. This usually leads to a strong sense of JAMAISVU, particularly on Saturday mornings. As I sip my coffee, if I am lucky, some of the clues will stimulate a new sensation of "presque vu" or "just on the tip of my tongue". Finally, after the coffee has all been drained, I am joined by my old crossword puzzling friend, "deja vu", and am able to finish the puzzle. Puzzle solving requires a frame of mind and it's not always immediately available to me, but with some work I can usually find it. YMMV
@M&M. Don’t forget “vuja de”: that eerie feeling that none of this has ever happened before (per George Carlin!)
There were so many strong clues, with equally strong fills—how could so many of mine have turned out to be w r o n g? On the second pass, after getting completely tangled up, I finally had a few I knew were right—the British watering hole, Balzac's unfortunate heroine, The Bead Game guy, etc., and I reluctantly pried out the treacherous fills I had so confidently written in. Mildew is a fungus, right? Yes, but no. I must have had a dozen like that, but the old friends got me on track and I finished it. Thank you, Aidan, and congratulations, Akshay. It was a really, really good puzzle, but I must say it came at ACCOST. (I especially liked JAMAISVU—knew it had to be the opposite of deja vu, but needed crosses to uncover it.)
I must have seen JAMAIS VU before, but I don't remember where. Today's rabbit hole (I found no candy) was the Lion of Judah flag, which I knew from reggae album covers. It was the imperial flag of Ethiopia, and referred to claimed descent from King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba. The lion was removed from the flag after the overthrow (and then murder) of Haile Selassie and a subsequent Soviet-backed coup. The current government has replaced the traditional emblem with a golden pentagram on a blue disc, and any display of the Lion of Judah is considered monarchist, and can result in imprisonment.
Everyone has heard of déjà vu, but very few people have heard of jamais vu. Both can be seen in seizure aura, although the former is far more common. It is a fascinating phenomenon. One patient was in the shower, and when she stepped out, she freaked out because she thought that she was in someone elses' bathroom; she did not recognize it as her own. Another patient was in a chemistry lab and went on break. When he returned to the room, he asked "why did we switch labs?".
@DocP Thank you so much for this comment. Just yesterday, my mom couldn’t remember that she’s been drinking coffee for 30 years. She doesn’t have any other signs of dementia and wasn’t exhibiting any other signs of a stroke, so I let it go with intention to monitor. She does, however, have a seizure disorder. I’ve never noticed this particular aura presentation, but her seizures have changed in recent years. It brought us both a lot of relief to understand what might have been happening, so thank you. Sometimes it’s actually a good idea to read the comments!
@DocP I read Oliver Sacks’ Hallucinations recently and I remember his conclusion that both déjà vu and jamais vu may be experienced as part of temporal lobe epilepsy, but that for some people they may also come as part of their migraine aura? Not sure I remember the latter part correctly. I don’t have the book handy.
Am I getting smarter or are these puzzles getting easier? In the past, I could rarely solved the Saturday puzzle and the Friday ones were problematic as well. Sometimes I'd just get a few words. Lately I've been solving them both. This week I completed the Saturday puzzle in 36 minutes. Please tell me it's because I'm getting smarter.
@SrBruno It is. This may not have been the hardest Saturday ever, but it sure was tricky enough for a late week puzzle, for me, anyway.
@SrBruno If you’re using the app for the crossword, investigate the archives. Saturday puzzles a decade or more ago were more difficult by a lot.
@SrBruno, It’s because you’re getting smarter.
@SrBruno No doubt you have improved but to remind yourself of the difficulty issue bring up a an old Saturday puzzle from the archive. It will likely be extremely difficult compared to today. The Times is appealing to more people if they never publish puzzles that the majority won't be able to solve. So many here can't get used to it.
Loved this puzzle. Wonderful clues and answers. Thanks!
Clueing for the large middle stacks was superb. Bravo.
I found yesterday's and today's offerings to be very smooth Friday puzzles. Nice job here, Aidan and Akshay. I'd really like to see a Saturday puzzle.
@Barry Ancona I thought Friday and Saturday were advertised as equal difficulty. And I thought @Barry Ancona was always the advocate for the puzzle makers against the complaining comment makers.
@Barry Ancona I feel like we just had back-to-back excellent themeless Wednesday puzzles.
@Barry Ancona It's been a while now that tough Saturday puzzles are the exception. Easy sells subscriptions. It's time to get used to it.
Sometimes I'm drawn to interesting clues or entries in the puzzle, and sometimes it's the accompanying photo. While that is one ginormous sand castle in the photo, it's not the tallest one ever constructed. Guiness World Records has an entry for this category: - <a href="https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/tallest-sandcastle" target="_blank">https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/tallest-sandcastle</a> Probably of interest to no one but me, but there you go.
@RichardZ Thanks for the link. It seems a bit of a cheat to have used all that heavy construction equipment, but it's still pretty cool.
@RichardZ The one you linked was from 2021. The one from the picture was from 2017, and the constructors expected their glory wouldn't last long.
Great puzzle. Congratulations to Mr. Deshong and Mr. Seetharam for an excellent collaboration. Except for the very clever CUTANDPASTE, I filled in the middle with not too much trouble. I had no idea what a Purple hatted Nintendo is. One of two new words for me. So TIL WALUIGI and JAMAIS VU. I'm thrilled to know JAMAIS VU. WALUIGI not so much. I will probably not know the next Nintendo clue either. Fun clues. I had a good time tonight finishing up the puzzle. Thank you guys. Have a lovely week end y'all. Stay safe, cool, and hydrated. ✌️
So, just saying, I played Tetris on its original platform, DOS, when it first came out. Sure, it was ported to NES, but it was ported to everything. The question was basically Name a gaming or computer operating system. Didn't affect anything, though - nice fast Saturday.
Nice puzzle! My only grumble is 26A because NES is neither the only platform nor the original, and while that doesn't make it an incorrect clue, just a) I couldn't fill it until I had crosses, and b) it seemed odd that it was linked to TETRIS and not WALUIGI (which, incidentally, is a name I thought was Wailuigi ... not as in wail, just wai-luigi. Oops. But I did learn today that the name involves a portmanteau with a Japanese word that means his name is "bad Luigi". (Insert "the more you know" rainbow)
@Isabeau I don't have any grumble, since it doesn't say first or only platform. GAMEBOY or MSDOS (a stretch) are other valid answers. That said, I thought NES was the original platform - or at least the first one where it found any fame. Maybe the original was Soviet People's Computing Machine Interface Number 3.
@Isabeau Yesterday, because of the column photo, I was thinking about Encyclopedia Brown. Do you remember a story where the important clue was somebody(maybe a parrot?) saying "222b Baker Street"? That's all I can remember. (I hear the series is being rebooted as Wikipedia Brown.)
@Isabeau NES (a console that launched in 1985, based on one that came out in Japan in 1983 with a slightly different design and a different name) couldn’t be linked to WALUIGI because the character wasn’t created until a game on the N64 (a console that launched in 1996—the game in question was from 2000). Incidentally, the original platform for Tetris was apparently the Soviet-produced Elektronika 60 minicomputer.
@SP More like the stuff I don't remember. That series doesn't sound at all familiar, but from your description I'm guessing I read it. Thank you!!
Very good puzzle, great fill, impressively little glue. But, editors, is there a link to the Saturday puzzle?
@Solverado I just stopped by to say how I love your 'puzzl-name!' LOL
First a Friday I enjoyed then a Saturday? Low on niche trivia (what's with Mario) and high on word play. Do we have new editorial policy? More like this please.
@Lauren Yes, the new editorial policy is to make the puzzles as easy as possible to attract new subscribers. Glad it’s working on you.
Another nice, well-constructed, interesting puzzle. Kudos to the creators. Lots of good fill. But for the nth time in a row, far too easy for a Saturday. The NYT has watered down their flagship puzzle so much that my mindset around Saturdays has completely shifted. The trepidation has vanished. The sense that I'm going to be getting really stuck in has vanished. The sense of being challenged has gone. That's what happens when you run 50 easy Saturdays in a row. I know these comments bore a lot of people. But if we keep banging the drum maybe someone will take notice.
@Arthurs I agree with you. There’s no way my Saturday solve time should be less than half of Friday’s! It’s all about expectations: Saturday’s puzzle should be daunting, challenging, etc
Surprisingly easy for this day of the week! I was most challenged by the NW corner, cut off as it is from the major body of the puzzle. I did know CAROLE Lombard and the chain eatery (though I've never been to one)...so I was less hampered than I expected by the Nintendo, car ad, TETRIS reference, and "villainous group" as clued. Rabbit food? Oh, ha ha. (78 years old and still safe from Peeps!) For 29A I entered REPOSITION, but alas--not a single letter was correct. LOL If I am the one who TAMPS something down, you won't say it was a "pat", I guarantee. Every so often I mysteriously receive a SPORCLE update notice. Fave clue: 21D Buildings that aren't water-resistant! I NEED A trip to the beach! See all y'all tomorrow!
"I NEED A trip to the beach!" MOL, Biloxi Blues?
@Mean Old Lady What “chain eatery”? Since you mentioned the NW corner, I’m guessing you mean CROSTINI. That’s a dish, not a restaurant. I told Francis earlier that I had some tasty recipes for CROSTINI, but I see now that they’re actually for bruschetta. I’m not sure I know the difference. They sound very similar to me.
I thought on first pass this one was going to be very tricky to get out, and then it quite suddenly came together on the second or third go after ditching some incorrects, and ended up very quick! Nice one, some fun clues.
This has been an easy weekend, so far, so I'll have to figure out something else to do to stay occupied. I thought yesterday's puzzle was fairly light, and it only took me about a minute longer to finish today's, in just a little over half my average. I started in the NW, and didn't have too much trouble, though it wasn't that quick. Surprisingly, all three long downs got filled in instantly without crosses, and the long across answers didn't take too much longer. Loved EASTER CANDY for rabbit food, JUST BECAUSE. Managed to see through the obfuscation and misdirection for the most part, so the rest of it gradually fell into place. Thanks, Aidan and Akshay, I had fun.
31D reminded me of a George Carlin joke: vuja de The strange feeling that somehow none of this has ever happened before
@Mr Dave I had the same observation, 'cept I recall a comic saying walking into a room and having no idea how you got there. I don't remember who the comic was, but made me laugh, nonetheless.
I had "ah cmon" instead of 'aw cmon." I didn't know Luigi.
@Jonathan Those colloquial ones are just lazy editing IMO. They can come up with almost anything and it’s often impossible to know as a solver that you’ve guessed right. What sound is it? Aw, oh, ah…
@Jonathan I did the same thing. When I got the error message at the end, I thought that that was where my mistake was. But even when I fixed it, I still didn’t get the gold star until I realized that [You can see right through them] was not some old slogan for HANES underwear. (And thus did a quick solving time become 50% longer.) I wouldn’t go as far as John and Teresa, but this was a pretty bad crossing that depended on one’s knowledge of Mario characters. Not quite bad enough to ruin an otherwise excellent puzzle.
Jonathan and Teresa, AW CMON; nobody says ah cmon.
First, I’d call TIL a clipping, not a contraction. And it’s not poetic. But really TILL is the word and it’s not a form of until at all. It’s its own word. A battle I have given up (not really, as this comment shows).
@John you might appreciate our original clue: [Word that's un-abbreviated?]
@John I thought it was a clipping of “until”
Clue 51A should have been "Parts of cassettes", not "Parts of cassette players"
@Colby Hawkins You're probably right, but when I saw SPOO_ I did not think that deeply about the clue as I quickly plugged in the "L".
@Colby Hawkins I know this one! The parts of the cassette player are capstans, named after the parts on ships that raise the main sails and such. The spools are in the cassette, and fit over the capstans...or a Bic pen.
Star Wars is not science fiction. It's fantasy.
@MFSTEVE It has spaceships and pew pew and planets. It's SciFi.
@MFSTEVE Anything with interstellar travel in it is fantasy.
@MFSTEVE Just had this exact conversation yesterday during a discussion of Star Wars. I’m not a Star Wars fan and assumed it was because I didn’t like sci fi. Now I have to check out sci fi to see if I in fact like it!
Of course you need to be somewhat ‘smart’ to solve a Saturday. But it is definitely also an acquired skill. “Apple skins”. 100% knew it had to do with the technology company. Plus the go to fill like OLDS, TMI, NES. I know I’ve gotten dumber over the last 5 years. But my nyt crossword solving aptitude had gotten better. Haven’t done the xwords much lately. I barely remember to do Wordle. But did last week's Friday/Saturday. And This week’s. Certainly they have been more ‘approachable’ than late week puzzles I remember. But they are a fun diversion. Meaning they have been challenging, but not frustrating. A diversion that doesn’t seem mindless like doom scrolling. I wish I could do all late week puzzles at sub 25 minutes (a good time for me), but I can’t. But I’ll enjoy this while it lasts. I know this post makes no sense. But I’m gonna post it anyway. Oh. I did enjoy the puzzle. As well.