I'm too old for yet another playground retort.
@Aaron Figuring out which playground retort is correct is definitely my favorite recurring bit in the crossword - right above choosing between TCM and TMC.
@Aaron ... are not! ... i'll see myself out.
"Want to go rock climbing with me?" "Nah, you're boulder than I am." (These puns get a belayed reaction.)
@Mike Wait a minute while I piton my boots. (You roped me in today.)
@Mike I'm rappelled by your punning!
Alas, Giorgio Armani passed away today, so the clue was timely if not prescient.
@Andrew Zucker I appreciate the lengths to which the author went, to get reality to fit the publication of this puzzle.
Today I achieved a 200-day streak! This puzzle felt like it had a nice theme, but it seems a little confusing out of context. I erased several of my answers crossing theme entries because they didn't make sense before I found out what the theme was. Nice puzzle just was slightly difficult to take from a blank grid. Going for 365 days next!
@Harry And you did it in a country where everyone is upside down!
@Harry That’s terrific. Congrats!
Okay sorry, but it was Uncle Ben, not Spider-Man
@Kyle Had I had to fill in NEBELCNU I would have lost it. Totally lost it and probably never retrieve it.
@Kyle That was the first thing I thought as well. “What” popularized would have worked.
@Kyle Uncle Ben said it, but Spidey popularized it by putting it into action and making it his guiding ethos.
The Cinephile channel is TCM, not TMC
@Rick Box That tripped me up for a minute too, but since the crosser had to be SPIDERMAN (not typing that backwards), I let it go.
@Rick Box It's both. One is Turner Classic Movies, the other is The Movie Channel, owned by Showtime.
@Rick Box ...I think emus ate my first attempt. Sorry if this ends up duplicate. It's both. TCM is Turner Classic Movies; TMC is The Movie Channel, owned by Showtime.
@Rick Box I'm a little late to solving, but wanted to make someone (again!) brought up this repeated egregious error: TCM is for cinephiles TMC is a channel barely anyone has any more that shows recent tripe. If you need TMC for the grid, clue it likewise!
I'm really missing rebus puzzles, answers that are out side the grid, or inside the black squares, or some kind of twist that the last few Thursday puzzles have been lacking. No dis to the constructor, it was a nice puzzle, some fun clues, but it's time for a real Thursday. Pretty please?
@TMD Didn't we just have one last week? Only on Tuesday or Wednesday instead of Thursday?
@TMD I'm with you, I really love a quirky, unorthodox Thursday (but also Sunday!)
This was a weird experience for me. The puzzle was generally easy and I figured out the trick on its first, very obvious entry - having done the across pass first, I had enough crosses there to spot ROCK CLIMBER immediately. Being a (gym) climber myself helped, I guess. It was a bit of a letdown, to be honest. Granted, it took me a while to figure out the other entries, but realizing the gist of the trick I've been waiting for for a week on its first clue was an anticlimax. Still, the fill confused me in places, but not for fun reasons. I have no idea what a BIG TOP is or who the Flying Wallendas are, for example. In the end I needed several lookups to deal with the grid. Also, are we asking about friggin *corn syrup brands* now? Seriously... I'm glad I got it from crosses, but c'mon. Surely that's going too far with trivia? I haven't been that annoyed by a crossword entry in ages. On a positive note, the neighbors are in love with our puppy. Grown men and women are awwing over him on out walks 😍. Next week we're starting doggie kindergarten. I can't wait! Watching the dog learn new stuff is so awesome 🤩
@Andrzej a BIG TOP is also known as a circus. The Flying Wallendas were a family of acrobats in a circus <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Flying_Wallendas?wprov=sfti1" target="_blank">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Flying_Wallendas?wprov=sfti1</a> Congrats on the new puppy!
@Andrzej Speaking as a non-USian, I understand that Karo is not just any tradename but an iconic product, esp. in the southern US. Like Coke, it is /the/ exemplar for its category. Indeed, so much so that (again, like Coke) it is constantly fighting the lapse into genericity (like "zipper" and "aspirin", which are no longer US trademarks, having lost their brand specificity.) PS "Woof!" to the newest arrival.
@Andrzej KARO syrup is sometimes used to help babies with constipation, that’s how I know about it.
@Andrzej The Flying Wallendas were a family group of acrobats/trapeze artists who performed in major CIRCUS venues...(under The BIG TOP--the main tent, often featuring three rings with simultaneous acts performing at the same time. The Wallendas were such dare-devils that they performed without nets often. After a tragic accident during one performance, it was suggested that the name change to The Falling Wallendas. (Sorry!)
@Andrzej - Sorry, an American puzzle today.
@Andrzej 1) Under the BIG TOP is pretty in-the-language here; it's the title of a film from 1938, and a country song from a few years ago. And of course there's the film BIG TOP Pee-wee. 2) Don't know if I ever saw them but the Flying Wallendas are famous enough that they're pretty much the only trapeze artists I could put a name to. 3) I don't know of any other brand of corn syrup other than KARO. I bought a bottle once because a recipe called for it, and 10 years later threw it away almost full. It's also well-known in the film/tv/stage world for its use as fake blood. 4) I wish you could post pix or video of the new pup! Enjoy.
@Andrzej He's so cute! Thank you for sharing.
In my culinary experience, the only use of KARO corn syrup is to make pecan pie (for Thanksgiving). In general, one buys a half-bottle than one needs, and that sticky bottle lives in one's kitchen cupboard for years thereafter. You feel me?
@The X-Phile No, no, no. It's only until The Next Pecan Pie.....at Christmas.
@The X-Phile As a professional pastry chef, let me say that my experience is pretty similar--just replace the sticky 16oz. bottle with a sticky gallon jug. (Actually, my go-to recipe for brownies includes corn syrup, so I use it fairly regularly.)
@The X-Phile You're thinking of that jar of molasses I bought to make baked beans with. It haunts my pantry, along with those cowpeas I bought from an African market, sure I would use them for something. Wait, can I make the cowpeas into baked beans?!
@The X-Phile in my experience the only use of KARO is the NYT Crossword
@The X-Phile Almost my experience! Except it's Tate and Lyle's golden syrup and it's used on Pancake Tuesday, the only day I might eat a pancake. The US dedication to pancakes, especially for breakfast, is a continual mystery to me.
@The X-Phile Thank you! I was racking my brain trying to remember why Mom keeps a bottle of KARO in the pantry. Then there's the ancient bottle of Kirschwasser in the back of the liquor cabinet that is only used for the Christmas Eve cheese fondue.
@The X-Phile I feel you. I moved recently and threw out 3 bottles that had been in my cabinet unused for over 20 years since the person who baked pies moved out.
@The X-Phile Exactly. You never think of it until the next pecan pie or on occasion when you walk through the baking aisle and wonder who the heck is buying all the corn syrup and why.
I really had to grind this one out. Nothing seemed to come easily. I wrestled with several wrong answers that I was sure of: AnalyZE instead of AGONIZE, Rush instead of RACE, left instead of MALE, BAnKING instead of BACKING. Of course all this with rockcLimbeR instead of REBMILCKCOR, which just obliterated everything. I was pretty well beaten until I finally decided saw that I almost had WINDOW backwards. With that click, it all came into focus. But it was nip and tuck up to that point.
@Francis I had a hard time with it too, but I just figured my brain was really tired tonight. I also had BAnKING at first, but it didn't feel exactly right for the clue.
@Francis I kept looking at __hsaw and couldn’t figure out anything that could work. Window was what finally clued me in.
@Francis Lots of misleads here. CARGO vs CABIN, BANKING vs BACKING, RAN vs LED, CIRCUS vs BIGTOP, TRAM vs TBAR, TIRANA vs ANKARA, etc. Those thuds you kept hearing was me falling for every one of them and, of course, the crossings were little saboteurs instead of helpers...Brutal. You may now all tell me what a cinch this was, and how undeserving of a Thursday slot.
@Francis Very similar solve here. I stared at W_DN__ for quite a while, and couldn't think of a single word that would fit. Then the penny dropped.
Re: 26D; here's a cautionary/explanatory tale. For many years, my family has been stopping at a mom-and-pop smokehouse in the Adirondacks. Their products are all excellent, and their bacon is the best I've ever had. I was delighted when they started doing mail order, and sending Christmas gift baskets to my family members became my tradition. And then Rachel Ray featured them on her show. (She's a local.) Well, the orders started pouring in, and the owners decided that they could not keep up with the increased demand without sacrificing quality, so they shut down the mail order operation. In short, the business did not scale. Hope that helps.
@Grant Sad story. But it gives you an excuse to drive to the Adirondacks occasionally. Or are you, like me, getting close to the age when long drives aren't fun? We did a MASS to PENNA to DC to DEL seashore trip this summer and it was fun but also almost too much. Even with breaks.
Less than half my average Thursday time. The link to this discussion is broken on the iOS app (at least for me). I had to search for it…
@John link broken for me as well
@John Broken on the Android app too
So for those who say that I never criticize puzzles, this one didn’t rise to the occasion for me. First, an inconsistent theme—3 people and an object? Why word it as a reply to the revealer then, since a grapevine can’t talk? In any case what is “it”? The first three aren’t “its”. Then I thought maybe it’s the profession that scales, punnily, but Spider-Man isn’t a profession and a grapevine certainly isn’t. I’ll grant a certain leeway to a tentative revealer if the theme is really imaginative or creative, but an obviously backwards theme doesn’t fit that bill. Second, the fill—about average difficulty for me—was only meh. An awful lot of glue I think and nothing really very interesting on accessory entries. Babe Ruth? Noah’s Ark clued in a cute but trite way? Yawn. My only bright spot was GOMEZ Addams who for me will always be the incomparable John Astin (no offense Raul Julia and Nathan Lane), who also gets extra points for adopting and raising Sean Astin (Samwise). Otherwise, sorry, this one just didn’t get off the ground.
@SP I’ll backtrack just a bit on my critique, after a bit of thought, maybe “it” is the entry itself. But even then the clue should read “to which the answer for (entry numbers) is a resounding ‘Yes’”—and I still don’t like three people and an object.
@SP 🤜🏽🤛🏽 I'm with you on this. Don't be sorry about being critical. Embrace it and let it empower you 💪🏽 That approach does wonders for me 🤣
@SP I think you are overthinking it. There are four answers that scale (or climb up) the grid itself. They all physically scale it, and I think each one worked well visually. No musical scale, no bathroom scale, just answers that crept up the grid. Frankly it took me a while to see, finally got the obviously (to me) climbing WINDOW. The other ones were (to me) long enough to stay hidden until the bitter end. I enjoyed it.
@SP Agreed! Also, I think window washers generally start at the top and work their way down throughout the day!
A person can discover the trickery and thrill in the larger process of solving but then get completely stymied by the small but critical difference between TCM and TMC.
1. With great power comes great responsibility the proper answer is Uncle Ben TO Spiderman! Had to get that off my chest!! However being a circus fan loved Big Top. Wanted to put Barry Bond not Babe Ruth but land of talking animals and magic clued one of my favourite fantasy book series Narnia.
@Megan Uncle Ben said it, but Spider-Man (my autocorrect insisted on that lol) is the reason we know about it.
@Megan I agree. SPIDERMAN is fine as the answer if it's referring to the title of the comic book or film, but then the clue should be, "What popularized the proverb..." rather than "Who popularized the proverb..." Spider-Man the character didn't popularize this proverb, either within the world of the comic book or film, or in our world. The answer should be UNCLE BEN or STAN LEE.
@Megan @Isabeau @Bob agreed. My first thought was Stan Lee, which was too short. Regarding autocorrect's knowledge of Spider-Man: I was killing time in a hotel room Sunday night, and ended up watching a few episodes of Big Bang Theory, including one where the group discussed Batman and Man-Bat. ;) <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZzFFkYdjWA" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZzFFkYdjWA</a>
I’m surprised there isn’t more discussion of the spooky coincidental nature of 60A coming on the exact day that he passes away. I realize there are coincidences all the time between crossword puzzles and the “real world,” but that one struck me as quite… remarkable.
@David G The NYT killed Armani to promote their crossword puzzle, I am sure of it.
I still remember my first Thursday gold star. I came here so proud and read that it was apparently a very easy Thursday, not representative. So I'm here about 5 years later to say I got a gold star and PB with this one, at 11:54. I have stopped measuring myself against what's "easy" for others (I still don't know many US references) and so should you. Just wanted to say it really is a learnable skill, in case you're not there yet.
@K Thanks for the motivation! Today's puzzle made me feel defeated and I came in at well over my average, with several lookups. Helps to hear that I can improve with time!
Fitting tribute to Giorgio Armani, who passed away today.
@Anand Coincidence, they couldn't have planned that ahead, right? Or maybe his health was declining and it was clearly near the end?
The coincidence of having 60-Across in today's puzzle is rather eerie!
I just heard on the radio that Georgio Armani passed away today. I will have to rethink my lifelong ambition to be mentioned in a New York Times crossword puzzle.
@Roberta This was the 46th appearance of ARMANI, so there is little causal connection to his passing. That being said, I hope you find a way to be included 45 times.
I just saw the news that Giorgio Armani has passed away at 91. Fitting tribute for him to be in today's puzzle. <a href="https://www.vogue.com/article/giorgio-armani-the-italian-designer-who-changed-the-shape-of-fashion-has-died?utm_source=firefox-newtab-en-us" target="_blank">https://www.vogue.com/article/giorgio-armani-the-italian-designer-who-changed-the-shape-of-fashion-has-died?utm_source=firefox-newtab-en-us</a>
@Niki B Just came here to mention that…😢
I'll die on the hill that Sunset Boulevard can't be officially classified as a film noir... but I suppose I get how "satirical Gothic melodrama" probably wouldn't fit on any day but a Sunday
@Jack Yeah, I didn't quite seem like NOIR to me, either. I haven't seen it but I almost always identify NOIR with crime.
@Francis Never saw the movie, but in the musical based on it I believe Norma commits a crime.
@Jack Well, if Wikipedia says it is, it must be, right? ;)
@Jack I too think of it as something more than noir, but several sources lump it in there. On Rotten Tomatoes it's #5 in their top 100 noirs, after Laura Shadow of a Doubt The Maltese Falcon The Third Man
@Jack I agree. And there are SO many movies that are actually noir that this is inexcusable.
@Jack I will allow that Sunset Boulevard is not a film noir if you will allow that Star Wars is not science fiction.
Also I must say: the less time I have to spend thinking about investors and the "growth at all cost" mindset that ruins most businesses, the better.
This one is an all-time fave. Fun solve with a clever, well constructed theme and rewarding “aha” moment. Scrabbling success!
I know it wasn't planned, but I'm surprised to see Karo in the puzzle, after seeing INVERT as a kind of sugar in yesterday's Strands. My mother was a fabulous cook and baker, as well as a teacher of home ec and chemistry (tiny school in the 1930s). One of her specialties was a chocolate fudge that had a creamy fine-grained texture I've not encountered since. Her secret was 2T of light Karo syrup. She explained that Karo was an invert sugar that changed the way the sugar crystalized in the fudge. So Hi Mom!
@Margaret from Brooklyn Turbino....I had to ask AI to unscramble it for me....😔
I’m neither a beginner nor an expert solver, and I enjoyed this puzzle. Lots of clever clues, I thought.
I came in through the bathroom window. Hope the front door opens soon. (Did a URL go Down instead of Up?)
@Barry Ancona Didn't anybody tell Deb? Didn't anybody care?
@Barry Ancona I came in through that weird little door in the back alley by the dumpster. I didn't realize they'd left a window open, but I'm probably too short for that anyway.
If using a computer, it's wise to create a bookmark to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/spotlight/daily-crossword-column" target="_blank">https://www.nytimes.com/spotlight/daily-crossword-column</a>
@Barry Ancona I hope you didn’t trip over the scale.
I had DISH instead of DIRT which gave me HBO instead of TMC.
51:30, my first Thursday gold star!🌟 With a little help from the boyfriend, but who's counting....
@Olivia Grace "I get by with a little help from my friends..." 🎶
Look at me, Secretary Kennedy. My hand is up. I’m one of those old people who has been denied a COVID shot. One pharmacy hadn’t received the new vaccine as of September 3. A major chain said I needed a prescription, even though I’m 75. But even if I got a prescription, they still couldn’t vaccinate me because some committee had to meet. So you’re wrong. Eligible people are being denied COVID vaccines. And we won’t forget.
@Robin Schulberg I’m not 65 but trying to get it on a different condition. The pharmacy just doesn’t have it yet, they said.
@Robin Schulberg It is heartbreaking to hear this. But here's the acid question: how did you vote last year? You don't need to tell us but it might affect how you respond to your current endangerment. If you helped elect the current regime, it seems only fair that you try to undo this. Protest and demonstrate if you can. If not, make phone calls, write letters, hold voting "bees" for registering and organizing. Do what you can.
A contestant came onto that budding entrepreneur show with a fish processing invention, and the very first question was . . . . . Yes, but DOESITSCALE?!
Best moment for me was seeing the first long backward word. I have no idea why, but there is a tender place in my heart for backward words Even post-solve, when my eyes fell on DOOR, my brain called out “Rood!” I knew it was something but forgot what, then found that it’s an old term for a quarter of an acre. That there is a term for a quarter of an acre just seemed so random to me that once again – and I don’t know how many times a day this happens – I fell in love with humanity. I liked the echoes of the climbing theme: • TBAR. • NOAH’S ARK, which rose as the downpour continued. • CABIN as part of an airplane. I liked that moment when I looked at NOTATE and saw it as two words, as in, “That’s a very nice modern art museum, but it’s NO TATE!” I liked seeing BIG TOP, because the constructor said in his notes to a previous puzzle that he worked as a circus juggler for ten years. So, smiles on top of the fun of filling in. Thank you for a lovely start to the day, Colin!
@Lewis And a rood is 40 square rods. Now you can reel that off.
@Lewis I just wanted to make sure you saw this from a comment abutting yours: "Lewis gets to the heart of the beauty and sheer difficulty of being human like no other writer ... and he writes with humor, compassion, and love."
@Lewis "Rood" is also a Middle English word for "cross" (as in "crucifix"), which survives today in the church architecture term "rood screen," a term which is on the tip of everyone's tongue: <a href="https://tiny.cc/fy3s001" target="_blank">https://tiny.cc/fy3s001</a> Now my next task of the day is to research whether the etymologies of those two words are connected--perhaps roods are the quarters of an acre sectioned off by an imaginary cross?
60A - High End Suit, appearing in today’s puzzle the same day Giorgio ARMANI passed away. RIP good sir!
Unplanned, I'm sure, but let's appreciate the homage paid in 60A.
Uncle Ben Popularized "With great power..." NOT spiderman :/
@Chris - I was thinking the correct answer should be Stan Lee. :-)
@Chris In this case, SPIDER-MAN is the name of the movie, not the character. PAG is correct, the phrase first appeared in Amazing Stories, before Spidey had his own book. Stan Lee put it in a text box, not attributed to a character.
I was confused initially when ROCKCLIMBER didn't work but I figured the answer would reveal itself eventually. Sure enough, after several crosses the answer became obvious, and then I rapidly filled in the rest of the themers. I had to let go of TCM for Turner Classic Movies and to with TMC for The Movie Channel, even though cinephiles watch the former moreso than the latter. However, that was the only way the SPIDERMAN was going to scale that wall. Fun puzzle!
Because I knew or had heard of all the answers and got the theme early on, I was able to complete this puzzle in 48% less time than average. Or perhaps I just rose to the occasion.
My Partner and I live on the seventeenth floor of a high-rise co-op--really nineteenth, counting the lobby and mezzanine. (Sorry to brag, but the view is stunning.) The last couple weeks, there has been a spider clinging (outside) to the living room window! How did it get there? Did it climb? Was it carried there by a passing tern? However it did, in the past several weeks, IT HAS GROWN BIGGER!--it is quite fat by now. So it is obviously getting enough to eat. Also, it is regularly, but not always, visible--does it hide out of sight just under the window frame? Does it wander over to see what is happening in 1711? "Is Alt-emo a thing?" the puzzle made me wonder. I typed "alt-emo" into the search box of Youtube, and got a smattering of hits, none of which I felt inspired to follow (there was an "alt-emo makeup tutorial," in two parts, totaling over an hour. It had been reposted from Tik-tok.) I have never heard the revealer. I can imagine someone saying it, just someone I would never want to meet. Like @EH and several other posters, I found this an unsatisfying puzzle. But I found I could spell backwards.
@Bill We once had a huge spider living in a massive web in our bedroom window. It was awesome. No insect could get in. One day there was a hole in the web and the spider was gone. Something must have ate her/him 😢
@Bill The revealer isn’t an expression I’m familiar with, either, but it’s apparently a thing. Someone said that if you watch Shark Tank, you hear it a lot. I don’t watch Shark Tank. It seems like it’s specialized lingo for a specific segment of the population. I’m not in that segment. I thoroughly believe that phrase exists, but it’s not part of my working vocabulary. I’m not sure of exactly what it means in a business context. Apparently, I’m not the only one. And I can’t get too enthused about a puzzle that hangs its hat on something that doesn’t seem common to me. (Note: To me, not to everyone. I’m sure many business people out their find it perfectly normal.)
@Bill Here's a little, 1:30", praiseful Improvisation by Francis Poulenc, which hangs by a tenuous thread to today's theme, and which might be described as "alt-Czerny": <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHp1pkBmdHM" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHp1pkBmdHM</a>
@Bill I keep reading alt-emo as alt-Elmo. Which brings up a picture in my head of an Alt-Elmo-Country-Punk. I wonder what Gemini would do with that prompt?
@Bill For information on your little friend: <a href="https://www.wbez.org/curious-city/2021/12/16/how-do-spiders-survive-on-chicago-high-rises" target="_blank">https://www.wbez.org/curious-city/2021/12/16/how-do-spiders-survive-on-chicago-high-rises</a>
@Bill The spider is full of eggs; keep your eye out for an egg sac! The spider will die after creating her magnum opus, but if no WINDOW WASHERS interfere, the babies will emerge in Spring. (Haven't you read _Charlotte's Web_? Aside from the fanciful part, it's accurate as natural history, right down to Charlotte's name: A. Cavatica.
@Bill I had one in an upstairs window of my house last fall. It was interesting to watch her work on the web. Once, a large leaf got tangled up, and she had to do a lot of work to cut it out, and then make repairs.
@Bill From Charlotte's Web I learned that when spider eggs hatch the baby spiders spin out some silk and let the wind take them somewhere else. [I just did a little search; it's called "ballooning". ] I'm guessing that's how your spider got to the 19th floor. As long as it's finding food there's no reason for it to leave.
What are the odds that ARMANI showed up in this puzzle on the day of his death?!?!?! He was a guy who knew how to scale up. R.I.P.
@Lisa Marshall There have been 11,610 puzzles since Will Shortz became editor. ARMANI has been an answer 42 times. So 42 chances in 11,610. Or approximately 1 in 276.
@Lisa Marshall. Thank you Lisa…this was bugging me all yesterday, wondering if anyone else noted it.
When I saw the clue for 2D first thing, I thought we were being insulted...and then I got the REBM sequence (after I took out and restored IMMUNE) I thought we were being hosed...and then I calmed down and saw LIMBER before me! The heavens opened, doves and angels floated down on a rainbow path while bluebirds sang, ...and so on and so forth. However, DHubby could not explain DOES IT SCALE ...and I don't want to call our financial advisor with a question from the NYT Xword puzzle, so Oh well. Got the puzzle, didn't "get it" and can't be made to care. Might have to read the Column. Need more coffee.
@Mean Old Lady DOES IT SCALE? Does the business model still work if your business increases by a significant amount?
This might be my favorite clue ever: 63A Locale for a couples cruise?
@Cal Gal It is a funny clue. So were [Wild couples cruise?] (Adam Vincent, 4/16/24) and [Couples cruise vessel?] (Elizabeth Gorski, 1/19/08). There might have been others that clued some variant of NOAH’S ARK. I’m fine with the NYT recycling good clues now and then. There will always be someone who hasn’t seen that clue before, in the same way that when an orchestra performs something like Beethoven’s 5th, there’s always someone in the audience who has never heard it live. But I do like to see credit where it’s due, whether that’s the wonderfully talented Liz Gorski or Will Shortz and his team.
I don't think this useless fact has been mentioned. SCALE also has a meaning in software production. It's used to mean, suppose this app or web site suddenly gets really popular. Will it be able to handle a sudden increase in demand graciously, or will it crash? Of course, that has no relevance here, and as a purveyor of useless trivia, I thought I should point that out.
@Francis FWIW here is what Gemini AI says; In the business world, scaling means increasing a company's revenue at a much faster rate than its increase in costs and resources. This creates a favorable profit margin because each new sale or customer adds less to the operational costs than it adds to the revenue. A scalable business can accommodate higher volumes of business without fundamentally changing its operations or structure, leading to enhanced profitability, market reach, and overall business value. Since I'm retired I find this useless but interesting. :)
The puzzle is what it is. But NYT decided to insert a banner at the top of my puzzle (encouraging more family members to subscribe), which made solving the possible significantly more difficult. Having to constantly scroll up and down to get the puzzle onto the screen was not fun. Please consider the size of laptops when deciding to insert an additional 3/4" of vertical space. It makes a difference.
@David Totally agree! This is an unwelcome and very rude implementation of a banner, with no way to minimize.
@David Y'all gotta complain to the tech folks, though I doubt they have much sway over the advertising department. email customer team <a href="mailto:NYTGames@nytimes.com">NYTGames@nytimes.com</a>
@David Working the puzzle online seems generally more problematic than working it in the newspaper. There are the banners I've clicked on inadvertently and have to back out of, there are the crosses I need to check before entering an answer and have to keep scrolling the lists of clues up and down, there is the quirkiness of the software deciding that I mean to change direction when I don't and having to figure out where the letters wound up that should have been going in one direction and instead flew all over the puzzle, dropping in letters where I never meant them to go, and then I have to remember to find and take them out because they are not part of that fill and are taxing my brain like so many red herrings. My lord, it's a wonder I ever finish one of the darn things, and I only keep on truckin' because I do love them.
@David Even worse on mobile browser screens of course. And it doesn't go away after viewing the ad either. However I just found that the element picker in uBlock Origin made it go bye-bye, nice and easy.
Took a while for the SCALEs to fall from my eyes and understand the trick. This would have made a very nice Wednesday puzzle. But the inclusion of GRAPEVINE made me think of the opening to a great 1980s movie. Yeah, I'm old. <a href="https://youtu.be/az-VjJLwn2I?si=e-kqr2XrN545ZhJN" target="_blank">https://youtu.be/az-VjJLwn2I?si=e-kqr2XrN545ZhJN</a>
@Vaer Yay Big Chill— didn’t even have to open the link. What a cast!
@Vaer that brings back such great memories. We listened to that soundtrack every Saturday morning as we cleaned our house. I still love the soundtrack and play it on roadtrips 🥰
@VaerThanks for the memory. Great movie, cast, and soundtrack. Favorite scene: Breakfast with the boxes of running shoes fading to each house guest, with Jeff Goldblum as the last to appear and he asks if he is the first one up. Favorite line: Nobody said it was gonna be easy, at least no one ever said it to me.
@Vaer I know that Kevin Costner played Alex (as the corpse, and in flashbacks which were all cut). I'm curious if the flashbacks are available online. Oddly, I'm not sure I want to see them; I think Kasdan was right to cut them.
@Bob T Agreed that it was probably right to cut his scenes. If memory serves, Kasdan gave him his role in Silverado to "atone" for that. (Loved Linda Hunt in that.)
I thought this was great. Paused a bit to remind myself that it's Thursday, then did my usual passes, skipping over the long ones until I had something more to hold onto, and that's when I realized something strange, not sure what, was going on. How could I be so off base with so many long answers? I think VINE was first, and then the rest fell pretty quickly. My only real holdup was DIsh.ANKAsA, hMC. Speaking of KARO syrup, we have a couple of jars in the pantry, probably for a recipe we wound up not making, but is there even another brand out there? I enjoyed 17A, but my favorite BABERUTH quote was his reply when a reporter asked him what he thought about getting paid more than the President. "Hell, I had a better year than he did". Thanks!
@Jack McCullough Given that the president was Herbert Hoover, he was probably quite accurate. Now, the freshest rookie makes more than the president. And probably, deservedly so.
@Jack McCullough I went to the supermarket this morning, and other than the generic house brand, Karo was it.
Once in a while, when I think I’ve seen every trick in the book, a new one comes along. This was not that day. Sometimes I miss being that newbie who sees repeated tricks for the first time, and marvels at them. Alas, the totally fresh ideas are few and far between. There have been 47 puzzles in the history of he NYT that required backwards answers, plus another half dozen or so that had a backwards trick within certain answers. One puzzle required ALL the downs to be entered as “ups.” It was pre-Shortz, so you can’t solve it via the NYT archive, but you can if you’re a member at Xword info.com. For Xword info members, here’s the unsolved grid: <a href="https://www.xwordinfo.com/Solve?psdate=5/20/1990" target="_blank">https://www.xwordinfo.com/Solve?psdate=5/20/1990</a> For everyone else, here’s the completed grid for that puzzle: <a href="https://www.xwordinfo.com/PS?date=5/20/1990" target="_blank">https://www.xwordinfo.com/PS?date=5/20/1990</a>
@Steve L There's nothing new under the sun, but we keep coming back, hoping that we might be mistaken.
@Steve L thanks! Any puzzles that used the diagonals?
@Steve L -- I loved your first two paragraphs!
@Steve L Thanks for the link. I wonder how XWI got permission to republish NYT puzzles. Do they pay a royalty?
I felt clever when I solved it but somehow backwards words in a crossword don't feel that fun to me although I love just about every other Thursday trick! Still, I appreciate the hard work in construction and any puzzle with NARNIA in it makes me happy. Recently I have been re-listening to a podcast on C.S. Lewis's book "The Great Divorce" (which is not about divorce!), a book with so many layers and such depth that it's worth a read (or re-read). Lewis gets to the heart of the beauty and sheer difficulty of being human like no other writer. And (IMO) although he's a Christian apologist, his themes and insights are pretty universal and he writes with humor, compassion, and love. Maybe you'll enjoy it: ❤️<a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/5P4tYS815akoMPRNQ3TsU2" target="_blank">https://open.spotify.com/show/5P4tYS815akoMPRNQ3TsU2</a>
@Niki B If you think this quite simple bit was unfun, you should go back into the archives and find the ingenious puzzles of Charles M. Deber (I hope I am remembering his name correctly.)
Yes - I heard about Armani while I was doing the puzzle. ****insert twilight zone music here**** But I don't want it to take away from Colin Ernst's lovely Thursday effort. Have a great day!
Especially gratifying "aha" moment!