As a non-Ameican who only speaks English as a second language, I found this one of the toughest Tuesdays I have ever seen at the NYT. The abundance of trivia (which crossed, in places) and unknown expressions (BONES UP ON???) in the fill hindered my solve, as did being unfamiliar with a JUG BAND. I resorted to several lookups, in the end. I haven't read the other comments yet but I imagine it's one of these puzzles that gets labeled as "super cute and super fun" by its most intended, American audience, but gets a shrug, at best, from some of us outside the US. November 11 is when Poland celebrates regaining independence in 1918. Poland was one of the strongest regional powers in Eastern Europe in the 16th century, but rapid decline as a result of wars, famine and egoism of its nobles in the 17th and 18th centuries led to its disappearance from the map in the 1790s, when Poland was partitioned by its more powerful and aggressive neighbors: Russia, Prussia, and Austria. The defeat of Germany (successor to Prussia) and Austria-Hungary (successor to Austria) in WW1, and Russia's descent into revolution allowed Poland's resurrection, with American support offered by Woodrow Wilson. November 11 is our biggest national holiday. We don't have a holiday for veterans, specifically. Our armed forces celebrate their holiday on August 15, the anniversary of the 1920 battle in which Poland repelled a Soviet Russian invasion: <a href="https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Warsaw_(1920" target="_blank">https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Warsaw_(1920</a>)
@Andrzej as an American, I found it kinda meh and harder than a typical Tuesday.
@Andrzej Didn’t think about it too much but the theme is certainly as about Americana as you can get.
Hi Andrzej -- I just read this poem by the great Pittsburgh poet Jack Gilbert, on the subject of Polish bravery against its invaders. Here's the poem: The Abnormal Is Not Courage The Poles rode out from Warsaw against the German Tanks on horses. Rode knowing, in sunlight, with sabers, A magnitude of beauty that allows me no peace. And yet this poem would lessen that day. Question The bravery. Say it’s not courage. Call it a passion. Would say courage isn’t that. Not at its best. It was impossib1e, and with form. They rode in sunlight, Were mangled. But I say courage is not the abnormal. Not the marvelous act. Not Macbeth with fine speeches. The worthless can manage in public, or for the moment. It is too near the whore’s heart: the bounty of impulse, And the failure to sustain even small kindness. Not the marvelous act, but the evident conclusion of being. Not strangeness, but a leap forward of the same quality. Accomplishment. The even loyalty. But fresh. Not the Prodigal Son, nor Faustus. But Penelope. The thing steady and clear. Then the crescendo. The real form. The culmination. And the exceeding. Not the surprise. The amazed understanding. The marriage, Not the month’s rapture. Not the exception. The beauty That is of many days. Steady and clear. It is the normal excellence, of long accomplishment.
@Andrzej I was thinking the same — and I’ve spent most of my life in the States. Not once in my life have I heard the expression BONES UP ON, had never heard of JUG BANDS, and only knew of Lincoln’s headgear as a TOPHAT, sans STOVE. None of this is the constructor’s fault by any means, but curiously, almost every time there’s a high concentration of these rather endemic expressions, there’s also baseball trivia. Again, not a fault with the puzzle per se, but clearly you and I are not its intended audience. And I can forgive the NYT for indulging regional interests every now and then. I’m not the kind of person who LOSES IT when the timer threatens to meaningfully affect my average solve time, but between my knowledge gaps in Americana, my biblical ignorance, and a general disconnection with the theme, my solve was a MESS. No biggie — sometimes there’s a Friday or Saturday that fits too well with my hobbies and interests, to the point where I feel bad with people who don’t share them. It’s ok to be on the other side of the epistemic coin now and then.
@Andrzej as I completed this puzzle I thought of you and how much this was the essential anti-Andrzej puzzle. While JUG BANDs are cute (especially when populated by Muppets), and as you know one must BONE UP on American trivia to be successful at NYT crosswords, I didn’t particularly love this one either.
@Andrzej I found it harder than the usual Tuesday even with a gimme answer of Omaha in there! Some of those terms are very old sayings or words such as Jugbands and Bones up on which is something my parents said.
@Andrzej This was one of those where I never had to stop writing. I didn't try to solve the puzzle in any order, just jumped around, filling in what seemed right, and made only a few mistakes. No look-ups, and no big problems. When I saw the UG I knew there would be a J. That may make me the All American Solver, or it may mean that I was lucky, but either way, the puzzle doesn't deserve all the dissing it got. (New word for me. I hope I got it right).
Is "go GAGA over" about losing temper, as the column says? I thought it was the opposite -- enthusiasm rather than anger.
@Isabeau Yeah, for me too "gaga" would imply over-the-top enthusiasm
@Isabeau definitely always used it for enthusiasm also.
@Isabeau I definitely equate “going gaga” with enthusiasm. I also equate “going ape” with enthusiasm. Online dictionaries seem to agree unanimously with the first. They’re split on the second— so I guess “ape” can mean either enthusiasm or anger, depending on the context.
Isabeau — as you suspect, going GAGA over something has nothing to do with getting angry.
I can't put my finger on it, but I didn't really like this one. Some odd clues or too many names I guess. Idk just didn't jive with me.
@Phil Sorry for the pedantry, but it's jibe, not jive. That said, I share your sentiment.
@Phil Agreed. For me, it was too many phrases and proper nouns unfamiliar to me or too difficult to get even with crosses. And I should add this was true for both the entries and the clues themselves
@Erik Well, they're the same thing, for all intensive purposes.
Camilla is William and Harry's STEPMUM. I don't know what MUVER is, however. Off the plank for Stulberg and Shortz! Arrgh!
@Captain Kidnap Right? Putting that O there rather than I felt very off.
Nice puzzle, but 46D?? Could the constructor not choose an American family for this clue? Shouldn't the answer be STEPMUM, not MOM, for a British family?
@Paul How long did you stare in frustration at “muver” before it occurred to you to swap the “U” for an “O”?
This is a Tuesday crossword? I might be in trouble this week...
@Michael On the note of tough Tuesdays, check out August 18, 2015. It’s got some pretty tough clueing overall by the present standards (aside from the theme, this would run on Friday or Saturday nowadays), but man, that upper-left corner absolutely wrecked me. Anyway, all that to say: I agree today’s puzzle was tougher than usual…but I also kinda wish they’d still publish the occasional early-week puzzle that’s waaay harder than usual, just to keep things interesting.
Re: 63A The year was 1979, I was a third year student at the University of Michigan Law School, and as I walked around the campus I would regularly practice the BONES, commonly used in Irish music. One day I had an on-campus interview with Legal Aid of Western Michigan, and after we spent some time talking about the law and other things, they asked me what I liked to do outside of work. I told them that I played music, including guitar, pennywhistle, and the BONES. "BONES? What's that?" Well, I happened to have them in my pocket, so I took them out and started playing. It wasn't the only factor, but having the most unusual interview they had ever seen was maybe one factor in getting that job. 46 years later, not in Michigan anymore, but still loving my Legal Aid job. Thank!
@Jack McCullough What a great story! (The best ones are the true tales, IMHO.) There was a time when a grad school prof advised, "You need a life outside of your profession." He was right on many levels, but at the time I was taken aback... Live and Learn!
I came to the column expecting complaints that it was too easy, even for a Wednesday, and instead I'm seeing the opposite. I am an experienced solver, but not a wizard, and this one confirms my theory that connections that are hard to some will be easy enough for others. The order in which the fills are made probably has more of an impact than we are aware of, and a wrong answer can push us in the wrong direction for more than it should. I thought this was a fine puzzle, Jacob. I'll be happy to see you back soon.
@dutchiris “this one confirms my theory that connections that are hard to some will be easy enough for others” Absolutely, the wavelength factor is YUGE in determining subjective puzzle difficulty. Personally, I finished 40% over my recent Tuesday average, and that’s consistent with how I felt during the solve — there weren’t any entries that stood out as particularly difficult (in contrast to the upper-left corner in the Tuesday offering from August 18, 2015, which I recently encountered in the archives), and I didn’t lose much time to confidently-wrong guesses, but my overall progress felt noticeably plodding compared to the usual Tuesday. Anyhoo: I agree that it was a perfectly fine puzzle.
Random thoughts: • Nice to see Jacob, maker of 35 Times puzzles, back after a four-year absence. • The puzzle’s stars to me were the theme answers, all colorful – look at them! Fresh, too, with two NYT answer debuts and two once-before. • Two lovely PuzzPairs© involving backward answers: GAGA and a backward NUTS, and TSARS and a backward IVAN. • I liked the cluing, which was a step thornier than Monday cluing, but not as tricky as on Friday/Saturday. For example, [Holly locales, in a Christmas carol] for HALLS. A simpler clue from a Monday past is [Passages], and a Saturday clue from the past is [Passages in a long story?]. • Have you ever heard a good spoon player, whose sound is crisp and mesmerizing? For many years we had one of the best here in Asheville -- Abby The Spoon Lady, who busked downtown. Please, give her a listen: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nLmM9kcBKs&list=RD_nLmM9kcBKs&start_radio=1" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nLmM9kcBKs&list=RD_nLmM9kcBKs&start_radio=1</a> . I came into the box today blank and neutral, and have left it alive and buoyant. Thank you for a splendid outing, Jacob!
A slow Tuesday for me. I was surprised 46D is STEPMOM instead of STEPMUM given the clue refers to a British family
Wow. Glad some enjoyed it. In my opinion, what a ridiculous and contrived puzzle, too nuanced, and perhaps a tad pedantic and clever for its own sake. Anyways, did not enjoy it. To whom it may concern: I'm allowed to not enjoy it and am exercising my right to say as much. You may disagree, but I don't think that really matters to me. Have a great day!
@Kristopher Why would I disagree? We all dislike some puzzles (well, maybe not Lewis 😃), and it sure is OK to say so. I wasn't a fan of this one, either. If you don't like pedantic and clever though, you'd hate me 🤣. At least I'm not terribly nuanced!
@Kristopher You left out the raspberry at the end!
Okay, if you're going to clue it "Camilla vis a vis William and Harry", then I'm going to enter STEPMUM. Just sayin'.
@Kate yep! That's why I didn't get the happy music on the first try!
I didn't expect the STEPMOM to be the most controversial aspect of this puzzle! The spelling doesn't change depending on where the stepmom is from, it changes depending on where the observer of the stepmom is from (ahem). As a Brit I'd call her a stepmum, like for me Central Park is in the centre not center of Manhattan, but I'd fully expect an NYT crossword to call her a stepmom. Fun puzzle, managed to finish with just a few look-ups of some of the more obscure Americanisms. Thanks Jacob!
@Alex Using examples from the UK usually implies British English spelling in NYT games.
@Alex 💯 to your formulation regarding STEPMOM. I’ve had quite a few conversations with Brits where we respectively used “mom” and “mum” to refer to a single individual — without the slightest consideration to said mom’s/mum’s nationality or language background. I can easily see where people are coming from in expecting the answer to be “mum”…but that simply does not make “mom” wrong.
Reading the comments I find I’m not alone in not knowing JUGBAND. The B last to fall as it was a sports clue. And yes, it’s Mum. British clue, British spelling. We don’t use MOM. Ooh, does that make me sound a bit snarky? No snarkiness intended, just pedantry.
@Helen Wright Not at all pedantic! Just....correct. They'll have to clue it otherwise next time! "Cruel parent of Cinderellas two sisters" or something....
@Helen Wright Not pedantic at all - I'm so glad you weighed in here with this clarification as one of our resident experts on the Mother Tongue!
Heck of a Tuesday crossing NOLA with a baseball player from the first half of the 1900s. Plus the whole jugband thing. I've had better. Just overall too heavy on the americana to be enjoyable.
@M ENOS Slaughter has been a crossword staple for a long time, but hasn't been used for a while. Last use was in 2022, and before that in 2021 and 2019. He was clued a lot around 2010-11. ENOS has mostly been clued as a biblical persona. OREL Hershiser is another baseball player who's made frequent appearances from time to time.
@M Even as an American, this one felt too "Americana" in an obscure way. These days I'd happily enjoy more Canadian cluing!
Shouldn't 46D be "step mum"? I mean, they're British.
@Kelli Yes. Yes it should 🇬🇧
@Kelli Harry does reside in the USA now, down the road from me.
The idea of the Queen Consort and King Charles attending a jug band in some grungy dive in the cool part of Omaha is making me a little gaga. And, what with orcs and all, I did consider for half a second whether the keeper of treasure might be GOLEM ("my precious..."). Still, I do see other possibilities for accompanying instruments for the purposes of this puzzle's jug band: a smallish CONGA drum beat on with a tsp. HEAVE a HEAP of HENS' EGGs (and PENCE, and OPAL BEADS!) at the CHEST of an ORC. Whack your STEPMOM with a TOFU RYE SUB repeatedly until she LOSES IT, screaming lyrics from Taylor Swift's latest ERA at full BLAST in the UPPER registers! I better stop there. The next one I thought of, involving A ROD, going off one's meds, taking something called an "Oahu vapor" etc.
@john ezra "Whack your STEPMOM with a TOFU RYE SUB repeatedly until she LOSES IT," I am absolutely certain that that combination of words is perfectly unique, even with special translation from both human and non-human lifeforms, anywhere in the known universe. You may have just set off an inter-galactic event.
If this is Tuesday, I'm not quite feeling up to the rest of the week...
Wow, a surprising amount of negativity about this puzzle. I thought it was really fun! My favorite bit was the crossing of LEIGH and HARE, as Janet LEIGH starred in the masterpiece Night of the Lepus.
@Katie And HENS with EGG. I quite enjoyed this puzzle too.
Not a huge fan of this Tuesday. Kind of hard with obscure trivia
Am I the only one who found the clue for 18 across to be a bit odd? While it makes perfect sense, I find it to be a bit off. I ladle out soup, and scoop out ice cream. Would never use the term spoons out. Just sayin.
Fresh off Jeopardy, Paolo Pasco has a nice puzzle in The New Yorker today.
"Spoons out"? Is that really the way people say it? Just one of the few problematic clues in this puzzle.
@Francis No, it’s certainly not the way anyone has ever said it 🧐
@Francis I've heard this said many times. Maybe a midwest or southern thing.
@Francis Interesting yesterday people had issues with CLIPS OUT (which I have heard a lot) and today SPOONS OUT (which I have heard less but is not totally alien to me). Not to mention BONES UP ON which I also hear all the time and even use myself not infrequently. And as for JUG BAND I know of them and of the “instruments” just didn’t know what it was called.
When I was really little, my mom would read me a book called “Emmitt Otter’s Jugband Christmas,” which was later made into a movie directed by Jim Henson. The theme made me smile.
Weird little coincidence: Yesterdays New Yorker puzzle had 2 answers that made me think of JUG BANDs. One was Gus and the other was Grateful Dead. So yesterday, I played Gus Cannon's Jug Stompers - The Complete Works: 1927-1930 and The Music Never Stopped: Roots of the Grateful Dead which contains the Gus Cannon song Big Railroad Blues. I enjoyed today's puzzle, and when I saw SPOONS and WASHBOARD, I thought "It couldn't be....", but it was!
@Nancy J. I hope you also thought of Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions. I will try to find it but can you please tell me the clue from yesterday's New Yorker puzzle with the answer of the Grateful Dead? Thanks
What a fun puzzle. Great theme. Nice cluing. I loved the clue for RYE. I started with RED. Thanks, Jacob! Have a great Tuesday everyone!
Putting the D in STEPM[ ]M may be a popular adult theme, but putting an O in a British STEPMUM surely is going too far?
I didn't like this one. Lots of questionable clues (BLAST, BONESUPON, GAGA, APE), too many abbreviations and informal words, too many short clues with ambiguous answers, and a boring theme. Solving this felt like a chore
Glad to see I wasn't the only one who found today's tough for a Tuesday! Still enjoyable, just took me a few more passes through than my norm.
Started this right as it dropped at 7 pm. I made two full passes across and down and got about 3/4 of the way through the grid and couldn’t stay awake a second longer. I live at sea level and spent the weekend in Flagstaff at 7,000 feet. It always throws me off. It didn’t help that our flight home was delayed almost two hours due to the airspace getting shutdown for the President and VP in Phoenix on Sunday. Woke up at midnight to finish and found a weird error. I had bASeBOARD ABS before WASHBOARD 🤣 It threw off that entire NW corner. Once that got sorted, I figured out the theme. As a native Southern Californian, JUG BAND makes me think of the Country Bear Jamboree at Disneyland. You went there to rest after being on your feet for hours! <a href="https://youtu.be/kq6axc9y1VA?si=0Xl3IZMTmIxLssDs" target="_blank">https://youtu.be/kq6axc9y1VA?si=0Xl3IZMTmIxLssDs</a> I enjoyed this one as it brought up fond memories from my childhood spent at Disneyland, so thank you, Jacob.
On construction sites, units of concrete are “yards”.
@Bob No doubt...but it's Tuesday, and if the answer that comes to mind is relatively obscure for the average person, it's probably wrong.
@Bob THANK YOU! Sheesh. We've ordered an outfit to pour a patio, among other projects; it certainly did not come in SLABS!
@Bob Except that the clue says nothing about construction sites.
@Bob I put in 'sacks' first, because that's how they're sold in home improvement stores.
@Bob yes, but after it’s poured it becomes a slab. I would venture to guess that unless one has poured concrete or gotten a history lesson in dam construction, yards is not the first thing that would come to mind.
Camilla would be William and Harry’s Stepmum. If they were American she’d be their stepmom.
@Bml She is still a STEPMOM, even if Brits often vocalize MUM.
@Bml So you are saying that the term “stepmom” is only pertinent when said stepmom, along with all stepchildren being referenced, are speakers of American English?
@Bml Good catch here that our UK friends would appreciate!
@Bml Slogan from WWII: "Be like dad, keep MUM."
Poor Edna Millay--a formalist caught in modernist world! A conversation I had with a friend recently, wondering what Cape Cod was like in the 1930's, made me look up this (one of Millay's rare forays into free verse): Memory of Cape Cod The wind in the ash-tree sounds like surf on the shore at Truro. I will shut my eyes . . . hush, be still with your silly bleating, sheep on Shillingstone Hill . . . They said: Come along! They said: Leave your pebbles on the sand and come along, it's long after sunset! The mosquitoes will be thick in the pine-woods along by Long Nook, the wind's died down! They said: Leave your pebbles on the sand, and your shells, too, and come along, we'll find you another beach like the beach at Truro. Let me listen to wind in the ash . . . it sounds like surf on the shore.
Funny how a wrong answer can help to get a correct one. I had SPOONS filled in when I got to the theme, which I assumed to be “kitchen”. That led me to get STOVEPIPE HAT immediately. It wasn’t until much later that I realized we weren’t looking for a kitchen stove. I thought this was a little challenging for a Tuesday, but I’m not mad about it. I also appreciated a clue for APE that wasn’t the usual “mimic”.
Well, I loved this one. Fun theme, smooth solve but with some surprises. It boggles my mind to see several negative comments. To each his (or her) own, I suppose. Thanks Jacob Stulberg, Will Shortz, and Sam C. 👏🏻
Crosswords are a great learning tool. Did not know about jug band before
Definitely felt more challenging than a typical Tuesday puzzle on two fronts: trickery and fairness. Trickery stretches my recall, association, or interpretation, like MAW for “gaping opening “ and STY for “place for wallowing”. Fairness, to me, is how closely my lexicon matches the author’s— how “obvious” are the clues once solved. BONES UP ON and JUG BAND, as examples, are phrasing that I’ve never encountered.
@Forrest Give a listen. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=afxMPRTQBTI&list=RDafxMPRTQBTI&start_radio=1" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=afxMPRTQBTI&list=RDafxMPRTQBTI&start_radio=1</a>
What on earth is a jug band? The difficulty was amped up by the tricky grid and Wednesday-feeling clues.
@Vanessa Believe it or not, to my knowledge, a jug band is pretty much what it sounds like. First of all, there are a lot of other instruments besides the "jug" in a jug band--guitars, violins, banjos--but one of the distinctive sounds is the percussive effect of blowing into a jug, making a strange pipe-like sound. Generally the jug player kept the rhythm. In fact, now that I think of it, other than a washboard, I can't think of any other purely percussive elements. The type of music was very much of the early American blue grass variety. I would also say "hill-billy" but as that is a pejorative for some, so I say if for clarity with the caveat that it is considered pejorative.
@Vanessa think Country Bear Jamboree at Disneyland 😉
@Richard "The cannon's BLAST was deafening"....eh?
@Mean Old Lady I've always thought of the 'blast' as the act of the cannon firing, while the sound is a (ka)boom!
Some extremely weird answers in this one for a Tuesday. I have no idea what a JUGBAND is. BONESUPON? RYE as alternative to white? HEAVE for emit a sigh?? Sheesh.
Cody, HEAVE a sign of relief. RYE bread or white? BONES UP ON (better now?) JUG BAND: see the Wordplay column.
@Cody I agree. Although I don’t mind RYE and HEAVE, JUGBAND and BONESUPON (as well as a few of the other answers) seemed quite out of place to me for a Tuesday. In fact, I can’t remember playing a Tuesday as hard as this one. I have no problem with hard clues, but when they’re put in a Tuesday puzzle, there’s a little bit of a mismatch in terms of expectation and reality.
Thought that was really fresh and fun - and enjoyed watching the Muppets jug band too. So creative, that Jim Henson was a genius. The porcupine needles sticking out of the coat - hahaha!
Interesting Tuesday. Seemed off putting on the crosses at first. Slogged until it fell into place. Slower than average for me. But well worth it.
Would write my own comment, but basically everyone has said it for me. Inbox contents are EMAILS, Camilla is a STEPMUM, BONESUPON is obscure and the trivia crosses were unfortunate (NOLA ENOS and AROD EDNA). The theme I didn't find too bad. I'd never heard the phrase JUGBAND before, but one I got WASHBOARDABS it started to make sense.
@Seb It's a crossword puzzle from an American newspaper. If I did crosswords from the London Times I'd expect to struggle with a few clues that would be obvious to someone in England, and if I did one from Athens (the original one, not the one in Georgia...meaning the US state by that name, not the nation), I'd probably find that it was all Greek to me.
This is a first for me - I found it easy while quite a few others didn't. I think a jug band is similar to what we called a skiffle band in the late 1950s? Certainly there was a washboard and other home-made instruments, like a tea-chest double bass. Makes up for the struggles I had last week.
@Jane Wheelaghan they kinda come from the same heart…but they end up at different places. They are kinda do it yourself bands…but with skiffle it was at the start of rock and roll…So that’s where the music ends up. The Beatles were a skiffle band in their early versions like the Quarrymen. Whereas jug bands in the American tradition were earlier and are typically looked at more as country and blues.
@Jane Wheelaghan That's funny, I was just now thinking of skiffle, in that context, with the (tea) CHEST in 47A. I've heard a recording of the Quarrymen doing "Rock Island Line."
Shouldn't the clue for NOLA [The Big Easy] allude to the fact that it is an acronym? Even though NOLA was the first answer that occurred to me, I thought it couldn't be right, so I looked fruitlessly for other ideas, such as *FILM (there's one with that title from 1986, but maybe too obscurefor a Tuesday).
@Bob Not an acronym. See link to definition of acronym. <a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/acronym" target="_blank">https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/acronym</a>
@Bob I thought the same thing. But maybe because The Big Easy is a nick name NOLA is too? Well. At least we got it.
@Bob That's one more thing I've learnt. Not seen it before.
Anybody else have dASHBOARDABS? No? Thought not. Only a brief stumble, but it did make me think.
I’ve never heard of ”bones up on” and I don’t know what bones are in the context of a jug band. I didn’t like this puzzle that much.
@Mango this video will not only show you what they are, it will also teach you how to play them: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iMokBr9cTxM" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iMokBr9cTxM</a>
@Mango BONE UP is an older term for studying/refreshing one's memory on a subject. Not common these days, but certainly was used in the last century. As far as bones in a jug band, they can be animal bones but are sometime substituted with wood sticks or other items as a rhythm instrument.
@Mango Here's a jug band, if you've never heard one, or even if you have. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wUZNw2dJKuU&list=RDafxMPRTQBTI&index=2" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wUZNw2dJKuU&list=RDafxMPRTQBTI&index=2</a>