In my defense, sometimes earrings do need to be rescued.
Well, exQQQQQQQQ me! (Steve Martin did this puzzle decades ago.)
@Barry Ancona Beat me to it. <a href="https://youtu.be/zANvYB93u2g?si=4KyZFLVtQjBXKRH8" target="_blank">https://youtu.be/zANvYB93u2g?si=4KyZFLVtQjBXKRH8</a>
@Barry Ancona - Somebody should contruct a grid where doubled (or beyond) Xes ansd Qs create a theme with that as the revealer.
"Aren't you supposed to be on stage now talking about the 17th letter of the alphabet?" "That's my Q!" (They skipped over "Q"? Sounds like a PR stunt.)
@Mike Show us your Equity Car! (Oh, exQQez-moi, now your face RED.)
I just awarded myself three stars: one for no look-ups, one for finishing it, and another one for finishing it. When the congratulations popped up I was stunned. I should reQQ myself from judging my performance, but I thought it was pretty thrilling. Joseph Gangi, I loved this—it was great fun! Thank you.
@Deb I'm so happy for you to be retiring, but so sad for us. However, being successfully retired myself, I offer my services if you haven't yet figured out your post-employed life! I keep saying I need to write a book on how to retire successfully, but the truth is, it probably isn't worth more than a newspaper column or magazine article. Regardless, thank you for your guidance these past years, as I went from Monday, Tuesday solver and hair-puller the rest of the week, to a confident weekly solver. You have had a positive impact on so many lives. I raise my coffee cup in salute and thanks! Le'chaim!
@Marlene - beautifully said. My solving experience in retirement has been similar, thanks to @Deb Amlen’s advice that anyone can learn to solve! In fact, my standard retirement advice is to routinely solve the NYT crossword because it is a reminder of what day it is. Cheers!
I can't unsee MISDO. "Waiter, there's a D in my soup!" Fauxberges, though, that was pure gold (plated) ! Funny about plural endings: torsi and strata. Enoki. Any of you have any nominations for the Griddies, please REPLY to this message. Each year volunteers have awarded prizes for the best puzzle of the year in 4 categories: M-W, Th, F-S, and Su. All are welcome to nominate as many puzzles as you wish. All we need is the name of the constructor(s) and the date of the puzzle (calendar year 2025). I'm doing it this year with Marshall Walthew and our fearless leader Eric Hougland. We do already have a lot of nominations, so I won't be making this...SPIEL again till after Xmas. Bring it on! [Opinion piece by Zola?] JAQQ
@john ezra So here are my final noms for Friday/Saturday. I narrowed it down to 9. Phew this was hard! 1/18 Scott McMahan This gets points for construction but not difficulty. Three stacks of three grid spanning entires, all clean and interesting, is quite the eye catching feat 1/25 Michael Lieberman A lot of medium style stacks but this gets points for a lot of clever cluing: Body Shops—MORTURARIES, They support many student movements: PE CLASSES, Consumed with grief: STRESSATE and many others. Points off for not cluing ENTERPRISE to Start Trek and ZADIE to a Jewish grandfather like me ; ) 3/8 Joe Deeney Impressive quadruple quadruple stacks of 10 each, all interesting fill and a stellar clue: Common component of ranch dressing? STETSONHAT 4/18 Greg Snitkin and Glenn Davis Giving the nod to this one because it looks like it gave me a decent challenge, taught me about BARBIECORE, and had two of my favorite clues this year: They help you get off a lot –AUTOLOANS., and Present-day attire? SANTA SUIT 7/5 Tracy Bennett Not the hardest Saturday on record, but I liked the combination of TIL entries (UNCANNY VALLEY, QUEER THEOLOGY) and two fun clues (Oil smugglers?—ARTTHIEVES and Alley Oops—GUTTERBALL. Plus it was my birthday, so there’s that.
@john ezra (Fri/Saturday continued) 9/6 Kunal Nabar Just a lovely opening stack: They help you see the big picture MOVIE TICKETS Swing States? OPEN MARRIAGES Things you can’t live without BARE ESSENTIAlS Plus an introduction to OCTAVIA BUTLER and another fun clue: Ones with big blocks AMNESIACS 9/26 Larry Snyder Just picked this because it had one of the best marquee clues of the year: Takes in the trash DELETED SCENES And some other great ones: Stream with a lot of shade HATEWATCH It might be in display at Comic Con INNERGEEK Problem for someone pushing 90 SPEEDGUN 10/25 Byron Walden If my time is accurate, then this was extremely challenging, but I enjoyed it—not quite BETTER THAN SEX but close. Two other fun clues in: 46 years? BIDEN PRESIDENCY and Green suit? JUNIOR EXECUTIVE 12/13 Gene Louise de Vera Everyone focused on the ONEOFEVERYTHING feat but honestly I think this would have been a contender anyway with its eye catching grid, fresh long stacks and clever clues like Some of them may be forgiven—STUDENT LOANS and Creator of some bubbles— CORPORATE GREED. I thought it was a perfect level of difficulty. The fact that it was the first grid to have at least one clue of every possible length 3-12 was just the cherry on top and probably pushes it to my top vote for POY.
@john ezra Thanks to you, Eric and Marshall! Just wanted to give a shout-out to @Tito, who first had the idea (back in 2020) that Wordplayers might vote for our favorite puzzles of the year as a way to pay tribute to the crossword constructors and editors who provide so much pleasure to so many of us throughout the year. As it was back in 1942 when the NYT first started publishing crosswords, they remain a much needed, and appreciated, diversion from the news of the day.
@john ezra missed opportunity - much harder edit/solve if it were Botches/Misqq
@john ezra FWIW, ENOKI doesn’t have a plural ending; Japanese doesn’t have grammatical number, to begin with.
@john ezra Saturday, June 14, 2025 By Barbara Lin 8D "Half a comedy duo"
@john ezra I wish I had better descriptions of the puzzles, but I just scrawled brief impressions on my finished grids and took photos. I'll try to do better next year. Early week Wed Nov 12 - Brad Wiegmann and Nicole Wiegmann Duck or rabbit ambiguous figure with an "eye" rebus Maybe a special award for constructor notes? Wed Mar 19 - Evan Par and Jeffrey Martinovic Expanding star Thursday May 22 - David J. Kahn Exchange terms for money with word ALL Jun 19 - Hannah Slovut Letter switch May 8 - Dan Caprera Letters outside of grid Friday Jun 6 - Adrian Johnson Very tough, like a puzzle from the archives. I drew a stick figure on my grid of me with cartoonish sweat coming from my head. 'Nuff said! Saturday Jan 25 - Michael Lieberman Feb 15 - David P. Williams Mar 22 - Katie Hoody Sep 20 - Katie Hoody Oct 25 - Byron Walden All just good old fashioned Saturday puzzles that made me work for it. Sunday Jan 26 - Rich Proulx - "Letter Openers" Picture rebus for clues Feb 2 - Derrick Niederman - "Two For One Special" Favorite type of rebus. Double trouble. Mar 16 - Paul Coulter - "Have It Both Ways" Read down entry up and down to go with 2 different across entries May 11 - Brendan Emmett Quigley - "Power Grid" Nice, big themeless May 25 - Dylan Schiff - "Travel Bug" Worm holes
john ezra — enoki is the plural form for the enokus mushroom (a nonexistent species).
I want to take this opportunity to say a huge THANK YOU to the fabulous, witty, and omniscient Deb Amlen, who leaves us way too soon to pursue her greater adventures in retirement. You have been a constant and steadying voice to this beloved forum, and while I know your catchphrase is "It wasn't me!", I beg to differ: it very much was you, and you will be greatly missed.
What a beautiful compliment, @Chungclan! Thank you so much
I enjoyed this a lot. I found it harder, I think, than the other early commentators—maybe because like Deb I had BEE before BED for ages and tried to fit USE in a rebus for SYRACUSE ORANGE even though I already had the two Qs in the first themer. Then it clicked, and it did get easier at that point, but I was still impressed—first for the relative smoothness of a difficult construction with all Qs, some SCARYGOOD accessory fill like FAUXBERGE and INNUENDOS and some fine cluing like EMANUEL and LIARS. So, a great all around puzzle for me.
Well, I was Q’d to be charmed by this puzzle, because Joseph made what I consider to be the cutest grid art ever. I still smile thinking about it. To see it go here (spoiler alert, the grid will be filled in): <a href="https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=3/16/2022" target="_blank">https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=3/16/2022</a> . And even though there was no grid art today, I was charmed anyway, due to answers that brought delight – SEGUE, RIFE, POMP, INNUENDOS, SCARY GOOD – and clever opposite-based clues: [Off-line, online] for IRL, and [Appropriate, inaapropriately] for USURP. Much fun built into solving this – grokking the theme and guessing at the theme answers with as few crosses as possible. Props to Joseph for coming up with this theme answer set, because there aren’t too many QQ’s words outside of resqqs, Syraqq, exqq, and aqq and their variants. Some others are reqq, barbeqq, pool qq, curliqq, and maybe qqticks. Are there more? Row 4 – SIT EAT USURP doesn’t have the ring of EAT PRAY LOVE, but I still think t would make a great title. Your puzzle was charming, fun, and impressive, Joseph. Thank you for making it!
@Lewis Backstory of 'Hamlet': SIT, EAT, USURP
@Lewis I tried steal and heist before USURP 😆
Best of everything to you, Deb! You will be sorely missed. I have enjoyed your column immensely and I credit you with my willingness to try Friday and Saturday puzzles. Yo you r humor has helped keep all of us a bit saner during these crazy times. THANK YOU! Also, fabulous puzzle today!
Thank you so much, @Maria J A!
I got tripped up by having bees instead of beds for a while but I was so proud of myself for figuring out the trick. I feel like I was staring at this for a while but then when I got it everything fell into place. Super satisfying solve.
I, too, had BEeS for BEDS until it became untenable.
Yeah, I thought eARRINGRESQQS were perfectly reasonable quests for gallant knights.
@Bay Area Native Meant to put that in reply to DIVAS IVLIVS below.
@Bay Area Native I had the exact same error 🤣 Queen BEES made perfect sense to me 😆
Really fast and pretty easy to be quite honest. A fun little jaunt, well executed. I like more challenge on a Thursday but I'm not feeling up to pointless carping at the moment. So I guess I'm reQQing myself. :)
I'm amused that @Deb Amlen used the phrase "cruciverbal derring-do" in her column. When trying to solve the first themer at 17-A ("Feats performed on knights' quests"), I had DARIN----, and I thought to myself that the theme was going to involve common misspellings: DARING for "derring", for example. I was happy that I was mistaken. It's nice to see the QQ getting attention, but I'm impressed that a puzzle focusing on that letter is able to include four X's, as well. Nice, non-rebus Thursday. Thanks, Joseph Gangi!
It took me longer than my average Thursday, thanks to BEES (not BEDS) and deleting QTR (for being next to another Q) and trying a couple rebuses. Finally, I had SYRA__ORANGE, then considered my previous deletions, and it dawned on me. To the constructor, I'm adding two more Qs to the ones in your puzzle, which makes 10Q. 10Q very much.
I sure sat here for quite a while wondering what earings have to do with knightly quests! Fun puzzle, I really liked the QQ gimmick.
@Shane Yes, exactly. Knights with earrings and their derring-do
I don't usually comment on puzzles but once I cottoned on to the theme I really enjoyed this one. Hit me just right :) great work!
What I’m loving about the kind posts about @Deb today are that they are written with warm hearts. Oh, Deb’s job has been to explain the theme and tricky clues, and she has done that skillfully. That’s all she’s really had to do, but she’s gone – day after day – the extra mile. You know you’re going to feel good reading Deb. She touches such a lovely place in the heart, makes it go ahhh and smile. Part of it is how genuine she is – she’s never trying to impress. No, she’s wanting to help, wanting to share when a funny thought hits her. Rooting for the new solvers while at the same time making observations that experienced solvers can relate to. Lots of specifics for why Deb is special, but to me it’s mainly the je ne sais quoi, the magic. She has a talent for that, and I’m so grateful for it. What a gift you’ve been to the Times and to us all. It’s been a great run.
Q the music. I enjoyed this puzzle and thought that FAUXBERGE was a SCARYGOOD entry. I originally tried daring deeds, but quickly spotted the Q theme thanks to ESQ, and got DARINGRESQQ. After that, the puzzle fell into place steadily. BRYN Mawr was a gimme, because it has a close relationship with my alma mater, and I took a lot of courses there. It’s also where I met my first wife, and where I had my first job after graduation (managing the college snack bar).
Marshall Walthew — In that case, I probably taught at your alma mater.
“Alumni” is plural. A single graduate is an alumnus or an alumna. (Sorry, this is a pet peeve of mine.)
@Bonnie Nestor i thought so, too. but we are/were wrong. <a href="https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/alumni" target="_blank">https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/alumni</a>
@Bonnie Nestor "Alum" is a fine non-gender specific singular. As long as you don't get it mixed up with KAl(SO 4)2!
Lived more than half my life in Japan, still haven't seen any ramen with ENOKI
This was a fine second Wednesday puzzle for the week. Thanks, Joseph. Now can we have a word with the editors?
@Barry Ancona Yes, I suppose since my time was only ~5x rather than 10x versus the expert solvers, this was too easy for a Thursday :) But it was a romp for me!
I continue to wonder when some in the forum will get used to the variations in difficulty, which have been going on for a very long time. It doesn't bother me at all.
@Barry Ancona I thought that today's puzzle was (roughly) at the appropriate level of difficulty for a Thursday. What say the stats?
Is etiquette in the line for the loo minding your Qs and Ps?
Typical slow Thursday start for me, but tumbling to the trick was a huge turning point and that's always a nice touch. And, of course puzzle finds today. Some rather unusual ones. First - a Thursday from July 30, 2009 by Ashish Vengsarkar. Some clue/answer examples: "Facility" EEEE "Signals" QQQQ "Garden sights" BBBB "Man oh man!" GGGG And then two grid-spanning semi-reveal answers: FOURLETTERWORDS REPEATOFFENDERS Here's that link: <a href="https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=7/30/2009&g=8&d=A" target="_blank">https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=7/30/2009&g=8&d=A</a> I'll put other puzzle finds in a reply (or replies). ...
@Rich in Atlanta As threatened: First a Sunday from July 16, 1989 by Peggy Devlin with the title: "Touching twins from A to Z." Pretty amazing feat of construction. 26 theme answers - each of them with at least one double letter, so it included every letter in the alphabet. Some examples: MIZZENMAST SHOWWINDOW RECONNOITERED OSUUNDERGRADS NAVVY AMMO IQQUESTION BERRA APPLICATION HAJJI SAYYES COBB FOXX Here's that link: <a href="https://www.xwordinfo.com/PS?date=7/16/1989&g=120&d=A" target="_blank">https://www.xwordinfo.com/PS?date=7/16/1989&g=120&d=A</a> ....
I loved today's puzzle but I need to change the subject. Did anyone else get a bit perturbed that the Year End Wrap Up for Games didn't include Crossword????
@Oaktowner Yes! I was so confused that “connections” was my most played game until I realized that it’s because there was nothing about the crossword…
That was fast fun, with a pretty easy theme to grok and pretty easy clues. I enjoyed the clue for a bejeweled egg knockoff — FAUXBERGÉ — having viewed a big collection of them at the Metropolitan Art Museum in 1964.
Even though it turned out to be easy, it was fun. Enjoy!
POETs, LIQUORS, INNUENDO, Kermit, and Severance... these are a few of my favorite things! When the NANA bites, when the UFOS sting, I simply remember my favorite things... Anyhow, fun puzzle, fun theme, and fun fill, though quite fast for me. Also, like @Jacui J, I love an abundance of Qs (and Js).
@Jacqui --- ironically, I missed the Q in your name. Oh my gosh!! My voice to text couldn't spell your name correctly, so I incorrectly corrected it without one of my two favorite letters. Sorry about that! Once again, my kingdom for an edit button!! Please borrow a Q from the puzzle!
I’ve mentioned before my love for the letter Q 😍 I have a running list of puzzle ideas, and this one was on it!! Joseph did a phenomenal job with it (and for sure better than anything I could have put together). My husband is also an alum of Syracuse, so we both got a chuckle out of that one as it’s specifically on my list 🤣 I had one error when I finished. I had [Some queens] as BEeS 🐝 before BEDS. Thank you for the EXQQ to put off gift wrapping for a few minutes, Joseph. This was a fun jaunt.
@Jacqui J Well you got one more J than Q in your handle, so maybe you can make one with that letter featured.
@Jacqui J Late entry, but I lost a couple of minutes sussing out my mistake as I thought "Some queens" could be BIDS, coupled with my continuing inability to remember the mushroom spelling: INOKI? ANOKI? Oh, yeah, ENOKI...maybe I'll remember it next time!
Alas no solve today - too many misqq.
Fun puzzle today, but that's a lot of QQ to still not add up to a pangram, eh? Very clever theme, although for 44A I am much more accustomed to hearing PARDON than EXQQ. I had an early inkling about 29A, suspecting that SYRAQQ was one of those schools that had resolved their sexism problem by referring to their teams simply as a blob of color. (REDMEN==>CARDINAL,q.v.) After adjourning my city council meeting minutes before 11 last night, and getting up before 5:00 to take out the dog who didn't actually need to go out, I found this to be the appropriate level of challenge. Thank you!
@Jack McCullough The St. John's Redmen became the Red Storm. It wasn't a sexism problem as much as a cultural appropriation problem. Unless there's another Redmen team I'm unaware about.
LOVED this puzzle. Loved the clueing ...
@James Flanagan The clueing or the Q-ing?
Quite the Quick and Quirky Quandary today!
Had me going there for a bit as I had Qs rather than QQ. Overall, not too easy, not too hard for me. It cleared my morning cobwebs for sure. Speaking of, my family called cobwebs Irish lace. Must be the German side. ;-) This Buffalo native had never heard that our fair lake was ever called Lac du Chat. Half way through August 2013 in the crossword archive leaving just the rest of that year to complete the archive entirely. That’s 11,301 puzzles. Oy!
I scampered through the NW corner thinking the puzzle would be too easy -- and once you have DARING RES with only two squares to go, QQ is easy. It took me a bit longer than it should have to realize that all the trick squares would be a pair of Qs. I loved EXQQ MY FRENCH and UNJUSTLY AQQ. While I hate a great many of today's new coinages, I tend to love the clever portmanteaus. Is FAUXBERGE great or what? Puzzle hint for today: All 5-letter film critics are EBERT -- just as all 4-letter critics are AGEE. You're welcome. Not the hardest Thursday, but colorful and enjoyable. Note to either Deb or the headline writer (who may be a different person): Today's "Q"-citing headline gives away the entire trick. Which is fine if people who see it have already done the puzzle. But what if the people scrolling by are on their way to Connections or Wordle??? Today's crossword will be ruined for them. Please don't EVER give away the trick in the headline! Thank you!
I filled in DARING deeds. and prepared myself for another boring Thursday. Boy howdy, was I wrong! Enjoyed this one thoroughly. I also loved FAUXBERGE, which was new to me but quite guessable. So I have to ask, is the watch in the column photo a FAUXLEX?
@Grant This particular watch apparently was recently sold at auction for $1.73 million. <a href="https://www.everestbands.com/blogs/bezel-barrel/the-rolex-gleitze-oyster-just-sold-for-1-73-million-and-rolex-didn-t-win-it#:~:text=Nearly" target="_blank">https://www.everestbands.com/blogs/bezel-barrel/the-rolex-gleitze-oyster-just-sold-for-1-73-million-and-rolex-didn-t-win-it#:~:text=Nearly</a>%20a%20century%20after%20Mercedes,watches%20%E2%80%94%20passed%20on%20Gleitze's%20Oyster. Someone's going to be rather upset if it turns out to be a FAUXLEX.
Aw man, I was so close to keeping my streak. tOAST wasn't it, neither was rOAST. Can't believe I didn't think of BOAST! Maybe I should drink my coffee before doing a Thursday.
A very nice puzzle, but not really Thursday-esque. Barely took 15 minutes. Got the theme with SYRAQQORANGE, though to me this is the one themer where the QQ substitution isn't quite right phonetically. Consider the infinitive "to USE" and the entry at 32A "OF USE". Different pronunciations of "USE" in each, at least for me. Same for me with "Syracuse"; the city in Central NY has the same sound as in "OF USE" and not that of "to USE". So QQ isn't quite right there, for my ears. In any case, an enjoyable and clever puzzle. Liked FAUXBERGE, though it was completely unfamiliar. Nice Scrabble score for this one!
@Xword Junkie Interesting. I lived near Syracuse for years and we always pronounced it with the sound in "to USE." Never heard it the other way.
@Xword Junkie my husband attended “The Cuse” and insists that it’s pronounced ending in a Z sound. If you listen to game broadcasts for football, basketball and lacrosse, they all pronounce it the same way - ending in the Z sound 😉
@Xword Junkie - agree with you. Grew up in Central NY and for me and mine, It’s the “of use” pronunciation. Even when shortened to “The ‘Cuse”, or even “‘Cuse” it retains the “of use” sound vs. the Z sound.
2Qt for words! [Lac du Chat]=Lake ERIE was a gimme. The Erie tribe was known as the "Cat People." Why? Theories abound. Too bad we can't ask the Eries, but, as a people, they were extirpated by the Iroquois in an act of genocide. The Iroquois wanted better hunting grounds. The Lake Erie islands--Kelley's and the Bass Islands in Ohio, and Pelee in Ontario--were known as "les Îles aux Serpents," from the many watersnakes (Nerodia sipedon insularum) which made their homes there. Like the Eries, they were nearly extirpated, with a population of 1500 by 1999, when they were designated a "protective species," and, by 2009, their population had rebounded to 12 000. And trust me, the (human) islanders are still very protective of them! Here, for you, Mr. Gangi, is some Emmanuel Ax (with his wife Yoko Nozaki), apropos of little, save that the title contains a Q--I had this recording on vinyl when I was a teenager, and played it to death: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-3QkR6SuMLA&list=RD-3QkR6SuMLA&start_radio=1" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-3QkR6SuMLA&list=RD-3QkR6SuMLA&start_radio=1</a>
@Bill Just want to pop in again and say how much I enjoy your posts 😁
Very QT puzzle! Any more Qs and Qflation may befall us…
I guess “Thursday puzzle” is its own revealer now. It’s all good, there’s really no XQQ for needing more.
Proud of myself for solving this one, and was pleased to see my alma mater Bryn Mawr appear.
Though I enjoyed the puzzle today, a few things are bugging me. Surely a team is made out of more than the players on the court, no? I feel like this could have been worded better, a volleyball team usually has 12 players on the roster, at least by the CEV and FIVB rules. Also, Im not the biggest fan of using somewhat obscure TV actors' names to begin with so I had to look up 59D. I have seen Severance but don't even remember the character, how am I supposed to know the name of the actress?? This one was way too obscure imo.
@Sonja I would consider the exact number of players needed for a game as the team. Just like a soccer team is 11 players, not the whole 20 to 30 that are there as substitutes and what not. Totally agree with you on the Severance clue though
@Sonja This is a CROSSword puzzle. I didn't know the name of the actress either, but I used the CROSSES to figure it out without looking it up. Of course, you can solve the puzzle in any way that brings you joy. Regarding your team complaint, I'm reminded of the old classic poem "Casey at the Bat", which refers to the Mudville Nine. I suppose they could have referred to the Mudville 26, but don't you think they should also include the managers and coaches as members of the team? How about the administrative staff?
Sonja, I was expecting you to say that SIX was the easiest sports answer you'd ever seen in a NYT Crossword! We'll be watching the NCAAWVB DI semis tonight. P.S. JEN from the (easy) crosses for me.
@Sonja I was torn on whether the volleyball team would be two or SIX. Sand volleyball is very popular here and a two person team sport. I had to confirm which one through the crosses
@Sonja I think it was fair game for a crossword, but there's no doubt that bench players are part of the team. I coach soccer and pick a starting 11 before every game. The other players are not off the team just because they are not starting.
Wow. That's all I've got. Brilliant construction and clueing.
I like to say Excuse my French whenever I attempt to say a French word or phrase since chances are I'm mispronouncing it.