A perfect, no STRESS puzzle, with a clever theme that doesn’t get any tighter than this. The highlight for me is the wonderful debut of PERSNICKETY. What a great word! I like CAJOLES too. Congratulations on your debut, Suzanne. Well done!
A charming, lightly challenging puzzle, perfect for a cold day by the fireside (well, GAS heater, if you're PERSNICKETY). I definitely did not want to be OUTRAGED, or ONATEAR, just GENTLY entertained, which I was. Thank you, Suzanne, for giving us your breaks. Come by anytime.
First we lose the mighty PENN A coin once stubborn as a JENN Next to go will be the NICKE Which has slowed down to a TRICKE Followed by the mighty DIM Certainly, it’s past its PRIM Sadly, next will be the QUARTE I’ll drown my sorrows in a PORTE I guess I find it very STRANG To have to say goodbye to CHANG
@Lewis Nicely done! But TRICKEL? :-) (I said goodbye to change (all cash, really) a few years ago. I should start carrying cash again, because several merchants here pass credit card fees along instead of rolling them into their prices.)
@Lewis Isn't CHANG the one certainty in LIF?
@Eric Hougland This worked in my favour a few times. A guy on marketplace listed a soundbar for 600ish dollars. I asked if he would take all the cash in my wallet instead, which was 420$ On another occasion, we had hired a handyman through an app. I thought the task would take 2 hours. It took 8. Because the app takes a large percentage of the hourly rate, we negotiate a fair price and I paid in cash. It cost me less, and he had more money in his pocket for the same work
My five favorite original clues from last week (in order of appearance): 1. Just about anything on a string (3)(3) 2. Bills first introduced in 1861 (5) 3. Generate clippings, say (3) 4. Extremely rare, facetiously (5)(6) 5. Timer setting (4) CAT TOY FIVES MOW STILL MOOING OVEN
My favorite encore clues from last week: Person in hot pants? (4) Appropriate inappropriately (5) LIAR USURP
"I was going to pay in coins. Should I change?" "Well, money you should ask..." (Sounds like a cents-ible conversation.)
@Mike try not to get too centimental 😉
@Mike Not to mention, if you buy dinar in another country, you have to peso much. It’s enough to make you go loonie.
@Mike Guess now I'll have to offer people a nickel for their thoughts. Talk about inflation.
@Mike I routinely gripe about the quality of your jokes but I find today’s set of puns to be indollarable
@Mike Sometimes I flip for your punny posts. Maybe it's coin-cidental?
@Mike I like the way you always manage to mint something that bears currency to the day's puzzle. I bank on it. And your posts are right here -- they not far things!
This is my favourite Monday puzzle ever! What a fun and thoughtful theme. I hope we get a lot more puzzles from this constructor!
Nice job, Suzanne. I hope your thesis will be as tight as the theme of this puzzle (albeit in a few more words).
I loved this puzzle! A perfect Monday with a clever theme, I hope to see more from Suzanne in the future!
Suzanne, if this was your debut we need to see a lot more from you! One of the best Mondays I can remember—who says that just because Mondays need to be accessible, they can’t still have sparkling fill, clever clues and and a stellar theme you won’t guess ahead of time? Loved the clue for BIG LEAD. You certainly didn’t blow it on this puzzle.
May your dissertation be so successful as this puzzle!
I always thought tootsies were toes. 🤷🏼♀️
@Jane Now that you mention it... I guess that just wasn't part of my general vocabulary. My kids may not have had TOOTSies.... just regular ole FEET with TOESIES. I just ran that by DHubby; he agrees with the usage, as in "Don't freeze your TOOTSies"...singular being TOOTSY. So I guess that settles it. Then again, he's from Pennsylvania, so....
@Jane <a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/tootsy" target="_blank">https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/tootsy</a>
The best Monday puzzle! 10/10 theme. Congrats on the debut!!
Congratulations on an excellent debut! Loved the revealer. Looking forward to seeing many more puzzles from you.
A brief history of SHORTCHANGE as a Crosslandia revealer. It’s been used twice before, but never as in today’s puzzle, and never in the Times. In one puzzle, the last words of theme phrases were anagrams of synonyms for “short”, such as EXTRA MALLS. In the other, anagrams of “short” were circled and embedded in theme phrases, such as GIF(T)(H)(O)(R)(S)E. The end. I liked today’s version best of the three. I reacted to those above with an, “Oh, I see”. Whereas today’s gave me a fist-pump “Hah!”. I also liked: • LOW in today’s grid echoing “short”. • Semordnilaps LEE and EEL cohabitating the box. • How PERSNIKETY and CAJOLES, beautified the grid as the Scrabbly JAZZ QUARTET sparked it up. • And, on a ONA note, ON A DIET, ON A TEAR, and nONAgon. I love how your mind saw “shortchange”, Suzanne, and morphed it into this theme. That whets my appetite for more from you – and may there be! Congratulations on your debut, and thank you for a splendid outing.
@Lewis “Anagrams of synonyms”? That sounds like one of Wyna Liu’s wackier Connections!
@Lewis I spy, with my little eye, ORS and ERS, with only one being a surgical reference.`
I'm wide awake, so no excuses, but maybe it's the lack of coffee, or 18 hours on the road yesterday, but I struggled with this one. More than doubled my Monday average. Very nice puzzle and congrats on your first!
@Andy G I thought this was a challenge too! My brain wasn’t vibing with it for whatever reason.
I usually whizz through on Mondays but the SW corner defeated me today. I'd never heard of POPO, ON A TEAR or POP FOUL and thought TOOTSY was a toe rather than a foot. I didn't know PERNICKETY could be spelt with an S in it either, so that baffled me for a while. Oh well, we live and learn!
@Puzzled Brit Thanks! Now in addition to knowing what PERSNICKETY means, I’ve learned that it’s an alteration of PERNICKETY. PO-PO is a slang term that I picked up from crosswords, though it’s been around for at least 30 years.
@Puzzled Brit TOOTSies are toes, and I've never seen the singular spelled with a Y. That entry went hard into the variant lane. My personal favorite slang for the police is rozzers, thanks to Top Gear.
This one felt really tough for a Monday. A holiday week Monday, no less 😉
> Will our children and children’s children know about MOZILLA, the [Creator of Firefox and Thunderbird]? Crosswords may be the only thing keeping its history alive. Oof, that one stung. Firefox isn't exactly Netscape, are people so deep in the Chrome hole that they forgot other browsers exist?
@mkrl I still use Firefox!!
@mkrl I went Chrome for a while, but privacy concerns sent me back to Firefox. I hope it’s not going anywhere.
@mkrl I use both Chrome & Firefox (when the Chrome AI drives me to distraction). Netscape was my browser of choice, and somewhere I have the disks for vers 1-4.
@mkrl my main email is at netscape.net, though it's now owned and run by AOL. There are still relics from the ancient internet!
This was a phenomenal debut. I’m seriously impressed. I was engaged throughout the fill and I loved the theme. I still use Firefox as my browser 🤓 For the longest time, it was the only one that had a private browsing option. I do use Safari and Chrome on occasion, but my go to is Firefox for now. My husband also uses Firefox 🤷🏼♀️ As for JAZZ QUARTETs, I thought I’d share one of my favorites. Wynton Marsalis spoke at Princeton in 1994 at the Baccalaureate service during graduation week, which I had the pleasure of attending when my sister graduated from there. Such a talented family of musicians! <a href="https://youtu.be/HLD8i8CMw14?si=7Bc1PLVErNNn4KOh" target="_blank">https://youtu.be/HLD8i8CMw14?si=7Bc1PLVErNNn4KOh</a> Enjoy 😊
@Jacqui J I thought I was the only one who still uses Firefox. But lately I've been having so much trouble accessing sites, such as financial accounts or ones on which I want to make a charitable contribution, that I'm seriously thinking of having to abandon it. It would be horrible after having it as my default since its inception. I don't have these problems on Chrome or Edge. You aren't experiencing this?
Congratulations on a fantastic NYT puzzle debut, Ms Oliver! I keep an ever-growing list of words I’ve learned from crosswords, Spelling Bee and other puzzles and games. I don’t often learn a new word from a Monday puzzle. PERSNICKETY is not new to me, but Today I Learned that it means “fastidious” and not “crotchety” or “peevish.” (David Connell, if you’re out there: I too often ignore your advice to look up the words that I think I know. But I’m getting better about doing that.) I expect to have plenty of opportunities to use PERSNICKETY. It is fun to say and both my husband and I are PERSNICKETY about some things. (Unfortunately, they’re not the same things.) Thanks for the fun!
@Eric Hougland I'm the first to admit that my knowledge of geography and weather is shaky once I leave the East Coast, so I'm wondering if you were affected by the hurricane force winds that they were reporting for the Denver area at the end of last week.
@Eric Hougland I have thought of David Connell often this year--he's MIA, and badly missed. I hope he's still out there, making my "corn pone" for dressing ...or just because it's good.
A Monday that felt closer to a Tuesday is always welcome
Nice Monday puzzle, loved the theme! Congrats on the solid debut!!!!!
Well, a theme can't get much tighter than this. Congratulations on your first NYT puzzle, Suzanne. Hopefully you'll be back again and again.
Kudos all around. To Suzanne for her debut puzzle To Sam for the column and the photo chosen to head the column And to the photographer for the amazing photo There's always discussion about POPO when it turns up. I first heard it used on The Wire way back in 2002, so don't have any problem with it appearing in a puzzle. The first time it showed up was in 2014.
That was hard for a Monday, at least for me! Very fun, thank you.
ADZE in a Monday puzzle? No fair!
@Joy Harkin. ADZE is to woodworking as “Oreo” is to cookies, at least in NYT xwords
Excellent Monday puzzle. Clever and fresh. Thank you Suzanne!
Delightful. The PERNICKETY difference has been addressed already. Scots dialect has the word "perjink", which has the same meaning. I know ADZE from many UK crosswords. We all need words with Z in them. My niece in Elon, North Carolina has a local bookshop called Persnickety Books.
When I was younger, I always carried a wallet with a change compartment. For men, these were hard to find; most guys carried change loose in their pants pocket. But I was always able to find one when it was time to replace the wallet. I was solicited for credit cards when I was finishing college, and I no longer needed to worry that the meal I was eating was going to cost more than I had in my pocket. As time passed, I started using credit cards to pay for most everyday expenses, and started accumulating points or miles or got cash back. I used cash less and less, to the point where I could get $100 at the ATM at the beginning of the month, and still have $95 at the end of the month. I even started paying for small items, like candy bars, with credit cards. In the end, I was mostly using bills for tips, and found I wasn't using coins at all. Occasionally, I'd find myself at a place that was cash only, but where I live, such places are fortunately few and far between. On such occasions, I sometimes found myself with coins back as change. I literally didn't know what to do with them. I put them down on my dresser, and there they sat. So the demise of the penny seems long overdue; the nickel should be next. Neither of them buys anything anymore; we could just drop one decimal place if we wanted to keep them, but then there'd be fewer millionaires. My current wallet has no changepurse. Just a lot of card slots.
@Steve L Unless you have bad credit and can’t get a card, it’s silly not to substitute every possible cash transaction with a no-fee, cash-back credit card. Pay in full every month and you’re earning money.
@Steve L "I even started paying for small items, like candy bars, with credit cards." Don't vendors have to pay a fee every time a customer uses a credit card? I felt bad about using a credit card to pay for a five-dollar loaf of bread the other day?
@Steve L the high school that my two youngest kids attended went cashless in 2021, partly because of Covid and people complaining about not wanting to touch cash that was covered with germs. So the snack bar only accepts debit/credit cards. Will we become a completely cashless society at some point??
@Steve L I still have almost all of the $200 I took from the ATM right before Covid started. Not kidding. I stopped using cash a long time ago. But now a lot of merchants and service people have started adding on a 3% charge for using a credit card. They even did it to my daughter's debit card, which is illegal. Really ticks me off, since they can deduct those fees as a cost of doing business. Just a sneaky price hike. I'd love to boycott those businesses, but at least here, it's getting to be more and more difficult.
@Steve L One of my health care providers charges me a six-percent fee if I use a credit card--so I write a check when possible.
I was TESTY about yesterday’s puzzle but today I was ONATEAR. Monday is always EASY enough to make regular solvers feel like JEDIMASTERS. I did my usual challenge (using the across clues only, no peeking at the down clues) and I managed it in 13:05. A nice way to make the puzzle a little crunchier and to make it last a little longer at the start of the week. Frankly I’m glad I didn’t have to solve POPFOUL or SEQ. And not to be too PERSNICKETY, I was under the impression that TOOTSY meant a tiny toe, not a tiny foot.
@Petrol for crunchiness you can try printing it out and solving without using a writing implement. 😀 I used that method in the pre-app days. I eventually decided my amusement wasn’t worth the paper it was printed on.
Really fun Monday. Fairly smooth solve, but it wasn't until I was almost done and stopped and pondered that I finally caught on to the theme. That's always a nice touch. Looking forward to more from Ms. Oliver. A couple of fun puzzle finds today - the first one inspired by TOOTSY. A Thursday from February 19, 1998 by A.J. Santora. Five theme answers in that one: TEETERTOTTERED TAKESTWOTOTANGO TICTACTOE TOOTTOOTTOOTSIE TURNSTHETABLES Here's that link: <a href="https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=2/19/1998&g=56&d=A" target="_blank">https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=2/19/1998&g=56&d=A</a> I'll put the other puzzle in a reply. ...
@Rich in Atlanta As threatened: A Sunday puzzle from March 20, 2011 by Brendan Emmett Quigley with the title: "Chick Lit." Eight theme answers in that one, each of theme clued as... "Chick lit book #1" - #2, #3, etc. (with the date of publication in parentheses). Here are those answers: THEPELICANBRIEF UGLYDUCKLING THESTERILECUCKOO SIXDAYSOFTHECONDOR TOKILLAMOCKINGBIRD THEMALTESEFALCON LONESOMEDOVE WHEREEAGLESDARE Here's that link: <a href="https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=3/20/2011&g=69&d=A" target="_blank">https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=3/20/2011&g=69&d=A</a> ....
Finished up yesterday's puzzle last night, which was great BTW, and then this was a proper dessert. Congrats on the debut and hope to see more.
Ah, PERSNICKETY, a lovely old word. Wasn't it used to describe Eloise of the Plaza Hotel? I guess that's old-fashioned, too. A fun and lively puzzle, Suzanne, thanks.
Could've had a more musical SW corner with different clues for OIL and LED (midnight, zeppelin)
This was a really fun puzzle. A perfect Monday!
Fun puzzle but I never heard of POPO; that's a new one on me.
@Ms. Billie M. Spaight prominent slang in rap music.
Ms. Billie M. Spaight, You missed it here in June.
@Ms. Billie M. Spaight I learned it from my husband who was a retired policeman.
I ran POP FOUL past DHubby, who made his "That's NOT right face." POP UP or FOUL BALL ....or FOUL OUT, because that's usually fatal. The catcher jumps up, throwing off his mask, and gets under the ball as it--fatally--drops into his waiting glove. YER OUT! I try not to be PERSNICKETY, but I spell it PERSNICK i TY. Most definitely needed The Reveal to get the puzzle. I also got led astray (OPEN BOOK; JEDI KNIGHTS; JAZZ BANDoops). Wonderful start to the week, though. More, please.
@Mean Old Lady I started with FOUL POP; either would work but it was the other one here.
MOL, Are you sure you read the 39D clue to DHubby exactly as it is written? The answer is correct (and I'd think he'd know that).
@Mean Old Lady Hand up for OPEN books. That’s what we called such tests.
@Mean Old Lady I had FOUL TIP crossing FUZZ, because POPO is far to silly.
@Mean Old Lady Maybe it depends on the broadcasters one hears. Been following baseball for more than 60 years, in Cincinnati when I was a kid and the last roughly 50 years in St Louis and have heard POP FOUL quite often.
@Mean Old Lady--a pop foul is any pop up which comes down in foul territory, as in behind home or anywhere else outside the baselines
Re: the Constructor Notes and 52A, I had a friend in college who had a beautiful long-haired calico cat that she doted on. The friend was looking for a name for her home-based typing service. I suggested PURRSNICKETY but she didn't like it. Ditto, my second suggestion: PURRFECTION. You can't please everyone.
@lucky13 Well, that cat probably never lifted a paw to assist with the work, you know.
Two toddlers so far and TOOTSY has yet to be uttered! Failing as a parent, too busy thinking AUDAL was a word.
@Erik P Yeah... I tried to cast my mind back into the dark Past...(both kids now in their Forties). No TOOTSY there. Our daughter referred to her feet as Righty and Lefty (long story)... She is the only child I've ever known to recognize Right and Left before a third birthday.... (Personally I still mix up R and L.)
cheeky monday and excellent debut. i wonder if anyones first seven puzzles have ever appeared in sequence from monday to sunday...
Not yet. Andrew Ries is the only constructor to hit the cycle in their first seven puzzles, and his weren't in daily order.
What a delightful puzzle. Thanks, Suzanne! Happy Monday, y’all! Peace!
That's it! I'm keeping an index card with the names of every rapper that shows up. That particular musical made-up-word genre is the Lord's gift to crossword puzzle makers. 😛
@Molly in Wake Forest “[M]ade-up-word.” Please let me know when you find a word that someone somewhere some time didn’t “make up.”
@Molly in Wake Forest Interestingly folks have done literary analyses of rap lyrics and found that many rappers have a larger vocabulary than Shakespeare (also a noted coiner of words!)
What a fantastic debute! Lots of fun clues with a very clever revealer. I hope to see more puzzles from Suzanne, this was my favorite Monday crossword yet!
Respectfully disagree. One of the best things about crossword puzzles is learning new words.
Price of admission was just a bit steep for newbies on a Monday...nevertheless, a clever and fun puzzle! Thsnks Suzanne! more please!
Great debut Suzanne, even if you did make my Monday average a little worse, grrr.
Thank you to Sargento Cheese for keeping PERSNICKETY in the language. (I had no idea that the Brits drop the S from that word, interesting.)