Very cool how the grade inflations are in descending order from D, C, B, to A and all phrases are of the same length. A+ to the constructors!
An A+ puzzle. While the theme was fairly easily uncovered, the fresh answers and cluing made this particularly entertaining. And how nice to see a Wordplay column from Will Shortz.
Mr Shortz! Welcome to the column! Don't be intimidated by being the new boy. You'll get the hang of it, and if you need any help with, well, anything, that's what we're here for. We always know a lot more than the constructors and the editors, and we're always eager to share our suggestions and criticism. This was a ZESTY puzzle for your first day, and I want to say, you did a fine job. In no time, you'll be a regular crossword puzzle solver. Uh oh. You're THAT Will Shortz? Never mind.
@dutchiris 🤣😂🤣😂 Well done! Very, very well done!
@dutchiris But is it that Gary Larson?
@dutchiris, haha. Touché! So nice to see Will Shortz’s name today!
@dutchiris DI, you are on a roll with your comments the last few days. Today’s was the best yet. It made my morning.
You probably knew I would do this… Dude! We cleaned out the pool in record time! HIGH DIVE! Look at those young upstarts driving down the street in their CROP TOPS. I’ve told you and told you: don’t OVERBOOK the Brussels sprouts! Oy! I’ve walked ten miles with these A LISTERS and can’t take any more!
Cat Lady Margaret, And we're glad you did!
@Cat Lady Margaret Aren't there enough hotel rooms for the school group from Belgium?
@Cat Lady Margaret -- HELLO WITTY!
I found this puzzle thoroughly enjoyable and Thursday-appropriate. Sure, it was possible to get all the theme entries on the vertical crossings, but I loved the 💡 moment when figuring out the grade-inflated letter in each themed across clue. Thanks to the cruciverbalists for a charming collaboration!
Very lively puzzle. Thanks, constructors! And the guest Wordplay columnist seems to know something about crosswords. I'll have the ELOTE with GLEE.
Perhaps the YENTA had me in a YSOM (Yiddish state of mind) because I confidently plopped down OY PAPI initially. Oy vey papi, indeed!
Nope. Two fails in a row. Feels like I'm losing the grip. Very clever puzzle, though, I have to say. I would have been proud to have solved it. Regarding the weather, the ice in Minnesota is particularly dangerous this year. I passed a lady coming out of the grocery store tonight who slipped and fell. Fortunately she was all right, but not everyone has been that lucky. I would love to see a thaw, but I don't think one is coming. I don't think one is coming for a long, long time.
@Francis What tripped you up today? I admit I had to get LAGUNITAS entirely on crosses, FIFTYCENT mostly on crosses, and the NE gave me pause.
@Francis - Woodbury forecast (have family there) is 37 for Thursday. Should help. (As an aside, we feel for Minnesota today.)
@Francis Sadly, Francis, I have to agree with you. a long, cold, lonely winter.
@Francis So I guess you're not planning to vacation in Greenland once it's liberated?
@Francis Sending love to all our lovely friends in Minnesota 🫶🏼 My heart breaks for you all and everything you've been through in the last year. Stay safe.
I liked this one and thought it was a fun Thursday. And man, there are some grumps in the comments. Go read a book, if that's what you all would rather be doing. Sheesh.
¡Ay papi, that was fun! I never thought I’d see so many people complaining about the *lack* of a rebus. It must be Yadsruht, because I think I’m in Bizarro world. No rebus, just a good old-fashioned letter substitution: one of the many treats in Thursday’s extensive bag of tricks. And another Roo sighting! Always a bonus for me and my pup. Great puzzle, ladies.
@Heidi Well said! Yes, the rebus has become the Dread Pirate Roberts of crossword land haunting Thursdays and Sunday: Intimidating by its mere existence, difficult to recognize and ever elusive.
I don’t quite get why some folks are saying rebuses should’ve been accepted. If a grade is inflated, it’s not listed as a C that should actually be a D or something. It’s a D that’s inflated to a C. One letter. Just like in the (slightly Thursday-weird) answers today.
@Dave S To be fair, even though I did not consider entering a rebus even for a moment, I can understand why some people wanted to. It wouldn't be perfectly in sync with the revealer, maybe, but still...
@Dave S, because not only did it make the answers work (across and down), but also, it showed a progressive series (top to bottom) of “grade inflations”: F/D, D/C, C/B, B/A. Had they not been in order that way, the rebuses wouldn’t have seemed so correct.
@Dave S Because it is very frustrating to have figured out the trick and gotten everything correct and get no music because you also have to guess exactly how the editors want you to enter it. Any method of demonstrating the grade inflation trick should work.
Very impressive how Mallory and Zhou came up with answer pairs differing by one letter, with those differing letters being alphabet neighbors. Not to mention, they only had F, D, C, and B to work with. Plus, those answers had to fit grid symmetry. And … the answer pairs are both in-the-language phrases -- wow! Try coming up with some of these – I, for one, did with very little success, and thus my bedazzlement with what they did. I liked seeing ABCS as an answer in a grid about school grades. Also liked seeing AYES, a grade-inflation of “byes”, echoing the theme. Plus, it was lovely to see ROSA again, who we saw on Monday, also clued by playing on “Parks”. Congratulations, Mallory, on your NYT debut, and Zhou on your fourth, and thank you both for a fun solve with wow overtones!
Folks are free to complain about anything they want, and god knows I’ve indulged. But I am surprised at how many people felt like this should have been a rebus. Given the revealer, it never occurred to me: A rebus wouldn’t be “inflating” the grade, it would just be showing two grades side by side. When the revealer is about transforming a word letter into another word or letter, isn’t it always just a straight replacement?
@Stephen I’ll admit that I thought it might be a rebus after the first two themers didn’t fall into place smoothly, but that’s because I didn’t know what the theme was yet. Once I got 39A, I eliminated the rebus from consideration. Once you see what’s going on, it’s clearly not a rebus.
I guess if you thought this was too easy for a Thursday it was the result of DAY INFLATION? Yes this theme was a little light for a Wednesday but I agree with Will that the clue difficulty bumped it up a bit, not surprising from a Zhou Zhang puzzle. Congrats Mallory on your debut, what a great mentor! Loved the theme, perfectly executed, interesting additional fill, and a fun clue for YENTAS, that will probably make Lewis’ best of the week. I’m sure the animal lovers will also appreciate, finally, a clue for ORCA that doesn’t dis them for their diet.
@SP "400 pounds" isn't dissin their diet?
I got the theme easily enough. But because it IS a Thursday, to me it is inexcusable that rebuses were not accepted as alternatives in the crossing squares. It took me forever to suss out which letter(s) were acceptable and otherwise ruined a fun puzzle finagling the app to get the happy music.
@Greg Anderson, There is a mention in the Wordplay column today about the deliberate decision not to go with a rebus, and how the theme made the solve a little different today. The columnist is a new guy, so you might want to cut him some slack 😊.
@Greg Anderson But what was there to rebus? No extra letters needed. Just a letter-for-letter substitution for grades. Nice touch to have ABCs as an entry.
@Greg Anderson I get what you are saying, it could be a double rebus where the F was for the across and the D for the down, and the grade “inflated” in the rebus square. It never crossed my mind. All I can say is that usually there’s more in the revealer to suggest a rebus, and typically more than one letter each way. Also the revealer just specified the acrosses and a rebus would also have to involve the downs (or maybe say affecting four spots in the grid rather than four across entries). It’s subtle but I do think the rebus was unnecessary for this theme, and would have been more confusing.
@Greg Anderson But a rebus would have made the down entries gobbledegook. You weren’t finagling the app, you were searching for the right answer, and just like in every other square, you don’t get the happy music until you enter the right letter..
@Greg Anderson I agree! I had the rebus too, D/C for the first for instance, so that both down and across answers made sense and the 'inflation' was the D->C indicated in the rebus. Made the most sense to me, rather than having across answers that didn't fit the theme clues. Had to come and read the column before I could get the happy music. Oh well, wouldn't be a Thursday if it wasn't tricky, I guess!
@Greg Anderson Agreed. Usually the app takes either letter or both, no? Today it needed one specific one.
@Greg Anderson It made more sense to me that the across answer included the inflated grade. It never occurred to me to use a rebus. There may be a tendency for some to go into a Thursday expecting a rebus. Regardless of the day of the week, I don't look for a rebus unless no other option makes sense.
@Greg Anderson This might be a first. A complaint that there ISN’T a rebus?? 😆
@John if you were allowed to enter either letter, then one option would be to enter an uninflated letter grade, which would make the revealer and the down entries nonsensical. I imagine that's why it's a non-rebus puzzle
It wasn't a near Wednesday for me! I "finished" in about average Thursday time, but then had to spend over four minutes finding mistakes and corrections before it finally clicked. I tried entering the inflated grades as rebuses (A/B, B/C etc.), but of course that didn't work. (I still think maybe it should have.) The Heineken subsidiary was a large time waster, since the vowel (U) necessary for it to cross the Boolean value was a "true" Natick for me. If only I'd been a beer-loving coder! It's never as much fun to wrestle with a puzzle you thought you had finished, but I can't blame this one on the constructors. Now that it's done, I admire the idea and the execution. Nice work!
@DYT I agree with you totally - rebuses should have worked and would have been completely fair.
@DYT. I put in rebuses too. Kinda thought they only wanted the higher grade and it eventually worked out. Liked the bow clue and seeing the name of the cartoonist/artist who gave us the elephant for the Republicans and our usual Santa Claus.
If your grade has been inflated, you receive the higher grade. Not somehow two grades at once. Also, a rebus would have made the down answers gobbledegook. Thus, no rebus required
Especially compared to the other puzzles this week, this one was kinda fun. That’s not saying much though. Many of the clues felt a bit unimaginative but I liked some of them. The theme wasn’t bad. My engineering classes in college definitely benefited from some grade inflation after it was determined that everyone failed the class. Victor Borge’s Inflationary Language also comes to mind. “You look twoderful threenight.”
@Charles Nelson Reilly I'd add that I often wonder if grade inflation is real. Has anyone dug a bunch of 60's blue books out of storage and asked today's profs to grade them? College grades were a lot less important. The shall-be-nameless Ivy that I attended then had plenty of happy "pass men"; I had the misfortune to be teamed with one in a computer class. (Side note: given the casual misogyny of the time, the women students were almost universally dissed as grade grubbers.) oh and yes I realize the men were hanging on to their draft deferments, but it's still true that one could get a decent job afterwards with a C average.
Today I learned about the Osage Nation! Starting with the fact that their name comes from the French “eau sage”, or “calm waters”. I consider myself a fairly well-educated European and five minutes on Wikipedia has reminded me that I remain deeply ignorant of many things, including Native American tribes!
@Petrol It’s been decades since I took French. I get eau, as any crossworder would, but how does the French sage become the English calm?
@Petrol Thank you for that TIL! I'm still unclear what waters are being referred to--the Osage River? The Missouri? The Mississippi? It doesn't help that so many so many First Nations relocated, voluntarily or in-, across great distances of North America. Once settled on the Great Plains, the Osage were one of the first peoples to adopt the horse. Horses are, of course, not native to the Americas, but, once they were introduced, horsemanship spread across North America almost as fast as smallpox.
@Petrol Don’t feel bad, most Americans are sadly ignorant about native American tribes too.
An easy and pleasant Thursday puzzle, but as a college prof., I have to say: your editors missed an opportunity to hold out for a release date closer to the end of a semester, around the time we're all entering final grades!
Being Canadian I know little Spanish, so the cross to AYPAPI could have been BOINK, DOINK, ZOINK. If you sound these out loud people look at you funny.
Even Canadians should know the AY from "Ay caramba" from The Simpsons.
@Barry Ancona I don't watch The Simpsons, sorry.
@Dave S Now I'm hearing, BOINK, DOINK, ZOINK and looking at you funny. I thought of BOINK first, too.
Yay for Mallory and Zhou! I love that their constructors' notes have a playfulness befitting the puzzle (and, in my experience as Zhou's friend, reflects Zhou's personality). I'm looking forward to meeting them at ACPT!
For those who were expecting a rebus, I will expand on my earlier comments. I hear what you are saying but in the future I think these hints will help: 1) Double rebuses are rare to begin with, and would even be more rarely seen with only one letter in both directions 2) if a double rebus is used, the revealer will will indicate some justification for the rebus, and indicate that it applies to a location or cell in the grid, not just across entries 3) Think about the implication of the revealer. GRADE INFLATION means that the grade was CHANGED from a lower to higher grade—not that both grades exist together or side by side. 4) In general, assume that a rebus isn’t used if it isn’t necessary, and in this case it isn’t. The grade inflation is implied by the change in the letter for the across, and the downs are perfect as they are. 5) Lastly, I say this about any double rebus—if you think it’s one, only put in one direction to save yourself the headache of making sure the order or formatting is correct. It’s usually pretty standard but I hear enough complaints and have never had a problem doing this. This may or may not have helped today if you happened to put the incorrect across letter in and not the downs. Again, you are not stupid or thoughtless for thinking there might be—after all, a lot of smart people came to the same conclusion—but in my experience the above criteria would be necessary for a rebus and they weren’t met in this case, so maybe this will help.
SP, This should be helpful ... for people who read it.
@SP Stop defending the indefensible. The job of the app is to recognize when you’ve figured it out, not when you’ve stood on your head and twirled your thumbs in the right direction. Most of the time there are a variety of ways of filling the rebus that all count because they all reflect that you ‘got it’. This was an error in programming. And a mighty frustrating one at that.
@SP The flaw in all of this justification is that the correct answer makes the across clue simply wrong. Some meta-argument about rebuses is irrelevant. Arguing that the undesirability of grade inflation is somehow a clue to the answers not matching the clues is just too tortuous.
@SP I wish I could recommend this comment 100 times. Well said!
@SP I have never understood "rebus" as it is used/applied in Crosswords. I never pay attention to that in Comments. So that's just aside. However, the "grade inflation" which affects the Downs (making those clues' answers correct) negates the Across answers (even though the result of the change is an actual word/phrase in itself, it's just just hanging there. Pfft. Unsatisfying. Since I solve on paper, I divided the crossing square and put in both letters ==top one as the "inflated grade" for the Down, and the bottom one to keep the clue/entry relevant. I found it more satisfying. Enjoyed the solve. The End.
@SP hello, co-constructor here! i'm a bit hesitant to wade into these rebus-filled waters (which i'm very much enjoying), but i can't help myself... i'll admit that over the many, many hours Mal and i spent on this puzzle, neither of us thought the "trick" of this puzzle would be people thinking a rebus is afoot when it's not. 😳 our intent was always a single letter per square, where the theme answers you enter in are "inflated" from the answers that match the clues. i can definitely see in hindsight why folks would be frustrated by the fact that a rebus isn't acceptable as an answer... but that wouldn't have changed how we made the puzzle. (honestly, i'm a bit tickled that the majority of complaints are about lack of a rebus.)
I thought the trick was quite nice, once I understood it. Not quite tricky enough for Thursday though, maybe? I generally expect more weirdness this time of the week. I'd see this theme on a Wednesday. I found the fill very weird though - a mix of extremely straightforwardly clued gimmes and personally ungettable arcana which I had to look up. The SW corner was naticky for me, and personally impossible to solve without Google. Now I know I've seen ELOTE before, probably in these puzzles, but I couldn't remember it today. I suppose Sir ELTON Hercules John is Elton John of music? As clued he was a mystery to me. I do the shopping in our household so I know many brands of feminine products, but KOTEX, while apparently available in Poland (or so google says), is not huge here at all, so I didn't know it. And finally, I may have learned the names of some Greek letters from these puzzles, but I'm unfamiliar with their order. I had issues directly S, too. What is KELLY green? And apparently there is no end to the ways one can clue EYRE (I haven't read the book, so they all confuse me). I can never remember how you spell words with IE/EI. SEIZE but TIER? The sound is the same but the spelling different! Why won't you be normal, English? 🤣 This is especially hard for me as I speak German, where IE and EI represent very different sounds. I was happy to remember ARBUS, and figure out AY PAPI and YOINK though 😃
@Andrzej I before E unless after C and unless the word is seize 😀 and others …
@Andrzej The day I learned in my German I class that "ie" was unequivocally different from "ei" in sound and spelling, I immediately became a German at heart. From then on, if someone with a name like "Gardenstein" pronounced their names different from the German rules, I'd just correct them; tell them their were mispronouncing their own names. Not a way to make friends, I'll tell you right proper.
@Andrzej For those of us in U.S. of a certain generation, “KOTEX” means any pad as Kleenex means any brand of tissue.
Now THAT was a Thursday, my favorite in a long time. All five phases of Thursday puzzling transpired: Confidence, Bafflement, Despair, Enlightenment, Smug. That hasn't happened in a long, long time. Great debut and collaboration.
@AudreyLM, So good to see you out here again, it’s been a while! Welcome back! (And I love how you ended with Smug, too!) 😊
If I might offer some unsolicited advice that may have been helpful today and going forward. Don't consider a rebus until it hits you over the head. In other words, pretend rebuses do not exist until they have to in order to solve the puzzle. It may take getting burned a few times before this makes sense.
@Jim But rebuses were needed to solve the puzzle, otherwise none of the relevant across clues made sense. Using a rebus with the lower grade followed by a slash and the higher grade (e.g. F/D or C/B) solves in both directions and makes the "grade inflation" in each rebus explicit. I am one of those who solved with such rebuses but had solution rejected. Those rebuses should also have been counted as correct. It is arbitrary not to count them, but it's only a puzzle. So, no big deal.
I think the test of a good tricky puzzle is to be annoyed during the solve, finish, and then realize that the puzzlement was most of the fun. I was all the way down to ALISTER'S place before I caught on and that was *after* I had filled the reveal. So congrats on the constructor and collab debuts. Well done.
@John Carson That was my experience exactly. A true aha moment at ALISTER.
Nice to receive a note to us from you Will Shortz. When you started my mom was sitting on the couch doing the puzzle every day, on paper with her big ol’ dictionary by her side. I imagine she’d have a certain look on her face seeing me with my little phone on the bus.
My goodness! There have been some inane arguments on this comments page over the years. This one about rebuses and not rebuses and whatever is really an all-time low. It’s a beautiful puzzle. There is a revealer to tell you exactly what you need to do. What more do you want? Somebody to hold your hand? It’s not your puzzle. It belongs to the creator of the puzzle. We get to enjoy their creation, much like we get to enjoy a painting. You don’t get a vote.
Welcome Mallory! You chose an excellent theme and a talented collaborator. I love that feeling of filling in answers that don't make sense, along with the anticipation of finding out why they are correct. The puzzle had a peppy feel and a revealer that brought on a smile.
Surprised at the negative comments here, I thought it was a great puzzle with solid fill, and yes, on the easier side for a Thursday with a mild theme, but any spicy themes get panned here too, so there's no pleasing all people. Also after that very crunchy Tuesday (some of that fill was dreadful for us young'uns), it's nice to see a more approachable puzzle.
@Jonathan I am definitely NOT a young 'un lol (GenJones) and that danged Tuesday still took more than a minute longer than the last two days by more than a minute! That was a big boat... cheers!
Hi Will, Delighted to have you stop by! Hope you'll come around more often (and lovely words about Deb; I agree, she'll be missed!).
Oh boy, this one is going to generate a lot of posts! I solved it without help, but it took me more than 30 minutes, mostly because I didn't know DROPTOPS so I was quite reluctant to enter CROPTOPS, even though I felt it had to be correct. LIked the very clever theme, but I'm guessing that ARBUS, YOINK and PONZI crossing AYPAPI was tough for many solvers. I didn't know the specific Spanish exclamation in the puzzle, but knowing "Ay caramba!" helped me get that Y. I liked that the inflated grade letters were *not* highlighted with circles, which would have taken away much of the challenge. Even though I entered GRADEINFLATION instantly, I didn't understand the theme until I reached OVERBOOK/XBOXES, where the horizontal clue clearly called for OVERCOOK. Congrats on the debut/collaboration. This was a real Thursday workout, and much appreciated!
@Xword Junkie Well stated. It's amusing to me that most of the complaints are from people who are upset that it wasn't a rebus.
Congratulations on your debut and cheers to an all women collab! This was an immensely fun solve and when I figured out the trick I actually said "ohhh clever" out loud. My dog didn't get what I was talking about, but he gave you a hearty tail wag anyway. I definitely think this belongs on a Thursday because for me the criteria is "most fun solve". Thanks for the enjoyable start to the day!
Man people complain about everything on here, whether it’s too hard or too easy. I got this one in less than half my average Thursday time and you’ll hear no complaints from me about that!
@Dr. Katertot - So did I. Fairly quick.
@Dr. Katertot Seems like complaining has increased recently.
@Dr. Katertot What are people supposed to talk about on a crossword puzzle discussion board if not, among others, perceived puzzle difficulty? And why do people complaining about complaints always believe their meta-complaints are some better kind of complaint? How about my complaint about people complaining about complaints? Is it kosher?
@Dr. Katertot Oh oh. You accidentally triggered an AIRE (Andrzej Infinitely Recursive Event). Don't worry about it. You won't be banned from the forum or anything. We'll just have to reboot and Bob's your uncle. It's happened to all of us at one point or another.
I really enjoyed solving this puzzle, and I especially enjoyed reading Will’s column and salutations to Deb. Bravo to the constructors, and thank you both for inspiring me to take the leap into crossword construction… I’m excited to find an experienced constructor and bring up that all-women collaborator statistic! Lastly, happy birthday to my fellow Capricorns (Jan 9th over here!
@Jane yay, this comment makes me so happy!! i'm only middling in my crossword experience, but if you want to work together, feel free to hit me up! my email is zhou (dot) zhang (at) gmail (dot) com.
Loved the puzzle. Seeing FIFTYCENT immediately brought me back to my high school days, where saying “fifty” was just plain wrong. It had to be “fiddy.” Turns out it came about from Sharon Osborne, who famously pronounced his name that way at the 2003 MTV Music Awards. I found this humorous tidbit from an article (Elite Daily): Basically, 50 Cent said you can refer to him as both "Fifty" and "Fiddy," depending on what type of person you are. For example, if you call a $100 bill a "$100 bill," you should call him "Fifty." But, if you call a $100 bill a "Benjamin," then you should call him "Fiddy."
You'll hear no compliment INFLATION from me -- I thoroughly enjoyed this grid from start to finish! Thanks for a Dabulous Brossword, Mallory and Zhou -- I hope we see more collaborations from you! A+ to a great team (including you, Mr. Shortz) ~
Judging by the amount of whinging in the comments, today was a lesson for quite a few people that “If there’s a rebus, then it must be Thursday” does not necessarily equal “if it’s Thursday, there must be a rebus.”
@Jester of Xanadu It could also be a Sunday.
Thursday shenanigans! I’m pretty literal and rarely unpack tricky revealers. Today was different. I solved the revealers riddle and then actually applied the results to complete the puzzle without going down a rebus rabbit hole. This puzzle was a delight and everything I could hope for on a Thursday.
AY PAPI was a new one to me, as was YOINK. A snatching sound, really? I’ve read a lot of comics but haven’t seen that. Liked the theme, though, and caught on to that fairly quickly. About 30% under my average.
@NYC Traveler Commonly heard as an exclamation in the Groening universe when someone grabs something but I'm not sure it's spread beyond that. An image search turned up tons of graphics and t-shirts with the mystic word.
@NYC Traveler The term was also widely used to describe how DJT grabbed the FIFA Peace Prize medal.
I enjoyed this puzzle. And liked the theme. Getting from "blisters" to A-LISTERS" is indeed quite an inflation! Rebuses never occurred to me, though I can see how people might've given it a try. Puzzle finished up quickly for me; had to laugh at [Tea traders]! Now if someone can just explain to my slow brain why Will Shortz chose the bird picture to lead in the column...
@Sal Well... Here is my interpretation. The caption reads: This black redstart chick is here to encourage you as you dig into this puzzle.Credit... Now, the bird is sitting on a discarded bottle, with more refuse in the background. Maybe Mr Shortz is telling us he thought the puzzle was tr@$h? Nothing else makes sense 🤷🏽 (Why pick a pic of a bird at a dump, of all places??)
@Sal I think it's as simple as that the column is titled It's a Start! and the bird is a redstart.
Here's an interesting, 3 minute, documentary/demonstration of the Sumerian harp: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6JRmlLaSPRk&list=RD6JRmlLaSPRk&start_radio=1" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6JRmlLaSPRk&list=RD6JRmlLaSPRk&start_radio=1</a>
Delightful! YOINK, LAGUNITAS, AYPAPI,and finally, KOTEX! Thank you, lady constructors! All hail team women!
Maybe I'm just in a bad mood (with regard to all the nonsense that's going on in the world), but this puzzle didn't do it for me. I'm still trying to figure out why. I think it's a combination of too much common crossword fill (like TAS, OAT, AMA, AIL, ROSA, etc.) mixed with a number of too-peculiar answers (like LAGUNITAS and AY PAPI and YOINK). And when one of those peculiarities is a themer? (DROP TOP? I know "rag top" and "soft top", but this was new to me.) That creates even greater concern. I'll give it a "B". But that's only because of GRADE INFLATION. And an "A" for Effort, because I know you guys are trying really hard. As ever, YMMV, and I hope it does.
This was extremely impressive! The constructors were doubly constricted by their theme: not only by the "inflated" letters, but by the fact that they went in order from F to A. The fact that they managed to get in so much fun fill (ELOTE, ELTON, YOINK, YENTAS) with so much constraint built into the theme is amazing. AY PAPI!
I can maybe do 50% of Thursday puzzles without hints at this point, but this one stumped me. I was so close to getting the gimmick on my own—should have just given it some more time. Fun!
Part of figuring these things out is being exposed to all the different ways they can trick you. Last year I may have given up on this one too. But not this time!
@West of Midwest Right there with you! Wasn't it fun, even after wrassling this grid to push in things every which way - then come to find out it had everything it needed, and nothing we could add? Nobody said there would be math!
Took a highdive - but highfives to Mal and Zhou! Ai papi, I see there's a rebus A novelty some say is grievous Did you seizeon the trick Making xboxes fit? VIOLA! Grade inflation deceived us! Dang it, there ought to be more than one way to (periodically) skin a Thursday humdinger!
ACME E-Rebus Turbo Solver™ So, how about a new "you're getting warmer" light and/or sound feature triggered by errant guesses and overstuffed rebus squares? That way, when you're way off the solving mark, your screen changes color, or a red alert Klaxon blares. AH-HOO-GA! Better yet, maybe the Times could sell rebus-solving reclining chairs that would tilt/vibrate/spin the solver until those darn squares get filled - AND the happy music would be accompanied by a wiff of SOMA!* (*Zippicamiknicks sold separately)
@Whoa Nellie Just use Autocheck