Like, that was fun. Seven very common phrases, yet each is a debut. Totally rad. I always enjoys puzzles from Rebecca and Christina. Nicely done, ladies. Tended garden with a brown thumb, in Valleyspeak? GREW LIKE A WEED
Spent a delightful evening at a members event at the Charles Schulz Museum in Santa ROSA, CA, only to come home and find it in the crossword. I love synchronicity
OMG, that was, like, totally awesome
This was, like, quite amusing. Thanks, Rebecca and Christina. It's fine with me to have a fun Sunday that doesn't put up much of a fight (although I really wished Saturday had). I'm glad the constructors went with the themers they did; I hope FOUGHT, LIKE, THE DEVIL?, which they discarded, does not describe anyone's solve today.
The first precincts are reporting: <a href="https://xwstats.com/puzzles/2026-06-28" target="_blank">https://xwstats.com/puzzles/2026-06-28</a>
My first Sunday that I finished without lookups! Even though it was certainly easier than normal, it still feels like an accomplishment. Such a, like, fun puzzle!
@AtlasMoray Yay! A first Sunday is a first Sunday. End of story.
@AtlasMoray @Francis I want to say something lame like "You never forget your first," but I've forgotten my first. I suspect there's but a handful of firsts which are truly indelible in memory.
@AtlasMoray Well done. Not my first such today but In my 16 months of doing the NYT xword, I've learnt enough Hawaiian island names to scrape through today with out looking up.
Commit arson, in Valleyspeak SPREADLIKEWILDFIRE Compete at Westminster, in Valleyspeak WORKLIKEADOG Administer an oath to a seaman, in Valleyspeak SWEARLIKEASAILOR Heal kings and queens, in Valleyspeak TREATLIKEROYALTY Peruse some literature, in Valleyspeak READLIKEABOOK
What it lacked in difficulty it made up for in smiles and head shakes. I squeaked with anticipation when I saw the constructor names and the synergy of their collaboration did not disappoint. An unusual Sunday to be driven so overwhelmingly by charm.
16:38, and a 1619-day streak that must end because tomorrow brings a no-phones, six day rafting trip in Idaho. Farewell, fond streak!
@Marshall Hey, when you get back, IF you start your puzzles wherever you left off, your streak will probably continue. Thank God that works, because after a surgery a couple years ago, my brain was entirely incapable of filling out a puzzle for two days.
@Marshall And if Alita’s idea doesn’t work, just write down where you were at on your streak, start over, and if anyone asks what your streak is just add them together. I promise I won’t tell. Maybe if you get nominated to be a Supreme Court justice you will have to come clean but otherwise I think you will be fine.
@Marshall Have fun. Sounds amazing!!
@Marshall Salmon? if so which fork? have a great trip!
@Marshall Enjoy the water. It will all be here when you return. Have fun!
@Marshall I’m glad to see you have your priorities in order. Have a wonderful time.
@Marshall Streaks are a prison for yourself. Enjoy the new-found freedom to actually decide whether you want to do a puzzle or not.
@Marshall If your timing is right you might be able to make it up by doing a few puzzles at the usual stop for ice cream at what used to be the Forbes Ranch, about halfway. I'm sure they will have wifi there now, although they didn't in 1993 when I did the River of No Return. Should be a short stop for you with times like that! (and keep your device dry and charged up)
I won’t be the last to say there was a lot to LIKE here. This was a cute theme and they got better as the puzzle progressed. Always happy to see a byline by Rebecca or Christina, what a great team! A lot of Gods and two Hawaiian islands (LANAI or KAUAI, the age old question, along with SCARF or SNARF?) My favorite clue: “They shine during the day”. Terrific grid!
@SP I had to flyspeck, and my error involved those Hawaiian isles. For some reason, I had MA_I for the location of that curvy road, and thought that it must be in MALI. KALAI? Well, there are a lot of small islands, so that seemed perfectly plausible. Why a desert nation would have such a road was the greater puzzle. MAUI and KAUAI??? Too many vowels!
This puzzle was so corny I couldn’t not, like, like it. And a tip of the hat to Madame Brendlar who introduced me to Le Petit Prince in high school French.
@Marshall Walthew I have a beautiful old copy in French that was my grandmother’s. A treasure.
[Dog-ear your Dad’s first edition of “Great Expectations”, in Valleyspeak?] HURTLIKETHEDICKENS An uncannily fun puzzle!
@JohnWM One of my favorite themes in a while. [Help a local cross the street in Cairo?] WALKLIKEANEGYPTIAN
(First attempt got emu'ed...) I loved this! Nothing but an outstanding puzzle could come from a mind meld of Rebecca and Christina, powerhouses on their own, and a TIDAL force to be reckoned with together. I started at the bottom of the grid, so figured out WORKED LIKE A CHARM quickly, setting a fun tone for all the themers. Then I had a blast with the fill which took me to many places... . BABEL - great movie . ANTOINE de Saint-Exupéry - earlier today I came across a quote of his, simple in wording, but nailing the concept of perception: "The meaning of things lies not in the things themselves, but in our attitude toward them." (from "Wisdom of the Sands") . YSL - that other "Saint," Monsieur Yves Saint Laurent, for whose cosmetics company I had the honor of working while he was still alive and had a say, insisting on quality. Yes, he was responsible for the first Beatnik collection (which was also the first prêt-à-porter at a time of only couture on runways.) He put women in stylized motorcycle leather jackets and put models in thigh-high boots. He put women in pant suits. He put Black models on the runway. And he put art into clothing, giving us the Mondrian dress. You could say I worship his creativity and genius, as I do Rebecca's and Christina's. I rode like the wind on the wings of this amazing puzzle and wanted more. Thank you to both! <a href="https://youtu.be/kA9uaBqvRtA?is=4Gkb8jyvziuwUIG2" target="_blank">https://youtu.be/kA9uaBqvRtA?is=4Gkb8jyvziuwUIG2</a>
@sotto voce I knew what the song was gonna be, but couldn't find anything online about the video. (Rainey Qualley is one of Andie McDowell's daughters. ) And too bad you're on the wrong coast to go see this exhibit featuring YSL, his work and his life. <a href="https://www.icp.org/exhibitions/yves-saint-laurent-and-photography" target="_blank">https://www.icp.org/exhibitions/yves-saint-laurent-and-photography</a>
OMG! They closed the GAP at the mall! My life is ov- wait a minute, is that our song playing on your Walkman? Saw their byline, and just HAD to hold my breath Making SASSIER clues is what Becs and Chris do best I SHOOKLIKEALEAF, ain't ASKIN for disgrace WATCHEDLIKEAHAWK, in case I ERRED and needed to backspace Let's spell to-tally like they do! You know they're CLEVER and we're getting better (it's ABOUTIME) There's nothing Becs and Chris can't do No valley here, just ALTITUDES! Dreamt of better grids, and WEDO think they ACED! Trapped by ANEMIC clues, they JILT that clichéd paste They made a puzzle grid to test this Sunday race KNEEDEEP in OATHS some streaks had long gone by GOODLOSER cries INSIDE With brain heavylikeOXIDE Let's spell the words just like these two! ILLBET you solved it, and you ITCH to LAUD them, all the time! There's nothing Becks and Chris can't do No valley here, just ALTITUDES! OKDONE. Can we stop for some Orange Julius?
@Whoa Nellie Bravissimo!!! 👏👏👏👏👏
As a person who grew up in the SF Valley, I felt nostalgia from this theme. Yes, we absolutely talked like this and worse. I have old videos as a 12 year old saying “totally” and “for sure” and our parents always tried to break us of the “like” habit. But we persisted. The kids from the valley were so maligned at that time, going to the beach was a risky business. “Vals go home” graffiti was a threat, but we still made the journey. Two bus transfers, many hours of travel and disgust from locals would not defeat us. Have a rad Sunday everyone!
@Lisa S I saw a T-shirt that made me smile: KOOKS ONLY NO LOCALS
Did I, like, do that!? Why yes, fer sure! It was so totally rad, I'm gonna get my AQUAnet from my LAIR and tease my hair into Liberty spikes—as DIOSMIO intended! How very.
@HeathieJ It seems my rely to you got, like, emu’d. Because you can’t be all using gnarly words like kitchen in the comments. Or, like, a word that rhymes with kitchen but starts with a “b”. Whatever, Later, hater.
Mercy, I don't have any idea how some of you solve so quickly! I can't even begin to read all the clues in those times, let alone parse answers and tap tap tap, oops, backspace, tap, gah!, backspace, backspace, tap tap, tap in my answers on my Android phone. I can solve a little quicker if I'm at my PC with a full size keyboard. But some of y'all are just on another level than this old plodder. 50 minutes on the dot, and several minutes better than my Sunday average.
@Kenny you and I both. It doesn’t matter at all, fun comes in all speeds.
@Kenny It's unusual, especially since this was oversized, but I never paused (coffee got cold) ....just kept filling (and the hits kept comin') until it was finished (pen on paper.) I haven't put my eye drops in yet, for which I am grateful! But I'll go do that now.
I like both these constructors a lot separately and I was sure I'd like them a lot as a team. And I did. If you make a Sunday puzzle playful enough, it will never be a slog regardless of its length and this is very playful. Growing up in NYC, I may have never heard a Valley Girl in the flesh as it were, but she's been parodied plenty in the past. Now, if only I could remember the accent -- but I don't. The overuse of the word" like", however, isn't restricted to the Valley. It's bled into speaking patterns all around the country and it's incredibly annoying. I have heard interviews with Really Famous People who, if you took the word "like" away from them, would be rendered mute. Also -- why do Valleys tend to produce idiosyncratic speaking patterns. While I've never met a Valley Girl, as an East Coaster, I've met more than a few women -- it's always women! -- with Locust Valley Lockjaw. This is a pseudo-posh and very pinched way of speaking in which the jaw, lips and teeth barely move at all. Is there also a Napa Valley way of speaking? A Death Valley way? Just wondering. As for the puzzle, it's a delightful theme idea that's very amusingly executed. I found it fun from beginning to end.
@Nancy Interesting question..... Death Valley way? Waaaaaaaater......
@Nancy Semi-serious reply: valleys isolate their inhabitants. Isolated populations preserve patterns of speech. (Hence, you could land at a Newfoundland outport until the1980s or so and hear Elizabethan English as Shakespeare would have known it.) So you're more likely to find linguistic curiosities among such populations because they are not erased or smoothed over by social mingling with other accents.
I already know this puzzle is gonna make solvers wrestle house-pets, in Valleyspeak (FIGHT LIKE CATS AND DOGS).
@Billy ....which doesn't really work as Valleyspeak, BUT which I love anyway. Once our family stopped moving around (Dad was retired from military service after 20+ years, one of the Up-through-the-ranks officers...as the military upgraded requirements for its officers' corps)...we could have pets! So we had a beagle and then later added a Siamese kitten. From the beginning it went beautifully!--as long as the beagle did what the cat wanted! LOL
Yet another use of the word LIKE that is ultra-common in my experience at least for 40+ years is for the phrase "to be like" used in the present tense to mean "said". As in "I'm like "What are you doing here?' and he's like 'I dunno, nothin' really.'" I'm not sure if that's part of Valleyspeak or not.
@Dan Yes, and it's linguistically useful, since it includes the information that what you're about to say is your best remembrance/an approximation of what was said, not word for word.
Whew. and Wow! Not an easy one for me, of course, but a really clever theme and just had a great time figuring out the theme answers once I caught on (needed lots of crosses, of course). And... puzzle find: A Sunday from August 12, 2012 by Patrick Berry with the title: "The Meaning of It." Some theme clues and and answers: "Talking isn't going to reseal that wine bottle!" PUTACORKINIT "I already know my homemade cold cream is useless!" DONTRUBITIN "Of course this car isn't voice-controlled." ITGOESWITHOUTSAYING "This tippy Christmas tree is driving me crazy!" ICANTSTANDIT And there were more. Here's that link: <a href="https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=8/12/2012&h=38a" target="_blank">https://www.xwordinfo.com/Crossword?date=8/12/2012&h=38a</a> See you later. ....
Was disappointed that "beer" was not the official fuel of the NHL in Canada.
@Ed That’s what I thought for a minute also !
Ed, Same reason ‘air’ isn’t the official sponsor of the National Hang-gliding Association :)
@Ed In which case it would be Blue, as in Labatt. (Or Bleu, for les Quebecois.)
For a more academic discussion of the use of “like” here’s an article by my favorite linguist (actually, one of my favorite academicians, period), John McWhorter: <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/15/opinion/casual-speech-like.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share" target="_blank">https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/15/opinion/casual-speech-like.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share</a>
I'm a fan of McWhorter as well — especially his columns about words.
@SP A fascinating phenomenon, to me, is how the word "like" has come to serve as the most ubiquitous filler word in other languages, as well. Among just the languages in which I'm conversant there's "כאילו" (k'eeloo) in Hebrew, "so" and "wie" in German, "como" in Spanish... Any linguists out there care to weigh in on whether this is a natural linguistic propensity (i.e. using "like" as an informal substitute for "as if") or the influence of English-speaking culture on world speech? Or a combination?
@SP that is a good John McWnorter column, Thanks! I also noticed I started using “low key” for saying “I am a bit low-key nervous” or “I am low-key nervous about….”
Consume the *other* red meat, in Valleyspeak EATLIKEAHORSE What to do if you forget to use oven mitts, in Valleyspeak DROPITLIKEITSHOT An Avro pilot's job, in Valleyspeak FLYLIKEANARROW
@Gavin Thanks for the shoutout to the Avro. With Canada Day (née Dominion Day) coming up on Wednesday, it's poignant to think of the Canadian aerospace industry that was throttled at birth.
Two things: I had one clue I was stuck on forever. It hit me while mowing my lawn. Not sure what the means. Secondly, I howled with laughter at the theme clues and answers. I've been doing puzzles for over 20 years and I can't believe people can incorporate these incredibly interesting themes. Well done folks.
No one could have been entirely clueless about the Valley Girl talk. Amy Heckerling, who wrote and directed the brilliant take-off on Jane Austen's "Emma," flooded the language with Valley Girl tropes, much of it harvested from what she heard and some of it she just invented. If you haven't seen the movie, you've missed the source of some very funny dialog that energized teen language everywhere. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xRQPtUBxDmM" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xRQPtUBxDmM</a>
@dutchiris Yes, Clueless is terrific. But IMO the best bit in it is the excuse the heroine tries on the guy administering her driving test when she fails to stop at a STOP sign: "I totally paused". We took my mega Austen fan mother to the movie--not quite sure if she'd like it-- and she had the AUDACITY to use that line on ME a month or so later.
I've known about the Large Hadron Collider for many years, but it never occurred to me that it was a particle. Seriously, I thought it was a place name. So TIL it means "fat particle" because it has more than one QUARK. Lepton, by contrast, means "skinny particle."
Grant, Interesting to know. For me, your post provided a similar insight into the etymology of the well-known Scrawny Lepton Collider. ;)
Just in case Marshall (or anyone!) doesn't read my response to his post, or it doesn't get posted at all, let me remind people that if you are on a streak and have to take a break, if you pick up where you left off when you get back, your streak will continue. If you do the puzzle for the day you get back, and then go back and do the ones you missed, your streak will start over at one. Fingers crossed!
@Alita Shaver Not in my experience. If it’s late, it’s blue. But I’ve never been one to worry about streaks, so it doesn’t bother me.
@Alita Shaver may be true for blue stars, but not for gold stars which have to be done within a restricted time frame (we are at day 2179 in our current gold stars streak)
@Alita Shaver I think that’s only true for a brief time window. You can definitely maintain your streak by doing the puzzles in order well after the next day’s puzzle has dropped. Not sure if it would work after two or more additional puzzles have dropped, or where the exact cutoff is - or if that cutoff has changed over time
Kudos to Christina and Rebecca for the puzzle and to Caitlin for the column, the headline, and most especially for the photo with all the AQUAS and its clever caption.
That was like totally fun. Quick for a Sunday (my third new PB this week, alongside Thursday and Saturday), but delightful!
Excellent puzzle. Fun, creative, just the right difficulty... I can't wait for the next one. I'm loving Christina Iverson's puzzles lately. I'm going back to the archive and making sure I have had a go at her creations. I'm not a solver who's going to break any speed records, I enjoy the different elements too much to breeze through them. Along with her collaborations. They are some of the Best NYT Crosswords ever. So now I've added Rebecca to my list. Great Sunday puzzles really set up some good karma for the upcoming week.
Something I rarely (okay, never) write on Sundays: Like, I really, like, *liked* this puzzle! About forty minutes of work, almost all of which I enjoyed. Very few winces, and none of those elicited by the thematic entries or their silly clues. Having two entries that included just "like" rather than "like a" struck me as a nice thematic feature. And I even learned that "before" can technically be a conjunction, and is, for example in "By this count I shall be much in years / Ere I again behold my Romeo!" For me, a Sunday POY contender. Thanks!
@Xword Junkie Wait. Did you, like, like it? Or did you, like, LIKE like it? 'Cause, if you, like, LIKE liked it, I'll tell them, and I'll find out if they, like, LIKE like you. And maybe you can, like, ask them to the dance, or, like, something. But if you just, like, liked it, Well, I'll just, like, keep it to myself, and no one but us, like, needs to know about it.
This was totally tubular. Seriously I am having such a bad week and me and my husband were laughing out loud on this one! Really great puzzle. Thank you thank you!
80s girl here who like totally loved this rad puzzle. A fun and easy Sunday, fer sher. Can we get some more constructions from this awesome female duo, puhleaze??!!
Clever and funny, and, like, really enjoyable, thanks so much!
This was like, so totally like, rad, you know? I’m like, not *even* with it? Like tooootally POY? I’m like so sad cuz like, we have to like paint our fence, and it’s like, sooooo hot today? I’m gonna like, get like, sweaty which sooooo grody? Like, gag me with roller… Y’ know?
@CCNY Maybe if you try Tom Sawyer's trick?
That was so much fun. Yes, easier than the average Sunday, but after the week we’ve had with the sun turned to full VOL that’s ok. The theme was a hoot, though it brought back nightmares of DD and chums in their teen years with like, LIKE, being like, every like other word. Aaargh.
@Helen Wright I completely agree! Even after sunset we BURNTLIKETHEMIDNIGHTOIL over here. Today's Sunday crossword was a cool breeze of fresh air!
Really fun theme and well executed! I latched on to the theme early so for me it was like an airline pilot avoiding turbulence, in Valleyspeak (flew by, like, the wind) and I enjoyed the entire solve.
I'm no cannibal, but this puzzle had me cooking like a chef.
This one put a spell on me. In other words: It worked, like, a charm.
Well. I am no doubt the only person here, or in the entire world, never to have heard of Valley Girls or the way they speak. I was quite mystified by the clues. I did enjoy solving the other clues though, a bit nice wordplay although mostly synonyms. In 1975 I was sitting on a beach in Santa Barbara and a beautiful blonde boy with a surfboard informed me that 'rad' was the latest slang, and would replace 'far out'.
@Jane Wheelaghan "(...) beautiful blond boy with a surfboard" sparked for me the memory of a great Brazilian song about one of those beautiful beach boys who unfortunately have nothing much else up there... The lyrics, loosely translated, go like this: Pretty boy Your look is simply beautiful But there's nothing more to it So I want to look at you And then walk away Without telling you why I'm a gypsy Just one look at you And I feel bewitched And in danger Your look is simply beautiful But there's nothing more to it... <a href="https://youtu.be/IKvVNGPipTA?is=kmKFadBO-zfUlfkQ" target="_blank">https://youtu.be/IKvVNGPipTA?is=kmKFadBO-zfUlfkQ</a>
At first I was all like, "barf out." But by the end I had to confess this is probably the best theme I've ever encountered.
Either I forgot to hit Send, or I got Emu'd for a pun (in Mike's absence.) Trying again: Started at the bottom with my Hawaiian Islands. Got BOISE (The Gem State, eh?) and then 121A was the first Themer of the SEVEN! to fall. "Oh. THAT Valley." QED. I enjoyed this very much, glad to have a faster solve than the Spelling Bee, which required 278 or so just for Genius. I quit after 314 points, just tired of conjugating! As our Punster Mike would say, "T'was simile divine!"
Valley speak has a lot more to LIKE about it than just that one word. I mean, GAG ME WITH A SPOON, surely you can think of more TOTALLY TUBULAR clues. Actually, I really enjoyed this puzzle.
What an entertaining puzzle! I loved it!
This was a wonderful puzzle. A classic Sunday crossword. Thank you Rebecca and Christina.
I'm a bit embarrassed to say that even though I claim to love math, I had never heard of John Nash until "A Beautiful Mind" came out. Even more embarrassing, at no point in that movie did anything I recognize as "math" appear. The notation, the symbols, nothing at all made the slightest sense. And I know it's not the movie just doing crazy stuff. It's like there's a giant piece of math out there I'm completely unaware of. If only we had information like that at our fingertips...
@Francis I love math, too, but it turns out I ever learned and loved the teensiest fraction of it, as it were. After linear algebra and differential equations my path led elsewhere and I was never introduced to the worlds and notations of topology, game theory (Nash's bailiwick) and who knows what else. Same thing happened to me with physics. Makes me feel small.
@Francis If you really want to have your mind blown, look into statistics. The fact that you can take such a small sample and extrapolate valid, useful data from it is amazing once you really understand the subject.