Striker

That was an awesome puzzle. Don’t remember the last time we had a letter hidden in a black square, let alone a rebus. And to have each BACK work for four clues, across and down? That’s a real feat of construction. I’d rather have a “Doner meat dish” than a “Donner meat dish” - Which is how I initially read that clue. Yikes! Thanks for the amazing puzzle, Matthew Faiella!

They *really* got me with ETALIa crossing with NEaL. I’m sure that will be a common experience. I knew it was NEIL but, given the cross, I second guessed myself right away and it took me forever to give it a second look while I was fly specking. I kept thinking I had something wrong with TINCT so I tried everything I could in that section before looking elsewhere. No complaints. Fun puzzle!

Let’s all send some healing energy Dolly’s way. So much more than a BLONDE — she’s a national treasure. Get well soon, Dolly!

CLUE: Group of puzzle solvers who frequently graze the Wordplay column. CROSSWORD NERD HERD

What a fun one! EXTRA OLD BAY made me laugh out loud for some reason - even though it might not be the funniest of the themers. I was stumped with no gold star until I swapped the Z with an S, in SUZIE. … And CALF for [New Jersey?] was also a funny one I landed at the very end. Once it finally dawned on me. Stellar, as usual, Amsay. Perhaps a bit gentler than most of yours but absolutely great.

AU NATURaL + WaN was a Natick for me. (Or, do Naticks only qualify when its two proper nouns?) I was sure AU NATURaL was correct, because of the way I’ve *always* heard it pronounced, but, after a long and hearty ‘speckin, WaN was the only fill I was unsure of. I tried the E and, sure enough… AU NATUREL! … Who knew? Fun puzzle. I appreciate it, Zhouqin Burnikel!

I haven’t read many comments yet, but, I found this to be a wicked and fun little Thursday - All variety of misdirects and wordplay. The theme definitely helped me out in a big way - once I figured it out - And the revealer is the only way I would have had a chance at that. For my money, thats the best kind of tricky Thursday puzzle: Solve the revealer -> crack the theme -> solve the puzzle. In that order.

My local ice cream shop recently opened a new location here in town that serves only frozen yogurt. It’s a self service deal - pay at the end based on weight. Now, I love taking the kids to ice cream for an occasional treat. They pick two flavors - most times they seem to complement each other. Sometimes they’ll get a topping that ties it together. Delicious. Refined. Wonderful. But frozen yogurt is a different beast all together. The kids go CUCKOO. They fill big tubs with all sorts of nasty flavor combos and candy. There’s something unholy about mixing watermelon sorbet with chocolate peanut butter swirl, topping it with marshmallows, sour worms, and whatever else is within arm’s reach of the sneeze guard. It’s not a dessert. It’s a *crime scene*. So, between you and me, I’m not taking them to froyo anymore. I’m not depriving them. I’m guiding them back to civilization. They’ll thank me one day. Until then, they’ll have to suffer through a delicious O O V

Shout out SOTTO Voce. Nice to see your handle pop up in the puzzle and thanks for all your great contributions to this community.

Another easy one. Which I loved. But I’m sure many will be sad that the weekend came and went without putting up much of a fight. Maybe we’re all just getting *really* good? I’ll go with that.

I thought that puzzle was oddly charming. I don’t think I’ve seen a theme like that before, and I’ve been a daily solver for about three years. A simple concept, well executed, is always enjoyable.

This is my favorite Friday in a long while. I haven’t been around as much lately, so I never got to say thanks to Deb. I’ll do that now and hope she still reads it. Thanks for helping me out so much over these last three years. I’ll miss reading your words in the column. (Nominating @Eric Hougland or @Lewis to take your spot!) @Andrzej, it felt like Will Shortz was talking directly to you in his intro. You’re a great example of an offshore solver who gets the Americanness of the NYT Crossword, learns from it, and respects it. That’s not to say you always love it. But it seems you get it, and your perseverance on Foreign Soil is one of the reasons we all think so highly you.

So much for the “hardest week of the year.” I kind of sailed through that one. That said, I had a long day, and a perfect Friday really hit the spot. Thanks, Jackson Matz. Also… My long day involved working with developers on an app I’m building. Being on the other side really makes you appreciate how amazingly smooth the NYT Games App works. We tend to gripe when things aren’t perfect, but (trust me!) we should be thanking more people than just the constructors and editors in these comments. There’s a hardworking team behind the scenes whose job is to make sure we don’t notice them. Well, *now I’m noticing!* A sincere thank you to the NYT Games App team. You folks are doing a phenomenal job.

WHAT A BOAR that southwest corner was. I had the rest of the puzzle near finished in with under 7 minutes and then I hit that tiny section. I found it to be Fridayish difficulty. Finished around 20 minutes. On a Tuesday! Woo doggy. And, as I always say, I’ll take too tough over too easy *any day of the week*. I love Tuesdays with *a little gristle*. I thought the theme was really great and enjoyed the whole puzzle. Thanks, Justin Werfel!

Anyone else get their gold star after they finally changed FLORaS to FLORES? I thought that was a great puzzle. Thanks, Rafael Musa!

Something felt very high society and fashionable about this puzzle. Ritzy. Like an issue of Vogue magazine. Went down quickly but I really enjoyed it.

This puzzle was tough but loads of fun. Incredibly well executed and a perfect theme for the day. Never thought of a lemon as a tropical tree - But, seeing it clued in this way, I CAN SEE NO WAY tropical isn’t the PROPER classification because the NYT doesn’t get things like that wrong (but I often do). OBVi felt way more OBVi than OBVS so DESDEMONA became quite challenging for me. Really loved this one. Happy Halloween, everyone!!

Woo doggy. That was a pretty tricky little Tuesday. a total blast. Well done, Howard Neuthaler.

Can we all agree - most difficult Wednesday of the year? What an absolute beast 😅

Wellll… I’d never heard of the revealer, Didn’t know the deli, And was not familiar with the HIV med. And that made for a very difficult center section. But, it was a fun puzhle, nonetheless.

I had the same experience as Deb. I caught on to the LIE, but I didn’t see the rebus at first. I also thought it was hidden in the black square at first, and then, for a moment, thought LIE might be ”spiking” upwards using the last three letters of the down entry. It was a nice “I GOT IT” when the rebus clicked. I really enjoyed this puzzle. Thank you and congrats to Rena Cohen. So many amazing young constructors! Two days in a row. Clearly, a bright future for these constructors and the NYT Crossword.

I enjoyed this one top to bottom. Really all just clever and good. Wasn’t too easy. Wasn’t too hard. Just tricky enough without being too tricky for its own good. And, in the end, left me thinking about the creativity and mastery in its conception and construction. Good times. My thanks to Joe Marquez.

Early comments expressing a lot of big feelings on the easiness of this one. I’d like to say, first, I enjoyed it quite a bit and thought it was clever. And second, this puzzle certainly wasn’t hard, but I thought it was fairly standard Thursday difficulty for a Monetization Era puzzle.

This is exactly how my Spanish sounds. In my rather sorry attempts at speaking Spanish, More sacred = MÁS SACRED, etc. That is, until I’ve had a few drinks - y luego hablo español con fluidez! Fun, relatable puzzle for me. Thanks, Hanh Huynh!

25A = EASE, not EASy (In case anyone else gets caught in the same fly trap.) I really loved OAT sitting in the middle of the puzzle, feeding all the HORSES and JACK ASSES. Fun puzzle. Thanks, Avery Gee Katz and Aaron Gee. I hope everyone enjoyed their Veterans Day. *Especially* any military veterans in our community. Thank you for your service!

I’ll be the first to say it…. NO NOTES! This felt like a perfect Friday, for me. I got through it pretty quickly, but I think that was maybe more a “wavelength” thing vs a too easy thing. Nothing felt easy but it also didn’t include any of those words / phrases that I’ve never heard before or words / phrases that only live in Crosslandia. Really enjoyed it. Thanks, Jesse Cohn!

I reckon that’s the most difficult Monday I’ve seen in a while. Definitely well over average. Maybe I’m just distracted by the Niner game. It was fun. Thanks, Neil Padrick Wilson!

I liked this puzzle a lot. Just the right crunch - finished a bit below Friday average. There’s a difference (er… diff’rence?) between “easy for a Friday” and “too easy for a Friday”. In my opinion this puzzle is definitely the former, which is just fine by me once in a while. Great job, Evans Clinchy!

Super cool puzzle. Loved the theme! As for [Comedian Chelsea], my first thought was definitely Handler, but it didn’t take long to get to Chelsea PERETTI, being a fan of her standout work on Brooklyn Nine-Nine, not to mention her famous husband, Jordan Peele. She’s also got a famous (in some circles) brother - Jonah PERETTI, cofounder of BuzzFeed and HuffPost.

When I arrived at EARLAP I got a quick jolt of excitement thinking that I had discovered a rebus! Surely, that answer must be EAR*f*LAP! As the puzzle went on I quickly discovered that wasn’t the case and, by the end, EARLAP (without the f) sounded correct to me. So, no rebus. But I’ll still tip my hunting cap to August Lee-Kovach for a fun Thursday puzzle! Thanks you!

[Nail Polish Brand] (3 letters) = OPI [Nail Polish Brand] (5 letters) = ESSIE Whuddya say we just go ahead and remember those for the rest of our life now, Striker. 2 years in… these should be a gimme at this point. It seems one of the two pops up every couple weeks. And yetttt. I never remember. Ever. (OPI, ESSIE, OPI, ESSIE, OPI, ESSIE)

No complaints. This puzzle was mEaTY as I struggled with it and, finally, ZESTY when I got it solved. I’ve never heard of Q DOBA in my life. East Coast thing? Mid West? And, are we sure [Who’s cutting onions?] should get the question mark treatment? DICER seems like an extremely literal answer. Not a punny one. I suppose, because the phrase seldom used literally, the literal answer becomes the pun? Great puzzle. Thanks a bunch, Jake Bunch

NW, NE, SE took 20 - 30 minutes, tops. Nice! I’m rolling! 1 hour… maybe 1:10 for the Southwest 🤦‍♂️ I found that quadrant difficult from top to bottom. New words. Misdirects. Unfamiliar language. AAVE [TIL] CRED (“Indie CRED”? TIL) ANDRA (TIL) CLUE (shag?) LAS (what is LV in roman numerals?) BUS DRIVER (Networks? Bell Hops?) TIRE (Does a TIRE “attach” to a rim?) SANK (SiNK? SuNK?) T’was an awesome Saturday puzzle. Thanks, August Miller!

Not only am I commenting today. I also did *not* comment yesterday (at least, I don’t think I did). That’s like a +2. No offense to Mr Curry on his beautiful puzzle - a solid A, to be sure… (And let’s all spark on UP (or burn one DOWN) in honor of Curry’s comment count stopping at 420) … but let’s be honest: a rebus and a Schrödinger? That combo should be an automatic ticket to the 600 Comment Club.

Anyone else get a good smile when they had to erase SLAT in 5D only to put it back in at 62A?

I confused “Everything is illuminated” with “The Theory of Everything” and wound up in deep SHTETL.

It took me ages, but I got this one without a single fly to speck—so the woodpeckers will have to eat SAP (TIL)! The gold star landed on the last letter I entered. I can’t remember the last time that happened on a Saturday. The SW was the last section to fall for me. Although, with those long entries, I suppose it’s better described as the West, since they essentially filled the whole left side of the puzzle. I really liked this one, mainly because I found it very difficult, yet, in the end, it was all within the realm of what’s knowable for me. On some Saturdays, when I struggle, I look back at the puzzle and it’s clear why—entries that are completely foreign to me or clued so “cleverly” that I doubt I could ever get them. None of that tonight. This one was a true battle, and I emerged victorious. The best kind of Saturday.

Shoutout to any fellow SDSU ALUMS out there. Double shout out if your diploma is signed by Arnold Schwarzenegger. It was a good time to be 22 and living in San Diego.

Geeze. Absolutely wicked Naticks (for me) on this one. In a single quadrant (on a Wednesday?!) we’re criss crossing: ETE ENIAC LACUNA IGNOBLE and TRINITAD DEI MONTI Thats just mean, man! And I love it. Needed a little help from Wordplay. First time that’s happened on a Wednesday in over a year, I reckon. Love it. Bring it. Thanks for the great puzzle, Casey Callaghan and Will Nediger!

Try putting a “D” where 30D meets 43A. That oughta get you your gold star. I’m thankful for the gift of patience given to me by the NYT. A clean solve on any puzzle, Wednesday - Sunday, has been exceptionally rare for me all year. I do not like searching for mistakes and I would suggest that informing users how many clues they have wrong on the “so close” pop up would be a fantastic add. I don’t think it would detract from the challenge and it would make the flyspeck much more palatable. Luckily for me, only one square was off tonight! I thought this puzzle was really fantastic. I’m thankful for this puzzle - all puzzles - all constructors - all editors - all members of “The Games” team - and all of you solvers out there. Happy Thanksgiving!

Tuesday puzzles have been great, lately. Much prefer a Tuesday that’s closer to a Wednesday than a Monday. This one was still simple enough but still checked the ego in just the right way when I first got started and expected to breeze through.

Had to laugh at myself when I got stuck without my gold star, only to realize it was the stinking U in EMU (of all words!) that was jamming me up. I had WVa, thinking West Virginia, and convinced myself that “EMa” must be an indigenous tribe. I didn’t find this puzzle especially easy. Then again, I was watching Happy Gilmore 2 as I solved. And I thoroughly enjoyed it. So, yes, I was a bit distracted. But given my MEDIA DIET, it might already be clear to many of you that I didn’t start the puzzle with much BRAIN POWER to begin with.

Octopussy: [Bond sneaks on to the island and makes his way into Octopussy's room] “Good evening. I wondered when you might arrive.” James Bond: “So you are the mysterious Octopussy.” Octopussy: “And you are James Bond, 007, licensed to kill. Am l to be your target for tonight?” James Bond: Oh no, not necessarily. Depends… if there were more than one of you, would you be Octopussies or Octopussi?”

TETE: Did you see all these comments saying they were confused about the theme? Me: Yeah, weird! We thought it was easy, didn’t we? TETE: Most def. We got it quick at 17A and, once we spotted it, the other three went down in a flash. Me: That never happens, does it? TETE: Easy for us, hard for them? With this group of crossword beasts? Not ever. They’re always breezing through themes that teleport and turn corners and jump gaps and flip all around. And we’re always sittin there like, DUHhh? Me: That’s what I’m sayin! Anyway. Weird but we’ll take it, amiright! TETE: Oh fo sho. ME: Nice. Well, you worked hard today, GOOD BUDDY. I’m going to go to sleep now. TETE: Not if I go to sleep FIRST, MATE. TETE / Me (together): ZZZZZZ