William James

I found this one [hard / easy]. I [maintained / lost] my 2000 day streak. My time was [above / below] my average [and a personal best] - is 35 nanoseconds good? [CAPS] and [CAPS] [witty pun]. I have never seen [CAPS] used and am astonished it got past the editors who clearly don’t know me very well and my own personal but definitive lexicon - see below. This was [chewy / crunchy / too easy] for a [every day of week except Monday]. The [theme / gimmick] was [brilliant / funny / impenetrable]. I [like / love / applaud the debut of] setter. [witty emu pun] Signed Samuel Johnson creator of the English language and cross word supremo.

Dreadful. Utterly dire impenetrable clues that even when brute forced made only passing sense or relationship to the answers. Yup all justifiable answers, before I am corrected in my “insufficiency” of solving prowess but I am struggling to see how OKAY WHAT or ONE PLEASE made the cut as in common parlance. Awful end to otherwise fun week.

All ready hear yo get on my high horse about specialist clueing; but as I had the thought I assumed that setters and editors know their stuff and it’s a Tuesday not a Thursday and the crosses must provide sufficient letters to work it out. And that’s how it was. Vaguely aware of the author. Never read a book of theirs and not a name in the UK but came together. I imagine their will be a lot of folk who will stop at the first hurdle of “never read ‘em” and start sharpening their not for me quills. Equally for the more literary there will be a lot of self-back-patting and record times as they breeze through this with many a comment of “all on my bookshelf” or “in my cannon of academic achievements”. And some will come away and think…maybe I should read one of these as someone clearly thinks the author is more than worthy of celebration in a NYT crossword. One vote from me for this.

Ermmm…erhhh…[head scratch] Nope…theme still eludes me - eight ball good with that but were these answers or something else, a headline? Not a pretty solve. East and West US GK naticks. Guessed one, flunked the other. Get’s a distinct “meh”.

This was according to the comments below a straightforward and easy solve. The theme was easily discernible from the straightforward cross filling. Unless it wasn’t and you are just slow and dull - like me. Depressing and not fun reading the comments as failed to make any sense to my lowly wit. Darkened room and chamomile tea for me

Did not click at all. Some cultural disconnects. GOTTALOVEIT is not sarcasm (or irony) in the UK it’s a genuine observation typically. DEARY can just about connect to Sweets GROUSE is muttering disapproval not a full blown row ABLER so more able…more fit for purpose? Others that just clunked rather than clicked After a straight through streak this week this was disappointing. And it appears I’m alone here :(

Yup easy peasy, breezed through it in a tad under 6 hours - almost 20 seconds slower than my average time for a Monday - which I generally find too easy for me to even start the week. So I actually wake up after the weekend on Wednesday ensuring that I can kvetch about the utter simplicity of it all. I can only hope that we can add days to the end of the week - Emuday and Nattickerday - so that my brain can be properly exercised. At this level of simplicity my late onset dementia might reemerge… Breathes out. I quite enjoyed it and found it perfectly challenging.

Brute force solve and not much fun as a result. Too much reliance on brands and plurals and a trick that required an explanation. Only saving grace was no rebus to consider. NE was perfect storm of “Os” - 6 in 18 letter grid. It solved, it passed the time, it caused me to kvetch…I’m probably very happy.

My favourite bit about the Monday puzzle is that nobody ever moans about the Monday puzzle being too Monday or more like a Monday or too Monday or did they get the day wrong is it Monday. Mostly I assume because it’s a Monday and most folk can solve a Monday precisely because it’s a Monday. Long live the Monday solvers. Down with the ease-a-centi and their appropriation of Monday in the service of Thursday and Friday.

35 years…never had ESQ on a business card…my dad neither. The odd letter maybe as an affectation used by some banks in the UK or a posh invitation. It was originally used to signify that you owned property and was short for SQUIRE, was always my understanding. And before I get the dictionary quoted at me, I note it is apparently used as an honorific for lawyers but none of my acquaintance old or young or from the USA.

Utterly impenetrable. No aha moments. Grim acknowledgment that certain clues fit the solve on planet esoteric. Really quite unpleasant. After 1 hour reveal button pushed too no great acclaim or forehead slapping self-awareness moment. This week has descended into a a level of complexity that has been intense and not enjoyable. The only benefit being the easy Pearey crowd have been notably silent

Way too many words answers that stretched credulity. Yup they are words and expressions, that’s how a crossword works before I get filed in. But we’ve had a fairer wind (GAEL) this week. It’s MANX everywhere except here. ADORBS…ok I am rather but only in a badly written romcom. Top left also seemed a bit rushed. Deeply unsatisfying and not for me.

I remember speaking to the creators of Who Wants to be a Millionaire. One of their key phrases and watchwords was: “A question is only easy if you know the answer.” Therefore always interested in posts that say a puzzle was easy. Perhaps it might be more accurate to say, I knew the answers to this one. As it appears rare that the same folk will appear saying that “[Day] puzzle utterly defeated me and I was forced to press reveal. “ I can comfortably say I got nowhere with that one. Off wavelength completely and realised was going nowhere very slowly. Reveal showed a series of perfectly reasonable answers that my brain refused to tune into and I am therefore obliged to say it was hard for me and I used up all my lifelines on the first question.

A quick scan down the comments reveals that this appears to have been about right for a Friday. The key ratios here are: easies : crunchy / chewy / challenging : google / look up / reveal : hated every second and cried Using some advanced GenAI technology - my brain - have deduced it was bang in the middle of Friday day midday. For me a few lookups on the basis that I is British. But chuffed to actually know NAMATH.

Some days you are the paper…sometimes the pen. Today I was holding the pen. In spite of a load of trivia there was a lot to hold on to and make sense of. Some olde Englysh trivia too..GREAVES fell to umpteen castle visits as a child. And I owe you five farthing’s say the bells at St Martins. Pictures I had seen in the paint too..Vermeer most recently in The Hague - when missed in Amsterdam at the amazing Vermeer exhibition. Very enjoyable Sunday morning

Weird puzzle. It solved with no real sense of purpose. Fills were not so much “Ah Has!” as “oh that fits” and “I can sort of make the clue work at a stretch”. The level of general understanding to get into seemed a bit obscure as well - wrote some odd things in that did not change. Drank a nice cup of tea so I suppose it was a good one.

First day of spring here in Blighty. And a fitting theme as my lilac and honey suckle are doing their thing and outside smells enticing. And a Wednesday puzzle that’s delighted pretty much everyone. Well it’s a good day when everyone can do a Wednesday and not be giving out.

So for a Brit this was hard work..lot of fairly obscure US GK and trivia. Mostly can get the majority of US references from popular culture but this was one step beyond. Also my general expectation is that tonally there will be a degree of consistency in the setters vernacular and reference points. This spanned some wildly different eras and themes. Made tuning in very hard work. Having said that when finally looked at the theme - mea culpa mea as usual culpa - things got a little better. Got there with a few lookups to check some of your US ways.

Seemed to be a lot of trivia that made it quite daunting on first pass. But having said that the crosses kept filling and it became more feasible. Did not enjoy doing it but enjoyed finishing it. Think that’s probably the point so working my way round to a thumbs up in a desultory way.

Well this did not work at all. Loads of US trivia as entry points. Look-up-ageddon for this Brit. Some, frankly, arcane phraseology. Deeply impressed that the use of the word “sheer” in a clue made VS barn-door obvious. By the 10th look up realised was no longer really in the game. THERE ARE NO WORDS means precisely the opposite of speechless. As it’s the classic start to a speech with lots of words. SCOFF is generally mock or deride and involves speaking and not generally laughing before I get grammatically corrected. One for the folk for whom these clues are obvious indicators but not one for me. Sunday is another day.

Bit natick / US Trivia heavy in NE corner. Crosses of 9 and 31 and the down of 15 made this a bit challenging for this Brit…but brute force got there in the end :) As regards the discussion in TAKE and HOLD I would suggest this might be a reference to the expression “take hold” or in the alternative a reference to betting terminology when hold and take have some equivalence.

Always entertaining when something out of the ordinary pops up. This one I could see and even appreciate so was in the I “enjoyed this” camp but equally this time last week was less than happy so it’s swings and roundabouts. The levels of irritation and “haters gonna hate” commentary seems about on par so think the setters and editors and emus will not be too stressed. Just happy to be moving through the week without hitting the wall.

Brick wall By the time I’d looked up the 20th clue realised it was not really happening. On a different wavelength completely. Nothing clicked. Clicking revealed showed I was miles off. No pattern recognition and some of the potentially more useful crosses were quite opaque to me. Shame as this week has otherwise been loads of fun.

Theme was fun but think the construction and complexity suffered a bit from endeavouring to make the theme answers sufficiently evident to fill. So the downs seemed to fill fairly simply as base structure for the solution. The resultant other crosses then got a bit awkward and laboured. Also sticking / tending to ones knitting is generally used - in the uk at least - to mean stick to what you do best rather than an admonition.

Pretty dire… Since when is a BULL a COW? ERA was a republican period in one country - some geographical pointer possibly in order? Trivia was impenetrable and not really guessable from crosses. Had read one of them fortunately Always interesting when it clicks with some and the “not quick but did it in 3 minutes 45 seconds” brigade…”slightly slower than my average For this who were in the - chapeau. Unmitigated slog over here with more than a couple of look-ups.

Interesting one. So most of this was on the crosses and some vague comprehension of a theme and some correlation between the clues / annswers and friendship although had First Lady in for a while as thought the theme was uxorial. This, for me was mostly pattern recognition rather than actual use of clues. Spent a lot of time thinking that must be the answer now got to make the clue work to validate…ANTE and IMP came quickly but with not much assistance from the clue other than eventual oh that’s what hellion means.. Hey ho was quick and completed without any real anguish.

Top half was great. The bottom bit was a little frustrating for all the reasons set out below. Loved hoity toity being an Englishone. The laterality of the symmetricality was somewhat obscure as a description but clear as a theme. I am disappointed that Maximus did not do in the Emperor Calculus - father to a murdered pun, husband to a load of strife. But where would we be without things to comment on

Crunchy for a Tuesday. Lots of potential naticks which had to be brute force solved. But the spanners were ok once the water theme was established. Lots of partial fills based which then resolved other bits. CANNIBAL was chuckleworthy as was the misfill of HANNIBAL below…hopefully a setter filing that one away.

Best time…never…took me forever. Never had or seen any of the cocktails but worked them out from the crosses. I’ve clearly lead a sheltered life. Not sure about the flying birdie, broken china more like. It’s a shuttle-birdie over here and not heard the non compound usage as that’s used in multiple other contexts to signify a male bird, a mate, an idiot and other things (ahem). Telling your partner on a UK BADMINTON court to “grab the birdie” would get you some odd looks. So congratulations to all those who found it easy-peasy-lemon-squeezey I was in the thick of it and it was difficult-difficult-lemon-difficult.

Meh… Seemed a bit squashed and contrived in places. East side particularly clunky. About time we had a UK shipping forecast clue. The gold standard of concise information conveyance. For those who have been on the sea or just driving late at night the hypnotic calm of the words: “Shipping forecast issued by the Met Office, on behalf of the Maritime and Coastguard Agency… North Utsire, South Utsire. Northwesterly 4 or 5, occasionally 6 in southeastern South Utsire, becoming variable 2 to 4, then southeasterly 4 or 5 later. Slight, occasionally moderate. Mainly fair. Good”

Laboured…felt like more hard work than it ought to have been. Crosses got a bit obscure ERSE and spelling of NEWB were a little painful. In jolly old England we say IF NEEDs BE. Liked noodling through the theme would have liked the crosses to be a little more consistent to help , but can’t have everything :)

A lot of controversy below. I missed the theme. I’m not clever enough to know Bach but ETUDES are a muso thing right? Whenever a clue references plurals I bung an S in even if I don’t know the answer. You say KABOBoe I say KEBABoe etc. This kind of did the Wednesday thing for me quite satisfactorily but enjoying even more the commentary and analysis.

WIFFLE and WAMPUM…not so easy for us limeys. A Naticuk?

Confident use of OSTLER had to be replaced by MUCKER. Great disappointment. Has OSTLER ever been used as it’s a weird English word I know.

So the SILENTI was impenetrable and had to read the review and still slightly stumped; but it crossed ok so no nats. Otherwise theme great and like DADAISM a lot PS on the Mini can an emu please point me to a reference to ZIGS as a plural in the context of ZAGS as that slightly destroyed my incipient speed record

Nice to see normal service resumed. Slightly shocked to see a thread I’d been on removed. And a lot of doubling down. Notice the easy peasy crowd rolling into town for their Thursday jaunt and making me feel dim and distant. Could not crack the North on this but rest fell nicely and was determined to get the theme clues. So all in all a fair days work.

Entirely geocentric, egocentric and eccentric puzzle. Insanely hard to get into (for non-native) and with a relatively complex theme to deal with, turned what might have been good fun into a laborious task of working the theme round the answers round the puzzle. Working the theme out actually made it harder as then trying to work the swaps to assist with some of the crosses was a thankless task. Got most of the top with US GK lookups and then defeated by the bottom. Not a good day.

The themes recently have become increasingly abstruse and difficult to get. Is there a concern it will make puzzles too easy if we get the theme…? Kind of thought that was the point. Utterly unencumbered by this theme and even when I discovered what it was was equally nonplussed as a God Save the King singer. Rest of the fill was actually pretty sensible and sufficiently Thursday to keep me engaged for a good length of time. So otherwise all well.

Minor frustration with theme clues. Playing in low light with screen dim the bold letters only became evident as sun came up. Also a tad US-terminology centric but it is the New York not Old York Times.

Liked the connections theme - like the connections game also which has become a little bit competitive in this household - Mrs J is massive “Only Connect” fan in the UK (TV Game Show with a connections wall) Cluing a bit sporadic and squashed into the theme. Had MOVIE DERRIÈRES as the connection came after and not before the connection? But the theme seemed to allow this so my bad but like it all the same. BTW if this is all too easy for some folks might I recommend the Time Crossword. A former training ground for Bletchley Code Breakers and I’m sure a worthy challenge for the “it was a bit Monday/Tuesday” naysayers

Once upon a time in the West…bit of a word spaghetti…I’m all for interesting informative answers and expansions of my knowledge but got a bit convoluted and some very archaic facts and usages. Otherwise pleasantly surprised that it fell into place on a Thursday and I got the West by dint of some indolent ENNUI…blah blah blah.