Joe

A moderate Wednesday for me; finished around 20 percent under my average time for the day. A wonderful theme, I thought…and as former newspaper and magazine writer, I’m all for pay walls, though of course they frustrate me at times…but I recognize their importance for getting writers/photographers/editors paid. When people I know complain, I always ask: would a plumber fix your faucet for free. One small memory flash from 30A (SPEAKS ONE’S PIECE): In 1986, I was laid off from the regional magazine where I worked. Pretty quickly, I got hire at an alternative weekly, where I worked with a marvelous journalist, J A Lobbia, who was under five feet tall but fierce in every way. As the two staff writers, we shared our work with each other as a check before it went to the editor. I had ambitions in creative writing and if I pushed those tendencies too far, when I gave her one of my stories to read, she’d snap, “You’re just showing off.” She was always right and I’d cut the show-offy parts before I turned it in. One day, when I handed her my work, I said, “Here’s my piece.” She said, “This is a newspaper. We call them articles.” I left the paper after three years to get an MFA in fiction, then joined the faculty at a mid-sized university. JA ended up at the Village Voice, where, even from 900 miles away, I could tell she was still fierce. Sadly, she died at 43, in 2001. So, thanks, Phillip Koski, for the nudge to remember her.

I enjoyed this puzzle quite a bit. For a while I thought I might end up with a personal best but ran into a couple snags and finished a few minutes over my best time. Puzzles that rely on puns for their themes always make me think of my father, who passed away 41 years ago at 60. Often, if he was home for dinner (uncommon as he was a doctor who was a workaholic—hence his four coronaries) he expected me to engage in a pun-duel, in which he’d make a pun and I had to respond with a pun related to his, then he would have to build on that, then I would, continuing until one of us (usually me) would surrender. Mind you, this started when I was perhaps 13 or 14. Later, some years after his death, I came to understand that he was quite shy, even to the point of having no idea how to talk to the son who bore his name, and so puns were his way in.

Finished a few seconds over my Sunday average, largely because I spent ten minutes searching for errors. Still, I enjoyed the puzzle, found several clues delightful mis-directs. Mega-store for HOARD. Place with moving exhibits for ZOO. You might get one in a row for SHINER. One general comment about relatively difficult clues: We often see complaints in these comments that such-and-such was too difficult…trivia that’s obscure, terms like MREs that are unfamiliar for us, rebuses. There’s a lot I don’t know and, lord help me but on the days I dare to look at the stats for solve times I pretty much always come away thinking, “Gee, I thought I was getting good at this but clearly not.” Still, it’s a big wide world out there and people of a significant span of ages that do the NYT CW every day, so why does anyone think their knowledge and experience should be the benchmark for everyone else?

I always settle in with a fresh cup of coffee on Thursdays after taking the dog out, tending to the cat and feeding the birds, pretty much always thinking about the challenging puzzle that awaits me, looking forward to a test…then today I finish in a Thursday PB, roughly a third of my average time. Nonetheless, I enjoyed this quite a bit. I’ve actually read all three novels the puzzle refers to….starting with Atlas Shrugged and David Copperfield in high school, Les Miserables a few years ago, during lockdown. I liked AS when I was 16 but hated DC. Years lateen grad school I re-read the Dickens and admired it enormously…the Rand, well, I’m not 16 any longer, nor am I Paul Ryan, so no longer have interest. I love long novels, which I often read at the rate often pages a day, right after the crossword. Currently, I’m reading Bleak House, largely to pull myself out of the contemporary madness. Kudos to the constructor.

Congratulations on a stellar debut. Loved so much of the clueing: 35D…Artist who made a lot of good points, for SEURAT; 15A…Light shower, for APERTURE; Many of these begin with E, for EYE TESTS. Also, I loved your clue for 9A (SASHAY) that didn’t make the cut: Copy a working model, perhaps. Two nostalgia twinges: COIN PURSE: My father carried a plastic coin purse in his pocket, a small green oval that opened by pinching the two ends. If I needed a quarter or fifty cents (this was the 1960s, when that amount could buy lunch, or a movie ticket with snacks), he’d take out his purse, pinch it open then, before giving me a coin or two, regard them in a way that made me think he was assessing how nearer to ruin giving me that money might bring us. He was a doctor, so it was likely an echo from the Depression…though I was the oldest of eight. The second twinge came from your story about tea and crosswords with your grandmother. When I was 5, we lived briefly in Cleveland where my parents were from, while my father tried to figure out where to set up a practice; this was the late ‘50s, just after his discharge from the Navy, where he spent two years after his residency because of the doctor draft. I often some time with my grandmother when she had friends over for coffee and gossip. She’d sit me at the table with them, fill a china cup for me with milk, adding a smidge of coffee, and I’d sit, feeling quite mature, listening to chat about people I didn’t know.

When I was a kid, my dad brought home several games from the WFF-N-Proof company, including one called Propaganda, in which the game presented statements and players had to identify the fallacy or technique that appeared in the statement. He also gave me a book called How to Lie with Statistics, by Darrell Huff. I still have both, roughly sixty years later. So, thanks, John Ewbank, for a puzzle that reminded me of my father, gone 40 years this year.

I found this quite challenging for a Tuesday…finished around half a minute above my average for the day. Still, given our new era, I appreciated being able to focus on something other than cruelty and the tragic results of it, so, thank you.

Slightly breezy Friday for me, as I solved at around 40 percent under my average time. I enjoyed the long fills…however (and this may be only me, and is not a complaint or even a nit), I’d always heard it as lift THE CURTAIN in that context so it took me half a moment to get RAISE since it didn’t come automatically. Anyone else? I felt a twinge of sadness at 31A, AMANDA Gorman, as it sent me back to January 20, 2021, and her recitation of her moving poem, as I was thinking then that we’d survived the madness and were on the other side. Foolish, naive me.

I often look at XW Stats after I finish. I will never come close to the median time but I generally have the same experience as the average solver there. If they find the puzzle “easy,” solving within about, say, three minutes under their average time, that’s about where I am with my own time. Today, however, it was pretty crushing to see the average solver finished 28% under their average time, as I found this quite difficult, finishing a minute and a half over my average time. I had never heard of PUPU, or ANTINOVEL, and had difficulty getting on the constructor’s wavelength. This is not a complaint…the crossword is the crossword is the crossword. It’s just that sometimes it’s in my wheelhouse and other days I’m lost asea, to use a common crossword fill. Still, I finished and with only one lookup, it’s 70 degrees, I’m on my deck drinking coffee, looking at the woods behind the house, and listening to an album my daughter gave me because she thought I’d like it, which I do.

Quite a challenging puzzle, wonderful debut…and congratulations especially on the triple stack. I am so sorry for the loss of your friend and lab partner. I looked up his obituary this morning, and the heart-breaking tributes other students, and professors wrote. He does sound remarkable…it’s clear the world lost a light with his passing. Listening to Chopin’s Ballades as I write this.

I found this an appropriate Sunday challenge; there were quite a few delightful clues, including those for the theme, which put me in mind of my father who, when I was a kid struggling to multiply and divide fractions, bought me a mathematical encyclopedia that I still have 60 years later…though I still struggle with multiplying and dividing fractions. I thought of my sister, too, who failed geometry in high school, said it wasn’t going to defeat her, and went on to become a professor of mathematics.

At some point in the past week, I came across an article about the QUADRUPLE DOUBLE, since apparently it’s somewhere around an anniversary of a player nearly achieving one in the NBA playoffs. My eye really just ran across headline, but I didn’t actually read the article since the only sport I follow at all is baseball…nonetheless, it was on my radar (SONAR?). One of the first things I do in a puzzle on Thursdays and Sundays is look for long(ish) fills in the south, since that’s often where the revealer is. When I saw the clue for 50A, the answer came to me immediately…and I finished, if not at a PB, pretty close to one. Also, I appreciated some of the clueing…”Article around a photo?” “She-eep.” …and the juxtaposition of OVERTHROW beside P(EE)W(EE) F(OO)BA(LL). Given our current time, I could only see SALEM/SELMA as places that, in addition to being anagrams, were also the locations of some of the most shameful events in our history.

I laughed when I saw PLAY-DOH as the answer to 13 D (Toy with a scent trademarked by Hasbro). Ages ago, I taught an introductory professional writing class that included advertising and one year brought in mini containers of the product and gave it out to my students so they could consider its features/benefits. One student commented on the scent and I realized they were right…the scent was a product benefit. Who can sniff it and not feel comforted? From then on (don’t judge me, if you haven’t already), I kept a container on my desk and took a whiff from time to time on a stressful day. Honestly, I can’t recall a time it didn’t bring me comfort.

It took me a bit to figure out the theme but once I did my solve went fairly briskly and I finished roughly 30% under my average time. The theme reminded me of the time 20 years ago when I was selling my house and decided to replace the baseboards on my own, after getting a carpenter’s bid on the project. Getting the length right, given the necessary angle cuts often meant measure twice, no three times, no four times, cut once, oops, measure five times…you get the idea… At any rate, I ended up admiring this puzzle quite a bit and enjoyed a lot of the clueing…37A “Rock bands” for SEAM; 118A “When mating usually occurs” for END GAME; 29D “Cycle at night” for REM. Again, given our present circumstance I felt a twinge for anything connected to governance…71A “Biohazard regulator” for OSHA and especially 70D “‘Resolute’ item in the Oval Office” for OAK DESK. The photo illustration for the Wordplay column made me nostalgic for saner times.

I am surprised by the number of people who didn’t like this puzzle. I am not saying they don’t have a right to feel that way…as my father used to say, de gustibus non est disputandum. It’s just that I feel as if it hits the right notes for a Thursday…a theme that I had to work to get, along with some challenging and even very challenging clues. One of my favorite puzzles in a long while. Finished about five percent under my average. So, thank you, Joe DiPietro.

Generally an enjoyable and clever puzzle. Finished roughly ten minutes under my Sunday average but since I solve on my tablet I also found this a bit frustrating, since I spent quite a bit of time trying to figure out where I was in the grid, because it was often unclear which squares were highlighted. Yes, I know the squares are numbered, but on my tablet the numbers are generally quite small, especially in the larger Sunday grid. Don’t get me wrong: I did enjoy it for the most part but maybe in the future the editors and coders (I assume there are coders) could take the issue of colored squares into account. I did, however, chuckle at 81 A [BLACK] OLIVE, because of the mild arguments about it as a pizza topping on Friday. On Friday, olives-on-pizza is a divisive issue; today it’s supreme. I guess it is a great, big, diverse world after all. (And I am in the “yes” camp for olives on pizza.)

So often I will slog through a puzzle only to come here to see many people commenting, “So easy for a Saturday! Finished in less than two minutes!” At least I see I am not alone in my struggle…however, although I finished 10 minutes above my average time, I am satisfied that I was able to grind it out without looking anything up. I did cringe at ZEITGEISTY…though it appears the word is not as obscure as I thought it might be. Loved the clueing for 17A, 31A, and 12D, among others.

Pretty breezy for a Sunday, but I nonetheless enjoyed this quite a bit. Caught onto the theme quickly and finished more than 40% under my average time. An eerie coincidence: my birthday is tomorrow and one of my daughters sent me a coffee mug with the first three paragraphs of MIDDLEMARCH spelled out on it (we both love the novel). Before I started doing the puzzle, or even reading any of the clues, I snapped a photo of the mug beside my tablet with the crossword open…I did it quickly because I didn’t want it to take too much time off the clock, and I sent it to her, saying, “Crossword and coffee on the Ides of March.” I laughed when I came to the first rebus…and laughed even harder when I came to the revealer. Though, of course, Miranda Kany could not have intended it, I nonetheless thank her for the bonus birthday present.

A challenging puzzle—I finished around a minute over my average—but nonetheless I found it delightful; like at least one other solver, it took me to my freshman year of high school when I had to read The Odyssey, which I initially faced with dread but came to love before I finished. It’s stunning how a single word…POLYPHEMUS…can carry one back nearly 60 years. More recently I’ve read the Emily Wilson translation, which I recommend…including her long (90-page) introduction.

Been an odd CW week so far…might we say UP AND DOWN? My Monday time was a couple minutes slower than my Tuesday time. My Wednesday time was just about at my Thursday average while today was a minute and change under my Wednesday average. Still,I enjoyed today’s puzzle despite how relatively easy I found it. Caught onto the theme with HEART TRANSPLANT, so that helped. Some clever clues: Base for a proposal for KNEE. Work on a sub for EAT. I will say, however, the government-related clues/fills make me cringe lately…FEDERAL GRANTS on Monday; OSHA today. As I often told my students, Context is everything.

I guess I needed more coffee, as I found this a challenging Monday…Finished 40 seconds under my average but a few minutes over my typical Monday recently. Still, I appreciate the relative difficulty, since usually after the more difficult weekend puzzles, I find the ease of the start of the week a let-down. BLACKBOARD gave me a slight bit of nostalgia since when I started teaching 40 years ago my classrooms had them…so I was flooded with all sorts of memories: the sound of the chalk on the slate, the chalk that broke if I was writing something with particular enthusiasm, the way it always bothered the OCD part of me that when I erased a board at the end of class the ghost of chalk dust always remained… and that led me to recall the stacks of papers I collected if there was an assignment instead of downloading them from the digital platform, the way I always marked them up in pencil instead of red ink since I wrote a lot of comments in the margins (I taught writing) and red seemed like shouting whereas I thought my students might be able to take in the content of what I wrote more easily if the marks on the page were lighter…the way I’d sharpen my black Eagle # 2 1/2 pencils before a grading session, lining up five or six of then so I could pick up a new one if one became too dull…

A solid Friday workout that I solved around half a minute faster than my average time. Some great clues. I especially liked “Turn down?” for DOG EAR, as it took a while to get it. On CROSS AT THE GREEN, I’m reminded of a crosswalk near my office for around 30 years at the university where I taught. At one point, they installed a voice alert for blind people, and for the longest time I thought whoever installed it was trying to be sort of hip, as I heard it as “Hit the road. Walk sign is on.” One day as I stood there, I glanced at the street sign that I’d walked past or stood beside thousands of times. “Edgar Rd.” Just then the signal changed and the voice alert sounded and I realized it was quite mundane: “Edgar Road. Walk sign is on.” I preferred my mishearing.

Quite challenging, even by Friday standards. Loved so many of the clues. TIL the word “splooting,” and at an appropriate time since our “extreme heat warning” finally ended this morning after a week (the high today will only be 95). Re: 14D and TERABYTE being an extra large storage unit…I got my first computer in 1984, an Epson with 256Kb of RAM and one 5 1/4 inch floppy drive. Each day I’d have to load my word processing program, eject the disc, then load the one I wrote to. At some point…1988?… I graduated to an IBM desk top with two 3 1/2 inch floppy drives, and a one-megabyte hard drive. The first time I switched it on, I sat back at my desk in awe, saying aloud, “I’ll never fill that drive!”

I loved the theme, particularly the revealer (ON THE ROAD), which gave me a twinge of nostalgia: When I was a junior at Northwestern, living in a Rogers Park apartment and driving to campus most days, I often picked up the TA for one of my classes and took him to campus, too. At one point he started talking about a book he was reading, the Kerouac classic in today’s crossword. I mentioned I’d like to read it and when he finished, he loaned it to me … a paperback with a vibrant yellow cover, which enthralled me from the first sentence. Back then, this being college in the early 1970s, I often went to parties where we smoked a certain substance that was then illegal but which now, at least in my state, one can buy legally at any number of dispensaries. One night during the time I was in the middle of the novel, the …substance… came my way. I looked at it and thought, if I do this, I won’t be able to go home and read the book, and passed it on, and never partook again. I also never returned the book to the TA, which gave me pangs of guilt quite often, as I carried that book with me every day for years, re-reading it often. A few years ago, I re-read it after not even dipping into it for decades…and, honestly, I felt no pull at all. As for the puzzle…I found it moderately challenging for a Thursday, finishing around 40% under my average time.

A decent challenge, which was a relief for me after yesterday’s slog…at least it was for me. Finished a minute under my Saturday average. Quite a few difficult but clever clues…”Apple corps” for GENIUS BAR; “Ones who should prepare for their day of reckoning” for MATH TEAM (though my initial thought centered on, well, you know without my sullying the comments with their names). BTW, I loved the mention of Harry and Tonto, which I recall as a charming film—I remember being happy for Art Carney’s Oscar win at the time, though the choice was unpopular, as other nominees included Al Pacino for Godfather 2, and Dustin Hoffman for Lenny). I thought seeing it again now might be a tonic against the absurd and cruel madness, but sadly it doesn’t seem available to stream.

I found this quite challenging by Thursday standards…finished a couple minutes above my average…but I’m satisfied as I managed to plug away with no help, and I found so many of the clues clever: “They try to admit the worst first, informally.” “Forces offshore.” “Secured by a slip.” “Kind of average.” Congratulations to Simon Siegel for a first-rate crossword.

A fairly brisk Friday for me as I finished in around half of my average time. Fortunately, the long fills .. CREATION OF ADAM and CELESTIAL EVENT came to me immediately. I also loved their juxtaposition as they are similar in their grandeur. I had never heard of EVOO, though I managed to get it easily enough by the crossing fills. I did enjoy the clueing for CANON, “What fan fiction is not.” I thought it was quite sly. Though I actually look forward to tough end-of-the-week puzzles and I breezed through this, I did enjoy it. I don’t necessarily think it was easy, it was just that I was on the constructor’s wavelength. Because the XW gods may think I’m cocky now, tomorrow I’ll probably end up tearing my hair out over the grid.

Honestly, although this was no walk in the park, and I was tempted a few times to look something up (something I avoided today, thankfully), this is one of my favorite puzzles in quite a while. There are so many delightful clues: “Number” for ETHER; “Locales with many banks” for SKATE PARKS; “Characters in ‘The Lord of the Rings’” for RUNES; “Opener for an aerial act” for PARACHUTES; “Synthetic oil producer” for ART FORGER…I could go on, but I’ll stop there. This was a smash of a debut, so congratulations to Kelvin Zhou.

This was moderately challenging, though I finished about three minutes under my average, with the help of looking up T’NIA Miller. I wish I’d trusted my crossing fills, but doubted the T-N…ah, well. OVALTINE…yes, I can see, vividly, Ralphie decoding the super secret message, only to discover, to his disgust, it means “Drink more OVALTINE.” However, whenever I think of the beverage, the first voice that comes to me is Cloris Leachman, in Young Frankenstein. <a href="https://youtu.be/lcgEN3CaqXs?si=RNlQTdg-IujId3rX" target="_blank">https://youtu.be/lcgEN3CaqXs?si=RNlQTdg-IujId3rX</a>

I was surprised to see XWStats rated this as “easy” since this was the most challenging puzzle of the week for me, by far; finished about 30% over my average. Had a hard time getting on the constructor’s wavelength. Still, I appreciated the challenge; if all crosswords were easy I’d likely have stopped long ago, as it would have bored me.

A fairly smooth puzzle with a theme I enjoyed quite a bit. On a personal level, I take 10A as what I hope is a positive omen: for a few years my older daughter has been working in management for a restaurant chain and today opens a restaurant in that chain that she’s a partner in. Their specialty: BBQ.

Although I finished at six minutes above my average, I’m a huge fan of this puzzle because it was challenging with so many clever clues, but it was also fair. Congratulations to Jackson Matz on a fine piece of work.

I actually found this one to be fairly smooth for a Friday. Finished just shy of two-thirds of my Friday average time. Yes, there were a number of clues I had no idea about but I was able to solve them by the crossing fills and intuition. I will say that I winced at 27D… “One mailing it in” for EARLY VOTER since, well, you know…

One thing I appreciate about the NYT CW is how it is so often egalitarian…using clues/fills that I have no idea about while others know instantly (Ella MAI, MIA Toretto, AYOEDE BIRI), but others that many haven’t the foggiest about but which I (a baseball fanatic and True Child of the Big Ten) know instantly (yesterday’s Dave STEIB; today’s Fighting ILLINI). Today’s CW was about right for a Friday, I think…a couple minutes under my average time, but a few quadrants I had to pick my way through…and, yes, anyone who gives a shout out to hostel mates is okay in my book…

This was a slog for me…over an hour, and I broke down and looked up a handful since I had a lot on the to-do list today (yard work before yet another storm; baking bread). Got hung up a bit as I assumed that every all the letters of every fill beside a magnet had to spell an animal, rather than only the three letters after the turn. A number of celebrity clues I didn’t know. Not complaining…it was a solid Sunday workout. Just disappointed I couldn’t fully solve it without help.

A moderately challenging Saturday that I pretty much solved bottom to top since it took a bit to find a toehold but once I managed I went through it steadily, solving around 25 percent under my average time, and without assistance. Quite a few clues that tickled my brain: 14A, Noted line in Buddhism for DALAI LAMAS. 16A, Galaxy program, e.g., for ANDROID APP. 31A, Product pitched by a pitcher for KOOLAID. One byproduct of the CW that I enjoy is the trivia I learn. For example, the literal meaning of ALIAS.

I started this last night after a particularly rough day (I volunteer as an intake interviewer at a food pantry on Wednesdays and Saturdays and yesterday was especially brutal, for reasons I assume you can figure out). Because I was so distracted, I missed seeing the crucial clue for the theme and closed the puzzle since I had too many holes I wasn’t able to fill. This morning, out on my deck overlooking the woods behind our house, and fueled by coffee, I saw the numbered squares immediately (were they there last night or did they just suddenly appear?) and the grid fell pretty quickly into place, and this puzzle turned out to be one of my favorites in a long while, so thank you to Aidan Deshong. It took me back 25 or 30 years when I played likely too much [MINE] SWEEPER as a distraction when I was stuck in whatever I was writing on a particular day.

A pretty smooth puzzle that I finished at around nine minutes under my average. I do have a question about something I’ve noticed before: when I got the star, it showed my time as XX:09, but when I went back to look at the puzzle a couple of minutes later, the time changed to XX:08. As I say, I’ve noticed this before, and it always changes to a time slightly faster than it showed initially. Anyone else ever see this? More significantly, if I recheck a puzzle often enough, will the time roll back enough that I’ll break through the space-time continuum and I’ll actually solve it before I begin?

Nicely challenging for a Friday. I thought I’d end up having to lookup a few so I could finish and get on with what will be a good day, but then things started clicking into place. Sussing A LITTLE HELP HERE actually, um, helped a lot as it was the key to opening up a good part of the quadrant. Really a delightful puzzle, so, kudos to Trent H. Evans.