gail garfield

I completed this clever, well polished puzzle with enthusiasm (despite many lookups) the morning after a surprise engagement party for my grandson and his beautiful inside-and--out bride to be. I was delighted to celebrate the union between a U.S.-born nice Jewish boy with Ukrainian ancestors who arrived here in the late 1800s and English ancestors who arrived here in 1620, and a nice Indian -American girl born in the U.S. of physician parents who immigrated from Goa in the 20th century, and became pillars of their community. My grandson works for an organization that helps immigrants. His fiancée is an RN. (They did not meet through the immigrant organization ) As the oldest person in the room by at least 25 years, I was thrilled by the smart, charming, generous young people there, all of them highly educated professionals involved in socially useful work. Why am I sharing all this with you? Because I rejoice that this union will enrich community. I hope your wedding invitations make you think of what's happening to our country as a result of them. Plus1 expresses this thought very well, I think.

This puzzle took me back to my earliest experience of the NYT Saturdays. Very hard. Amazingly original. Educational. So much fun. Kudos and thanks to the Brilliant Constructors.

I set a new record today: the most lookups ever in my life. Why could I not get on this lady's brainwave? I do not know, but few of these clues sang to me. Hard work for her, I guess, too.

this was a chewy adventure, the kind of puzzle that used to dominate the New York Times offerings and has been lacking in recent years. I hope this marks the smarting up of the puzzles. Our entire language and speaking habits have been deteriorating for years, and the puzzle is one way to remind people that vocabulary, erudition, literary achievement are desirable things. No one learns anything if the puzzle is very easy. No one expands their horizons if all the entries are familiar, popular references. So, really it's at best good and at least OK if they're too hard for many people.

I'm a day late and $10 short. This is the hardest puzzle I have done in the past three decades, or should I say not done because I had to do a lot of lookups and tryouts and word checks and even Square fills which I never do. And even when I filled in the words, I could not get into this constructor 's brain . I didn't have aha moments, only oops and sheeses.. it's just one of those things, not the constructor's fault. Not my fault. It's a mercifully rare, interesting attribute of the process of crossword solving.

Heartiest congratulations to the constructors, a dynamic duo indeed,

This was the hardest puzzle for me in decades. Even with several lookups I didn't finish without a puzzle check which destroyed my streak. But kudos to constructor, I learned so much which is why I still torture myself.

An example of misplaced belief that because you can, you should. For the first time in my life I didn't care enough to finish.

While so many people are outraged by editing or lack thereof, I will add a current complaint and hope that Joe Fogliano and any other editors read it and take it to heart . I also hope that others agree with me. In recent weeks I have noticed an acceleration and multiplication of repeated clues within a week or two. these are readily discernible. It seems like AI is being used to construct the puzzles and is collecting or ignoring repetition. I hope I I am wrong. This would be a more serious outrage than any other, in my book.

"Excellent" is an understatement for the quality of this perfect puzzle. Ms Robbins has silly humor and wit, and vast knowledge, and makes fresh, idiosyncratic connections that to me mark the very best of crossword puzzles, the kind that you are positive could only be generated by a personable human who chuckles all the way through, as I did.

ONLITTLECATFEET gave me one of those joyous slightly shivery thrills that one's brain works perfectly. . It is one of the few lines from poems in my memory bank for over 70 years, poet is Carl Sandburg, Whole sentence is THE FOG COMES IN... . I actually remembered it as fog CREEPS in, and, although it is certainly pretentious to edit a famous poet, I like that verb better! Great puzzle.

as so often happens I breezed through this puzzle without ever even considering what the theme might be. Got gold. I feel bad when I miss the true creativity. On the other hand it's kind of a treat to be on the same wavelength as the constructor subconsciously if not consciously. Thanks for a very nice puzzle.

This is what I call a perfect puzzle full of delightful puns and word plays.

The times when I feel that my brain knows the constructor's mind intuitively are all too rare, and this delightful, witty, puzzle with deceptive feints was one--and gave me gold! Thank you!

I agree with all who loved it, and just want to submit personal thanks for honoring Q , my favorite letter.

PINKYSWEARS and TURKEYJERKY star in this fresh masterpiece using entertainment trivia for a skeleton and quirky wit for the flesh. It gave me a [GRINAMINUTE]

It doesn't matter whether one likes the gimmick or gets the gimmick so long as one solves the puzzle. That's my view. I find that if I try to figure out the gimmick, it impairs my ability to get the words, but if I just let my mind roam where it will I can get them pretty easily as I did today. Luckily we can all have fun without overthinking it.

WOWWOWSHOWHOW it's done when a crossword genius runs with a theme! this is my favorite puzzle of all time as of today! So varied, so rich, so sneaky in the best clever way! I feel like I known this constructor's wide ranging eclectic interests intimately now that I finished after more than an hour and a half!

Now this was a triumph! Eclectically rooted in "C". Traveling in time (Ancient REGNANT to contemporary DATA POINT), varied in parts of speech, playful in tense and sense. Required for me lookups, which made it a great pleasure to learn while solving . .

In crossword puzzle Construction, as in life, there are some things that you shouldn't do just because you can do them.

This is a puzzle that makes greeting a rainy Saturday joyous. Brain twisting, imaginative, educational, youthful!

A really clever friendly witty debut: FUNPUNRUNHON

For me this was as hard as a Saturday and a hard Saturday at that. Everything made sense after I got it filled in but getting to the actual answer was challenging because they were off the beaten track of idiom. Very enjoyable!

DONT HAVE A COW is a phrase used often when I was a preteen, which is 80 years ago. So well forgotten, that its C was the only square I could not fill based on knowledge or educated guess or crosses.

refreshingly perky for a Tuesday!

This is such a far reaching flexible variegated, sometimes deceptively simple creation that I found myself asking could AI do this ? I hope not, for I take it as an example of the miraculous possibilities reachable by only a human brain.

I usually. don't pay much attention to circled letters, Probably because to do so it overburdens my aged brain. Today I regretted that after I cheated by checking words. Had I instead glanced at the circled squares I would have solved faster and enjoyed it more. Thanks for the lesson learned and the fun of being challenged, and the VERY important theme.

Today's was to me obscure, boring , relying on made-up silliness and brimming over with proper nouns. . Please don't do this anymore, editors!

I shudder at three letter entries. This was the funnest exception!

According to my friend the marine biologist there is no word octopi. 28 across.. The plural of octopus is octopus.

It was fun to be on the constructor's witty quirky brain wave .

This was the biggest crossword challenge I have faced in the last couple of years. I am awed by the acrobatic wit of this punstering

ohnoewheismyex! is the triumph among the two-letter words. sayspresto! is my second fave. this puzzle is really clever and I enjoyed every second of it. Surprisingly it was a very fast solve for me, but I did have to look up one word because my brain just went into freeze over Priscilla, the wife of Elvis.

A funpunrun for my money,

I loved this puzzle. The clever clueing was right for my brain wave pattern and the misdirects were readily solved with crosses. I knew most of the proper names less one letter. Perfectly easy to start, perfectly challenging to finish. Btw to a complainer, one can "pencil" answers in with the little button at top right , in the left side of the row of choices.

Wow, so many puzzlers Gotcha-ed me! No doubt you saved others from acting on my misstatement about soil acidity! I am grateful. My hydrangeas of varied species in sandy clayey soil on Cape Cod range from pale mauve to deep vivid blue. I use aluminum sulfate on those that were born pink. On those that were born blue I use iron.

This has far too many proper names.

I recommend the Wikipedia article on Cephalopod . Using it to check my choice of SAC was very educational. Great puzzle!

On Safari in 1998 I saw what was then considered to be the last white rhino in northern Africa. But only two white female rhinos remain in the world, in Kenya's Ol Pejeta Conservancy. So the only way to ensure species survival would be to mate them successfully with southern African white rhino, and if the issue were not male, it would still be in danger of extinction. I didn't find any information on efforts to do that in my search.

I loved it and breezed thru.

Saturday is the only day Infind puzzles ro be a challenge, and this was a very enjoyable quirky one. I am curious to know if any other long time puzzle solvers find the same shortcomings I do with current puzzles. One, they are, other than on Saturday, too easy by far. Two, they are too repititious, using the same short fill words and phrases --like ado, todo, qasamI, ole, gala, okay, isee,and about 10 others--over and over again. This suggests to me they rely on AI or computerized searches for input and that is,Three, mechanical, not organic. This makes me sad, because it precludes the joy of aha!. Not being brave enough to try constructing I cannot be certain that this is the nature of the beast, hence inevitable. I would almost prefer it to be so. The good news is that the occasional creative constructor on whose brain wave I can hitch a ride is more esteemed than ever.