MFSTEVE
Seattle
The heck is an EARLAP?
@Complex Kid I would think you'd appreciate the added ... complexity
It was my understanding that there would be no math
AMER, BRUH, BLAM, LGA, SAO, YUP, MARPLE... Too many pretend words and obscure proper nouns sapped the fun out of this puzzle.
Anyone else have PRICE and HACE? HACE or High Altitude Cerebral Edema, a condition in people with Acute Mountain Sickness can present with confusion as a symptom.
I haven't had to cheat this much in a long time. Too many naticks for me.
If the constructor is going to cheat with words like OKRAS and TOGAE then I feel better about cheating too.
Well that was impossible, if you aren't a Bruno Mars fan, or tennis fan, without lookups. This puzzle was KRAP.
@BB The Lay of Luthien, a ballad sung by Aragorn in Lord Of The Rings, is the only reason I know what a lay is.
Couldn't get the solve and it was because I had 33a as WiND instead of WEND so yeah, I agree, lookups are fair play.
I've never had so many wild guesses turn out to be right. Just on the perfect wavelength today. Love when that happens. Feels like having ESP.
The first pass through the 'across' clues netted me only END and SAAB and I knew this would be trouble. But a few breakthroughs later and it began to fall into place. Cracked 39A by some miracle and then I was on a roll. Super fun, challenging and satisfying puzzle.
I only know who Hoda KOTB is because of her frequent NYT crossword appearances.
I was on my high school MATHTEAM. We went to State! What a bunch a nerds.
My thanks to Wikipedia and Google Translate for this solve.
I guessed LETS ROCK without any crossers. I love when that happens. Lots of fun cluing and fills. Thoroughly enjoyed this puzzle.
Haha finished the puzzle quick but with one error... somewhere... 20 min later... I cannot spell my way out of a wet paper bag - PaRISHTHETHOUGHT!
If you beat Metroid 5 times on the original NES, Samus Aran would remove their helmet revealing she is a woman, which blew the minds of many gamers at the time. She preceded almost every other videogame heroine ever created. And in 1986!
Fav puzzle in a while. Tough but fair.
@Momerlyn I spilled spot remover on my dog... Now he's gone.
For "Animal resting place", I had SEMETARY at first which I think is more clever than BARNYARD to be honest.
I couldn't figure out what was happening in this puzzle. Went to bed thinking about it. Figured out the trick in my sleep then woke up and solved the puzzle. YES!
This is the hardest puzzle ever. Over 2 hours and I'm only 50%. Might have to start googling.
Challenging puzzle today from a paper that has chosen to elevate anti-LGBTQ+ voices and platform hate groups while framing families seeking basic medical rights as extremists.
Star Wars is not science fiction. It's fantasy.
Filled it in until I got stuck but then realized, I hadn't tried to solve the "trick" yet. Filling in ROPE/CORD and YARN/CABLE helped untie the rest of the puzzle. No lookups! Good puzzle.
@Boaz Moser but ice is not denser than water, that's why it floats.
Not sure why but the NE corner really "stumped" me
Broke my streak because I was solving in bed last night and fell asleep. Woke up at 3 am with my phone stuck to my cheek and the timer still running, so I reset the puzzle. Ah well, 19 min feels better than 5+ hrs.
Once I figured out "Spilled Milk" it started to click. "Eggs in one basket" was the last to fall. Really clever Thursday puzzle. I do not understand RIMIER though...
I figured out the trick which was clever but the most difficult part was the intersection of bogus, made-up words: EELIER, MEEPLE and RELO.
BEL ESPRIT has been used in English since the 17th century? How many times, including this puzzle.
Very reasonable clues and answers today. Loved KINDASORTA and LSD. Very clever cluing.
Once it *clicked* the whole puzzle fell into place for me, although I had to look up the king of Hawaii which seemed a fair trade for solving the riddle.
The clue for AONE is garbage. Especially crossing ATOI? Garbage.
That was super fun. Absolutely clicked with this one so I plowed through in half my average time. When you find a groove solving, it is just the best feeling.
PUB seems a little unfair for such a confusing and broad clue. Not a religious person at all so never would have got the "B" without googling "Papal issue" which I thought may have been a weird reference to breast milk.
I was TOYING with the NE corner for about 45 minutes. Tough puzzle, but fair.
Got BELLADONNA thanks to alchemy skill in the game Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2. Beat my average by over an hour. Thanks, videogames.
The NYT, Don't Use "APED" In A Crossword Puzzle Challenge.
Anyway, don't Google C SPOT
@Allen colloquially, and as a person that has played in several bands, we would always refer to it as an "AMP" as in, "who's amp is this?" Or "can I borrow your practice amp". Or "Troy spilled beer on his amp."
Never could have finished this without lookups and straight up cheating. I guess if that's the constructor's goal, well played.
Hate to look stuff up but never would have been able to solve this without Wikipedia
I guess I don't know how to spell UGLY or GYDDYUP