Ms. Billie M. Spaight

@B Oh, we've been saying "have a cow" since time out of mind. Before the Simpsons were even born. It's a very old expression.

@Steve L I even like the puzzles I can't solve completely.

@Andrzej This is a puzzle in a USA-based newspaper. It's going to have things that are more likely to resonate with a US audience. While it's great to have solvers from other countries, please stop being a grump. If you want something to complain about, try Connections. It's terrible! I'm thinking of stopping it. And I'm from New York City. I'm only 1/4 Polish. Eat some pierogi and relax--it's just a game.

@Vy Well gee whiz, what else can one do with rebuses except put them in crossword puzzles? I like them very much. Gee whiz. OMG!

@Doug Because we don't all play CHESS. OK?

@Barry Ancona I didn't figure out the theme but I solved the whole puzzle with the crosses. After I finished I still didn't get it. Then I read the explanation in the column and I LOLed because this puzzle was so funny. I enjoyed it--not just because I solved it but for the humor in it. I would love to see more puzzles like this one.

@Andrzej I am absolutely LOVING your good mood today. It's so nice that this puzzle brought out sweet memories for solvers. We used to get strawberries from the supermarket. They came in small green plastic "baskets" that were shrink wrapped. They looked great. PROBLEMONE was that the ones unseen usually were not ripe or had gone bad. But the TOPEARNERS were great.

@Ms. Billie M. Spaight O MEA CULPA. MRE was Meals Ready-to-Eat. And somewhere in the Pinocchio story, he did grow DONKEYEARS. I did read Pinocchio as a child but I don't think that chapter was included. And MRE is really esoteric. We always called it MESS. Congratulations to the constructors for making a truly esoteric puzzle.

@Rich WHAAAAAT? Both expressions have been used since time out of mind by my relatives (white) and friends (various). No-one ever even HINTED that any thing racial was involved. Since when has this become racist? And why?

@SP I must have handled, proofed, and edited thousands of manuscripts in my career and nobody ever called a † anything but a cross. No authors, no other editors, no supervisors, no typesetters, and no printers! I called it a "fancy cross." We were all veteran publishing professionals, so that terminology in the puzzle must be obsolete. It's not modern publishing usage.

@Anita SUB LIME. I love it!

@DB I would say one of the worst! If I wanted to return to high school, then I would go there. The note was just the constructor showing off that he is a mathematician. Welp, "some are mathemeticians/Some are carpenters' wives/I don't know how it all got started/Don't know what they do with their lives...." (Bob Dylan). If I were the editors I would have rejected that note. It is BORING and egotistical. We are interested in words, not math. Sorry, but that note was not mathing for me.

@SBK to me a pretzel log is about 12 inches long and as fat as my thumb. A pretzel stick is about 2 inches long as as thin as a refiller for a pen.

@Eric Hougland Actually, it's a good thing because it shows the progress that's occurred. I think it's great that a person born in the late '80s with HIV is alive and thriving today because of the Fauci trials on infants with HIV. Google Joseph A. Kibler.

@Francis For starters, do our dear readers know the difference between Communism and Democratic Socialism? This is a critical distinction if we want to stop the red tide that threatens to engulf us all. Protect, restore, mourn...all appropriate words to use.

@Mr Dave Nit picker. Even I as an editor would have accepted "of" because that's what the eclipse was doing.

@B You and ME both!

@Andrzej Thanks for sharing the memory. I enjoyed this a lot. It was a very good puzzle. I love it when puzzles make me nostalgic.

@Andrzej I was in school starting in the 50s and through the 60s and no teacher ever even mentioned the kinds of dashes. I learned about them on the job as a sci-tech copywriter. The number of things we learn on the job is amazing. If you didn't work in publishing, it's not surprising that these kinds of dashes would not occur to you. The em dash—the longest one—is used to set off something that is not-quite parenthetical but the en dash signifies some kind of opposing relationship or a range (e.g., red–green or 3–8).

@john ezra They were own right good.

@Heidi I swear before the crosses made it more obvious that this was a camel, I thought it should be WEDNESDAY but that didn't fit. You know calling Wednesday Hump Day I figured that it was in the middle of the week, so two humps.

@Andrzej We usually write it KERBLOOEY so I had to rely on the crosses, but I did like the word. I just went ahead and used the autocheck whenever I got stuck. I like the KOOPA meaning poop. My mom never called it that. She called it BEBA. Over here it is the goose that lays golden eggs. Meanwhile, I was struggling with GILD or GILDED but neither of them fit.