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Harford
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Harford
Before I read the comments, I'm assuming everyone is going to say how easy this was, but I'm not gonna let it get me down today. I'm so happy that I got a gold for the first time on a Saturday. :) I solved the Saturday 11/8/2025 New York Times Daily Crossword in 44:34!
I think the size of this puzzle should have had a "do not try this on your phone" warning. That. Was. Rough.
@Kay They're reptiles. đĩ Comma, comma, comma, comma chameleon đļ
Someone in here once said something along the lines of "don't think about IF you'll finish, think WHEN you'll finish". It's great advice, and it helped get me to the end of several puzzles. Today though, it made me want to strangle them. đ I hated every minute of this. After the first half hour I had 3 answers I was confident in. An hour plus later, I finally broke down and hit the auto check button. I didn't know who doctor faustus or the mythical figure that was "in" it/them was, and I don't know what the latin phrase sine qua non means, but the autocheck revealed the very top right square should not be an S. Hellas was in my head maybe? IDK Why I didn't try HELEN / NEED I have no idea. Probably focusing on Ronaldo and the SE corner. And lastly, to the "too easy" commenters...you must be absolutely insufferable in person with all that smugness.
@Charlie I've never heard of it before this.
I would have beaten my best time for a Tuesday, but cat happened.
@Cat Lady Margaret Sometimes my RESEARCH DETOURs are so long I forget what I was originally looking up. :)
I solved the Tuesday 9/30/2025 New York Times Daily Crossword in 12:24! I started doing the crossword about a year ago, and today's was one of the most fun, truly a D-lite! And, on the mini, I learned reune is a word. :)
"Things that come with waffles?" Can some explain "ers" to me? All that's running through my mind is that waffles are a massive choking hazard and everyone ends up in the "ER". After decades of eating waffles safely, I now feel incredibly lucky. đ¤ˇââī¸
@Zack This is exactly what happened to me. Tuxes, then limos, and the eat/ate debate. Before I had any crosses, I was wondering if Nutella was an English thing. All sorted in the end. :)
@Sleepyinsummerland I've been doing these for about a year now. The Thursday puzzles can be really tough. And if you're unfamiliar with rebuses, they're even harder. I was really happy about finishing today's. After a year I'm still missing some Thursday's. Friday's I'm about 50% on (but that's way better than where I started). I don't even try Saturday's. Keep at it, I think most people playing for a full year will be doing much better than I am. :)
I can't remember the last time I got a gold star for a Friday. I don't even try to attempt Friday/Saturday puzzles very often. Lucky to have picked a day with an easy one to give it a shot. :) I solved the Friday 7/17/2026 New York Times Daily Crossword in 21:15! <a href="https://nytimes.onelink.me/IM32/7owuagxr" target="_blank">https://nytimes.onelink.me/IM32/7owuagxr</a>
@Zach That was my last square as well. "something I've never heard of (dal _____), crossed with the english version of the thing I've never heard of"
The SW corner was NOTMYJAM. NORMIE vs NORMAL. Country HAM is a thing apparently? Finally guessed UMPTEENTH which led to APP and guessing HAM, which gave me RAPACIOUS which solved JUT and TRU. And I'm still l not sure what TRU is. The rest went pretty quickly, only 4 minutes over my average, and at least all of that was the SW corner. I really enjoyed working it all out. :)
@Lewis ENDE_ or SOLVE_ DIDNOTFINISH?
Got absolutely nowhere. <a href="https://imgur.com/a/4MIyEeV" target="_blank">https://imgur.com/a/4MIyEeV</a>
Had a heck of a time with this one. I'll try again later, but I don't really see anything else clicking. I think this is a DNF for me. :( I thought ELLE and VIA for 47A & 51A. But 37D ended that. I resisted putting NELL in because the two Eleanors I know would hate that. Guessed that three lion team might be ENG or ESP, and I don't know what Estonia gets shortened to? EST maybe? Or Ecuador, or other E countries. I knew Shawn/Sean Aston/Astin was Gamgee, but only the pronunciation, not the spelling. The same goes for spelling Spillane/Spellane/Spallane. Thought CAPISCE was capesce, but Hemingway fixed that for me. 19 minutes in <a href="https://imgur.com/a/Afq6ITA" target="_blank">https://imgur.com/a/Afq6ITA</a> 26 minutes <a href="https://imgur.com/a/WeNNVk6" target="_blank">https://imgur.com/a/WeNNVk6</a> 33 <a href="https://imgur.com/a/TJ33l2D" target="_blank">https://imgur.com/a/TJ33l2D</a> 38 and temporarily giving up <a href="https://imgur.com/a/vxygjxC" target="_blank">https://imgur.com/a/vxygjxC</a>
Really liked the revealer. Fun puzzle. Karen, neatened, and gaea had me scratching my head for a bit. I wasn't expecting to get the congratulations screen when I thought I was misspelling Gaia. TIL Gaea.
@Ben It irks me every time I open the app.
I got hung up on the bottom for a bit. <a href="https://imgur.com/a/YBIXpws" target="_blank">https://imgur.com/a/YBIXpws</a> Then found some more easy clues that I had skipped over, which revealed the rest. And I thought I was done. <a href="https://imgur.com/a/nuNpjvC" target="_blank">https://imgur.com/a/nuNpjvC</a> But no! I messed up somewhere. :( Took a bit to hunt down the mistake. <a href="https://imgur.com/a/5pXuceK" target="_blank">https://imgur.com/a/5pXuceK</a> I really need to pay attention to the tense. Drew not draw. :p Super fun puzzle!
@Marilyn Yes! "I am so much worse at xwords than I thought" kept going through my head until I figured it out. :p
@Lewis Excellent choices! Though I'm still irked at how long it took me to switch from Crankcalls to Prankcalls.
Other than mistyping (that's a word right?) IRS instead of IRA and taking forever to find the mistake, I really liked this puzzle. :) Though until I figured out the Across trick, I thought I going to fail spectacularly! Also, I do not remember who suggested The Magicians book series, but 175 pages in and I like it so far. I never read the Harry Potter books, (but watched every movie with nieces and nephews) so I'm not sure how similar things will end up, but I'm happy to find out. So thank you person whose name I can't remember. :)
I managed to finish under my average despite hunting a typo for a while. I was convinced it had something to do with the randb?, ran db?, rand b?, genre that I was oblivious to. Finally found and fixed errandboyD, and still managed to finish under my average. :) Looked up randb afterwards, and boy did I feel dumb. :p
I was feeling good after doing so well on yesterday's puzzle. Not any more.
@Francis Whats a good clue for "self-dealing"?
New personal best for a Sunday :) 41:42 3:21 faster than my average. Would have been a bit faster if I hadn't wasted so much time trying to figure out what I got wrong. I almost "saw red" when I spotted it, but I only "saw ree" :(
I thought I failed because I couldn't figure out what a "Nbaref" was and assumed something was wrong there. NBA ref, Doh! đ¤Ļââī¸ Turns out I failed on the 27A / 24D crossing vowel. Kamal, not Komal, and Igotta not igotto.
I think I'm done with these. Couldn't finish it. Come in here and every other comment is about how easy it was. Apparently I'm catastrophically stupid.
I really liked this puzzle. :) The rebus, the ringed letters, the clues, everything. The only thing I needed help with was "voluntold". Luckily my better half was familiar, so I then knew what to look for. It took me longer than my Wed average, but that was a good thing since I got to enjoy it longer. :)
Kale? I didn't know Zora's middle name, so just had to guess the final square was L. Where in the world is kale a term for moolah? Had no idea what video game sold 300million copies. Thought maybe every version of Madden ever? Got it through the crosses and remembering buying my nephews MINEcraft related presents. Otherwise, that was really cool. Kudos to the creator for the extra creativity to come up with this idea! Definitely made me miss MINEsweeper! :)
That was a lot of fun! Plus, I learned what a Koan is. :)
@Steve L From context, not from the memory of today.
@KFC It gets easier, but never easy. I've been doing these for just over a year now I think and I've definitely gotten better, as well as learned some new words. :) Thursdays can be super-tricky sometimes, 75%-ish solves on those. I'm up to about a 50% solve rate on Fridays. I don't even bother with Saturdays still. But Sun-Wed....I'm pretty proud of how well I knock those out now. :)
First run through all the clues and all I could come up with is this. Probably my worst xword ever. See ya'll on Sunday. <a href="https://imgur.com/a/mJmF0rg" target="_blank">https://imgur.com/a/mJmF0rg</a>
I remember reading about issues people have had with the puzzle not "ending" when completed. Today, I thought I was done and searched through multiple times looking for a typo or error. I eventually gave up, but when I opened the app back up to surrender and hit the auto check button, the puzzle showed as solved. Honestly, thank goodness, because after DNF'ing a Sunday, I was starting to worry about my brain. đ¤Ē
I enjoyed this puzzle so much! The sweet sixteen (two^four) clued me in a bit, but I didn't fully get understand until I got to the revealer.
Arrgh, failed by one square. No clue what the intersection of 13D and 21A is. Pro instead of Pee really messed me up for a while at the bottom, especially since I needed the crossers to get enisle. I never would have guessed that that was even a word.
@John I had "pro" in there for such a long time. Sigh.
I really liked this one. Haven't been able to ski in years(decades), so the combo of a fun puzzle and fond recollections was lovely.
Took me a while to figure out the top left corner, but got it eventually. :)
@sotto voce I've been voluntold! đˇđ
I'm having such a bad Xword week. DNF on Thursday, Saturday, and now a Sunday. Saturday is 50/50 for me, so I'm fine with that one, and occasionally I'll miss a Thursday and I haven't done that in a while, but it's been quite some time since I DNF'd a Sunday.âšī¸ Started slow, picked up a bit then finally stalled at the 1 hour mark. <a href="https://imgur.com/a/i8SWm7V" target="_blank">https://imgur.com/a/i8SWm7V</a>
TIL what ester is. Nice Monday Puzzle. :)
I was not feeling very confident after the first pass, but persevered and it started filling in quicker and quicker. :) Still a little over my average, but I'm placing some of the blame on this guy ( <a href="https://imgur.com/a/UwSUu5c" target="_blank">https://imgur.com/a/UwSUu5c</a>) for interrupting and rubbing against my phone. Fun puzzle. Suitcase is what clued me into the ! answers. I'd love to end with a cool ______! clue, but my brain is done for the day. :p
@V I forgot to ask.... Shouldn't 61A be "Groups" with an "s" not "group" if the answer is "sets"? A group of sets? Is that correct?
@Andrzej Thanks, I appreciate it. :) Unfortunately I went and read the comments. Now I'm just embarrassed and can't delete my comment. :(
@Francis The way our brains recognize and interpret patterns is fascinating. I remember reading something long ago about the differences in brain activity between growing up with Chinese characters vs the English alphabet. Something about the visual-spatial recognition and using additional parts of the brain. I remember feeling disappointed that reading in English wasn't as brain-stimulating as if I was reading in Chinese. I could see a DOOK being a fish. Though also maybe an Australian bird? "Crikey, that red-billed dook just swallowed that mouse whole!" hehe Proper names are what usually get me. There'll always be some I've never heard of before, like today's Apple TV show. For those, I just have to hope I get ALL the crossers because you never know how someone will spell their name. Komal sounded reasonable to me. Kumail, Kumar.... why not Komal? ESPECIALLY when "I got to" also seemed like a perfectly reasonable answer to "No other option for me".
The middle letter in 19D and 23A got me. Had to just toss in random letters til I got it. :/