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As a soon-to-be PhD in classics, I loved this puzzle! So clever, and I always love an ides reference. Immediately texted my department crossword buddy to see if he'd started, and am looking forward to his review. However, as someone whose dissertation is due in two weeks so she can finally get the PhD in classics... a bit of a jump scare when I realized! Back to revisions, now!
Absolutely hated this--what kind of modern reimagining is this? I guess I see how it lines up on surface level, but I didn't care for its glibness. But hey, it's a puzzle, it doesn't have to contain the same emotion and message of the lovely original, and to each their own on their interpretation of the poem and their enjoyment of the puzzle! (Plus lately I think the point of literary reimaginings is to miss the message of the original anyway, for better or for worse, and in this way perhaps Joe's rendering achieves that goal.... but that's a different conversation.) Aside from disliking the theme (and the run-on clues), 30D/34A felt like a particularly unfair cross to me, but perhaps I just dated myself--both of those people are before my time. Would other commenters call these household names?
I liked today's, I always enjoy when there's a theme to an early-in-the-week puzzle. To me, BABE is gender neutral, but all of these words for women seemed a little dated (26 and don't hear them very often in modern parlance), so okay. I learned something new from 71A--I spin yarn, and have always called that tool a bobbin in reference to spinning because that's what the maker of my wheel sells them as, not a SPOOL, but it seems they are used pretty interchangeably. Fun puzzle! Overall, I liked it.
I loved today's theme! Always fun to learn a bit of trivia--SILLYPUTTY was a new one for me, and POSTITNOTES and PENICILLIN triggered deep memories in my brain of fun facts once known... anyway, I love coming away from the puzzle with something to share with others throughout the day. My question is, ever since NYT updated the UI on desktop (now putting the three crosswords in the header instead of just the full size), has anyone else been experiencing a slight delay (5-10 seconds) between finishing and receiving the "you solved it!" notification? Or maybe I just need to restart my computer again...
I loved today's puzzle! I am always fond of an early week puzzle with a theme--I remember when I was a new solver and the Monday/Tuesdays were the only puzzles I could routinely solve without assistance, but I felt rather left out by never having a theme like the Thursday and onward puzzles, so it's always nice to see these. I've enjoyed reading others' comments on the impressive construction of the grid! I especially liked the cross of 25A and 28D, and also 64D. One thing--does anybody else solving on desktop have a banner at the top of the screen offering a family subscription? It makes it so I cannot see the last row of the grid, and the puzzle jumps when I get to the final clues so that I can't see the top where the clue is written solo, only the side lists. It's a little thing, but it's driving me absolutely bananas. I'd hoped it would go away after a week!
Anyone else find themselves correcting their posture with 32D? I liked today's puzzle a lot--I love when early week puzzles have a theme/trick, I remember when I was a new crossword solver and Monday/Tuesday were the only puzzles I could routinely solve without help or checking the answers, and it was always nice to get to figure out a theme!
Definitely tricky! I got the central clue early and understood what the theme was going for, but didn't quite get it how it was being executed, not even with the animation at the end (it was moving just a little too fast for me to track--I just watched several more times now it's been explained, and I see now!). I solved with the crosses for most of the clues with the missing letters, and there were definitely some tricky clues in there, but it woke my brain up for sure! A harder Thursday, but those are good sometimes, right?
@Emerald I have also always wondered this specifically with respect to año, given that ano is, ahem, not a year. I had always just wondered "why not clue it a little differently?" Your suggestion of the tilde being in both crossing clues is really clever! I like it a lot.
@The X-Phile Four years of high school Latin (taken out of spite, admittedly, because I wanted to take French but my parents said no out of concern it would not be useful...) led me to a BA in classics, where an inspiring Latin prof. said "I don't know what you are thinking of doing after school, but have you considered this?" Six years of graduate school begun in 2020 have been a blur of ups and downs, and the PhD is certainly the most challenging thing I have done to date, but I am so glad I did it. I work on Greek and Latin poetry, classical myth, and reception--defending next month. It's funny, it never occurred to me that PhD school actually comes to an end someday, but it really is in sight (in spite of the mountain of work between me and distributing to my committee ahead of the defense!!).
@Amy Fair enough! In my years of solving, there have been plenty of clues/squares that aren't in my knowledge base, some I found to be guessable, some I did not. In this case, perhaps I should have said natick rather than unfair--hence my question about whether these proper nouns were commonly known or household names. I am wondering if this actually counts as a natick. :)
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