Eric
Boston
This felt like an old-school puzzle, in a positive way. Quite difficult but not unreasonably so or Natick-y. Congratulations and thank you to Katie!
Tough puzzle but I loved it. I feel like this was much closer to a traditional Saturday-level difficulty, without the fill being totally obscure or ridiculous. I think NYT puzzles have largely evolved in a good direction but I do relish having more challenging ones now and then.
@Nat K I think it's a both-and. Solvers improve, but I do feel like older puzzles (even just 10 years ago) are much more difficult, and not just because the references aren't as fresh. Feels like older puzzles were more trivia-ish, and there has been a notable effort to move away from crossword-ese over the years. I think modern puzzles are both better and easier for that shift in emphasis.
Loved this. Really difficult cluing, great to see.
Lovely puzzle, and I set a PR by a long way. This does feel like an example of where the NYT crossword is getting much easier. This felt like a Friday-level difficulty at most. But I also don't think better, more accessible but slightly easier puzzles is a terrible thing, to be clear.
@RozzieGrandma If there's an abbreviated state name in the answer, shouldn't there be an abbreviation in the clue? I thought that was a golden rule of crosswords
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