Andrew F
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This has helped crystallize something for me - despite her first album coming out in 2006, Taylor Swift will remain a "teenage" sensation in (the slightly stuffy end of) the popular mind for a long time, just as people are only just starting to realize that Millennials are not the kids with the avocado toast, and are instead solidly middle-aged.
What have you American savages done with our (checks notes) cultural treasure the Hokey Cokey?
It's possibly just a function of being someone who has had some sort of personal DESKTOP COMPUTER for a longtime (a programmer), but I absolutely consider 'error' a verb: if you do this, and then that, then the bit of code over there will error.
Huh, I'm surprised to find myself the only one looking in a puzzled manner at CUSH - I've never heard the word before, and CUSHY would have been a fine answer for the clue.
I enjoyed this puzzle a lot (even the parts that others didn't seem to) - sometimes you just need an edge of a few clues in your wheelhice to really get going - having SPEEDRUN and EATME as certainties, and then making just the right guesses for crossers to build more of a lattice, and continuing on from there. Also some experience of answers that I only know from this crossword (SEGO / OSA). It wasn't my fastest time, but I didn't erase much at all. I think MISSES for LOSSES? And then POP IN for 58A, which I definitely have a question about... I can see two connections between "Stop by" and END AT, but they both seem loose: 1) both words refer to a point on a journey, but to my ear, "Stop by" indicates that this is not the final stop, which END AT of course is. 2) and both can refer to a time of cessation: "The concert will stop by / end at 11PM". But stop by means it may stop earlier, and end at is more nailed on (again, to my ear) And I missing a third connection, or just being a little to tied to my understanding?
@Francis I agree with a lot of this, but I'd add that I don't think you need to be a constructor to appreciate the work involved. It's my appreciation that keeps me from seriously attempting it, to be honest! Of course there's two related skills, filling the board and cluing the answers - just because I rush through a Monday's doesn't mean that I'm not sometimes impressed by a particular bit of clockwork. If you've not already familiar with Leonard Dawe, his story (too long to reproduce here - too good to précis) is an excellent example of the dangers of unyoking the two skills too far!
I feel we might need an intervention with the editors to underline that, with the exception of email, no-one has said e-anything since the dot-com boom. Not evite, not etail, definitely not esharp.
@Jeb Jones it will be a reference to what Gone with the Wind was referencing: the seat of the High Kings of Ireland.
@joel88s They're technically doing slightly different work, in that 'bench press' is a regular phrase while 'knight schtick' just references one, but they're both in a solid tradition of humorous light misdirection in cluing - what would you have as an example of one that does have a tonal connection? "Classic pick up lines" seems both less-highlighted and more obscure, to my eye.
Isn't RUNS POINT corporate jargon taken from the military (the lead in a platoon, from the pint of the spear), possibly via sports? Or is that just 'takes point'?
@Matt This is the second day of it, and as far as I can tell it didn't really appear yesterday - you can see it not quite being there at the top of yesterday's comments <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/24/crosswords/daily-puzzle-2026-02-25.html#commentsContainer" target="_blank">https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/24/crosswords/daily-puzzle-2026-02-25.html#commentsContainer</a>
(since yesterday's Midi didn't really seem to appear for a lot of us until today) I can't tell if it's someone sneaking in something clever, or an unintentional self-own, that a European filling in the first of the Midis would conclude that it's KIDSIZE.
@Andrew F (point of the spear, of course)
WISHES / DISHES I was fine with, but I don't entirely understand WITHER as a clue (not helped by the Scottish word SWITHER, which does fit the clue better)
@Eric Hougland I have to admit your comment wrong-footed me to begin with - I've not seen conservatives offer much of a definition of "woke", but definitely not "alert to prejudice", which they would argue they are (while brushing aside most examples, and insisting on some imaginary ones) So my immediate reading was "In my experience, the only people who use WOKE that way (progressives) use it to belittle people (conservatives) who have more respect for people unlike themselves than the people calling them WOKE (progressives) have." - the old "you say you want diversity, but what about diversity of opinions?"
@Andrew F (admittedly not an opinion I expected to see much in the NYT comments page)
(bah, I mean WITHER as an answer, of course)
@Eric Hougland No, that's fair enough - I might leave it there though, unless I'm greatly mistaken we're on the same page.
Is there a place (is this the place?) to discuss the monthly crossword? I nodded at ERRS for cluing basketball with ball in Catch Phrase - I don't know that game, but it's a solid rule and, of course, one that I'd taken to apply to the NYT crossword. So I was particularly surprised to see "Workers safety org" cluing OSHA, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration!
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