Tuesday, May 26, 2026, Brad Lively

The revealer today is BODYOFKNOWLEDGE (What the answers to the starred clues are, collectively?), and it refers to the following entries:

SHARPTEETH - *Aids for biting
KEENEYE - *Attribute for spotting what others miss
WISEASS - *Cheeky sort
SMARTMOUTH - *One given to insolence 

The thinking is that the first parts of all the theme answers - sharp, keen, wise, smart - are synonyms for knowledge, and the second parts are all parts of the body. OK. And three of the phrases are in fairly common usage. SHARPTEETH is just kind of a random thing, and the last two - WISEASS and SMARTMOUTH - are synonyms themselves, and these things muddy the waters a bit for me, but still, it works on one level, and it's Tuesday, so let's move on.

When I do an early week puzzle, I will often try to get the first three Across answers and then move immediately to the Downs that run off of them. This worked well today until I got to 5D - "Spot to keep a passport while traveling." I had the H, and so I entered Hippocket without a second thought. It took several crosses to get me to realize that they actually wanted HOTELSAFE, which is pretty much the polar opposite of my original answer. For the record, I have never put my passport in a hotel safe. I leave for more passport travel in a little over a week, and I will update you if I end up doing so.

Best clues today: "A little sun?" (DWARFSTAR) and "Number not representable by Roman numerals" (ZERO). 

Overall, I liked it.

- Horace 

Monday, May 25, 2026, Anthony Grubb

The week is starting off HOTHOTHOT! Which is nice, because the weekend has been pretty cool and rainy up here in "other New England," as it's referred to at the A.C.P.T. Harrumph!

Today's tidy theme, courtesy of Buster Poindexter, is three things that are hot - DEATHVALLEY, GHOSTPEPPER, and a good old R-rated LOVESCENE. Nice. Is it relevant that SALIVA is just under the GHOSTPEPPER? Or that the LOVESCENE connects with DARKNESS? Hmm... HOTHOTHOT sits ATOP OBOE and HIVE... mayyybe HIVE could work.

OK, enough on that. Let's turn now to a few of the QMCs - "Paper cut?" for EDIT was good, "De-tension center?" was cute for SPA, "Go off the deep end" (DIVE) worked in a similar vein, and "Place of buzziness" was just plain kwazy for HIVE. In non-QMCs, I was amused by the oddness of "Back of a car or front of an elephant" (TRUNK). 

I was a little surprised to see HOBO (Drifter in search of work) in the grid. (Do we still use that term?) It reminded me of when I was a college student, making my way from campus to the small town of Beloit, Wisconsin. As I passed a young boy walking with his mother, he turned to her and said, excitedly, "Look, Mom, a HOBO!" True story.

I enjoyed this one.  

- Horace 

Sunday, May 24, 2026, David Steinberg

NEXT, PLEASE!

It's Sunday, and we have a puzzle with the theme of advancing one letter in a phrase one step, alphabetically. The affected letter is circled, but the change only happens in the Across answers. The original phrases vary from good - "controlled chaos" and "give me one reason" - to mundane - "contact lens" and "first class mail," and the converted phrases and wacky cluing vary similarly. The best are, maybe, FIRSTCLASSNAIL (Good name for a salon specializing in mani-pedis?) and GIVEMEONESEASON (Exasperated television producer's plea?). 

There were some bright spots in the fill - FORE (Warning after a slice), CAST (Musical group?), and LIPREADERS (Experts in body language?). And ONTHEAPPS (Using Tinder, Bumble, Hinge, etc.) was nice. But I took issue with the awkwardly clued AGO (Earlier), the rando DISK (coin, commonly), and "Stance that resembles a ballerina on one leg" (DANCERPOSE). I mean, isn't a ballerina standing on one leg a person in a DANCERPOSE? And yes, I know it's yoga.

Oh, I don't know. I got up on the wrong side of the bed, maybe, and this puzzle didn't do it for me. The theme answers all work fine, and the changed letters spell out "plus one," which is a nice touch, but somehow it just didn't sing to me. I won't say IHATEDIT, but I did say EWE a few times. At least it GOTDONE, and now I'm GUANACO on to tomorrow. See you then.

 

- Horace 

Saturday, May 23 2026, Kameron Austin Collins

Love the  layout today!!  A chunky solve, especially in the middle of the grid, where a full dozen long-ish clues intersect.  Very impressive construction - though the price paid is the almost-orphaning of the top left and lower right corners.

Right off the bat in that top corner, there's misdirection afoot with "They might be settled atop stools" - BARBETS, after a moment's thought. Just below that, "A boxer's might knock you out" did not fool old ex-boxer-owner me - DOGBREATH.    Those answers helped with a Down entry  RIGVEDA ("Ancient collection of Hindu hymns") that was a learning for me.

Other learnings - German novelist Theodor FONTANE ... MARLSTONE as an ingredient in cement ... the SANDSNAKE which preys on lizards in Africa ... Edward GOREY's "The Gashleycrumb Tinies" - what a fabulous book title!!

38A "Sugar ____" was a write-in for me, who grew up in the Eastern Townships, home of the world's best MAPLE syrup.   Raised my eyebrows at MATEINONE as a "Chess puzzle challenge, maybe".  Stress the "maybe" - it's hard to make a one-move chess puzzle that is much of a challenge!  "Walk on water?" (GANGPLANK) was amusing :)

Finally, how many of you wrote in TIC instead of SEA for "Tac preceder"?  (I did!)

This was a really great Saturday puzzle on which to end a week of blogging.  Horace takes the reins tomorrow.  Enjoy your weekend everybody!

-philbo

Friday, May 22 2026, Gene Louise de Vera

A pleasant, not too difficult themeless Friday puzzle that just seemed to flow from top to bottom, with a somewhat unusual 16x15 grid bisected vertically by a pair of long entries side by side.  (What do we call "stacks" when they're vertical?)  One of these really piqued my interest : Beethoven's MOONLIGHTSONATA, clued at 7D as "an inspiration for Chopin's Fantaisie-Impromptu".  I'd not heard that before, so as I write this, I am listening to the Chopin piece with that in mind.  It's lovely, but do I hear echoes of the Moonlight Sonata in there?  I dunno.  Maybe I need a better musical ear.

I particularly liked a couple of the other long entries as well.  18A "Qualifier to an embarrassing question" (ASKINGFORAFRIEND) made me smile; I use that phrase all the time.  And the other long Down entry 8D "Kepler-22b or Kepler-186f, e.g." (EARTHLIKEPLANET) tickles my science-y fancy.  Amazing that we can make that determination from impossibly far away!

Other nuggets in the grid .. 15A "Footnote phrase" is ETALII, which one rarely sees in its unabbreviated form.  I was a little Shocked at the 65A QMC "What some streakers are charged with?" (TASER) - I definitely did not expect that!  A bit of unusual construction in the lower left corner, with CLOT and CLOY side by side.  Neat!  I also had to do a double-take before accepting MEANS as the answer to "Is" at 26D.  

Finally, a shoutout to William of OCCAM, he of the eponymous Razor.  In the spirit of simplicity, I shall end here.

Cheerio!

-philbo

Thursday, May 21 2026, Zhou Zhang and Mallory Montgomery

A fun rebus-y theme in this Thursday's puzzle, with four Across clues clearly requiring a bit of lateral thinking:

• 20A "timiL" = BACKWARDSCAP
• 35A "Golfer's suppor-" = CUTOFFTEE
• 42A "Evade" = MINISKIRT
• 55A "P | u | n | c | h | e | s" = STRIPEDSOCKS

I like the clothing motif, and until I reached STRIPEDSOCKS, thought there was also a bit of a punky thing going on.  These are all cute and fun, and I only wish the trailing dash had been left off the clue for CUTOFFTEE, to make it less explicit and leave the solver wondering if a typo could have crept its way into the puzzle!  

Theme aside, the puzzle didn't put up much of a fight, although the top right corner was problematic with a term that was new to me (AO DAI - "Traditional Vietnamese garment").  Good thing the crossers were all knowable - at least once I realized that the "Pineapple Isle" is LANAI and not KAUAI, and the animal that spits when angry is a LLAMA and not a KOALA (really, Philbo??).  Still in that corner, I don't love AIS for "ChatGPT, Claude, etc."  Doesn't seem right.  But I shrug and move on.

Down in the lower left, I thought "Increase, as interest" (PIQUE) was very clever, especally as I had the 'U' early and was sure it was going to end in 'UP'.  And 3D "'Bingo!'" (EXACTAMUNDO) brought back vague memories - was that something the Fonz used to say?  (resisting the urge to just Google it, here)  Oh and I don't believe I've ever seen GOOIER in a crossword before..

All in all a pleasant, gentle Thursday solve.  On to rougher waters tomorrow!

-philbo

Wednesday, May 20 2026, Kathleen Duncan

I gotta say right up front, I loved today's puzzle.  Really fun and just the right amount of crunch for a Wednesday. The well-disguised theme turned out to be quite SPECIAL!  To wit - the first three long Across clues all looked ordinary and had straightforward answers, but they all had something in common:

• 16A : "Nontraditional time for voting someone into office" (OFFYEARELECTION)
• 26A : "What a waiter might offer to start you off" (SOUPOFTHEDAY)
• 44A : "Bit of movie magic" (VISUALEFFECT)

Unclear until the revealer at 58A : "Condescending rhetorical question" (ISNTTHATSPECIAL) brings it together - the theme answers are all "special" things; in fact, you could replace their leftmost parts with the word SPECIAL and they would make as much sense.  I think this is neat, and a very worthy idea as a theme.

The revealer, incidentally and as many of you surely know, was the catchphrase of Dana Carvey's recurring Church Lady character on Saturday Night Live some years ago.  And in that sketch-comedy vein, a reference to Monty Python's "Fish-Slapping Dance" was a creative way to clue John CLEESE, whose piscatory antics with Michael Palin were great silly fun.  I was a big fan of the Flying Circus as a kid!

Elsewhere...I had difficulty getting an initial toehold, thanks to the opaqueness of the opening clue at 1A "Establishment that serves zombies, perhaps" (TIKIBAR), and, right below that, the great term HATERADE that I'd somehow never heard of ("'Drink' for vocal critics").  Not helping matters was 3D "Gets hyped", which I originally had as AMPSUP, instead of KEYSUP. 

 I liked the circular references in 26D and 27D (SEAL and ORCA, ocean prey and predator).  And I must take issue with 38D MOLASSES, as to be an "epitome of slowness", of course it must be IN JANUARY. 🙂

Finally, the perennial crossword favourite EKE for the very last clue "Just get (by)".  I've been putting EKE into crossword grids since time immemorial, without really knowing its definition.  It basically means "to supplement", which is rarely how it is used in common parlance.  So I think about that now, whenever I see the word.

And on to the themelesses tomorrow (the stretch I believe we refer to as "the turn")!  See ya then

-philbo