Thursday, August 21, 2025, Simeon Seigel

I have been dealing with a family issue for the past few weeks, and have not blogged, but today I will, because I thought this was a very clever puzzle.

The revealer WHATGOESUP (Start of a popular saying about gravity ... or a hint to completing the answers to the starred clues) went in easily, but it wasn't until after I finished the puzzle that I realized what was going on. Let's take 19-Across "*Wildlife parks" as an example. The answer appears to be GAMER, but the true answer is "Game reserves," and to find that, you have to go to the R of GAMER, then go up and down, using the letters of 9-Down, SERVES to complete it. Pretty slick.

And this trick works for all six of the theme answers, which are all valid entries on their own. Very impressive.

I was not familiar with the game ZORK, despite playing video games in the very beginning of the video game era. "Fictional character with a famous opening line" (ALIBABA) was funny, and I thought it was convenient that "faucet" fits in where SPIGOT is correct for "Tap." Tricky.

Just a really good Thursday, I thought.

Horace 

Saturday, August 9, 2025, Aidan Deshong and Akshay Seetharam

0:09:36
Mini: 0:00:37
Connections: Green, yellow, purple, blue
Wordle: Nothing on first guess; five
Strands: Spangram first, no hints

Started slow, but finished fast today. I think SANDCASTLES (Buildings that aren't water-resistant) was my first long one, and then the rest of the middle fell into place quickly.

It's a pleasing grid shape. Nice open middle with staircase squares on the sides, and an upward diagonal feeling. 

I was helped in the SW by my nephew having attended UC IRVINE, but despite my extensive French study, JAMAISVU felt strangely new to me. :) Nor did I know La Cousine BETTE, for that matter...

It's always nice to picture a SEAOTTER (Animal that sleeps while floating on its back), YOKEL (Rube) reminds me fondly of The Simpsons, and LUSTS (Feels thirsty) is nicely modern.

Nice Saturday.

- Horace 

Friday, August 8, 2025, Rafael Musa and Matthew Stock

0:08:07
Mini: 0:00:39
Connections: green, yellow, blue, purple
Wordle: 1Y 1G on first guess; three
Strands: no hints

I just happened to learn that "The Streak" was the most popular song in American when Ken Jennings was born. I was eight at the time and I remember the song well, but I was not thinking of it when I hit the clue "Events akin to streaks" (UNDIERUNS). Another thing working against me was that I had never heard the term "undie run." Seems to me that if you're going to do it, why not go all the way? BESTRONG and get that TENTPOLE out there for all to see. Too much?

Let's see, what else...  I learned in BARTRIVIA, I think, that Antarctica was technically the largest desert in the world, so ARID went right in. But still, when I think "desert," I think "sand," so it still seems a little odd. 

I liked both the clue and the answer in "Disaccustom" (WEAN), and doesn't the idea of NORTHSTAR just feel so comforting for some reason?

- Horace 

 

Thursday, August 7, 2025, Ben Zimmer

0:11:48
Mini: 0:00:28
Connections: Purple, Blue, Green, Yellow
Wordle: 1Y1G first guess; three
Strands: No hints

It seems so straightforward now, but finished this without figuring out the trick, which is explained in the central revealer FRUITLESSLY (... how to read the answers to...). So, for

TOPEARNERS (Mixtures in copier cartridges)
IMPEACHED (Chatted online, in brief)
ROMANGODS (Some fishing gear)
and
PROBLEMONE (Investigate in detail)

fruits need to be removed from each one for the answers to make sense. I'm not sure PROBLEMONE is a normal thing to say, but I could be out of the loop.

The last square for me today was the first square of the puzzle - "Speeding check" (BUMP) and "Be up" (BAT) just were not clicking for me. Honestly, I was so stumped that I started to run the alphabet. Luckily, I skipped "A" as being highly improbable. :)

I enjoyed the QMCs for PUERTO (P.R. piece?), ELS (Trains for the Chicago White Sox?), and NAN (Grammy, in the U.K.). 

- Horace

Wednesday, August 6, 2025, Hanh Huynh

0:05:43
Mini: 0:00:48
Connections: Purple, Blue, Green, Yellow
Wordle: 1Y first guess, six
Strands: No hints

Weird, funny theme today of ITSNOTTHATDEEP:

INFLATABLEPOOL
PAPERCUT
SCREENPASS
POWERNAP

Amusing. Four totally different things, but it works. Nice.

"Paired number" (DUET) had me confused for a bit. And I was thinking about child-rearing when I read "Stopped bringing up," so LETDIE was a bit of a shock. I believe they meant conversation topics. :)

"Lead-in to -umvirate" (TRI) was amusing.

- Horace 

Tuesday, August 5, 2025, Gary Larson and Amy Ensz

0:04:30
Mini: 0:00:28
Connections: Purple, Blue, Green, Yellow
Wordle: 2Y first guess, 4
Strands: No hints

Cute theme today of splitting the A off of the first word of a phrase and making it into an indefinite article. As in:

ACUTEANGLE (Adorable perspective on things?)
and
AHEADOFTIME (Major newsmagazine's C.E.O.?)

There are two other theme answers, too, as you will have seen.

Fun entries in the fill today include IMPETUS (Driving force), TEATREE (Member of the myrtle family that's the source of an essential oil), and DREAMT (Imagined). And it's nice to finally get a little more information about the ULNA (Arm bone on the pinkie finger side). 

Fun clue for COOP (Certain apartment (with a hyphen) or farm housing (without one)), and "Competition that offers a lot of bucks?" (RODEO) wasn't bad either.

Fun Tuesday.

- Horace 

Monday, August 4, 2025, Patti Varol

0:04:17
Mini: 0:00:35
Connections: Yellow, Green, Purple, Blue
Wordle: One yellow first guess; Five
Strands: Complete, no clues

This appears to be a vowel progression. I haven't seen one of these in a while, and along with the older-style theme we get some nice older-style fill: ARIL (Seed covering), AGRA (Indian tourist city on the Taj Express route), LULU (Doozy), "AMO, amas, amat ...," and HIE (Go quickly, quaintly). And in addition to all that, we have the odd ANAG (Scrambled word, Abbr.) closeby ANA de Armas, four Spanish entries in the first half (USTED, AGUA, TAPA, and OTRA), and a bunch of abbreviations, prefixes, and plurals.

It was a nice nod to the one whose record was broken to have ROGER Maris cross AARONJUDGE. "Short lines at the register?" (UPC) was cute, and any reminder of ODE to Joy is good.

- Horace 

Sunday, August 3, 2025, Jeremy Newton

0:22:20
Mini: 0:00:25
Connections: Purple, Yellow, Green, Blue
Wordle: One yellow first guess, finished in four
Strands: Complete, no clues

HEAVENLY VOICES 

OK, that's a cute shaded Starship Enterprise in the grid today. Hah! It's kind of a complicated theme. I mean, ok, on one level, it's STARTREK, but the long Down answers containing character names in circled letters in reverse from bottom to top, clued with quotations that the character might have uttered? That's a little complicated to explain. Oh, and MISTERSCOTT gets his own space. See? Nothing to it.

It was nice to learn a secondary definition of SQUIRES (They study how knights move), and the nearby PLIGHT (Tough spot) was a good ten-cent word. "Beethoven's No. 8?" (ACHT) was clever, and "One giving the highlights?" (DYER) reminds me that it's really time for me to go in for more lowlights. :)

I liked that me and my sister got in today (TOM and SUE), and any puzzle is good that starts with STARTREK and ends with BEERS. 

- Horace 

Saturday, August 2, 2025, Robert Logan

0:09:27
Mini: 1:57 (possibly my longest ever)
Connections: Purple, Green, Blue, Yellow
Wordle: One yellow first guess, finished in six
Strands: Complete, no clues. 

This was a fun one. Four grid-spanning Down answers pinning the sides, and a couple of diagonal channels running through the middle. So there was a good mix of open and closed space to work through. 

BATTED (Like baseballs and some eyelashes) was a pretty easy start for a Saturday, and off of that quickly came BADJOKES (Groaners), ADROPINTHEOCEAN (The most infinitesimal amount), and THENEXTBIGTHING (Silicon Valley's holy grail). The next three short ones took me longer. I never studied Spanish, so even what should have been a simple form of the verb "to be" (ERES ("You are," in Spain)) took lots of crosses. The shortest answer in that opening section got the best clue: "Key for getting rid of your work, in brief?" (DEL). Nice.

Another great clue was "Eyebrow makeup" (HAIRS). First, I was surprised that there was such a thing, then I kept wondering what, specifically, eyebrow makeup was called. But no. It's what they are made of. Derp.

"Way in" (ENTRANCE) was good. As was "It's most beautiful when broken" (GEODE). "More of this?" (THESE) was cute, and "Verb that appears the same when rotated 180º" (SWIMS) is almost right, but not quite.

Overall, a breezy Saturday for what is looking like a perfect day in the Northeast. Now it's time to get outside!

- Horace 

 

Friday, August 1, 2025, Abigail Martin

0:06:06

This played smooth and quick. I don't think I've ever heard IFTAR (Evening meal during Ramadan) before, and although APPA (Dad, in Korean) rang a distant bell, it didn't come without all the crosses. ORLESS (Sale sign words) and NAIL (Hit hard) were not obvious, but pretty much everything else seemed straightforward. "Offerings from a truck or cart" (STREETFOOD), "Oatmeal, e.g." (HOTCEREAL), "Literally, 'grilled meat'" (CARNEASADA)... 

Just a couple of funny clues today: "Phish-monger?" (SCAMARTIST), "Ay, there's the rub!" (MASSAGE), and did anybody else want SPIDEySENSE instead of SPIDERSENSE for "Intuitive ability in the Marvel Universe"?

- Horace