Sunday, June 21, 2026, Hannah Slovut-Einertson

BIG DRAW

Greetings, from Salerno, Italy, where many a COFFEERUN has been made, but where you won't find any giraffes. Unless it's WORLDGIRAFFEDAY and there is a cute one drawn into a specially-shaped 17x27 Sunday grid! 

This puzzle didn't put up a ton of resistance in the Acrosses, and although there were some nice, long Downs, they tended to COMEEASY, as there were usually at least a few crosses in place. Things got trickier toward the bottom, with the uncommon CORNPIT (Farm play area) (?), LOTUSROOT (Starchy plant part in Asian cooking) and ALMONDOIL (Nutty extract), but again, crosses helped! 

I enjoyed the not-often-seen BENTS (Natural predispositions) and BEHELD (Looked upon). Nice old-fashioned, slightly formal answers. Maybe BEARWITNESS (Testify) could be added to that group. All the Bs. And speaking of old-fashioned, I also enjoyed "Threads around a forum?" (TOGA). Hah! I will be at the Forum in Rome later this week, and I'll let you know if I see any togae.  

"Spoke sheepishly" (BAAED) was fun, and I had never considered that fact that YODA was a "'Star Wars' character whose species is never named." And speaking of trivia, I was a little surprised that the word "ossicone" didn't make it into the grid. 

 Oh, and one last thing - I loved seeing disc golf get into the clues with TEEPADS. I have played a lot of rounds in the past couple years! 

- Horace 

Saturday, June 20 2026, Katie Hoody

When I'm not on blogging duty, I do the NYT puzzles online, which is a faster but somewhat less satisfying experience; solving with pen and paper lends itself to a better appreciation of theme, clever clues, and overall construction.  Today, as I worked my way through the grid and put little tick marks beside my favourite clues, I felt like my cup runneth over - such great cluing today!!

My entry point was Soprano RENEE Fleming, right in the middle of the grid.  Immediately below that, the grid-spanning "'I've done better" was obviously NOTMYFINESTHOUR, except, as it turned out, it was actually NOTMYFINESTWORK - my only misstep today.  

Back up at the very top, the high-quality clues began immediately.  1A "Dad's pop, perhaps" (CREAMSODA) took me a while to "get" - I thought it was a questionable generational reference, but no, it's a branding thing.  Right below that, I needed most of the crossers to figure out 15A "One might be used to launch promotional materials" (AIRCANNON - brilliant!!).  And right below THAT, 17A "That's not the whole story!" (PLOTPOINT) was very clever.

I could narrate practically the entire grid like this.  7D "Bulb that becomes translucent when heated" (ONION).  23D "Stories of college students?" (DORM).  34D "Man's name whose first four letters spell a word describing its last letter" (RINGO) - also very clever!  31D "Fair weather followers" (SNOWBIRDS) - indeed - a whole contigent of Canadians can be classified this way...

The only thing approaching a "nit" for me is Hall-of-Fame football coach WEEB Ewbank at 43A. A tiny bit of a reach, no?  

A fitting finale at 61D "Sound made when something snaps into place?" (AHA) - a suitable anagram for AAH, the sound I made upon completing this puzzle.  Well done Ms. Hoody, well done indeed!

It's been a slice this week!  And now, over to Horace's capable hands.....

-philbo

Friday, June 19 2026, Jack Hatchett

A really nice construction today, with eight long Across entries and four long Downs, with nothing spanning the entire grid.  This led to a pleasant, steady solve, all the way to the very end where I failed in the SE corner and FWOE'd.  More on that later.

Things were promising from the very get-go, with 17A "Chef's complimentary bite" (AMUSEBOUCHE).   After such morsels, I like to sit back and announce "Well, my bouche is amused", to the amusement of nobody.  Right above that was a nicely oblique QMC "Field trip", whose answer HOMERUNTROT definitely did not jump out at me. 

 

Lavish use of contractions was in evidence; e.g. 20A "Dish often served with tartar sauce, informally" (FISHNCHIPS) and 35A "___ Green (Kermit the Frog song)" (BEIN).  I don't necessarily object, but it did stand out a little bit.  

What's the deal with SHOWERBEER ("Cold one enjoyed during a hot wash")?  Never heard of such a thing.  BEERSHOWER, on the other hand, in my younger days, yes maybe...

My very last entry was the diabolical QMC at 32A "Off-grid connection?".  I thought it had to be IRL (you know, "in real life") until getting the real answer from the crossers : THE.  Brilliant!  When was the last time you saw this word in a crossword?

Finally, the very last Across clue "Chinese revolutionary Sun ____" was lost on me.  I guessed YATSEE but it's actually YATSEN.  I should have known - my guess was too similar to the dice game Yahtzee to really be plausible.  If anybody asks, I'll say I ATECROW on this one, hoping for the response OHCOMEONNOW...

See ya on the weekend!

-philbo

Thursday, June 18 2026, Scott Hogan

A pleasant, gentle stroll through Crosswordland today, with a fun, somewhat cryptic-y theme distinguished by its super-short clues, which then appear in the answers in a self-referential way.  I'm having difficulty using my words, here, so I'll just write them out..

• "Bro?" is BROADWAYOPENING
• "Sit?" is VISITORCENTER
• "Ale?" is FAIRYTALEENDING

See how the answers describe the clues!  This is standard cryptic crossword fodder, which I've never seen in a "regular" crossword before.  Once I got the first one, the last two were very easy to write in; hence, this was a bit less challenging than a typical Thursday puzzle.

Regular readers of the blog may recall my comment yesterday babout the word MANEUVER, which appeared in a clue, and here it is again today as an answer to "Skillful move", right beside COINCIDE ("Occur at the same time")!  I fnd that ever so slightly eerie.  

The term FMRI, clued as "Mind-reading scan, in a way", was new to me.  "Functional MRI", it is, measuring brain activity via tracking blood flow.  The clue raises questions about what the "mind" really is.  If our neurologist Colum were blogging this, I'm sure he'd have plenty to say on the matter.

As a Canadian, 45D "$2 coin, eh?" was a write-in (TOONIE).  I don't mind the stereotyping.  I'm used to being pegged as a Canuck within two minutes of meeting any English-speaking foreigner.  Fun fact - our $1 coin features a loon on its Tail side and is called a LOONIE.  When the $2 coin was introduced, there was a bit of a movement to have it named a DOUBLOON, which for my money is a much better name.  But duller heads prevailed, ultimately. 

Are inert gases really referred to as NOBLES?  Is that some sort of chemistry insider thing? Noble gases, sure, but really?

Not a huge fan of the two pluralized beverages near the top:  3D "Absolut alternatives" (STOLIS) and 9D "Colas in the 'cola wars'" (PEPSIS).  Surely STOLID and SEPSIS could have somehow been worked into those positions?

I liked the in-your-face-ness of CLASSAMORON ("Bona fide numbskull")!

Well, I've managed to WINGIT through another blog.  Nice puzzle today!

-philbo

Wednesday, June 17 2026, Jonathan Raksin

 

Today's crossword features a really neat device, revealed by the central Across answer RIFFLESHUFFLES ("Casino maneuvers (*) carried out three times in this puzzle?").  In a properly done riffle shuffle, a deck of cards is cut into two equal piles, and then shuffled so that the cards from each pile are exactly interleaved, the cards from pile 1 now 1st, 3rd, 5th, etc. from the top and those from pile 1 now 2nd, 4th, 6th and so on.  Somehow, Mr. Raksin has come up with three different eight-letter words/phrases, which can be split into halves and riffle-shuffled letter-wise and still be valid English :

• CONSOLES --> COOLNESS
• STONEPITS --> SETPOINT
  ...and my favourite for its absolute cheekiness:
• GOOFOFFS --> GOOFOFFS

If you're like me, this is the first NYT puzzle you've ever solved with an answer appearing twice in the grid.  It was even clued the same ("Slackers")!!  What chutzpah!  But of course it works here - and I fully approve.

Amazing!  I can only imagine how these pairs were discovered.  If it were me, I'd have used software somehow.

Incidentally, if you perfectly riffle-shuffle a deck of cards 8 times, you restore it to its original order! A neat and not necessarily intuitive outcome.

Despite a bit of an odd grid configuration, with the NE and SW corners almost completely isolated from the rest of the grid, it was a smooth, midweek-appropriate solve.  I was nearly done in right at the start by a couple of intersecting clues in the NW corner that I had no idea about : Paul MESCAL, who played Shakespeare in "Hamnet", and the Disney film ENCANTO.  I also thought Tom Cruise was ILL-CAST, not MISCAST, as Jack Reacher, and that the Complete Works of anything would be CANON, not TOMES.  But it all worked out with a lucky guess or two, and no damage done.

I liked the little Supernatural Corner at the bottom, with "Telepathy, e.g." (PSI) in close proximity with "'Ability' that's hard to believe, for short" (ESP).  Popcorn TOFU sounds terrible.  Well, regular popcorn ain't all that either.  I was not familiar with the term SHORTCON for a fast-paced scam. I love Osso BUCO.  Maybe I'll make it this weekend, in between bike rides...

And with that, on to the "turn"!

-philbo

(*) known in these parts as "manoeuvres"

Tuesday, June 16 2026, Brad Lively

I must kick off today's review by perpetuating the Canadian stereotype and saying "sorry" - sorry that Tuesday's puzzle didn't really do it for me.  The four theme entries are distinguishable by their circled letters - a short consecutive string and an extra circled letter on its own.  I didn't pay much attention until hitting the revealer clue spanning the middle of the grid : "Hemingway tale about an elderly fisherman, with 'The'...", at which point OLDMANANDTHESEA was an easy write-in.  And sure enough, the theme answers all contain some form of OLD MAN (in the fatherly sense), plus an extra 'C', as indicated by the circles.  To wit:

17A "Pontiff's emblem with three horizontal bars" = PAPALCROSS
29A "Amigo" = COMPADRE
42A "Crustaceans sometimes called 'mudbugs'" = CRAWDADS (I did not know this!)
57A "Open some bubbly with a bang" = POPTHECORK

All makes sense but I felt a bit "meh" about it.  To be fair, none of the embedded "old men" have a fatherly connotation in the context of the words/phrases in which they're embedded, which is a plus.  

Notable stuff in the fill : 8A "Place for the highest-scoring golfer" (LAST) was amusing.  Interesting factoid in 55D about WHO being sung over 100 times in the WHO's WHO Are You"...  Speaking of 100, there must be that many ways of cluing ORCS (here in 36D as "Green-skinned World of Warcraft characters").  LALALA (18D "Fingers-in-ears syllables") was cute too.  I still find it an effective tool in an office context, given the right audience. 🙂

My only misstep was IMEANTO for 53A "That's my next move" - quickly corrected to IPLANTO.  

That's all she wrote!  Hoping for sunnier skies (or, maybe just a better attitude) tomorrow..

-philbo

Monday, June 15 2026, Eric Rollfing

I thought this was a great Monday puzzle, and I'll tell you why.  It wasn't so much the fill, which was quite straightforward, even for a Monday.  It was the unexpectedness of the theme - I couldn't see what the three long answers had in common until solving the revealer, which made me chuckle out loud.

• "Device that helps you make a point in class?"  (PENCILSHARPENER)
• "Toy likely to be found at a pop-up store?"  (JACKINTHEBOX)
• "Revolutionary kitchen gadget?" (SALADSPINNER)

Excellent QMC-type cluing but then the revealer "Response to a series of complaints..." turns out to be SOMEBODYSCRANKY.  So THAT's what connected those clues!  Love it!!  Not for the first time, I say "who thinks of these things?"  

As noted above, aside from that lovely surprise, not much jumps out of the grid.  ESCHEWS ("Forgoes") is a grand word.  Maybe a niggle with 30A "Wished (for)" (HOPED):  Are hoping and wishing really the same thing?  With regards to 57D "Gumbo ingredient" (OKRA) - I made gumbo for the first time just recently and that was my introduction to gumbo.  I'm not sold.  It's kinda slimy.  Maybe there's a special way to prepare it.  (Anyone?)  

See ya tomorrow!  

-philbo

Sunday, June 14 2026, John Kugelman

LIMITED RUNS

Greetings fellow Crossworders!  By the time you read this, I will have completed a weekend of bike riding to raise funds for the Princess Margaret Cancer Foundation here in Toronto.  Thousands of us.  Millions of dollars raised.  260+ km over two days.  (Sorry, folks, that's 160+ miles 😉 )

But enough about me.  On to the Sunday crossword!  A really fun, somewhat nerdy puzzle from Sunday crossword veteran Mr. Kugelman.  The way I like to roll when not under time pressure (i.e. not at the ACPT) is (uh - here I am, talking about me again ..), I don't look at the clues for the long answers - I fill them in with the crossers and then try to deduce the theme after the fact.  It was very quickly evident that something funny was going on - the long Across answers were composed of only a few distinct letters - four, in fact (think : "MISSISSIPPI").  And lo, the revealer in 110A, paraphrased as "What a modest play has in common with each theme answer?" : SMALLCASTOFCHARACTERS.  What a coup!!  Never mind how contrived and silly some of the theme clues/answers are; e.g. "Harsh taskmaster taken to task" = DERRIERERIDERDERIDED" (YOWIE!!) - that was a large part of the fun!  I can only imagine the smile on Mr. Kugelman's face as he came up with these...

Aside from this, there was lots to relish in the puzzle.  This was my first time seeing a reference to the OG of first-person-shooter video games, at 18D "Fireball-throwing demons from Doom" (IMPS).  Ah, the wasted hours of my younger days.. Also, what do you do when you have to clue 'GAOH' into a word? Simple!  A "measure of high resistance" is indeed a MEGAOHM.  An example of excellent cluing : "Returned to air, as an old pilot, perhaps" (RERAN).  "Modern art" (ARE) - yes!! And it took me right to the end to get CDTRAY for "It can carry a tune". 

A couple of clues threw me off.  Indeed, a PHONE is a "Bad thing to take to bed, it's said."  I thought at first it was ANGER.  "Volcanic gems found on every continent" are AGATES, not GEODES.  (C'mon, Phil!)  And although it wouldn't have fit, when I saw "Needle holder" (FIR), I reflexively thought of that old crossword standard the ETUI.  "Innocent sort" isn't NAIF - it's LAMB.  

I take minor issue with 60A "Part between the shoulders" (LANE).  Clever, but it kinda doesn't work for most roads, does it?   YOWIE  ("Hoo mama, that's hot") seems a little forced on both clue and answer side.  And I didn't love "Lunged (for)" (MADEATRY).

Great puzzle overall.  Hope y'all liked it too!  OCANADA!

-philbo

Saturday, June 13, 2026, Ryan McCarty

To finish my week of reviews, the Saturday grid offered a pinwheel shape, with a chunky middle section of mostly 8- and 9-letter entries. It was a fun solve, with the hardest portion for me coming in the southwest corner.

I was delighted that MWAHAHA was correct, but even though the rest of the corner filled in fairly easily, I was stuck with a challenge exiting the corner with THE___ at 23A and AL___ at 27A. So I skipped to the top of the middle section, where SEGO and OXO, old crossword standbys, helped me out.

The great REGGIEJACKSON anchors the middle of this grid. He is 80 years old this year, working for the Astros. As a Red Sox fan in the 1970s, he struck fear into my little boy heart when he batted for the hated Yankees. I was just at a Yankees game, and a friend of mine and I reminisced about those teams. I especially remember the feuds between Thurman Munson and Carlton Fisk. So long ago, now!

MAANDPA looks amazing in the puzzle. I was uncertain for a split second about those consecutive As, but reparsed and saw what I was looking for. And 19A: "Right?," in British lingo (INNIT) is a lot of fun.

IGGY Azalea

After that, I finished parts of the middle section, completed the southeast corner, then worked my way back to the southwest corner. My problem here came from a typo: I put in AMaROSO at 32D: Lovingly, in a score (AMOROSO), so 40A: Blew up (GOTMAD) was very unclear. 

Only two QMCs in a Saturday puzzle, and both are fine, not great. 38A: Show to be fabricating? (CATCHINALIE) is a great answer, but I'm not even sure the question mark is needed. 16D: Flight restriction? (SEATBELT) is pretty good.

Turning over to Philbo for tomorrow, when he'll be coming off of an extremely long bike ride for charity. Good luck!

- Colum

Friday, June 12, 2026, Amanda Winters

I like the look of today's grid, with the northwest and southwest corners cut off, and the scattered single black squares in the middle. It looks a bit like a lace doily!

The upper left corner gave me fits to begin with. I tried "trite" at 3D: Passé (DATED), but took it out after putting SRI in. That gave me DUDS, and allowed me to bypass the various possibilities at 2D: Cab alternative (UBER) - could have been "Lyft," could have been "rosé" or "asti," etc. But what should have been a gimme wouldn't come at 12A: Children's book title character in a green suit (BABAR). So I moved down the middle of the puzzle.

15D: Site of America's first roller coaster (CONEYISLAND) is lovely. 31D: Quality establishments (INNS) is a great hidden capital. These brought me straight down to the bottom of the puzzle.

From here, I worked the southwest corner. 49D: Do business? (SALON) was nice, and 63A: Cone holders (RETINAS) is a great example of misleading non-QMC. I don't particularly like UPTURN crossing UPTOPAR, but I appreciate PORTLANDOREGON as an answer, and as a shoutout for independent booksellers - Powell's Books, in this situation.

At this point I worked up the east side of the puzzle. MAGGIE Smith was a treasure, and I'm happy to say I saw her play Rosalind in As You Like It in Stratford, Ontario, in the 70s. I don't remember that much about it, but I hear she was wonderful.

ICECREAMPARLOR echoed the other business clue. I finally figured out 34A: Style with spotty coverage (POINTILLISM) - hah!, and then GENETICLOTTERY got me back in the Northwest, where I finished off the puzzle. 

Lovely themeless. It's been a great week so far. Let's hope Saturday doesn't disappoint!

- Colum

Thursday, June 11, 2026, Nikhil Bailey

So much fun this Thursday! A clever theme, fun clues, and good entries.

Let's start with the theme. Take standard phrases, and reinterpret the first part as if it were written in Roman numerals, and replace that part with the English version of that number. 

Simple, right?

Okay, okay, we can do an example. The phrase "aye, aye, Captain!" can be reinterpreted as II Captain, or TWOCAPTAIN if the II were translated from Roman numerals to the English word.

So HUNDREDLEGS is "sea legs," FORTYSHEETS is "Excel Sheets," and FOURLEAGUE is "Ivy League." Very nice!

For clues, I enjoyed 33A: Met someone? (OPERAGOER). It's been too long since I saw an opera at the Met, but our friends recently saw Eugen Onegin. I am envious!

17A: It might have many sides (MENU) is a lovely example of a non-question mark clue (non-QMC, per our glossary, see side pinned post). 

CHLOE Kim

I'm not convinced by OPTICLOBE. As a Neurologist, I would instead refer to the Occipital lobe, where visual information is processed. The closest equivalent to the amphibian optic lobe is the superior colliculus, a tiny bump on the dorsal surface of the midbrain which helps reflexive eye movements get to where they need to get to. As such, it is not the human "mind's eye," but I get what we're trying to do here.

Dang, a lot of Neurologic information for a Thursday post! But that's what you get when you ask a Neurologist to review the NYT Xword. I blame Horace and Frances.

Anyhoo, a lot of fun. See you tomorrow!

- Colum

Wednesday, June 10, 2026, David J. Kahn and Ethan Quigley

The World Cup is coming to North America! It's first games were in 1930, and have been happening every four years since. So it's astonishing to find out that only eight countries have joined the exclusive club of WORLDCUPWINNERS. They are represented by their country code in the circled letters, each hidden in an answer that crosses the central spanning 8D answer. The first was Uruguay, and the most recent Argentina, with Brazil the most winningest club, with five victories. Germany and Italy each have four wins.

And to top it off, there's a bit of crosswordese that actually is theme related at 56D: Only player on three victorious teams in this puzzle (PELE). Nice!

I wonder if the USA will ever make it onto this list. I doubt it!

Museo REINA Sofía, in ESPaña

I find that when a puzzle is this dense with theme material, the clues for the non-theme entries tend towards the straightforward. I can see why that would need to happen: it can be challenging to find your way into a puzzle like this, and on a Wednesday, which is meant to be more difficult than the early weekdays but not to the level of a tricksy Thursday, it's important to give solvers a chance.

So I will overlook the questionable entries (TYS, I see you!), and note 45A: Cousin of a flugelhorn (CORNET) - very nice - and The Marvelous MIRIAM Maisel. I also look fondly on NOWISE, which reminds me of Pogo and of Foghorn Leghorn.

On to The Turn!

- Colum

Tuesday, June 9, 2026, Rebecca Goldstein

I was slowed down in my understanding of the theme by entering RUBSRed at 21A: Chafes excessively (RUBSRAW - a much more apt answer), but when that was corrected I saw the connection between the theme answers. But I still chuckled when I entered the revealer at 58A: Prediction of a negative outcome that is true of 21-, 28- and 47-Across (THISWONTENDWELL). That's a great twist, that also, incidentally, completes the progression of how done you like your meat.

Sadly, I FWOE'd today's puzzle. 64A: Sound of a cartoon hit (BOINK) I entered somewhat confidently BOINg. I don't think I've seen the actual answer much in a cartoon, but the other meaning of the word is likely too blue for the NYT!

LANA Del Rey

Funny that the "carnivorous cinematic alien" is the BLOB, a creature I haven't thought about in decades. But then I couldn't fit "xenomorph" into four squares.

I am always happy to see GNU in the grid. 

BYENOW!

Monday, June 8, 2026, Tom McCoy

Now this is what I call the ultimate in excellence in a Monday puzzle. What we're looking for in an early week grid is straightforward fill, smoothness of solve, and a clever but not too clever theme. 

Let's take the last first: the theme is revealed at 50A: Of the highest importance ... or, when parsed differently, what each bracketed number in the clues indicates? (PARAMOUNT). And then, when you look at 18A, 23A, and 41A, you find the numbers in the bracket increase from 1 to 3, indicating the number of "PAR" in each answer. Thus PARCHEESI, PARALLELPARKING, and PARTYPARTYPARTY. Nicely done!

An Inuit KAYAK

The solve flows nicely through the puzzle for the most part. The NW and SE corners are somewhat isolated, but the answers and clues in those regions are very straightforward, so it's not a problem. Outside of AGER, I don't find much of anything to complain about.

On the other hand, some lovely fill includes 43D: What misers take to an extreme (THRIFT), which always reminds me of Hamlet:

"Thrift, thrift, Horatio. The funeral baked meats did coldly furnish forth the marriage tables."

What an amazing line.

Also, the fact that Bert Lahr was a LEO. Apt. Apt! 

And 13D: Characterize? (SPELL). Hah!

- Colum

Sunday, June 7, 2026, Adam Wagner and Simeon Seigel

 SPLIT SECONDS

While some are whiling away time in what seems like sunny Italia (if the pictures on Horace's BeReal are anything to go by), I have to make do with New York City in the early Summer. It's nothing to sneeze at! Unless you are dealing with allergies, like some bloggers. Ah well, there's alway the New York Times Crossword to take your mind off of sniffling.

Today we have the ingenious idea of a series of three answers which can be reparsed into two answers by putting them all together and then split them somewhere in the middle. So 22A (GATECH - that's Georgia Tech), 23A (ANGELIC) and 24 (ENSURE) can be split into GATECH/ANGE and LIC/ENSURE. 

I am impressed with the way the words recombine in these creations! SOLI/STEN and CHES/STABLES is nice in the way the T changes from a silent sound to a sounded one. The reverse happens with the C in CHIAS/MUS and CLEMEN/TINES. We even lose a syllable in THEREST/IME and then regain it in ANTIT/HEFT.

To top it off, we get a revealer in the middle at 66A: Amount that "ain't bad," so to speak ... or what to make with six sets of answers in this puzzle? (TWOOUTOFTHREE).

A classic SCONE

It was fun to figure out what was going on with each set of answers, which drove the enjoyment of the solve. But we had room for some fun clues as well! How about 7D: Lofty pitches (HIGHCS) - challenging to see that clearly! And 112: Chest beaters? (HEARTS) was nice. 

I'll also give a shout out to SONOFA, and to PHOEBE, who I hope can enjoy a good Sunday puzzle even as she's dealing with an unwell pet.

- Colum

Saturday, June 6, 2026, Daniel Bodily

Although I was a little daunted by the sheer volume of white squares when I first looked at today's grid, I got going like a hot ICESAW through butter, even with a quantity of unknown-to-me items like MOMALA, NCISLA, EMILIANO, LUISE Rainer, and INTELSAT. However, I came to a grinding halt in the top left. This, despite the fact that I confidently entered UHAULVAN for "Moving day rental" right off the bat, and guessed what I thought was the tricky - and fun - SCHMEARS ("Spreads out in the morning?). The Stravinsky quote took me a while to figure out, I am unfamiliar with MUNSHI ("Hindu clerk"), the tricky QMC "T-slots?" for ARMHOLES stumped me, and I didn't rub up against the idea of ROSINED right away. I was on the RAGGEDEDGE for some time, but eventually, I was able to BURNSAGE and cleanse the negative energy in that quadrant. 

Fill-wise, I enjoyed CORNCRIB, WAYFARER,  and ERSATZ. In addition to the kickoff QMC mentioned above, I also liked "Religious right?" (AMENDMENTI), but my favorite C/AP today was a non-QMC "Ce n'est pas du fast food" ESCARGOT. Ha! 

~Frannie. 

Friday, June 5, 2026, Kelly Morenus

I could blame it on any number of things – a slightly drugged state, lack of sleep, jet lag, or the fact that I’d just landed in Rome – but one thing is for sure, I had a tough time with today’s puzzle. I looked at clues at random (see drugged state above) and found none that I could drop right in and very few that I had a guess for. I’m not complaining – it is Friday after all – just describing the situation as I experienced it. About the third time through, and after a caffè ristretto, things began to look up.:)

Loyal readers of this blog know I don’t favor “quotation” clues and we have two grid-spanning whoppers almost right out of the gate (not to mention another one in the bottom half). I chipped away at the crossing Downs and finally made some enough headway so I could guess the answers. The S from EMTS forced me to consider SIS for “Gal pal” but, as something of a woman myself, and a sister several times over, I found that an odd clue/answer pair. Also, DIAPERS must have been upgraded some since I last changed ‘em. My only experience was with pins and tape, not snaps. And GRR for [Get away]” was odd, unless it was vocalized from the point of view of a dog, maybe? 

Anyhoo, here are a few of the clues that lead me down the garden path: “Lecture setting” (DAIS) - I had hall - “Round striker” (PEEN), “Something you could see right through” (IRIS), Not so rich, so to speak” (LITE), "Fjji, e.g." (REDAPPLE), “Kind of figure” (PLANE), and “Summons” (HAILS). Also odd-to me was the clue “Destination” for AIM. Add all that to the variety of “fact” clues that I didn’t know (CAVA, the so-called Champagne of Spain, ROALD Hoffman, ANNA Arnold Hedgemen, etc.) and you have a recipe for disaster, at least until this reviewer GOOSES themselves up with some strong coffee. 

I did enjoy Where 22-Across is” (HERE). Heh. Also “Canal entry” (EAR) because ERIE. Ha. I thought the QMC “Coat on a tip?” POLISH was trixy.

I’ll close with a shout out to local Clover restaurants in the Boston/Cambridge area. Their last day was  going to be Thursday, May 28 due to financial difficulties, but we learned yesterday that due to an outpouring of support, they REOPENED this week. 

~Frannie

Thursday, June 4, 2026,

Four squares in today's grid are larger than the rest. What does each one represent? A BIGBOXSTORE. The name of a nationwide retail establishment is to be entered, in rebus form, inside each big box: ALDI, LOWES, IKEA, and GAP. I particularly liked the minimalist 11A: "Last over the line, say" that needed to add only two letters to LOWES for S[LOWES]T. Also fun that the composer of "The Four Seasons" contains an ALDI (VIV[ALDI]). Except for those two answers, the store names bridge the other two-word phrases, which I think is neat. I thought all the two-word phrases worked L[IKEA]CHARM. Its partner STR[IKEA]POSE and the pair ME[GAP]LEXES and YO[GAP]OSES were good. 

While the theme answers anchor the puzzle, there's a lot more to look at elsewhere in the mall - I mean grid. I enjoyed "Middlemen in illicit transactions" for FENCES, "Become enamored with" for TAKETO, "It's a matter of degrees" for ANGLE, and "Disguise in a way" for ENCODE. I was pleased to see that Shakespeare and his signature ACTV showed up again today. :) And who doesn't love a Bob ROSS reference? 

For the first time ever, I think, there was a directional clue that I could figure out and enter instead of just waiting to see how it filled in: "Montreal-to-Boston dir." (SSE). A small, but satisfying personal victory. :) OTOH, "Nursery purchases" for SOILS really threw me for a loop, even when I had S_ILS. I was rocking the wrong cradle on that one. 

I enjoyed the French-leaning ALACARTE, SOIREE, and EST ("Part of the conjugation of être") and fill-wise CHASM, SERAPHS, and SMARM are excellent. My favorite QMC clue was "Soft rock?" for MAGMA, but I've got to give a shout out to what I think is a fun non-QMC clue "Small square" (ONE). Mathtacular!

~Frannie.

Wednesday, June 3, 2026, Jiahe Men

Today's theme revealer is TRIPLE THREAT, and one could say that today's puzzle is, itself, a triple threat, as the theme is multi-faceted. I looked it up and "triple threat" is defined as "highly skilled in three distinct but related areas," which I think is a fun fit with the "EGOT contender" element of the clue. Additionally, the puzzle has six theme answers in which one letter appears three times in a row. Add to that the fact that the tripled letters in each of the shaded areas spell out OR ELSE, a threat of its own and there you go, a trifecta. The theme answers were all good, although I personally prefer the term "Tree Book" to DEADTREEEDITION, but that would in no way suit today's theme. 

Solve-wise, I found this puzzle more challenging than the average Wednesday. It included a lot of people and things unknown to me like SADIE Sink, Linda PERRY, negitoro roll, SHAKA and, PADSEEEW, but, fortunately, still enough stuff for me to make a tri-dent. 

I noticed a welcome number of female references, the two referenced above, plus RIOTGRRRL, CARLY Rae Jepson, MAAM, and Tu Youyou, discoverer of a lifesaving treatment for MALARIA. I thought for a minute that there might be no "male" answers in the puzzle, but we do have IAGO, and NYY is clued by referencing Mssrs. October and November. Still, WOOT! :) 

I enjoyed the idea of a "dank" or "deep-fried" MEME, even though I'm not 100% sure exactly what about a meme would engender either of those descriptions. Perhaps because IMTOOOLDFORTHIS. I was amused by the reality check on transport options in the CARS movies that don't really make sense if "everyone" is a car. Heh. In a nice crossover event, we have AHAB intersecting with SHIP. My favorite C/AP today was "Give a makeup test?" for ASSAY. Ha! 

OTOH, perhaps because the constructor had to tri so hard to get the all the theme material in, the grid was a little choppy, with a prevalence of three- and four-letter answers. More specifically, I was tripped up by the clue for 34A. I get that one might want to make a trickier clue for crossword stalwart EDAM but citing a Czech dish for a Dutch cheese seemed like not such a gouda idea. 

~Frannie.

Tuesday, June 2, 2026, Rich Katz

Got off to OSLO start today so it took me a minute to grok the theme of this puzzle, but once I did, I let out a cheer. The first words of four theme answers are homonyms of 2-4-6-8 which lead up to the big finish at the end of the puzzle: WHODOWE APPRECIATE. The C/APs for the theme answers were entertaining, especially "Gets a pooch to attack" SICSTHEDOGON, although, that's no good when you think of it FORREAL. :(

Overall, the clueing was clean and precise, by which I mean my progress through the grid was pretty much, read a clue, enter the answer with very few hesitations or skips, and no incorrect entries. Now that's something to celebrate!

In clues 38A and 42A, I liked the pairing of seemingly disparate entities that share a common feature. A house and a mouth (38A) both have a ROOF, and both shoes and bras (42A) can have LACE. Also, perhaps coincidental but fun, 7D: WON ("Was victorious") crosses ATWAR (5A). 

There were a couple of QMCs that brought a smile, including "Babies that are supposed to be up all night?" (OWLETS) and "What helps you get a leg up?" (HEEL). "The decline of Russia?" for NYET was my favorite. 

Extra points to this puzzle for supplying me with some new information. I learned that UBERPOOL was the original name of Uber, that a baseball infield is about 8,100 square feet in AREA, that glycol spray is used to DEICE an airplane wing, and that all of Shakespeare's 37 surviving plays have 5 ACTS. Winning!

And, on ANEW tangent, I'll state here that, although I don't watch much football, I APPRECIATE ROMO as a commentator when I do watch a game. Go team!

~Frannie.

Monday, June 1, 2026, Kenneth Cortes

Today’s theme answer, CAMEOUTONTOP, ("Emerged victorious ... or what this puzzle's constructor did, as indicated by the shaded squares") is one literal way to summarize what the shaded words, MOM DAD IM QUEER, each of which occurred at the top of a two-word phrase in the top half of the puzzle, might literally represent - an apt way to OPEN Pride Month. 

Nice that we didn't have to SETTLE for the same OLD grid format today. The grid pattern broke out of the usual mode and featured some fun longer Down answers like the theme answers as well as SEASONPASS, HATSTAND, and the amusing CLAPOMETER.

Overall, a Monday puzzle that wasn't TUTU difficult, but I did make one ERROR as I completed the grid. I first entered APtest at 14A “High school assessment scored from 1 to 5” but, when I got to 17A “Despise” and figured the answer had to be DETEST, I realized that two "tests" couldn't rightly ABUT each other. Fortunately, I was able to RYES to the occasion and correct APtest to APEXAM. 

Clue-wise, I thought “archaically” in 21A ("'You,' archaically" (THEE)) could, and maybe should, have been extended to 23A “One taking office dictation” (STENO). In today’s world, the real answer would probably be Siri or Claude, or some other such means of automated transcription of the spoken word. I was amused to think that people find "lifelike dolls" to be CREEPY. In the QMC category, “Filing job, for short?” (MANI) was clever, and I enjoyed both the clue and answer for 37D “Give a tut-tut, e.g." (ADMONISH). Fill-wise, SPREE, DYSTOPIA, and OCULAR were a good TRIO.

Out of curiosity, I looked up the Wales village with the world's longest NAME (58 letters). Here it is for your viewing pleasure: Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch.

~Frannie.