Monday, June 9, 2025

BEQ 12:35 with a cheat (Eric) [3.50 avg; 2 ratings] rate it
LAT 2:02 (Stella) [3.88 avg; 4 ratings] rate it
NYT 3:50 (Sophia) [2.80 avg; 10 ratings] rate it
The New Yorker 7:21 (Amy) [4.00 avg; 10 ratings] rate it
Universal untimed (pannonica) [2.75 avg; 2 ratings] rate it
USA Today tk (?) rate it
WSJ 4:43 (Jim) [2.50 avg; 3 ratings] rate it

Aimee Lucido’s New York Times Crossword — Sophia’s Write-Up

Theme: Each theme answer ends with a 5 letter word that rhymes with “least” but is not “least”

New York Times, 06 09 2025, By Aimee Lucido

• 17a [Dangerous thing to be inside] – BELLY OF THE BEAST
• 26a [Easter or Passover, but not Christmas] – MOVEABLE FEAST
• 46a [Beermaker’s supply] – BREWER’S YEAST
• 61a [“And bringing up the rear …” or an apt description of the ends of 17-, 26- and 46-Across] – LAST BUT NOT LEAST

This was one of the rare Monday puzzle’s recently where I figured out what the revealer was going to be before I got to it! Rhyming-adjacent puzzles are always fun in the early week, and I liked all the answers Aimee chose. BELLY OF THE BEAST is a great spanning answer, and even though I wasn’t familiar with BREWER’S YEAST it was very gettable from the clue and the crosses. I *believe* BEAST, FEAST, and YEAST are the only 5 letter words that fit the pattern _EAST besides “least”, so the theme set is tighter than it appeared to me at first glance.

This puzzle played pretty hard for me overall (for a Monday, at least). I started off by spelling SABER as “sabre” and then really wanted the answer for [Stinks] to be a verb rather than ODORS. But overall the fill is Monday level, if clued more like a Tuesday IMO – SOLTI was the only answer fully new to me.

Fill highlights: EDGE CASES, DREAM BIG, REBUFFED, HEAT WAVES (although I did initally have “meh” instead of HEH for [“I guess I get the joke …”] giving me the funny-but-wrong answer “meat waves” for a while).

Clue highlights: The new to me fact of [Hitchcock film given an R rating 24 years after its release] for PSYCHO, [It’s often packed during the final few weeks of pregnancy] for GO BAG.

Mike Shenk’s Wall Street Journal crossword, “Space Flight”—Jim’s review

Theme answers are familiar phrases that feature stretches of letters where they alternatingly spell out types of birds. The revealer is WINGSPREAD (56a, [Aircraft’s width, and a hint to the circled letters]).

Wall St Journal crossword solution · “Space Flight” · Mike Shenk · Mon., 6.9.25

• 17a. [City with a famed French Quarter] NEW ORLEANS.
• 22a. [Coat or cloak, say] OUTER GARMENT.
• 36a. [Samuel Johnson’s biographer] BOSWELL.
• 47a. [Seeming inevitability in many cliffhangers] CERTAIN DEATH.

First off, I’ve never heard the term WINGSPREAD, only “wingspan”. Wikipedia backs me up and only lists WINGSPREAD in reference to a Frank Lloyd Wright-designed building. If the clue had referred to the building, I’d probably be okay with it, even though I’ve never heard of it. Second, if I wanted to be nitpicky about it, the term is WINGSPREAD, not “bird spread”.

While there are some highlights in the grid (THE DEEP END, DROODLE—which I don’t think I’ve heard of, and RAN WILD), there were quite a few clunky entries that made themselves noticeable. These included OSTEAL, I WERE, A PAL, ONE I, BAT AT, and E COLI. Also, I really wanted [Highlight of a high school year] to be SENIOR PROM not SENIOR TRIP. The former crushes the latter on Google’s ngram viewer.

Clue of note: 18d. [Julia of “Kiss of the Spider Woman”]. RAUL. Good choice of film title adding to the misdirection that the answer will be the last name of an actress named Julia.

2.5 stars.

August Miller’s Los Angeles Times crossword — Stella’s write-up

Los Angeles Times 6/9/25 by August Miller

This is a theme type one doesn’t usually see on Mondays, and it’s nice that beginner solvers can get exposed to this more typically midweek kind of grid play. The revealer at 55A [Nonprofit that delivers food to the elderly, or what can be found three times in this puzzle?], is MEALS ON WHEELS, because each theme answer starts with a meal (BREAKFAST, LUNCH, and DINNER); looking at the circled squares in the grid, each one contains the letter O, which acts as a “wheel.” In each case, the meal word is sitting on two O’s, both positioned under the second and second-to-last letters in the meal word — i.e., where the “wheels” would be if you think of the meal word as a car. I really appreciated that touch!

• 20A [Cozy spot for a morning repast] is a BREAKFAST NOOK.
• 34A [Not in the office, perhaps] is OUT TO LUNCH.
• 42A [Evening ringer] is a DINNER BELL.

Besides the theme being cool and unusual for Monday, I liked entries like RED ROOF INN, WILLA Cather, and LICHENS. Fun puzzle!

Beth Rubin and Will Nediger’s Universal crossword, “Internal Angles” — pannonica’s write-up

Universal • 6/9/25 • Mon • “Internal Angles” • Rubin, Nediger • solution • 20250609

39d [Understands] GETS.

It took a a little extra thinking for me to make sense of the revealer vis-à-vis the theme answers, but recognition certainly would have come sooner had I referred to the title.

4d [“Told you!”] SEE.
41a [“I’ve figured it out!”] AHA.

• 57a^R [Reconsideration of decisions made … and what follow the first words of 16-, 28- and 43-Across?] SECOND THOUGHTS. That is, the second words of those phrases can be synonyms for ‘thought’.
• 16a. [Phrase on the Google homepage] I’M FEELING LUCKY (feeling).
• 28a. [Auto windshield attachments] SIDE VIEW MIRRORS (view). Aren’t they on the doors?
• 43a. [“What a rude remark!”] YOU TAKE THAT BACK (take).

For the most part the cluing in this crossword is exceedingly straightforward, almost but not quite excruciatingly so.

• 11d [Sport with two-wheelers instead of horses] BIKE POLO, which I may or may not have heard of, but which is rather obvious here.
• 37d [Makes a different offer] COUNTERS, which I somehow misread as [Makes a different order].

That’s all I’ve got here. Not much to remark on, as I indicated.

Kameron Austin Collins’s New Yorker crossword—Amy’s recap

New Yorker crossword solution, 6/9/25 – Collins

Difficulty level was right on target for a Monday New Yorker themeless puzzle.

Fave fill: SHADOW BANS, trade APPRENTICE, INSTANT POT, WISE CHOICE, “I CAN TAKE IT,” NEWSSTANDS, IVAN PAVLOV, TWISTER, “MUST BE NICE,” NECK TATTOO, tasty ALMONDS, GOING FOR IT. Not so keen on AGHA, fictional EVEY (one of several cinema clues), RIA, VARIATES, TOPES.

Surprised to see POLO MALLET here and another POLO entry in the Universal puzzle on the same day! At least the version in the Universal puzzle sounds less elitist than the sport that requires horses.

Interesting etymology learning of the day: POSE has a different root than the key word in 55a. [Hold a position, say]. The former relates to stopping, the latter to placing something.

Surprisingly cinematic clue for a science word: 50d. [The alien’s blood in “Alien,” for example], ACID.

Four stars from me.

Brendan Emmett Quigley’s Crossword #1790 — Eric’s review

Brendan Emmett Quigley’s Crossword #1790 — 6/9/25

I zipped through the first part, easily filling in most of the answers and sussing out the ones I didn’t know.

But I hit a roadblock in the middle, mostly because of intersecting football clues. In the interests of finishing up so I could write my review, I checked a few answers and revealed a square that I had wrong.

I had gimmes throughout the grid, which helped me get started:

• 14A [“Erlkönig” composer] SCHUBERT
• 22A [Beer named after a river] AMSTEL The Amstel River is also the source of the name “Amsterdam.” I learned this from some crossword.
• 44A [Beck’s last name] HANSEN

Other stuff:

• 1A [Gustavia’s island, familiarly] ST. BART’S My Caribbean geography is pretty bad, and I don’t remember ever hearing the name of Saint Barthelmé’s capital.
• 15A [Pitching statistic?] AD RATE I knew this wasn’t about baseball, but tried AD SALE first, even though 12D [Piano class assignment] wanted to be ÉTUDE.
• 26A [Spot for un canotier] TÊTE  A “canotier” is a French sailor’s hat, similar to a boater.

• 27A [“Go to hell”] EAT SHIT I’ve generally got nothing against vulgarities, but the crudeness of that particular combination bothers me.
• 35A [DC thoroughfare that starts behind the Treasury Building] G STREET I know that the streets in the center of Washington have lettered names, but I had no idea which letter this one might be. It’s not as familiar to me as something like K Street.
• 40A [New York city] ONEONTA It’s about 60 miles from where I was born. It’s also got a population of barely 13,000. I’m sure it’s a fine place, but skimming the Wikipedia entry on it, I don’t see anything remarkable about it.
• 47A [Chancellor who won Super Bowl XLVIII with the Seahawks] KAM I didn’t know that name at all and tried SAM and CAM even though they didn’t work well with 28D.
• 49A [Jag rival] VETTE If you say so, Brendan. I don’t see many people driving Jaguars who seem like the type that would purchase a Corvette instead.
• 52A [They often come with levels] TOOL SETS Nice clue.
• 55A [Slowness comparison] MOLASSES It took me longer than it should have to get that.
• 1D [Tried to take advantage of] SCAMMED ON Does “on” add anything? Does it maybe imply the unsuccessful result of the scam?
• 7D [“Look elsewhere, please!”] STOP STARING AT ME I like this one, even if the clue doesn’t seem quite interchangeable with the answer.
• 28D [First NFL player to have a touchdown reception in 15 consecutive seasons] ART MONK The name sounds only a tiny bit familiar; his NFL career went from 1980–1995. He’s the first cousin once removed of jazz pianist Thelonius Monk.