Monday, August 11, 2025

BEQ 12:23 (Eric) [3.83 avg; 3 ratings] rate it
LAT 2:10 (Stella) [3.00 avg; 1 rating] rate it
NYT 3:10 (Sophia) [3.57 avg; 14 ratings] rate it
The New Yorker 7:05 (Amy) [2.60 avg; 10 ratings] rate it
Universal untimed (pannonica) [3.00 avg; 3 ratings] rate it
USA Today tk (?) [2.00 avg; 2 ratings] rate it
WSJ 4:00 (Jim Q) rate it

Rebecca Goldstein’s New York Times Crossword — Sophia’s Recap

Theme: Each answer ends with something that could be found on a CHEESE BOARD

New York Times, 08 11 2025, By Rebecca Goldstein

• 17a [Independence Day banger] – FIRECRACKER
• 25a [Rush hour snarl] – TRAFFIC JAM
• 38a [Lego piece in the shape of a person or animal] – MINI FIG
• 42a [Warm greeting to a spouse or partner] – HI HONEY
• 55a [Recipient of two Golden Globe Best Actress nominations for Netflix’s “GLOW”] – ALISON BRIE
• 64a [Cocktail party staple that may contain the ends of 17-, 25-, 38-, 42- and 55-Across] – CHEESE BOARD

Cute theme! I figured out the gist of what was going on from just FIRECRACKER and TRAFFIC JAM, although I spent much of the solve thinking the revealer was going to be “charcuterie” rather than CHEESE BOARD. Do cheese boards usually only have one type of cheese on them? No matter – I loved how all 5 (!!) theme answers clearly changed the meaning of their final word. I don’t recall seeing MINI-FIG in a puzzle before, despite being familiar with the little guys, so that was a great new entry. I also just saw ALISON BRIE’s new movie “Together” last week, so her inclusion feels timely.

Very clean fill in this puzzle, which again is especially impressive because there are 6 theme entries including the revealer! Quick hits on the rest of the puzzle:

• General fill highlights: FREE WIFI, NETI POTS, ONE BY ONE, DEAR JOHN
• My biggest hold-up was at 1a, where I wasn’t sure if [Improvises during a gig] would be RIFFS or “scats”.
• [___ Way, block in Lower Manhattan where a popular cookie originated] for OREO – new Oreo lore unlocked! It was the block where the first Nabisco factory was.
• [Channel with a call to order?] for HSN – this is probably the weakest entry in the puzzle, but it’s saved by having the best clue.
• And one more clue highlight: [This is not working!] for REST.

Happy Monday all!

Mary Winslow’s Los Angeles Times crossword — Stella’s write-up

Looks like this might be a debut construction! Congratulations to Mary Winslow.

Los Angeles Times 8/11/25 by Mary Winslow

The revealer at 60A [Survive an audition, and what one may do to the start of 18-, 23-, 36-, or 54-Across?] is MAKE THE CUT, indicating that you can CUT the first word in each of the theme answers:

• 18A [Hula dancer’s bottom] is GRASS SKIRT. One thing I love about living in NYC is that I personally will never have to CUT GRASS.
• 23A [Yellow spice in tangy marinades] is MUSTARD SEED. I was hoping to find out more about the etymology of CUT the MUSTARD to put in this post, but it seems the origin of the phrase isn’t well known.
• 36A [Lounger on an ocean liner] is DECK CHAIR. I suppose you could also CUT the DECK on an ocean liner, if it’s one that has a casino on board.
• 54A [Influencer with serious clout] is POWER BROKER, since you can also CUT the POWER (to the mic being used by someone giving an embarrassing toast at a wedding, perhaps?). I recommend Robert Caro’s excellent The Power Broker to anyone who wants to know more about why New York City is the way it is and/or how an unelected official can acquire and wield power.

This being a debut, I guess I can see why a bit more crosswordese than usual (APSE, ARP, ENO, INST., ISO-, OSS, OSSA, RES, TAE, plus RETASTE) was allowed to sneak in, but I wish there’d been another round of grid refinement with the constructor to remove at least a couple of these.

Guilherme Gilioli’s Wall Street Journal crossword, “What’s Behind the Mask?” — Jim Q’s write-up

Here’s a crossword that’s happy to see you!

THEME: Phrases that end with parts of the face

WSJ • 8/11/25 • Mon • “What’s Behind the Mask?” • Guilherme Gilioli • solution • 20250811

THEME ANSWERS:

• SNAKE EYES
• RIVER MOUTH
• NEEDLE NOSE
• (revealer) MAKE A FACE

There’s also some grid art there and a semi-quasi bonus answer in (the very politely stated) MAY I SEE YOU AGAIN?

Nice to see a Monday with this many long answers and only 74 words! In that sense, it did feel a tad harder than the average Monday, but nothing overly daunting. Both the construction with the L/R symmetry for the grid art help the theme out, which is basic at best. EYES, MOUTH, and NOSE to make a face sounds like something I could sketch with my less-than-ideal art skills. And tbh, NEEDLE NOSE doesn’t sit with me as a stand-alone. I feel like it really needs the word “pliers” with it, so it feels a bit partial.

STUMBLES/MUSINGS:

• 3D [___ mountain dog (breed from Switzerland)]. BERNESE. I was this many days old when I found out that it’s not BERMESE with an “M.” The breed originated in Bern. Makes sense.
• 30A [Macho type] MAN’S MAN. I was trying to parse this as MAN S???, so I needed all the crosses lol
• 46A [Throws, slangily] YEETS. Is this still a thing, this word? I feel like it was a flash-in-the-pan that will now live on in crosswords for its letter combination convenience. Like 90’s PHAT, which I remember as being a thing for, like, a month before we all realized it was stupid.
• 14D [Casual sneaker brand since 1916] KEDS. I didn’t know these were still around. That’s a long time. I only wear Converse. I have about 400 pair. It’s a problem. I don’t repeat a pair during the school year. Teacher schtick.

That’s all for me! 3 stars.

Brian Keller’s Universal crossword, “Sober Curious” — pannonica’s write-up

Universal • 8/11/25 • “Sober Curious” • Keller • solution • 20250811

“Sober curious” is when you toy with the idea of removing EtOH from your intake.

In this crossword the theme answers are normal, familiar phrases, but when you eliminate the names of various potent POTABLEs (45d [Safe to drink])—which I’ve circled for convenience—they become wacky, or curious, ones. And that’s what their clues signal.

• 60a^R [Spiritless? … or a hint to interpreting the starred clues’ answers] ALCOHOL-FREE.
• 20a. [*India, Iceland and others?] RUMINATIONS → “I” NATIONS.
• 27a. [*Watching over Tinker Bell?] FAIRYTALE ENDING → FAIRY TENDING.
• 51a. [*Response to a casual greeting?] SUPPORT YOURSELF → ’SUP YOURSELF?

It’s a bit convoluted but ultimately understandable.

• 1d [Move a muscle] STIR. Or a common step in cocktail building.
• 3d [Tiny building block] ATOM. 9d [Fusion, but not fission] CUISINE. Who knows what the frontiers of molecular gastronomy may yield? 29d [It carries a charge] ION.
• 21d [“No” votes] NAYS. 59a [“Yes” vote] AYE.
• 46d [Shrinking Asian sea] ARAL. It’s nearly gone. And it was not a real sea but a lake, now several disjunct ones.
• 49d [Exam that is never silent] ORAL. I recently watched the acclaimed film Coda (2022), so I’m thinking about such an exam in an ASL setting.
• 55d [Less, when added?] SUFFIX. Clue confused me until I got the answer.
• 61d [Piece of one’s mind?] OP-ED. I rushed in with LOBE.
• 14a [Indian conglomerate] TATA. I know of them because of their tiny automobiles.
• 16a [General Assembly VIP] UN REP. 17a [Happy Face Pancake’s restaurant] IHOP. True story: when I was young I thought the original International House of Pancakes was the cafeteria at the United Nations.
• 19a [“To whom __ concern”] IT MAY. My preferred version is “to whom it concerns”. Prior to that I would abbreviate the more conventional version to TWIMC, which was later phoneme-ized to the inscrutable twimmick. Oh yes I’m lots of fun.
• 38a [With 31-Down, Civil War colonel who founded a pharmaceutical giant] ELI | LILLY. Crossing occupying the center of the grid.

Brendan Emmett Quigley’s Crossword #1808 — Eric’s Review

Brendan Emmett Quigley’s Crossword #1808 — 8/11/25

Me with the first three-quarters of this grid: Zip, zip, zip. Me with that NW corner: Chip, chip, chip.

I count 24 blocks in this grid. That seems pretty low, which leaves a lot of white space. (Don’t hold me to that 24. I’m notoriously bad at counting because I constantly lose my place and count things twice or don’t count them at all.)

It’s mostly nicely filled:

• 1A [Sarcastic heckling sound] SLOW CLAP I know what that is, but even once I had CLAP, I wasn’t sure what the first four letters would be.
• 14A [Factory machinery or patent, e.g.] CORE ASSET I’m guessing this is an accounting term. As with 1A, I had the second word before I could figure out the first.
• 17A [It has a parabolic antenna] RADAR DISH Same solving pattern as the other Across answers in that corner.
• 18A [Migraine medication] ALEVE I know it as a general pain reliever; I didn’t know it was specifically recommended for migraines. My sympathies to anyone who suffers from them. Be sure you’re well-hydrated; that’s supposed to help.
• 22A [No-good dirty trickster] WEASEL Guessing this from the L in LYFT helped break open the NW corner for me. There are lots of other words that fit the clue.
• 35A [Song whose chorus begins “Sharif don’t like it”] ROCK THE CASBAH My first answer in the grid. We were living in Austin when the video was shot in and around there. The oil rig is the “Santa Rita No. 1” rig, which is on the University of Texas campus. UT has a nice campus in large part because of oil money from state-owned lands dedicated to UT and Texas A&M.
• 51A [“Here’s some advice”] IF I WAS YOU I’m 99.9% certain that IF I WERE YOU is more grammatically correct.
• 55A [Depression-era documentarian Dorothea] LANGE You might not know the name, but you know her most famous photo.
• 

  “Migrant Mother” (1936)

  57A [Woodworking device] EDGE PLANE I’ve done a little woodworking and have relatives who do some nice woodworking, but I don’t remember hearing of an “edge plane” — it’s always just a plane, which is sometimes used on edges.

• 60A [Hit single?] SOLO HOMER Nice clue, but if it was supposed to be a misdirection, the question mark spoils that.
• 62A [Pillars of Islam?] MINARETS Cute clue that I just now read; I got half the answer from crosses and the other half from the letter pattern.
• 1D [Wackadoodle] SCREWY Like WEASEL, there are lots of words that might’ve worked here.
• 2D [Bakery display] LOAVES Not BREADS. Not SCONES.
• 8D [Coin with a Ring of Splendor of the Sun Stone motif on the reverse side] PESO If I had more time this morning, I’d find out which country’s peso has those images. If you know, please speak up in the comments.
• 9D [Actress Bowen of “Nashville”] CLARE I don’t really recognize that name, so I assume she’s on the TV show and not in Robert Altman’s 1975 movie (which is quite good).
• 10D [Six-time Latin Grammy winner Downs] LILA A gimme for me, though I don’t think I can name a single one of her songs.
• 11D [Portmanteau for facts supported by personal evidence] ANECDATA I hadn’t heard that one. Like the best portmanteaus, you know what it means without being told. One of the most depressing things I learned in my 28 years of working for the Texas Legislature was how often they enacted laws based on a few anecdotes from witnesses in committee hearings.
• 12D [Sort of just before prime time] SEVENISH Well, not if you live in the Midwest, where prime time starts at 7 PM.
• 21D [Salacious bios] TELL-ALLS I would have said those are autobiographies or memoirs. Am I the only person to whom YouTube offers video after video of what singers a  particular musician “hated” or what actors a particular director will never work with again?
• 29D [Some rideshare providers] LYFT CARS Some of them are painted green.
• 34D [Texas ___ (caterpillar)] ASP 50+ years I lived in Texas, and I don’t think I ever heard of such a creature.
• 38D [Emmy- and NAACP Image Award-winning social media personality Brown] TABITHA I probably should know that name, but I needed a few crosses and then only got it from the letter pattern.
• 42D [“The Highwayman” poet] Alfred NOYES A gimme. Ah, the things you can learn from crosswords.
• 50D [What medals are made of?] VALOR Another kinda cute clue.

Natan Last’s New Yorker crossword–Amy’s recap

New Yorker crossword solution, 8/11/25 – Natan Last

Late with the write-up because my internet misbehaved before I had to leave for the afternoon.

Several unknowns for me here.

• 18a. [High-fantasy author who finished writing Robert Jordan’s “Wheel of Time” series], BRANDON SANDERSON. Also didn’t know 7d. [Longtime Donald Duck voice actor Tony], ANSELMO. I plugged in a G before I had the -MO part, thought it was ANGELOS or something. BRANDON G. ANDERSON was plenty plausible.
• 55a. [Author of “Rejection” (2024)], TONY TULATHIMUTTE. At least the crossings got me there this time.
• 11d. [Carrier whose logo features its eponymous peninsula], AIR SINAI. It was created to have flights between Egypt and Israel and has been defunct for a few years.

Fave fill: “SO I GATHERED,” GAME PLAN, literary PARIS REVIEW, OUROBOROS, PINHEADS, SOLO SHOW.

3.5 stars from me.