LAT 3:20 (Stella) 
[3.13 avg; 4 ratings] rate it
Newsday 25:25 (pannonica) 
[4.00 avg; 3 ratings] rate it
NYT 7:55 (Amy) 
[2.61 avg; 22 ratings] rate it
Universal tk (Matthew) 
[3.33 avg; 3 ratings] rate it
USA Today tk (Matthew) 
[2.00 avg; 2 ratings] rate it
WSJ untimed (pannonica) [2.00 avg; 3 ratings] rate it
Byron Walden’s New York Times crossword—Amy’s recap
NY Times crossword solution, 8/16/25 – no. 0816
On the tougher end of the Saturday spectrum, but way easier than a Saturday Stumper. It helps that the grid allows for free flow across sections.
Encountered a few unfamiliar things:
- 22A. [Tied up], ALL EVEN. Is that actually an idiomatic phrase? I googled it and found some Black barbershops and hairstyles with that phrase, but I don’t recognize the phrase as clued. My sports-fan husband is good with it, though.
- 14D. [Call to whomever], “HEY, ANYBODY.” What? Who says this?
- 24A. [Évariste ___, 19th-century French math prodigy for whom a differential theory is named], GALOIS. Not in my wheelhouse.
- 24D. [Dairy spread in a health food store], GOAT BUTTER. That’s a thing? “Hey, anybody! Have you got any goat butter?”
BOARDIES for board shorts is inferrable but I don’t know that the terminology has made it to the Midwest. HEXER is also an oddball inflection, has a roll-your-own-word vibe to it.
Fave fill: BLOW-DRY BAR, LOWER HOUSE, THE BARTMAN, AUSTENITES, PRESS START, ACTION HERO, LEA SALONGA, RESELLER, UNWAVERING. Entirely gross (but useful!): HAIR TRAP.
Three more things:
- 36A. [Like bismuth and bitcoin], MINED. Great clue. Had me stumped for a bit, it did.
- 1D. [Appearance of the marine creature called “by-the-wind sailor”], BLOB. Well! That merits a look-up. Here’s the Wiki page. Velella velella, a jellyfish cousin.
- 25D. [Bond classification], ACTION HERO. Bond, James Bond, and not bond, municipal bond.
August Miller’s Los Angeles Times crossword — Stella’s write-up
Los Angeles Times 8/16/25 by August Miller
This puzzle is a pangram, and those Scrabbly letters come in fun places: the J in PBJS, the Q in nepo baby MARGARET QUALLEY, Xs in SILVER FOX and BOTOX PARTY (my two favorite entries in the puzzle).
I didn’t notice the pangram potential, nor really the individual entries, as much as I noticed a couple of other things (“Trend Alert!” as they’d say on Fashion Photo RuView):
- A bit more appropriate-for-a-Saturday ambiguity than usual. I had ADORE in place of the correct CRAVE at 4D [Fancy and then some] for a while, proving that even if you’re not fooled by the wordplay, you can still fall into a trap that makes getting the crossing answers harder. It’s also easy to have IT’S NICE TO SEE YOU in place of the correct IT’S GOOD TO SEE YOU at 30A [Line at a reunion].
- One or two more plurals than I like. Maybe it’s because I make cryptics and in the UK there are actual rules about how many plurals and present-tense verbs ending in S can be in one puzzle, but I try not to have an overabundance of them in my puzzles. The line I draw, both as a constructor and a solver is: Am I likely to say this word in its plural form out loud (or read about it) in real life? So: YELLS, ASPARAGUS SPEARS, and MOSQUITOES are A-OK in my book; BAR FRIDGES, SPRAY TANS, not so much.
Anyway, I suppose this puzzle gives the lie to my usual attitude of “I don’t give a crap that it was a pangram; was it fun to solve?” because I think my favorite entries here are the ones with the Q and the Xs in them!
Mike Shenk’s Wall Street Journal crossword, “Family Visits” — pannonica’s write-up
WSJ • 8/16/25 • Sat • “Family Visits” • Shenk • solution • 20250816
The trigram KIN has been inserted into familiar words/phrases. Wacess ensues.
- 23a. [Yokel competing in the lumberjacks’ roleo?] BUMPKIN ON A LOG (bump on a log).
- 39a. [Cake makers who specialize in decorating with frosting from a pouch?] BAKING PIPERS (bagpipers).
- 48a. [Feature of Shrek and the Hulk?] LIME SKIN TONE (limestone).
- 64a. [Remove all its seeds, in preparation for making a jack-o’-lantern?] PRIME THE PUMPKIN (prime the pump).
- 81a. [Penalty for pedaling over the posted limit?] BIKING TICKET (big-ticket).
- 88a. [Didn’t overstay one’s welcome?] WENT TO BE KIND (went to bed).
- 108a. [Lapel decoration at a Russian literature conference?] PUSHKIN BUTTON (pushbutton). Was more than half-expecting a ‘pushpin’ construction, despite having become familiar with the theme.
Mildly entertaining, well executed.
- 1d [Claiming cry] DIBS. Decided on this over MINE, with no crossings.
- 4d [Afternoon break] NAP. 14d [Out, in a way] ASLEEP. 19d [Vacation goal, perhaps] REST. 38d [Greet the day] RISE.
- 12d [Sweet and well-behaved] ANGELIC. Another I got with no crossings, thanks to the spot-on clue.
- 16d [Party leader] HOST. No question mark.
- 17d [Go to the dogs?] MUSH. No quotation marks, but a question mark.
- 34d [Gentlemen of Verona] SIGNORI. 69a [“A Midsummer Night’s Dream” role] HERMIA.
- 49d [Fructose and glucose, e.g.] ISOMERS. SUGARS just wouldn’t fit. 96a [Proton’s place] ATOM.
- 61d [Bombastic] TURGID. 35d [Confident style] ECLAT. Some SAT vocab for you all.
- 65d [Feels remorse] REPENTS. Not sure how well this works. Seems to me you can repent without feeling remorse, and you can feel remorse without actually repenting.
- 71d [Welcome warmly] ASK IN. Oho, what are you doing here?
- 82d [Roadhouses] INNS. Different connotations? Maybe I’m being influenced by popular culture but I associate roadhouses with rowdiness and inns with quaintness.
- 90d [Main impacts] BRUNTS.
- 95d [Cheapskate] PIKER, not MISER.
- 105d [Closes] ENDS. 24d [Close] NEAR.
- 7a [Woolly mammal] ALPACA. 13a [Asian region that lent its name to a soft wool] KASHMIR.
- 25a [Novel set in Dublin on June 16, 1904] ULYSSES. Known as Bloomsday.
- 27a [Like some winter weather] SLEETY, not SLUSHY (which describes a condition more than actual weather).
- 30a [Boston bus-and-subway system, familiarly] THE T. Didn’t really know this.
- 32a [The Dubliners and the Weavers, e.g.] FOLKIES. Tried FOLK ACT, even though it doesn’t agree with the clue’s “and”.
- 61a [Trees whose pods are used in Worcestershire sauce] TAMARIND. I’ve never forgotten this was an ingredient since a pre-internet Games magazine scavenger hunt contest challenged participants to find a common supermarket product that contained tamarinds and anchovies.
- 87a [Duds] ATTIRE.
- 106a [Begin brawling] GET IT ON. Oh.
- 117a [Sketchy strangers] RANDOS. Is this generally well-known enough?
Ben Zimmer’s Newsday crossword, Saturday Stumper — pannonica’s write-up
Newsday • 8/16/25 • Saturday Stumper • Zimmer • solution • 20250816
This one proved a definite challenge. Dense, interconnected grid, but there was so much I was unsure of or clueless about.
- 1a [“Alas…”] THAT’S SAD, for which I for a long while had SAD TO SAY. This mis-fill was reinforced by 1d [It may require a wedge] TRAP SHOT, for which I tried SAND TRAP. Held me up for a very long time. Devilish!
- 4d [ __-Mania (“A Devil of a Job” episode’s sitcom] TAZ. So there’s a sitcom called TAZ?
- 16a [Bash] REVILE. Another sense of bash could lead to the too-long REVELRY.
- 19a [Push-up participant] PEC. I held off on putting in BRA because it just didn’t seem likely enough.
- 22d [Column bottom of a kind] SUM. Only makes sense after the fill is in.
- 27a [Name on frosting tubs] HINES. Duncan-HINES. Was mystified by the clue for far too long.
- 29a [Venerable recruitment figure] Uncle SAM.
- 31a [Capital having the world’s largest skating rink] OTTAWA. Was definitely thinking MOSCOW.
- 35a [“…”] THERE ARE NO WORDS. Somehow I ended up putting in THERE AREN’T WORDS and I needed to hunt up the error after the grid was completely filled in. 34d [Help for night vision] ROD. In the eye, complement of cone.
- 47a [Rain shower?] RADAR. Any early get. Thank you, question mark!
- 53a [Part of a rock group] STRATUM. Wanted this as the answer for a long time, but a couple of key misfills—including the belief that 8d [“As if!”] DON’T MAKE ME LAUGH might end in –OUGH—dissuaded me.
- 56a [He’s name-checked for Passover] ELIJAH. Had I known this, the solve time would have been much faster because that lower left section would have been a snap. But sussing out 57d [#35] JFK helped in this area.
- 58a [Clodhopper’s counterpart] URBANITE. Tried SYBARITE with –BA-ITE in place. Oops!
- 61a [Feature of an emo look] GUYLINER. An early get, with the Y in place from 50d [#43] DUBYA.
- 62a [Its role at play] SEEKER. This is hide-and-seek. Another clue I was completely nonplussed by.
- 3d [Port northeast of Cartagena] ALICANTE. Didn’t know this without significant crossings, but at least 6d [3-Down address] SEÑOR was easy enough to see.
- 11d [Transit terminal] -IVE, a suffix.
- 13d [Scratchy-sounding name] CLAUDE (“clawed”).
- 21d [Gender stereotype] HE-MAN. Had FEMME here, which also obviously slowed my solve.
-
Arctictis binturong ©Joel Sartore
24d [Fierce fighter] BEARCAT. This is some North American colloquialism, and I’m not sure if it refers to any specific animal. However, the binturong (Arctictis binturong) of southeast Asia is also known as a BEAR CAT. They are not fierce. In fact, they’ve been known to make good pets (don’t keep exotic/endangered animals as pets, kids!) and are said to smell like popcorn.
- 26d [Architectural assistant since the ’80s[ AUTOCAD. 26a [Second, e.g.] AIDE.
- 30d [Less well done] RAWER, not RARER. An easy mistake to make.
- 37d [Change the perception of] REDEFINE. Don’t let people, especially the powers-that-be, redefine such essential concepts as truth and art.
- 38d [Slice of pizza?] DIAMETER. meh
- 39d [Precipitate pedestrians] STRIDERS. Precipitate is an adjective here. Tricky.
- 53d [Closing time?] SALE. Tough, very tough.
- 54d [Key bagel interior ingredient] MALT. The “interior” of the clue is a little clumsy, but it does help to eliminate a swath of ingredients that are essentially toppings.
Puzzle: NYT; Rating: 2 stars
I got through the right side pretty well. But I had absolutely no chance with the left side. Once I hit the half-hour mark I gave up the gold star, and even then it was still a struggle.
I don’t dislike a puzzle merely because it’s hard. But I didn’t find the fill very fresh or interesting, especially compared to last Saturday’s sparkling grid. This one felt like I had gone into the NYT archive and picked out an old themeless grid and solved that.
Now then, I’m going to go play some DRMARIO as a pick-me-up.
Puzzle: NYT; Rating: 1 star
same experience. I get that it is frowned upon here to give a puzzle a 1* but the left side was brutal unless you knew the proper nouns. And the proper nouns aren’t exactly daily use kind of things. I could easily live the rest of my life never referring to Ash Carter, Galois, Lea Salonga, Dr Mario, Rhodes. I am an avid beach goer and have never heard Boardies used in my lifetime. And THOS??? wow
Puzzle: NYT; Rating: 3 stars
The clue for GALOIS is straight-up wrong — GALOIS theory is not a “differential theory”; it falls squarely in the realm of abstract algebra, focusing on groups and fields. It has nothing to do with differentials.
There’s this. You do know that the constructor is a professor of mathematics, right?
Neat! Thnx for mentioning! I didn’t know, but it now makes sense that the constructor notes focus on a quick bio of GALOIS… which btw was quite interesting to read (if you haven’t).
I know enough math that GALOIS was a gimme, but not enough to be put off by the reference to differential theory. The clue says that a differential theory is named after Galois, not that he devised the theory. Needlessly arcane even for a Saturday puzzle, IMO.
Agreed with David L on all points regarding Galois. I even took a course in abstract algebra, which was pushing my limits in math. (I had better luck that term as a physics major learning tensor math for general relativity.)
Overall, puzzles don’t get harder than this. I blew it on the right by thinking OVERNIGHT would fit for the flight to London. That’s always how I experienced it, after all. And here I thought I could quote the 10th amendment easily and so kept trying to fit either “to the states” or “to the people” (of one of those without “to”). Oh, well. And don’t even ask about the SW (or, goodness,” BLOW DRY SPA).
Puzzle: NYT; Rating: 1 star
Lots of long answers, but perhaps too many. A few extra black squares might have allowed for better fill than the likes of GOATBUTTER, PRESSSTART and RESELLER. And the small fill (AMER, BUTI, ESSE, THOS, etc.) was mostly brutal. Overall, a tough slog and not a great solving experience.
NYT: I’ve heard ALL EVEN in relation to sports scores, so I agree with Amy’s husband that it’s legit.
I agree with Amy, though, that HEY ANYBODY is not so legit. “HEY, is ANYBODY there?” is okay, as is “Hello? Anyone?” but HEY ANYBODY is not a stand-alone phrase I find familiar.
Not crazy about having to think about OPEN MOUTHS and French kissing so early in the morning. Doesn’t pass the breakfast test for me.
I found the GALOIS clue to be amusing, in that the “for whom a differential theory is named” is supposed to be helpful, but how many people did it actually help? At least from the Wikipedia entries, it sounds like the differential Galois theory isn’t even the most well-known theory Galois introduced. Maybe 1% of solvers will have heard of his algebraic theory, and yet the clue refers to the Galois differential theory that even the 1% won’t necessarily know! Byron Walden is trying to trick even the mathematicians!
Reading more about Galois on Wikipedia, he is very impressive. He died in a duel at age 20, but he has 17 concepts or theories in mathematics listed in Wikipedia that are named after him and made many fundamental contributions.
I’m in that 1% who know about the Galois algebraic theory and never heard of the differential theory. Citing the differential theory was meant to confuse people like me.
Same
I haven’t seen Byron Walden’s name in a while, and I usually find his stuff difficult. This one was not so bad, despite some unknowns – BOARDIES, THEBARTMAN, DRMARIO, MRLONELY.
Strangest of all, to me, was BLOWDRYBAR. Am I understand that you go to one establishment to get washed and shampooed, then go outside with dripping hair to the BLOWDRYBAR down the street to have the job finished? Weird…
A pop-up blowdry bar opened a couple of years ago near me. Apparently a passing fad among the pampered upper-class.
Blow dry bars are great for working women who are always short on time and also expected to present as well groomed.
And the “pampered upper-class” comment was snide and just plain offensive.
Sorry. My snideness sometimes runneth over.
All is forgiven!
Puzzle: NYT; Rating: 3.5 stars
No, you go to get your hair styled without a cut or color. Also called a “dry bar.”
Thanks — far beyond my ken!
I was OK with the NYT… the various obscure and misleading clues didn’t bother me all that much. A slow start, and then slow work through the grid. 19th century French math prodigy named Évariste had to be Galois, despite my never having heard of the differential theory.
Puzzle: NYT; Rating: 3 stars
Really really really dislike the clue for RESTON (I suppose it’s fair, but that is not a commonly used definition of surmount). Especially given the proximity to a random pop culture name and an abbreviated name that could have been THEO (or even THAD) and a random name for swimwear I’ve never heard. Ugh. Otherwise I thought it was pretty fun, if a bit tricky.
Puzzle: NYT; Rating: 3 stars
I guess my prayer about not seeing another Nintendo clue in my lifetime went unanswered. DRMARIO indeed.
As an erstwhile raiser of goats, I never did hear about making butter from their milk. Cheese, of course. And don’t get me started about having them climb all over you (sans diapers) in a yoga class!
So… that clue was even more obscure than I thought.
As a matter of principle, I refuse to learn all the stupid names and variations on them from Mario games and their spin-offs.
Puzzle: Newsday; Rating: 4.5 stars
I really liked the Stumper and it played more easily for me than most. Surprising, especially since I also put SAND TRAP for 1d. OTOH, ELIJAH was a gimme, so that corner fell quickly. It seemed much fairer than many Stumpers, too – the difficulty came from legitimate twistiness like using “precipitate” as an adjective, not from deliberate obfuscation.
@pannonica – fond memories of the GAMES magazine scavenger hunt! We puzzled over the “tamarinds and anchovies” product forever, it was one of the last things we found. We never found a sugar packet with a woodpecker on it, so as a last resort we found a plain one and drew our own. Technically correct, I suppose. We also heard that there were some veterinarians named Byrd, Fish, Katz or Wolf who were so swamped with requests for business cards that they started charging for them. Like you, as soon as we saw the clue the memories came flooding back. Were you able to find everything?
Newsday @pannonica: Taz-Mania was a Warner Bros. cartoon in the early 90s. It aired as part of the Fox Kids block.
It’s a bit odd to call it a “sitcom.” That might have been a bit confounding.
Apparently, it was a half-hour show with a regular cast of characters and a “plot” for each episode. I gather that “The Simpsons,” “Family Guy,” “South Park” and the like are referred to as “animated sitcoms.”
Byron Walden has provided some of my most transcendent solving moments, so when I see his name, I drop everything and get to the puzzle. But I have to agree with some issues raised in the forum. The slog/fizz ratio tilted slog this time.
I love the idea of your “slog/fizz ratio”! And I share your appreciation for Byron Walden’s work, and also agree that this puzzle leaned to “slog”.
The liked the clues for ACTION HERO and PRESS START, but there were way too few of those, and too many questionable clues, obscurities, and trivia tests for my taste. Just way too far outside my wheelhouse to be an enjoyable challenge, I’m afraid.
Puzzle: NYT; Rating: 2 stars
This NYT Saturday played like a mid2010s Saturday puzzle; the editorial style, cluing, and fill just weren’t up to snuff compared to recent Saturday outings. Some nasty crosswordese fill, some not-in-the-language usages (i sure rolled my eyes at HEXER BOARDIES HEYANYONE et al.) I knew Galois’s first name, so that was an easier go for me, but agreed with everyone above that citing his differential theorem is almost comically obscure. Fewer Boomer-era film or TV references than the old 2012 Saturdays, but for my money it felt like Walden [whose puzzles i usually live for] and Shortz were longing for a throwback.
Perhaps this puzzle was just a reversion to the mean? I feel like the last several months, Friday and Saturday puzzles have done a great job feeling like they were authored “in our current cultural moment” as opposed to today’s puzzle, which for whatever reason just felt like someone blew the dust off an old, shelved entry? Am I alone here?
This is exactly how I felt. But I usually solve the night before and if I’m the first comment, I don’t want to set the tone by coming in hot unless I thought it was just extraordinarily bad.
Puzzle: WSJ; Rating: 1.5 stars
I have decided to abandon puzzles that contain clues and answers like YOKEL, HICK, HILLBILLY and BUMPKIN. I do not fit into any of those ugly stereotypes, but damn it, I sure am sick of seeing them summoned in puzzles.
Stumper: Pannonica nailed it, as usual. I found it a little harder, but not awful. Our usual pattern is my husband puts in an answer or two, then I finish it. However, this time, it took the two of us and a couple of back and forths. He got 9D “trois” (he had French in high school, so he’s good with those), so that helped me get almost all of the upper right. He also had “rarer” for 30D, but that was enough for “runes” for 30A to help with the upper right. I got 49D “ether,” which helped with the lower left, but I had “vinyl” at first for 42A, which didn’t help. However, I was able to do the lower left. After that, I had to turn it back to him and he got a bunch in the upper middle, enough to get the long 3D. The upper left eluded us for a while (had “trap…” for 1D, but the rest was elusive and I kept thinking Scandanavia for 31A), but we eventually got enough to guess 3D “Alienante” (I did double-check the spelling on that because I just had the first few letters and was guessing about the others).