Jonesin’ 5:58 (Erin) 
[4.00 avg; 1 rating] rate it
LAT untimed (Jenni) 
[3.00 avg; 3 ratings] rate it
NYT 3:23 (Amy) [2.82 avg; 11 ratings] rate it
The New Yorker 9:30 (Eric) [3.85 avg; 10 ratings] rate it
Universal 5:57 (Eric) [3.00 avg; 4 ratings] rate it
USA Today tk (Sophia) [3.00 avg; 1 rating] rate it
Xword Nation tk (Ade) rate it
WSJ 6:15 (Jim Q) 
[2.33 avg; 3 ratings] rate it
Matt Jones’s Jonesin’ Crossword, “State Animals” — well, these at least spell something. – Erin’s write-up
Jonesin’ solution 11/18/25
Hello lovelies! Our theme this week involves using the abbreviations of the states in the theme entries to create new words.
- 17a. [State aquatic bird? [Med school graduate, maybe]] INDIANA TERN. The state abbreviation for Indiana is IN. Replacing INDIANA with IN gives us INTERN, which is the name for a medical school graduate in their first year of residency.
- 27a. [State antlered animal? [“Skedaddle!”]] VIRGINIA MOOSE. VA + MOOSE = VAMOOSE
- 43a. [State rodent? [Unit of weight for gems]] CALIFORNIA RAT. CARAT
- 57a. [State wild bovine? [Singer Roy]] OREGON BISON. OR + BISON = ORBISON
Other things:
- 41a. [U.K. equivalent of an Oscar] BAFTA. British Academy of Film and Television Arts.
- 36d. [1993 puzzle-based video game] MYST. Myst creator Cyan is still out there. Their latest new game, Firmament, was released in 2023, and their rebuild of Riven launched last year.
Until next week!
Robert S. Gard’s Universal Crossword “Any Fries With That?” — Eric’s Review
A theme perhaps more appreciated by carnivores like me than those who eschew meat:
- 15A [Holiday also known as “El Dia de la Batalla de Puebla”] CINCO DE MAYO Despite having lived in Texas for 50+ years (where May 5 is a big holiday in some Mexican-American communities), I don’t think I’ve ever heard it referred to by the battle it commemorates (1862, in which Mexico defeated the Second French Empire).
- 24A [Casual updos] MESSY BUNS I don’t remember where I picked up that term, but I’m glad it stuck in my head.
- 39A [“Peanuts” tomboy who says, “I hate talking to you, Chuck!”] PEPPERMINT PATTY
- 48A [Head honcho] BIG CHEESE
- 61A [Texas-based fast-food chain … or what one may exclaim when the ends of 16-, 24-, 39- and 48-Across are assembled] WHAT A BURGER Back in my 20s, I had my share of What-a-Burger hamburgers. As fast-food burgers go, they’re pretty good.
The puzzle’s title should’ve tipped me off to the theme, but I didn’t really pick up on it until I reached the revealer. The theme answers were all easy enough to get without understanding the theme, though if I had gotten it sooner, I would not have paused over PATTY or PATTI.
Other stuff:
- 10A [Fake follower] BOT I’m lucky NEWS didn’t fit.
- 30A [Maui Wowie, for instance] WEED/21D [Compound in 30-Across] CBD Can you get a contact high from a crossword?
- 2D [Legal excuse] ALIBI I need to let this one go, but this usage repeatedly annoys me. In Latin, “alibi” literally means “elsewhere.” An alibi is not an “excuse,” it’s a defense based on the accused being somewhere other than the scene of the crime at the relevant time.
- 3D [Suit line?] PINSTRIPE That clue doesn’t seem to need the question mark.
- 36D [Upholstery tool] STAPLE GUN Just once, I’d like to see this clued as [Tool used by a local band promoting an upcoming performance]. Despite the signs discouraging it, the wooden utility poles in Austin are perpetually covered with posters for band gigs and other performances.
- 38D [What Odin gave for wisdom] EYE Almost all the Norse mythology I know is from crosswords, including this new-to-me tidbit.
C.W Stewart’s Los Angeles Times crossword — Jenni’s write-up
I enjoyed this puzzle and it satisfied my appreciation for old-timey sayings.
The revealer takes us back*. 35a [Quaint warning of impending danger, and a hint to the implements at the ends of 16-, 24-, 29-, and 58-Across] is KATIE BAR THE DOOR.
Los Angeles Times, November 18, 2025, C.W. Stewart, solution grid
The theme clues:
- 16a [Linked-together homemade decoration] is a PAPER CHAIN. I’m sure some of you will have glue-smeared paper chains made by loving little hands on your Christmas trees soon!
- 24a [Noisy flash of lightning] is a THUNDERBOLT.
- 49a [Tool needed for some needlecraft] is a CROCHET HOOK.
- 58a [Arm-twisting wrestling hold] is a HAMMER LOCK.
CHAIN, BOLT, HOOK, and LOCK are all mechanisms to keep a door closed. Solid!
What I didn’t know before I did this puzzle: that Miranda OTTO appears in “Homeland.”
*when I consulted the Ngram viewer, I learned that this expression peaked in 2002. I sure hope that’s not considered “quaint.”
Blake Slonecker’s Wall Street Journal crossword, “Spin Job” — Jim Q’s write-up
THEME: Two word phrases that start with a synonym for MIX, as in the kitchen? I think?
WSJ • 11/18/25 • Tue• “Spin Job” • Richard Liu • Blake Slonecker • solution • 20251128
THEME ANSWERS:
- 17A [Sharp as a tack] WHIP SMART
- 25A [Itching to get out] STIR CRAZY
- 50A [Seal the deal] SHAKE ON IT
- 61A [Drum machine mimic] BEAT BOXER
- 37A (revealer) [Confusing signals “sent” by 17-. 25-. 50- and 61-Across] MIXED MESSAGES
Not gonna lie… I’m not sure I get it. I stared at the grid for quite a while post-solve trying to interpret the revealer because it feels like I’m missing something important. I don’t see what is being “sent” by the themers. I don’t know why “sent” is in scare quotes. The word MIX is often an indication to anagram something, but nothing seems to anagram very well. The first words of each of the themers are also anagram indicators… am I supposed to “SHAKE“ ON IT to get a word that is a synonym for message? That seems like a tall order. And the clues are way too straightforward for that.
So… I dunno. It’s very likely I’m missing something, but at the moment all I see are two word phrases that start with a synonym for MIX, as it would be found on a blender setting. Where are the MESSAGES? If the clue were something wacky like [“Go thoroughly blend that Patsy Cline hit!”?] for STIR CRAZY, then I would get the MESSAGE part as someone in that context is communicating something to another.
OTHER THINGS / STUMBLES / NEW TO ME:
- WHIP SMART is new to me as a phrase. Regional? Old-timey? Sounds like something vintage my grampa might say.
- Seemed like more frequently-seen-in-crosswords fill than normal. Not crosswordese per se, but lots of foreign language (ID EST, DIEM, EIN), proper names (GRIER, OTTO Preminger, KEIRA Knightley) and acronyms/initialisms/abbreviations (UAW, UCLA, QTS). The crosswordy vibe may’ve been exacerbated by my lack of theme grokkment.
- JINX IT seems off as a stand-alone phrase to me.
- [Shout accompanied by a fist pump] YES. Feels like the clue needs a qualifier, like “perhaps” or something. I’ve shouted that quite a few times, and more often than not there is no fist pump.
- I like I AM AWARE. You can almost here the passive-aggressiveness tone. Still, I think I’M AWARE is more familiar in the [Response to the obvious] context.
- I’m having trouble substituting [Strong bond] with EPOXY in a sentence, which is probably just my brain at the moment.
Lastly, I am without my laptop and access to Acrosslite and Scraper, so I solved in the applet. I’ve heard there have been significant upgrades, but for the life of me I can’t figure out how to toggle between Across/Down answers without a mouse-click. There has to be something I’m missing, right? That’s frustrating. Update: Looks like it’s the ?/ key. Is that intuitive for most? I don’t see any guides that explain the keyboard settings. Also, it wouldn’t allow me to peruse the clues post-solve and had to reset the grid, but then it only allows me glimpses of the finished puzzle when I hit “reveal.”
So overall, a rather frustrating Tuesday solve for me. 2 Stars.
Will Nediger’s New Yorker Crossword — Eric’s Review
Will Nediger’s New Yorker Crossword — 11/18/25
I found this one pretty much fits the “Moderately Challenging” label, though three things might have slowed me down a little: I’m solving on a laptop I’ve had for about a week and am still getting used to the keyboard; the New Yorker‘s new puzzle-solving interface makes it hard for me to tell if the clue I’m looking at is for the Across answer or the Down Answer; and the grid today seems a bit disconnected, with Utah blocks in the center of all four edges, which effectively turn it into five midi-sized crosswords.
On the other hand, there’s lots of nice stuff here, including the four 12-letter answers that hold the corners together:
- 1A [Volume of visitors to a website] TRAFFIC It’s always nice to have a gimme or near-gimme at 1-Across.
- 2A [Fishes with a net] TRAWLS I briefly tried TROLLS, even though I should know that’s fishing with a line.
- 15A [Mononymous d.j. and producer who inspired Charli XCX’s “So I”] SOPHIE That’s not a name I’ve heard before.
- 18A [Anna who starred in many of Jean-Luc Godard’s early-sixties films] KARINA My first thought here was KARENINA, but I knew that’s the title character of a Tolstoy novel that I’ve never read. I’m less certain whether I’ve seen any of Ms Karina’s films.
- 31A [Buy-curious?] JUST BROWSING Cute clue. I’m glad my standard reply to salesclerks — “JUST LOOKING” — didn’t fit. Having a wrong answer in the grid always slows me down a lot.
- 35A [“Finally . . . my life is complete”] I CAN DIE HAPPY I don’t have a “bucket list.” Do you?
- 43A [Undertaking concerned with identifying distant technosignatures, for short] SETI We’ve been watching Pluribus; the search for extraterrestrial intelligence leads to the global transformation that starts the plot in motion.
- 46A [Terse summons] COME Not HERE.
- 53A [Popular YouTube channel whose namesake character is typically studying to chill music] LOFI GIRL It’s not so popular that I’ve heard of it, but there are lots of popular things I’ve not heard of.
- 7D [Makes some space] CLEARS THE WAY Okay, maybe this isn’t really fun answer to see in a grid, but there’s nothing wrong with it.
- 23D [Really rips into] TEARS A NEW ONE According to crosswordtracker.com, the “one” has been an answer only once, in an AVXC puzzle 10 years ago. Yes, it’s crude, but those letters are grid-friendly!
- 28D [Squeaky poutine parts] CURDS I’ve never eaten poutine, but guessed this off the bat (though it’s not clear to me why cheese curds would squeak).
- 31D [Sportswriter Bois who coined the word “scorigami” to describe a final score that’s unique in N.F.L. history] JON I’d never heard of him or his score concept. His coinage fails my benchmark of a good portmanteau, which is that someone unfamiliar with the term should instantly understand what it means. I don’t know much about origami, but I doubt you can make thousands of paper cranes and have each one be unique.
- 33D [“Hold on—did I hear you right?!”] WAIT WHAT I waffled between the correct answer and WAIT WAIT.
- 35D [“No big deal”] IT’S FINE Not IT’S OKAY.
- 37D [“Pale Fire” character Shade whose first name is a shade] HAZEL Pale Fire is a 1962 novel by Vladimir Nabokov. I’ve not read it, and being pretty familiar with Nabokov’s Lolita was no help.
- 41D [Dye jobs with color gradients] OMBRES I learned that term somewhere in the last year or so, but it didn’t really stick.
Joe Deeney’s New York Times crossword—Amy’s recap
NY Times crossword solution, 11/18/25 – no. 1118
The revealer is TO-DO LIST, and the themers are all phrases whose words start with TO— and DO—. You’ve got TONE DOWN, TOP DOLLAR, TOOTH DOCTOR (who says that?), and TOKYO DOME. Straightforward theme.
I don’t know if the puzzle would have been accepted with an 8/9/9/8 theme, but it felt like there was more clunky fill than usual, particularly for an early-week puzzle. ETERNE, OATY, CLIO, NEW AT, EDDA? The central 11 forces those corners with 6s and 7s, which you may appreciate as a change-up from the usual barrage of 3s, 4s, and 5s in the fill.
Fave fill: REAL ID, AZTEC, KARMIC (Spelling Bee today!), JETSAM, TINKERER, IRELAND, REVS UP.
Three stars from me.
NYT: Pretty good Tuesday. I didn’t see the revealer because I had enough crosses that I just filled it in without looking at the clue. So, when I looked back at the puzzle, I picked up the “T D” part of the themers, but not the “TO DO” part.
Pretty solid fill. Did not care for REUNES.
I didn’t care for it all that much. The revealer was clever, but the theme answers were pretty dull. I’ve never heard anyone refer to a dentist as a TOOTHDOCTOR. And as well as REUNES, ETERNE is musty old crosswordese.
Agree, some strange fill today. Why would anyone call them a TOOTHDOCTOR when dentist is shorter and easier to say.
Maybe to include dentists, orthodontists, endodontists, oral surgeons and prosthodontists?
It’s also cutesy (“colloquial” per the clue).
WSJ: I also don’t fully understand the connection between the revealer and the theme answers but kudos to the constructor for squeezing in two J’s, two K’s, two Q’s, two X’s and two Z’s.
I interpreted it as WHIP, STIR, SHAKE, and BEAT are terms that can mean mixing ingredients in a recipe.
I caught that part, but if that’s the extent of the theme, the revealer clue would have alluded to the first words of the theme answers, right? Also, why is “sent” wrapped with quotation marks? There seems to be more to it that I’m missing.
I haven’t identified a commonality among SMART, CRAZY, ONIT, and BOXER so if there’s more to it, I don’t see it, either.
I took the quotes around sent to mean figuratively rather than literally send mixed messages.
Of course it’s always possible I’ve underthought it
Puzzle: WSJ; Rating: 2 stars
But even figuratively, what is being “sent”?
I don’t know. Maybe the constructor/editor looked over phrases containing ‘mixed’ that could serve as a revealer and landed here
TNY: Nice puzzle – fits the “Moderately Challenging” designation on my scale.
Clue for 17-D is just bad. A “second stringer” is not a SCRUB. SCRUBs are the guys who come in when the contest is no longer a contest. There are four or five NBA players in the Hall of Fame who won the “Sixth Man of the Year” award while they were playing.
Liked TALL ONES, TEARS A NEW ONE and JUST BROWSING.
Still don’t know how to parse LOFIGIRL, and I guess I’ve seen OMBRE before, but couldn’t bring it to mind – so that crossing sucked for me.
I liked it, but found it a tad harder than yesterday’s. I still can’t figure out whether LOFIGIRL is a specific person or a type. I had trouble with 24A, because I didn’t know what P.T.O means. I went with PRREP for lack of a better guess, then changed it to HRREP because PASTIER didn’t fit the down clue.
CASUALS, as defined, is new to me, as were SOPHIE and KARINA, but in all cases the crossings were fair.
NUANCED always puts me in mind of lazy academic writing (“We present a nuanced reading of Sense and Sensibility…”) by scholars who are desperately striving to say some tiny new thing about a well-worn subject.
I’ve got the LOFI Girl channel going right now. Very relaxed pop-rock. It’d probably put me to sleep if I left it playing. It’s not really my kind of music. I’ve never heard of any of the artists in the episode I chose.
But the channel has over 15 million subscribers, so I guess it’s “popular.”
+1…. I followed your lead and… holey guacamole I was snoring after about three bars. Might be good white noise to work by as well as go to sleep by… it certainly is “chill” LOL! The two I chose were more easy listening jazz than pop-rock.
Did you ever listen to the pianist George Winston? Some of what I heard slightly reminded me of his music.
But then, I once read a review of one of Winston’s albums that called him “the Snoozemaster of Windham Hill” (that being his record label).
@David L – just in case Google hasn’t helped you out already, P.T.O., in this context, refers to Paid Time Off.
Thanks — after the right answer appeared, I guessed ‘personal time off’ but was too lazy to check. I spent the last 25 years pre-retirement working for myself, so HR lingo is largely unknown to me. (And only one job that I held, for a couple of years, in my earlier career was with a large enough organization that they actually had HR people, with whom I interacted only when I announced I was leaving…)
I really enjoyed this one. Like the long phrases you did, along with “I can die happy”…
All I can make of lofigirl is she listens to chill music so she is lo-fi as opposed to hi-fi??? really no idea but that.
I started out with “hirer” for the hr rep, had no idea on Jon Bois, and the only scru_ word I could think of for sports was scrum… and have no idea what that is other than “related to sports somehow”… anyways, it was wrong.
Fair crosses for the most part made it right on target for the Tuesday degree of challenge, for me.
Lo-fi is a thing.
New Yorker: I don’t know what to make of this puzzle, so alien and yet seemingly solvable in the end. It was a strange combination of pleasant and unpleasant. I want to rate it but have to think it over. To be fair, I should add that I know almost nothing about sports and less about modern culture and abbreviations. I also don’t mind taking my time, which I usually have to do anyway.
Solvable, no errors. Can’t check here!
Sorry. I filled in for pannonica today and just now posted my review.
Ooh, thanks. Sorry to be pushy about the free service, Eric.
Thanks.
Ooh, thanks. Sorry to be pushy about the free service, Eric. Diary tells me I posted that note already, but I don’t see it. Nice review. Thanks for mentioning the missing “Across” and “Down,” another characteristic of the horrid new New Yorker software.
WSJ: Thanks, Jim, for the information about the keyboard command for changing directions in the WSJ puzzle-solving interface. I had to use that new interface a few weeks ago and found it worse than the old one (if that were possible).
People complain about the NYT Games app interface, but at least you cans see what direction you’re going and easily change directions.
Puzzle: The New Yorker; Rating: 4 stars
I think it’s harder than yesterday. Or maybe it’s just outside the range of trivia that I know about.
Thanks!
NYT: Amy summed it up well. But also, I noticed that the nyt review was (geographically) at the very bottom of all the reviews on the page today? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Puzzle: NYT; Rating: 3 stars
I know it’s Tuesday, but still. TOOTH DOCTOR? REUNES? ETERNE? And there was one other that I don’t have time to look for.