BEQ 9:47 (Eric) 
[3.00 avg; 2 ratings] rate it
Fireball tk (Jenni) rate it
LAT tk (Gareth) 
[2.63 avg; 4 ratings] rate it
TNY 0:58 (Amy) 
[3.33 avg; 3 ratings] rate it
NYT 9:11 (ZDL) [2.89 avg; 9 ratings] rate it
Universal 5:49 (Eric) [3.20 avg; 5 ratings] rate it
USA Today 10:00 (Emily) [2.25 avg; 2 ratings] rate it
WSJ tk (Jim Q) rate it
Daniel Hrynick’s Universal Crossword “Switch-Hitters” — Eric’s Review
Daniel Hrynick’s Universal Crossword “Switch-Hitters” — 12/25/25 (Click to Embiggen)
This one’s for the New York Yankee fans — sluggers from that team’s storied history are scrambled in the theme answers, as indicated by consecutive squares with circle letter
- 14A [Singer known for country, despite his surname (In this answer, unscramble letters 4-7 and think “Babe”)] KEITH URBAN Babe Ruth When I first got that answer, I assumed “Babe” was a reference to the sheep-herding pig from the 1995 movie.
- 22A [F-35, e.g. (Letters 6-10, “Derek”)] FIGHTER JET Derek Jeter
- 34A [Ritz-Carlton VIP (Letters 3-8, “Mickey”)] HOTEL MANAGER Mickey Mantle
- 45A [Apt spots to order sidecars?] BIKER BARS Yogi Berra I’m amused by the play on the two meanings of “sidecar.”
- 56A [Christmas party game … and a theme hint] YANKEE SWAP By the time I reached this answer, I’d gotten most of the theme answers and didn’t think about the scrambled letters being ballplayers, much less Yankees.
I like that the scrambled surnames give this theme a slightly different unraveling than I’ve seen in other puzzles, though I didn’t rely on it to solve the grid.
Other stuff:
- 17A [Dried poblano] ANCHO I must have gotten this through crosses, as I didn’t notice the clue or answer until now. We put those peppers in our chili and it’s surprisingly difficult to find them where we live.
- 41A [High-calorie seasonal drinks] EGG NOGS ‘Tis the season, though I’d think twice about ordering one in a biker bar.
- 8D [“1000-lb Sisters” network] TLC Now that I’ve looked the show up, I remember having done so before. But I didn’t recognize while solving.
- 9D [’50s dance named for a body part] HAND JIVE I remember the Eric Clapton song “Willie and the Hand Jive,” but never really thought about it being a dance.
- 34D [Dale Gribble’s neighbor in the fictional Arlen, Texas] HANK From the animated TV series King of the Hill. Unlike the Dodge OMNIS (39A) and NES game console (19D), at least this is 21st century pop culture.
- 44D [AI-generated junk] SLOP I appreciated this clue because, unlike one that refers to unappetizing food, there was no question that the answer might be GLOP.
Sam Ezersky’s New York Times crossword — Zachary David Levy’s write-up
Time: 9m11s
Difficulty: Breezy (<8m) | Easy-ish (8-9m30s) | Moderate (9m30s-11m) | Rough going (11+m)
Sam Ezersky’s New York Times crossword, 12/25/25, 1225
Today’s theme: LAUGHING all the way
- LOLLYGAG
- BY THE HORNS
- RICHARD HARRIS
- WHITE HEELS
- BROUHAHA
After 4- and 21-across, I thought we were going to do the whole song, and I was strangely okay with it (although I suppose that wouldn’t be much of a challenge).
Cracking: HOO BOY
Slacking: LET HIM, let whom? Do what?
Sidetracking: the best version of my favorite xmas song
Kate Hawkins’ USA Today Crossword, “O Tannenbaum” — Emily’s write-up
O Christmas tree, o Christmas tree…
USA Today, December 25, 2025, “O Tannenbaum” by Kate Hawkins
Theme: each themer ends with a decoration for a Christmas tree
Themers:
- 18a. [Person who’s rapidly gaining popularity], RISINGSTAR
- 38a. [“Meet Me in St. Louis” actor], JUDYGARLAND
- 60a. [Beauty vloggers’ shadow-reducing gear], RINGLIGHTS
If you need any decorations, the themer set has some for you with RISINGSTAR , JUDYGARLAND, and RINGLIGHTS.
Favorite fill: JAMBANDS, CATDOOR, BLIP, and TRYIT
Stumpers: SPAN (“taut” came to mind first), OLDS (I was a bit young in the ‘oughts for this reference), and NURSE (new to me, but likely known to others)
Merry Christmas (to all who celebrate)! And happy holidays to anyone celebrating other holidays (or waiting to ring in the new year)! Excellent grid today with great overall fill. Some cluing was a bit tricker though everything was fairly crossed so it wasn’t too difficult to complete. How’d you all do?
Hope everyone has a restful end to 2025!
4.0 stars
~Emily
Andy Kravis’s New Yorker midi crossword, “2025 in theatre”–Amy’s recap
New Yorker crossword solution, 12/25/25 – Kravis – “2025 in theatre”
The New Yorker’s year-in-review puzzles continue with Andy’s midi today spotlighting recent (and maybe also less recent?) Broadway projects. There’s the “Waiting FOR Godot” revival starring Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter of “Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure.” COLE ESCOLA, who won a Tony for playing Mary Todd Lincoln in “Oh, Mary!” 2025 Tony-winning musical, “Maybe HAPPY Ending.” POET clued via a “Hamilton” line; yes, it’s still playing. An EVITA revival in London with Rachel Zegler. SARAH SNOOK, who won a Tony for playing all 20+ roles in “The Picture of Dorian Gray.” UGANDA with a “Book of Mormon” clue; is that still playing on Broadway? “John Proctor Is THE Villain,” a riff on “The Crucible”; I hadn’t heard of this one, unlike the rest.
Eight Across themers in a 10×9 midi is impressive! And the crossings are all clean.
Brendan Emmett Quigley’s Crossword “Rocking Around the Christmas Tree” — Eric’s Review
Brendan Emmett Quigley’s Crossword #1847: Rocking Around The Christmas Tree — 12/25/25 (Click to Embiggen)
Weird. I went to BEQ’s site earlier to see if there was a new puzzle for today, and I thought I saw cute little Christmas trees in the grid. But there were no such graphics, just shaded squares (or circled letters, depending on how you solved the puzzle) that, read clockwise from the correct letter, have a famous rock band in each quadrant:
- NW: THE CLASH
- NE: VAN HALEN
- SE: COLD PLAY
- SW: GREEN DAY
I didn’t immediately notice THE CLASH after filling in the NW corner, and it was only after I finished the grid that I saw the four bands. So for me, it was one of those themed puzzles that I solved as if it were themeless.
Other stuff:
- 16A [She voiced Sleeping Beauty in “Shrek the Third”] Cheri OTERI I didn’t know this offhand. I saw the first Shrek movie. That was enough, thanks.
- 18A [Was completely unsuccessful] ALL IN VAIN I think this is where I finished the grid, mainly because I didn’t know 10D [“Wild Thing” rapper] TONE-LOC. (I’m lucky that at least I recognized the name and filled it in with a few letters.)
- 29A [___ notte (“Good night” to Giuseppe)] BUONA I know that “night” in Spanish is “noche,” so why did I put BUEN_ in here to begin with?
- 33A [Longest river of the state of Western Australia] GASCOYNE That sort of sounds familiar.
- 48A [Shrek and Fiona, e.g.] OGRES Man, just can’t get away from Shrek today.
- 63A [Actress Sackhoff of “Battlestar Galactica”] KATEE Not a name I knew.
- 66A [12 Days of Christmas” gifts] SWANS That could have been MAIDS or LORDS. Wait for the crosses!
- 1D [Brian Jones played it on “Paint It Black”] SITAR Well, that’s a cheery song for your holiday playlist.
- 5D [Cravat decoration] TIE CLIP Decoration or practical accessory?
- 6D [“Death of a Naturalist” poet Seamus] HEANEY A gimme even though I’ve never read any of his work.
- 7D [Tripping balls] ON LSD I’m not up on the latest drug slang. Or much of any drug slang, really.
- 11D [He played Jack McFarland on “Will & Grace”] SEAN HAYES I know the show, I know the actor’s name, I don’t know the character’s name. Having that as a gimme would have helped.
- 13D [___ Yang Twins (hip-hop group)] YING Another name new to me.
- 22D [Classical pianist Alice Sara ___] OTT Yet another name I’m not familiar with. Poor Mel. No love for him today.
- 33D [Test with verbal and quantitative reasoning sections] GRE Not SAT. I’m glad my days of taking standardized tests are long in the past.
- 42D [Barber Todd] SWEENEY As in the Sondheim musical.
- 55D [Sticking point, maybe?] TRAP Not CRAW.
- 58D [St. with more businesses than there are residents] DEL I guess I retained something from that Business Organizations class in law school.
NYT: A pretty straightforward theme for a Thursday. Seems like we’ve had a run of those. Nothing especially bad about the puzzle. Nothing especially good.
Puzzle: NYT; Rating: 2 stars
DOR crossing DIRK? Never heard of either of them and guessed the wrong first letter.
Inferable D’OR crossing a non-proper name DIRK doesn’t seem especially onerous to me.
DIRK as the Scottish knife? That’s old-school crosswordese. Folks who have been solving the crossword for 40+ years may remember it, but I don’t think there’s any reason newer solvers would know it.
I would have thought it was used in Dungeons & Dragons / fantasy lit too?
That must be where I picked it up; I knew it despite only doing crosswords for < 5 years
It wasn’t onerous for me either, and whatever I first knew it from, it isn’t crosswords, although yeah I’ve seen it there. D’OR also springs to mind from L’Age d’OR, the classic film by Luis Bunuel, and from the Palme d’Or, the film prize at Cannes, but then French was my foreign language.
DIRK was gettable because I’ve been doing crosswords for a long time – pretty sure I’ve never encountered it IRL. And I confess, I had SNEE (another crossword-only word) on my first pass. Could have done DIRK as a name, but the only one I came up with off the top of my head is basketball player Nowitzki – and I suspect that he would be obscure for a lot of solvers.
D’OR made sense when I finally thought to put an apostrophe in it. I assume this is a gold ball?
Anybody know if Sam accepts DIRK in the Spelling Bee?
Could have gone with Dirk Gently. Not sure how widespread Adams’ work is outside of the Hitchhikers Guide.
DIRK Diggler, the stage name of Mark Wahlberg’s well-endowed character in Boogie Nights.
How is D’OR inferable? Admittedly, I haven’t looked it up, but I have no idea what it means. I do not watch soccer.
“of gold” in French. It’s basic stuff, and a cinch for an award’s name.
NYT: I thought we were going to do the whole song as well and kinda liked the idea. Agree it would not have been challenging.
I too after the first couple of italic clues asking for a word from Jingle Bells thought that we were in for more such, you might say laughing all the way through a very easy Thursday and wasn’t sure whether to be disappointed. But then I found it actually hard for Thursday.
I did’t know quite a few, like PELLA, LOCHTE, Albus Dumbledore, and BRAH (where I was looking for simply “bro” and still am not clear what it means). I think of white shoes and high heels as idiomatic but not white heels. I’d forgotten the details of “Catch-22” a while ago. I didn’t have a hard time comining up with D’OR, though not from soccer and though I didn’t know T-BONES crossing it. So it was a challenge.
Funny thing is that now I don’t get the theme. Thinking of laughter, I can see a HA in HARRIS and BROUHA, but that’s about it and isn’t much.
Theme: 16A hold LOL (Internet for “Laughing Out Loud”; 26A holds HEH; the non-idiomatic WHITE HEELS (57A) holds the weirdly spelled TE-HEE. (For what it’s worth, I had SHOES before HEELS.)
I’m not sure there’s a difference between BRO and BRAH except for who’s using it.
I asked Santa for some green paint this year. Thought WHITE SHOES were coming but had to settle for WHITE HEELS instead. But just as good!
Re: the theme – it’s text-speak LOL (laughing out loud), HEH (which doesn’t really seem like LAUGHING to me), HAR HAR, TE HEE (which seems like it should be TEE HEE), and HA HA.
BRO and BRAH, I think, both translate to “brother.” Not sure who uses one vs. the other.
ETA – Eric beat me to it!
Thanks. Kinda interesting that it takes a range of laughter equivalents. I latched onto HAH too soon.
Puzzle: LAT; Rating: 5 stars
Puzzle was treat (might say BONUS) to solve. Very light-hearted and clever.
New Yorker PSA: Every subscriber but me probably knew to look for the mini today, which was themed: 2025 in theatre (sic). We know the minis do not get reviewed on this page. The crossword, by Andy Kravis, was pleasant and nicely done.
Puzzle: tny; Rating: 4.5 stars
New Yorker (TNY): Alert, alert. Amy reviewed the New Yorker small themed holiday puzzle today, making my previous post somewhat untrue. However, the link didn’t work. She will fix everything soon, I trust, if she is free, but don’t miss the review!
Not fixable but the treat of a review is on this page, not linked.
UNIVERSAL: Merry Christmas to all. Anyone know why the Universal puzzles are not accessible? Neither the PUZ version nor a day late HTML version can be accessed. Any ideas? Thanks. David
The.puz files are missing because a power substation fire near my home caused havoc with my network, and I’m out of town for a couple of weeks. I can’t recover today’s but here’s tomorrow’s in a different location:
http://herbach.dnsalias.com/wsj/uc251226.puz
https://herbach.dnsalias.com/wsj/uc251226.puz
Corrected.
Thanks, Martin!
David.
Puzzle: Universal; Rating: 4.5 stars
I thought this puzzle was as close to perfect as you can get on a Wednesday. Four anagrammed themers & a revealer!