Tuesday, January 20, 2026

Jonesin’ 5:10 (Erin) [4.00 avg; 1 rating] rate it
LAT untimed (Jenni) [2.25 avg; 2 ratings] rate it
NYT 5:12 (Jim Q) [3.00 avg; 11 ratings] rate it
The New Yorker 5:57 (Amy) [1.81 avg; 8 ratings] rate it
Universal 6:19 (Eric) [3.33 avg; 3 ratings] rate it
USA Today tk (Sophia) [2.50 avg; 2 ratings] rate it
Xword Nation tk (Ade) rate it
WSJ 5:34 (Jim Q) rate it

Jonathan Raksin’s New York Times Crossword — Jim Q’s Review THEME: Places where one may find an ECHO

• NATO ALPHABET
  

  Jonathan Raksin’s New York Times Crossword — 1/20/26

• GREEK MYTHOLOGY
• AMAZON WAREHOUSE
• THE GRAND CANYON
• (revealer) [Skill shared by bats and dolphins … or, when read as two words, what 19-, 26-, 34- and 44-Across each is] ECHOLOCATION

Jim Q here filling in for Eric, who is under the weather. Apologies for the delay in getting this posted. I set my alarm to get up earlier, then conveniently forgot why I did so when it was blaring at 5 AM.

I learned a few things from today’s puzzle, including just now (after actually reading the revealer clue carefully for the first time) that ECHOLOCATION is one word. I don’t mean to put my ignorance fully on blast, but there it is. We grow.

This was a fun concept overall. A very Tuesday-style theme that I tend to enjoy: different interpretations of a single word, loosely tied together with a sly revealer. That said, it is a bit odd to think of any of these as literal “ECHO LOCATIONs.” Both AMAZON WAREHOUSE and THE GRAND CANYON feel awfully specific. MY NIGHTSTAND or THE VALLEY BEHIND MY HOUSE would also qualify, in a sense.

AMAZON WAREHOUSE, in particular, could be the location of… pretty much anything. (Remember when Amazon sold only books?) It’s also somewhat strange to think of an ALPHABET as a location, or of something as broad as GREEK MYTHOLOGY as a “place” where one might find the very specific nymph Echo (whose name I only ever recall from the myth of Narcissus.)

Still, all of these nits mostly make me smile. In the end, they’re all distinctly different types of ECHOs, and they certainly can be “found” in all those “locations,” quotation marks doing a lot of heavy lifting.

STUMBLES / ERRATA / THINGS I’M EMBARRASSED TO ADMIT

• SAL [___ Minella (“The Muppet Show” Muppet)] I feel like I know this cleverly
  

  SAL Minella

  inferable name, but I was picturing a completely different character. Specifically: literally any Muppet in the band with Janice. Fine, I’ll admit it. I was picturing Janice.

• SYSTEM [The “S” of A.B.S.] Something with brakes, right? Ah yes. Anti-lock Braking SYSTEM. Filed under: things I absolutely know but temporarily forgot.
• SNEERY [Visibly disdainful] Used in a sentence: When I saw the word SNEERY in the crossword, I became rather SNEERY.
  

  Not at all SAL Minella

• ENZ [Split ___ (New Wave band whose name sounds like a hair problem)]Never heard of this band. Are they well known? Mildly surprised to see this as fill. Looks like a debut, and not one that comes with a greatest-hits album.
• TWAIN [American author whose life span closely coincided with Halley’s comet visits] That’s some intense trivia.
• OWE [Be behind] One of several short-fill stumbles today. I entered LAG. Also END for ENZ, ORL for ORD, NAAN for ROTI, ADIN for ADEN, and UIES for UEYS (though that last one hasn’t felt right to me since I started solving at age ten).
• PUR [Brita competitor] Pronounced “PURE,” I assume. Based on the logo, it seems
  

  Logo that doubles as a Rorschach Test. What diacritical do you see?

  we’re meant to select whichever diacritical mark best suits our mood.

• REX [Follower of “T.”] I really wanted something involving Mr. T, who was fresh in my mind thanks to the FOOL clue. Alas.
• WAWA [East Coast convenience store chain with a reduplicative name] Extremely common around my parts. Is this well known elsewhere, or does it still read like baby talk to half the country?
• SPA [One place to find a Brazilian] We are, of course, not referring to a person. Still, I don’t really think of a SPA as a place to “find” a Brazilian any more than I think of THE GRAND CANYON as a “location” for an echo. Went to include a picture and just realized I probably set off some alarm bells in my school’s tech department. How am I going to explain that?
• LEFT [West side?] A classic groaner. And I mean that as praise.
• C SHARP [D flat equivalent]. Any other musicians out there absolutely hate playing in C SHARP but love playing in D flat?

Perfectly off-kilter Tuesday, if there is such a thing. 3.5 stars.

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Matt Jones’s Jonesin’ Crossword, “Best of Five” — a quintet of quintets. – Erin’s write-up

Jonesin’ solution 1/20/26

Hello lovelies! As the title explains, this week we have five theme entries that belong to different groups of five.

• 17a. [Espagnole (one of five)] MOTHER SAUCE
• 26a. [Queens (one of five)] NYC BOROUGH
• 36a. [Michigan (one of five)] GREAT LAKE
• 52a. [Styx (one of five)] HADES RIVER
• 61a. [Yellow (one of five)] OLYMPIC RING

Other things:

• 38d. [American photographer/actress Stark, once linked to former Prince Andrew] KOO. I usually don’t care about entries passing the breakfast test. Not much grosses me out. But there has to have been some other way to clue this without including someone with such disgusting behavior as his.
• 6a. [“San___ High School Football rules!” (“Bill & Ted” quote)] DIMAS, crossing 6d. [Conspicuously chic] DASHY. I knew the quote from the 1989 movie so I was able to figure this out, but I’ve never heard of DASHY. Did anyone have trouble here?

Until next week!

Bharati Hemmady and Steve Faiella’s Universal Crossword “OMG” — Eric’s Review

Bharati Hemmady and Steve Faiella’s Universal Crossword “OMG”— 1/20/26 (Click to Embiggen)

I don’t see Bharati Hemmady in Fiend’s constructor database, so I assume this is their constructing debut. Congratulations, Bharati! Steve Faiella is a veteran constructor who gave me some valuable feedback and tips when I was constructing my first grids. My late sister-in-law was fond of expressing awe, surprise, wonder and pretty much everything else with “Oh. My. God.” in her Southeast Texas accent. Somehow, though, she still charmed almost everyone.

I’d like to say that this theme charmed me, but the wholesomeness of it was just too much:

• 20A [What a surprised fisherman might say!] HOLY MACKEREL
• 33A [What a surprised toastmaster might say!] I’M SPEECHLESS
• 41A [What a surprised goatherdmight say!] YOU’RE KIDDING
• 56A [What a surprised travel agent might say!] GET OUT OF TOWN

Yes, these are mostly fine phrases of surprise, though I’m not sure I’ve ever heard the last one spoken.

Other stuff:

• 1A [One over par] BOGEY I read “over” and mentally substituted “under” and still stumbled on the right answer my first time. Weird how that sometimes works.
• 54A [What may be right under your nose, informally] ‘STACHE I like this clue better than the last one for “stsche”  that I saw.
• 63A [17+ rating] TV-MA I keep forgetting that television shows get rating these days. And video games. And whatever else.
• 1D [Certain chessman or churchman] BISHOP I’m not feeling great and keep nodding off. I initially counted the answer slot as five squares.
• 15D [Kind of valve in the heart] AORTIC PSA time. Don’t smoke. I’m on my third aortic valve. Did I have an aneurysm because I smoked many years earlier or because I could have a hereditary connective tissue disorder? At this point, it doesn’t matter, except that I won’t ever light up again.
• 30A [Rapper with the 2005 hit “I’m Sprung”] T-PAIN He’s also credited with popularizing a usage of pitch correction software that makes voices sound electronic. It’s an effect I don’t much care for.

Dylan Schiff’s Los Angeles Times crossword — Jenni’s write-up

I had no idea what was going on until I got to the revealer and I enjoyed it once I knew! We have circles.

Los Angeles Times, Tuesday, January 20, 2026, Dylan Schiff, solution grid

• 20a [Trousers with tool-carrying pockets and loops] are CARPENTER PANTS.
• 30a [“So glad I don’t have to deal with that”] is BETTER YOU THAN ME.
• 38a [Goal of  meditation, perhaps] is STRESS REDUCTION.

And the revealer: 5a [Backpedaled, or what’s found in 20-, 30-, and 38-Across] is REVERSED COURSE. If we read the circled letters from right to left we get STARTER, ENTREE, and DESSERT. Now I’m hungry. What I didn’t know before I did this puzzle: did not know that Chappell ROAN recorded “Hot To Go!” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xaPNR-_Cfn0

 Kathy Lowden’s Wall Street Journal crossword, “Town Center” — Jim Q’s write-up

THEME: Well-known American cities can be found in the center of common phrases.

WSJ • 1/20/26 • Tue • “Town Center” • Kathy Lowden • solution • 20260120

THEME ANSWERS:

• PHENOMENON
• THERE ARE NO WORDS
• WORLD SERIES GAME
• JUMPED OVERBOARD
• SESAME SEED

Revealer in the title today- though I’m wondering why it’s not titled “City Center.” They are all cities, right? I’ve been to all of them, and I remember NOME being sparse, but by Alaskan standards it’s a metropolis for sure (oof… population 3700… I think there are local school districts near me with higher student enrollment). I do like how PHENOMENON, JUMPED OVERBOARD, and SESAME SEED hold their cities dead center, making them jibe more fully with the title. But THERE ARE NO WORDS is still the most fun of the group. In these theme-types, the goal is often to get the hidden word to bridge other words in the phrase, which doesn’t happen with ERIE and isn’t possible with PHENOMENON.  I was on auto-pilot with fill, which seemed entirely fair. A DEER and I COME weren’t my faves, but everything else felt super smooth. Right over the plate today. 3 stars.

Brooke Husic’s New Yorker crossword—Amy’s recap

New Yorker crossword solution, 1/20/26 – Husic

Subbing for Erica, who wasn’t able to fit the puzzle in this morning.

I sure ran into a lot of unexpected fill and one utterly unfamiliar entry I was delighted to learn. I suspect those who don’t know their current American drag superstars and the other youngish pop culture bits may find the puzzle frustrating, but I found it to be a blast. There are 17+ proper nouns, which also signals a frustrating challenge for folks who don’t happen to know the references. The solving time was longer than a typical Tuesday TNY for me, so even a name-knower hit some skids here.

Bits and bobs:

• 1a. [Using A.I. to program, per a recent coinage], VIBE CODING. Might be a 2025 coinage. Note: AI cannot have “vibes.”
• 11a. [Resource whose entries include “fire,” “ice,” and “droplet”], EMOJIPEDIA. Ah! They are also in the DICTIONARY.
• 26a. [Ready-to-light dispensary purchases], PREROLLS. Pre-rolled joints, I presume.
• 33a. [Queen who wrote “The Big Reveal: An Illustrated Manifesto of Drag”], SASHA VELOUR. She’s got amazing style and looks (lewks).
• 37a. [Protagonist of a second-person novel], YOU. Love this clue!
• 39a. [Nineties Game Boy release with a “Red” companion version], POKEMON BLUE. I play Pokémon GO so I’ve heard of this, but didn’t know anything Pokémon or Game Boy back in the 1990s.
• 42a. [Soca band with the 2017 song “Hello”], KES. Never heard of them. Thank you, crossings!
• 43a. [Best-selling Eiichiro Oda manga], ONE PIECE. Saw this recently in a crossword clue alongside “Sailor Moon.”
• Trans model Hari NEF, LOTR, rapper PETEY Pablo, Für ELISE, and AGRA: Five proper nouns in a row in the Acrosses. You don’t see that very often!
• 60a. [German typographical symbol used to make nouns inclusive], GENDER STAR. I suspect you also want to learn about this.
• 62a. [Lady Gaga’s “Born This Way” and Diana Ross’s “I’m Coming Out,” for two], GAY ANTHEMS. Another answer with PRIDE vibes, and it’s not even June.
• 1d. [Professional who may give treats along with treatment], VET. Imagine if the answer had been PCP, primary care provider. I would like a treat!
• 31d. [Nutrient lost during menstruation], IRON. Straightforward fact. Is anyone at all still squeamish about that? Gen Z, I think, has a lot of young men who grew up hearing their female classmates talk about their periods. My son heard plenty in his junior high years, ergo not squeamish at all. Not sure about GEN Y (millennials). Note: The current kids and teens are Gen Alpha.
• 56d. [Initialism coined by Dan Savage for the qualities of a desirable sexual partner], GGG. I was just reminded of this the other day. Something, giving, and game? It’s “good” etc. Wiki says “one should strive to be good in bed, giving ‘equal time and equal pleasure’ to one’s partner, and game ‘for anything – within reason.'”

4.25 stars from me.