WSJ (Contest) Grid: untimed; Meta: 10 minutes 
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Matt Gaffney’s Wall Street Journal contest crossword, “The Current Situation” — Conrad’s writeup.
This week we’re looking for what you might say after you solve it. The clue for 16A (UPRIVER) contained a big hint: How you’ll want to swim today. There were five long theme entries, each containing a backwards river:
WSJ Contest – 03.29.2026
- LA[Y](AGLOV)EON: Score against, in boxing -> VOLGA
- B[E](LARU)SIAN: Like Minskers -> URAL
- SH[E](ENIES)T: Most lustrous -> SEINE
- OR[S](OIHO)PED: “That was the plan, anyway” -> OHIO
- MIC[H](ELIN)MAN: Tire hawker -> NILE
The “upriver” letters spell our contest solution YEESH. I raced past YEESH, discarding it as a red herring, but failed to find a further step. So I guess that’s the answer. This was a clean, by the books, meta with a really incongruous solution that doesn’t match solving the puzzle itself. I’m sure there are a limited number of words that can formed by placing letters before backwards rivers, but… yeah. I could certainly be missing something. Solvers: please share your thoughts.
Puzzle: WSJ (Contest); Rating: 4 stars
YEESH, that’s indeed an underwhelming answer for an otherwise good meta.
Puzzle: WSJ (Contest); Rating: 3 stars
My thoughts exactly…
Hmm, interesting to see the YEESH backlash! Unexpected. Really tight set of theme entries so I was thrilled to get anything reasonable from the upriver paddling. Was going for “you might say yeesh after a tough workout like that” (paddling + meta solving).
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/yeesh
Never, have I ever, heard anyone say YEESH!
What language is it?
I was stuck on PO instead of OHIO for the longest time and has YEEHH and thought maybe it was YEEHAH…
+1
The existence of Po is a major ding on this one
+1
I can’t recall exactly but I think I saw the PO thing but there was no other option for OHIO. Red herring!
I missed the OHIO and PO led me to reluctantly submit YEEHH as my answer.
The big issue for me with PO and OHIO in the same answer is that if you find one river, you stop looking.
I can get being confused by PO if that’s what you noticed from that answer — you’re not the only one to have seen it and I was lucky not to have noticed it at all — but I’d also think that if you landed on YEEHH, wouldn’t that be enough to say, wait, that can’t be right, let’s keep looking?
(In fairness I also wasn’t totally sure about YEESH since I didn’t see what it had to do with rivers, but in retrospect maybe it’s meant as the reaction one might have to swimming UPRIVER which would be tough to do.)
Yep, I thought of a salmon saying, “Yeesh, that was tough!”
right, this was my general idea there
As I said, I wasn’t totally satisfied with YEEHH as an answer, but I foolishly accepted it as an alternate spelling of an elongated YEAH, which fits the prompt.
I for one loved YEESH. This puzzle was no lazy river, but a clever commentary on the CURRENT SITUATION in our world right now. And my reaction is indeed YEESH. Thank you, Matt.
My first rabbit hole was thinking DONAU had something to do with the meta. It was odd to see the Danube referred to this way, at least in recent puzzles. And LEANS UP was suspect. I usually LEAP OUT of bed. But that is what made me stretch UP just a bit further after getting VOSNU as my answer and coming up with YEESH.
It occurs to me that one of the (so far) overlooked positives of this puzzle is Matt’s very appropriate description of the answer. YEESH, or whatever your cultural equivalent word or expression that expresses this feeling, was right on the money, and the comments pretty much confirm this.
YEECH
Puzzle: WSJ (Contest); Rating: 4 stars
I took the hint to mean just the rivers reading up, so once those were found I tried all the usual suspects, anagramming their first letters, anagramming their countries’ first letters, looking for other entries with one letter different, clues with their letters, you name it…and gave up. Came back a day later, the answer jumped out, and I literally said it out loud, a “Yeesh!” rather than an “Aha!” moment. Straightforward, sure, but I thought the meta was kinda cool, actually, use the letters up from the rivers reading up.
Puzzle: WSJ (Contest); Rating: 3.5 stars
How diabolically clever: a meta on the meta. Exasperation and disbelief because YEESH doesn’t seem to fit the solving experience to the point that you throw up your hands and exclaim “YEESH.”
That, at least, is how I read the current situation….
Puzzle: WSJ (Contest); Rating: 2 stars
Yeesh!
I found YEESH, but thought it was obviously an amusing miss. I didn’t submit it. Rats.