Tuesday, May 12, 2026

Jonesin’ untimed (Jenni) [3.33 avg; 3 ratings] rate it
LAT 3:37 (Erin) [2.00 avg; 2 ratings] rate it
NYT 6:38 (Eric) [2.44 avg; 9 ratings] rate it
The New Yorker 10:04 (Eric) [3.88 avg; 8 ratings] rate it
Universal 7:34 (Eric) [3.20 avg; 5 ratings] rate it
USA Today tk (Sophia) rate it
Xword Nation tk (Ade) rate it
WSJ 5:16 (Jim Q) [3.50 avg; 2 ratings] rate it

Matt Jones’s Jonesin’ Crossword, “My Ames Is True” — where it’s at – Jenni’s write-up

Like they say at ACPT, pay attention to the title! Each theme answer shows us where Ames is.

Jonesin’, Matt Jones, May 12, 2026, “My Ames Is True” – where it’s at, solution grid

• 17a [Broadcast signal carrier] is a RADIO WAVE.
• 23a [Name of multiple British earls (one of whom changed his name slightly and wrote the first Gothic novel)] is HORATIO WALPOLE. Apparently that would be The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole.
• 35a [Soundproofing square] is a STUDIO WALL PANEL.
• 45a [Electronic identifier embedded in sound files to protect copyright] is an AUDIO WATERMARK.
• 57a [Series of Nintendo microgames featuring a squiggly-mustached villian] is WARIO WARE.

I really enjoyed this! I finished the puzzle with no idea what the theme was even though I noticed the WA in each theme answer. Then I went back and looked at title. I may have said “aha!” out loud.

What I didn’t know before I did this puzzle: see above re: HORATIO WALPOLE. I also had never heard of WARIO WARE.

I leave you with this for obvious reasons.

Jim Heane’s Universal Crossword “School’s Out” — Eric’s Review

Jim Heane’s Universal Crossword “School’s Out’ — 5/12/26 (Click to Enlarge)

All your favorite fishes are hiding out here in the circled letters:

• 17A [*Brought forward to exhibit] TROTTED OUT Trout
• 29A [*Oscar winner for “Children of a Lesser God”] MARLEE MATLIN Marlin
• 49A [*Sound judgment that few have?] PERFECT PITCH Perch Nice clue, with the play on the different meanings of “sound.”
• 65A [Clumsily search in a bag, or a theme hint] FISH AROUND The second part of that answer is an indicator that each fish starts in the left-most letters of a theme answer and ends in the right-most letters. Fair enough.

With such a common theme type, the theme answers have to be interesting. These are fine, though I wonder if younger solvers will know anything about Ms Matlin.

Other stuff:

• 15A [Like the dish quzi or the city Basra] IRAQI I hadn’t heard of قوزي) which is transliterated as “quzi,” “qoozi,” or “ghoozi.” Wikipedia says it is “usually prepared by stuffing a whole lamb with rice, vegetables, spices and nuts and slow-cooking it over a closed or submerged oven.” I like lamb quite a lot and this sounds interesting.
• 24A [Poker variant from which “ace in the hole” originated] STUD I didn’t know this, but it makes sense.
• 36A [Greenland’s is often inflated on a map] SIZE On the Mercator projection maps often used when I was in elementary school, “Greenland appears the same size as Africa, when in reality Africa’s area is 14 times as large.” (Wikipedia again.)
• 13D [Question for someone with an agenda?] WHAT’S NEXT? Cute.
• 33D [Spur-of-the-moment] EX TEMPORE Fancy, all that Latin.
• 34D [Present presented for being present] DOOR PRIZE I won a nice little door prize last week — $50 in gift cards to a coffee stand.

John Ruff’s New York Times Crossword — Eric’s Review

John Ruff’s New York Times Crossword — 5/12/26 (Click to Enlarge)

Congratulations to John Ruff, who appears to be making his crossword constructing debut in a publication covered by Diary of a Crossword Fiend.

It helps to recognize some British place names here:

• 17A [Listing at an ice cream shop in Ipswich] FLAVOUR OF THE DAY
• 27A [Kids’ items at a day care in Derby] COLOURING BOOKS
• 46A [Areas on a map of Manchester] NEIGHBOURHOODS
• 58A [“Hmm, why use the spellings of 17-, 27- and 46-Across?”] OH YOU ARE BRITISH O-U-R. Very punny.

Other stuff:

• 23A [Some limb-moving muscles] ABDUCTOR Specifically, moving a limb or part away from the midline of the body, or from another part.
• 64A [A pelican can hold more water in this than in its belly] BILL I’m not surprised to learn that.
• 5D [Instrument with a Renaissance-era ancestor called a sackbut] TROMBONE I knew a sackbut was a wind instrument, but I had thought the trombone was based on the trumpet.

Zhouqin Burnikel’s Los Angeles Times crossword — Erin’s write-up

Los Angeles Times solution, 5/12/26

Hello lovelies! We’re keeping up with a Tuesday food theme trend for the LAT.

• 17a. [Practical baby shower gift] DIAPER GENIE
• 26a. [Sheer brilliance] PURE GENIUS
• 36a. [Hidden nerdy side] INNER GEEK
• 52a. [Pumping device in a pub] BEER ENGINE
• 61a. [Simple salad, or what 17-, 26-, 36-, and 52-Across all have] MIXED GREENS. Each theme entry has the word GREEN scrambled somewhere.

Other things:

• 32a. [Fish enjoyed on Unagi Day] EELS. Doyo-no Ushi-no Hi (Day of the Ox) is a day each summer in Japan when people eat eel for strength and stamina, usually in the form of unadon, or grilled eel over rice. Unadon is delicious.
• 55a. [Leafy vegetable rich in vitamin K] KALE. Vitamin K is essential for proper blood clotting.

Aiden Glenn’s Wall Street Journal crossword “Highlights” — Jim Q’s write-up

***There’s no record of Aiden’s name in the meta-data for this site, so this is likely a debut! Congrats, Aiden!***

THEME: The dipper constellation (user’s pick: big or small) is represented by blocks that spell S-T-A-R

WSJ • 5/12/26 • Tue • “Highlights” • Aidan Glenn • solution • 20260512

THEME ANSWERS:

• 7 STAR Blocks
• (revealer) [Ladle, and a hint to this puzzle’s circles] DIPPER

A nifty puzzle visually. It’s never easy to arrange letters into shapes like this and still emerge with mostly clean fill… a much harder construction feat than it appears at first glance. And for the most part, this one pulls it off. The grid felt oddly open to me too, despite technically landing at 76 words.

The downside is that once the gimmick clicks, the theme more or less runs out of runway. Once you realize the circled squares spell S-T-A-R, you can essentially autofill the rest since the letters even occupy the same positions each time. And if I’m being picky, the block formations themselves don’t especially evoke stars to me. The somewhat awkwardly placed revealer didn’t entirely sell the concept either.

OTHER THINGS:

• [Record producers?] ARRESTS Excellent clue.
• [Place with pumps] GAS STATIONS Could also describe shoe stores, and honestly that version would probably cost less these days.
• [___ tissue (connective tissue with sparse fibers)] AREOLAR Completely new word for me.
• [Amount a person can carry] ARMLOAD Nice, sturdy entry.
• [Famed Italian restaurant in East Harlem] RAO’S Ah yes, the origin of the extremely expensive supermarket sauce.
• [Black-plumed water bird] COOT Deeply unfortunate bird name.
• [Rightmost boxes on many cals.] SATS Ugly pluralized abbreviation. Why not just clue it as the much more familiar Scholastic Aptitude Tests?

Fun concept, but a less satisfying solve than I’d hoped.

Wyna Liu’a New Yorker Crossword — Eric’s Review

Wyna Liu’s New Yorker Crossword — 5/12/26 (Click to Enlarge)

This is a nice puzzle, and my solving experience was fairly smooth, with no major hangups. It didn’t feel like it took more than 10 minutes, and yet it did. I still don’t care much for the new New Yorker solving interface because I’m never quite sure where I am in the grid relative to the clues.

Anyway:

• 1A [Cantina order wrapped in a husk] TAMAL Language purists rejoice! No room here for the Americanism “tamale.”
• 13A [Recurring “Jeopardy!” category about alcoholic beverages] POTENT POTABLES I expect that was a gimme for many solvers, as there’s a big overlap between crossword solvers and Jeopardy! viewers. Not me, as I haven’t watched the show regularly in decades. But I knew their category names are often alliterative, which helped. It also helped that POTIONS was too short.
• 16A [Bright pinkish red] CERISE That’s French for “cherry,” which seems a bit odd. The cherries I usually see are a deeper red than “pinkish,” but I know there are different varieties. (The dictionary I checked defines “cerise” as “a bright or deep red color.”)
• 28A [Believe] BUY It took me much too long to think of that Y.
• 35A [Auto-tune source?] CAR RADIO Cute clue.
• 40A [Mail, e.g.] ARMOR Yep, I thought only of apps for a long time.
• 42A [“Mercedes Benz” singer Joplin] JANIS I must have heard that song a lot as a kid, because I pretty much still know all the words. But it’s got a repetitive lyrical structure, which helps for memorization.
• 49A [“Just circling back . . .”] PER MY LAST EMAIL I’m glad I’m retired and generally don’t have to read any email that I don’t want to read.
• 52A [Climax of a French novel?] LA PETITE MORT Cute clue.  Literally, it means the “little death.” I’d always thought that it was how the French refer to an orgasm, but apparently, it’s the brief loss of consciousness you might experience after climax.
• 5D [Drug used to treat high cholesterol] LIPITOR I wish this hadn’t been such a gimme.
• 8D [Something used in lieu of bookkeeping?] LIBRARY CARD Cute clue. After 18 months in my new home, I finally got my library card. I’m interested to see if they have the translation of The Magic Mountain that I’m three-fourths through as an e-book, because I’m becoming convinced that reading on my iPad is not helping me sleep.
• 13D [“The Merchant of Venice” character who says, “The quality of mercy is not strained”] PORTIA This should have been a gimme; I finally read that play about four months ago.
• 25D [McDonald who played Rose in the 2024 Broadway revival of “Gypsy”] AUDRA I didn’t know she’d done that show, but she’s the only “McDonald” on Broadway I can think of. Too bad I couldn’t (at first) get the crosses to work.
• 27D [Quick ___] FIX Another three-letter word that should’ve been instantaneous and wasn’t.
• 30D [Gripping part of a flight?] BANISTER Cute clue. With the AN in place, I tried to get HANDRAIL to work. Nope.
• 36D [Zoomorphic marshmallow treat] PEEP The popularity of that kind of candy will always puzzle me.
• 39D [Gurira of “Black Panther”] DANAI I saw the first Black Panther movie, which probably suffered from being watched on a small screen. I vaguely remember the character of General Okoye, but had no idea of the actress’ name.