Tag Archives: Peter Gordon

NYT Crossword Puzzle 9-19-21 Complete (contains spoilers)

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I pulled out 63A Relative of cerulean: AZURE because I got it immediately, and I’m proud of that. Hooray for blues!

From National Colour Supplies.

Pantone named Cerulean the color of 2000/color of the millennium. They really cut it fine waiting until 2000 to choose it. But that’s smarter than calling the murder of Stanford White the Crime of the Century back in 1906.

The title of this puzzle is New Look.

23A Meticulous magical beings?: THOROUGHFAIRIES. Just because you’re winging it doesn’t mean you can’t do a good job.
32A Like some cross-Caribbean flights?: PANAMAHAITI. The first of two headwear clues. More on that a little later.
50A Journals of a certain stunt performer?: DOUBLEDIARIES. A better clue would have been Journals of certain game show contestants?
68A Possible reason for refusing to wear a tank top?: SHOULDERHAIRINESS. Nothing to be ashamed of. Be who you are.
85A Means of learning about Chiang Kai-shek?: BOOKSONTAIPEI. Checks out.
99A Inept dancers at Oktoberfest?: POLKAIDIOTS. So true!

116A New look provider … or a homophonic hint to this puzzle’s theme: FRESHPAIROFEYES. Because they’re other phrases when you remove the I’s.

THOROUGHFARES, DOUBLEDARES, SHOULDERHARNESS, BOOKSONTAPE, POLKADOTS.

Now, there’s 124A Felt on the head?: STETSON. And Stetson makes a Panama hat!

From Del Monico Hatter

Finished this one in 37:25.

DayThis WkBestAverage4-Wk AvgStreak
Monday4:313:499:266:5674
Tuesday12:225:2213:179:091
Wednesday11:207:3817:0911:5115
Thursday13:4512:1228:2625:501
Friday26:5516:2332:4221:0215
Saturday22:0420:1233:0228:3515
Sunday37:2515:1154:1547:432

NYT Crossword Puzzle 7-5-21 Complete (contains spoilers)

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The Monday streak is now to 64. That’s a lot of Mondays in a row. I’m proud to keep that going.

I pulled out 10D Cheese-on-toast dish: RAREBIT. I hadn’t heard of rarebit. So I looked up the etymology, and I am not satisfied.

rarebit (n.)

1785, an absurd perversion of (Welsh) rabbit, as if from rare (adj.) + bit (n.).

So no help.

I don’t know if I fully understand the the theme of this puzzle. I mean I think I get it, but I don’t know if it’s as superficial as it seems, since I haven’t seen a theme clue.

17A Marine inhabitant that’s an animal, not a plant, despite what it’s called: SEA[C]UCUMBER.
27A Angry shout to a miscreant: WHY[Y]OULITTLE.
41A Sobriquet for Simón Bolívar: EL[L]IBERTADOR.
54A Observation satellite: EYE[I]NTHESKY.

So the theme is just that the the word that precedes the circled letter is the letter as a word?

Finished this one in 6:00.

DayThis WkBestAverage
Monday6:003:499:30
Tuesday5:5213:46
Wednesday7:3817:36
Thursday13:0929:54
Friday16:2335:42
Saturday27:4336:06
Sunday15:1158:57

NYT Crossword 10-28-20 Complete

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OK. What. In. The. World! I know I’m a little out of practice, but when did Wednesday get to be so difficult? I’m used to taking a beating on Thursdays, not Wednesdays. And I completed this partially by brute force until the it finally told me that I had finished and am on a one-day streak despite clearly being on a three-day streak. Way to cut it unnecessarily Shortz, NYTXW.

That’s clearly three days.

This puzzle was absurd, but before the madness, there’s some fun.

68A U.S. Navy builder: SEABEE
This reminds me of riding bikes on at the beach with my family. I think that was the first time I had heard of the Seabees. My dad told me about how they build stuff like bees do and on the sea because the US Navy. But also that it was CB for Construction Brigade. It was among the easy clues for me to get in this puzzle.

But this puzzle was ?????????????

1A With 21-, 30-, 49-, 61- and 74-Across, end of a Carrie Bradshaw quote that starts “Men in their 40s are like the New York Times Sunday crossword puzzle …”: TRICKY. From the word go. Holy smokes!
21A Part 2 of the quote: COMPLICATED AND
30A Part 3: YOU’RE NEVER
49A Part 4: REALLY SURE
61A Part 5: YOU GOT THE RIGHT
66A Casual ristorante: TRATTORIA. You know, just to see if you’re paying attention.
74A End of the quote: ANSWER

So Men in their 40s are like the New York Times Sunday crossword puzzle Tricky, shamelessly self-promoting, complicated, and you’re never really sure you got the right answer.

I had been able to work a bunch of these parts from letters that were in there and the reference to the Sunday puzzle, and you’ll notice above that I did not complete Sunday’s.

Now, this puzzle took me just under half an hour to complete. In contrast, my best Wednesday was 7:55 on August 5, and my average is 18:01. So for this to be what it is and for me to have struggled with it like I had is head-shaking times.