tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post7378744902455409144..comments2024-03-28T14:57:33.856-04:00Comments on Rex Parker Does the NYT Crossword Puzzle: SATURDAY, Jun 6 2009 — Nematodes piercing mouthparts / Creator of Stupefyin Jones / Killer * green-skinned Batman villain / Space-scanning proj)Rex Parkerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16145707733877505087noreply@blogger.comBlogger81125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-55107856428655430312009-07-12T03:35:14.864-04:002009-07-12T03:35:14.864-04:00My education ON sub-atomic particles ended in 1968...My education ON sub-atomic particles ended in 1968 (thankfully) so I had never heard of a HADRON.<br /><br />IMHO, blood pudding (with a contribution from a PIG) doesn't pass the breakfast test.<br /><br />I had a tough time with this puzzle and was only able to fill in about 3/4 of it. But what I had was correct!!<br /><br />I liked CHUGS (Downs without a break) but first thought it might be some football term I didn't know....<br /><br />@Noam D. Elkies: Thanks for the mention of Tom Lehrer's Elements. I looked it up on YouTube. It was delightful and the version that included animation was clever.shrub5https://www.blogger.com/profile/09466867716773759568noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-56033296764838113232009-06-08T11:12:22.136-04:002009-06-08T11:12:22.136-04:00For me, LENAPE was a total gimme. I grew up in th...For me, LENAPE was a total gimme. I grew up in the Philadelphia area, near West Chester PA, where there used to be the Lenape Amusement Park. Rinky-dink kiddy rides and spook houses and all that, but hey, it was great, and our family went there most 4th of July's.<br /><br />Like a lot of local names, it was Indian in origin, but I had no idea. But every time there's the littlest news item that refers to one of these Indians, a light bulb goes off. And yes, the Lenape are in the news every so often, and that particular light bulb burns extra bright.<br /><br />So Delaware + tribe + 6 letters + fondly remembered defunct amusement park gave me LENAPE instantly. In fact, I ended up solving this puzzle bottom up thanks to that clue.william e embanoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-846360893258110352009-06-08T04:33:45.462-04:002009-06-08T04:33:45.462-04:00@Dan
um...Nexis Herb Caen circa 1984-86
and then w...@Dan<br />um...Nexis Herb Caen circa 1984-86<br />and then write to me with an apology!<br />;)<br /><br />(I think we're tied...he quoted one of my jokes about Nancy Reagan being the first artificial heart "donor" and one about Diane Feinstein having the first baboon "hair" transplant...I know, I know, but they were topical at the time! All about Barney Clark and baboon hearts, etc. heady times!)andrea cocks michaelsnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-72795101971218359592009-06-07T05:16:48.954-04:002009-06-07T05:16:48.954-04:00As to "Bikini spec" I was thinking biger...As to "Bikini spec" I was thinking biger than C CUP. <br />I was all MTON.<br /><br />MEAT AND POTATOES<br />ITSY BITSY SPIDER <br />have a nice homey feel,<br /><br />LEAVE IT TO BEAVER<br />SEEING EYE SINGLE<br />bring a nice feel of '60s suburbia.<br /><br />SETI TASS SSRS cold war era stuff..<br /><br />what's more America than AL CAPP and PECANS?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-40885717014102277142009-06-07T02:13:21.588-04:002009-06-07T02:13:21.588-04:00A good rule of thumb is "any applet solver wi...A good rule of thumb is "any applet solver with a faster time than danfeyer is a cheater, unless it's tylerhinman."Orangehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12433254398377357737noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-54152416384164866632009-06-07T01:27:57.535-04:002009-06-07T01:27:57.535-04:00There are usually only a few cheaters on any given...There are usually only a few cheaters on any given day (not the same people - repeat offenders often get "banned" from the standings), and they're most evident on Fri/Sat. You could exclude them pretty easily - I or Orange could give you a list of the legitimate top-tenners... :)<br /><br />@fergus - wow, I never noticed that arithmetic serendipity!, @mac - alas, I took a break from word games from ages 14-29, @Stan - thanks, @Alex P. - hey send me an email, oh, it's not you? darn. (I should really get in touch with him, we were good pals in 7th/8th grade...)Danhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11209543514266918480noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-9888383876705864102009-06-07T01:00:55.236-04:002009-06-07T01:00:55.236-04:00I well recognize that the medians I've been po...I well recognize that the medians I've been posting are by no means a scientifically valid experiment (I too am a statistician by trade). But I don't think they're completely uninformative. I'm sure that there are people at the top of the list who solve the puzzle on paper or, worse yet, wait for Rex (or some other web site) to reveal the answers and then type them into the web interface at breakneck speed. But I think the vast majority of times are probably legit and using medians rather than means ameliorates the effect of extreme values (at least to some degree). Yes, there's the problem of having what is undoubtedly a totally different sample on Monday from that on Friday and Saturday. It might be interesting to look at the median value for something like the 25th through 200th or so best times each day. That should eliminate any cheaters at the top of the list and the unworldly solvers.sanfranman59https://www.blogger.com/profile/15118732156312301425noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-9052934334153857882009-06-07T00:44:22.841-04:002009-06-07T00:44:22.841-04:00As re: time-to-completion over the course of a wee...As re: time-to-completion over the course of a week ... One could probably track the stats posted in real time to the NYT site. If you checked in each day for a week, you could get a pseudo-representative (and comparative) sense of both average rate of completion success and average competion speed. I'd expect in the first instance that the total completing would attrit over a week (and, of course, that the average time to completion would increase.) The data would allow one to say, if nothing else, that among those who completed puzzles for each day of the week, average speed decreased at a rate of x. The total n is large enough to get a fairly robust statistical read. I think. I don't really know what I'm talking about.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-30456410315568167802009-06-06T23:57:40.355-04:002009-06-06T23:57:40.355-04:0016 + 33 = 49
-Bill Walsh16 + 33 = 49 <br /><br />-Bill Walshfergushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17056002311944010536noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-53035124088183050492009-06-06T23:43:16.994-04:002009-06-06T23:43:16.994-04:00Loved it!Loved it!nanpillahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05548473809500612699noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-74913802975582296902009-06-06T22:52:59.395-04:002009-06-06T22:52:59.395-04:00@Dan -- Great, interesting, cool post. Also, compl...@Dan -- Great, interesting, cool post. Also, completely on topic.Stanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02681342234536407419noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-47398492275976940282009-06-06T22:38:18.389-04:002009-06-06T22:38:18.389-04:00PECANS are a fine accompaniment to one's ice c...PECANS are a fine accompaniment to one's ice cream, if there's nothing else going on on Saturday night.<br /><br /><br />Pardon my preponderant stress on "on" but someone had to do it.fergushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17056002311944010536noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-22325579458416417862009-06-06T21:51:34.490-04:002009-06-06T21:51:34.490-04:00Despite the fact that my times totally s**k compar...Despite the fact that my times totally s**k compared to the upper echelon of solvers, I am posting them on Amy Reynaldo's blog. SFman59, where should I post them?retired_chemisthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13181126754941899228noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-13086922928422912912009-06-06T21:44:16.619-04:002009-06-06T21:44:16.619-04:00Foodie,
I'm quite interested in this question...Foodie,<br /><br />I'm quite interested in this question, and I like your approach, but I have to think that any methodology would require a conscientious crowd ready to submit honest answers. That's to be found here "on" this blog, where the data might also be selectively mined, but it's probably a much more reliable source than the numbers we've seen from the New York Times. <br /><br />Thanks to those who have supplied numbers of solving times, but as an an economist, and thus a Statitcstics guy, gradually becoming pleased with the direction the profession is taking after so many years, there's an openness to genuine human behavior.<br /><br /><br />So you may also be curious about a wider data set.fergushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17056002311944010536noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-12691602659912086942009-06-06T21:35:53.642-04:002009-06-06T21:35:53.642-04:00@foodie
Thanks for following this up. Everything ...@foodie<br /><br />Thanks for following this up. Everything you say makes sense to me.michaelnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-48824705991652742722009-06-06T21:12:14.131-04:002009-06-06T21:12:14.131-04:00@ sanfranman59
thanks for doing this! If Rex is O...@ sanfranman59<br /><br />thanks for doing this! If Rex is OK with it, then another week would be very interesting to see. It would tell us what the level of variation is form one week to the next. <br /><br />@michael,I think you and I agree that the decreasing number of solvers as the week progresses makes the data harder to interpret. But I feel it is informative.<br /><br />For instance, I think we can safely conclude that for a sizable number of people, Friday was harder than Saturday. And for ratios, I think we can probably get a sense of their lower limits. Since it's a good bet that the best solvers stayed across the entire week whereas the less experienced ones only attempted early, we can say that Friday took AT LEAST 4 times longer than Monday, but probably more. <br /><br />A much more demanding but more precise way to analyze the ratio question is to start with those people who completed Friday/Saturday under 1 hour, and work back and find out how they did on the previous days of the week (assuming that they bothered with the easy days). One is then only selecting the best solvers and getting their ratios. But I'm not recommending it given the time it would take.foodiehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13052189131129098616noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-1304131279914949972009-06-06T20:19:01.287-04:002009-06-06T20:19:01.287-04:00Dan, untrue, that was totally cool.
Number 33 ta...Dan, untrue, that was totally cool.<br /><br /> Number 33 taking hand-offs from and receiving short passes from the revered number 16 is a memory that lives on, even among those who care not for 49ers.fergushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17056002311944010536noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-9640597060578037242009-06-06T20:05:49.267-04:002009-06-06T20:05:49.267-04:00@Dan
Dude! That was totally uncool!@Dan <br />Dude! That was totally uncool!Alex P...noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-79966870234414097432009-06-06T20:00:35.540-04:002009-06-06T20:00:35.540-04:00@sanfranman59
I wonder if there is a sampling pro...@sanfranman59<br /><br />I wonder if there is a sampling problem here. Note how many more posters there are for the beginning of the week than the end of the week. This suggests to me that the less-skilled posters are not putting up times for Friday and Saturday -- doubtless because they can't finish these puzzles. It therefore seems to me that we can't conclude from this data anything about (1) average solving times; and (2) average ratio of solving times at different times of the week. I find this data interesting (mostly telling me that there are some good solvers out there -- which I already knew somewhat), but have no idea what it tells us.michaelnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-56386365557300672062009-06-06T19:42:26.625-04:002009-06-06T19:42:26.625-04:00This week's median solve times. As predicted b...This week's median solve times. As predicted by at least a couple people here, today's is better than yesterday's. I've been trying to check the times close to when NYT posts the next day's puzzle, but I didn't do so well yesterday or today because I wasn't near my computer at 6pm Eastern.<br /><br />If there's interest out here, I'm willing to keep this going for a few weeks to get more stable average times. (Rex, just say the word if this is outside the scope of what you want to see on your blog and I'll cease and desist.)<br /><br />Mon 7:10 (800)<br />Tue 8:20 (807)<br />Wed 9:51 (754)<br />Thu 15:36 (489)<br />Fri (< 1 hr) 28:53 (334)<br />Fri (all) 33:08 (428)<br />Sat (< 1 hr) 23:05 (298)<br />Sat (all) 25:13 (343)sanfranman59https://www.blogger.com/profile/15118732156312301425noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-64221034474555747282009-06-06T19:40:05.269-04:002009-06-06T19:40:05.269-04:00I did this relatively quickly for a Saturday for m...I did this relatively quickly for a Saturday for me, but nothing like the six and eight minute times others are posting. I agree with the poster who wrote that it was the form of the puzzle rather than the clue-answer combinations that made this doable.<br /><br /> I'm a baseball fan so seeing eye single was familiar (though not all that common), but it must have been mysterious for most solvers.michaelnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-9957015192721633112009-06-06T19:30:44.360-04:002009-06-06T19:30:44.360-04:00@Dan: great story. Didn't realize you started ...@Dan: great story. Didn't realize you started the word games that early!machttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06794371617847975218noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-26022533252063376102009-06-06T18:46:18.165-04:002009-06-06T18:46:18.165-04:00Thank you, Doug and Will, for including CAEN again...Thank you, Doug and Will, for including CAEN again so soon, so I can brag about making Herb Caen's column... twice! I bet even Andrea can't match that. Here are the Nexis hits:<br /><br /><i>The San Francisco Chronicle<br />MAY 14, 1991, TUESDAY, FINAL EDITION<br />SECTION: NEWS; Pg. D1; HERB CAEN; LENGTH: 926 words; HEADLINE: The Galloping Gamut; BYLINE: Herb Caen</i><br /><br />ADD INFINITEMS: Newspaper publishers worry that teenagers aren't reading their fishwraps but I know two who do. Daniel Feyer, a 13-year-old eighth-grader at San Francisco Day School, read my item about a fancy anagram the other day and immediately twisted Saddam Hussein into "Damned as sushi." This inspired his pal 14-yr-old Alex Pappademas, who, in 37 seconds, transformed Berkeley, California, into "Fear Icky Neo-Liberal." I am proud to have these young people as readers . . .<br /><br />(It turned out that Alex had plagiarized his anagram from <i>Rolling Stone</i> or somewhere - oops. He's a rather successful entertainment journalist now! GQ cover story, anyone? . . . Apologies for soiling your Google transcript, Alex.)<br /><br /><i>The San Francisco Chronicle<br />MAY 23, 1991, THURSDAY, FINAL EDITION<br />SECTION: NEWS; Pg. B1; HERB CAEN; LENGTH: 937 words; HEADLINE: Poor Herbert's Almanac; BYLINE: Herb Caen</i><br /><br />. . . Daniel Feyer, the 13-yr-old eighth-grader at the S.F. Day School who got hooked on anagrams while perusing this fascinating column, comes up with another dandy. He has rejiggered "World Champion San Francisco Giants" into "Al cons fans. Craig can't win so drop him." More, Daniel, more! . . .<br /><br />(Al Rosen was the Giants' GM, sometimes appearing in crosswords as [1953 American League MVP] . . . Roger Craig was the Giants' manager, and a different Roger Craig from the S.F. 49ers' star running back in the '80s/'90s. The two Roger Craigs has to be one of the great name coincidences of all time . . . I didn't do any more anagrams, because I no longer had boring eighth-grade classes in which to work on them . . . It's too bad that Larry King's <i>The USA Today</i> column has given "three-dot journalism" a bad name. RIP, Herb.)Danhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11209543514266918480noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-11257648763357995122009-06-06T18:33:15.515-04:002009-06-06T18:33:15.515-04:00And I like Foodie's reasoning with respect to ...And I like Foodie's reasoning with respect to mechanical and contemplative processing time. I find myself a little slow in the mechanics, which means I'll never be able to complete a puzzle in less than five minutes. But Monday and Tuesday rarely take me above ten. With today's solve at around 15 and yesterday's around 30, my ratios are seemingly comparatively low. <br /><br />Raw time: a two or three factor, but with the rescaled adjustment of five minutes of mechanical processing tossed out as a constant in the equation, a variation of up to five or six from Monday to Saturday shows up. <br /><br />This analysis reminds me of ACME's wish for damnable puzzles in tournaments, since the mechanical part would become ever more diluted. And I'm not meaning to dis the remarkable skills of speed-solvers ...fergushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17056002311944010536noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35115061.post-82280004855694748102009-06-06T18:30:24.111-04:002009-06-06T18:30:24.111-04:00Fun puzzle; took me less than 20 minutes at the be...Fun puzzle; took me less than 20 minutes at the beach.<br /><br />One write-over - had BARONET before CORONET.Bob Kerfufflehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02615811802419025933noreply@blogger.com