Fashion designer Carolina / SUN 2-15-26 / Duchess of ___ (noted Spanish title) / Certain public transit network / ___ Winter, basketball coach who famously innovated the "triangle offense" / Photo-editing technique used to create a smooth transition / Video game character aptly celebrated in Mar. 10 / Made younger-looking in an editing studio, say / Reality TV franchise created by Tyra Banks / Science-and-nature magazine familiarly / Sarcastic response to a show-off / Horn contents at a Viking feast

Constructor: Michael Lieberman and Rebecca Goldstein

Relative difficulty: Easy

THEME: "Good to the Last Drop" — theme answers "drop" (merging with separately clued Down answers) just after the letter string "HERE," as hinted at by the revealer, IT'S ALL DOWNHILL FROM HERE (73A: "Things are only going to get worse" ... or a hint to answering the seven italicized clues in this puzzle):

Theme answers:

• BLOW TO SMITHEREENS (24A: Completely destroy with a blast)
• MOTHER EARTH (27A: Gaia, by another name)
• TEACHER EDITION (40A: Version of a textbook designed for instruction)
• FEATHER EDGE (96A: Photo-editing technique used to create a smooth transition)
• ETHEREAL (93A: Delicate, as beauty)
• AT THE REAR (123A: In back)
• IS THAT ALL THERE IS? (125A: "Wait, are we done?")

Word of the Day: TEX Winter (60A: ___ Winter, basketball coach who famously innovated the "triangle offense") —

Morice Fredrick "Tex" Winter (February 25, 1922 – October 10, 2018) was an American basketball coach and innovator of the triangle offense, an offensive system that became the dominant force in the National Basketball Association (NBA) and resulted in 11 NBA Championships with the Chicago Bulls in the 1990s and the Los Angeles Lakers in the 2000s. He was a head coach in college basketball for 30 years before becoming an assistant coach in the NBA. He was an assistant to Phil Jackson on nine NBA championship teams with the Chicago Bulls and the Los Angeles Lakers. Winter was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 2011. In 2016, the NBA created the annually presented Tex Winter Assistant Coach Lifetime Impact Award in his honor. (wikipedia)

• • •

This one rides entirely on the revealer. It's a clever, extremely literal use of the phrase "IT'S ALL DOWNHILL FROM HERE"—it got a big "aha" out of me, for sure—but the theme itself is very one-note, with nothing particularly interesting or funny or clever to show you. Words contain the letter string "HERE," and after "HERE," they head ... down. Over and over and over (seven times). Kind of a shrug, and an easy one at that (once you know the "HERE"s are out there, you're basically given those four letters for free every time you see an italicized clue). Obviously the execution of this theme involves some intricate architecture. Those themers not only have to drop after the "HERE," but they have to merge seamlessly into Down answers. But from a solving standpoint, filling in those answers just wasn't that interesting. There's just not enough cleverness or humor to carry this one over a huge Sunday-sized grid (slightly oversized at 22 wide). It all works fine, but aside from the revealer, it lacked pop. My main feeling at the end was that it was all kind of dull. And, relatedly, once again, the puzzle was terribly easy. I've got red ink here and there on my grid print-out (signifying various snarl-ups), but it's pretty sparse, and none of the snarl-ups held me up for very long. The puzzle had just one answer that seemed particularly original, but sadly it was one of the answers I liked least: WEED TEA. I am clearly behind on the whole THC beverage craze (my only experience with edibles being sleep gummies). WEED TEA? It's really called that? Yeah, it looks like "cannabis tea" is indeed sometimes called WEED TEA. I wish that answer did something for me. I needed something in this puzzle to do something for me. I have to give that answer credit for trying, at least. The rest of the grid just kind of lies there. RESPELLED? Hmm. I'm making a very grimacey face right now just looking at that word. You will be shocked (shocked, I say!) to discover that both WEED TEA and RESPELLED are debuts. I'll say it for the billionth time: Not All Debuts Are Good™. But if it's WEED TEA vs. RESPELLED, well then, WEED TEA wins by TKO, for sure. 

By far the hardest part of the puzzle for me was this little knot in the upper middle, where (off of "-IT-") I had written in BITE for 47A: Sharpness (WITS). This left me with TRAM BAY in the cross (26D: Certain public transit network), which I was on the point of rationalizing: "You gotta keep the trams somewhere, I guess." Since "bay" has various architectural / structural meanings ("bomb bay," "cargo bay," etc.), I was ready to accept TRAM BAY ... but the clue says [Certain public transit network] and TRAM BAY (if such a thing existed) seemed like it would be *part* of a network, not the network itself. Annnnnyway, I left the mistake in place and would have kept it there til the end if it weren't for the unlikely help of U.S. STEEL (37D: World's first billion-dollar corporation). I thought, "that's gotta be U.S. STEEL," and a couple of crosses confirmed it, but I had "USE-" at the beginning (because I still had "BITE" for 47A: Sharpness). Eventually U.S. STEEL became undeniable, and after a second or so of trying to make BITS work for 47A: Sharpness, I took out the "B" from TRAM BAY and TRAM-AY / -ITS became TRAMWAY / WITS. Maybe I've heard the term TRAMWAY before but I don't know that I've ever been anywhere with a TRAMWAY. Disneyland, maybe? No, wait, trams are like streetcars or trolley cars? Public transport that runs on a network of rails integrated right into the urban environment. Well, I've been to San Francisco, and I've been on cable cars (which are a type of "tram"), so I guess I have seen a TRAMWAY. I don't remember anyone's calling it that. Thanks to wikipedia, I now know that San Francisco (where I was born) was the first city to operate cable trams, and Dunedin, NZ (where my wife grew up) was the second. Clearly we were fated to be married! Brought together by public transportation history! Ah, destiny! Happy belated Valentine's Day, everybody!

The other toughish part for me was FEATHER EDGE, a term I don't really know as I don't spend a lot of time editing photos. I put the "HERE" into that answer and it did virtually nothing for me, even after I got the "EDGE" bit (from WEDGE) (91D: Shoe with a thick sole). The impossible (for me) clue on ALBA (104A: Duchess of ___ (noted Spanish title)) and the very weird colloquial clue on "ABOUT TO" (98D: "Next on my list"), kept the FEATHER EDGE corner (SW) dicey there for a bit. But then (for the first time in my life) MARIO came to the rescue! Usually I'm tripping over myself trying to answer clues about the vast Mario Universe (about which I know nothing except what the puzzle tells me), but today, I got that MARIO clue easily (110D: Video game character aptly celebrated in Mar. 10). I don't think I've ever been so happy (or happy at all) to see a MARIO-related clue. MARIO ... MAR10 (i.e. Mar. 10, i.e. 3/10) ... you see the resemblance. Very cute. 

Bullets:

• ___ Winter, basketball coach who famously innovated the "triangle offense" (TEX) — I'm gonna dispute "famously" here. When you say "triangle offense," I say Phil Jackson. Phil Jackson ran the triangle offense "famously." This TEX guy may have "innovated" it, but I'm not sure "famously" applies, since this is the first I'm hearing of him. He was Jackson's assistant coach on nine championship teams (all six Bulls championships plus the Lakers' threepeat of 2000-02).
• 105A: Made younger-looking in an editing studio, say (DE-AGED) — a very real and (to me) very creepy thing. I associate the process with Scorsese's The Irishman, for which DeNiro and Pacino and Pesci were all digitally DE-AGED in order to play their younger selves.

• 107A: Reality TV franchise created by Tyra Banks (TOP MODEL) — as an enthusiastic non-watcher of so-called "Reality TV," I only know the names of shows from hearing them discussed ... wherever. I really thought this show was called America's Next TOP MODEL. Where am I getting that from? Oh ... well, that is its name. TOP MODEL is just how it's known familiarly (also ANTM, put that in your grid and smoke it!). Really could've used a "familiarly" here. But knowing the full name of the show made getting the partial name of the show pretty easy, actually.
• 62D: N.Y.C. neighborhood that's home to the Grey Art Museum (NOHO) — should've made "Grey Art Museum" my Word of the Day because that name meant absolutely nothing to me. You tell me "N.Y.C. neighborhood" and it's four letters, I'm going SOHO, maybe NOHO. So I waited for the cross. No problem. I've been to a lot of N.Y.C. museums, but I've never even heard of the Grey. Ah, I see, it's NYU's art museum. It's called the Grey Art Museum because of a 1973 gift of one thousand works from someone named Abby Weed Grey. So there's some more WEED for you, if you're into that.

That's all. See you next time.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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Like Miss Piggy and Captain Kirk, by birth / FRI 10-3-25 / Service to foster parents? / Professional juggling act? / One end of a lap / Something raised during Oktoberfest / Not listen to, as on Spotify / When repeated, a nonverbal "Can you hear me?" / Graduates in green-and-black regalia, in brief

Constructor: Rebecca Goldstein and Rafael Musa

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium

THEME: Taylor Swift new release day! — jk, there's no theme (Life of a Show Girl does come out today, though)

Word of the Day: Alfresco (43A: Alfresco dining spot = TERRACE) —

: taking place or located in the open air : outdoor, outdoors 

In addition to describing a type of dining, alfresco can also describe a kind of painting. The word fresco, which comes from the Italian adjective fresco, meaning "fresh," refers to a method of painting on fresh plaster. Although the "outdoors" sense of alfresco is by far the most common in current use, the term is sometimes used to describe painting done in the fresco manner—that is, on fresh plaster. (merriam-webster.com)

• • •

Lord help me, my first answer was IOWAN (16A: Like Miss Piggy and Captain Kirk, by birth). That's one of those bits of trivia that I feel guilty for knowing. I don't even know *how* I know Kirk is IOWAN, but it's not the kind of "knowledge" I'm exactly proud of. Felt a bit like cheating. If it hadn't been my first answer, if I hadn't whiffed on the first few clues I looked at, I wouldn't have found my knowing the answer so (semi-)embarrassing. But because it's the answer that gave me my first push, I felt like I'd accidentally discovered Easy mode, like the puzzle was stooping to my HALFASS level just to give me a chance. But once IOWAN went in, then bam, it's SKIP (and not MUTE) (1D: Not listen to, as on Spotify) and bam, it's SANDS, which is what I wanted initially but couldn't confirm (1A: Smooths out some rough edges), and bam, it's KNEES (cute; 14A: One end of a lap). And I never struggled again. All 'cause I know where some fictional characters were "born." In the olden days, IOWAN would've been clued via M*A*S*H's Radar O'Reilly (born in Ottumwa). . . actually, I'm not seeing him in any of the clues for IOWAN (or IOWA, for that. matter). How strange. He was iconically from Iowa. Wait, was Hawkeye also from Iowa. Because Hawkeyes are Iowans the way Sooners are Oklahomans, so ... was that entire M*A*S*H unit from Iowa!? No, Klinger was from Toledo, for sure. Oh, and it turns out Hawkeye was, bizarrely, from Crabapple Cove, ME. For future reference, the people used in NYTXW clues for IOWAN include Grant Wood, Herbert Hoover, Buffalo Bill, John Wayne, and Johnny Carson, as well as (back in the day) a senator named Hickenlooper and a VP named Wallace (the very first IOWAN clue, 1944)

After Miss Piggy and Captain Kirk came to my rescue, I was fine. Nothing more than minor hiccups the rest of the way, and even an occasional feeling of whoosh-whoosh zoom-zoom. Like here, for instance:

Those three Downs in the NW did not exactly come charging out of the gates, but once they went in, whoosh, there went WORK-LIFE BALANCE, and the whole grid opened up (33A: Professional juggling act?). Overall, the puzzle felt solid and smooth, if not as spicy as I tend to expect from these (accomplished) constructors. "PLEASE BE PATIENT" is a very real phrase, but it reminds me of being on hold, and of computer voices pretending to care about me or my time or my struggle to talk to a human representative, so I don't like it at all. I do, however, like CRYBABIES and "ASK ANYONE!"—that SW corner is nice. The rest of the long answers are OK, but lacking something in the zing department. The one thing that slowed me down at all today was the compound nature of so many of the answers. I'd get one part of an answer, but somehow the next part of the answer wouldn't come. Had ANOTHER and no idea about ONE (2D: "Apparently we weren't done with these"), DEAD and no idea about LINKS (4D: Bad internet connections?) (I was thinking [Bad internet connections?] had to do with DEAD LINES). Then TAX and no idea about LAWYER (32D: One skilled at withholding details), and GET but no idea about ANGRY (23D: Lose it) (this one really should've come to me right away, but somehow GET AGGRO (!?) was running interference). Otherwise, the only things that made me hesitate today in any significant way were the MDS / DOCUSERIES crossing (27A: Graduates in green-and-black regalia, in brief / 28D: Reality shows?) (didn't know about the colors of the former, and the clue on DOCUSERIES was just too vauge for me to get without that initial "D" ... I wanted FOCUS-something-something). Oh, and I wrote in COLT before FOAL (22D: One under a mare's care). Not thrilled about the two "ONE"s in the grid, though one of the ONEs is part of ANYONE, so it probably gets a pass. Also, two ASSes? One American, one British? (HALFASS, ARSE). I can't say I'm mad about that, but I did notice.

Bullets:

• 14A: One end of a lap (KNEES) — the other end is your hips, or the tops of your thighs, to be more specific. This is the "lap" you make when you sit.
• 19A: "Bygones will be bygone, ___ fadin' into gray" (Taylor Swift lyric) ("ERAS") — you don't have to know the lyric, really. If you have been solving puzzles at all for the last couple years, you know Taylor Swift had a huge ERAS Tour. This is the ninth (!) time that ERAS has gotten a Swift-related clue. Today is the release date of Taylor Swift's much-anticipated new album, The Life of a Showgirl. And so ... a new "era" has begun. The reviews seem good. I haven't heard a note. Let's listen.

[this song namechecks the Plaza Athenée in the first line—I spent one night there in 1987; my first night in Paris, and I spent it at the most expensive and beautiful hotel I've ever been in, before or since. You see, my father made a huge mistake with the hotel booking—what he thought was the weekly rate was actually the *nightly* rate. So we were out of there the next day, off to some hotel with Eiffel Towers for key rings, LOL. But that one night has stayed with me. Step out onto the wrought-iron balcony of your room and hello Eiffel Tower. The robes! The wallpaper! The jet lag! What a time!]

• 37A: When repeated, a nonverbal "Can you hear me?" ([TAP]) — without any "mic" context, this was toughish. Also, you usually follow the [TAP] [TAP] with something verbal, don't you? "Testing" or some such? 
• 56A: Something raised during Oktoberfest (BEER TENT) — not a term I know, though one I can certainly visualize. I wanted some kind of STEIN, of course.

That's all for today. See you next time.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

P.S. tomorrow is the Midwest Crossword Tournament in Chicago. Registration has closed for both in-person and online solvers, but you can preorder the puzzle packs here. Good luck to everyone participating!

[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Facebook and Letterboxd]
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Lego piece in the shape of a person or animal / MON 8-11-25 / Small tower on a castle / Recipient of two Golden Globe Best Actress nominations for Netflix's "GLOW" / Independence Day banger / Apt anagram of NOTE / German cry of annoyance / Craftiest animal in the Garden of Eden / Channel with a call to order?

Constructor: Rebecca Goldstein

Relative difficulty: Medium-Challenging (for a Monday, solved Downs-only)

THEME: CHEESE BOARD (64A: Cocktail party staple that may contain the ends of 17-, 25-, 38-, 42- and 55-Across) — just like the clue says: last words of all the themers might are all items you might find on a CHEESE BOARD: 

Theme answers:

• FIRECRACKER (17A: Independence Day banger)
• TRAFFIC JAM (25A: Rush hour snarl)
• MINIFIG (38A: Lego piece in the shape of a person or animal)
• "HI, HONEY" (42A: Warm greeting to a spouse or partner)
• ALISON BRIE (55A: Recipient of two Golden Globe Best Actress nominations for Netflix's "GLOW")

Word of the Day: ALISON BRIE (55A) —

Alison Brie Schermerhorn (born December 29, 1982) is an American actress, writer, and producer.

Brie earned recognition for playing Trudy Campbell in the drama series Mad Men (2007–2015), and had her breakthrough starring as Annie Edison in the sitcom Community (2009–2015). She then voiced Diane Nguyen in the animated comedy series BoJack Horseman (2014–2020) and portrayed Ruth Wilder in the comedy drama series GLOW (2017–2019), receiving nominations at the Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild Awards for the latter.

In addition to her television work, Brie has featured in films such as Scream 4 (2011), The Five-Year Engagement (2012), The Lego Movie film series (2014–2019), Get Hard (2015), Sleeping with Other People (2015), How to Be Single (2016), The Post (2017), The Little Hours (2017), Promising Young Woman (2020), and Happiest Season (2020). She also wrote, produced, and starred in the films Horse Girl (2020), Spin Me Round (2022), and Somebody I Used to Know (2023). (wikipedia)

• • •

Whoa, that was a rush! As a Downs-only solving experience, that was about as thrilling as it gets. Things kept seeming impossible (so many longish Downs), and then bam, I'd get a crucial Down and then crack some kind of pattern recognition code and boop boop boop, a section would fill itself in. In the NW, in the SE, in the middle-to-NE section, this sort of "uh oh, I'm sunk" followed by "wait! I got it!" cycle kept occurring. And that's not even counting the total leap of faith I had to take on MINIFIG (which I fig-(!)-ured was an actual miniature fruit until I looked at the clue post-solve). I put in GARB, then took out GARB because what long word ends in '-FIG?', then finally had to leave it because everything else looked good. I also had to navigate (!!) ERIE and its FISH without being able to look at the clue for ERIE and having a complete non-clue for FISH (26D: See 31-Across)—eventually, I figured, sure, ERIE's a lake, it's got FISH in it ... why not? And sure enough, why not! When I carefully clacked in the last few letters in REHEARSE (once I realized the clue was asking for a verb, not a noun) (11D: Practice for opening night), I felt like I was defusing a bomb, only I was hoping for an explosion, not a dud (I wanted the "Congratulations" message to pop up, is what I'm saying). Clack ... clack ... clack ... boom. Success. What a ride. I solve Downs-only to make things more challenging on Mondays, but I rarely get an experience this white-knuckly, this borderline disastrous, with this many AHAS. The theme itself is pretty straightforward, a pretty standard variety, but the originality of at least three of the theme answers (MINIFIG, "HI, HONEY," ALISON BRIE), and the semi-harrowing quality of the Downs-only solve made me a fan. If you crashed and burned on your Downs-only solve, believe me, I understand. If you don't solve Downs-only, well that's cool too. You are normal! I assume that, like me, you mostly enjoyed the puzzle, even if you probably found it easier and slightly less exciting.

The clues were often, let's say, less than straightforward. I could only imagine GONDOLAS being propelled by poles (1D: Vessels that may be propelled with poles). "FOR NOW" implies (to me) that things will or are likely to change in the future, which isn't reflected in the more certain phrasing of 3D: "Unless something changes...". I read 14D: "Shucks!" as an embarrassed kind of "Gee!" (like "aw, shucks"), so the dejected exclamation "DRAT!" took some crosses to pick up. FETID is a reasonably ordinary word, but it still didn't leap to mind at 27D: Stinking to high heaven (I weirdly considered REEKY (!?)). On the other hand, I was able to drop FREE WIFI and NETI POTS with zero help from crosses. Same with "DEAR JOHN" and ITALIANS, so it wasn't all struggle. I think that's what made it more interesting—the whoosh of success followed by the feeling of peril and doom ... followed by more of the same. I only made one outright error during the solve, though—wrote in IMARET (!?!) instead of TURRET at 54D: Small tower on a castle. I feel like that's a mistake only an inveterate solver (who is not quite thinking straight) could make. Really made a muck of my SE for a bit. But when you end up with things like YOAE and BRMT as your Acrosses, it's pretty clear you've gone wrong somewhere, and in the SE, it was clear which of the Downs was mostly like the bad egg. So goodbye IMARET, hello (much more ordinary) TURRET. And, eventually, hello successful solve. [addendum: I actually made two errors during the solve—the other one (besides IMARET) was guessing CHEESE PLATE before CHEESE BOARD]

Helped to know who ALISON BRIE is, for sure. Much better that I never saw the clue for her, because I have never seen a single episode of GLOW and don't know anyone who has. I'm sure it's great, but few shows are less on my radar than that one. I have, however, seen ALISON BRIE in many other things: Mad Men, Bojack Horseman, and (most notably) Community, which is definitely where I first saw her (which means I must've started watching Mad Men late, because Mad Men predates Community by two years) (or else I just didn't notice her in Mad Men—her role there (as Pete's wife, Trudy) is much smaller than it is on Community). I was lucky to be able to slap down her full name as soon as I saw that the first part of that answer was likely gonna be ALISON. I imagine there will be many solvers who don't know her name, and who also have never heard of a MINIFIG, which is why I wouldn't be surprised if this puzzle played a little harder than usual for a Monday (if not all *that* hard in the end).


Bullet points:

• 20A: Apt anagram of NOTE (TONE) — think music (took a few seconds for the "apt"ness to kick in for me)
• 50A: ___ Way, block in Lower Manhattan where a popular cookie originated (OREO) — of all the ways to clue OREO, this ... is one of them. I actually don't mind it. Go nuts, as far as I'm concerned. We've seen OREO so many times that every new instance should be *required* to show us something new in the cluing.
• 72A: This is not working! (REST) — "!" signifies a very literal clue. Note the lack of quotation marks around the clue phrase, which means we're looking not for an equivalent of the phrase itself, but for an equivalent of "This." Not working = REST.
• 37A: Channel with a call to order? (HSN) — Home Shopping Network. The pun here feels a little clunky. Why would any channel, or anything that is not a meeting, have a "call to order"? The misdirect is awkward (obviously you "call" HSN to "order" things ... I'm just saying the surface-level meaning of the clue doesn't sound great to my ears)
• 23D: German cry of annoyance ("ACH!") — German "ACH!" (as in BACH), Scottish "OCH!"  (as in LOCH). OCH! There hasn't been an OCH! in the puzzle since 2015! That's quite an OCH dr-OCH-t! (hey, look, the "drought" pun works in Middle English, so ... there)

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Facebook]
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Portmanteau drinking hangouts / SUN 6-15-25 / Hit 1981 German language film / Thawb-wearing leaders / Grasslike marsh plant / Nail polish brand with a "Wicked"-inspired collection / Comparatively upper-crust, in a way / Figure with an eponymous fire / Five-time world chess champion Viswanathan "Vishy" / University whose name sounds like a kind of highway / Scenario for a software developer

Constructor: Adam Wagner and Rebecca Goldstein

Relative difficulty: Easy

THEME: "Tossing and Turning" — themers have two clues; the first one is literal (enter the answer normally) and the second can only be understood if you read the answer INSIDE OUT AND BACKWARDS (9D: How a shirt might be put on in a rush ... or a hint to this puzzle's theme)—that is, backwards, with one of the letters in the word "INSIDE" (found in a circled square in each themer) taken "out" ... the circled squares spell out "INSIDE" if you read top to bottom along the left side of the grid and bottom to top along the right:

Theme answers:

• NETI POT (23A: Device used to clear out nasal passages / Final part of a radio countdown (i.e. Top Ten))
• DNA BANKS (36A: Genetic repositories / Reel Big Fish or Sublime (i.e. ska band))
• DAS BOOT (54A: Hit 1981 German language film / "What a shame!" (i.e. "too bad!"))
• DIET TIPS (80A: Offering from Healthline / Roasting on an open fire, maybe (i.e. spitted))
• BARCADES (98A: Portmanteau drinking hangouts / Marine crustacean (i.e. sea crab))
• WASPIER (115A: Comparatively upper-crust, in a way / Wood cutter (i.e. rip saw))

• ROMAINE (118A: Component of a Caesar salad / Captivate (i.e. enamor))
• TENSPEED (101A: Like some bikes / Sunken, as the eyes (i.e. deep-set))
• T.S. ELIOT (84A: Pioneer in Modernist poetry / Throne (i.e. toilet))
• SIGNORAS (58A: Women abroad / Wrapped garments (i.e. sarongs))
• TRADES ON (40A: Takes advantage of / Decoration painted on many a W.W. II aircraft (i.e. nose art)
• OMELETS (25A: Brunch entrees / Figure with an eponymous fire (i.e. St. Elmo))

Word of the Day: TODAY (81D: Program that debuted a little before "The Tonight Show," appropriately) —

Today (also called The Today Show) is an American morning television show that airs weekdays from 7:00 a.m. to 11:00 a.m. on NBC. The program debuted on January 14, 1952. It was the first of its genre on American television and in the world, and after 73 years of broadcasting it is fifth on the list of longest-running American television series.

Originally a two-hour program airing weekdays from 7:00 a.m. to 9:00 a.m., it expanded to Sundays in 1987 and Saturdays in 1992. The weekday broadcast expanded to three hours in 2000, and to four hours in 2007 (though over time, the third and fourth hours became distinct entities). Today's dominance was virtually unchallenged by the other networks until the late 1980s, when it was overtaken by ABC's Good Morning America.

Today retook the Nielsen ratings lead the week of December 11, 1995, and held onto that position for 852 consecutive weeks until the week of April 9, 2012, when Good Morning America topped it again. Today maintained its No. 2 status behind GMA from the summer of 2012 until it regained the lead in the aftermath of anchor Matt Lauer's departure in November 2017. (wikipedia)

• • •

Architecturally impressive, but not terribly fun to solve. The secondary clues just made everything too easy. I often didn't even look at the forward-facing clue, finding it weirdly easier to get some crosses and then solve the backward, circle-less version of the clue. As for the gimmick itself, it really didn't take long to pick up at all. I got NETIPOT without really noticing what was going on with the clues. I got the theme with the next themer I encountered, but only because the band name Reel Big Fish really caught my attention. Not exactly a household name, but I'd heard of them. I wanted that answer to end with BANDS, but then, for some reason, I actually looked *back* at the full clue for NETIPOT, noticed that the second clue ([Final part of a radio countdown]) was NETIPOT backwards minus the circled "I"—i.e., TOP TEN—and then applied the same logic to the Reel Big Fish clue; *that's* when I saw that "BAND" was heading backward—DNA BANKS in one direction, SKA BAND in the other. After that, I didn't need the actual revealer. I had the gimmick concept, and all themers were twice as easy to get thereafter as they would've been in a simple single-clue situation. 

As for that revealer, it's cute. Take the letters spelled out by the circled letters, i.e. "INSIDE," out of the puzzle, then read the resulting answers backwards, and you get the correct answer to the second half of all the themer clues. I don't really understand why INSIDE is running up the right half of the grid "backwards." That's an extra flourish that doesn't really have anything to do with solving the themers. The "backwards" part obviously applies to how you read each individual theme answer, so the "backwards" INSIDE ... is an add-on. A doubling up of the significance of "backwards" I guess. I also don't fully understand the title, which doesn't really evoke what's going on with the theme at all. The "Turning" I get, but not the "Tossing" so much. Nothing's being scrambled or anagrammed, so I'm not sure what the "Tossing" part is supposed to signify [update: as I was making the coffee just now, I suddenly realized that “Tossing” meant “getting rid of,”which is of course what you have to do to the circled letters to understand the backwards answers—so the title is good, I apologize]. I don't think I've ever put a shirt on INSIDE OUT AND BACKWARDS in my life—doing either one of those things would be highly unusual; doing both, nearly impossible. But sure, it could happen. [Full disclosure: my first stab at the revealer was INSIDE OUT AND OUTSIDE IN (it fit!?)].  I admire the complexity of the theme, but as I say, the whole thing just lacked a certain sense of mystery and fun once I grasped the concept. Too easy too easy too easy. But, admittedly, a genuine marvel, architecturally.

Almost no black ink on my puzzle print-out, which means hardly any trouble spots. I had trouble with HEAVIES because (as you can see) I had ARNOLD before AHNOLD, so didn't have the "H" for HEAVIES. Also, I don't know that meaning of HEAVIES. To me, "HEAVIES" are the villains in a story or movie, whereas "heavy-hitters" are [Big, important people, informally]. Weird. I somehow managed to remember NIECY, which was my big pop culture victory for the day. Definitely learned her from crosswords (11D: Actress Nash of "Never Have I Ever"). Never heard of Viswanathan "Vishy" ANAND (34A: Five-time world chess champion Viswanathan "Vishy" ___)). Again with the chess, ugh. Bah. PAH. Totally overrepresented in the puzzle, relative to general interest. A lot of you complain about "rappers" in the puzzle, but those "rappers" are usually exceedingly famous, whereas even the most famous chess player (besides maybe Bobby Jones [sorry, Fischer], or Magnus Carlsen) is not even NIECY Nash levels of famous. Oh, wait, Kasparov! And Spassky! OK, maybe I know more chess players than I thought. To be very fair to this "Vishy" person, he's clearly a huge deal ... in chess. But ... shrug. To me, that's like being a huge deal in luge. I just have no idea. 

Also never heard of BARCADES, which sounds terrible, in that the last thing I want to hear when I'm drinking is the sound of an arcade ... or any sound, frankly, beyond the murmur of background conversations and occasional tinkling of ice in glasses (98A: Portmanteau drinking hangouts). Maybe some jazz, not too loud. Arcade!? Hell no. Not drinking there.

[The perfect bar. Whiskey, cheap sandwiches, and not an arcade in sight]

USECASE is a super boring and ugly answer (16D: Scenario for a software developer). Most of the rest of the grid is pretty clean and well constructed, though. No real highlights for me (except maybe TEA SNOB ... a type of person I've never met) (I know some TEA aficionados, but none of them strike me as "snobs"). If you want very deeply informed, well-written essays on tea, with no snobbery whatsoever, I recommend Max Falkowitz's newsletter, Leafhopper. I subscribe, and I don't even drink that much tea (though I drink more than before I started reading). Coffee is a love affair I can't seem to break off. I've tried. No luck. I'm a more controlled drinker now. No coffee past 9am. I just can't give up the ritual. It's too important to my sense of the day, to my sense of the day's beginning. It's a thing I do, carefully, slowly, deliberately, with my cats. It's honestly the closest I'll ever come to being Philip Marlowe (OK, I'm conflating book-Marlowe and movie-Marlowe here; the former is fastidious about coffee, the latter has a cat ... basically, I'm Every Marlowe (it's all in me)).

How much do I love Marlowe (all the Marlowes)? And cats? I just bought this limited edition print (by Brianna Ashby) which I will have framed and then prominently display in my office, or possibly my kitchen:

["I Got a Cat" (Elliott Gould as Philip Marlowe in Robert Altman's The Long Goodbye (1973))]]

Bullets:

• 1A: "Oh, fiddlesticks!" ("AW, DARN!") — not a huge fan of these ambiguous and contrived exclamations: some combo of "oh" or "aw" and then "rats" or "dang" or "darn" (and maybe others I'm forgetting). This is only the second "AW, DARN!" Looks like we've had four "OH, DARN!"s, three "OH, RATS!," five "AW, RATS!," etc. Mix and match
• 72A: Actress Sink of "Stranger Things" (SADIE) — it's a hard name to forget. Born in 2002, she's been acting since she was ten (lead in Annie) and just this year got a Tony nomination for Best Actress in a play for her lead role in John Proctor Is the Villain.

• 52A: Thawb-wearing leaders (EMIRS) — got this from "leaders." Never heard of a "thawb," which is the "long-sleeved, ankle-length robe." Perhaps unshockingly, THAWB (5) has never appeared in the NYTXW. But now we all know it, so ... why not? Sure. Go ahead.
• 100A: Film studio with a tower that beeped out "V for Victory" during W.W. II (RKO) — it's not a big deal, but something about the way this clue dupes the idea of "V"-as-symbol irritated me (see 7A: Peace symbol = V-SIGN) 
• 125A: How the U.S. has existed since its inception (IN DEBT) — a real awkward clue. I guess it's true. I mean, here we are, it's in the puzzle, so I assume it's true. But the phrasing is still unnatural. [What the U.S. has been since its inception] reads more naturally. You are (or you aren't) IN DEBT. You don't "exist in debt."
• 76A: No man's land? (ISLET) — is the idea that tiny islands are frequently uninhabited? Looks like yes, they most commonly are not big enough or don't have enough vegetation to support human habitation. I wasn't aware that ISLET had a precise definition. I thought it was just vaguely "small." But the World Landforms website (!!) says very clearly: "An islet landform is generally considered to be a rock or small island that has little vegetation and cannot sustain human habitation." So the clue is definitionally accurate. And I learned something, hurray.

The Westwords Crossword Tournament, which debuted to great acclaim last year, is coming up again next week: Sunday, Jun. 22, 2025. Solvers can compete in person or online. Here's the blurb! 

Registration is open for the Westwords Crossword Tournament, which will be held on Sunday, June 22. This event will be both In-Person (in Berkeley, CA) and Online. Online solvers can compete individually or in pairs. To register, to see the constructor roster, and for more details, go to www.westwordsbestwords.com.

See you next time...

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Facebook]

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Canine that bites / WED 5-14-25 / Spin instructor? / "I Dreamed a Dream" musical, familiarly / "Come on, help me out" / Some Mexican Americans / Assembly of experts / Cherubic archer / Stay there! / Reduplicative nickname in pop music

Constructor: Rebecca Goldstein and Adam Wagner

Relative difficulty: Medium



THEME: Two-word phrases where the second word describes the shape of some highlighted letters in the first word

Theme answers:

• 17A: MOOD RINGS [Color-changing fad jewelry ... or a description of this answer's shaded letters?]
• 24A: CHARACTER ARCS [Heroes' journeys, say ... or a description of this answers shaded letters?]
• 39A: REGRESSION CURVES [Visual aids on scatter plots ... or a description of this answers shaded letters?]
• 51A: DIVIDING LINES [Some painting in a parking lot ... or a description of this answers shaded letters?]
• 63A: ALL ELBOWS [Awkwardly lanky ... or a description of this answers shaded letters?]

Word of the Day: 41D: CORN BELT [Midwestern agricultural swath]—

The Corn Belt is a region of the Midwestern United States and part of the Southern United States that, since the 1850s, has dominated corn production in the United States. In North America, corn is the common word for maize. More generally, the concept of the Corn Belt connotes the area of the Midwest dominated by farming and agriculture, though it stretches down into the South as well reaching into Kentucky.^[1][2]

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Hello, friends! It's Rafa here subbing for Rex. Hope you all have been doing great since I've last been here in spite of *gestures vaguely at the state of the world*! Several exciting things have happened since I last wrote here ... most importantly ... I met Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld, in person (!) at the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament (ACPT) in Stamford, CT. So I can confirm that he is in fact a real person who is lovely and kind, in spite of the occasional curmudgeon accusations. (So is his wife Penelope, though I don't think I've seen any curmudgeon accusations levied against her.)

I'm excited to be blogging this puzzle by fellow Bay Areans (is this a thing? it should be a thing!) and crossword besties Rebecca and Adam. I don't think I've ever blogged a puzzle by a constructor I knew well. I confess I can't really claim impartiality, but luckily this puzzle was very clever and enjoyable so I don't need to do any gymnastics trying to be critical without hurting their feelings. (Phew!)

TIL they originated in Peru, but these are my favorite potatoes ever, from a brunch place in SF called Plow (run, don't walk!)

Let's start with the theme! Every theme entry is a two-word phrase, and the second word describes the shape of some highlighted letters in the first word. So, in MOOD RINGS, the two Os are "rings" and they are in the word "mood" so they are ... mood rings. Notice how the second word is always plural and there are always at least 2 of the relevant letter in the first word, and how each phrase is totally real and in-the-language. Good stuff! My only nit: is an L an "elbow"? I leave that as an exercise to the reader.

The biggest IKEA store in the world is in the Philippines

Onto the fill! Funny how CORN BELT showed up two days in a row. Nothing much to nitpick ... we've got our classic GNU, as well as ARG (the country abbreviations always kinda bother me), but the rest of the short fill is super solid. I've never seen SOMM in a crossword before, and I would have instinctively spelled it "som" ... but the internet says "somm" and I believe the internet. I am only partially convinced that PR GURU and TSA BIN and LIGHT VERSE are Real Expressions™, but there was loads of fun (to me!) stuff like BODICE, AT RISK, AMEN SISTER, X-RAY CAMERA, SUPERNOVAE, CHICANOS. I really struggled to parse PR GURU at first. I muttered "WTF is a PRGU??" but eventually it all fell into place. But that area could be tricky if you are unfamiliar with AREPAS (something I recommend you rectify as soon as possible).

The clues were fun too, as I expect from these constructors. My favorite was 43A: UNHIP [Not hot or cool] ("hot" and "cool" here meaning "popular" and not anything temperature-related). Honorable mention for 1A: SWAB [Do a spit take?] (as in collecting saliva using a cotton swab) and 59D: LSAT [Exam whose score can't be argued, ironically] (though not to be an annoying pedant, it seems like you can request an audit / regrade?)

The iconic meme with corkboard and STRING connecting evidence

Overall, a very solid and classic Wednesday puzzle. A clever theme that is not obvious from the outset, and a some tricky clues sprinkled around.

Bullets:

• 5A: CRAB [Sea creature whose name doesn't rhyme with a1-Across (SWAB), weirdly] — I got to this clue and thought ... ok, here's a fun animals / rhyme clue
• 9D: GRR [Sound from an annoyed samoyed]— Oh look ... it's another rhyming animal clue! Or rather, it doesn't rhyme and that's why it's fun.
• 53D: EEL [Prey for an orprey] — Ok why does this puzzle have so many clues about animals where the animal is spelled the same as another word and sometimes rhymes with it but sometimes does not rhyme with it?? What does it mean???
• 48D: GNU [Creature that stampeded in "The Lion King"] — Kinda sad they didn't commit to the bit with this other clue for an animal!

Signed, Rafa

[Follow Rex Parker on BlueSky and Facebook]

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