Monday, September 8, 2025 - Monday's crossword is fair and fun

There's a lot of pressure resting on a Monday crossword's black-and-white shoulders: welcome and educate new solvers, retain and entertain experienced ones, and above all, don't be boring. Today's cro...

24 Maalis 11min

The very talented Alex Eaton-Salners is back with a cheery Sunday crossword engineered to lift your spirits (if they are sagging) or elevate you to almost Elysian heights (if you are already in a good...

23 Maalis 26min

Today's crossword was replete with awesome clues — pretty much all of them were fresh, imaginative, and entertaining. We covered a slew of them in today's episode, but even though we used our "end-of-...

22 Maalis 11min

This marks Rafael Musa and Rebecca Goldstein's 4th NYTimes crossword collaboration, and it is a fine piece of work. Being a Friday, it was themeless, but there were oodles of admirable clues in today'...

21 Maalis 15min

Today's crossword was full of surprises. The theme? A surprise. The correct spelling of DADAIST? A surprise (at least to Mike). The fabulous 51D, Nation whose name sounds like a plea for seconds, SAMO...

20 Maalis 16min

Adam Vincent has turned in an ab fab Wednesday crossword. The theme was highly amusing, and the rest of the clues equally awesome. We cover a lot of them in today's podcast, because they definitely de...

19 Maalis 12min

MADISON, Wisconsin is a wonderful city that has received many accolades over the years, but one has always eluded it: recognition in the NYTimes crossword. We are pleased to report that those sorrowfu...

18 Maalis 14min

This was a superb and somewhat crunchier than usual Monday crossword, a side-effect perhaps of an excellent, and about as NYTimes-ish as you can hope for, theme. For all those reasons we are delighted...

17 Maalis 13min