Constructor: Joe Deeney
Relative difficulty: Hard-ish? 15:29
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THEME: Language class!— Phrases that involve languages are clued cheekily using that language
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Relative difficulty: Hard-ish? 15:29
THEME: Language class!— Phrases that involve languages are clued cheekily using that language
Theme answers:
Word of the Day: HONG CHAU (Best Supporting Actress nominee for "The Whale," 2022) —
Hey squad, and Happy Fourth of July! (I'm writing this on Tuesday.) I hope you were able to eat something smoky and charred, or drink something colorful and frosty. Or both! What's your favorite "America" song? Mine is probably "Independence Day."
- Кукла as a clue for RUSSIAN DOLL
- أرقام as a clue for ARABIC NUMERALS
- 跳棋 as a clue for CHINESE CHECKERS
- לאומי as a clue for HEBREW NATIONAL
- Γιαούρτι as a clue for GREEK YOGURT
Word of the Day: HONG CHAU (Best Supporting Actress nominee for "The Whale," 2022) —
Hong Chau (born June 25, 1979) is an American actress. She has received several award nominations for her film roles as Ngoc Lan Tran in Downsizing (2017) and as Liz, a nurse, in The Whale (2022), including one for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for the latter.
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My guess is that this puzzle played very hard for most of the solvers! If you don't read or recognize the language, then you have zero information for the across clues. (If you recognize the language, it might help you out-- like, I can't speak Hebrew, but I know what Hebrew looks like, which would help me out with the "Hebrew" part of HEBREW NATIONAL.)
This is a big complaint I have with "quip puzzles," by the way, where one long-ish quote / sentence is broken up across the theme answers. It makes the puzzle harder to solve because you're missing a clue. By that logic, you'd think I didn't like this puzzle... and you'd be wrong! (Once again proving that oftentimes the reason you like a themed puzzles is just based on vibes.) I loved this! And I don't even read any of the languages listed here. The mechanism was unique, and the entries themselves were cute.
This is a big complaint I have with "quip puzzles," by the way, where one long-ish quote / sentence is broken up across the theme answers. It makes the puzzle harder to solve because you're missing a clue. By that logic, you'd think I didn't like this puzzle... and you'd be wrong! (Once again proving that oftentimes the reason you like a themed puzzles is just based on vibes.) I loved this! And I don't even read any of the languages listed here. The mechanism was unique, and the entries themselves were cute.
There was a good amount of long fill in this, given that it had five long theme answers. AVENGERS and VR HEADSET were cool to see, but MIND BLOWN feels super dated to me.... or is that just because I'm Gen Z? Having ELDER and OLDEN slowed me down a bit, as did GIA, EOS, and THISBE.
Bullets:
Bullets:
- [Square things] for ATONE — This is a hard clue for a Wednesday! I'd expect to see it on a Saturday puzzle.
- HONG CHAU— I didn't recognize this actress from her name, but once I Googled her, I recognized her immediately. I thought she was very funny in "The Menu," one of my fave movies of last year.
- [Diwali dress] for SARI — Is this a dress? I suppose so. It made me go "hmmm" though.