The Decade in New York Times Crosswords and Games

Thanks, Deb, for these thoughts, and for all the years of careful, good-natured, joy-filled work. You have been such a big part of the current success of the crossworld at NYT!

I Love Spelling Bee. I might propose to it but will have to ask my wife. I’m usually amazing 😉 sometimes a genius but ok, ok, a slow genius and I have to leave a puzzle for a few hours to let my subconscious percolate. Ethical question: is rotating the letters frequently cheating? If so, 100% cheating? If not, please estimate the percentage. Picky point: I do find that there’s a bias against fish. Both “finny” and “roughy” were recently disallowed and I neeeeded the points. Also “nitty” was disallowed but “gritty” snuck through. Go figure. Hope Spelling Bee 🐝 never leaves.

A better link for the puzzle that requires folding: https://select.nytimes.com/premium/xword/pdf/Dec0510.pdf The PDF at the current link lacks important graphic elements that are necessary to the final reveal. This was very confusing for me.

I am retired and live far away from my home in NYC, friends, etc. So for me the crossword is a welcome companion - often my only companion for the day. I prefer the tough ones because they take longer to finish.

I love the new puzzle, Vertex. Who designs it and where can I find more?

I especially relate to “it’s not cheating, it’s learning”. For years, I never even looked at Friday and Saturday. Now I take them on. Sure, I had to search for proper names (looking at you, ESAI Morales), but I can reason my way through the rest of the grid. The puzzles became a seven-day experience for me once I accepted that I get to make the rules about how I solve.

Dear Deb, thank *you* for creating this wonderful space on whatever cloud we are now, and for encouraging us all to take part in it. I doubt we would have ever decided to try, if not for your column declaring that we, yes even WE, can solve a NYT puzzle. You are, directly or indirectly, responsible for no less than five ways my life was enriched. I count: solving the puzzles; reading your column (don't you dare going on vacation, ever!); first loitering around then actively partaking in the hilarious and educating comments section; taking on construction (just finished my fifth one, and I can feel it, this one's a winner, baby); learning from gifted and generous mentors. Since my earliest childhood, I felt in awe when numbers or words "clicked". I made the former the central point of my education and work. Thanks in no small part yo you, I now have a new place to fully enjoy the latter, too. May the next decade allow your enthusiasm to reach as many new solvers as possible. With technology advances surely to come, I can just vision a NYT Holographic Crossword subscription, full with your personal Deb Amlen dragging you off the couch while giving you a pep talk on how you are smart enough for a Saturday puzzle if you would just give it a go.

I don't see anywhere in this article a mention of the, for me & my adult daughter, of the greatest Crosswords editor, Eugene T. Maleska...the puzzles during his tenure had an intuitional "flow" that was very satisfying, even ecstatic...under Will Shorz, for me, the puzzles have lost that quality & are not very intuitive but more jagged, more herky-jerky, lurching forward in fits & starts. I remember reading an article by Will Shorts on the differences he introduced that he felt are improvements over previous editors, especially Maleska & I can't remember now that he details but I remember disagreeing with his reasons. I still do the crosswords, though often in collections & consistently find them unnatural in feeling compared to Maleska!

My hubby and I found out we love solving the Sunday puzzle together as a Saturday night date. A nice dinner, bottle of wine, and two sharp pencils. Modern love

No mention of KenKen? The Times wouldn't be The Times without KenKen. I can only assume you're working on a separate article featuring the world's greatest puzzle. :-)

I had just found my seat on the final leg of a long flight home, and a man was in my hard-won window seat. At first he feigned sleep, but a flight attendant helped me shift him to his center position, where he began to mock my Southern accent and demean my intelligence. So I went full-Mayberry on him until he relented. He then picked up the airline mag and began to solve a NYT Sunday crossword puzzle. One time through the clues, he gave up and angrily tore out the page. After my coffee, I pulled out my copy of the magazine, turned to the puzzle, searched my purse for a writing implement, and brought out a pen. He guffawed, then magnanimously offered me his pencil, which I declined. Unbeknownst to him, I had completed the puzzle on my previous flight, finishing with a raucous group effort as the wheels had touched down. This being a short flight, I filled the puzzle in quickly, then began to gather my possessions as the flight descended. Beside me, he was seething, as if I were the one who had insulted him. Sweet justice.

I have only been working the NYT puzzles for a few months. My sister got me hooked on Spelling Bee, and I was a goner. Now I work Spelling Bee, the Mini, and the Daily almost everyday. I have found my time improving on the Daily as I have learned to adjust my way of thinking about the clues. Now, if an obvious choice doesn’t work for the answer, I know to think like your authors.

Thank you so much. I am new to NYTXW (only about 2 months in) and I love the tips and community. I'd love to see an in depth article on how one can create a puzzle, or even an online class to create a puzzle. Creating one appeals even more to me, but i really don't know how to get started.

Responding to the first paragraph: There was never a year retroactively designated as zero. There was a year retroactively designated as 1. Therefore: Third millennium: 2001-3000 21st century: 2001-2100 Third decade of this century: 2021-2030

p.s., forgot to also mention thanks to the crossword team for including more science in the puzzles, and also I love that Thursday is "special fun puzzle day".

Although you don't mention those of us who said that the puzzles had become far too easy over the years I'm sure I wasn't alone. I interviewed both Margaret Farrar & Will Weng for a magazine article & they both thought the puzzle should be a bit of a challenge which they rarely are nowadays. I used to enjoy them when they graduated in difficulty over the course of the week &, while I still do them every day, it's very disappointing when so many are almost 'fill in the blank'.

What a nice summary of all the changes over the years! Count me as one more person who has gained confidence thanks in part to the Wordplay column and the ease of using the online version and being okay with looking up the occasional word.

thanks Deb! the NYT crossword puzzle is a highlight of every day and I'm glad you've brought more people into the joy of solving.

No matter what - I always felt extremely accomplished if I could complete the Saturday puzzle in less than a few hours IN INK not pencil (which I still prefer for Sunday puzzles).