Tuesday, December 23, 2025 |

Jonesin’ 4:40 (Erin) rate it
LAT tk (Jenni) rate it
NYT 5:48 (Eric) [3.63 avg; 4 ratings] rate it
The New Yorker tk (pannonica) rate it
Universal 5:47 (Eric) [4.50 avg; 1 rating] rate it
USA Today tk (Sophia) rate it
Xword Nation tk (Ade) rate it
WSJ tk (Jim Q) rate it

Matt Jones’s Jonesin’ Crossword, “The Other Way” — makes more sense how you read it. – Erin’s write-up

Jonesin’ solution 12/23/25

Hello lovelies! It’s time to BACK it up this week…the theme entries start with an implied BACK and are entered backwards in the grid.

• 17a. [Singer who complements the lead] TSILACOVPU. Reverse the letters and add BACK to the beginning to get BACKUP VOCALIST.
• 25a. [Pre-employment screening] KCEHCDNUORG (BACKGROUND CHECK)
• 40a. [Available again, like a hot item] DNAMEDRALUPOPYB (BACK BY POPULAR DEMAND)
• 49a. [1980s movie starring Michael J. Fox] ERUTUFEHTOT (BACK TO THE FUTURE)
• 62a. [“I Want It That Way” group] SYOBTEERTS (BACKSTREET BOYS)

Other things:

• 30a. [___ Taco (discontinued Good Humor-Breyers ice cream snack)] CHOCO. I am still mad that Choco Taco is gone. It was basically an ice cream cone but the cone was shaped like a taco shell, but that somehow made it so much more delicious than a regular ice cream cone.
• 46a. [Chewed stimulant familiar to Scrabble players] QAT. Its effects include decreased hunger and fatigue, and increased communication and euphoria.

Until next week!

Tarun Krishnamurthy’s Universal Crossword Puzzle “Album Cover” — Eric’s Review

Tarun Krishnamurthy’s Universal Crossword “Album Cover” — 12/23/25 (Click to embiggen)

I forgot again to pay attention to the title. But I’m not sure that had I done so, my solving experience would have been much different. Three theme answers have music genres starting on the right side and ending on the left, as indicated by circled letters:

• 16A [CNN host and “60 Minutes” correspondent] ANDERSON COOPER Opera
• 22A [Wooden piece in some DIY Christmas ornaments] POPSICKLE STICK K-Pop I lost a few seconds here trying to remember if POPSICKLE has a K.
• 50A [Speak convincingly] TALK A GOOD GAME Metal
• 58A [Certain annual music-listening recap, and a hint to this puzzle’s theme] SPOTIFY WRAPPED I’m old-school when it comes to my music consumption and rarely stream music. I know this Spotify feature exists and I think it gives you the opportunity to hear the stuff you listened to most often during the past year.

This is a nice, easy-to-understand theme, with theme answers that are relatively interesting and a revealer and music genres that many solvers will recognize. I’m not sure where the “Covers” part of the puzzle’s title fits in, but the revealers WRAPPED works well.

Other stuff:

• 20A [___ Museum (Vegas attraction full of electric signs)] NEON I’ve more than once mentioned that I don’t care for clues with extraneous information in a parenthetical phrase. (Shorter clues are better.) So it’s only fair to note that without this parenthetical, I would only have gotten NEON from the letter pattern.
• 56A [___! Cherry-O (board game)] HI-HO On the other hand, this parenthetical didn’t help me at all. But I expect some solver found it useful or at least informative.
• 3D [Minimalist paintings?] NUDES Cute clue.
• 9D [Smoke shop purchases] VAPE KITS Not VAPE PENS.
• 36D [Fitness class with kids?] GOAT YOGA Cute clue. The question mark didn’t register and I interpreted “kids” as young humans for too long.
• 38D [Moon of Jupiter] EUROPA I had that last letter as E until I couldn’t make sense of 58A, thinking it was pronounced as a long E instead of being the silent E like the continent.
• 53D [Camera that may be attached to a ski helmet] GOPRO Most of the people I see on ski slopes who have helmet cameras are snowboarders. If you don’t get video of your stunt, did it happen?

Nathan Hale’s New York Times Crossword — Eric’s Review

Nathan Hale’s New York Times Crossword — 12/23/25 (Click to Embiggen)

• 15A [Secondary subject for a college student] MINOR I guess that clue works. My undergrad degree is in Radio-TV-Film, and I didn’t have an official minor. But probably ⅔ of the classes I took were not in the RTF department.
• 18A [Alternative to épée or foil, in British English] SABRE It’s only from crosswords that I’ve learned the three type of swords used in fencing (at least at the Olympic level). About 35 years ago, my husband designed a logo for the Texas Fencing Academy. They’re still sort of using it, but their current logo inexplicably uses a Klingon Bird of Prey from Star Trek.
• 19A [Tokarczuk who won the 2018 Nobel Prize in Literature] OLGA I should probably have not needed a cross or two to get this name.
• 31A [Antitrust enforcement org.] FTC/13D [Org. regulating water safety] EPA I wish the New York Times would start putting “former” in this kind of clue.
• 

  Me a day after the last time I caught serious air (2006)

  41A [It’s part of the job] TASK With the K from 33D HUCK already in place, I tried DESK here, while shaking my head at the NYT’s limited view of the working world.

• 2D [Go off a ski jump, say] CATCH AIR Not CATAPULT. I have to be careful skiing that I don’t inadvertently make myself airborne. I never learned how to reliably land a jump, and my back is messed up enough as it is.
• 7D [With all judges present] EN BANC A gimme had I read the clue. Many appellate courts hear cases with a three-judge panel and will sometimes grant the losing party an en banc rehearing if the losing party doesn’t appeal to a higher court.
• 8D [___ de Rossi, “Arrested Development” actress] PORTIA Another would-have-been gimme; she played Lindsay Bluth Fünke, the adopted sister of Jason Bateman’s Michael.
• 41D [Resident of Pisa or Lucca] TUSCAN I sort of knew Pisa is in Tuscany, but the T from TASK made it certain.
• 56D [“Escape (The ___ Colada Song)”] PIÑA I may have to sue the NYT for intentional infliction of emotional distress for that earworm.