NYT Spelling Bee

[Langue_doc]

QB with a weird word. This was a difficult puzzle for reasons I'll give tomorrow.

[ab_grp]

Congrats, Langue_doc! We compared for our final words to get first letters.  He just had the pangram left.  As I suspected, he was not familiar with it.  I think I'd heard of it, but that's about it, and I was lucky to guess it.  Anyway, I got to impure QB.  Lots of bee words in there!

[ab_grp]

Finally got a 2fer!

[ciao_yall]

QB with one hint. In my brain it was two words.

[Parasaurolophus]

Today was not my day.

[cathwen]

Good morning!

Well, can we all complain about pfft in yesterday's SB?  I guess I've seen it once before in the Bee, but it wouldn't have occurred to me without a hint from WordPlay, which got me to QB.   Pettifog was not easy, either, but at least I've heard the word before, archaic though it is.

Today I am at genius with pangram, and pessimistic about QBABM.  And I don't have a 2fer for LB, either. 

For yesterday's LB, I had anchovies-snarky.

I should be responding to discussion postings today, but my slacker students are procrastinating big time—so there isn't much to respond to.  (They're not all slackers, but a good number of them are.)  Oh well, more puzzle time for me, I guess! 

Happy puzzling!

[Langue_doc]

Good morning!

QB! cathwen, you'll get there. I too have been unhappy about the bee's word selections--will vent later today.

QB yesterday.

I think I had hackney/rakish with a letter left over, and another pair with a dangling letter.

Just got back from the slightly fancy store with my Thanksgiving goodies. Taking the subway is always an adventure. Today, there was an individual clearly off his meds behaving erratically and taking his frustrations out by banging on the subway doors. The man across from me rolled his eyes at me and shrugged his shoulders (which I interpreted as gestures of relief) as soon as the other passenger got out. I too rolled my eyes at him, both of us communicating with the unmasked parts of our faces.

There's at least a quarter of the crossword to be completed.

Happy solving, all!

[ciao_yall]

Morning!

QB with a hint. Last word was tipoff which I always think of as hyphenated.

LB - anchovies-snarky as well.

Lots of puzzles today, so happy solving!

[onthefringe]

anchovies-skyr yesterday (leaving me stuck with the image of anchovy flavored yogurt).I like the idea of snarky anchovies better!

Congrats on getting your thanksgiving goodies home Langue_doc. I am starting Thanksgiving prep in the sense that the turkey is thawing in the fridge and bread for stuffing is drying out in the oven.

[ab_grp]

Good morning/afternoon!

One more word to go in the bee.  I think pfft, poppet, potpie were my last ones yesterday.  We are having potpies this week and have been talking about them a good bit, so not sure why that one escaped me.  Not a fan of pfft.

I also had anchovies-snarky yesterday.  Congrats on a different solution, onthefringe! I have not heard of skyr and am not sure anchovy flavored yogurt sounds too good.  Maybe the anchovies are being snarky because they think they make everything taste better, even yogurt!

The NW of the crossword took me the longest today, and the NE/E was hardest for husband.

Sounds like an interesting trip to the slightly fancy store, Langue_doc! These days, I guess it's good that the person just acted weirdly and got off the train rather than acting up further.  Some of the things happening on mass transit these days are a big yikes.

Happy solving!

[Parasaurolophus]

Got to genius fairly quickly today.

[Langue_doc]

Crossword is done! It was the SW corner that gave me trouble.

onthefringe, I'm sure your house is already smelling like Thanksgiving. This year's Thanksgiving and Christmas are both special because of the staying home and isolation protocols last year. Car needs to visit the tire shop tomorrow to make sure that the tires are properly inflated.

[ab_grp]

Finally got a 2fer!

[ciao_yall]

Finally got a 2fer!

Woohoo! Just 3fers so far.

[Langue_doc]

Good morning!

Pangram and genius so far.

As for the bee words, it appears that the words are chosen at random by an individual or group of individuals who refuse to divulge the rationale for their selection other than resorting to justifying their choice on "hand-curating" (whatever that means). This comes across as a bit sadistic because only the puzzle-setters know the arbitrary list of words but they expect the solvers to read their minds and thus come up with the words in the list. As a result, getting to genius is easy, but getting to QB is possible only if you remember the list, as was the case with pfft which not many people might think of as a word. Not too long ago, glottology which I think of as more of a word than pfft was not accepted.

End of vent.

Happy solving, all!