Here are some of the common abbreviations in the Comments section:
Clecho: Clue echos. Same clues for different entries in the grid.
CSO: A Shout Out is a reference to someone you know but here it is usually a Coincident
DF: stands for dysfunctional, often suggestive of sexual innuendo
DH: Dear Husband
DNF: Did Not Finish
DW: Dear Wife
FIR: Finished it Right
FIW: Finished It Wrong
FLN: From Last Night
LIU: Look It Up
Natick (D-Otto): Natick is small town in Massachusetts that no one (except locals) have ever heard of. Used here, it means the crossing of two names that a normal person wouldn't know -- might know one, but not both. Rex Parker created the Natick Principle years ago.
Perps, short for Perpendiculars, refer to the crossing answers that help you fill in letters of the word you don't know or you are not sure of.
Red letter: When you solve the puzzle on line in Regular Skill Level, your incorrect entry will be marked in red color.
WAG: Wild Ass Guess
WBS: What Barry Said. Coined by Dudley.
WEES: What Everybody Else Said. Coined by Jayce.
WMOS: What Most Others Said
Clecho: Clue echos. Same clues for different entries in the grid.
CSO: A Shout Out is a reference to someone you know but here it is usually a Coincident
DF: stands for dysfunctional, often suggestive of sexual innuendo
DH: Dear Husband
DNF: Did Not Finish
DW: Dear Wife
FIR: Finished it Right
FIW: Finished It Wrong
FLN: From Last Night
LIU: Look It Up
Natick (D-Otto): Natick is small town in Massachusetts that no one (except locals) have ever heard of. Used here, it means the crossing of two names that a normal person wouldn't know -- might know one, but not both. Rex Parker created the Natick Principle years ago.
Perps, short for Perpendiculars, refer to the crossing answers that help you fill in letters of the word you don't know or you are not sure of.
Red letter: When you solve the puzzle on line in Regular Skill Level, your incorrect entry will be marked in red color.
WAG: Wild Ass Guess
WBS: What Barry Said. Coined by Dudley.
WEES: What Everybody Else Said. Coined by Jayce.
WMOS: What Most Others Said
W _ _ S: What a person Said If it were Husker Gary the abbr. would read WHGS
14 comments:
For those who might wonder, the word "clecho" was coined to describe the theme entries (repeatedly clued with "Eagle") in the October 6, 2010 puzzle.
Seven clechos appear in the Feb 19, 2012 puzzle, though they aren't theme clues.
Hi gang,
Just dropping in for a sec. I wrote a long comment after reading the comments about a puzzle having to do with 'dodo'. I can't remember when it was. Didn't know that there was a new procdure for posting and lost the comment. . I hope I'm getting this right.
I've been missing you all, though J.D. Carol, and Chickie have kept in touch and we're planning another get together here in June, when Lucina pays her anual visit.
If anybody else feels like making the trip, let me know and I'll be happy to have you join us. We picked u p Garlic Girl a couple of years ago and she sees the lucky south peninsula two regularly. Carol made it once before my time, but Oregon is a bit of a trip for lunch! We'd love it if you could do it again, CArol.
C.C. you know there's always an open invite for you, too. How great if you could make it!
Hello and hugs to all the rest. I think about yuo often, dear friends.
I read this long ago when I started here, but reading it over now that I've been around for a while, it seems to need expanding. These are the ones I can think of offhand.
ESP: Every Single Perp. Coined by Tinbeni.
LW: If you're over a certain age, Little Woman, otherwise Loving Wife. Either way, it's the same as DW.
Natick: crossing point where both across and down words are unsolvable. Coined by Rex Parker.
Reveal: entry that gives or hints at the theme gimmick. Sunday puzzles have a title as the reveal, Saturdays are themeless.
Thumper: "If you can't say something nice, don't say nothing at all." From Bambi.
Also some general texting abbreviations that we use, that are sometimes showing up in puzzles --
FWIW: For What It's Worth
HBD or HBTY: Happy Birth Day To You.
IMHO: In My Humble Opinion
IMO: In My Opinion
OMG: Oh My Gosh!
OTOH: On The Other Hand
I continue to have problems filling in the "words" for personalities asked for in the crossword clues.
Such as "Character played by Sally in Time for Dollars"
My contention is that crossword puzzles were created to allow the solver to come up with thw WORD hinted at by the clue, thus the name crossWORD puzzle.
What happened?
C.C. - Add TITT: Threw In The Towel. DNF for one reason (couldn't do it) or another (not enough time to play). -T
I've been seeing YMMV. No idea.
If someone is really ambitious, it would be nice to have a newly alphabetized list.
>>Roy
Roy,
YMMV is a texting abbreviation for Your Mileage May Vary.
P+P = Patience and Persistence, the virtues often needed to see a chewy PZL through to the end.
JohnK: This gets asked so often, I wish one of the admins would just post these links directly above the comments, instead of telling people to search all through the loooonnnngggg main page for them.
I was just looking over the comments-section-abbreviations page, and noticed one I sharply disagree with.
Natick: Natick is small town in Massachusetts that no one (except locals) has ever heard of. Used here, it means the crossing of two names that a normal person wouldn't know -- might know one, but not both. Rex Parker created the Natick Principle years ago.
If you know one of them, it's not a natick. That's the way crosswords work!
It doesn't have to be names, anything obscure will do.
There is no such thing as a "normal person". ANYTHING is unknown to some person! And everything is "in the wheelhouse" of some other people. So what is a natick to one person will be different from another. No natick will be so for everyone, but we can talk about naticks that are so for large numbers of people.
Owen KL, so true! I was there when Rex Parker declared Natick, MA a “natick”, but I knew Natick, MA so it wasn’t a “natick” to me. No one knows everything and everyone is ignorant of some things.
Learned a new one to me, TLWs...Three Letter Words. Duh! I feel thick headed! Knew TLA, Three Letter acronym, came close, but the 'W' sent me asking Mr. Google :D
Waseeley used "Ektorp" today and I have seen it a few days ago. What is that?
The crossword on April 17, 2024, had a clue Ektorp Sofa maker with the answer Ikea. Splynter blogged that day that any weird furniture name had to be Ikea. The crossword author that day was Emma Oxford and she commented:
"Another point of interest: Will Pfadenhauer and I have been trying to get "ektorp" into the crossworld lexicon. Much like natick, it is also a small city that no one has heard of (IKEA furniture is named after real places, fun fact), but where natick means "an impossible crossing," we submit for your consideration that ektorp should mean "a clue whose answer you can get from context without actually knowing it." Splynter has proved my point above, saying that weird furniture names is all that's needed to know the answer must be IKEA, even if you wouldn't have been able to come up with those furniture names independently."
This is the source of the term "ektorp".
Or “thrown in the trash”, if you really really hated that particular puzzle! 🤣
====> Darren / L.A.
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