Monday, July 6, 2026, Katie Hale

Theme:  Gravity brings me down!

Katie Hale, assistant crossword editor of the Los Angeles Times and today's constructor, starts the week on a grounded note, with a very down-to-earth puzzle.  The big reveal of the theme occurs here:

54-Across. Fashion house release with autumnal colors, or what the ends of 20-, 34-, and 41-Across are: FALL COLLECTION.  This reviewer is familiar with the cycle of seasonal fashion collections, but the answers referenced here contain a collection of synonyms for a different kind of FALL -- the kind where you plummet to earth.

20-Across. Official clearance to miss class: PERMISSION SLIP.  I remember needing this type of note from the teacher if I had to be in the hallway after the bell rang.  But like so many words in English, SLIP has another meaning -- it's a synonym for FALL.

34-Across. Perform dramatic flips down a sprung track: POWER TUMBLE.  A sprung track is an elevated runway with flexible fiberglass rods or steel springs beneath a padded surface to provide the rebound necessary for the multiple high-speed flips and twists of power tumbling.  (Congrats if you knew this!)  And TUMBLE is another synonym for FALL.

41-Across. Outdoor family getaway: CAMPING TRIP.  I don't go camping with my mom anymore, but I did make a TRIP to the ER with her a couple of weeks ago when she TRIPped.  You will have noticed that TRIP is another synonym for FALL.

As we get older, FALLing is our Kryptonite.  Steady on your feet, there, Solvers!  Let's make our way carefully through the rest of the clues and answers.

Across:

1. Stylish and classy: CHIC.

5. Olivia Rodrigo album with the hit "Vampire": GUTS.  If you say so!  Solved with perps (perpendicular entries).  Here's the official video (with some language not for kids):

9. PD boss: SARGE.  A Sergeant (SARGE) supervises Detectives and Uniformed Officers, but ranks beneath a Lieutenant, Captain, Commander, Deputy Chief (or Assistant Chief), and the Chief of Police.  Your Police Department may vary.

14. Nike's Swoosh, for one: LOGO.

15. Fairy tale brute: OGRE.

16. "Stop the launch!": ABORT.

17. Wall St. investment opportunities: IPOS.  Initial Public Offerings.  These are the moments when private companies transition to publicly traded entities by selling shares on a public stock exchange.  This is also when early investors in the private companies can recoup their money and get out.

18. "The Keep" novelist Jennifer: EGAN.  Ms Egan's 2006 gothic horror thriller was a national bestseller.

19. Makers of mysterious footprints in the Himalayas: YETIS.  You remember Yeti; he's the Himalyan counterpart of our North American Bigfoot (AKA Sasquatch).

Yeti and Bigfoot

20. [Theme clue]

23. Little hellion: IMP.

24. Basketball three-pointer: TREY.  "Trey" is basketball slang for a three-point shot.

25. Happens: OCCURS.  Stuff occurs.

28. "As you wish": SO BE IT.

33. NHL great Bobby: ORR.  A retired champion of the National Hockey League, who is still a favorite in crossword grids.

Bobby Orr, 1970

34. [Theme clue]

37. CBS military law drama: NCIS.   This series portrays a fictional team of special agents from the Naval Criminal Investigative Service.  I delegate the watching thereof to DH.

39. Small battery size: AAA.

40. Nintendo consoles with balance boards: WIIS.

Life is but a dream ... or a video game.

41. [Theme clue]

46. Actress Dennings: KAT.  Kat Dennings is an American actress known for her starring roles as Max Black in the CBS sitcom 2 Broke Girls (2011–2017) and as Darcy Lewis in the Marvel Cinematic Universe superhero film and television franchise beginning with Thor (2011).

Kat Dennings in 2 Broke Girls

47. Madrid's nación: ESPAÑA.

Madrid is magnificent.

48. Happened after: ENSUED.

50. Boast: BRAG.

53. Bowling pin count: TEN.

54. [Theme clue]

61. Amazon basin bean: CACAO.

Cacao pods and beans

62. Trash: RUIN.  As a verb, "trash" means to throw away, destroy, or severely criticize something.  DH and I once suffered through a night in Reno when the hotel guests in the room next to ours trashed the place, and security personnel seemed loathe to interfere.  Staff members were removing broken furniture from that room when we ventured out in the morning.

63. Org. with a "Know Your Rights" handbook: ACLU.  The American Civil Liberties Union was founded in 1920 to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed by the U.S. constitution.

64. Opener: INTRO.

65. __ off: angry: TEED.  Everyone seems to agree that this expression came from golf, but it's hard to understand how.  The nearest I can come is that when you take a hard swing at someone or something -- even if you use your words! -- you're pretty angy.

66. Bog material: PEAT.  A bog is a wetland where partially decayed plant matter accumulates over thousands of years, forming PEAT.  The water in a bog comes almost entirely from rainfall, and is acidic.  Specialized plants thrive in the low oxygen bog, and their remains trap vast amounts of carbon, helping to regulate the global climate.  Ireland has famously harvested peat for a centuries as an energy source, but is now closing its commercial peat bog operations to slow climate change.

Soaring oil prices have contributed to individuals harvesting peat, 
even while commercial operations are closed by the government.

67. Black tea variety: ASSAM.

68. Puts in: ADDS.

69. Ice cream brand: EDY'S.  We never see EDY'S in L.A.  The same company is called Dreyer's here.

Down:

1. Trim, as fingernails: CLIP.

2. "Fingers crossed" feeling: HOPE.

3. "The Rite of Spring" composer Stravinsky: IGOR.  Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971) was a composer and conductor.  His ballet "The Rite of Spring" caused a near-riot at its Paris premiere in 1913 due to its modernist music and choreography.

Igor Stravinsky

4. Astronomical: COSMIC.

5. Becomes a paid athlete: GOES PRO.

6. Fluffy winter boots: UGGS.  "Ugg boots" have a long history in Australia, and have been commercially manufactured there since the 1930s, but the UGG brand was founded in Santa Monica, California in 1978 and primarily marketed to surfers, who were the main users of ugg boots in Australia. I bought Darling Daughter's first pair in a surf shop in L.A. -- but I did once visit New Jersey and see groups of tween girls wearing them in the mall in the winter.

UGG boots in their natural habitat

7. Characteristic: TRAIT.

8. Mister, in 47-Across: SEÑOR.

9. "Well, that's not what I think": SAYS YOU.

10. Eve's second son: ABEL.  

Abel and Cain

11. Indian flatbread: ROTI.

12. Customizable part of a tennis racket: GRIP.

13. Non-earthlings, for short: ETS.  Extraterrestrials.

21. Post-alarm utterance: I'M UP.

22. Wasp's home: NEST.

25. Two-tone ocean predators: ORCAS.

26. Pinch closed, as pie crust: CRIMP.

Basic crimping technique

27. __ bag: party favors: SWAG.

29. Audi competitor: BMW.

30. Chargeable transport: E-BIKE.

31. Homeric saga about the Trojan War: ILIAD.

32. Evaluate: TEST.

33. "In the past ... ": ONCE.

35. Have dinner: EAT.

36. Not often seen: RARE.

38. Mud wrap venue: SPA.

42. Like a flower garden during spring: IN BLOOM.

43. Drug cop: NARC.  Narcotics officer.  Baby boomers also used NARC as a verb meaning to snitch on someone, especially in regard to drug use.

The tee shirt says "Don't be a narc."

44. Means (to): INTENDS.

45. Fraction of a min.: PSEC.  A picosecond is a unit of time equal to one trillionth of a second.  

49. Take off a certain adhesive: UNTAPE.

51. Major artery: AORTA.

52. Put on a certain adhesive: GLUED.

54. Ardent supporters: FANS.

55. Performs in a play: ACTS.

56. Video game archaeologist Croft: LARA.  Lara Croft is the main protagonist of the video game franchise Tomb Raider.  She made the leap to film in 2001, portrayed by Angelina Jolie.

Lara Croft as she appears in the video games

57. Wasn't honest: LIED.

58. Frosted, as a cake: ICED.

59. Regenerist brand: OLAY.

Being a woman requires specialized lotions for various body parts.

60. Snack bowl filler: NUTS.

61. Spy org.: CIA.

Here's the grid:

Solvers,

I DNK (did not know) "The Keep" novelist Jennifer EGAN, the basketball three-pointer TREY, what a sprung track is or the POWER TUMBLE that takes place thereon, or actress KAT Dennings, even though I've covered her in a previous blog post.  I found the middle east block pretty tough, where TUMBLE and KAT both lived.  I'd say that Katie's puzzle was challenging for a Monday!  On the other hand, I FIR (finished it right), thanks to perps (perpendicular entries) and the occasional WAG (wild ass guess). 

How about you?  Were you FANS of this puzzle?  Were you NUTS about it?

Or did you go down to RUIN and defeat, and get TEED off by the exercise?

BRAG about it in the comments!

-- NaomiZ

Monday, June 29, 2026, Zachary Edward-Brown

 Theme: So many greens!

I sit beside the fire and think of how the world will be

When winter comes without a spring that I shall ever see.

For still there are so many things that I have never seen:

In every wood, in every spring, there is a different green.

-- Bilbo Baggins in Book II, Chapter 3 of The Fellowship of the Ring by J. R. R. Tolkien.

Glacier National Park -- photo by NaomiZ

Zachary Edward-Brown is back and this time he's contemplating the many shades of green in the theme clues and answers, which are:

16-Across. *University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina: WAKE FOREST.

24-Across. *Hall of Fame wide receiver who was drafted by the Vikings in 1998: RANDY MOSS.

49-Across. *Person looking for employment: JOB HUNTER.

60-Across. *Major coin producer in Colorado: DENVER MINT.

And the big reveal, smack in the middle of the grid:

37-Across. Strive to reduce one's carbon footprint, or what the answers to the starred clues do?: GO GREEN.

Forest green, moss green, hunter green, mint green ... here are samples:

Hopefully these green hues put you in a relaxed mood to explore the rest of the clues and answers.

Across:

1. Tapioca pearls in some tea: BOBA.  Boba tea is a choking hazard!  Remove the tapioca pearls for young children and serve them in a bowl with a spoon.  You can remove mine, too!  Blech!

Boba tea

5. Trades jabs in the ring: SPARS.

10. WNBA stat: Abbr.: PTS.  NBA players also earn PTS.

13. Forget to mention: OMIT.

14. Cut equally: HALVE.

15. Spoiled kid: BRAT.  

16. [Theme clue]

18. Norse god of mischief: LOKI.  All I know about Loki, I learned from watching Vikings on the History Channel.

Travis Fimmel as Ragnar Lothbrok in Vikings

19. "That's all __ wrote": SHE.  "That's All She Wrote" is a song written by Jerry Fuller, and recorded by various artists including Ernest Tubb, Johnny Mathis, and Ray Price.

Dearest baby may I thank you for being a friend of mine

And while you're reading these words I'll be gone like a bird in the winter time

And I'm taking with me the few sweet memories we made as my souvenirs

And it's a shame that the laughter couldn't outweigh all the tears

That's all she wrote

Everything that I own in a small envelope

Leaving me so alone that I wanted to die

The momеnt that I read her note

That's all shе wrote

20. Mountaintop: APEX.

21. Forty-__: NINER.  A prospector in the California gold rush of 1849, or a member of the San Francisco Forty-Niners, a professional football team.

22. Dry as a bone: ARID.

24. [Theme clue]

27. Name of 12 popes: PIUS.

29. Production amount: OUTPUT.

30. Nearly five billion people: ASIANS.

33. Rugged ride, briefly: ATV.  All-terrain vehicles have agricultural, military, and recreational uses.

ATVs

34. Stanley Cup org.: NHL.  The championship trophy awarded annually to the National Hockey League playoff champion.

Evolution of the Stanley Cup

36. Yoga roll: MAT.

37. [Theme clue]

40. Corp. head: CEO.  Chief Executive Officer.

41. "Thx" counterpart: PLS.  "Thanks" and "please" in text-speak.

42. Cherry center: PIT.

43. Handouts at a spa: TOWELS.

45. Nonreflective finishes: MATTES.

48. "Hey, over here!": PSST.

49. [Theme clue]

51. "Othello" villain: IAGO.  In Shakespeare's play, Iago is a soldier under Othello's command, and is very much trusted by Othello.  Iago is jealous when he is passed over for promotion and manipulates Othello into killing Othello's wife and commiting suicide.  Nasty guy.

Othello and Iago

54. Like new candles: UNLIT.

55. Italy's capital: ROME.

57. Astonishment: AWE.

59. __ queen: DRAG.  A drag queen uses extravagant clothing, wigs, and makeup to celebrate and exaggerate female gender attributes.

A drag queen in and out of a green costume

60. [Theme clue]

63. Talk effusively: GUSH.

64. Fire sign of spring: ARIES.  As the first sign of the astrological year, Aries represents creative spark, passion and initiative.  Isn't fire more destructive than creative?  Anyway, astrology ...

Aries

65. Load to bear: ONUS.

66. Middle-earth's Treebeard, for one: ENT.  J. R. R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings again!  Ents are giants who resemble trees, and Treebeard is their leader.

Treebeard in the green woods

67. Put on clothes: DRESS.

68. Athletic award: ESPY.  Excellence in Sports Performance Yearly Awards produced by ESPN.

Down:

1. Gift toppers: BOWS.

A green bow

2. Nebraska city: OMAHA.

3. Motorcyclist: BIKER.

4. Grabbed a bite: ATE.

5. Boutique: SHOP.

6. Small kitchen knives: PARERS.

The paring knife is the little one at bottom.

7. Apple : Siri :: Amazon : __: ALEXA.

8. Motor homes, for short: RVS.  Recreational vehicles.  Jinx, is your rig moving with you?

9. Tennis match part: SET.

10. Sound out, as a word: PRONOUNCE.

11. Admits defeat, informally: TAKES THE L.  "Take the L" means to accept a LOSS.  I'm glad I solved 34-Across. Stanley Cup org.: NHL, because I would have had to take the L on this answer otherwise.  "Cup" in the Across clue had me thinking about sailing competitions instead of hockey.  Nearly sunk me!

12. Keeps from sticking to the pot, perhaps: STIRS.

15. Goodyear airship: BLIMP.

I took this photo from my front garden!

17. Growing dim: FADING.

21. Empire St. paper: NYT.  New York Times.  Famous for challenging crossword puzzles.

23. Hoppy beer letters: IPA.  India Pale Ale.

25. Post-it __: NOTE.

26. Bed covers: DUVETS.  I grew up ignorant of duvets.  Now I spend a good part of my life underneath one.

This duvet is ready for its cover.

28. Last Grand Slam event of the year: US OPEN.  Tennis tournament.

30. Concert device: AMP.  Amplifier.  Rusty, show us yours!

31. Upstream migration that feeds grizzly bears: SALMON RUN.

Unlucky leap

32. "This party rocks!": IT'S A BLAST.

33. Museum display: ART.

35. __ Angeles: LOS.  I had the home team advantage on this one.

38. Main point: GIST.

39. More meddlesome: NOSIER.

44. Tour gp. for Coco Gauff: WTA.  Cori "Coco" Gauff is an American professional tennis player.  She made her Women's Tennis Association Tour debut in 2019.

Coco Gauff on a green court

46. Quadriceps locale: THIGH.

47. "Tsk!" kin: TUT. Clicking tongue sounds of reproof.

48. Shows beyond doubt: PROVES.

49. Courtroom decision-maker: JUDGE.

50. Orange Muppet who sings "When Bert's Not Here": ERNIE.

Bert and Ernie with a green background

52. Obtains: GAINS.

53. Admit (to): OWN UP.  Take the L, perhaps?

56. State of disarray: MESS.

58. Site with vintage items: ETSY.  Known for handmade items, you'll find some vintage things as well.

60. Stereotypical teller of terrible jokes: DAD.

61. Make a goof: ERR.

62. Barkeeper who is a frequent target of Bart's prank calls: MOE.

Bart Simpson loves to prank call Moe.

Here's the grid:

Solvers,

Did you ERR anywhere?  Did you find yourself FADING?  Did you throw in the TOWEL?

Or would you say of this puzzle that IT'S A BLAST and your flawless grid PROVES it?

GUSH all about it in the comments!

-- NaomiZ

Monday, June 22, 2026, Robbie Cottom

Theme:  Avian journeys

We are just at the tail end of spring migration for birds.  How nice for constructor Robbie Cottom to remind us of it.  His birds, however, are rather down-to-earth.

16-Across. Flightless migration on a farm?: CHICKEN RUN.  A chicken run is an enclosed outdoor space where chickens can safely roam and forage.

Chicken run

35-Across. Flightless migration on a pond?: DUCK TOUR.  A duck tour uses amphibious buses to take visitors on land and sea.

It only *looks* like a disaster.

60-Across. Flightless migration on Thanksgiving?: TURKEY TROT.  A turkey trot is a short race held around Thanksgiving Day in the United States.

Macabre costumes optional

10-Down. Flightless migration in Toronto?: JAY WALK.  Jaywalking refers to a pedestrian crossing a street unlawfully.  Toronto because of the Toronto Blue Jays, a baseball team.  In Toronto, the most common jay bird is the Blue Jay (Cyanocitta cristata).

Blue Jay

40-Down. Flightless migration in a cornfield?: CROW HOP.  A crow hop can be a short, quick jump -- or, if you are sports minded, it can be a footwork technique used by baseball outfielders.

Crow hop

WALK with me now -- or HOP, RUN, or TROT -- on a TOUR of the rest of the clues and answers.

Across:

1. Channel that brings tears to one's eyes?: DUCT.  There are two sets of tear ducts in each eye.  On the upper outer side of each eye is a lacrimal gland producing tears, which flow through ducts and over the eye.  Excess tears drain into lacrimal ducts in the inner corner of each eye, flowing thence into the nose.  That's why your nose runs when you cry.

Note the ducts at left and right.

5. Grow frantic: PANIC.

10. "__ my memory": "Remind me": JOG.

13. Worker protection org.: OSHA.  Occupational Safety and Health Administration.

14. Unavailable: IN USE.

Do not enter!

15. Serving success: ACE.  In tennis, an ace is a legal serve that is not touched by the receiver, winning the point for the server.

16. [Theme clue]

18. "Despite that ... ": YET.  I took you on that fabulous bus tour of the pond, and yet ...

19. Tempts: ENTICES.

20. Nobel Peace Prize winner Sadat: ANWAR.  Anwar Sadat (1918-1981) was an Egyptian military officer who served as the third president of Egypt from 1970 until his assassination in 1981.  In 1978, Sadat and Menachem Begin, Prime Minister of Israel, signed a peace treaty in cooperation with U.S. President Jimmy Carter, for which they were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

Anwar Sadat

22. "Who even __ you?": ARE.

23. "Where babies come from" class, briefly: SEX ED.

25. The __ of one's existence: BANE.  A source of misery; a curse.

26. On a smaller scale: LESS SO.  I thought this was going to be LESSer, and was excited to tell you about one of my backyard birds.  But it was LESS SO ...

Lesser Goldfinch in my garden

28. Sicilia's country: ITALIA.  This is how Italians say Sicily and Italy.  Isn't it funny how they don't know the real names?

30. Thought: IDEA.

31. Animal life of a region: FAUNA.  Birds are fauna, too.  Even TURKEYs.

34. Penn of "Harold & Kumar" films: KAL.  Kalpen Modi, known professionally as Kal Penn, is an American actor, author, and former White House staff member in the Obama administration.  He is known for his portrayals of Kumar Patel in the Harold & Kumar film series, Lawrence Kutner on the television program House, White House staffer Seth Wright on Designated Survivor, and Kevin, a psychologist and boyfriend to Robin in How I Met Your Mother.

Kal Penn

35. [Theme clue]

38. __ and cheese: MAC.

41. Tempos: PACES.

42. Letters not found on a 24-hour clock: AM PM.

46. Under threat: AT RISK.

48. Also: AS WELL.

50. Clump of earth: CLOD.

51. "Your food is getting cold!": EAT UP.

54. Puffin kin: AUK.

55. Maya of "Stranger Things": HAWKE.  The daughter of actors Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman, Maya Hawke made her screen debut as Jo March in the 2017 BBC adaptation of Little Women. She starred as Robin Buckley in the Netflix series Stranger Things (2019–2025).  She has also recorded three musical albums.

Maya Hawke

57. Bugs Bunny fare: CARROTS.

59. "Kinda like that": ISH.

60. [Theme clue]

63. "New" prefix: NEO.

64. Nordic noir novelist Larsson: STIEG.  Karl Stig-Erland "Stieg" Larsson (1954-2004) was a Swedish writer, best known for The Girl with the Dragon Tatooo, The Girl Who Played with Fire, and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest, all of which were published posthumously, starting in 2005, after he died of a heart attack.  

Stieg Larsson

65. Some poke fish: TUNA.  Poke (POH-kay) is a dish of raw fish cubes tossed with soy sauce, sesame oil, and green onions.

Tuna poke

66. Telepathy, e.g.: ESP.  Extrasensory Perception.

67. "Got it?," slangily: YA DIG?

68. Do as one's told: OBEY.

Down:

1. Rx writer: DOC.

2. Guided (in): USHERED.  Better than the "ushed" we sometimes see in these pages.

3. Like dim sum and bao buns: CHINESE.  Perhaps nostalgic items for our blogmistress.

4. Diplomatic skill: TACT.

5. "Easy-peasy-lemon-squeezy!": PIECE OF CAKE.

6. Granny flat, maybe: ANNEX.

7. Breastfeed: NURSE.

8. The Cyclones of the NCAA: ISU.  The Iowa State Cyclones are the NCAA Division I collegiate athletic teams representing Iowa State University.

And YET Iowa's state bird is not the Northern Cardinal (depicted)
but the American Goldfinch.

9. Wrestler/actor John: CENA.  John Cena was a professional wrestler with the WWE for 24 years, and a 17-time world champion, before becoming an actor.  Cena is also known for his charity work, granting more than 650 wishes for the Make-A-Wish Foundation, the most in the organization's history.

10. [Theme clue]

11. Australasia's region: OCEANIA.  Oceania inlcudes Australia, Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia.

12. "Be reasonable": GET REAL.

17. O : hug :: X : __: KISS.  XOXO means hugs and kisses -- even though the X for kisses comes first.

21. Org. with Cavs and Mavs: NBA.  The Cleveland Cavaliers and Dallas Mavericks are teams in the professional National Basketball Association.

22. Boxer Muhammad: ALI.  

Muhammad Ali

24. Paleontologist's prize find: DINOSAUR EGG.

The small feathered dinosaurs with beaks designed to crack seeds
survived the famine when an asteroid collision killed most plant life on Earth
and gave rise to today's birds.

27. Unhappy: SAD.

29. Greek "T": TAU.

32. Org. that oversees NYC's Museum of the Dog: AKC.  American Kennel Club.

33. Sport-__: auto for rugged terrain: UTE.

36. Delivery company with brown trucks: UPS.

37. Like some poke fish: RAW.  See 65-Across.

38. The "M" of ATM: MACHINE.  Automated Teller Machine.

39. Geography texts: ATLASES.

40. [Theme entry]

43. Barbecue chef's coat?: MEAT RUB.  The coat goes on the meat, not the chef.

44. Wedding guest's date: PLUS ONE.

45. Civil rights leader honored in Jan.: MLK.  Martin Luther King.

47. Brief "No clue": IDK.  I don't know.  Here in the Crossword Corner, we often write "DNK" for "did not know."

49. Light on one's feet: SPRY.

52. Bitter-smelling: ACRID.

53. "Star Trek" legend George: TAKEI.

George Takei as Sulu on Star Trek

56. "Keep commerce human" website: ETSY.

58. Director Preminger: OTTO.  Otto Preminger (1905-1986) was an Austrian-American film and theatre director, producer and actor. He directed more than 35 feature films, and was one of the most influential directors in Hollywood during the 1940s and 1950s.

Otto Preminger

61. The Jazz, on scoreboards: UTA.  The Utah Jazz compete in the NBA.

62. Swift, to Swifties, when doubled: TAY.  Taylor Swift fans ("Swifties") call her Tay Tay.

Here's the grid:

Solvers,

Did you need perps (perpendicular entries) to JOG your memory regarding the celebrities named in this puzzle?  Did you PANIC at any point?

Or was the whole thing a PIECE OF CAKE?

We want to hear from you in the comments.  YA DIG?

-- NaomiZ