Monday: Making Things Hard On Myself - 20 January 2025 New York Times Crossword

[@emmettpaterson2075]

This is fast becoming my favourite solve of the week. Considering you wouldn’t have the theme to help you, it would be fun to see you try a down only solve some Monday to make it even more difficult.

[@daven1223]

This was enormously entertaining. I hope the all across or all down becomes a Monday feature. I will add that whenever I attempt this myself, I have to physically block the screen because can’t stop my eyes from peeking.

[@avanjou]

Very impressive solve. I was so relieved when work like a dog clicked.

[@HarriV-f3e]

I tried this "looking at across clues"-only approach on a Monday puzzle from the archives and it was successful. Using the app it was easy to keep the down clues hidden. The particular puzzle did not have any unfamiliar names so that helped. I can see that those would be a real struggle to fill.

[@TenTenJ]

Good job. Ulta was my design client at one point in my career, so I knew that right away.

[@Joe-nd6km]

Great solve! very much enjoyed your noodling.

[@schlorpuscorpus]

The "bad you" that you remember might be from Jake and Amir from Collegehumor.

[@briangonigal3974]

That was an amazing performance. The only thing that tripped me up was 57 Down (“Volunteer’s words”) I assumed it was “I’m in” (to go with 43 across’s “I’m out”), combined with how I’m only familiar with the term “Britishism”, which OK I could see dropping the “h” to make it fit, that still works, but turning the s into a “c”? That just didn’t track, especially since the portmanteau with “witticism” doesn’t really fit the clue as there’s nothing particularly clever about “biscuit” or “chips”.

[@captaingid]

I have to agree that this one was a touch harder than usual for a Monday. My own solve video for today was 34min I think (and I utilized the Down clues!). Big fun though

[@etyek78]

I know it must be frustrating for you during the solve, but the eureka moment at 22:30 was immensely enjoyable to watch (and the fact you managed to get that far given the unusually high number of red herrings in a Monday puzzle was impressive).

[@savannahcooper-hughes6816]

The number of times he said the answer and didn't try it 😂 very entertaining

[@scurty2]

That was very impressive! After the first pass through the grid there were a lot of empty cells. I think everyone put spam as an answer first, but in hindsight bill makes sense because of the word mail.

[@trennonleavitt]

I stand by my earlier opinion that watching the “across only” style solves are a good time! Your crossword intuition is fun to watch.

[@Bear-re5xm]

I was SO happy when you said "work like a dog!" love watching these solves :D

[@ToddLindberg]

I echo others: this was entertaining to watch you sus out the answers with only the across clues! AND you still beat my time of 34:46 when I used the downs too! Your intuition and knowledge is impressive!

[@ethannissani7062]

The phrase " I can't believe I'm having this much trouble for a monday" Should be left to people who are looking at both the across and down clues!

[@timegentleman]

This was amazing, well done!

[@leehazell7633]

Looked at how long this video was and sighed with relief because I struggled this Monday.

[@pstmdrn_werewolf]

Really enjoy watching you work these out in this manner! Hope it becomes a Monday ritual for the foreseeable future!

[@mikewilliams345]

It would have been far better if you looked at down clues rather than subject us to whatever that was.

[@amhokies]

I think you’re in the minority

[@briangonigal3974]

@@amhokiesI agree, although I do think that Down Only should be the follow-up for next week. (Not having any horizontal theme clues to lean on should up the difficulty a bit.)

[@thorneto2742]

I strongly disagree. I hope this is how he does Mondays going forward

[@PassingSeagull]

Speaking for myself, these across/down clue only challenges are a nice switch-up for the easier Monday/Tuesday puzzles. It is also undeniably impressive to see Chris figure out a whole crossword based on only half the clues!