NYT Connections, Mini Crossword, and Strands | Jan 9, 2025

[@ZorinDobson]

I knew strands was gonna give you trouble as soon as I saw it. I think we’d make a great trivia team because the holes in your knowledge overlap with mine perfectly. I struggled with the crossword today.

[@dudeman71213]

Your reaction to figuring out the theme of the strands had me chuckling at my desk 😂 it took me forever to understand the theme too

[@SteveCChapman]

You had me laughing with “I don’t see it”. When it is Information Technology! 😂

[@Thungon]

and "from sea to shining sea" lol

[@yemimahoupt7356]

Ok but I love how the spanagram is shaped like a fish

[@elransom04]

Connections: 🟩🟨🟪🟦 Mini: 1:23 Strands: Rangsk Perfect

[@bibliopolist]

Strands was brutal for me with another first language than English, I didn't know a single word and had to rely on hints a lot.

[@nicasraissa1607]

Same! Unfortunately that happens to me a lot, so I just resort to searching (for example, today was "types of tuna" 😂), but I also helps me find new vocabulary! A few weeks ago I learned that "portmanteau" meant "compound words"

[@gemma3877]

It's my native language, but I'd only heard of 1 of these. I used so many hints and double hints today. 😅

[@GoodandDelicious]

Honestly, when I’m just so beyond lost that it doesn’t matter anymore, I’ll look up hints. Sometimes I use the whole list like an old school word search or just seeing one word helps me understand the theme. I personally am not competing with anyone, so I don’t feel like I’m cheating, just trying to keep it fun.

[@nicasraissa1607]

@@GoodandDelicious Same!! Especially in Connections, when I'm stuck, I love to see the official comments and trying to decode the hints people left there, it's so fun 'cause it seems like a whole nother puzzle

[@finlandtaipan4454]

Perfect Connections! Three mistakes for me. Phew! Excellent Thursday Mini My time was 2:43. Tough Strands! I don't know much fish either and took a hint.

[@RoToRa]

You "missed" a possible red herring with "(The) Shining": That, "(The) Stand" and "It" are all Stephen King novels.

[@iabervon]

Yeah, I thought of it immediately when I saw SHINING, found STAND, took a bit longer to find IT, and then stared at it for a while trying to find a fourth. On the other hand, if you know enough to find those three, you're not going to guess any of the options as the last, so there's no tempting mistake to make.

[@becca2710]

Love an easy connections! Then mini in 34 seconds!! Haha got tuna family then I straight up decided to look up the tuna species and got “perfect” lol

[@sarahbouboulis6579]

Connections: 🟩🟨🟪🟦 Mink: 1:42 Strands: Rangsk Perfect Immediately i was like, "Oh on, Rangsk's kryptonite, Fish!"

[@dudbike]

I figured out the category pretty quick but still had to use hints for the kinds of tuna.

[@chadkent327]

On today’s mini crossword: Oscar isn’t a muppet, he’s a Sesame Street character. Those are two different things.

[@G0ldnFen1x]

He's a muppet, but he's not a Muppet. All the Sesame Street characters are muppets, but they aren't members of The Muppets.

[@Cesa37]

If it makes you feel any better I had to use even more hints for Strands than you did 😂 Also, as a European I’m glad they put the “America the beautiful“ category in a Connections where the other three categories were easy, otherwise I would have had to resort to guessing!

[@G0ldnFen1x]

Connections was a breeze. Wish I was better at determining yellow from green - I could've had a reverse rainbow! Strands was wild - I knew more tuna types than I thought. The Mini was a bit of a struggle for some reason. Connections: 🟪🟦🟨🟩 Mini: 1:22 Strands: Rangsk Perfect

[@tomkadams]

Similar to you, pretty simple Connections but I had no idea with Strands today haha

[@msolec2000]

I had two mistakes in connections. First I put stand into the dog commands. After finding the departments (sneaky) I tried a SIT, STAND, STAY, STALL for a fake "don't move" category. Then yellow, purple, green for a Solid.

[@BreadmanPlaysGames]

Get you to an aquarium! Fish can be very fun to learn about. See Tuna in person at the Monterey Bay Aquarium!

[@vcarter0723]

Almost same order as you in connections, except I saw purple before blue, but otherwise strands was so hard! Fish is also my weakness!!

[@GoodandDelicious]

You being stuck on bigeye cracked me up Lol. 😂 Honestly I just saw yellowfin right off the bat.

[@michaeljones7351]

I got Reverse Rainbow, 1:19 mini, and a Rangsk Perfect Strands.

[@msolec2000]

You didn't realize what you did a funny when starting the mini crossword and reading the first clue you answered "Left. Right?" :D

[@gemma3877]

It's like when you're doing directions when driving. The number of times we reflexively confirm "left" with "right." Too funny. 😂

[@MathewPlaysGames-e6s]

Easy Connections: Green - Blue -Yellow - Purple for me. The Mini was tough, I think it took almost 2 minutes. I finally gave up on Strands. It's just either really easy or ridiculously frustrating.

[@sonalita_]

The one day where saying the connections words out loud actually hinders you. I've seen other solvers think it was "it" instead of EYE-TEE" As I do work in IT that was an easy category!

[@BBQasaurus]

I somehow magically got tuna family immediately and then after some searching I found yellowfin and albacore, but then realized I knew not a single other variety of tuna fish. I needed hints all the way down.

[@Rangsk]

Yeah it's super trivia heavy

[@tannerarmstrong1496]

Well you blew me away in wordle today. I was lucky to get it in 6, but I got the reverse rainbow in connections and didn't need hints for stands.

[@markfoz7248]

Singing the Purple song and then moving on made this tough to watch (not even mentioning “the IT department”) 😂

[@MortarChelle]

As soon as I saw the theme for Strands today I thought "Oh, Rangsk isn't going to like this one." 😂 I also needed 3 hints to get it today. I got Connections but it took me so long to think of "IT" rather than "it" but I think that was because I was locked on to a red herring early on. I was thinking "Stand, Shining, It" as Stephen King books. Even after I had discounted that as a category though, I still had 'it" in my head. Got there eventually lol

[@kylietempleton9770]

I was convinced connections had King novels when I first started. Didn’t know the song so purple just had to happen for me.

[@julianxamo7835]

No mistakes on connections today! Yellow-Blue-Green-Purple (not familiar with the song as I'm not American, glad the rest were relatively easy for me) (the) Shining, IT and (the) Stand were definitely a red herring, they are all Stephen King novels/movies, but there's no 4th one Strands was hard, found "family" immediately and kept trying a lot of different options with it, but ultimately had to use 2 hints because I don't know anything about fish BTW looking at the number of words helps you figure out how long words are on average, this was very low so that means long words

[@TaikaApina]

You can probably understand how confused I was when the first word I managed to lock in on strands was skipjack. I was like wth is that? Then noticed family and traced tuna before it. Rest was pretty easy. Took me several minutes to find the first word though. Almost pressed that hint myself too.

[@xaimara13]

I knew it was fish, but couldn’t figure out any of the words 🙈🙈 as soon as I realized the theme I thought of you 😂😂 knew you were going to have a hard time. I used 4 hints.

[@katelynihrig3443]

When you said it department instead of IT department I was laughing and knew that would be so funny once you figured it out 😂

[@Rangsk]

I think the "it department" involves clowns in some way

[@GoodandDelicious]

Strands was actually a breeze for me today. Finally!

[@robinames8333]

Strands was a nightmare. After getting a ton of words that didn't count, I asked for a hint. The hint confirmed that I knew the category, and I STILL couldn't get it done. Got another hint. UGH!!!!! (I laughed when I saw your reaction to the topic! What could be worse than specific fish?!) The other games were okay, though.

[@markfoz7248]

We all got our types of tuna knowledge well and truly tested today.

[@MoviesWithDallin]

I saw sea to shining sea immediately but thought it was the red herring

[@Rangsk]

You'd think it would be!

[@gemma3877]

I thought of you Rangsk when I finally figured out that Strands was types of fish. An awful category for me. 😅

[@AsuraSantosha]

I didnt think I knew anything about fish but this is like the 6th time there has been a fish theme/category and I had no problem. So maybe I know more about fish and fishing than I think I do.

[@jamjamguy6847]

Very happy with a reverse rainbow today 😊

[@dustyb58]

l don't know fish but was able to muscle it out without hints. Connections was pretty easy which I was ok with after getting zero cats yesterday.

[@seasearead]

Family was the first word I saw. I found tuna at some point. Never would have put the two together

[@veronicapietsch8017]

I finally got green and purple first two today wooo

[@abscott88]

So Connections today was fairly easy, but I'd like to point out for people outside the US purple is very much not immediately apparent.

[@Sg190th]

connections was focused on blue lol

[@520_metal]

connections was easy today

[@jodiwilloughby2562]

Miraculously , I was able to do Strands with no hints And got the spanogram first.

[@user-qv2ik6eg6d]

I got reverse rainbow today 🎉

[@iRun32]

As a vegetarian, strands was so hard today

[@kawonam]

I thought STRANDS was supposed to be words. Are all of those words? Or proper nouns for tuna? 🤔

[@Rangsk]

I thought so too

[@gemma3877]

I think that pesky fisher(wo)men and marine biologists have got words like tuna species into dictionaries. Just like how you'd expect to see, I dunno, types of lettuce and cabbage included in the dictionary.

[@Riqu213]

Was I the only one who got bamboozled in connections by a Stephen King red herring: It, (the) Shining, (the) Stand? Also, is it just me or are they putting out answers that would have been a red herring and calling them purple lately?

[@janmarcocervantes1601]

I immediately knew that Rangsk would struggle Strands today when I first played this. As a fish person though, it was easy for me. I understand that a lot of people will struggle strands today especially when they don't know the types.

[@AsuraSantosha]

Connections Puzzle #578 🟩🟩🟩🟩 dog commands 🟨🟨🟨🟨 spots at a market/fair 🟦🟦🟦🟦 Business departments 🟪🟪🟪🟪 I did not think this would be that easy