Friday, August 21, 2026 — It's a Proper Noun Playground! 😱

This, Adryel W. Robles Ojeda's second NYTimes crossword, was uber difficult, thanks to a plethora of relatively obscure names, abetted by some rather cryptic crosses: we loved it (as today's podcast makes clear). 

As an example of the cryptic crosses, we had 29D, Diamond wear, MITT (nice one!); 49A, Especially ornate, ROCOCO (we definitely had to dredge that out of long-term storage); and 7D, Sport similar to pétanque, BOCCE (a clue that helped ...not at all 😀, which was surely the point). 

tldr: this was a delightful piece of work, definitely worth 5 squares on the JAMCR scale.

Besides the crossword, we have a Fun Fact Friday segment which may be of particular interest to those of you suffering from, well, just about any malady at all (although remember, we are not medical doctors, and under no circumstances, whatsoever, should you listen to us as opposed to persons who are, you know, qualified 😉).

Show note imagery: The Schaezlerpalais' Festival Hall, in Augsburg: it doesn't get much more ROCOCO than this!

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