Tuesday, 10/3

NYT 4:06 (wait! I can explain!)
CS 3:44
Tues NYS tba
Mon NYS tba
LAT tba

(An adjacent-key typo cost me 40 to 60 seconds...)

Hey, Peter Gordon—any chance you can remind the Sun's tech staff to hook us up with this week's puzzles? You know we all really start jonesing for them by 9:00 a.m. Monday!

Ed Stein's Tuesday NYT puzzle is thematically dense: I counted 79 theme squares split among a whopping nine entries, with PORTMANTEAU WORD describing the other eight words. If you like portmanteaux—and who doesn't?—check out the Wikipedia article on 'em. Aside from the typo, this puzzle didn't take me much longer than the typical Tuesday NYT, but I suspect people will be grumbling about a few of the entries—Villa D'ESTE crossing the Latin GESTAE and the currency-related UNPEG, MACAU (which I usually spell Macao) crossing the prairie grass BLUESTEM (but look how pretty!), the uncommon DIGRAM, and the gettable-but-is-that-actually-a-word UNNEATLY. But still, 79 theme squares!