Tomtit in the tilth -- the NY TIMES SPELLING BEE thread

Anybody do the old-school paper version on Sundays? It’s very humane. 4-letter words don’t count, you only get 3 points for the pangram, and there’s no “Queen Bee” because - get this - Frank Longo (Ed.) provides a word list but says that ultimately you’re the judge of what words should count and what words shouldn’t. It’s up to you!

Oh no absolutely, the whole point is to gripe about the stupid inclusions and exclusions. I do enjoy the ways that it's still NYC-centric: occasional Yiddish-isms, chi-chi, etc, but LALLYGAG is torches & pitchforks material. Just simply wrong.

I feel absolutely certain that Longo, while not forbidding you from awarding yourself 1 point for LALLYGAG if you wanted to (all words count as 1 point in the paper version apart from the PG), would never dream of including it in his answer list.

the way this puzzle immediately tamps down your sense of pleasure and achievement at thinking you've found the word ABATTOIR for instance is just inimical to joy imo

^knew what that would be. Insane

otoh you have to enjoy the themed pair of VIBRATOR and RABBIT today

not clicking on that because i'm at work lol

Yesterday I was two away from QB on my own, then couldn't get IMPENITENT even with hints. There seemed to be a lot of bickering in the comments yesterday, too. Although as usual I didn't see the offending comments, just the comments about the comments (this always happens me on Twitter as well. I never see the thing, only the people talking about the thing).

i thought ARRIBBIATA was on the list before?

Yeah those 2 missing A words are clangers even by Sam's arbitrary sense. Is ABATTOIR not common usage in the US or something?

no it is perfectly well-known

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXYDOaDuA2Q

Bah, go to 3:01.

no KOBOLD fu sam

COCKBLOCK/ED on COLDBLOODED

why do we do this to ourselves

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sqkVNHwJfKc

JOURNO ok but RANDO isn’t?

good pangram today

Yes. It helps that I just saw Billie Eilish a couple of nights ago. :)

I couldn't care less.

Said with a knowing wink, btw.

Almost got my first QB without having to peek at the hive clues but alas, a couple of words escaped me. I'm starting to get the hang of remembering all those weird niggling little words the game always has that I'd never think of otherwise.

So yesterday gimmel wasn't accepted but today aleph was. Sigh.

today's pangram - well, one of them - is a word i've never seen before in my life and only managed to get by typing in a random string of letters lol

Ive seen multiple ppl say that, so Ive still no idea what it is lol. I got the other one fine.

Making H the centre letter is just mean.

today's pangram - well, one of them - is a word i've never seen before in my life and only managed to get by typing in a random string of letters lol
― donna rouge, Sunday, August 28, 2022

a bullshit pormanteau

*portmanteau

LOL that 2nd pangram! A friend has a "phone" she can barely hold with one hand, so I am familiar with the word. Wild that it's allowed though!

This thread should be for posting your most ridiculous guesses made in desperation even though you know perfectly well they're not real words, like when you stick verb suffixes at the end of a noun or w/e

so 'gingering' actually counts, who knew

There are some things I wish were allowed that aren't. Also a lot of things that aren't allowed that I wish would be.

This is the nature of a game (ndeed, a voluntary leisure activity.

OK Jaq's clue got it for me but lolll what the fuck is that non word.

I object to it for the same reason I object to the other ph word. They are WAY too arbitrary with nu-slang.

i downloaded an app that basically allows anything in any dictionary and it's awful -- you need to set it to five-letter words and 'avoid common endings' to even be playable

so i don't doubt that it needs an editor

but of course we all could do better

the paper version by frank longo is better, there i said it

a few reasons for this i guess:

- no four-letter words allowed, so less mindless box-ticking of specialist words like NENE etc

- they seem constructed more intelligently, with certain consonants playing a lot of different roles and different types of cluster available within the same puzzle

- longo refers to “our” word list rather than “the” word list and suggests that you count your own dictionary words if you think they’re worthy

editing is definitely necessary for playability, it’s the inconsistency that is annoying because you can’t follow some determinate rules on what is included and what’s not. it’s okay to exclude some words - it’s the inclusion of others that should be excluded using the same criteria that is annoying

take today’s bee, for instance. why is DUNNO included but OUTTA isn’t?

Or my previous complaint that one letter from the Hebrew alphabet was accepted but another wasn't.

But again, this sort of annoyance is also part of the game's appeal (albeit a pungent one), and it's sort of an exercise in knowledge/vocab/whatever to identify what we think is a glaring omission/inclusion.

I didn't have as much grumpiness today as yesterday - the completely bullshit "healable heatable hateable helpable" sequence was WAY worse than "phablet."

Dunno is sus but it's in keeping with Sam's generally high tolerance for cutesy-poo reduplicative and nonsense words. Gimme, booboo, wanna, etc. Plus cancan, bonbon, noob, etc.

doodad
woohoo

fuckin woot

Yes and do not get me started on pitapat, ratatat, patapan.

I only got "heeltap" by smashing random things that seemed like they _could_ theoretically be words in English.

*pattypan

(Which is an actual non-nonsense word; way more defensible because there is no other word for it.)

The one word in this general class of words that I find myself wishing was included? Haha. Like, haha as in a recessed fence or hedge.

Why no TUDOR ?

Proper noun

yeah well except PANAMA etc

CANCAN but no CHACHA

another proper noun in today’s

but no MOOK. some mid-century new yorker you are, sam!

feel like BACKROOM is a stretch given all the other compound words that don't make it, but i guess he needed a pangram. (i totally support BARROOM tho)