NYT Connections, Mini Crossword, and Strands | Sept 12, 2024

[Music] let's do connections we're finding four groups of four we have sake save Pepsi Mochi these are well sake Pepsi and mochi wait yeah our drink is mochi a drink actually I don't remember what Mochi is curry feta bird biota so biota is the word that's generic for Flor and fauna so it's all the life in in a biome life magic I do like magic uh Advantage Kobe Kobe uh favorite interest bookmark and benefit I think this might be Kobe beef but um let's see coob is that we've got some foods we've got some drinks Advantage sounds like a sports term um Curry fav it save are these social media buttons they like to do those you can favor it a video you can like it you can save it what's the other one maybe not a bookmark I guess you could bookmark it let's go for these Mark online for later gotcha okay uh I don't know if you would like something to see it later but I mean I guess you can look at your liked posts and videos and stuff so maybe um it's weird when there's also a save button but cool uh what biota is interesting just because like what does that go with there's not like a fill-in the blank for it I'm not seeing anything else that could even remotely connect so maybe there's word play Saki ending ending e that are pronounced that is a cheese goat cheese curry I mean Japanese things friend of mine's dog is named Moi is it that things friends of mine's dogs are named um what would be like another Japanese inspired thing like this is Greek and this is Indian I I mean I know the Japanese have Curry against my better judgment I'm trying this that's not even one away okay yeah well that's why I said it was against my better judgment but it felt like it could be a category um pretty sure the Japanese eat Curry I don't know if they claimed to have invented it I don't think they did but um Pepsi like why Pepsi specifically I don't know let's look at interest um interest like you're um making interest off an investment or you're just interested like you like it um benefit advant benefit and Advantage are just synonyms for in certain cases we've got bird here Larry Bird are these oh these are basketball players Steve Curry Larry Bird Kobe Bryant uh is is I don't know I don't think Pepsi interest Mochi benefit Advantage magic magic Johnson okay basketball players NBA legends okay so it was Kobe Bryant they're they're enough and they're enough of a legend that I know them that says a lot um cool uh still haven't gotten green even though I've got my to the green shirt on I don't know what's going on here um are they see I want to say just drinks like sake Pepsi I think mochi's a drink but there isn't another drink here paa biota sake Pepsi Ben I mean benefit advantage and interest I feel like they've got to go together is it just sake instead of sake is it sake I I can see stake being in this category but not sake I'm going to try it behalf yeah for your sake for your in okay that's a weird category I think the plus two saved me there Pepsi feta Mochi biota these are purple they've got to be a play on words right like these have nothing to do with each other biota is so out there so there are words that end in vowels that are pronounced I don't know Pepsi's a brand what would we do with word play here adding letters removing letters changing letters um anagrams that sort of thing I'm not seeing it what else could this be it's not like pep fet M purple is so purpling today I I am extremely confused I give up what is it it was a play on words ending with Greek letters is it I don't even know all the Greek letters so this is cha Chi that's chai Sai ETA and OT maybe there's no way wow okay sure purple sure uh difficulty I mean purple just happens I I um it really wants you to read S as sake which is really interesting that that's a nice um puzzle there I don't think it was that hard though I'm going to give this like a 2.6 connections command says 3.2 they haven't done an under three puzzle in a while uh at least according to their own metrics so I don't know if they're trying to ramp up the difficulty or or if they've just readjusted their difficulty scale I don't know all right well let's see what what the bot has to say all right let's analyze my game 55% trickier than usual four out of five so 91,000 games don't have all the million in yet um curious how much this changes as time goes on um this is this is kind of what you'd expect from one that people aren't guessing on pretty low percentages for each of these but just because there's a 5 5% solve rate but anyway let's continue I got an 88 skill Score 1 and 234 so this was a pretty common mistake I guess okay found first yellow most people found yellow first that's not surprising at all and then blue after that not surprising I mean you see Kobe at the very least and you're going to go okay this is basketball related you just find the other names oops oops I didn't mean to continue there I want to see what second uh second was also yellow no second was green followed by yellow then blue so interestingly you either found blue first or you just you found blue uh third interesting that's kind of that's that's crazy that second is so much different um let's see 1% found purple first 3% found purple second and then yeah Green Green Third these percentages are weird it's weird how this lines up but anyway um 14% found purple third and a whopping 82% just may had it happen so yeah that was my prediction um let's look at common mistakes saki Mochi biota Kobe Japanese origin people were like what's biota mean maybe it's a Japanese thing same with curry putting curry in there which is what I did is this Japanese Cuisine um like favorite interest bookmark makes sense um sake Pepsi Mochi biota consumables like what what the heck would biota be other than like people are just like I don't know what biota means I think that's what's happening I'm going to look it up to see if there's any alternate definition the animals and plants living in a particular place time or habitat yeah I don't think it's used for anything else okay um well let's continue just a lot of people just not knowing a biodent and see if it went in certain categories that they had three out of four for um most common first mistake sake moch curri Kobe trying to do a Japanese themed thing makes sense [Music] um second guess is what I did there 11% of players into the situation okay uh interesting mistake Advantage interest magic benefit weird just trying to figure it out I guess yeah okay what's Happening Here is reading SE as sake still which is what I was doing until I got that if you're trying to figure out what biota means all right well um that's it how'd you do let's do the mini crossword for Thursday September 12th let's go hair with mascara on it eyelash your lash maybe emotion and inside out too who opens up a sarcasm in Riley's mind I did not see inside out too so I'm not sure which emotion that is one finding work for an actor or author an agent looks behind couches and curtains say uh someone trying to find something I don't know makes a mistake I hope I hope the Downs are easier renters agreement is a lease emotion and inside out who blows Flames out of his head that's anger oh is this Envy Envy doesn't fit hold on on we I don't know mocking smile uh sneer how you spell that is it e a r i don't know beef cakes hunks um blank all I ask it's all I ask got it 101 all right let's look at the ones I didn't get it was on Wii okay um and then looks behind couches and curtains say seeks right I I need I'm I I how how often how many time how many crosswords have I solved and I still don't read the clues right you're supposed to replace looks behind couches and curtains with a word makes mistake was S I think I got all the other ones cool well how'd you do let's do strands for September 12th today's theme is this should be right up your alley are these things found in an alley like garbage can um or trash can um H cars dumpsters what are in alleys I don't know I don't have an alley just trying to think about New York alleys and movies um um okay so what are we what are we actually do it could be bowling related stuff like bowling alleys teeth or teeth in your alley weird that teeth is there I don't see what teeth would have to do with that but I don't see bowling lanes I see Lane I don't know if I'm going to be able to find the span first cuz I don't know what's going on here why um what is it is this teeth what would that if it was teeth what would that do not knowing if it locks in or not makes it much harder to think about this um I may just start trying words soon what would our spag be though wh what we have what and we have why that's pretty funny um tou no I don't think it's bowling related I do see Lane but okay if it was bowling related would we have ball would we have pins we have different kinds of shots maybe yeah I don't I don't think that this is bowling alleys like alleys between buildings in cities so you've got dumpsters garbage cans um car parking areas we've got balconies I don't see any of that stuff okay um I'm just going to try I'm just going to start trying things teeth okay teeth wasn't it Lane was it so what are we doing over here Dr or something what would Lane okay oh are these just Street suffixes like Street that's why there's teeth here right Street um we didn't we literally just have a strand that was this exactly am I going crazy Drive is this a repeat um what are these like do we have name here or I know what our spog is still I just got to think of more okay so Street and Lane Avenue Avenue highway road th oh through thorough what are we actually trying to do here weird that there's thorough here thorough Fair okay there there we go um Boulevard I I swear we had a strands that was the same theme maybe that's why it should be right up our alley I feel like I'm going crazy here it was different words last time in a different span but still all right well how'd you do 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