New York Times, Tuesday, February 8, 2022

ADAM: It's truly special to be sharing this byline with two real-life friends! We met in our University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign dorm (shoutout to Nugent Hall!) as freshmen, and two years later, we're roommates in what's gotta be the most crosswordy apartment in the Chambana metro area.

Last year, we were sitting in my dorm room brainstorming theme ideas when we scrolled past a note on my phone that read "BANANAGRAMS TOMATOMETER." We all thought it had potential. Only thing was, there was no way we'd find more entries to fit the absurdly specific constraint of a fruit followed by a unit of measurement. A couple of hours of scrolling through OneLook later, we found FIG NEWTON and LEMON BARS and had a theme. From there, we built the grid, divvied up the filling process, and wrote clues together on a Google Sheet. It was deeply collaborative; I hope it's proof that three heads are better than one!

JACKSON: I am from Chicago, a junior majoring in journalism and minoring in statistics at Illinois. I remember when my dad and I would open up a copy of the New York Times crossword every Sunday and get a few words before giving up. A major reason I am so obsessed with crosswords now is because of Adam, and I never thought I would ever actually construct a grid, let alone get it published in the NYT.

I'm incredibly excited to be making my NYT debut, and doing it with two of my college friends makes it even more special.

I don't remember how this theme came to fruition (pun intended). We were pleasantly surprised that our clue for TRIO survived the editing process.

P.S. Support local and student journalism!

JACK: It's super NEAT to be making my debut in the New York Times, let alone as part of a TRIO of friends! I am also from Chicago and am now a junior at Illinois studying aerospace engineering and computer science. I've always enjoyed solving and constructing any puzzles or mazes. Fast forward to my freshman year of college, where I met Adam, who re-introduced me to crosswords.

Fast forward another year to when I was celebrating my birthday with my family. Suddenly, my phone buzzed with an incoming FaceTime from Adam and Jackson. I was confused, we don't usually FaceTime, but I thought they might be calling to re-wish me a happy birthday. To my surprise, they gave me the news that our puzzle was accepted into the NYT! Talk about an awesome birthday gift!

I hope you enjoy the puzzle because we had a blast making it.

Finally, a puzzle for us uber-dorks! Forget the NYT crossword's usual snooty art and literature references. Chuck the too-clever culture clues. Screw science fiction — today we're treated to science fact! BARS. METER. GRAMS. NEWTON!

Wait. BARS?

BARS?!

No, no, no! You can't use a non-SI unit when you've used three standards. It should have been PASCALS.

Huh? No in-the-language phrases use PASCAL? Yeah, but—

Watt? No one knows weber SI units are important or not?

Ohm my God, my head hertz.

Reasonable early-week theme, although the parentheticals in clues gave away the idea right off the bat. Even something straightforward as UNIT could have served as a revealer.

Okay fine, no one would have recognized the BAR or NEWTON as a UNIT!

I'm out of lux today.

Although the theme straddled the no-man's-land between techies and fuzzies, I enjoyed so much of the fill. LOLCATS are from a generation ago, but I still lol at them. CILANTRO makes me remember a friend who nearly broke up with someone because he thought it tasted like soap. OOH BABY, that was a lot to enjoy!

ADDED NOTE: It wasn't until I read the constructing trio's note that I realized all the themers are fruit-related. D'oh! That helps elevate the concept, no doubt, and I appreciate that it's an observation I never would have noticed. Still, without some revealer to pull things together — a shame that FRUITY UNIT isn't a real phrase — it's kind of an odd mix-up of fruits and voltables.