NEW Strands Today — Hints, Spangrams and Answers for Game #288 (Monday, December 16, 2024)

On December 16, 2024By Littum

Strands today: Quick menu

Need help with NYT Strands today? Today’s theme – “Crosswords” – is really fun, but relies on you knowing a specific expression to find the crossword puzzle.

Below we have collected some useful tips for Strands #288, as well as the answers should it come to that. We’ll start with some clues before building up to the full answer for Strands #288, so read on if you need some help.

Warning: Spoilers ahead for Strand’s #288.

Today’s NYT Strand’s answer — Today’s theme and hints

The official theme of NYT Strands #288 is… “Crosswords”.

And here’s an unofficial hint from me: “Combined meanings”.

If you’re still in the dark, here are some helpful words to give you those valuable clues:

comrades
TRACK
ZERO
HE
SURE
WOOD
THERE
RARE

Still struggling? The spangram will give you a hint about the connecting word. Today it starts with ‘P’ and ends with ‘X’.

Scroll down to find out what it is…

It’s PORTMANTEAUX.

Dagens Strand’s answer

So what is today’s Strands response to game #288?

Drumroll, please…

BRUNCH
SPORK
SMOG
ZORSE
THE ANKLE
ATHLEISURE

Thread #288

(Image credit: Alan Martin)

…and the span frame was PORTMANTEAUX.

Thread #288

“Crosswords”

Hello Strand’s fans. This was the most enjoyable Strands puzzle game in a while! Taxing, but not too difficult (as long as you’ve heard the word spangram before, that is).

The theme – “Crosswords” – was suitably cryptic, but when I saw BRUNCH in the lower right corner, I realized it could only mean one thing. This was a puzzle about combining two words to mean one thing – or PORTMANTEAUX as it is known.

I found said spangram from top to bottom of the board, and split it neatly in half. But it didn’t exactly open the floodgates, and the answers came relatively slowly. SPORK was immediately above BRUNCH, but it took me a while to see SMOG halfway down the left side.

It helpfully split the left wing into two different sections and I eventually got ZORSE on top through some trial and error. I then returned to the upper right and realized that “leisure” was actually part of ATHLEISURE.

Finally it was back to the bottom left corner to find out what LKENAT could be. I finally decoded it: ANKLE!

Yesterday’s Strand’s answer

Are you reading this in a later time zone? You can find the entire article about yesterday’s Strand’s answer for game #287 right here.