Looking for the most recent Strands answer? Click here for our daily Strands hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle, Connections and Connections: Sports Edition puzzles.

Today’s NYT Strands puzzle was a fun one for me, but then, I get a huge kick out of the game that is today’s topic. Game? Sport? I guess it’s both, depending on your dedication level. Some of the answers are difficult to unscramble, so if you need hints and answers, read on.

I go into depth about the rules for Strands in this story. 

If you’re looking for today’s Wordle, Connections and Mini Crossword answers, you can visit CNET’s NYT puzzle hints page.

Read more: NYT Connections Turns 1: These Are the 5 Toughest Puzzles So Far

Hint for today’s Strands puzzle

Today’s Strands theme is: Strike one!

If that doesn’t help you, here’s a clue: Put your shoes on and start rolling!

Clue words to unlock in-game hints

Your goal is to find hidden words that fit the puzzle’s theme. If you’re stuck, find any words you can. Every time you find three words of four letters or more, Strands will reveal one of the theme words. These are the words I used to get those hints, but any words of four or more letters that you find will work:

• COAL, BOWL, RACE, RACED, DEAL, LEAD, BALE, SPIN

Answers for today’s Strands puzzle

These are the answers that tie into the theme. The goal of the puzzle is to find them all, including the spangram, a theme word that reaches from one side of the puzzle to the other. When you have all of them (I originally thought there were always eight but learned that the number can vary), every letter on the board will be used. Here are the nonspangram answers:

• PINS, BALLS, LOUNGE, LANES, ARCADE, SCOREBOARD

Today’s Strands spangram

Today’s Strands spangram is BOWLINGALLEY. To find it, start with the B that’s two letters over on the top row, and wind over and then down.

Alienware is finally stepping into budget territory with the Alienware 15, its first properly affordable gaming laptop in decades.

Honestly, the timing couldn’t be better. With gaming hardware prices climbing across the board, this feels like Alienware responding directly to where the market is heading.

The Alienware 15 starts at $1299, which gets you an AMD Ryzen 5 220, 16GB of RAM, 512GB SSD storage, and an NVIDIA RTX 4050 GPU. There’s also an Intel option with a Core 5 210H chip for $1349. In select regions, a lower RTX 3050 variant will be available. That’s a solid entry point for modern 1080p (and beyond) gaming.

The laptop uses a 15.3-inch 1920 x 1200 display with a 16:10 aspect ratio, a 165Hz refresh rate, and 300 nits of brightness. It’s not trying to be flashy, but it covers the basics well enough for smooth gameplay.

Connectivity is another strong point – you’re getting two USB-C ports, two USB-A ports (all USB 3.1 or better), HDMI 2.1, a headphone jack, and even an Ethernet port. Notably, that’s still surprisingly rare in thinner gaming laptops.

Design-wise, Alienware has clearly dialled things back. Instead of the usual RGB-heavy aesthetic, the Alienware 15 comes in a more understated nova black finish. There is a simpler iridescent logo, It’s also slim at under an inch thick. This is thanks to a design that avoids the bulky thermal shelf seen on higher-end Alienware models.

There are also a few smart usability touches here. A full numpad makes it more useful for productivity, while a Stealth key lets you instantly disable lighting and switch to quiet performance mode. That’s handy if you’re using it in class or a shared space. Inside, there’s also room to upgrade. There is a second SO-DIMM slot for adding more RAM later.

It’s not perfect. The webcam is limited to 720p at 30fps, which won’t impress anyone relying on video calls, and there’s no microSD card reader. However, those feel like understandable trade-offs at this price point rather than deal-breakers.

Overall, the Alienware 15 should be a meaningful shift for the brand. Instead of chasing extremes, it’s just offering a more accessible way into serious PC gaming. This comes at a time when affordability actually matters again.

• US Army seeks lighter rations to reduce battlefield logistical burdens significantly
• Gel and powder meals under review for combat ration development
• Insect and lab-grown meat excluded from current Army study

The US Army wants to change what soldiers eat during combat operations through a new source sought announcement.

The military branch is asking for help developing alternative protein technologies for field rations in the near future.

from the must-be-hiding-something dept

Something that never was a problem for years suddenly became a thing after Trump’s return to office. As his administration ramped up its cruelty towards non-white people, Democratic leaders suddenly became much more interested in seeing how ICE was handling this influx of detainees.

Not that they were wrong to do so. The history of ICE detention is extremely ugly, with detainees regularly treated like the subhumans ICE (and their subcontractors) seem to believe these human beings are. But with ICE and the DHS making all the wrong kinds of headlines as the administration carried out its racial cleansing programs, DHS started to pretend congressional members were no longer allowed to perform inspections of ICE detention facilities.

In some cases, this refusal to comply with the law resulted in the arrest of politicians trying to engage in their legally ordained oversight duties. When that intimidation failed to stem the flow of congressional reps to ICE facilities, DHS started issuing its own limitations on inspections — exactly zero of which were supported by current law.

Kristi Noem issued “guidance” last year pretending that Trump’s budget bill freed ICE from having to open their facilities to congressional inspection. Noem’s theory was that while normally DHS couldn’t make congressional reps give ICE 72 hours to seven days advance notice of inspections, the “Big Beautiful Bill” concocted by the GOP created pathways for pretending existing law didn’t exist.

That guidance specifically noted the DC Appeals Court had already ruled against the DHS by stating its current demands for advance notice were “inconsistent” with existing law. No doubt we’ll see similar misleading “guidance” issued by the DHS again in the near future as the DC Appeals Court has (again) rejected the government’s attempts to violate the law while litigation over these new policies continues.

A federal appeals court on Friday required the Trump administration to continue allowing lawmakers to inspect immigration detention facilities without advance notice, ruling unanimously that the impromptu visits posed minimal problems for the government.

The decision by a three-judge panel of the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit preserved, for now, the ability of Democrats in Congress to make unannounced visits to detention centers and check on the conditions inside.

The one-page order [PDF] (and its 10-page explanation by Judge Rao) is inexplicably absent from the New York Times reporting. But it’s embedded below (and linked above).

Judge Rao says the government does have some interest in controlling access to its facilities for several, mostly credible reasons. But its belief that these concerns override existing law allowing congressional inspections is misplaced.

The government is entitled to deference on how it maintains the security of detention facilities, but the current record does not substantiate the government’s claim that oversight visits without advance notice impose harms beyond administrative inconvenience. While a close call, particularly because of the strong likelihood of success on the merits, I concur in denying a stay.

As Noem pointed out in her memo, the Big Beautiful Act created a flow of funding that was (theoretically) outside of the purview of existing appropriations laws governing ICE facility inspection. This order points out that this is no longer the case as that particular rider attached to the Act lapsed along with the rest of the DHS’s funding during the shutdown. The dead rider has not been re-attached, so the DHS’s insistence this means this particular funding can be used to thwart congressional oversight isn’t exactly a foregone conclusion.

That’s not to say this decision will ultimately lead to the DHS abandoning its demands for advance notice before inspections. While the government has failed to show it will suffer irreparable harm if congressional reps are allowed on-demand access to detention facilities, the plaintiffs here are legislators — people who aren’t generally allowed to sue the same government that employs them to obtain relief.

Judge Rao says the administration is likely to emerge victorious because the Democratic congressional reps don’t have standing. But that doesn’t mean the government has presented solid arguments about its own interests in denying access to detention facilities.

The government has credibly alleged inconvenience and disruption caused by congressional visits. But the government has not shown that these harms arise from congressional visits undertaken without seven days’ advance notice, as opposed to congressional visits generally. The government cites a single security incident involving the unauthorized presence of the Mayor of Newark in the secured area of an ICE facility and the alleged obstruction of the Mayor’s arrest by Representative McIver. But the government does not explain how this incident resulted from a lack of prior notice of the Representative’s oversight visit.

To be sure, the mayor of Newark is not allowed to access ICE facilities without advance notice or explicit permission. But that doesn’t extend to everyone else ICE wishes to keep out of its facilities — a list that seems to include every congressional rep that actually might want to perform an inspection.

In addition, this never used to be a problem. The Appeals Court isn’t convinced that it’s suddenly a problem now, just because this version of the DHS wants to pretend it is.

By contrast, the Members have provided numerous declarations attesting to congressional visits made with less than seven days’ notice that were conducted without incident since 2019. The government does not meaningfully dispute these accounts and responds only that the pending litigation incentivizes the Members to conduct their visits in a nondisruptive manner. Even if that is true, this pending appeal will continue to provide the same incentives for good behavior.

For now, congressional reps don’t need to give ICE a heads up before engaging in an inspection. That may change (at least temporarily) if the administration can show these congressional reps don’t have standing to pursue this litigation. But we can hope that any final dispensation of this case only grants the administration its argument about standing. The law is still the law, no matter how the DHS might feel about the law. When this all wraps up, the status should be reset to quo: Congressional reps have a legal right to inspect facilities without advance notice. Everything else is just mud in the water.

Filed Under: accountability, congress, dc circuit, dhs, ice, oversight, trump administration

Campfire Audio has built its most complex in-ear monitor to date with the Chimera, a nine-driver flagship IEM that like the figure from Greek mythology that it’s named after, combines many elements, including dynamic, balanced armature, electrostatic, and bone-conduction drivers.

These drivers are all housed inside a single CNC-machined magnesium shell, which is hand-assembled at the brand’s Portland, Oregon facility.

The drivers look to divide responsibility across the frequency range, with a newly developed 10mm True-Glass dynamic driver covering low and low-mid frequencies. A dual-diaphragm balanced armature handles the midrange, with two dedicated high-frequency balanced armatures for clarity and articulation. Then there are four electrostatic super-tweeters that extend into the uppermost range for air and precision.

Alongside those eight conventional drivers sits a bone-conduction unit embedded directly into the magnesium shell, a first for Campfire Audio. It allows low-frequency energy to be felt physically through the shell as well as heard acoustically, adding tactile weight to bass content that a acoustic driver arrangement supposedly cannot replicate.

Internally, a pressure valve regulates airflow behind the dynamic driver while a final-stage tuning damper sits integrated into the nozzle, two components that work alongside Campfire’s acoustic routing to maintain coherence across a driver array that combines four different transducer technologies operating at the same time.

The shell pairs that magnesium body with a carbon fibre and brass Damascus faceplate, where layers of brass are folded into carbon fibre and then CNC-machined to produce a patterned surface that carries subtle variation between units, with the finish available in black and gold PVD variants.

Each Chimera ships with the ALO Audio Valence-6 cable, marking the reintroduction of the ALO Audio brand and features four high-purity copper conductors alongside two mixed copper and silver-plated copper conductors, finished with black anodised aluminium hardware throughout.

Pre-sale opens on 16th May 2026 ahead of an expected June shipping window, with the Chimera priced at £6,999 / $7,500, with limited initial quantities available worldwide.

For many Windows users, the taskbar in Windows 11 has always felt strangely restrictive. Microsoft redesigned the interface with a cleaner, more modern look, but in the process removed several customization options people had been using for years. One of the biggest complaints? The inability to freely move the taskbar around the screen. Now, Microsoft finally seems ready to loosen things up.

The company has started testing a major overhaul of the taskbar and Start menu for Windows 11 Insiders in its Experimental channel. And honestly, this feels like Microsoft acknowledging that users want their PCs to feel personal again.

Windows 11 could soon feel far more flexible

The biggest change here is the return of a movable taskbar. Instead of being locked to the bottom of the screen, users in the test build can now shift it to the top or even place it vertically along either side of the display. That might sound like a small tweak, but for longtime Windows users, it’s a pretty significant reversal. Earlier versions of Windows allowed this kind of flexibility for years before Windows 11 simplified everything into a more rigid layout.

Microsoft is also testing different taskbar sizes, including a compact version that could be especially useful on smaller laptops and tablets where screen space matters more. Even the Start menu is becoming more adjustable. Users will reportedly be able to resize it and switch between smaller and larger layouts, depending on how they prefer to organize apps and shortcuts.

The company is finally listening

Beyond the visual changes, Microsoft is also trying to clean up parts of the Start menu that many people found cluttered or unnecessary. New controls will let users decide which sections appear inside the menu, including areas for pinned apps, recommendations, and app lists. Interestingly, Microsoft is also renaming the “Recommended” section to “Recent,” which honestly makes the feature easier to understand at a glance. The section mainly surfaces recently used files and newly installed apps anyway, so the older name often felt vague.

There are also smaller but thoughtful privacy-focused touches being added. For example, users can hide their profile photo and account name from the Start menu, which could come in handy during presentations or screen-sharing sessions. Microsoft says these changes will roll out to Insider testers over the next few weeks. More importantly, the company openly admits that the Start menu and taskbar are where users judge Windows the hardest. And after years of complaints about Windows 11’s limited customization, this update feels like Microsoft is finally taking that criticism seriously.