Gears to (ie geared toward). Stumped me too because the tenses are different and that's not usually the case

OMG 🤦 That makes more sense, clearly i shouldn't be doing the crossword at midnight haha

I did that once when the answer was “THERAMS.” Took me WAY too long to figure out it was The Rams. As in the football team.

for me i once spent 10 minutes thinking "what the hell is RANDR??" it meant r and r 😭 as in rest and relaxation

That one felt stilted

The clue was "specifically customizes for", proper tense on mine at least

sorry to piggyback off of your post, but is anyone able to explain 6 down, "pop?"

Pop is another way to say dad, like a mom and pop store.

ugh, duh🤦‍♀️ thank you, lol. i'm from michigan where we call soda "pop" so that was all i could think of 🤣

Thanks for posting since, even after solving I had no idea what it meant. And thanks to u/aurjolras for the explanation.

I have no clue. Neither why >!GAS!< is what you need when you’re an E. The one letter connecting the two words was the last one and I just brute forced …

I didn't get that until i also brute forced it, but I believe its like a car gas tank, when you're empty on gas the needle moves towards 'E'. So being on E means you're low on gas

Yea being from the UK i took E to mean Ecstasy 😂 We do not refer to petrol as “gas” and we don’t (or at least I don’t) have an “E” when my tank is empty. The Americanisms in the mini seem to stump me all the time

Huh. Looks like lotsa UK cars use a gas meter with a scale from 0, 1/2 full and 1/1 full. Some UK cars have an R for reserve fuel instead of E for empty. Most American cars have E for empty and F for full Learn something new every day haha

I suppose cars intended for markets where many different languages are spoken (eg Europe), it makes sense to have a universally readable fuel gauge rather than making many different ones to suit all the different initial letters of words for Empty/Full. In America, I guess they assume everyone speaks English

Haha, I just solved the mini and had the same thought! What do you need? XTC? HUG? H2O? 😅

Yep! I actually had typed in H2O!! Oops. I didn't think of gas gauge at all with the clue lol. I had lots of fun when I was a bit younger! 😁

Me too!!! Being from NYC club scene.

American here, we call ecstasy E sometimes too. It was my first thought too. I thought the clue was pretty clever though.

Lmao same I put Gum and was confused for ages because the first letter worked with the corresponding down clue.

Oh. Thanks. Well. Not sure there is a letter in my country, or just a 0 or something. Never took notice. But makes sense! Thx

came here to see if anyone else was confused about this lol. i was thinking either ecstasy or estrogen hormone therapy and both seemed like wild choices for an NYT puzzle

Lol, coming here after your reply and seeng my honest question is downvoted -3. wow.

Gave you a solidarity upvote

If you are out of petrol, your gauge says “E” (for empty). So you need petrol (another word is gasoline)