NYT 'Connections' Hints And Answers For Sunday, June 22

(Five points if you get that reference and why it’s relevant.)

Hey there, Connectors! I hope you’ve had a fantastic weekend so far.

Pastimes isn’t a productivity, self-help or advice journal. I don’t have the expertise for any of that. But I might sometimes offer some suggestions that might make life just a little bit easier for you, this this, one of my favorite little productivity hacks.

I get upwards of 100 emails a day. There’s no way I’d ever square away everything that I need to do if I had to respond to all of them. Some languish in my inbox for days or weeks (sorry). I’ll get to them as my bandwidth allows (I’m so sorry). And even then, I absolutely miss a lot of stuff (seriously, I’m sorry).

I sometimes deal with email late at night, but I don’t necessarily want people to think I’m working then — even though it’s literally 1:30AM as I write this. So when I’m replying to a few emails late at night, I take advantage of the handy schedule send tool.

In the web version of Gmail, you’ll find this by clicking the dropdown button next to the big “Send” button (the same goes for Proton Mail). In the Gmail mobile app, its in the three-dot menu by the Send button. I don’t know where it is on other email clients, but they do have it. You’d have to look into where to find it on other clients, because I don’t know.

I never know how many people are aware of this “one weird trick,” but it lets me schedule emails for shortly before I start my work day, and perhaps the recipients will get back to me soon after. I find it useful, and maybe you will too.

Before we begin, we have a great little community on Discord, where we chat about NYT Connections, the rest of the NYT games and all kinds of other stuff. Everyone who has joined has been lovely. It’s a fun hangout spot, and you’re more than welcome to join us.

Discord is also the best way to give me any feedback about the column, especially on the rare (or not-so-rare) occasions that I mess something up. I don’t look at Twitter much.

Today’s NYT Connections hints and answers for Sunday, June 22 are coming right up.

What Are Today’s Connections Hints?

Scroll slowly! Just after the hints for each of today’s Connections groups, I’ll reveal what the groups are without immediately telling you which words go into them.

Today’s 16 words are...

• PORT

• PURSUIT

• PROGRESSIVE

• SUCCESSION

• HAPPINESS

• DEPARTED

• FLASH

• LIBERTY

• WIRE

• EUPHORIA

• REMAINING

• ENTOURAGE

• INSECURE

• BULLETIN

• LIFE

• REPORT

And the hints for today’s Connections groups are:

• 🟨 Yellow group — like some dancers, these are often breaking

• 🟩 Green group — seen close together in a very famous document

• 🟦 Blue group — like luck, vinyl and divorce

• 🟪 Purple group — linked by where Beyoncé might place a box of your possessions

One Word For Each Connections Group

Need some extra help? 

Be warned: we’re starting to get into spoiler territory.

Let’s take a look at one word for each group.

Today’s Connections word hints are…

• 🟨 Yellow group — FLASH

• 🟩 Green group — HAPPINESS

• 🟦 Blue group — EUPHORIA

• 🟪 Purple group — PORT

What Are Today’s Connections Groups?

Today’s Connections groups are...

• 🟨 Yellow group — news announcement

• 🟩 Green group — nouns from a famous line in the Declaration of Independence

• 🟦 Blue group — HBO shows

• 🟪 Purple group — what "left" might mean

What Are Today’s Connections Answers?

Spoiler alert! Don’t scroll any further down the page until you’re ready to find out today’s Connections answers.

This is your final warning!

Today’s Connections answers are...

• 🟨 Yellow group — news announcement (BULLETIN, FLASH, REPORT, WIRE)

• 🟩 Green group — nouns from a famous line in the Declaration of Independence (HAPPINESS, LIBERTY, LIFE, PURSUIT)

• 🟦 Blue group — HBO shows (ENTOURAGE, EUPHORIA, INSECURE, SUCCESSION)

• 🟪 Purple group — what "left" might mean (DEPARTED, PORT, PROGRESSIVE, REMAINING)

So many HBO shows here! SUCCESSION, (The) WIRE, EUPHORIA, ENTORUAGE, INSECURE... WIRE was the odd one out there due to the lack of the "the," and I got the blues quickly as a result.

The greens were pretty straightforward for me too. The sentence in question is "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."

Then, knowing, as I do, the finer points of journalism, the yellows were very obvious. But, of course, I slide through the purples first. Not difficult to figure out that connection either -- here, PORT refers to the left side of a ship.

I think it's nice when we have a good balance of easier and tougher (like yesterday's) games. The difficult levels of Connections are all relative though, as it's based on what you know. I suspect folks who aren't familiar with the HBO shows here would find this to be a tricky one.

A perfect game extends my streak to 117 wins. Here's the grid:

🟦🟦🟦🟦 
🟩🟩🟩🟩 
🟪🟪🟪🟪 
🟨🟨🟨🟨

That’s all there is to it for today’s Connections clues and answers. I’ll be back over at Forbes for the Monday-Friday editions for the column. And if you haven’t subscribed to Pastimes already, definitely do that! It would be super sweet of you.

P.S. "Irreplaceable" is a relaxing enough song for a Sunday recommendation, right? It's what I was referring to in the purple clue and it's easily one of Beyoncé's best songs:

Have a great day! Stay hydrated! Take care of yourself an each other! Call someone you love!

On weekdays, you can find this column over at Forbes. Please follow my blog there for more coverage of NYT Connections and other word games, and even some video game news, insights and analysis. It helps me out a lot!

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