NYT Connections hints and answers for Friday, January 5, #208

Connections today: Quick menu

Looking for today's Connections answers? The Connections answers on January 6 for puzzle #209 are tougher, with the Connections Companion rating this puzzle's difficulty at 3.3 out of 5.

Every day, we update this article with Connections hints and tips to help you find all 4 of today's answers. And if the hints aren't enough, you'll find all 4 answers below, with the category titles and the correlating words. Plus, we're including a reflection on yesterday's puzzle, #208, in case you're reading this in a different time zone.

Spoilers lie ahead for Connections #209. Only read on if you want to know today's Connections answers.

Unlike our guide to today's Wordle answer, where we recommend the best Wordle start words as your strategy, solving Connections relies on identifying connecting categories among 16 words. Each category's difficulty level is represented by a color; yellow is the easiest grouping, and purple is the most challenging. Once you've made 4 mistakes in your guesses, the answers will be revealed, so hints can be helpful.

If you need hints to solve the groupings, then here are the themes of each, based on the order of difficulty:

These hints should get you at least some of the way towards finding today's Connections answers. If not, then you can read on for bigger clues; or, if you just want to know the answer, then scroll down further.

Alright then, here's a larger hint:  Sidestep the seductive samba of music genres. Sniff out a category that packs a pungent punch and sway toward rhythmic motions. Choose wisely, and let the spheres guide you to a sparkling finish. 

So, what are today's Connections answers for game #209?

Drumroll, please...

At first glance, the board seemed to pulse with the energy of a night out—words that hinted at parties and music set the stage. I confidently jumped onto the dancefloor, pairing up Funk, Swing, Disco, and Rock, thinking these four music genres were a shoo-in. But no, the puzzle had other plans, and my guess missed the mark.

Shrugging off the misstep, I turned my attention to Disco—a word that usually hints at something shiny and lively. Ball! That was the link I was looking for. With a bit of thought, I connected Disco with Crystal, Foul, and Gutter, and just like that, I had my first correct category.

This breakthrough made the rest jive into place. Rock, Swing, Sway, and Wave grouped together naturally as movements back and forth. And what was left? Afro, Bone, Fight, Lock—all things you'd pick, albeit in very different contexts. With each category now neatly sorted, I walked away the victor.

Reading this in a later time zone? Here are the Connections answers for game #208, which had a difficulty rating of 2.4 out of 5, according to the Connections Companion.

While this week’s Connections have so far proven especially tricky for this particular player, it was a refreshing change today when everything seemed to fall into place rather neatly. Despite being initially drawn in to thinking Kid simply must be tied to Adult in some way, in the absence of terms like baby or elderly, I resorted to thinking again without submitting any mistakes.

Having an impish younger sibling finally provided some use after all these years when I spotted the words Josh and Tease, which I figured matched with the aforementioned Kid. Rib completed the yellow category to get me underway nicely.

Unable to spot any obvious patterns for Adult, I moved on to what appeared to be numerical-related words, combining Dozen, Pair, Score and Ten. No dice on this occasion, but only one away. I figured Ten was the offending figure, especially as some distant memory in the far reaches of my brain suggested that Gross might work here. Referring to a square dozen (yes, I have since Google that), it did indeed fit the other Words for specific quantities. Blue complete.

On a roll now, I had visions of Hillary and Tenzing ascending Everest as I put Height, Max, Peak, and Top together to complete the Apex category, leaving me with the simple task of submitting the remaining four: Adult, Kiss, Ten, Times. Today, I certainly felt like I had the X factor.

Connections relies more on your deductive skills and general knowledge, and you also don't get to know which word (or words) don't belong in your guessed groupings. Only if you've included one incorrect word, will the game tell you so.

To win Connections, you'll want to take your time looking at all 16 words before making your first guess. Do any words have more than pronunciation? Do any of the words mean more than one thing? Are any of the words part of larger phrases?

Often times, the answer that jumps out at your first will intentionally mislead you. That's why identifying any possible 5-word categories is a good strategy to start. Bookmark them and come back to them after you've solved another category or two, and it should help you figure out which of the 5 words belongs in a different category. 

Most Connections categories aren't incredibly obvious. It's common for the editor to use phrases, puns and other tricky topics that will require you to think. If you're stuck on the categories, cycle through each word in the grid and brainstorm possible categories that word fits into, even if you don't see other related words in the puzzle.

Connections is a category matching game, launched as a beta experience on June 12, 2023. It then joined the NYT Games app (iOS, Android) officially on August 28, 2023. This app is how people can play the daily New York Times Crossword and ultra-viral game Wordle; however, you need a paid subscription for crossword access, while Wordle and Connections are free to play.

In Connections, you're presented with 16 words and need to group them into 4, 4-word categories. There are often words intended to mislead you, or seemingly 5-word categories. Your goal is to group the words properly without exceeding 4 guesses. If you can't solve it within 4 guesses, you've failed, and the answers will be revealed. 

The NYT Connections puzzle comes out daily. The game is refreshed at your device's midnight local time.

You can play Connections on the New York Times Game App, available for iOS/iPadOS and Android. If you're on a computer or your device's browser, you can access NYT Connections online here.

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How To Answer ‘What Are Your Hobbies/Interests?’ In An Interview

How you talk about your hobbies is more powerful than you might think.

When you’re looking for a job, you want to impress the interviewer. As a result, your instinct may be to keep things all business. But chances are good you’ll also be asked about your hobbies or interests—and how you respond to the question is more powerful than you may realize. Luckily, there are some effective ways to answer—and some things to avoid as well.

You’re especially wise to plan for how you’ll reply to the question effectively because the job market is competitive, and it can be especially stressful. In fact, 77% of people experience stress and 69% struggle with mental side effects and 12% experience physical side effects through the job search process—from anxiety and sleep loss to frustration and exhaustion. All this is according to a poll by Monster.

But when you’re prepared to answer questions with credibility and confidence, you’ll reduce your anxiety and increase the chances your experience is positive.

In addition, when you plan thoroughly, you can respond brilliantly—and this enhances your likelihood of getting the job—and more importantly—a great-fit job. You always need to put your best foot forward, but when you’re also authentic, interviewers can more effectively assess your match with the role, the culture of the organization and your future opportunities with them.

All of these are powerful rationale for be intentional about every aspect of the job search process—including how to answer the question, “What are your hobbies or interests?”

Highlight your skills and passions when you talk about your hobbies.

Interviewers commonly ask about your interests and your hobbies, and it’s totally normal to talk about them in your job interview. Sometimes hiring leaders are using the question to learn more about you personally or to ease the intensity of the interview. In other cases, they use it as a segway to other parts of the discussion or as a wrap up question.

Whatever their intentions, your response has greater importance than you may realize. In particular, how you answer a question about your hobbies and interests has the power to demonstrate your personality, your skills, how you think and your level of confidence—and all of these contribute to the total impression you make.

Consider these overall tips for how to respond to the question and how to talk about your interests and hobbies in an interview—and provide an answer that is both meaningful and impactful.

In every interview, you’ll be asked for a lot more than just your hobbies or interests—of course—but the answers you provide can be a powerful demonstration of who you are, and it can make you more memorable to the interviewer as well.

One of the ways you can showcase your hobbies is to demonstrate how your passions relate to the job you’re seeking. If you’re applying for a teaching job and you talk about how you love to volunteer at your local library reading to children, you’ll be making the point that you have a passion for kids. Or if you’re seeking a job as an interior designer and talk about how you love to do home improvement projects on the weekends, you’ll be reinforcing your love of all-things creative.

In this case, sharing the why behind your choice of activities is powerful. Don’t just say you love to read to children in your spare time, talk about how you choose to spend the time because you’re energized by the curiosity that children invariably demonstrate. And don’t just say you love to do home improvement, talk about how it feeds your craving to build and express your creative spirit.

Employers want to hire people who are energized by the work they’ll do, so if you have hobbies that align with your role, highlight them.

Make connections between your hobbies and the skills relevant to the job.

Perhaps the most obvious way to leverage a question about your interests is to showcase your skills through your hobbies. If you’re applying for a job as an engineer, you can share how you love to participate in the annual pinewood derby with your niece. Or if you’re looking for a job as a landscape designer, you can share how you’ve always taken jobs at nurseries, learning about all the conditions for growing all kinds of plants.

In these cases, you’ll want to share your interests, but also how they’ve drawn on your existing skills and helped you develop your skills as well. The pinewood derby organizers always ask for your involvement because of the engineering and problem-solving acumen you bring. And after years working in greenhouses, there isn’t a plant or growing condition you don’t recognize.

Employers are looking for candidates with solid skills, so when you’re able to emphasize your capabilities through all kinds of examples—including hobbies and interests—you’ll put yourself ahead of other contenders.

When you answer the question about your hobbies and interests, you’ll also be smart to reflect some connection to the community. While sitting by yourself and reading books may demonstrate the ability to focus and concentrate, you’ll give yourself a greater advantage by sharing how you enjoy helping your elderly neighbor with her holiday shopping or how you thrive on your work at the local food pantry.

Employers are enthusiastic to hire those who will work well with others, have strong interpersonal skills and who will contribute to the team and the broader community of the organization—so you’re wise to reference these kinds of skills when you talk about your activities.

Talking about your hobbies is also a perfect time to discuss how you’ve grown or developed. For example, you wanted to get better at public speaking, so you joined a local Toastmasters club. Or you wanted to build your writing skills, so you joined a creative writing group. In these cases, you can describe the challenge you faced or the desire you had to build a skill or capability—and then how you took action through your hobby to develop it.

You can also show your initiative. For example, you love to read about topics related to your profession, so you started a reading club at your previous organization. Or you saw a need in your community for bird rescue, so you worked with your local nature center to develop an avian sanctuary program.

You’ll increase the chances of getting the job when you show that you value learning and how you’re always seeking to grow—and willing to take action to make things happen for yourself and others.

Hobbies and interests are also a great way to show how you manage your wellbeing. For example, you might talk about how you never miss a day of taking your dog for a walk because it helps you blow off steam. Or you may share how much you love to knit because it helps you relax and rejuvenate for the week ahead.

Statistically, when you’re happier outside of work, you’ll perceive greater happiness within your work as well—so you’re wise to have plenty of things which bring you joy.

In addition, it’s normal for work to be stressful, and meaningful effort can require a lot of energy—so employers like to know that you’re self-aware and have great coping skills and resilience.

Overall, you’ll increase the chances of getting a great job when you’re able to answer all kinds of interview questions, including the ones about your hobbies and interests. In fact, you may choose to offer details about hobbies or interests even if you’re not asked about them directly—since they can offer a window into the depth of your passion and the extent of your initiative.

Be open, be authentic and be confident in showing the interviewer who you are. You’ll be glad you did when you land the best job that allows you to express your passions.

The Answer, Unfortunately, Is ‘Destiny 3’

Destiny 2

Bungie and the Destiny 2 playerbase are doing some soul-searching after a traumatic week of mass layoffs and (unconfirmed but definitely happening) delays. Externally and internally, it’s known these layoffs have been triggered by the poor performance of Destiny 2 after this year’s Lightfall expansion, with player engagement down and revenue goals missed by a massive 45%.

The answer to this so far seems to be putting all stock in The Final Shape, the game’s last Light and Darkness era expansion. But with a delay, the declines ahead of that release are bound to accelerate, and it being an “ending,” drop-offs will also happen afterward.

Bungie seems like it’s in an almost impossible position at this point, trying to please Sony, trying to build multiple new games, trying to stabilize playercounts and revenue for Destiny 2, trying to increase employee and player morale in a terrible moment.

And the problem is, I don’t think there really is an answer. At least not one that isn’t extremely drastic.

I was just watching SkillUp’s show Friends Per Second where he had on Datto, Byf and Aztecross, three giants of the Destiny 2 community. When he asked a fairly simple question, what could Bungie do to turn things around from here, specifically after The Final Shape, everyone mostly looked around and shrugged. After years of suggestions, almost everyone is out of meaningful ideas. Better onboarding was one thing brought up, but what that even means seven years in with 50% of the game’s content deleted is unclear.

Destiny 2

In the wider community, the proposed “fixes” are impossible, like “just unvault all destinations and raids” like you’re flipping a light switch (ironically, location lighting is a big technical reason why it’s so hard to bring old areas back).

What I keep coming back to is that I do not think there is an answer except for…Destiny 3, something that does not seem to be on the table at all, but it is essentially the only thing that I can see working as a jump start and refresh for the series. And to build that may require a break of (gasp) a couple of years so Bungie can work on it instead of grinding out seasonal episodes or more yearly expansions around the clock.

My fear is that Bungie will stay on the exact same cadence of content release they are on now and it will do nothing to reverse declines. Staying with Destiny 2 indefinitely, all the same problems remain, and you’re not going to get some major surge in player population if some new “saga” launches in 2025, built on the back of 7/8 previous years of content. All the problems will still be there.

I think everyone needs a break. If Bungie was allowed to put Destiny 2 in maintenance mode for a period of time ahead of making a fully new sequel, players could just play as they felt like it without feeling the pressure to “keep up” the way they do now. Bungie could allow its seasonal teams to start working on larger content for a full sequel. And this has to be a real sequel, not just a new D2 expansion that vaults all past content and is called “Destiny 3,” which would probably be the worst of all worlds.

I know this is not how every game does it. WoW and Final Fantasy XIV and such don’t simply “stop,” and yet I don’t know if Destiny can continue this dream of being a full MMO like those games given the live service model it’s adopted where it can’t just return for huge, sweeping expansions, but it needs to be pumping out new content around the clock.

Destiny 2

You may say “well if you’re worried about player and revenue falloffs before this, stopping live content delivery would kill everything,” I get that. However, it feels like the kind of drastic step that would be needed if Destiny, or even Bungie, is going to survive in the long term. Maybe they couldn’t have survived a move like that as an independent studio, but this is where they would have to rely on Sony to give them runway to turn things around in their flagship series.

I understand Destiny is a live game, but at a certain point, that works against it as Bungie constantly has to build a road as they’re driving on it. Sony’s studios thrive by being able to take their time in between sprawling single player games, and while sure, it’s a different genre here, if Bungie wants to re-engage players on the whole, a big new start, a clean slate, new classes, new races, a new galaxy even, a place where new players can join on day one and veterans can be excited to return, they should be allowed that chance.

But I don’t think this is happening. From my time spent speaking with former and current Bungie employees during this past week, few seem to know or will share anything happening past the post-Final Shape episodes, and Destiny 3 doesn’t really seem to be coming up in conversation at all. I simply do not believe that even if The Final Shape is good, it will allow for anything other than a very brief surge in players and sales. After that, if we’re still just trying to trudge through years with similar seasonal content and similar expansions built in D2, I don’t think anything ever changes, and the declines will only continue. Sometimes you need drastic action to save a franchise and make sure it’s healthy long term, and as much as I may not want to believe it, I think taking a few years off to craft Destiny 3 as a clean slate for new players and veterans alike is the thing that makes the most sense, as scary as it may be for everyone involved. This current path leads nowhere good.

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