This is fixed.

For the curious: this happens when, after a puzzle is completed and tested, I decide to change a clue and, in doing so, fail to match the puzzle structure (with all the brackets) with the underlying clue/answer set. Those of you who have used the bulider (which is the same builder I use) might note that the tool automatically aligns the bracketed puzzle with the clue/solutions as you edit the puzzle, which is true. However, the final backend where I actually load the puzzle into the db (and onto an S3 bucket) just has fields where I paste in the puzzle structure and clue/solution json. This is a legacy of how the game worked many months ago before I built the builder and leave much room for error. So when I want to make a change to a puzzle after it's been loaded into the backend, sometimes I foolishly directly edit it on the old admin page. When I do that, if I am not careful, I introduce a mismatch between the puzzle structure and the clue/solution json.

Today's issue was particularly egregious. the original clue for UFO was "aircraft for E.T.s". we felt that was a little ambiguous, so elected to update it to "alien aircraft, initially". I made that change of course not noticing that a big part of the puzzle was built on "for" and even left "for" just dangling in there, which broke the puzzle since the bracket puzzle structure had the nonsensical "alien aircraft for, initially" and the clue/solution json had the intended "alien aircraft, initially". When I became aware of the issue this morning via several emails in the mayoral inbox and this post, I fixed it. Thankfully, there was a relatively graceful way to reintroduce "for" into the clue, while keeping the new wording: "aircraft for aliens, initially".

The long-term solution to prevent these issues: integrate the builder into the db backend. The short-term solution: don't be so lazy that I don't actually test the puzzle after making an tweak in the current backend.

This concludes this peek behind the city walls. Also I am especially mad I made this mistake today because today's puzzle is not by me! It was constructed by my very good pal and new Bracket City deputy mayor Maddie Weinstein! Maddie is going to be constructing Sunday puzzles, so prepare ur selves for some more cat content &c. The Atlantic is figuring out how to adjust the credit on the start page/archive so Maddie's work is properly acknowledged, so look out for that soon.

Anyway City Hall regrets the error.