Looking for the answer to today's Connections puzzle, the Connections answer to puzzle #436 on August 20 took a dive in difficulty compared to yesterday's answer The Connections companion rated the difficulty of this puzzle 22 out of 5

We update our Connections hints and tips daily And if the hints aren't enough, you can see all four answers along with the category title and related words In addition, for those of you reading this in a different time zone, I've included a reflection on yesterday's puzzle 435

There are spoilers for connection #436 Please only read this if you want to know the answer to today's connection

Alternatively, see our NYT Connections How to Play Guide for tips on how to solve the puzzle without our help

While today's wordle solution guide recommends the best wordle starting words as a strategy, Connections' solution depends on identifying the categories that are connected from the 16 words The difficulty of each category is represented by a color, with yellow being the easiest grouping and purple the most difficult Hints are helpful as the answer is displayed after four wrong guesses

If you need a hint to help you solve the groupings, here are each theme in order of difficulty:

If you read these hints, you should at least find the answer to today's connection If not, please continue reading for larger hints Also, if you only want the answer, scroll down further

Here's a bigger clue: Today is an autumn day, a ray of wind Then cozy up to a good book, perhaps something by Seussian You're all set for fall

Now, what's the answer to today's game #436 Connection?

Drum roll please

Allegedly, today's grid is easier than Monday's puzzle For me

I won't say how long it took me to figure out the blue and purple categories because I don't really know, but I took a break and came back again

I started the day with a green snag of crank, reel, turn, and wind

I was already thinking yellow, so blow, draft, gust, and puff fell right after I put in the word green

I couldn't for the life of me see a blue or purple category, so I took some strikes here

Usually I can make some sort of mental connection, but my brain wasn't working today I knew the blue category because after I almost struck out, my wild instincts kicked in I should have known that the bull, crab, lion, and ram are symbols of the zodiac

It's too bad, because purple is a fun Dr Seuss title figure, with “Cat (In the Hat),” “(How the) Grinch (Stall Christmas),” “(Hop on) Pop,” and “(Yertle the) Turtle (and Other Stories)”

It happens

I'm reading this late in the day According to the Connections Companion, this is Connections' answer to game #435, which had a difficulty level of 3 out of 5

Alyssa was pleased that Monday's puzzle was easier than Sunday's The yellow category took first place without much sweat Blues is hard to mistake for anything other than a genre of music, and when she started trying to sniff out other genres, county, folk, and rock came up quickly

She went to a family BBQ yesterday and must still have hot dogs and hamburgers stuck in her head

She then had a little trouble thinking, but stumbled on the wrong answer just one step away from correctly guessing the other categories She had heard of yoga Mountain and Warrior poses, and she vaguely remembered Chair from a yoga class a friend took her to a few years ago But she didn't know that “tree” was one, too

After that, she began to fill in the purple category by rote She says that the same category yesterday was related to another animated film, Snow White, and that she should really have been able to guess the connection