Find the links between the words to win today's game of Connections.gettyLooking for Fridays Connections hints and answers instead? You can find them here:Hey, folks! Welcome to the penultimate weekend of the year. Its a time for holiday parties, catching up on sleep, seeing friends and loved ones and preparing for more over the same over the next couple of weeks. Ill still be with you every day, of course, but I hope you have a wonderful, enjoyable, restful holiday period.Before we get started, Ive started a discussion group for Connections and this column on Discord. You can chat about each game (and other topics) with me and other folks. Im always interested to find out how other people approach the game, so join us! Its fun.Its also the best way to give me any feedback about the column, especially on the rare(!) occasions that I mess something up.Todays NYT Connections hints and answers for Saturday, December 21, are coming right up.MORE FOR YOUHow To Play ConnectionsConnections is a free, popular New York Times daily word game. You get a new puzzle at midnight every day. You can play on the NYT website or Games app.Youre presented with a grid of 16 words. Your task is to arrange them into four groups of four by figuring out the links between them. The groups could be things like items you can click, names for research study participants or words preceded by a body part.Theres only one solution for each puzzle, and youll need to be careful when it comes to words that might fit into more than one category. You can shuffle the words to perhaps help you see links between them.Each group is color coded. The yellow group is usually the easiest to figure out, blue and green fall in the middle, and the purple group is usually the most difficult one. The purple group often involves wordplay.Select four words you think go together and press Submit. If you make a guess and youre incorrect, youll lose a life. If youre close to having a correct group, you might see a message telling you that youre one word away from getting it right, but youll still need to figure out which one to swap.If you make four mistakes, its game over. Lets make sure that doesnt happen with the help of some hints, and, if youre really struggling, todays Connections answers. As with Wordle and other similar games, its easy to share results with your friends on social media and group chats.If you have an NYT All Access or Games subscription, you can access the publications Connections archive. This includes every previous game of Connections, so you can go back and play any of those that you have missed.Aside from the first 60 games or so, you should be able to find my hints for each grid via Google if you need them! Just click here and add the date of the game for which you need clues or the answers to the search query.What Are Todays Connections Hints?Scroll slowly! Just after the hints for each of todays Connections groups, Ill reveal what the groups are without immediately telling you which words go into them.Todays 16 words are...BANDSLEIGHBALONEYPANBUNKGROUCHCIRCLECANOPYCROCKOSTATUETTEPOTRINGMURPHYCASSEROLEHOOPAnd the hints for todays Connections groups are:Yellow group like a tire or the upside-down part of a rollercoasterGreen group kitchen toolsBlue group lay your weary head, perhapsPurple group linked by a forenameWhat Are Todays Connections Groups?Need some extra help?Be warned: were starting to get into spoiler territory.Todays Connections groups are...Yellow group loopGreen group cooking vesselsBlue group kinds of bedsPurple group things called OscarWhat Are Todays Connections Answers?Spoiler alert! Dont scroll any further down the page until youre ready to find out todays Connections answers.This is your final warning!Todays Connections answers are...Yellow group loop (BAND, CIRCLE, HOOP, RING)Green group cooking vessels (CASSEROLE, CROCK, PAN, POT)Blue group kinds of beds (BUNK, CANOPY, MURPHY, SLEIGH)Purple group things called Oscar (BALONEY, GROUCH, O, STATUETTE)No perfect game today, but thats back-to-back wins for me. Here's how I fared:The red herring of CROCK, BALONEY and BUNK almost got me. But I found the greens first.I made a mistake with CIRCLE, O, RING and HOOP, which left me one away from a group. BAND must fit into there instead, I thought.I opted to change strategy since I figured that I had the blues. I wasnt extremely sure about including SLEIGH, but I took a risk and it worked out.That didnt really help with the group of round things, but including BAND instead of O meant that I had the yellows.I didnt figure out the purple connection, but I probably should have between GROUCH and STATUETTE. After all, the first thing that came to mind when I saw the former on the grid was Oscar the Grouch.In the NATO alphabet, OSCAR means O. Meanwhile, Oscar Mayer produces BALONEY. As for STATUETTE, that refers to an Academy Award, aka an Oscar.Thats all there is to it for todays Connections clues and answers. Be sure to check my blog tomorrow for hints and the solution for Sundays game if you need them.P.S. Im not a huge Muse fan, but I really like some of their songs. One I particularly enjoy is Knights of Cydonia. I think its the bands magnum opus. Its a rollicking, operatic rock song that factors in thematic elements of the Wild West. As it happens, I was there for the first-ever live performance of the song, and it blew me away at the time:Have a great day! Call someone you love!If youre so inclined, please do follow my blog for more coverage of Connections and other word games and even some video game news, insights and analysis. It helps me out a lot! Also, follow me on Bluesky! Its fun there.