Why today is closed
A shared daily puzzle only works if the answer is not sitting under the question. The five pairs are fixed by the date in your time zone. Anyone who opens the answers first, then plays, is scoring a memory, not an eye. The page will show today's list if you ask it to. That ask is the decision. There is no second, secret board for people who peeked. The red outline on the play page is still the honest way to learn a miss, because you see your white guess and the truth in the same picture.
Closing the list is not a punishment and it is not an account gate. Nothing is checked on a server. The page knows whether this browser has a finished day stored locally. Another browser, or this one after you clear site data, looks unfinished. That can feel strict. It is the same rule as the streak: the record lives where you play.
How to read a line
Each finished round names the target, the reference, your guess, and the true measurement. The points beside them already include the day's weight. A modest miss on round five can cost more than a wild miss on round one, because rounds four and five count triple and rounds one and two count once. If you are replaying the day in your head, read the weight before you scold the eye.
The measurement is the one the fact sentence describes. A basketball hoop is the rim at 3.05 metres from the floor, not the backboard and not the player. A Boeing 747 on this board is a 747-400, nose to tail, about 70.7 metres. A blue whale is a large adult at 27 metres, and the fact says some are longer. If your memory was a different version, the line is telling you which version was in play. Argue with that sentence if you want a better board. Do not argue with the ratio. The ratio used the number on the line.
What a miss usually means
Most misses are a wrong multiple, not a wrong object. People know a whale is bigger than a bus. They do not know it is a bit more than two buses, not four. People know the Eiffel Tower is tall. They place the Statue of Liberty as a rival, then discover 330 metres against 93 metres with the pedestal included. The answers list is useful when you write the multiple next to the pair. 'I said about the same. It was three and a half.' That sentence is the whole lesson.
Area pairs need a second reading. Texas and metropolitan France are both large, and the pictures of them in atlases are cropped to the page. The board compares land area, about 696 thousand square kilometres for Texas and about 552 thousand for metropolitan France. The stage draws the square root so the silhouettes can share a frame. If you judged the pictures as lengths, the miss is about the axis, and the list will look harsher than your eye deserved. Check the axis word before you decide you cannot see.
Using the list without spoiling the habit
Look after you play. Note the direction, not just the points. Too big on thin towers and too small on long animals is a pattern. Too big on everything is often a slider habit: the hand likes the right-hand side of a log track because the shape grows in a satisfying way. Too small on everything is often humility. Neither one is a personality. Both are correctable if you catch them across three days rather than one unlucky pair.
Do not treat an old day as homework to memorise. The library reuses objects. It does not reuse the feeling of a fresh pair. If you want repetition, use unlimited and lock in before you look. The answers page is a record. It is a poor teacher if it becomes the first click of the day.
Dates, time zones, and empty days
A day key is your local calendar date, not UTC. Two people on opposite sides of the date line can be on different fives at the same minute. That is the rule we publish, and it is why a friend abroad may not match your list. Compare the date printed with the round, not the moment you both opened the tab.
A day with no stored result is marked as not played on this browser. It does not mean you failed, and it does not mean the pairs did not exist. It means this browser has no record. The measurements for past dates can still be shown, because the puzzle is a function of the date and the shelf, not of your identity. Today's date stays behind the button until you finish or you choose to look.