Katie

I love how the crossword in recent months is committed to the only significant meaning of ELON being a North Carolina college. That's true Southern shade.

IN A WORLD where PLAYTIME'S OVER and popcorn comes in TINS, a PRUDISH MINISTER, a ZEN TEAMSTER, and a SWAMP RAT go AWOL, go PRO, go for BROKE, and go BOOM. With an ICONIC TWIST you won't see coming, PROTEIN SHAKES this summer and so will you. WAR STORY, coming soon to a theater near you.

In retrospect, I filled in "Cattle call" as MOOOOOOOO a little too hastily.

Delighted to see DARKACADEMIA and GOSSIPGIRL in this one. Finally something for me! It can't always be golf and retirement accounts. More puzzles by women, please!

"Who just puts a pencil back without sharpening it?" POINTED QUESTION

If, like me, you didn't figure out the theme until reading the column, you can just let out a sigh, feel blue, razz the creator, mull it over, have a slow chuckle, and call the boys in (Bill and Tay?)

Oh, I absolutely loved this one! So many fresh subjects and fun angles. RIOT GRRRL (which I believe Anna Shechtman, talking about women's exclusion from the crossword world, specifically had called out as a once-rejected answer), Linda PERRY, PAD SEE EW and negitoro rolls, Pequod crossing AHAB, DEAD TREE EDITION, Tu Youyou... and probably my very favorite clue of all, "Pixar franchise in which buses and taxis exist, despite serving seemingly no purpose," which I immediately sent to my sister, as she has watched CARS so many times with her 4-year-old that she has made this very complaint about the worldbuilding. Jiahe, please let this be the first of many!

This was much brainier than I expected for a Wednesday, with clues and answers that felt fresh-- what a joy! The fellowship is giving us many of the paper's best puzzles. And grousing is the natural response to symphony puns, of course.

Thanks to this puzzle for teaching me the fact about box jellyfish, who not only have 24 true eyes but can apparently learn without a centralized brain! (I was disappointed that the "success in another's field" clue had nothing to do with poaching, though.)

Loved the theme, completely original! This was a joy to do. Hope the creators contribute many more, either together or separately.

"The Thin Man terrier" should be a World Heritage crossword clue by now. I remember my grandma (who loved complaining about the crossword) pointing out what an old standby it was many decades ago.

Like everybody else I'm gonna call foul on SLEEVELESS T-- it should be either "sleeveless T-shirt" or "sleeveless tee"-- but otherwise I didn't mind this one, and EN PASSANT happened to remind me of the beautiful lilac perfume by Olivia Giacobetti. (It's the NYT crossword, so I get to say things like that.)

Beautifully constructed, and made me hungry. Got to be one of the finest Sundays. (Though now I want to see a themed puzzle where LARCH appears as no. 1.)

I absolutely loved this one. And the little minesweeper bombs at the end! What a delight. My favorite this year.

Yes, yes, you filled this one in quick, but did you do it in time to the overture?

NATS crossing IONA is brutal.

Spent at least a third of my time trying to identify the one letter I had wrong (I had ACCEDES rather than ACCEDED), but I would forgive this puzzle anything for that delightful "Blue blood vessels?" clue.

A fun unexpected rabbit hole today: there are at least three six-letter BA- trees that can serve as food and water sources for elephants: bamboo, banyan, and BAOBAB.

Count me with those immensely pleased to see local author IJEOMA Oluo in the crossword, and with those who immediately checked the comments to see if everyone else had MATE for CHAP.

The only thing better than "THEY'RE Taking the Hobbits to Isengard" showing up is the fact that I just happened to spend a couple of hours earlier tonight reading all about how sloths are related to ANTEATERS and armadillos. I'm so pleased. Sloths are crazy! Look up the extinct giant ground sloth sometime and all the other strange creatures (like marsupials) that originated in South America and traveled across the Antarctic land bridge.

The day I see FURSONAE in the puzzle, I'll know we've reached peak NYT.

I don't know how I got convinced that POULTRYBAR is a thing.

Absolutely loved this one -- it was worth the slight trickiness of filling it in the app, and got me to spend a while reading about giraffes afterwards on this holiday weekend. Surely a highlight of the year.

I have to admire a puzzle that really made me feel like I was losing my mind, reading those clues, for a few minutes there. Impressive but tricksy!

The puzzle author also has a lot of fun maps/posters they've designed (the site is Barely Maps), and I've gotta recommend the clever city intersections series. Seattle and Honolulu are dead on.

Oh, this one was fun (if easy -- my fastest-ever Wednesday!). Liked the inclusion of HAIR METAL, SILENT BOB, and RONA, which always makes me think of the Cardi B coronavirus video (though I don't think she even uses that word). Hope I live long enough to someday torment my great-grandnieces and nephews with this trivia.

That Xena clue made my day!

Love the botanical theme, but I don't think the HIBISCUS is as strongly associated with lei-making as pikake, tiaré, orchid, and plumeria. It's more likely a flower behind the ear.

Loved this. Thank you. This crossword was such a gift, I had to tell my partner all about it (we were the first queer couple married in our synagogue, before Obergefell came down).

Anybody else see ONEG in the crossword and always expect a clue about kiddush rather than gravity?

Exceptionally clever, and, with the inclusion of TUX, almost doubles as a Sailor Moon-themed puzzle.

My dad used to say EDUMACATE long before The Simpons existed, so I got that one right away, but I spent ages staring blankly at "ATM_EE." It was fun to work out the theme myself.

Almost my fastest Wednesday ever. I blame too many Zoom meetings.

FURSONA in the NYT crossword. Truly, an historic day.

My niece who shares the name is a fan of the old classic Blueberries for Sal, so I was particularly happy to see that one.

I know this won't be for everybody, but I absolutely loved it and, because of the holiday, it was one rebus where I didn't even need to check the column to find out what was going on. I couldn't remember why Maine wasn't in there and then I ended up reading about the Missouri Compromise. Well, what better time to revisit the horrors of American history?

Probably my favorite theme puzzle since the Minesweeper one. The bad-car-ad puns were so hilarious my partner wanted me to screenshot them so they could have them and laugh. A+

Rena Cohen's crosswords go down so smoothly to me, without awkward crossword-ese. I like to see real phrases that people actually use, like THEMUNCHIES and LOCKANDLOAD. (Though ever since I watched the Inside No. 9 episode about cryptic crosswords, I can't see NINA without wanting to look for a nina.)