Carrie

I wouldn't know that EHOW existed if it wasn't for its frequent appearance in the NYT crossword, so just how much of a "popular website" is it really?

The instant I saw the clue for 12A I thought, PEDIATRICIANS, but then I thought, "Maybe pediatric-something, pediatricians is too short for such a long entry." Well glad I typed it in anyway because it turns out that some words are longer than they seem in my head. I was totally on the same wavelength as the author today. One of my fastest Saturdays ever.

New Wednesday speed record for me, despite time wasted having to guess AIDY/OYE. I guess it helps when the big long across clues are very straightforward.

I never have felt so tempted to write "touch grass" in a comment section. My goodness, it's a crossword puzzle and some of these comments are so over the top. And worst of all, needlessly cruel. Does it make you feel better to be nasty about one single day of a puzzle you personally didn't enjoy? Such weird entitlement.

If you started with a guess of TED instead of NEO for 37A, you probably are GenX like me.

Looking forward to seeing the Google Trends over the coming day or so for BOX SOCIAL. Surely I'm not the only one who found that entirely new. Ending the year by learning something, can't complain about that!

I knew the circles were going to spell something but I didn't get the second role of the circles until I had every letter of DROP IT, even as a SKIer who triple checked the verb tense of 9D because I couldn't believe it wouldn't fit. Really really cleverly done to the point that it reminds me that my brain could never write one of these grids! Sadly I think that it will go underappreciated due to the relative ease of the clues.

I appreciate the puzzle author agreeing with me that WOAH is a spelling that needs to stay on the internet! ;) I felt foolish after immediately filling in MA___R_ with MARBURG. (I didn't understand why it would be a virus "of sorts" but my brain seems to be stuck on the spread of infectious diseases for some reason that I just can't imagine...)

There must be things other than TEEs that you can buy at a concert, but when I see "souvenir" in a clue I know where it's going.

I found this a somewhat hard but satisfying puzzle (only 30 sec under average time which has been heavily weighted high by my early Saturdays and some big outliers). It was an extremely helpful to have the big long down restricted to a limited number of letters even if I wasn't 100% certain of where some of them would fall. I do have a question about TINDERBIO, though. I didn't get that first swing through because of the clue ending in a question mark. I thought that implied that it's not the obvious answer to the clue, some punny meaning, or such. But the obvious place to me that people stretch their heights is dating apps? Is there a more common answer I'm missing? Are people out in the world lying on torture racks to try to be taller or something?

Extremely satisfying Saturday! One of those puzzles where I read through all the clues the first time and only had a handful of answers...but with repetition and experimenting (this is why I don't do the puzzle on paper), it all fell into place without any hints. Actually faster than my average. [I have never heard of those sponges. Are they crossword fodder I should memorize?]

Despite entering it many times in puzzles. I've never had an ICEE (or even seen one in real life). In my imagination it was not a drink but more like the Italian ice of my childhood that the local store would serve us kids with an ice cream scoop. TIL.

Despite having owned one back in the early years, I sat for a minute wondering if the Nook (also 4 letters) was discontinued 12 years ago which I guess maybe suggests that Barnes and Noble is losing in the marketing game.

25% faster than my average Tuesday with a cute theme. Can't complain!

3 seconds more than my all-time Monday record because I have a cracked screen on my phone and it got me a couple wrong letters that I needed to correct. My new phone cannot arrive in the mail soon enough! As I am about to enter my second year of doing the daily crossword: have any of you regulars stopped doing Mondays? It's starting to feel a bit like a chore I guess and I'm not likely to start typing any faster at this point...