Michele G

I’m a doofus. Early on in the puzzle I thought we were playing skee ball, but I got to thinking how Whac a Mole would be a fun theme for a puzzle, and my constructor brain started thinking how it could be done. Oops! Mr. Hasegawa has done it, and done it very well! (Now wondering if there has been a skee ball themed puzzle…)

As a Canadian, I feel trolled by this puzzle. Salt in the wound with the STANLEY CUP, making me feel sad for losing the EXPOs, and the answer to the “spin out on the ice?” clue was not “curl”. What gives?!

Had a good chuckle at the theme, once I came to the column to confirm what I thought was going on. Just last weekend I went to an Indian restaurant and my sister and I were observing the redundancy (or, I guess, tautology?) of chai tea and naan bread. Also, I’m pretty sure there’s a rule that a four letter sword must be an epee, not a FOIL. Get it together, editors! ;)

What a delightful theme, and so well executed. Congrats on the debut!

Wonderful debut - so much fun, evocative fill and great clueing. “Northern hemisphere” for IGLOO was a particular favourite for me.

We have VIBRAPHONE and PUENTE without a clue that connects the two? Lost opportunity. My dad was a big jazz (ans crossword) fan, and took me to see Tito Puente in the 90s. He had incredible talent and showmanship.

What a fun puzzle! Uncomplicated but fun theme, and wonderful fill and clueing. And my corner of the world, OTTAWA, makes an appearance - though the tulip festival seems a long way off, with all the snow we have at the moment. A reference to our Winterlude festival would have been more seasonally appropriate.

VICTORY! I really did not think I was going to finish this one - was getting nowhere in the NW and SE, but I stepped away, and when I came back it clicked. Still took double my average time, though.

I enjoyed the puzzle and thought the theme and revealer were clever. Only thought is that it might have come out even more if the them answers were placed vertically. One could consider these to be wide JOHNS!

Fantastic puzzle - really enjoyed the theme. One tiny nit to pick - I thought for 87-down the clue should have used the French name for Corsica (La Corse). Or chosen another French island where we use the French name in English (like Martinique).

GRODY took me back to the 80s and my time as a valley girl (the Ottawa valley, that is).

Wonderful puzzle, and I only figured out the rebuses because I had a typo elsewhere in the puzzle and had to scrutinize my entries. What a wonderful aha (followed by frustration that I still had no happy music due to said typo, but I found it eventually).

Really fun, smooth puzzle. I found it on the easy side (30 seconds off my best Friday time), but enjoyed the ride.

Congratulations, Mr. Maher, on the great debut. Really clever and tight theme (with minor quibble for the word FOIL since the other entries were just the element and the item of clothing).

Put me in the camp of those that enjoyed this puzzle, but I suspected there would be some grumpy people in the comments. My main beef was that I once submitted a puzzle that was rejected because it had one unchecked square, and this one has 28! (Admittedly, this is a much cleverer theme.)