Ziggy

Wow. Lightning fast today. I blinked and it was over.

Oof I was going nuts in the top corner. TAXI was what I needed to get things going thanks to a comment. Entire puzzle was solved, I even had ____SIGN filled out. Awesome puzzle. I had a lot of fun with this one. I know people complain about the difficulty getting much easier, but really this was just at my skill level. After a year of this, the only puzzles I can’t solve without lookups are Fridays and Saturdays.

I’m still a “beginner” at the NYT. My process is to get as far as I can without any help, then when I’m truly stuck I check the column for the “Tricky Clues” section to get me unstuck in many of the corners. Fridays are horrendously difficult for me, so even with these, I end up looking at Mr. Google for certain answers. I’m proud to say I performed today without it this time, able to get through most of the cluing with no help. I had no idea what a SHROVE, cobbled together with crossings. I don’t know why EPITOMES was the answer for 34, but it made everything fit! Maybe one day I’ll solve the puzzles after Wednesdays without looking at the column, but today I feel like I finally evolved and made progress at my crossword puzzle skills.

Gave up on this one and started using auto-check, and then eventually revealed a word or two. I think I gave up too easily. Great puzzle.

Fast Monday, but argh that middle section… I had to look at the column to get JURYBOX so I could learn what ECRU, MANX and that there was more than Stephen in V for Vendetta.

Neat puzzle. Even Stephen Sondheim, not having heard of him, I was able to figure out with crossings but… NEE? Once called? I don’t get it. It was really hard to start anything in that top left corner, I eventually had to look at the column for PABA to get the juices flowing.