Marcy

This was so hard and so fun with its many twists and jokes. It's my favorite kind of challenging puzzle, one that relies on clever wordplay and divergent thinking rather than esoteric proper nouns.

What a cool theme!

What a cool double theme!

Tough one! I had the SCH in the top left and stared at it cluelessly for so long, even though I was thinking along the lines of butters or jams. And I had RAZORSEDGE and DAGGEREDGE and never heard of RAGGEDEDGE. It was very satisfying to finally get through and so cool to read about the record!

What is the significance of accepting a score of zero at a crossword tournament (in that it caused a burst of applause)?

I found the puzzle to be challenging and fun, and I was thrilled to finally get through after struggling for a long time on the central region. Question, though: I remember hearing (probably here) that a long-standing NYT crossword rule is no repetition, neither in the questions or the answers, so why did two clues include "epithet"?