Coffee, Please

Hi! I’ve been doing crosswords for about four-five months, and I know it’s a cliche, and I’ve never commented before, but this crossword was special enough to me. ASL is very close to my heart (I use it w/ multiple family members), and this was a great representation and mini-lesson of it. This was also day 100 on my streak, and I got my best Wednesday time! This along with lively fill like EASTBERLIN and ONTOAST with nary a rough patch made this my favorite puzzle yet! Bravo, Alex!

Recently, I’ve been diving into the seemingly endless crosswords of the archive, the puzzles a perfect mix of old and new, as well as giving me more of a challenge. I’ve noticed that the Mondays hardly ever have a revealer, such as one I completed the other day: Six theme entries that all end in ‘AND’ (ampersand, secondhand, etc.). While Mondays are supposed to be easy, I loved the aspect of figuring out a simple theme for yourself (although revealers are never a bad thing), because if you try to solve too fast, you might overlook the theme altogether. Today’s crossword reminded me of the joy I felt while doing older puzzles like that, as well as having the clues being simple in a similar fashion to the older puzzles throughout to compliment. And if you think these sort of themes are lazy, NEVER SAY NEVER! Thanks, Jeffrey!