Fun puzzle, with a great clue on LOWER - and to me, the theme works better in a mini. The NYT puzzle is solid, but I felt like once I got the trick it was too much of the same thing.
You are much more generous than the commenters on Crossword Fiend (https://crosswordfiend.com/2022/09/14/thursday-september-15-2022/#comments - how the heck do I get the words Crossword Fiend to link to this instead of having to put the full link in? IDK how anyone gets formatting in these comments) today. I quote, "I’ll just state the obvious: this one should never have seen the light of day."
4D cracked me up, nice one. I still don't get this theme! Why does having one letter off the grid equate to "raising" or "lowering"? The entry has just been raised or lowered off the grid? WHY???? I like this mini way better than the NYT version though because, in what might be called "Evan Birnholz style," the words that are left in the grid are meaningful entries on their one. Thumbs up to that.
As someone who's done many more variety cryptic crosswords than straight crosswords, where the former often involve convoluted entry transformations that usually result in valid grid entries, put me squarely under the "Evan Birnholz" heading!
Maxish 🤓1:13 · 2022-09-15T14:18:48.494Z
I like that ESTER is still a word. TBH, I wasn't thrilled with the NYT execution (not that I could do any better)