😂😂😂😂. I really should've been able to figure this one out but I couldn't get the trick until I revealed one of the downs. Great puzzle!

Lol I was shocked when I checked my grid and almost everything was wrong, and then I laughed once I realized the gimmick. Great puzzle!

"Well, ExQQQQ Me, Princess!"

Loved everything about this puzzle. And now I'm thirsty.

Seeing DEJAVU was awesome, and there were a lot of other great fills as well. Great puz!

This was great! Nice one, Philip! A lot of these clues made me smile. Shout-out to the Tappan ZEE Bridge!

Puzzle #51 "If you don't drink, how will your friends know you love them at 2 AM?"

Cool! Ugh, your making me reminisce on my childhood.. where’s my gameboy... fun puzzle man, thanks!

Fantastic!  From the title, after getting the first two shaded boxes I got the last two before even seeing 48D

As someone who still spends far too much time each day playing Pokemon Go, I LOVED this puzzle :-)

For whatever reason I had to just try all the letters for BONIER at the end 😆

Super fun, love the personal cluing style

Great theme. Loved such clues as AROOM, ARROW, TWO/NINTHS, and many others.

 Puzzle #50 "I wanna be the very best (like no one ever was)"

Thanks for featuring my work Mike :) I'm not too crazy about the last themer being a plural whereas the rest are singular, but went with it anyway to maintain grid symmetry - and also just an excuse to dig up and post an old family photo

I was wondering if that might be a family photo - very cool 😊

Nice and smooth, always love solving your puzzles! Also, just realized who did the memorable Mexican Flag Puzzle in the NYT..

That was just a treat. Thanks, Philip! And that photo hit me right in the feels 😊!

After enjoying your "I wanna be the very best" puzzle, I'm going back to do your others. They are so smooth and fun!

Thanks! I'm happy you are enjoying them :)

Puzzle #29 "And I was like baby, baby, baby oh..."

What a lovely theme and smooth grid! Nice one Philip 😊

Thanks Mike! I wanted to do a farewell-themed puzzle for my last day of work, so this is what I came up with. This is also the first puzzle I did with vertical symmetry instead of conventional 180º rotational due to the length of the themers

Wow! Fun, smooth and really amusing. Now, I’m wondering about those tombstones...

Thanks! Me too... I tried to work “Free at last, free at last! Thank God Almighty I’m free at last” into an earlier version of the puzzle

Nice! Love the "Bring It On" reference lol

Fun! Definitely like the tombstone theme!

thanks! hope the theme wasn't too morbid... i figured since the epitaphs were catchphrases/song lyrics associated with their life, it's a nice way of honoring them

Puzzle #49 "Parting is such sweet sorrow"

Wow such a smooth solve! Loved the original voice in the cluing - like for AWESOME and with the shout out to @scantor in LOLA (I should make @ mentions work in comments!)

lol thanks! yeah i didn't realize, but a lot of my favorite clues tend to be food-related... i love to eat! awesome blossom, puppy chow, dim sum...

Great puzzle, feel like this was filled with hidden messages

How often do you see a clue referencing Charlie the Unicorn? Loved it!

This was fun! Definitely felt like the clueing was much more personal - refreshing!

Puzzle #48 "Be a unicorn in a field of horses"

Amazing puzzle Philip! I loved the CAPTAINPLANET theme and the grid was so smooth to fill!

Thanks! I wrote the puzzle for earth day (next month). Kind of wish the elements would be in grid order (with captain planet at the end), but that was too difficult to do when I was laying out the grid

Sorry I cheated and solved it early as I worked my way through the moderation queue :P

Another great puzzle!  You really do a great job of avoiding hard crossings.

Thanks!! When I get stuck and have to use a more obscure word, I try to make the words that cross it easier. For example WABO and NAGE are pretty much nonsense-sounding words, so made sure the crossing clues are more fair and gettable...

Puzzle #24 "To cherish what remains of the Earth and to foster its renewal is our only legitimate hope of survival" - Wendell Berry

So much fun. Your puzzles make me feel like I'm good at puzzles. (I'm not that good.)

Awww thanks - puzzle difficulty is really all about the clues... I can really only do Mon to Wed NYTimes... maybe half a Thursday... Friday and Saturday is too hard for me... The more you work on them, you get better and start to notice and remember words like EPEE, ARIA, EMU

Puzzle #46 "😃🎥"

Awesome puzzle Philip - so smooth! I think my favorite was SELFREFERENTIAL

Loved it! (pun intended I guess) First time I've ever seen EROS add to the theme!

Thanks Ben! Yeah I wasn’t too crazy about having one unchecked letter in the grid for the sake of grid art, but I figure if I clue it as anagram of rose, then it is gettable

Really great puzzle!  I love how a lot of the clues included other tidbits of information about the topic.

Thanks Jeff! I like learning stuff from crosswords and in general so I usually try to inject extra info when I can, however a lot of editors do prefer brevity over long clues - personal preference I guess

Congrats on your NYT debut from last week!

Thanks Frankie. I am not, I'm from Queens, NY... Are you from Indiana? I really liked Sue's character... I think she made the show really fun

Nope. But my family always poked fun of my similarities with Frankie. I did a bunch of your puzzles in a row and I felt like I kept seeing 40D in them...thought maybe it was something you tried to work into your puzzles intentionally!

Though having said that I kept seeing it...I just went back and can't find it in any other puzzle. Maybe I'm losing my mind ;-)

Philip Chow

@pchow13