puzzle 101: "chris folds five"

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sorry for the absence of a puzzle last week--between acpt fomo, march madness, and a bunch of other stuff, forgot about it, and by the time i realized it, didn't have time to get a puzzle finished. but making up for it this with with an oversized puzzle, plus another tomorrow to accompany the collaboration that's running via universal crosswords.

this puzzle is being offered in two versions; the clues are identical, but the easy version has some circles that make the theme more obvious to figure out. to avoid spoilers, the version shown below does not contain circles.

puzzle 100: "los borrachos (freestyle 100)"

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triple digits! feels weird to be typing it out, but hey, i'll take it. and not all of the puzzles have been bad, either. in any case, felt i should celebrate with an oversized puzzle with an appropriate mini-theme; it started at 17x17 before ballooning to 19x19 to accommodate both the stacked seed entries and the nice, longer fill throughout the puzzle.

also: thank you for solving! no matter whether you've been here from the beginning, or this is your first puzzle, it's appreciated. can't do this without you all; i'm looking forward to a lot more puzzles here, and i hope you are too.

other puzzle news: i am looking into all the logistics and legal stuff behind starting a puzzle subscription service strictly for freestyle puzzles. if you have any helpful information, or if you know anybody who does, that'd be greatly appreciated. i would also absolutely love to have collaborators / co-editors for this project; if you're interested in helping out, drop me a line. and, finally, any suggestions for naming this would be appreciated as well.

also: i regret to say that i will not be at acpt this year, but my puzzles will be; feel free to spread the word. in addition, i have some upcoming puzzles in places that aren't this site: nyt on 3/21, minneapolis star tribune and universal on 3/24 (both collabs w/ george barany), and universal on 4/1 (a collab w/ dallas fletcher as part of the ucerp project). really excited for all of these puzzles, and to the other ones with dates to be determined.

puzzle 99: "turn around"

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apologies for the late posting; was out of town all weekend and spent most of it driving. not much to say about this one, other than that the seed entry wasn't the center spanner (as one might think) but actually the last one, though the center one was the one that made me fully commit to finishing this puzzle. as always, enjoy!

puzzle 98: "heartlifting"

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smaller puzzle for a smaller theme this week; as always, hope you enjoy!

in other crossword news, erik agard dropped a nice freestyle yesterday, and will nediger posted his recap of the best indie puzzles from february. proud to have gotten a nod (for winding numbers) and can say that the rest of the puzzles are just as good (if not better) and well worth solving.