New York Times, Thursday, June 7, 2018

I got the basic kernel of this theme idea from my buddy Erik Agard, but unfortunately, I was unable to talk Erik into co-construction. He and I did collaborate on another interesting puzzle currently in the NYT queue, and I can tell you he comes up with an amazing number of ingenious ideas.

I knew from the getgo I wanted four theme drinks with at least two O's (bubbles) each. I remember worrying that COKE ZERO was changing its name to Coke Zero Sugar soon, and worrying that JOLT COLA was popular too long ago (It was re-introduced late in 2017, but still is not real well known). I was determined to come up with a revealer that had no O's, and then I had to avoid O's in the rest of the puzzle.

It's always harder for me to work with vertical themers, and I knew this would be a Thursday, so I wanted a word count less than 78.

I love this weird but intriguing theme concept, and I hope solvers find it challenging but fair.

My submitted clue for FILL (at 53-Across) was not "Crossword constructor's pride" or some such thing, but still, I found it hilarious when the first draft of clues from the editors changed it to "Contents of a trash heap." I was a little disappointed that the final draft upgraded my FILL to "Dirt in a dump truck, perhaps" — too funny!

Creative idea, BUBBLES UP meaning that the Os in soft drinks rose to the top. Fun to see those O-shaped bubbles!

The annoying engineer in me wondered why oxygen bubbled up, though. It's carbon dioxide! CO2! NOT O2! IT'S WRONG! WRONG WRONG WRONG! IF IT'S JUST O-SHAPED BUBBLES, WHY IS EACH THEMER IMPLYING OXYGEN BY PROVIDING EXACTLY TWO OS?

Man, that engineer is annoying. Just enjoy the O-shaped bubbles, will you?

I liked that Bruce found so many themers, without repeating a key word like SODA or COLA. Tough task.

Solid grid, lots to love in MALL RATS, SLY WINKS, RAW DATA, CAT TREAT, AD BIZ. Bruce is getting so good at injecting long bubbly fill into his grids.

(EEE WIDTH ... not so much. We'll look the other way for that one.)

Yeah, there's some AMAT ANOS EINE in the short fill, but I'm okay with these as prices to pay for all the great long bonuses. And considering Bruce had to build around five themers, I think he did well!

The one real flaw: the BDAY / BENNET crossing. I expect a good deal out of educated solvers, but knowing all 100 senators seems unrealistic. With DDAY, VDAY, and BDAY all fine answers for an [Annual celebration, for short], a more specific clue was badly needed.

Maybe that's just sour grapes, as I guessed VENNET. It seemed plausible at the time.

Fun a-ha moment when I realized what was going on with the O-shaped bubbles — after beating down the annoying engineer complaining about accuracy, that is.