'Tis a puzzlement

I love crossword puzzles and double-crostics. I inherited this love from my mother (though I have not yet mastered the cryptic crosswords that she also loved.) So on my bookshelf is a clipboard where I keep several puzzles to work on. I subscribe to the NY Times puzzles which I can get online. I've tried working them on my computer, but I much prefer to work them with pencil and paper, so I usually print them out. I know this is less "green," but I do print them on the back of paper I have already used for something else. I always do the Sunday puzzle and it remains my favorite. I often do Wednesday through Friday or Saturday. The last two days can sometimes give me fits. For the most part I try to work them without resorting to looking up things, but if I still have gaping holes after a few days, I'll pick up a reference book. Last resort for me is googling.

The NY Times site also has acrostics a couple of times a month. I also like to do the Los Angeles Times puzzles. The News & Observer, which we have delivered, has the LA Times puzzle on Sunday. If I do it other times, I get it from the LA Times website. It carries some nostalgia for me, as the Louisville Courier-Journal carries it and that is the puzzle my mother used to do regularly. On the whole it is almost up there with the NY Times puzzle in terms of cleverness and difficulty, but every now and then it will surpass the NY Times. I occasionally get puzzles from the Chronicle of Higher Education and the Wall Street Journal online. I also have an email subscription to 2 puzzles that Ben Tausig sends out weekly through Google Groups "Weekly xword" group. These tend to be a little more modern in topic and sensibility (a touch of potty humor at times and sexual humor, as opposed to the more indirect sexual innuendo that may appear in the more "prim and proper" puzzles.)