Saturday 26:45 (no Google, but see below)

When bored online, generally late at night, I bounce around my bookmarks aimlessly, hoping to get inspired enough to stay in one place for a spell. One of them is Rex Parker's popular crossword blog.  Right at the top of each article is the latest puzzle's completed grid. These usually go up around 9-midnight the night before the paper release or early the day of, since the puzzle is available earlier online, and I usually do them early as well.

Except on Friday. I tend to get home later because of Friday Night Magic. Sometimes I bring home beer on Friday, print out and solve the Wall Street Journal Saturday variety puzzle, watch Real Time, whatever. I might get to the Saturday puzzle, but I sometimes leave it for the morning. But before getting to it tonight, I was bouncing around and hit upon Rex Parker. Seeing it was Saturday''s solution, I quickly closed it, but not before seeing the answer for 1-Across. It was a difficult clue, "Junk dealers?" for SPAMBOTS. It's hard to unring that bell.

Did I cheat? The time wouldn't suggest so. I didn't just enter 1-Across; I tried to solve it "fair" from crosses, but it's hard to not see what you know. It turned out to be the trickiest area of the puzzle, so any cheating doesn't even help much (I used the P to solve Nebula winner Frederick POHL, but I could have Googled it), and I think 1-Across ended up as my last entry. Seeing "Settlers of Catan" as a grid-spanning answer made me smile, as well as JANK, a formation which Rex Parker was unfamiliar with ("janky" is the more common parlance but the internet shortens everything). The benefits of Magic-playing. Not the first time it's come up, like the word SCRY.