Happy December everyone! There are plenty of holidays this month, so pick one (or several, or none) and celebrate!

• Title: One for All and All for One
• Grid size: 15×15
• Number of entries: 72
• Difficulty: Medium (my solve time 7:17)

“One for All and All for One” is this week’s puzzle, and I’m a little unclear on how the title relates to the theme, so feel free to enlighten me in the comments below. The themers are places or events where you can 57A: [Try … or something to do at 17-, 25-, 35- and 48 Across]: TAKE A SHOT:

• 17A: [Bullet exchange]: GUN BATTLE – I fIrst thought of SHOOTOUT, which obviously didn’t fit but could have given me an inkling of the revealer.
• 25A: [Scotch and rye drinker’s establishment]: WHISKEY BAR – I’ve been known to taste the wee dram myself now and again (though my shot-doing days are behind me) so this one came to me quickly.
• 35A: [Where passport pictures are taken]: PHOTO STUDIO – A passport photo is often referred to as a “head shot.” I had nearly all the crosses for this one entered when I finally looked at the clue, so no troubles.
• 48A: [Stompin’ Tom classic “Good Old __________”]: HOCKEY GAME – Shots are definitely taken at hockey games – and not just toward the goal, sometime players take shots at each other.

I kind of ignored the theme during the solve since it really wasn’t apparent until you got the revealer – which you essentially needed the themers to get. It was a relatively smooth solve for me; started out a bit slow in NW as usual, then made a beeline S where I filled in a few things, but was stumped by SW. Returned N and worked steadily S with 56D, 60A, and 63A being the last to fall – with 56D incorrect, so I had to search for 30 seconds to find and correct it.

(Wondering how I can retrace my steps as I did in the previous sentence? Well, check out this video)

Canadian content:

• 5D: [Bill passed in Parliament]: ACT – I’m mildly familiar with the Canadian Shipping Act, having worked shipping matters on the Great Lakes and Pacific Northwest.
• 13D: [University in Halifax or Calgary]: ST MARYS – There are also St. Mary’s Universities in Texas, Minnesota, and my home state of Maryland.
• 48A: [Stompin’ Tom classic “Good Old __________”]: HOCKEY GAME – Needed pretty much all the crosses for this one, not being familiar with Stompin’ Tom and definitely not this song (apparently its name is actually “The Hockey Song.”) though since this is at least the 2nd time he’s appeared recently, I should probably start listening to his greatest hits.
• 54A: [_____ bleu!): SACRE – It may have been in Quebec when I first heard this phrase in the wild.
• 54D: [Roughriders prov.]: SASK – Somehow Saskatchewan came to my mind instead of Teddy Roosevelt. Maybe because I already had the K at the end…

Other stuff:

• 1D: [“Two all beef patties, special sauce…” burger]: BIG MAC – Solvers of a certain age had the clue along with “…lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions, on a sesame seed bun” going through their heads for the rest of the day.
• 22D: [U.S. cashable payments]: CKS – Is the abbreviation in Canada CQS? 😉
• 24A: [“Sunday morning creeping like ____” (“Lady Madonna” lyric)]: A NUN – While I’ve listened to “Lady Madonna” many times and even sang along, I never knew Sunday morning crept like a nun.
• 29D: [It keeps things hanging on the line]: CLOTHES PEG – I had PIN ending this entry for a loooong time, so took me a while to get 60A and 63A,
• 38A: [Make like a banana and _____]: SPLIT – For some reason my brain wanted this to be PEEL – go figure.
• 40A: [Will’s partner in many “SNL” skits ]: CHERI – As my followers on Twitter know, whenever Cheri Oteri appears in the New York Times puzzle (almost always her last name) I always post this picture:

• 43A: [Bandmate of Björn, Benny and Anni-Frig]]: AGNETHA – While I knew the band was ABBA and that the band’ name used the letters of the band members, I had no idea and needed all the crosses for this one.
• 56D: [Montevideo is its cap.]: URU – I can never remember the 3-letter abbreviation for Uruguay. URG? URY? UR??
• 63A; [Made deeper, as a canal]: REDUG – My day job has me involved with lots of waterways construction, so the word that immediately came to mind was DREDGED.

Tip of the week: If you are packing luggage with lots of stuff in them be sure to weigh each piece before you get to the airport and have to move things around to meet the weight limit.