From the first letter to the last, when you make crosswords, there are certain rules you follow.
Across
- Musical work
- Adam Brody vehicle of 2003–07
- Lead singer of the Blackhearts
- Airport posting
- Insertive partner during sex
- Kernel holder
- Alternative to Gen Con
- Aphorism
- Temperamental
- Ultra-fancy
- X and Y, on a plane
- Bump from a broadcast
- Memo heading
- Trademarked benzodiazepine
- Alternative forms of genes
- Amount of sand you can hold in one hand
- Exasperated cry
- Halloween costume whose wearer might appropriately go "Rawr"
- Guy in Mare of Easttown
- Sci-fi epic about obtaining unobtainium
- Shot source
- Handheld boat propellor
- Marked, as a box on a survey
- Pay stub abbr.
- Whitney in the National Inventors Hall of Fame
- Building
- Bus. card info
- Edict
- Green Building designer
- Org. in The Americans
- The Bulldogs of the SEC, or their bulldog mascot
- The "R" of the pop star commonly called CRJ
- Prof's helpers
- Record holders?
- The second Gershwin you think of, unless you're being wilfully contrarian
- Venerable sleep aid brand
- Wii U and PlayStation 4 contemporary
- Certain je ne sais quoi
- Maggie Q series
- Nightstand light
- Not out
- Sue of the Field Museum, briefly
- Agate variety
- Bird associated with Thoth
- Indian wear
- Gender-neutral
- Kato played by Billy Magnussen in The People v. O.J. Simpson
- Language for many of Miriam Makeba's songs
- Mat Hoffman's Pro (video-game series similar to Tony Hawk's Pro Skater)
- "Said ever"
- Video game programmer, for short
- #2 helper?
- Club with clubs, for short
- Fish that, appropriately, becomes an exclamation of terror if you shift its last letter backward one space in the alphabet
- Short holiday?
Down
- Author of The Complete Book of Running, 1977
- Application file suffix
- Hew
- Vehicle whose driver might ask "Where to?"
- Fluorine's neighbor
- Cousin of a halberd
- What you're on if you accept bribes
- "At last," in Alsace
- First college attended by Barack Obama, colloquially
- Levy imposed uniformly per capita
- Score speeds
- Suffix with Gator and hater
- Twin (special relativity topic)
- Wood sorrel genus
- Cessation of hostilities
- Coloradan ski mecca
- Dress down
- Higher ed, to an Aussie
- Particularly disastrous interception
- Suffix with racket or rocket
- Sugar substitute found in sugar-free gummy bears
- Canasta coups
- Certain bacterium
- Das Kapital author
- "Evil Ways" band
- Leader in the Second Seminole War
- Obsolete communications medium
- Shepard of Idiocracy
- Carb-heavy party snack
- Chicken (varicella)
- Disney character who sings "In Summer"
- Make square
- Spelling whizzes?
- Basil-heavy sauce
- Competition in which skateboarder Bob Burnquist has the most total medals (30)
- Foaming at the mouth
- "Gimme just a "
- Putting cargo onto a ship
- Stratego piece that can capture the Marshal
- 1-1, e.g.
- Bedeck
- Fill-in
- Romantic love, in ancient Greece
- The Last O.G. network
- Member of the Royal Navy, slangily
- Power possessed by Professor X
- Waitress composer Bareilles
- Stuff inside a lava lamp
- X
- A shot in the
- The Sun King's regnal number
- Actor Herbert
- Norse underworld goddess
- Soul and Rio producer
- Subject of the photograph "Guerrillero Heroico"