Good afternoon, crossword fans — welcome to Week 158 of my contest. If you’re new to the contest and would like to enter, please see the site FAQ on the left sidebar for instructions.

***THE MGWCC TIP JAR CLOSES AT MIDNIGHT TONIGHT!***

Record-setting tip jar week! With eleven hours left our total stands at $4,728.34, dwarfing last year’s haul ($2,875). The jar closes at midnight tonight, not to open again until summer of 2012. Chip in via PayPal or a credit card by clicking the “donate” button:

[UPDATE, 6/11, 10:10 AM ET: Tip jar now closed for 355 days! Thanks, everyone.]

LAST WEEK’S RESULTS:

291 people solved it till they had their fill, just like a pneumatic drill. They noticed the ridiculous number of B’s in last week’s puzzle grid, then counted them, as prompted by the puzzle’s title. 52 of said letter could only mean The B-52’s, the second-greatest band to emerge from the 1970s music scene in Athens, Georgia…and last week’s contest answer group.

ABBA was a popular answer as well, as the A’s and B’s swirling around the grid (and the groups’s very appearance at 19-across) proved irresistible to 32 solvers. One of which was MGWCC’s only Swedish solver; I didn’t have the heart to tell him his answer was wrong (sorry, G.B.!). But G.B. will receive an overseas shipment of one blue (Swedish flag color) MGWCC pen to ease the sting.

Julie Stern writes:

I had completed the grid late Sunday night but was too tired to bother with the meta. The following a.m. I was awakened by a phone call from my mother’s doctor’s office (I look after her), telling me that she should start taking vitamin B12. I wrote this down in a sleepy haze on the bottom of my puzzle printout. Later while drinking my a.m. coffee and getting on to the meta, I knew it had to do with “B’s”. Looking at the title again “Be Counted”, the B12 at the bottom of the page gave me my Aha moment. It’s funny how often serendipity (one of my favourite words) comes into play when working on puzzles.

This week’s winner, whose name was chosen at random from the 291 correct entries, is Dan Feyer of New York City, N.Y. Dan has selected as his prize an autographed copy of Literary Crosswords.

THIS WEEK’S INSTRUCTIONS:

This week’s contest answer is a four-letter word. E-mail it to me at crosswordcontest@gmail.com by Tuesday at noon ET. Please put the contest answer word in the subject line of your e-mail.

To print the puzzle out, click on the image below and hit “print” on your browser. To solve using Across Lite either solve on the applet below or download the free software here, then join the Google Group (1,517 members now!) here. To solve with friends at Team Crossword, click here.

Solve well, and be not led astray by words intended to deceive.