angry? row back, down stream initially, to puzzles

Guess what I've been doing this week instead of reading quite so much.

Wasn't my title completely obvious? Crosswords, of course! (angry = cross, row back = wor, Down Stream initially = ds, puzzles = crosswords)
I went to a free preview screening of Wordplay last week and really liked it (so did Wolfangel), so when I found the little book of cryptic crosswords that Santa got me a few years ago, I was inspired to tackle them again. I'd only completed 6 of the 54 puzzles over the last 3 years, because I'd get completely frustrated with the seemingly nonsensical clues and give up. I'm up to number 14 now, though, and I'm down to an hour and 2 clues wrong/looked up! I feel so accomplished! I'm kind of thinking the champion crossword solvers from the movie aren't all that impressive any more, though. Sure they're fast, but the clues are completely straightforward. Try solving this in 10 minutes.
My mum (aka santa) got me the book after our first effort at deciphering a cryptic crossword. We were staying at the beach for a few days, but we had to spend the middle of each day holed up in our air-conditioned apartment to avoid the sweltering heat so we ended up doing every puzzle in every magazine or newspaper we had. The cryptic crossword was left until last, because neither of us had ever done one. I'd never been able to figure out how the clues could possibly mean anything. My grandmother used to do them every day, but sadly, I never asked her to explain; I'd just shake my head in awe that she could. We finally decided to tackle it after realising that if we looked up the answers, maybe we'd be able to figure out how the clues worked. It took us a long time, but after looking up half of them, we could work out a couple of clues on our own, and we eventually managed to fill it all in.
My book has explanations for how clues work (like ways to tell something is an anagram or a word backwards and common abbreviations) and a couple of worked examples. I still had to look up about a third of the answers on the first 6 puzzles I did, though. I think after doing 7 of them in a few days, my brain has finally learnt puzzle logic, because the last couple have seemed easy. These puzzles are all set by one person, though, so I'm not sure how well my skills would transfer. I'm still guessing some words based on what would fit, too, since I can't figure out the clue, even after I know the answer. (e.g. how does "rink performer kills Bush, right?" = "iceskater". Sure, the first part could be an easy crossword clue and the "right" means it ends in "r", but is "kills bush" just a red herring? Oh, wait, I just figured it out. I guess "ices" means kills and Bush = Kate. It's nice to be able to double check the answers, or have an alternative clue, at least)