Comments on: Independent 6939 by Math

By: Testy

Testy — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 14:26:29 +0000

This had me humming REM’s Man on the Moon (“… let’s play Twister, lets play Risk. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah…”

By: Colin Blackburn

Colin Blackburn — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 10:19:00 +0000

Two other games, intentional or otherwise, are “The Game of LIFE” and “The ANALYST game”. Both are relatively modern board games, though I think “The Game of Life” has been around nearly as long as Risk.

By: TwoPies

TwoPies — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 08:34:46 +0000

Twister is a game where you put your hands and feet on coloured circles. Board is stetching it a bit though, it’s more of a big mat!

By: Allan_C

Allan_C — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 07:33:32 +0000

I wondered if 1a was originally “board” and changed by the editor so as not to make the theme too obvious. But is beetle (played with dice, pencil and paper) a board game? And is there a game called Twister?

By: Paul B

Paul B — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 22:17:54 +0000

No, but it’s a great name for a band.

By: Colin Blackburn

Colin Blackburn — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 17:04:20 +0000

On maths, “The study of the logical consequences of a set of axioms,” doesn’t exactly lend itself to a cryptic clue definition.

By: Paul B

Paul B — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 16:49:35 +0000

Yep.

By: TwoPies

TwoPies — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 16:42:32 +0000

17a dd of identifies (shortened to id) and plural of id?

By: Paul B

Paul B — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 15:32:24 +0000

Eileen, I merely parse what’s there to be parsed, and yet I see those charlatans at Collins opine that mathematics is ‘a group of related sciences, including algebra, geometry and calculus, concerned with the study of number’. For Chamberites it’s simply ‘the science of magnitude and number’.

It’s the latter MATH (who with a pseudonym like that ought to know) seems to have plumped for, otherwise the indefinite article causes problems.

By: Mick H

Mick H — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 12:37:55 +0000

And then there’s the theme, signposted by the first two across clues (I spotted eight, possibly nine). 1ac could just as well hafve been BOARD, so I suppose the choice of BORED GAMES reflects Maths feelings about the Christmas break!