Comments on: Independent 7,587 / Dac

By: nmsindy

nmsindy — Thu, 10 Feb 2011 20:20:46 +0000

I think the query raised about news = NN is whether it’s precise enough, but since (happy to be corrected) there are no words with more than two Ns in succession, that makes it fairly unambiguous tho I’ll admit it’s not a personal favourite.

By: Allan_C

Allan_C — Thu, 10 Feb 2011 07:19:15 +0000

…. and two ‘new’s make ‘news’

By: Allan_C

Allan_C — Thu, 10 Feb 2011 07:17:43 +0000

N is common enough (in crosswordland at least) for ‘new’ so I suppose two ‘new’s – or ‘new’ twice – can be NN.

By: TokyoColin

TokyoColin — Thu, 10 Feb 2011 05:35:40 +0000

I had not heard of the slogan at 14ac but I got there by realising that FRIEND would fit the crossing letters for the second word and was an anagram of “finder”. So I went looking for a first word which could be interpreted as an anagrind. It was a real sense of satisfaction when Google.co.uk revealed the Flexible / Credit card connection. I enjoyed the clue more than if I had known the slogan.

And yes, great blog. Thank you.

By: flashling

flashling — Thu, 10 Feb 2011 00:14:37 +0000

Well pride and falls come to mind jmac. Off to blog Anax for the morning, no doubt scchua has already done it and is sitting waiting to comment…

By: jmac

jmac — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 23:33:26 +0000

What a great blog. Thank you for taking so much time to explain everything. Just got off a ‘plane and don’t suppose many people will see this now but IMPRIMATUR would be familiar to many with a Roman Catholic education as religious texts always carried an imprimatur to the verso of the title page to indicate their suitability for Catholics. I too put opera for omega, and was obviously feeling quite collegiate as I put share for stake. Probably serves me right for saying that the Saturday puzzle wasn’t too difficult Do Nimrod, fail Dac. And thanks to Dac for a lovely puzzle.

By: RatkojaRiku

RatkojaRiku — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 20:50:38 +0000

Thanks, scchua and flashling, for reminding me of the advert: I was replaying it in my mind this morning but just couldn’t remember which credit card it referred to, having forgotten that Access ever existed.

@ NealH: I too had OPERA first at 21, having read the clue in the same way as you, and had it been a competition puzzle to be attempted under timed conditions, I would doubtless have stuck with that and got the solution wrong.

By: rodders

rodders — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 18:53:11 +0000

Generally good but not so happy with nn meaning news.
Imprimatur fair enough but need a reference unless you are the UK scrabble champion !

By: flashling

flashling — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 18:25:17 +0000

I remember the Access Flexible Fiend slogan, although Access seems to have been subsumed into Mastercard these days. Another fine puzzle from Dac and a nice little blog too.

By: walruss

walruss — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 16:49:20 +0000

Another great puzzle from the Independent. Loved GREENSWARD. Now I don’t know, but what’s the betting that the next two for this week are as good as the first three?!