Comments on: Independent 7724/Punk

By: Martin H

Martin H — Wed, 20 Jul 2011 10:17:23 +0000

Thanks for that KD. Good to know there’s another one to do if it’s one of those days – and, with the recent talk about value for money, this one seems like a bargain.

By: Kathryn's Dad

Kathryn's Dad — Wed, 20 Jul 2011 07:02:43 +0000

Hi Martin H

Not sure if you’ll see this, but I often pick up the Indy i and if I do, I’ll have a go at the cryptic (I liked the cheesy offering from Virgilius yesterday). I’m guessing, but I think they are puzzles from the Indy files that are being recycled – certainly the usual gang of setters are there, although not any of the recent additions to the stable in the ones I’ve tried.

There was talk about getting a blog going, but I think the feeling was that there wouldn’t be sufficient interest to justify it, partly because it’s not available to do online.

By: John

John — Tue, 19 Jul 2011 23:59:48 +0000

Well I’m sorry, Eimi, I do know about a little more than golf or mathematicians. But Sam Cooke was someone of whom I’d never heard, and the songs you mention are all completely unknown to me (although perhaps I do know ‘Wonderful World’: Louis Armstrong?). Which isn’t to say that they should be.

By: Martin H

Martin H — Tue, 19 Jul 2011 21:42:35 +0000

Another list of something-or-other, and another set of solvers who know nothing about something-or-other. Well, there you go. I didn’t do this one – I did the Chifonie in the Guardian on-line; later I went on a train journey and tried to buy an Independent, but they only had the 20p ‘i’. There I found a cheese-themed Vergilius, which I thought deserved a thorough blogging, and came here thinking the two papers shared the same cryptic. Apparently not, although I think they have the other puzzles in common. Anyone know anything about the ‘i’ cryptics?

By: Lenny

Lenny — Tue, 19 Jul 2011 20:06:00 +0000

Pace Eileen (I think that’s the Latin equivalent of a smiley). I keep resolving not to get dragged into these pointless arguments but I can’t resist them. You (and Punk and Eimi) are absolutely right. I did not even suggest otherwise in my original post. I just said I had never come across it before.

By: Eileen

Eileen — Tue, 19 Jul 2011 19:57:40 +0000

Hi again Lenny

I chose the most authoritative link I could see when I googled – but there are plenty more. My Medical Encycloperia gives the same description.

[That's the weird kind of thing you tend to remember from pub quizzes!]

By: Lenny

Lenny — Tue, 19 Jul 2011 19:14:07 +0000

Thanks for the link, Eileen. If the BBC says it, it must be true. I looked at a few dictionary definitions, such as Collins: “A fully differentiated structural and functional unit, such as a kidney or root, in an animal or plant”. On that sort of definition Skin slips under the bar. I don’t seriously think, though, that anyone would describe skin as an organ except as a trick question in a pub quiz.

By: Bamberger

Bamberger — Tue, 19 Jul 2011 16:14:53 +0000

I got a lot of the non themed answers out but even though I guessed I was looking for singers, I failed to get one of them as the wordplay was too hard for me.
I’m in the Sam Cooke -who he? camp.
Thanks John for explaining the wordplay.

By: walruss

walruss — Tue, 19 Jul 2011 15:54:15 +0000

I accept skin = organ with no problem. But this was a bit idiosyncratic really, it seemed the compiler had to fight this a bit in the clues. My last of the day, which was not the best of days in Crosswordland for me.

By: Richard

Richard — Tue, 19 Jul 2011 15:52:51 +0000

The problem with this crossword, for anyone who knows little or nothing about soul singers, is that too many of the themed answers (Aretha Franklin, James Brown, Smokey Robinson and Roberta Flack) interlock within a small area of the grid. (I did manage to solve it, having guessed Sam Cooke from the wordplay and googled to get the rest, but I should not have been able to do so otherwise.)