Comments on: Independent 7,749/Dac

By: Allan_C

Allan_C — Thu, 18 Aug 2011 06:42:46 +0000

Nice one,Dac. And finished within 25 minutes including searching in Chambers for a word to fit the crossing letters of 15d – I was lucky and found it almost at once, even tho’ it was spelt with an ‘s’.

Bamberger @10: John Masefield was poet laureate from 1930 to 1967 – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Masefield – and Ariadne in Greek myth was the daughter of King Minos – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ariadne

Thanks Eileen (& Paul) for explaining the parsing of BISTROS

By: caretman

caretman — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 20:13:25 +0000

Well, to the list of new words that 15d has added to the English language, you can add PREPOLIZE (my vain attempt). I claim that's at least as good a word as PRECONIZE. If only the dictionaries agreed with me.

By: Bamberger

Bamberger — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 18:23:20 +0000

Memo to self-a coypu is not a fish.

14a Good to copy recipe for fish. Good = u , copy recipe means anagram it and hey presto coypu. Of course that made 3d la und au er but la und and au are all foreign articles aren’t they?

Anyway that made 1d & 15d ungettable.

Never heard of masefield , preconsize or ariandne.

By: Shirley

Shirley — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 17:54:00 +0000

Dac Don’t understand Preconize – surely it’s just E CON inside PRIZE. Where does Egg come into it?
Also I think there is a typo for 1A – it should be Trail not Trawl.

By: ele

ele — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 17:22:19 +0000

Thanks Ali and Dac. PAEAONISE was my desperate attempt at 15d, with vague memories of paeans of praise. Otherwise, this was the most easily finished x-word for some time, so thanks Dac. Preconize was a completely new word to me and I’ll never forget it now. Liked Rhine Valley a lot.

By: walruss

walruss — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 15:08:32 +0000

Thankyou nmsindy, but I’ll be in a Buddhist retreat! No internet for me for a good while.

By: Kathryn's Dad

Kathryn's Dad — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 14:00:19 +0000

Many thanks, Ali.

I too failed to parse BISTROS. Elsewhere, usual Dac elegance, with RHINO one I liked in particular this morning.

By: nmsindy

nmsindy — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 13:57:30 +0000

Many thanks, Dac, for another excellent puzzle, and Ali for the blog. Some brilliant surfaces as always with GERIATRIC the very best for me, top drawer. Was able to work out PRECONIZE (unknown to me) from the wordplay, ditto the play at 16/19 which I’d not heard of and is by Arthur Miller (just in case, like me, anyone else was wondering). A v minor point, I think 20A RACES in not double definition with the ‘ in “Race’s” making it a wordplay element, I think. Walruss at #2, many comment from Asia on these blogs and blogs here have also been written in Asia so maybe you will be able to do so also.

By: Wanderer

Wanderer — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 11:09:54 +0000

What a wonderful word PRECONIZE is. New to me, and the one that defeated me today. I entered the improbable-looking PREPOLIDE (E{nglish} POL in PRIDE) and was not really surprised when I didn’t get my message of congratulations!

Thanks for the explanation of RHINE VALLEY which I got without being able to parse. I now think it one of the best clues of the day. Also enjoyed LAUNDERER and much more besides.

Many thanks to Ali and Dac.

By: Paul

Paul — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 10:55:13 +0000

Thanks Ali and to Dac. I can’t read the other response on my iPhone so may have been beaten to this. But 10a. ‘Review classifies’ is ‘sorts’ written backwards and ‘i’ is one and ‘b’ is second rate. Didn’t get close to 15d but really enjoyed the puzzle.