Comments on: Independent 7,966 / Nestor

By: Dormouse

Dormouse — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 22:58:52 +0000

Well, I got there in the end – I was out this evening – but it was a bit of a slog towards the end. 3d I sort of got and a word search confirmed it was the only word that fit, but I couldn’t for the life of me see how it worked. Similarly with 17 I’d guessed AEGIS but couldn’t see why. 14 and 20 needed searches, and 14 was a new one on me.

By: Bertandjoyce

Bertandjoyce — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 21:50:53 +0000

We’ve been busy all day so started this one rather late. We completed the grid but needed 225 for explanations for 3d and 16d. Thanks RR for your help!
Would agree with flashling @5 about 1/10 which fell into place quite quickly with just two checking letters. The clue was excellent though and very cleverly constructed.
Thanks Nestor for waking up the grey matter at this time of night.

By: flashling

flashling — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 21:38:28 +0000

Emo’s in my 11th ed Chambers, I suspect most Bills shudder still when their mother calls them William! Pretty tough I thought although 1/10 fell pretty much instantly, Nestor must have spent some time on that very clever clue, pity solving it required no effort at all.

Thanks Nestor – quite a workout and RR for explaining a few I didn’t fully parse but just entered because I knew it was right.

By: NealH

NealH — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 17:48:44 +0000

I found this quite tough, but got there eventually. Getting the longer answer at 1 across helped a lot and I might have struggled to finish if I hadn’t got that fairly early on. I didn’t follow 3 down – I just assumed the over meant the word which was reduced by 20% was on top of the y.

Emo is listed on Wiki as a type of music, so is obviously not too obscure.

I’d question whether Bill and Will can be really be used as synonyms – is everyone who calls themselves Bill equally happy to be called Will?

By: Jean

Jean — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 17:04:59 +0000

Emo not in my dictionary – Chambers. Too old for such references!

By: MikeC

MikeC — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 13:18:40 +0000

Thanks RR and Nestor. Enjoyable puzzle. I needed your help, RR, in the parsing of 3d – I got the answer but missed the levitation bit.

By: nmsindy

nmsindy — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 11:30:15 +0000

Many thanks, RatkojaRiku, for the excellent blog. My experience was v similar to yours, in that I found the puzzle a little easier than Nestor normally is. The main reason for this was, I think, that I got the long answer NHS at the top of the grid very early on. All clues excellent, fair and bullet-proof (with innovative approaches), in the Nestor style. Thanks to him also.