Comments on: Independent 8093/Phi

By: yvains

yvains — Mon, 24 Sep 2012 15:54:00 +0000

For the sake of clarity: My dislike of ‘ran course’ at 22 had nothing to do with ‘se’ (indeed, an old chestnut) but everything to do with my dimwittedness in taking 3 days to realise what sort of course was being run. I apologise, Phi, for doubting you

By: Bertandjoyce

Bertandjoyce — Sat, 22 Sep 2012 06:12:49 +0000

Thanks Phi – another enjoyable Friday evening solve. Too tired (again!) so finished it this mrning. Very pleased to know that we didn’t miss a nina!

Some tricky ones to parse but thankfully we were more awake ths morning and able to sort them out.

Thanks John for the blog.

By: Phi

Phi — Fri, 21 Sep 2012 19:49:24 +0000

This puzzle was for a book magazine but was never used, so when I unearthed it a while back I decided to let it see the light of day. Can’t remember which of the Burneys wrote EVELINA but hers seemed to be the best V to use when I needed one.

I always thought SE = London was a bit of a chestnut myself.

GBS was tricky to clue, as he could be glaringly obvious with those letter lengths. Stumbling on BRAGG and SON lurking in there (still the only father-and-son pair to win, I think) pushed me to the Nobel definition, through recalling GBS to be the only individual winner of both a Nobel and an Oscar. (There is a trophy cupboard in America with both in it, but its owner shared both wins, I believe.)

By: nmsindy

nmsindy — Fri, 21 Sep 2012 19:43:38 +0000

re #10, calm = settled (adj) I thought.

By: Derek Lazenby

Derek Lazenby — Fri, 21 Sep 2012 19:16:41 +0000

Don’t usually do these, but I had time today. Thanks for the illuminations from all and sundry, but I’m still unsure about 21. Calm = Settle and Calmed = Settled. So where does the D come from? It isn’t in the clue.

By: Kathryn's Dad

Kathryn's Dad — Fri, 21 Sep 2012 16:56:10 +0000

Thanks, John.

Usual good Friday stuff from Phi, which I enjoyed, but like others there were a couple I couldn’t parse. Seems like there should be a theme, but I can’t see anything. DESICCATE is a tricky one, but one of the advantages of remembering a bit of Latin from school is that SICCUS is the Latin word for ‘dry’.

Good weekend to all.

By: Dormouse

Dormouse — Fri, 21 Sep 2012 14:24:14 +0000

Seem to have had many of the same problems as everyone else with this, with the addition that I just couldn’t see 26ac without a wordsearch. The bottom right corner was what held me up the most.

By: rowland

rowland — Fri, 21 Sep 2012 12:36:19 +0000

I’ll go for the latter, SE being a London postal district.

Fine puzzle, and I appreciated the idea behind making DESICCATED an anagram! Crafty old Phi will have caught some solvers out with that I fear.

Many thanks
Rowly.

By: Pelham Barton

Pelham Barton — Fri, 21 Sep 2012 12:31:35 +0000

Thanks Phi for an enjoyable puzzle and John for the blog. Too many good clues to single out a favourite.

13ac: Slightly awkward to indicate this name with an anagram, but compensated with the extra confirmation given by 25dn – a neat touch and thanks Phi for that in particular.

14ac: Considerable sympathy with crypticsue @5. I think the problem is the short E in the stressed first syllable followed by a single consonant and then another vowel.

22dn: I read this the same way as yvains@1 and was completely happy with it. “London area” for SE could refer either to London being in the south east of England or to the postal area within London. I took it as the former, but perhaps Phi will drop in and tell us which one he meant – or indeed if he deliberately gave us both options.

By: crypticsue

crypticsue — Fri, 21 Sep 2012 12:17:56 +0000

Very nice thank you Phi and John. My problem is that even with all the anagram letters, I still have trouble spelling 14a.