Comments on: Inquisitor 1247: Cause and Effect by Pointer

By: HolyGhost

HolyGhost — Fri, 28 Sep 2012 23:13:17 +0000

Preposterous indeed! (Now safely loaded onto my iDevice – thanks.)

By: kenmac

kenmac — Fri, 28 Sep 2012 16:10:07 +0000

If anyone’s still watching, here’s the single: https://www.dropbox.com/s/tnttkdkgvw5hmaz/18%20Preposterous%20Tales.mp3

By: HolyGhost

HolyGhost — Thu, 27 Sep 2012 20:33:11 +0000

PS For anyone who's interested, the sound on the YouTube link is not rubbish – the speakers on my laptop are!

By: kenmac

kenmac — Thu, 27 Sep 2012 08:40:57 +0000

Re: #6
I first heard the song about 15 years ago and I wondered if it was about me as certain bits of it were vaguely familiar; for example, I have won every game of Trivial Pursuit I’ve ever played … . About 3 or 4 years ago I bought I, Ludicrous’s “20 Years in Show Business” and also emailed Will Hung (great name) and he assured me it was about another Ken but I still remain slightly unsure as they’re a london based band and I was in London based around the same time!

The song was also one of John Peel’s favourites: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I,_Ludicrous

I have a copy of the single which I’ll post on DropBox in the next couple of days (can’t tonight – I’ll be out “drinking heavily again”) for the benefit of anyone who wonders what H___ G____ and I are talking about.

By: HolyGhost

HolyGhost — Wed, 26 Sep 2012 22:46:36 +0000

Pointer's IQ debut indeed, tho' he has set two Listener's (and numerous Magpie crosswords, as the link at comment #4 will show). And a fine initial outing this was too. (Can't agree with starburst at comment #1 – what's arbitrary about it?) The grid-fill wasn't that tough, but the endgame took a while. I was familiar with the BBC's Clochemerle with the fabulous Roy Dotrice, but that didn't help a great deal. I resorted to trawling through the possible single-letter changes of entries that intersected rows 2 & 12 and hit upon FRIDAYS → MAYDAYS to give MAYHEM, and then URINAL fell out soon after. Finding GAMAY wasn't too much of a struggle after that, but then I had to cogitate on the "highlighting" v. "overwriting". Still, all OK in the end. Inspired to write now as Radio 6 just played "Preposterous tales in the life of Ken McKenzie" by I, Ludicrous. Never heard it before – it's great. (Are you the Ken McKenzie???) Note: The sound on YouTube is rubbish.

By: Ross

Ross — Wed, 26 Sep 2012 17:30:11 +0000

For me this was one of the more challenging Inqs this year – but given the Beaujolais I thankfully was confident I was looking for something red. 2 days, though, it took to find GAMAY (after many near misses), notwithstanding the giveaway that it was largely hidden in the ‘effect’.

By: nmsindy

nmsindy — Wed, 26 Sep 2012 15:02:25 +0000

http://ccgi.laserbase.plus.com/crosswords/xwdb_home.html

The above address is Dave Hennings database which can be searched in many ways and will give details of puzzles in all the main themed series – as you will see, Pointer has set many puzzles but this may be an IQ début

By: kenmac

kenmac — Wed, 26 Sep 2012 09:30:14 +0000

Re: #2 Thanks JoanMM, I never even thought to look in Chambers! Post is updated.

By: JoanMM

JoanMM — Wed, 26 Sep 2012 09:19:16 +0000

Chambers gives ‘gamay’ as ‘ a variety of red grape’, so I highlighted the word using a red pen.

By: starburst

starburst — Wed, 26 Sep 2012 09:09:23 +0000

That’s a very useful post, thanks

I got to the same stage as you but I gave up rather than re-read the preamble thousands of times. It strikes me that solving the ‘change of letters’ involves/d rather a large element of arbitrariness, so I’m not inclined to bestow bouquets on the puzzle