Comments on: Independent 8179/Raich

By: Bertandjoyce

Bertandjoyce — Wed, 02 Jan 2013 00:17:46 +0000

Started off at a fast pace and then ground to a halt with two left to go. We had to check ukase which was clear from the clueing but couldn’t parse ANIMAL for 15d! Then the penny dropped!

We thought we were on the way to a pangram when UKASE went in after GLAZIER but there are a number of letters short.

We completely missed the theme unfortunately but the perculiar grid should have warned us that something more was going on.

Thanks John and obviously congratulations are in order! Thanks Raich for a good start to the year.

By: Raich

Raich — Tue, 01 Jan 2013 17:30:44 +0000

Many thanks, John, for the excellent blog and to all for their comments. Yes, hounddog you’ve spotted everything – unfortunately it was just a small number of years too early for ‘Hound Dog’.

The Collins dict knows about Eccles so you’re not alone, Bryan.

Finally may I congratulate John on winning the latest edition of the prestigious Azed monthly clue-writing competition with a superb clue for PICAROON!

By: Bryan

Bryan — Tue, 01 Jan 2013 16:36:39 +0000

Many thanks John and Raich.

Very enjoyable but I was amazed to see ECCLES in a crossy as I was married there a very long time ago.

I didn’t think anyone else was even aware of the place.

Small world!

By: allan_c

allan_c — Tue, 01 Jan 2013 13:34:26 +0000

I thought this was relatively easy from Raich (not that he ever, in my experience, sets fiendish puzzles), solved in two passes – but the theme passed me by. One or two parsings escaped me, so thanks, John, for the blog.
UKASE was possibly obscure for some; the word was lurking in my subconscious though I couldn’t remember what it meant. With the ending ‘-ase’ it always sounds to me as if it ought to be the name of an enzyme. It’s actually Russian in origin, from Tsarist days.
Thanks, too, to Raich.

By: crypticsue

crypticsue — Tue, 01 Jan 2013 10:32:29 +0000

Thanks to Raich for a very nice anniversary puzzle to start the year and to John for the blog.

By: hounddog

hounddog — Tue, 01 Jan 2013 09:51:47 +0000

Nothing special? Plenty of 1953 references: Coronation, the Matthews Final, Everest, the ‘Magical Magyars’ and no doubt others I’ve missed.

By: Pelham Barton

Pelham Barton — Tue, 01 Jan 2013 09:42:56 +0000

Thanks Raich for a pleasantly straightforward puzzle and John for the blog. I worked down the eastern half first and fortunately the sequence 31ac-27dn-28ac went in smoothly enough, but I still do not like grids that so nearly split into two.

11ac: I think the surface works well as “Nat[ionalist]s aim for change …”

By: Kathryn's Dad

Kathryn's Dad — Tue, 01 Jan 2013 07:47:47 +0000

Thanks, John.

A lovely puzzle from Raich to start 2013, which I enjoyed. The clear clueing meant that much of it went in pretty quickly, but I did get held up on the last few, including UKASE, which I didn’t know. Stupidly, my last one in was ENTER, which is staring you in the face really. I too pondered briefly over the surface for STAMINA. The cleverly constructed FLEE and COLLEEN were my favourites this morning.

Thanks to Raich.