Independent 10,081 by Alchemi

17 comments on “Independent 10,081 by Alchemi”

1. All good fun with a new word for me in 14d.

   Surely 8d should be enumerated (4-3) or (4,3).

   Many thanks to Alchemi and to Quirister.

2. Dave @1, I think I agree with you: Chambers has kick-off, which is the usual term in the UK.  But US usage doesn’t like hyphenated words and tends to lose the hyphens, so American football starts with a kickoff – and the usage is gradually creeping across the pond.

3. Quirister @2, and that’s a far from isolated example of such creepage!

4. Not a clean solve, as I checked a couple of things … and just gave up the hunt and revealed PORBEAGLE.  But plenty of fun had along the way, and I marked out CLANDESTINE as particularly neatly done and EAT as a beautiful description of one of the few things I can do very well indeed!

   Did notice that 8d’s enumeration didn’t match what I (or Chambers) thought.

   Thanks Alchemi and Quirister.

5. Some excellent anagrams and inventive anagrinds.  LOI the crossers PORBEAGLE and OUR ENGLISH DEAD.

   3D the definition is simply “secret” and the parsing land + est +in in ce.

   Thanks to Alchemi and Quirister.

6. gwep @5: thanks – I think I’d got that but wasn’t paying attention when I wrote it up.  Now corrected.

7. I thought this was a fantastic puzzle and, although it might have been pitched at the easy end of A’s range, I really enjoyed the variety of subject matter in the grid. Many thanks to Alchemi and Quirister

8. Thanks all. It wasn’t exactly intentional to have an eclectic set of references – it’s just the consequence of having an attic full of bric-a-brac for a mind.

9. Have to admit to looking up places that fall on the Nevada/California border and also to forgetting those lines from Henry V.   Loved the references in 1&9a (remembered both of those!) and managed to drag the football team up from distant memories of Dad checking the scores on the radio.

   Hadn’t really thought about the task of a 2d – nice to add that one to the memory bank.

   Thanks to Alchemi for another great puzzle and to Quirister for the blog.

    

10. Alchemi, thanks for checking in. That sounds a very familiar sort of mind, full of things put away in a corner in case they might be useful one day!

11. That was fun and not too taxing. Lots of interesting GK, clued with generous wordplay which compensated for my general ignorance (e.g FRIDA the artist, what indigent means, TOHAE the place/lake, the Henry V quote or what scientist who’s name gives us the unit of electric current was famous for) with fingers crossed for the vaguely remembered PORBEAGLE as my last one in. Thanks Alchemi for the entertainment and Quirister for the elucidation.

12. Thanks for a nice crossword. Maybe you already answered this another day but how do you know who the setter is? We get the crossword from the subscription Indy and since the change of format a few days ago we don’t get the setter’s name.

13. We solved this in record time – even faster than Wednesday and Thursday last week.  It all just flowed in; maybe our combined minds are a bit attic-like too.  We thought 1/6 could be classed as ‘clue as definition’, and 16ac stirred memories of those wonderfully evocative Scottish football team names.

    Thanks, Alchemi and Quirister.

    PS for Eric@12: The setter’s name still appears on the Indy website version.

14. ‘Reach for the sky’, a film?

    For me, the 1975 album by Sutherland Brothers & Quiver containing their biggest hit ‘The Arms of Mary’.

    [and don’t forget, these guys wrote Rod Stewart’s ‘Sailing’!]

    ‘I Am The Greatest’?  Reminds me more of Ringo on his debut album (with more than a bit of help from John Lennon) than of Ali [says he who thinks boxing is something utterly stupid].

    Indeed, nice crossword.

    Failed on ‘porbeagle’ but still very nice.

    Thanks to Quirister & Alchemi.

15. Sil @14: “‘Reach for the sky’, a film?” – Yes, click here.

16. [Sil…

    I remember seeing The Sutherland Brothers and Quiver at Sheffield City Hall in (1976?) along with – as I recall – Gallagher & Lyle. Very mellow evening – hardly any dandruff displaced]

17. Eric #12

    I’ll look into this

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