Azed

What one expects: only a handful of clues were solvable without a sometimes protracted wade through Chambers. Someone somewhere may know enough words to solve these things without dictionary help, but I certainly … Read more >>

I started doing this on Sunday morning while looking after my nearly-3-year-old grandson, unsurprisingly making not much progress, and didn’t get around to finishing it off until Saturday, when in my less distracted … Read more >>

Great cluing from AZED this week. There are three ‘gotchas’ (mentioned below), and several other clue wordplays that are truly great. A joy to be able to complete it, which I think, after … Read more >>

I can’t remember Azed using this particular combination of devices before, although he may have done so under a different name. So far as the across clues are concerned, it is known as … Read more >>

With apologies for the late posting. I found this one to be at the easy end of the Azed spectrum, though I needed Chambers to confirm a few answers. I do, however, have … Read more >>

A rather incomplete effort since I’m travelling sans Chambers and only have an hour in between flights.  So… most of the bottom-right is undone and there are several wordplays left behind. All fixed … Read more >>

The usual utterly sound and satisfactory puzzle from Azed. Across 1 FIREPLUG — discharging = fire, bolt = gulp, which reversed is plug. A fireplug is a hydrant: one is misled by the … Read more >>

I finished about three-quarters of this quite quickly and without aids, but finishing it off was a bit more of a struggle. As usual I had to do quite a lot of Chambers-trawling … Read more >>

Nick:  Nice AZED this week, which I rate 7/10 on the ‘AZED hardness’ scale. Some novel cluing going on, e.g. 12ac and 23dn. My last in was 20ac, which took me a while to … Read more >>

After a few minutes in which simply nothing occurred to me, the puzzle suddenly yielded and I was able to complete it reasonably rapidly, although only with the help of Chambers.  As always, … Read more >>

An Azed of mixed difficulty this week — I managed most of it on a train, but needed the help of Chambers for some of the more obscure words. Across 1 CRAB-YAWS Skin … Read more >>

I tend to enjoy empty grids in the Carte Blanche style — it makes me think I’m doing something more than just “mindlessly” solving clues.  In this case, I got lucky guessing that 1A and … Read more >>

As always of course, a very good crossword from Azed. Some of the clues (1ac and 1dn particularly) are marvellous and everything is sound and well-signposted. My solving performance is rather feeble: I … Read more >>

Another reasonably straightforward Azed, as far as I remember, helped by an easy 1 across to get me started, though as usual a fair bit of Chambers-trawling was needed to confirm all the … Read more >>