Independent 6505/Dac
This seemed like a harder crossword than a standard Dac. Looking back I can’t quite see why though although three words being new to me slowed me down (1ac, 27ac, 20d) Across 1 … Read more >>
Guardian 24161/Araucaria – the full monty
My Sheffield education was provided to me by the movie “The Full Monty” and the occasional Eurosport broadcast of an endless snooker match at The Crucible. Oh yes there are a couple of … Read more >>
FT 12,542 by Aardvark
I solved this one in fits and starts, although each quadrant of the grid fell into place pretty readily once I’d cracked the four “long” clues. I use quote marks because no answer … Read more >>
Independent 6504/Virgilius
Thematically, there seems to be quite a bit going on in this puzzle. We have horses/ponies (1A, 10A, part of 14A, 17A, 21A and part of 26A, along with a reference to a … Read more >>
Quixote and Everyman puzzles
We need to reduce the workload of our bloggers so we would like to stop blogging the two puzzles at the easier end of the scale which get read and commented on the least: Everyman and … Read more >>
Independent 6503 by Math
This had a theme, but I proved you did not need to know it to solve the puzzle, because I tumbled to it only when verifying for this blog having filled the grid … Read more >>
Guardian 24160/ Rufus August 20th 2007 Gentle for Monday.
Across 1 BAY RUM anagram of may rub. In the old days barbers would offer it as an after shave , posh barbers still do. It’s a distillate from Rum and the leaves … Read more >>
Azed 1837/uh-uh
Another mistake from Azed at 1A – the last Azed I did (1831) had one as well. What is the world coming to? I did the first half of this without a dictionary … Read more >>
Guardian 24153 (Sat 11 Aug)/Paul – Centre stage
Solving time: 9:29 A chocolate theme this week, with four examples of ‘centres’, i.e. the gooey bits in the middle. Overall probably a bit easier than usual for Paul. * = anagram, “X” … Read more >>
Independent 6501 by Phi
A bit more challenging than the usual Phi, but not as satisfying. A lot of tenuous clueing in place of the usual witty word play. Across 1 BORSCHT TH(C+S)ROB<. Fairly tenuous with ‘c’ … Read more >>
Beelzebub/Phi 912 (05-08-07)
I thought this was a cracking puzzle. It looked like it was going to be a lot harder than it turned out to be as my first pass over the across clues yielded … Read more >>
Independent 6496/Nestor
Absolutely brilliant puzzle from Nestor and very possibly the hardest blocked puzzle I’ve solved in recent memory (and there have been some tough Times puzzles over the last couple of weeks). To be … Read more >>
Guardian 24158/Araucaria – Araucaria?
Not a cross-reference in sight nor a long anagram. Was this really Araucaria? I can’t even detect a theme of sorts. Now that I’ve said this, will someone prove me wrong? Across 1 … Read more >>
FT 12538 by Monk – Nudge Nudge Wink Wink Say No More!!
Solving time: 26 minutes Terrific fun today from Monk with some real laugh-aloud clues including 1 across and 13 down. Nina hunters (those little hidden messages in puzzles) will be delighted to see … Read more >>
Inquisitor 32/Loda – A La Natasha
As far as Inquisiotrs go, this was pretty straightforward. A few recent puzzles have been of the “extra word in the clue” type, so I am becoming accustomed to them. In this example, … Read more >>