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Archive for the 'Azed' Category

Azed 1971

Posted by John on 14th March 2010

John.

The usual very satisfactory offering from Azed. I have learned not to look too far for wonderful surfaces, but to admire the faultless construction of his clues. Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Azed | 9 Comments »

Azed 1970 – Plain

Posted by petebiddlecombe on 7th March 2010

petebiddlecombe.

A reasonably difficult puzzle for me, taking about an hour, with Chambers used a lot. I think part of the difficulty was not getting 1A or 13D quickly. Azed seems to have errred slightly at 35A.

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Azed 1969

Posted by Andrew on 28th February 2010

Andrew.

A puzzle of two halves, I found: I whizzed though about two-thirds very quickly and without aids, then struggled rather more to finish it off. As promised, I’ve done this blog in the style Nick introduced last week. The lateness of this post is mostly due to some (rather unsuccessful) last-minute tinkering with the layout. Comments on the format are welcome (as well as on the blog and the puzzle, of course). Read the rest of this entry »

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AZED No. 1,968 Plain

Posted by The Trafites on 21st February 2010

The Trafites.

Nick:  I am trying a new format here, with the full clue next to the clue number and the solution with word play/comments underneath.  Often when reading other blogs on this site, I would like to read the clue but alas they are sometimes inaccessible.  If it appears too busy, please let me know.

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Azed 1967 – playing fairly

Posted by bridgesong on 14th February 2010

bridgesong.

So far as I can discover, this is the first Playfair competition puzzle for around two years, the last having been 1804, which must have been in December 2007 (probably the Christmas competition) and which doesn’t appear to have been blogged on this site. If Azed has used the format for a non-competition word since then, I don’t remember it. Accordingly, it’s probably worth giving some background to the format in some detail for those to whom it may be new.

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Azed 1966: Know-how

Posted by jetdoc on 7th February 2010

jetdoc.

Better late than never, I hope. I was relieved finally to retrieve my solved copy of this from the recycling bin, as I did not want to find time for re-solving it before doing the blog. The clues are fairly straightforward and — as always — absolutely sound, but I needed my dictionary to confirm the existence of quite a few words. I think the best Azeds are the ones where we learn new words, and this was definitely in that class.

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Azed 1965/groan

Posted by ilancaron on 31st January 2010

ilancaron.

As per usual a wordplay or two which I’m not sure of. Somewhat harder than my last Azed outing (1958). And a surprised groan or two were elicited (Azed isn’t the most humorous setter in my opinion usually).
Across Read the rest of this entry »

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Azed 1964

Posted by John on 24th January 2010

John.

It can hardly be that I am suddenly becoming quicker at these, but I found this unusually easy. Apart from the strangeness of some of the words, it presented no more problems than an average Times cryptic. It would be interesting to hear how others got on. Read the rest of this entry »

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Azed 1963

Posted by petebiddlecombe on 17th January 2010

petebiddlecombe.

I found this a pretty tough Azed, making little progress in my initial cocky “no Chambers for me” mode, and requiring two solving sessions rather than one. Overall time was over an hour, and possibly about two.
The bottom half gave me more trouble than the top.

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Azed 1962

Posted by Andrew on 10th January 2010

Andrew.

Azed starts the new year (though not, please, the “second decade of the 21st Century” – that’s next year) with a puzzle that was mostly straightforward: I manage to complete most of it without Chambers but with a number of educated guesses. Some clues needed quite a bit of unravelling when I came to write up the blog though. Onward to Azed 2000 in September!

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AZED No. 1,961: No nuts at Christmas

Posted by The Trafites on 3rd January 2010

The Trafites.

Nick:  My first blog on AZED and luckily it was a (fairly!) straight forward plod after the herculean ‘Christmas Parcels’ competition (and what a word to clue to boot!).  Some nice words this week (as usual) and also nice to learn some real meanings of words that get lost in modern day parlance.

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Azed 1960 Christmas parcels – hard to unwrap!

Posted by bridgesong on 3rd January 2010

bridgesong.

This was one of the hardest Azeds that I can remember. I was certainly in need of the additional time allowed, even during a holiday period. I found that I needed to make constant reference to Chambers, but with one small exception, all the clues were perfectly fair. Compiling them is not easy, as I found with my attempt at the competition clue. Getting a sensible surface reading is almost impossible. I think that this is a variation on a puzzle type that Azed has used before at Christmas: certainly “parcels” comes up as having been used before if you search for it on the (excellent) & lit website.

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Azed 1959: A bitter-sweet refrain

Posted by jetdoc on 20th December 2009

jetdoc.

An Azed of average difficulty this week, I think; I needed a dictionary to check several answers. The words ‘whample’ and ‘sprangle’ were both delightful discoveries. No clue stands out as favourite of the week, but I’ll give my vote to 10a.

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Azed 1958/are there any Welsh footballers?

Posted by ilancaron on 13th December 2009

ilancaron.

Surprisingly fast solve for me — I spent less than an hour before breakfast doing this with a bit of help from the Usual Suspects. Until I came to a crashing halt with our Welsh footballer.
Across Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Azed | 17 Comments »

Azed 1957

Posted by John on 6th December 2009

John.

As always with Azed apparently complete soundness in the wordplay of his clues; there are one or two places where I’m not sure how to explain this, but I suspect someone will do so. Read the rest of this entry »

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Azed 1956

Posted by petebiddlecombe on 29th November 2009

petebiddlecombe.

Solving time: 35 minutes without Chambers, but with one mistake

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Azed 1955

Posted by Andrew on 22nd November 2009

Andrew.

An Azed of mixed difficulty, I found. I sailed through about three quarters of it with trouble at all, including most of the five long answers, but made much heavier weather of the last few clues.

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Azed 1954

Posted by petebiddlecombe on 15th November 2009

petebiddlecombe.

I’m hoping that this puzzle from last Sunday does not have a similar deadline extension to last week’s prize puzzle. If you know that it does, please let me know with a comment, and I’ll get this taken down again ASAP.

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Posted in Azed | 9 Comments »

Azed 1953

Posted by bridgesong on 15th November 2009

bridgesong.

“Words may be false and full of art; sighs are the natural language of the heart”, by Thomas Shadwell is the quotation referred to here. The second part is obtained by the letters which are misprinted in the clues, the first part could be said to describe the setter’s aim. A normal misprints puzzle confines the misprints to the definition part of the clue, but here there are a number of clues with the misprint in the wordplay, even in anagrams. Having said that, there were a couple of fairly easy clues such as 35 across, 9 and 20 down to get started with and I found that it took me not much longer than usual to solve.  I’ve put the misprinted words in italics in each case.

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Azed 1953

Posted by Gaufrid on 8th November 2009

Gaufrid.

Due to the postal strike the closing date for entries has been put back to Saturday 14/11/2009 so today’s blog has been rescheduled for next Sunday.

Posted in Azed | No Comments »

Azed 1952: Pervy gumshoes

Posted by jetdoc on 1st November 2009

jetdoc.

An Azed with a mix of easyish and fairly difficult clues, and a few pretty obscure words, which made it interesting to solve. I think I will go for 17a as my favorite clue this week; 24a is runner-up. Read the rest of this entry »

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Azed 1951/Sway beer!

Posted by ilancaron on 25th October 2009

ilancaron.

Not as many impenetrable wordplays (note to self: must improve wordplay decoding). I’m sure once this is posted, someone will put us quickly out of our misery and reveal all. I will say that I spent an inordinate amount of time looking for the competition clue — not realizing this was a plain Azed.
Across Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Azed | 9 Comments »

Azed 1950

Posted by John on 18th October 2009

John.

As always Azed produces a top-class grid, with four words crossing it completely and two more almost doing so. As a result, of course, there are many words that need a painstaking hunt through Chambers, but they are all clued soundly and fairly. Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Azed | 11 Comments »

Azed 1949

Posted by Gaufrid on 12th October 2009

Gaufrid.

Another occasion when I have to cast my mind back eight days to try and remember how I originally parsed these clues. My recollection is that I had a little difficulty with one or two of them and had to resort to on-line assistance for confirmation (eg ‘I loved Duncan’ in 6d and ‘eier’ in 26d).

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Posted in Azed | 11 Comments »

Azed 1948

Posted by Andrew on 4th October 2009

Andrew.

This was definitely from the easy end of the Azed spectrum: I managed to solve all of it except 31ac without recourse to Chambers or other aids (though with some lucky educated guesses). Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Azed | 11 Comments »