duncanshiell's avatarduncanshiell

Born in 1948. I retired from full-time work in May 2007, after 37 years with Ordnance Survey and associated bodies and now have time to devote to crosswords, something not available for many years. Product of 17 years in the Scottish education system, but lived overseas or in southern England for virtually all of the time thereafter. I moved back to Scotland in 2010. Regular road runner and recently returned to orienteering and golf after a 35 year gap. Developed interested in cryptic crosswords in the mid 1960s (Scotsman, Sunday Express skeleton), but working overseas and then raising a family, meant dropping out of crossword solving for about 30 years. Now a regular solver of Times, Guardian, Independent, Inquisitor, Listener and Magpie crosswords. Reasonably regular finisher of the first four. Started blogging in late 2007. Any solving ability far outweighs any clueing ability. Krypton Factor contestant 1983; eliminated in the first round, but the obstacle course finish made good television!

Azed 2378

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The Azed puzzle this week is the monthly competition puzzle where this month the puzzle is plain and one clue is simply a definition.  Competitors are asked to write a clue for the … Read more >>

Azed 2372

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A normal plain puzzle from Azed this week, but one that I found quite difficult       I think I have got the parsing right for all the clues, but I am … Read more >>

Independent 9713 / Dac

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We have a typically elegant Dac crossword today       You know what you are going to get with Dac.  Clues with very good surfaces, unambiguous parsing and entries that come from … Read more >>