Never knowingly undersolved
Solving time: 6 mins A very entertaining offering from Paul, with a twist: several of the answers were rebuses or ‘dingbats’, where a phrase is represented in a kind of pictorial cryptic fashion, … Read more >>
Well another shortish preamble this week, put relatively succinctly, the aim is to find a quotation to fill two answers and the diagonal by discovering the unclued work it is from, then determine how this is … Read more >>
Finally got the chance to have a lunch break to do the blog, relatively straightforward I thought. Across 1 Sepulchre – (Cheers up, L)* 6 Rehab – Bar around he reversed 9 Tweet … Read more >>
The top-left of the grid held me up with an unfamiliar synonym of ‘river’ and some tricky wordplay. 9A is still waiting to be annotated. Tougher than Falcon’s usual, with all his elegance … Read more >>
I’m a big fan of Pasquale’s puzzles, but today was just one of those days when I was completely hopeless – I found this very difficult, ran out of time and so had … Read more >>
Only one potential slice of esotericum (at 28A, one of those “you either know it or you don’t” answers) as far as I could discern. Overall, this one didn’t really float my boat – but perhaps that’s more a case of my own Plimsoll line having become a tad decalibrated.
Ac
A characteristically challenging and inventive Tees puzzle, that was far too hard for me to complete in the time available. It feels like there’s a theme here, goddesses perhaps, though I can’t quite … Read more >>
It’s rather surprising to have two posthumous puzzles in a row: Rover died in May this year. This is a typical ‘mixed bag’ of a Rover puzzle – some good clues interspersed with … Read more >>
Monday Prize Crossword on 9 August 2010 Another gentle start to the week. ACROSS 1 CONTAMINATED *(no admittance) 10 ENTREAT EN (40% of greEN) TREAT (party) 11 WAR HERO Cha of WAR (fight) … Read more >>
Prize puzzle from the Weekend FT of August 7 Being on holiday in the Austrian Alps, I took this puzzle at a leisurely pace and it took me some time — there was … Read more >>
There’s never a chance of a bad (or even average) puzzle with Dac, but he does like to throw in the occasional tricky one. I came completely unstuck on the NW corner here, … Read more >>
As usual with Quantum, I am sadly unable to summon up much enthusiasm for this puzzle. Some reasonable clues, though nothing very exciting, but also some rather weak cryptic definitions, and a couple … Read more >>
It may just be me, but Mudd seemed to be lacking some of his usual humour today. There were attempts at it, such as the definition in 8dn (though the overall surface didn’t … Read more >>
The preamble told us that in each column, one letter from the first answer is displaced to the top row of the grid, and one from the second answer to the bottom row, … Read more >>
Apologies for the late blog; a little short on time today. Not a lot to comment on; I have a weakness for reverse anagrams, so I liked 18 across. Across 1 PEDIGREE … Read more >>