This was a more than acceptable Friday challenge, where I started off very fast (6ac and 9ac falling straight in) but ended up really bogged down at the end. Not necessarily for all the right reasons, … Read more “Times 28,301: Dismissable Solvers of Hiphoprisy”
Month: May 2022
Times Quick Cryptic No 2143 by Orpheus
Today’s puzzle from Orpheus took me just under 11 minutes to solve, my quickest this week. However, a gap in my GK meant that I needed some more time to properly parse 13d when I came to write the blog. The answer was obvious, if not the means of getting there. There was also a surprising lack of anagrams, with only one partial anagram to be found, although homophone clues seemed to make up the difference.
Times 28300 – general knowledge abounds!
Time taken: 8:11 I got off to a slow start with this one, but once I got into it, the answers came pretty quickly.
Times Quick Cryptic No 2142 by Hurley
Greetings all! I’m delighted to contribute my first blog post on the new site. My time for this puzzle was 6:35, and it was hard-won.
Times 28299 – not tough stuff, but here and there, you could say.
A much more enjoyable effort than last Wednesday’s test, taking me about 25 minutes with the SW corner putting up some resistance at the end.
Times Cryptic 28298
There were a few tricky bits along the way here so I was surprised to find myself finished in 23 minutes.
Times Quick Cryptic 2141 by Pedro
Quite a few missing first letters, a couple of upside downs and a couple of interesting clues (23ac, 12dn) pushed me to within one second of my 10 minute target. Highly satisfying all round. Thanks Pedro.
Times 28297 – This old man thinks he’s Saint Joan!
This will be my last blog for a few months, as my wife and I finally celebrate our retirements by embarking on our European tour taking in such gems as Serifos, La Roche-sur-Yon, Polperro…
Times Quick Cryptic 2140 by Izetti
I solved all but one answer in 8 minutes but then suffered a complete brain freeze.
Mephisto 3220 – “Where Alph the sacred river ran….”
This Don Manley Mephisto was not terribly difficult, but since I was tired I didn’t finish it all in one sitting, wisely breaking off and going to bed with several undone. When I came back, I found most of them rather straightforward, with only a couple need a trawl through Chambers.