Author: Zabadak

  What I will say about this is that I breezed through in 12.48, at the same time feeling like I was being particularly clever with the words and wordplay, with some of them being … Read more “29038 The Skirmish of the River Plate”

  I’ll content myself this time with simply mentioning that it took me 22 minutes on the dot, rather than trying to hazard a difficulty level. I submitted with a certain amount of trepidation, because … Read more “29026 Nothing to grouse about.”

  Something of a Quickie feel to this, and indeed about halfway through I checked to make sure I was doing the right crossword. Only the orchid stands out as an odd, esoteric word, though … Read more “29014 Nothing to get stuck on”

  A rather cheerful and friendly number which occupied me for 17.44, with no real hold-ups along the way. Perhaps a feature of this setter’s quirkiness is the rather high number of instances where capitals … Read more “29002 Well, I felt lucky…”

  Happily completed in a steady 17.28, with no particular hesitations except the American city, which I have now added to my list of hazily remembered places should I ever need it again. While there … Read more “28990 Blackbird, learn to fly.”

My 17.32 suggests that on a blogging night, when I’m more careful and less likely to throw stuff in without thinking, I didn’t find this particularly tough. Indeed there’s nothing in here that I didn’t … Read more “28978 A lying POTUS. Imagine that!”

  I did this in 16.23, which indicates that for me it wasn’t too tricky, but I was aware going through that there were words on the fringes of common vocabulary that might cause issues … Read more “28966 You might not catch a lot of these.”

Y 24.33, so not so easy for me, not least because on blogging night I had to be reasonably sure that all was in place and understood, and then this was no connected solve, answers … Read more “28954 Taking one consideration with another.”

  This felt brisker than my 19.34 might indicate, but it was an engaging time spent, with quite a lot on my last two in. Plenty of quirks, some slightly dodgy, definitions and allusions, and risqué … Read more “28942 Our survey says: completed at a cantur”

  I found this rather fun, and thought I was quicker than my 18.08. I definitely slowed towards the SE, with the specialist field and the steel proving elusive despite some pretty kind cluing, and … Read more “28930 THE [squiggly bit] TIMES”