Category: Daily Cryptic

Solving time : 25 minutes Another reasonably straightforward puzzle of I guess average difficulty. A certain London-centric flavour laced with Christian religious references. Other than that, no obscurities, one or two minor quibbles, a couple … Read more “Times 24,145 Sweeney Todd Finds God”

Solving time: 30 minutes Quite straightforward – it was pretty much clear what to do in each clue. I didn’t know Toscanini, although he looks slightly familiar. I also hadn’t heard of Berlin blue. Across … Read more “Times Cryptic (Number 24144)”

… yep, where you’ll find English cricket, me hearties. By the way, I gather the Aussies refer to Kevin P as ‘FIGJAM’ – “F*** I’m Good – Just Ask Me”. Anyway, an engaging puzzle with … Read more “ST 4314 (1st Feb 2009) – Down among the dead men …”

A very enjoyable weekday puzzle with some amusing clues which would surely produce a couple of sniggers. The Scottish connection extended to Puck in Guardian which introduced me to a nickname for Edinburgh. ACROSS1 HERODOTUS … Read more “Times 24,142 – Mentioning The Unmentionable”

Solving time: 17:57 I would probably have done this slightly faster if the letter-counts had not been wrong for most of the clues in the new-style print-out. I skipped yesterday’s puzzle and so was unprepared. … Read more “Times 24141 – wrong numbers again”

When I solved it, the online version had botched enumerations (answerlengths in brackets) in most of the on-line down clues. The clue numbers are correct, and only 13D turned out to be a multi-word answer … Read more “24140 – wrong numbers …”

Rather worryingly, this is the sort of time by which I would normally hope to have finished the actual solving and be blogging the result, but as yet I can’t even access today’s puzzle. Whether … Read more “Times 24,139 – Never Mind the Ballcocks”

Solving time: 27 minutes I browsed to the new Times Crossword Club and it remembered me – with the old version I had to log in each time. It’s also the first time I’ve tried … Read more “Times Cryptic (Number 24138)”

The run of more difficult puzzles continues, at least as far as I am concerned. In fact I found this one the most difficult of the week, though it’s possible that some of this may have … Read more “24136 – Ouch!”

Solving time : 23 minutes – after about 15 minutes I was left with 13, 14, 3 and 23, and it was a painful couple of minutes to get the last few (with a head-kick … Read more “Times 24135 – you say “Capstan”, I say “wot”.”