Category: Weekend Cryptic

A bit of a transatlantic feel to this one, with North American flora and fauna, some cowboy gear, a nod to Mark Twain and an iconic cartoon character all in play. At the same time, … Read more “Sunday Times 4661 by Jeff Pearce”

Solving time 17:05, so I found it a bit tricky last week. LOI was 6ac STEP, as I wasn’t happy with my parsing of it and spent ages looking for alternatives. In the end there … Read more “Saturday Times 26214 (26th Sept)”

Another plain vanilla one from Tim Moorey which I polished off in 12:11. After last week’s stinker from Dean I feel like I’ve dodged a bullet. This puzzle came in for some stick on the … Read more “Sunday Times 4660 by Tim Moorey: short in duration”

Solving time 10:08, so pretty straightforward for a Saturday. Sorry for the brevity today, but I’m off out and only had half an hour to throw something together! Across 1 A great deal, reduced green … Read more “Saturday Times 26208 (19 Sept)”

A list of the Top Ten Gags at the Edinburgh Fringe was doing the rounds recently, which included “They’re always telling me to live my dreams. But I don’t want to be naked in an … Read more “Sunday Times 4659 by Dean Mayer”

Solving time 9:29 (including at least a minute spent at the end on 19ac), so a pretty easy puzzle despite the odd bits of Latin, chemistry and literary knowledge required. Unusually there also seems to … Read more “Saturday Times 26202 (12th Sept) – meet Nina’s parents!”

24:15. I really struggled with this one, and was thinking to myself that it was another in the run of more challenging puzzles we’ve seen from Jeff Pearce of late. However from the leaderboard it … Read more “Sunday Times 4658 by Jeff Pearce: Punt and Venice?”

Solving time around 18 minutes, half nodding-off on the train on Monday morning. Looking back through it now a lot of the clues that gave me trouble seem like they should have been write-ins. Actually … Read more “Saturday Times 26196 (5th Sept)”

Overall I found this a reasonably straightforward puzzle, laced with a handful of standout clues. Thought 19ac was excellent, 26ac was a very nice cryptic clue and 17ac a pleasingly groanworthy pun. 1ac was pleasantly … Read more “Sunday Times 4657 by Tim Moorey”

I had some time on my hands last weekend so decided to do this one online, having had a lot of success with that method recently. Not with this one – 29:34 on the Club … Read more “Saturday Times 26190 (29th August) –”