Category: Weekend Cryptic

Solving time: 76:42 – with two mistakes Not a very good effort by me this week. The mistakes were both genuine and couldn’t be blamed on typos. I found it tough going, but probably fair … Read more “Sunday Times 4510 (4 Nov 2012) by Tim Moorey”

Solving time about 35 minutes, but I didn’t really time myself. This was one to savour, and it’s a shame I’m a bit pushed for time this morning and had to rush the second half … Read more “Saturday Times 25311 (3rd Nov)”

Solving time: 67:48 I struggled to get on Dean’s wavelength for this one, particularly in the NW corner. But it was certainly worth persevering with, as most of the clues were quite brilliant. As for … Read more “Sunday Times 4509 (28 Oct 2012) – one of Dean’s best”

Solving time 11:29, even after having only 2dn in after the first two minutes, so once I’d woken up that has to qualify as one of the easiest Saturday puzzles of the year. As usual, … Read more “Saturday Times 25305 (27th Oct)”

Solving time: 41:45 I found this one fairly average in terms of difficulty. I don’t think there were any new words in here to me, although there were a couple of unfamiliar ones – BERTHA … Read more “Sunday Times 4508 (21 Oct 2012) by Jeff Pearce”

Solving time – not sure, around 25-30 minutes. I stopped the clock to take a phone call after 10 minutes and forgot to restart it again afterwards. As always on Championship day, this was a … Read more “Saturday Times 25299 (20th Oct)”

Solving time: 57:11 with one wrong I really struggled with this one. There were several clues I didn’t understand until post-solve. And 6d I effectively gave up on, throwing in any old thing just to … Read more “Sunday Times 4507 (14 Oct 2012) by Tim Moorey”

Solving time 20:28 – should’ve been a bit quicker but I carelessly bunged in SADDLE BAG for 15D, which really threw me and stopped me getting the two long answers for a few minutes. Apart … Read more “Saturday Times 25293 (13th Oct)”

Solving time: 55:37 – I found this quite tough, even by Dean’s standards. There’s quite a bit of devious wordplay in this one, a lot of which I didn’t decipher until post-solve, otherwise I certainly … Read more “Sunday Times 4506 (7 Oct 2012) by Dean Mayer”

Solving time – a sluggish 20:55, although as usual going back over it a week later I can’t remember what slowed me down or why. Still, there were a few with tricky wordplay in amongst … Read more “Saturday Times 25287 (6th Oct)”