But were Robert's Rules followed to the letter?

The next two weeks are going to be intriguing - Samuel was one of the first people to get in touch with me when I started this blog, and is in a large way responsible for my getting better at these things. Not to mention I managed to solve his offering from last year. Will familiarity breed contempt? We have 27 misprinted words and 10 words that need some sort of motion. That meant a little more than half of the clues needed some alteration. 5 and 19 are unclued but lead to some non-resolution and resolution... OK.

Since I didn't know what would be moved and what wouldn't, I started entering in words faintly - I prefer pen to pencil because when I write in pencil I tend to smudge, and I can always print off a new grid, so light penning it was (when it came to scan-time I went over a few I thought wouldn't show up too easily on the scanner).

Oh, and this finally came in the mail!



Couldn't make anything out of 1 across, but 7 looked like a good starter - (r)EGRET. 7 down looked like E,T,CHING (much later I changed it to E,T,CHANT once I figured out what went at 19). If 9 down is T,END with RAPT becoming TRAP I've found a moved letter and another normal entry.

I managed to fill out quite a lot of the grid in the first go-around. Maybe it was because I was looking for them right off the bat but a lot of the words that had motion stuck out in the clues, such as 10 across - small YARM branch has to be ARMY.

When I got as far as I could with the grid, I looked at 19 and 5. DOCTOR ZHIVAGO could fit ith the letters I had in 19 (I still had the I from ITCHING) - is everyone getting on a train? Are we moving Lana Turner?

I turned to the lettets from the misspellings... T T HERIGHT stuck out - something is going to the right. The L in 29 across made me think something else might be to the left.

That fit with a few that I couldn't work out... 41 across was N-G-E which I was drawing a blank on, but if it was GNOME with the NO moved it makes perfect sense. NOES TO THE LEFT. Now is it EYES to the right or AYES to the right? 32 looked like it should be E-LAYER from the clue, but I had E-R---E... so move the AYE to the right and it fits. 24 was already in my grid as SNOB with a question mark (because nothing would fir at 15 down), but move the NO to the left and make NOSB and 15 becomes MESS-UPS and 19 is TING.

Getting there - downs are all normal if motion is only to the left or the right. And 5 down is DIVISION LOBBY! 19 across is either THE AYES HAVE IT or THE NOES HAVE IT (I didn't have 3 down at this point).

I'll admit I abused Things Cruciverbial to get the last few AYES... Entering in 8-letter words using ILTAYE came up with VILAYETS at 11across, and 6-letter words with UXAYE at 38 BAYEUX (I probably should have gotten that without Things Cruciverbial).

Funny thing is that I eventually got that ANTES in 1 across had to be NATES (to give the CAN in CANOPY), but it was another case of entering NOPY + 2 letters to make the penny drop - this also gave me the A to confirm ABOUND at 3 down and the overall message to be THE NOES HAVE IT.

We are yet to have a word that makes its debut appearance in Chambers 2008, I wonder when one is to come? This was a really well put-together puzzle and I liked how the answer came in little bits, rather than one flash and away I go. Victory to George!

2009 tally: George 2, Listener 0. Current streak: George 2.

I'm excited about next week's Vic Chestnutt/Elf Power show and I was going to put a clip of Vic Chestnutt up on here. Checking youtube, would you believe someone took a handheld of a concert I was at last year and uploaded almost the entire thing to youtube. I was standing just a few feet to the left of this guy while he was recording, I think I tried to disrupt him a few times - here's Vic's rather bizarre warmup.

Cogito Ergo Summary

According to the Listener page, Adam has been setting puzzles for over 50 years! The only one I remember trying, 3930: Double Entry, I got absolutely nowhere on. Apparently there was a mess when this first appeared online without the preamble, but by the time I got to download and print it, the preamble was there. Cells with asterisks, all around the perimeter, and a letter exchange later on.

I took this with me on a lunch break and found that I was on Adam's wavelength this time, in a little over an hour, I had a pretty decent chunk of the grid filled in, and even better, most of the clues with the asterisks were pretty gentle.

1 across: GO reversed around UT,IN - so I have OUG
5 across: KISMET (MISTAKE-A)* - giving MT
1 down: O,A RING - really liked this clue, Adam - R
9 down: wanTONNESs - so OS
20 down: IMPART(ial) - another nice clue - I
24 down: MANGE,R - G
33 across: TEETER - (THE TREE - H) - E
34 across: C,ENTER - C

So the asterisked letters were ORIEMTOSGCUG. At the bagel place where I had lunch, I couldn't make anything of this - I plucked out CUSTOMER but didn't see anything else (that would leave OIGG).

Back at the computer, I took a stab at the Word Wizards anagram generator, and entering in O as the extra letter threw up COGITO ERGO SUM, which sounded promising, and had the same number of letters as RENE DESCARTES.

The only ambiguities left to take care of were the substitutions of the Gs and Os - I saw RETINA for 1 taking care of both, and the outside was no problem.

But I wasn't finished, and that was frustrating... I had a bunch of no-fits in the top right hand corner. I'd messed up the anagram at 5, inventing a painter KICHENER, which was keeping me from getting 12 and 17 across. Bradford's came through with KIRCHNER, and after an agonizing day or two wondering if I could really blow it, I have a grid and a solution.

Maybe it's a policy to have an easy one to start off with, or I'm getting better, but I found this one a breeze. The clues are nice, very much like I'm used to in the Mephisto, and it was a fun solve.

Victory to George! 2009 tally: George 1, Listener 0. Current streak : George 1

It's far too tempting to put the Monty Python Philosopher's Song up with a Rene Descartes themed puzzle. So here's another French Philosopher, Plastic Bertrand.

Year 1 recap

A little bit of a story... I spent a large amount of 2007 sitting in hospital rooms while my partner was battling cancer (a battle ultimately lost). I had a lot of time and needed to keep my mind going, so I worked harder on being able to solve crossword puzzles. The Listener was a great one for passing long periods of time in sterile environments, but even with all that time I was a terrible solver. In 2007 I solved three completely (3918: Factory, 3953: Resolution and 3959: Inflation), and got very close on four others (3934: Surprise, 3935: Two Down, 3936: Convert, and 3961: Invitation).

So to go from three to 27 is pretty stunning. And it's been fun and a huge eye-opener blogging the experience and finding there is an audience for write-ups, bad jokes, and success and failure. And also to find that crossword setters and solvers are a forgiving and fun bunch - I was really anticipating some backlash, and got none.

Special thank you to setters who have read, commented and emailed - I am in awe of your efforts. Samuel, Homer, Phi, Ploy, and a component of Mango have all given me some pointers and are always a fun email.

Thanks also to the regular commenters, it's nice to know I'm not alone in struggling with some puzzles.

Here are a few Top 3s...

My 3 favorite puzzles that I solved.

3963: Carte Blanche by Homer - No way did I think I was going to get this... no gridlines, extra words, the sort of puzzle I would have given up on a few years ago. But clue by tiny clue I just got more and more and eventually had it.

3989: Key Cutting by Lavatch - Fear of Letters Latent overcome! Another piece by piece solve (I finished it the night before I wrote it up).

3965: Solitaire by Xanthippe - I never thought that scissors would be used in solving a crossword. I should have taken a picture of myself with all those little bits of paper.

My 3 favorite puzzles that I didn't solve.

3977: City Tour by Mango - I got close on this, but really loved how it worked

4006: We interrupt this programme... by Phi - Phi sent me an email saying that I shouldn't have gotten so much thematic material without solving, and then gave me some hints and pointed me at where to get better at solving his style of clue. Can't thank you enough!

3986: Terminal Suspension by Schadenfreude - I made a real mess of this in the end, took a wrong turn at Alberqueque and it was downhill from there, but I liked the puzzle a lot.

So now to year 2... I'll be keeping up my little blog - the bar has been set and the target to beat is 27. Feel free to add your tally, your comments, and anything else you like or dislike (I promise to not use that ghastly yellow paper I have a pile of anymore). See you next week for the first puzzle of 2009, hope you've got your new Chambers - according to amazon, mine has made it to the US and is in the hands of DHL.

Without Solution

The last crossword of the year, "Without Bars" by Elgin. The preamble is pretty daunting - most answers are entered normally (but there's no gridlines ), four are jumbled and partially entered and they're all acrosses, so if I spot a down entry, I can confidently write it in.

So rather than go top to bottom, I looked at clues on the right hand side of the grid, since these should be down clues and entered normally.

These are tricky clues.

I mean really tricky.

I got a little bit of a start using the right-hand side first method, helped along by 13 across FOU(r) - a very nice clue. In between scanning this and writing the blog, I realise that 17 down is OVERPAINT, so HAMLETS must be jumbled and RAGWORM goes down. 28 probably ends in an H from the jumbled HAMLETS.

But I am well and truly beaten on this one, so the year ends with a crashing failure. I am really curious to see what I missed (by my watch the answer will be posted within the next five minutes, so I'll find out soon enough).

Victory to the Listener Crossword! Final tally: Listener 25, George 27. Very close, but a satisfying end to the year.

I'll be posting a year-end review next. Two nights ago I was watching a little late-night TV and heard that one of the US cable channels (G4) is going to air "Chaser's War On Everything" which is a terrifically funny Australian show (these were the guys that made international news a while back by getting a guy dressed as Osama Bin Laden into the G8 summit). Here is their crowning glory, the darkly funny and not 100% safe for work "Eulogy Song"

Slipper found!

I'm on the road, so this is going to be a quick report, and without a grid until I get back home.

My first two thoughts as to what the game could be (since there were other children preventing things having to be done) were MUSICAL CHAIRS and BRITISH BULLDOG, the latter maybe being too violent for a Listener? The second letter in 1 down coming out as a U gave me hope for removing chairs from answers, but those hopes were dashed with 16 not being cot.

The rest of it was fun, and I solved it without having Bradford's or Chambers available (I was in Texas), though googling was needed to find the quotation, which ended up necessary to finish the lower left corner of the grid (apropos for Texas).

Took a little shoehorning to get the title SLIPPERY CUSTOMER since I was looking for some form of COBBLER (I jumbled the letters and tried to make it SUPREMITY COBBLER) in there to the point of inventing a boy's name starting with B for the letters that gave SEBASTIAN... then I realised I didn't have to jumble the first letters of the names and the answer was sitting in front of me (just like it was last week but I managed to get the last bit this time).

Last puzzle for year one coming up next week, but I scraped in success in trying to get half of the Listeners out for the year... current tally: George 27, Listener 24. Current streak: George 1.

The Tally: updated

My counting got messed up with those two puzzles that I thought I had completed, but I had made a few mistakes in and errors propagated. A glance back through this year, and the tally is George 26, Listener 24 (so at least a tie is guaranteed).

And I'm still kicking myself over missing the quote from 4012.

Still some explaining to do - what did Caesar say?

Happy New Year (though not the end of last year for George v Listener, that'll come in two weeks time). This week we've got Explanation by Lato - a pretty quick turnaround for Lato, who gave us "Yes" six months ago, which I managed to scrape a finish out of despite missing something from the preamble.

There's a wish granted in the perimeter, expressed by an unclued guy in the middle (dramatically), four clues have wordplay but no definition. OK... looks like we're dealing with real words and normal clues for the most part, let's get solving.

Things were off to a pretty brisk start, though there was a lot of chambersing involved in finding the words - I got more from the wordplay than definition here, but there were some that eluded me

Acrosses:

9) HIE,LAND - from wordplay, checked it in Chambers
10) (MATURE,U) - used the Chambers anagram solver to get TRUMEAU
12) One of my (still) unsolved... --R-RTS - was hoping to find the perimeter to get a grasp on the first letter
13) MALIC (nice easy anagram)
14) Not 100% on this, I think it's YEAH being E in HAY reversed
15) From wordplay again, anagram of RED in THINK making THE DRINK
16) DUN? Double definition?
18) I had DOE before I got this, so AGENT is DOER - checking DO-ER in Chambers shows that DOVE is a Scots word for stun
20) (g)RIMY
22) T in REAR reversed and D gives RETARD, which I'll be feeling like at the end of this
24) SHY (double meaning)
25) Hmmm... I have AE so I think it's AERO from definition?
28) Had -CE, I think it's ICE from the definition, can't see wordplay
29) RA,T(i)TLE - nice clue
32) A in NOH = NOAH
34) OAR (sounds like or)
35) Cute clue - PELE reversed, HAN,T
39) ARES - R in SEA reversed
41) I was relieved to find VAKAS was a word
42) STRETTI (I knew this one without having to hunt for the pretty obviously-clued anagram)
43) (l)ITERATE - another nice clue
44) I think this is one of the four without definition... BEECHAM with F for C would be BEEFHAM

Downs
1) No idea... I was thinking BIS for not once (but twice), with X, Y or Z inside, but can't come up with a solution
2) R in REAN gives RERAN
3) HARED (sounds like HARED)
4) INTRODUCTION (anagram of RUCTION,ED)
5) (p)ITCH - stations identified by their frequency?
6) FREE - FRERE without R, thanks Bradfords
7) IMARI (hidden, reversed)
8) Now I'm writing this, I'm having second thoughts - I had RAINY as IN in RAY
11) ELI(te)
17) Hmmm... now this could be one of the undefined. COBALT without CO?
19) CHARACTER would work from "sign" as a definition, can't see wordplay
21) I suspect another one without definition... E in MAT
23) And this one, probably A,NUT backwards to give TUNA
24) SCOOT - another double definition courtesy Chambers
25) ASTI(r)
30) I saw this same clue in another crossword recently, but liked it both times - PLATO(on)
31) SPAR,D
33) E in HARM gives HAREM which is also a spiritual place, apparently
34) OR,THO
37) Definition would give ANTE?
38) NE(v)ER
40) ETA-????

So the clues weren't that difficult, and this gave me -U--USCA-SA- for the middle, which means it should be JULIUS CAESAR (actually I got that before the A from CHARACTER or S from TENSE came in). 30 and 15 aren't defined either, but P-S- TE--- looks like it should be PAST TENSE

So what did Caesar wish for?

I've never seen the play or any of the films based on the play. I remember something about wanting ears, but looking it up, it was Antony that wanted the ears, not Caesar.

Good news! Caesar himself only appears in three scenes and doesn't have that many lines. One of them must be a wish or "hey guys, wouldn't it be great if..." stuff. I read his bloody lines five times and apart from wanting Olympus to be hoisted, he didn't as for much, and certainly not much that contained anagrams of BEEFHAM,MEAT, TUNA and possibly BALT.

Is it his dying words? ET TU BRUTE THEN FALL CAESAR? Maybe he was asking for a salad? Is it a recipe for Caesar salad, croutons, parmesan, worcester sauce and a fried egg? Nope.

Blazing away at this, even though there's no M's in it, removing the letters in BEEFHA(m),(m)EAT,TUNA,BALT leaves LETTERSCUR. Something to do with LETTERS?

Last gasp... write out the perimeter and look for something. I can make SETTERS from the extra letters, looking on the left hand side there would be room to put DUCK, HOMER, MYNOT, MR E, and then I draw a blank. Since some of those read this occasionally, I'll leave in my unfinished grid their names as my last attempt.

And stuck! Victory to Lato and the Listener Crossword and with two to go, this may well end in a tie. Current tally: Listener 23, George 25. Current streak: Listener 1

The math doesn't seem to be right here, aren't there 52 puzzles in the year? I'll go back and check later, after figuring out I missed here.