Toughie No 554 by Firefly
A Curmudgeon Writes…….
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment **
Greetings from the Calder Valley.
Well it’s a special once-in-a-lifetime day today. Yes, if the weather stays fine, you’ll be able to see the Space Shuttle Endeavour just after its launch later as it passes over the country.
Oh that’s right, there was something happening in London today. That event seems to have brought out the commemorative puzzles. All the newspapers have them and there were two in the Telegraph (although the Guardian’s Paul is restricted to just one clue: Fancy lad and me tied knot! (4,9)). Paul can fight with Giovanni for the cleverer version of it.
I’m risking death-rays I know, but I didn’t really enjoy the Toughie today. I have solved all the big newspaper puzzles today and this lags a bit behind all the others. The Times puzzle has elegantly written (if rather sycophantic) topical clues, the Indy and FT both made me laugh out loud and Giovanni’s DT puzzle was his usual elegant work. This offering by Firefly really seemed a bit too contrived in parts and mystifying in others. It doesn’t give me any pleasure to say this, as I do normally enjoy his puzzles in other papers, especially his barred ones.
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Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2585
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The closing date for this Prize puzzle has been put back, so the review will be published at 12.00noon on Tuesday, 3rd May.… Continue reading
Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26539
There’s No Escape!
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ***
It can’t come as any great surprise to anyone that today’s puzzle has a theme. So whether you’re enthralled by the whole thing or can’t wait for it to be over, you’re stuck with it here. Let us know what you thought of it in a comment.
For the last few weeks the on-line site appeared to have solved its problems with the enumeration of multi-clue answers. So it’s disappointing to find that they’ve reverted to the old, unsatisfactory method.
If you want to see an answer highlight the space between the brackets under the clue.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26534
A full review by Gnomethang
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ****
Morning All!. Cephas gave us a very enjoyable puzzle. At first glance I wasn’t sure that it was his but having gone through the clues it was clearly one of his!
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