September 28, 2012 – Big Dave's Crossword Blog

Calling Canterbury’s slightly mad hatters

Calling Canterbury’s slightly mad hatters

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John Pidgeon (Petitjean to Toughie fans, all manner of names to Cryptic solvers) will be running a series of Thursday morning crossword workshops in the village of Bridge, three miles from Canterbury, from October 11th.  Lifelong solvers and novices will be equally welcome at these get-togethers, where John’s aim will be to improve your recognition of various types of clues, help you spot setters’ sleight of hand, and get you more quickly to the right answer.

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Toughie 850

Toughie No 850 by Elgar

Whodunit??

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BD Rating – Difficulty *****Enjoyment *****

Whodunit??   It was that Elgar, m’Lud, and he was wearing his full Vlad the Impaler outfit, complete with new hob-nailed boots  and a large pointed stake, and he had the scariest wicked glint in his eye….!

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DT 26978

Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26978

A full review by crypticsue

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BD Rating – Difficulty *Enjoyment ***

I didn’t think I could possibly solve a crossword quicker than a time I am not allowed to mention here, but Saturday morning proved that apparently I can.  The perfect puzzle for what was supposedly the last nice day of the summer, a quick solve and then out to enjoy some lovely sunshine.

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DT 26983

Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26983

Hints and tips by scchua

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BD Rating – Difficulty **Enjoyment ***

Firstly thanks to BigDave for covering for me on Wednesday (busy week for him!).

This started off quite easily on the left side, but stalled a bit, but not much, with the remainder.  I would therefore give it a 2-2.5* for difficulty, and 3* for enjoyment, with the caveat that these are always subjective.  Thank you to setter.  Definitions are underlined in the clues.  “[xxx]” denotes a synonym or equivalent to “xxx”.

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