Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 27299
Hints and tips by Falcon
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BD Rating – Difficulty **/*** – Enjoyment ***/****
Greetings from Ottawa where we have been experiencing an unseasonably warm spell of weather for the past two weeks. Alas, the weatherman tells us that our good fortune is soon coming to an end with cooler temperatures and rain forecast for the weekend.
We have an uncharacteristically tame offering from RayT today. However, he has included his signature reference to Her Majesty. I was well on my way to a ** solve (in terms of difficulty) until the final handful of clues pushed it close to *** territory. It was still an enjoyable solve — even without the customary level of raunchiness.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 27269
Hints and tips by Falcon
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** / *** – Enjoyment ** / ***
Greetings from Ottawa, where we are experiencing a bit of a late summer heat wave. I found today’s puzzle to be challenging to pigeonhole. The difficulty level of clues seems to cover a broad range from facile to fairly tricky. Furthermore, some of the clues virtually defy efforts to craft hints for them. In the end, I have opted to set both meters between two and three stars.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 27209
Hints and tips by Falcon
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** / **** – Enjoyment ***
Greetings from Ottawa where I am making a brief stopover between travels. Earlier this month, my wife and I had the immense pleasure of spending a bit more than a week touring parts of England. We started in Liverpool, spent a day in Manchester, then several days exploring the moors and dales of Yorkshire, followed by a couple of days in Oxford and surrounding areas of Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire, and finished with a night in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. In all the time that we were there, we encountered only about an hour of rain – and that occurred during the bus ride from Oxford to London. By the time we reached our hotel, the rain had let up enough that we were able to take a stroll in Kensington Gardens.
As for today’s puzzle, while I was easily able to solve a half-dozen or so clues on the first read through, I would say that these were by no means indicative of the level of difficulty of the rest of the puzzle – which I found to be very challenging. For myself, the puzzle edged into 4* territory for difficulty. However, I may just be out of practice, recently having had little time to spend on puzzles on a regular basis. Some unfamiliar British personalities also gave me some trouble. Consequently, those of you in the UK may find the puzzle less challenging than did I.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 27179
Hints and tips by Falcon
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ****
Greetings from Ottawa where — following a heatwave of mid-summer proportions — we have reverted to more seasonable (or even below seasonable) temperatures. The premature taste of July makes the current conditions all the more unpleasant. There is certainly nothing unpleasant about today’s puzzle from RayT — it was a joy to solve and a delight to review. On my first pass through, I was able to establish a network of solutions spanning the grid. Then my pace slowed markedly as the remaining clues demanded more thinking. However, by systematically building upon the initial structure, I was able to gradually fill in the blanks. I thought that the puzzle edged into three star territory for difficulty, but I suspect there will be a number of readers who feel it stayed in the two star range.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 27161
Hints and tips by Falcon
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ***
Greetings from Ottawa where spring seems slow to arrive this year. One may even still see the odd isolated pile of snow in some well-sheltered locations.
This is a DNRT (Definitely Not Ray T) puzzle. I also found it to be a difficult puzzle to rate. To start with, the difficulty level of clues seems to range all over the map. I have set the difficulty at three stars, but some of the British terms may have caused me more difficulty than they will you. I also found it a bit tedious to review — especially the down clues where one encounters charade after charade after charade. I hadn’t particularly noticed this while solving the puzzle as I typically find myself tackling clues in a random order. I tried not to let this factor influence my rating, and gave it three stars for enjoyment as I felt that I had enjoyed the solving experience more than the blogging experience.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 27137
Hints and tips by Falcon
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ***
Greetings from Ottawa where spring has arrived. Judging from the UK forecast, conditions here are very similar to those in London – perhaps even a few degrees warmer here. However, we still have a foot or two of snow on the ground – but it is quickly disappearing.
I suspect that you did not get the blogger you were expecting, and maybe not the setter either – I would say that this puzzle has definitely not been fashioned by RayT. On first read through, I thought it was going to be more difficult than it turned out to be. Once I got a foothold established, things started to fall into place.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 27119
Hints and tips by Falcon
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** / *** – Enjoyment ****
Greetings from Ottawa where snow is piled high everywhere but it is finally beginning to feel like spring is just around the corner.
Today’s puzzle has all the earmarks of a RayT creation — a bit of innuendo and an appearance by Her Majesty. I enjoyed solving the puzzle but when it came to writing the review, I realized that there does seem to be a rather generous dose of anagrams and charades used in the puzzle.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 27095
Hints and tips by Falcon
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ****
Greetings from Ottawa where we are in the midst of our annual winter celebration known as Winterlude.
Did you find the language a bit blue today – what with oaths, profanity and vulgarity. Not to mention a bit of bodice ripping and touching? Should you have any question about the authorship of today’s puzzle, a quick peek at the first and last clues will dispel any doubt. However, before the RayT-phobes exit the room, let me say that I found it to be rather gentle. This just may be the chance for those who are convinced that they can’t do a RayT puzzle to prove themselves wrong.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 27065
Hints and tips by Falcon
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ****
Greetings from a very frigid Ottawa where the temperature is currently -23°C. With this being my regular turn in the blogger’s chair, the schedule has proven to be very fortuitous since – as we recently learned – Pommers is currently recuperating from a rather nasty bit of illness. I am sure he has taken heart from the outpouring of good wishes that have been directed his way. Hopefully, he will soon be well enough to flirt with those pretty Spanish nurses – when Pommette isn’t looking, of course.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 27042
Hints and tips by Falcon
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ***
Greetings from frigid Ottawa. Actually the temperature seems to be on a roller coaster lately – one day its close to 20°C and the next its subzero.
After two weeks of Ray T (as I can see from a quick scan of the files), I would say that today’s puzzle is definitely not a RayT.
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