DA on the 3rd/4th of September, 2010
I'm off to the Mercosur nations (but not Paraguay) on Sunday, which will mean that as of Sunday, all three originators of this blog, RC, TH and I will be overseas.
TH is lost to NY and RC is in Rio, as he has been for most of the year. I'll be catching up with RC over there next week. I'm taking a stash of old DA cryptics with me, and we plan on doing what might never have been done before: finishing a DA on the Sugarloaf Mountain.
And so, what about this week's cryptic?
(No spoilers on this thread till Monday)
DA on the 27th of August, 2010
Is DA pulling out his finest work on the verge of his book being published?
(No spoilers on this thread until Monday)
Update: Quality, but perplexing:
It's a DA dedicated to the peripheral: persimmon, Ross Sea, infobahn, Mount Wellington, yulara, Great Firewall of China, beau monde and botty are all words that simply don't spring to mind when given the direct clue.
A tough one for mine, not particularly brilliant either, but solid.
DA on the 20th/21st of August, 2010
Happy times, happy days -- I love voting, and here's hoping for a stellar election-themed crossword.
(No spoilers on this thread until Monday)
Update: A very, very good DA -- para Pantheon for mine:
It's perhaps the perfect cryptic crossword theme: a grammatical feature. And what's even better, at least for me: it's a self-referential grammatical feature whose name is derived from another language: portmanteau is a portmanteau and is French for carries the cloak!
A quality crossword that I grappled with for most of Saturday between voting, football watching (even though the Tigers lost, I really enjoyed watching their improvement against the Saints) and election partying.
It took me a while, but I eventually worked out the theme when cinema's Natalie made things obvious. By the sound of things, though, not too many of you are familiar with Natalie Portman. That's a shame because, although I consider her acting to be wooden at best, she's played in two great films: The Professional and V for Vendetta. The latter film I particularly recommend to any lefties among you who have ever daydreamed of blowing up politicians of the right (have I just revealed I voted Green?)
Labradoodle also made me laugh a childish laugh: labra in Spanish is the verb work, and, well, I don't think I need to say anything more.
DA on the 13/14th of August, 2010
A jolly good show worthy of the price of admission?
You be the judge, below.
(No spoilers on this thread until Monday)
Update: Quite a neat little crossword:
I certainly didn't find it easy as others have stated they found it, but I did enjoy it.
DA on the 6/7th of August, 2010
I'm expecting some sweet DA love for a pearler of a crossword.
(No spoilers on this thread till Monday)
DA on the 30th/31st of July, 2010
Two disappointing DA cryptics in a row is not possible.
I'm expecting this week's to be a corker.
(No spoilers on this thread until Monday)
DA DA for the 23rd/24th of July, 2010
Three cheers for a quality DA.
Yay or nay?
(No spoilers in the comments of this post until Monday)
DA for the 16/17th of July, 2010
How do we rate this week's array of sleights of hand?
(No spoilers in the comments of this post until Monday)
Update: I got two in less than two minutes, and then for the next twenty minutes or so, nothing, which is pretty much where things remained.
Given the theme and some of the answers (wop, sod's law), I'm kinda glad I didn't stick with it.
Further update: My cryptic research has uncovered that Finagle's law is also a synonym of Murphy's law and sod's law.
Before today, I'd only heard of Murphy's, and the hilarious Muphry's law.
DA for the 9/10th of July, 2010
Do we approve of DA's cryptic love note this week?
(No spoilers on this post till Monday)
Update: An everyday DA, which amounts to a very good crossword indeed:
Some excellent red herrings, but I'm still one of those who prefers to avoid using a dictionary or Google, hence a few blank spaces.
DA on the 2/3rd of July, 2010
Joy? Sorrow? Frustration? Release?
(No spoilers until Monday)
Upload: One of the best non-thematic DAs:
Some high quality, clever clues on this one. Quite impressive.
