See if you can recognise these two mystery voices in Newcastle’s Treasure Hunter Contest? Oops, I almost gave the answers away. One day I’m hoping to set one of these quests, a clue scramble around the region, though I can tell you know the grail will await you in a winery (winter) or a surf hangout(summer). That place teems with attractions – now with added clues!
Whack it up. Stir it up. A great podcast about Boston mobspeak, drawing on Yiddish, Russian and Shakespeare. And if you are a Sopranos fan, enjoy David Chase’s eulogy for big Jimmy Gandolfini.
And lastly, a bizarre story about a Melburnian restaurateur who wants to reduce ‘the’ to a symbol, in the same way the ampersand has supplanted ‘and’. What’s your take on this? What word would you reduce, and how? Or can we downsize any word with creative pizzazz? Like this:
Ozz = PIZZA/ZZ
-iki = DASHIKI
T c-ee = PLUNGER C/OFF/EE
INTR
T = INTR/OVER/T
What else?
Good news. Utopian news! I’ve just finished my new crossword escapade, a mystery tour across the century of the puzzle’s existence, from the New York World in 1913 to Araucaria’s remarkable cancer admission in 2013, and 99 stunning puzzles (their secrets, their marvels, their lore) in between.
Not the diagrams so much, as the stories behind them – from prisons, IKEA ads, TV, Egypt and China. From Nabokov and AA Milne. Scandals and flukes. You will encounter murder, love, propaganda, telepathy, aliens, funerals and births – each milestone captured by a crossword somewhere, somehow. The book – Cluetopia – will be out in late October.
And that’s why I’ve put the name in this batch of News Clues, to see who can find a better anagram than I COPULATE! No need for definitions here. But who can cook up some stylish wordplay for these 7 headline-grabbers?
- Cluetopia
- Simon Gerrans (Tour de France dynamo)
- Marion Bartoli
- Andy Murray
- Ashton Agar (19yo in the Australian XI)
- Dry July
- Edward Snowden
Over to you. What’s your clue?
Today’s words can follow MAGIC, with any HEY PRESTO letters disappearing! Hence a word like BULLET, which can fllow MAGIC, would appear only as BULL (2), the E and T vanishing. Or MUSHROOM, another MAGIC follower, would come across as MUM (5).
Note the missing letters are tallied, while the exempt letters keeping their sequence. (And can you extend to our magic circle?)
- UDDING (1)
- LANN (3)
- CA (4)
- QUA (3)
- ALI (4)
- LL (3)
- (3)
- IN (4)
SOLUTION TO APPEAR NEXT WEEK
BB419 SOLUTION: Virgin birth, Rin Tin Tin, living in sin, indistinct, sci-fi film, Philip Pirrip, missing link, first-string, high spirits, gingivitis, Dick Smith, shipping firm. Other i-words may work.
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Reflecting market sentiment, perhaps, this was our most sluggish Storm for a while, with only a handful of investors, and spreadsheet of opinions. To deepen the depression, we needed to operate without CL’s white-knight intervention.
Anyhow, the challenge was to devise wordplay for currencies across three continents, from Asia to Africa to Europe. Clues were awarded 3 or 1 points. Bearing in mind we had a few abstainers, here’s how Dow Jones saw it:
ASIA
RINGGIT – Rudd in now, Gillard gone, intensive talkfest begins [Obverse would have won my 3 points if only they said ‘starts’. But a deserved 2 points/2 votes.]
NGULTRUM – Gunshot left model cockeyed [A fiscal coup for Trash-Euro, with an emphatic 12/4, making this the best clue of the week.]
AFRICA
KWACHA – Whack a pervert [Short, sharp, funny. Ergo 7/3 for Mark.]
LILANGENI – Nigella in trouble [Topically, she is, kinda. This headline echo, and concision, gained Obverse 9/3.]
EUROPE
DINHEIRO – Fred’s pet bites the next in line [At least I rose above the all ordinaries, as Piggy, with 7/3…]
HRYVNIA – Tyrannical king without measure, terribly vain […tying with Bling, exactly, for his more erudite deletion.]
Totting up, in ascending order, we see 50 Cent 7, Bling 7, Mark 8, Piggy 9, Obverse 11 and Trash-Euro 14. We wish CL a speedy recovery from his decadent lifestyle (have a great break, Chris, honestly) and of course, festoon the Bourse for the Trash-Euro takeover. Thanks. Till next trade.
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What a blissful week of British crosswords. Have you been indulging? I’d rate this week’s Arachne and Loroso (FT) as being two of the finest tussles for quite a stretch. In case you’ve lacked the time – or tipoff – then here are X divine clues (to solve) and a handful of spoiler huhs from Arachne (and others) to answer.
ARACHNE
Marvellous Madoff? (5-5)
Transform an annoying person into a B-lister? (9)
Two English animals on the loose in Pacific region (9)
Diplomat’s encouragement of revolutionary? (7)
Altogether fascinated by muscle reflex (2,5)
LOROSO
Moving? What, moving walls? (9)
Plug fitted in upright base (8)
Wicket taken by present bowler? Well? (4,4)
Entering temple, hostage turns as I swear (2,4,2)
Perhaps stripper, fighting back, has to get rid off going topless (3,6)
HUHS
Removing meat from menu, serves exceptional seafood = MUSSEL
Ban is such as to make one fearful = UNMAN
Cap in hand over foreign money, a beast picking over carcasses = HYENA
Relating to heart and – say – club correlation? = CARDIAC
Boring with Mandela in charge? = PROSAIC
Can you answer the golden clues? Can you explain the opaque clues? Can you draft snazzy clues for any of these 15 answers? We shall see.
Remember that film-maker, the one seeking a visual clue for his movie? We had a Storm toying with the shapes of letters, dreaming up some ingenious stuff. Still can’t say for sure whether our auteur used any of the podium material…however: do you feel like one more reel challenge?
The film-maker has only now dropped a line with a very particular question for a very ambiguous pathway. Why not let Dilan explain:
“I’m at that point where I need to determine a clue whose solution is ‘cryptic’. Do you have any suggestions for what that clue could be? Preferably it is one where there are a few potentially viable alternatives…”
No promises, no Oscars, but if you’d like to take up the challenge, the forum is open. I’ll be having a dip as well. (Just ensure you don’t betray your cover names from the Storm, as I’ve done before.) May the best clue win the limelight.
To mark the start of a new financial year, we look at some of the weirder-arsed coinage of the world. (I swear only bankers without frontiers know these twelve.) Our challenge is to choose a currency per continent – Asia, Africa, Europe – and make a clue involving wordplay only.
Play all you like, coining clues for all twelve of course, but come ‘deposit’ time on Thursday afternoon, only one per continent can be nominated.
Use a monetary alias, please, and offer financial advice if you see an opportunity. Bank your three clues between 1-5 on Thursday, by declaring your final 3-coin shortlist in the forum. Then on Friday, we assess the market and vote 3/1 for each continent, emailing to DAMail a total of six votes.
Clear as krona? Let’s meet the moolah:
ASIA
ngultrum (Bhutan)
ringgit (Malaysia)
rufiyaa (Maldives)
togrog (Mongolia)
AFRICA
ekwele (Eq Guinea)
kwacha (Zambia)
lilangeni (Swaziland)
nakfa (Eritrea)
EUROPE
dinheiro (Portugal)
hryvnia (Ukraine)
markka (Finland)
perper (Montenegro)
Happy conversion, and may the best merchant banker win.
Planetary bikes. Beatnik players. Payable stinker. (At least Tanya Plibersek has plenty of anagram potential.) But the rest of the new Rudd team are pretty frugal with their pliable letters. If you don’t believe me, see if you can make any cogent combo out of these new (or recycled) ministers:
Jenny Macklin
Penny Wong
Jacinta Collins
Brendan O'Connor
Warren Snowdon
Five names, with 14 bloody Ns. (It’s just as well Neil Finn, Nene King and Anna Karenina kept their distance from Canberra.) See if anyone can reweave these stubborn strings.
You’ll be cheered to learn I have regained my voice, and my tranquil desk reign, this week, after a stormy patch of work and poor health has robbed us of our usual Storm games.
That said, ‘voting’ Storms will be a little less frequent in this new FY – more like once or twice a month – in tandem with regular clue/wordplay games where winners are not determined. Think this keeps us all a tad fresher, and frees up CL, and my Saturday mornings. Don’t worry. DA Central will always offer plenty of mind-gum to chew, and chances to vaunt your devious stuff.
Have a great week, and don’t forget Wednesay’s Times (tips Athony) is a lollapalooza. Here’s hoping the Guardian gang are equally evasive.
All 12 answers use I, and only I as their vowel. IMPLICIT in these instructions, I should add, is that no Y appears either.
BRICK KILN, for example, should warm you up. As would a STIFF DRINK! Happy DISTILLING – and can you add to this I-RICH-LIST?
- Christ’s origin (6,5)
- Movie mutt (3,3,3)
- Cohabiting? (6,2,3)
- Hazy (10)
- Tron, eg (3-2,4)
- Dickensian hero (6,6)
- Archaeopteryx (7,4)
- Main (5-6)
- Elation (4,7)
- Gum gripe (10)
- Gadgeteer (4,5)
- Maersk, say (8,4)
SOLUTION NEXT WEEK
BB418 SOLUTION: Dustin/g, aspirin/g, muffin/g, Scullin/g, jerkin/g, tiffin/g, gamin/g, matin/g
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Two head-scratchers for your solving pleasure this morning. (I’ve also posted the first puzzle on Twitter at the same time – to see who’s smarter: tweeps or dabblers.) And just to lighten your load, the day’s bulletin concludes on a fun idea, with some gag potential to lead into the weekend. Here we go:
Conundrum #1: I have in mind a four-syllable word. The first two syllables relate to music. The last two syllables spell something you eat. Yet the whole word has no connection to music or food. So what’s the word?
Conundrum #2: This time I’m musing a six-letter noun that is named after the object that created it. Perhaps such an oddity is not so rare, but I can’t think of another example. What am I pondering?
Folly: Many books and films have poor openers, but improve as the story develops. So let’s make a list of some infamous false starts like:
Zone with the Wind – nursing home
Girt Music – our national anthem
Fission Impossible – the story of aluminium
Can of Steel – see above
Can you add to our false-start folly? Just first word’s initial only.
Love this nifty puzzle from Graham Hanlon, a maths teacher with a dangerous flair for wordplay. I wish I could say I’ve nailed the solution, though I’ve yet to examine the patterns in closer detail. Before I do, I thought I’d share Graham’s devilry in the meantime.
Beware all browsers, if you wish to figure out the code on you lonesome, then I suggest you resist the Comments, as all comers are welcome to identify the group. (And can you construct your own encoded list?)
In Graham’s own words: “I’m thinking of a set of 9 objects, where each 1 stands for the same letter and similarly for 2 and 3.” Meanwhile zero stands for any other letter. What’s the set?
1 2 3
0 0 0 0 2 0 0
0 0 3 2 1
0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 1
0 2 0 0 0 0 0
1 0 0 2 0 3
0 0 0 3 2 1
3 0 0 0 2 3 0
Thanks to GH for the puzzle. A deft roll-call. And if you have a puzzle to share, send it in. These teasers are the mental callisthenics we love here.
After 36 hours of tiptoeing amid lapsed leases, old cookies, faulty DNS reroutes and a guy called Raj in Manila, I’m back, baby. Without a voice, thanks to laryngitis, but with a forum at least. Thanks everyone for your patience.
So let’s have some fun with the Origin players, where you have to devise some devious wordplay for any Queensland star (Group 1), any NSW star (Group 2), and any one of the debutantes (3). A prize of gladiatorial glory to the best trio, without formal votes needed.
Group 1: Greg Inglis, Billy Slater, Cooper Cronk, Johnathon Thurston, Cameron Smith, Mal Meninga
Group 2: Paul Gallen, Josh Morris, Robbie Farah, Luke Lewis, Greg Bird, Mitchell Pearce, Laurie Daley
Group 3: Nathan Merritt, Aaron Woods, Andrew Fifita, Chris McQueen, Daly Cherry-Evans, Josh Papalii
And may the best combo win – tonight, and in the next few days here.
So where was the DA website for 12 hours? No idea, good people. I thought the problem was failing to renew my domain lease. I still don’t know. We may yet turn into a pumpkin by the close of business. But let me roll out a Salon post before that eventuates.
Google Poems – have you seen these things? Once you start this search quest, an hour can whiz by. All you have to do is key in a sentence opener, and see what the great good Google suggests. For example, WHY DO WE…opens up YAWN, DREAM, CRY, HICCUP. While I’M…renders BORED, ON A BOAT, DIFFERENT, YOURS. Who can find the best one this week – I DARE YOU TO…
Solved Paul last night – a few Albion phrases I didn’t know, but fun. And cracked today’s Times over lunch, despite my laryngitis, loving the deletion technnique of 1dn, and the bilingual chic of 11ac. It’s a fine puzzle, and worth your coin.
By the way, the winter solstice event in Albury was momentous, drawing a crowd of some 800 people, with a real sense of the event being replicated in other places to keep the vital conversation about suicide alive. Here’s more if the matter interests you. I was honoured to take part
Have a great week, whether or not you can speak…
If bird dressing is robin robing, and lifting dried fruit is raising raisin, how will you go at solving our other pairs? (And if you’re willin', can you add to this elite set of pairs?)
- Mr Hoffman cleaning
- Pill-wishing
- Roll bungling
- Ex-PM rowing
- Waving jacket
- Lunch spat
- Waif at casino?
- Sex service
SOLUTION NEXT WEEK
BB417 SOLUTION: India, Nepal, China; Peru, Ecuador, Colombia; Pakistan, Iran, Turkey, Afghanistan; Bulgaria, Ukraine, Moldova, Serbia; Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda, Kenya, Sudan; Hungary, Austria, Italy, Liechtenstein
To keep your clue craft honed over the weekend, who can concoct the best clues for these recent headline grabbers? (James Gandolfini has already been anagrammed into a dozen phrases, most of them enlisting MAFIA, DON, NJ or DIES.) Good luck, and go you Wallabies.
- Irish and British Lions
- Michelle de Kretser
- Holgier Osieck (Socceroos coach)
- Tony Soprano
- Dolce and Gabbana (done for tax fraud)
- Edward Snowden (PRISM whistleblower)
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