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| billyweeds |
 Posted: Fri Mar 16, 2007 4:21 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 20618
Location: New York City
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Ghulam wrote: The Sunday puzzle is usually set at Wednesday/Thursday level. The Friday puzzles have gotten easier in recent years. It is the Saturday puzzle that still takes a long time to fall. I go to bed with the puzzle half finished, but the next morning, for some reason, it yields much more readily. Seems the brain is working while you are asleep.
Thursday puzzles, though somewhat easier and therefore not always as much fun as Friday and Saturday, can be punny and cute.
Sunday puzzles are often too easy, though sometimes they throw you a curve and give you one that's even harder than Saturday.
My favorite puzzles of them all are the Diagramless kind, of which they used to have two (two!) every four weeks like clockwork. Somewhere along the line they all but dispensed with them and now you're lucky if you get one every two months or so. It bugs me. |
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| Ghulam |
| Posted: Fri Mar 16, 2007 4:35 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 4742
Location: Upstate NY
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Billy said, "My favorite puzzles of them all are the Diagramless kind, of which they used to have two (two!) every four weeks like clock"
Shortz has said he would like to give us a diagramless every other week, but the pressures on him from lovers of other kinds of puzzles makes him give a variety of puzzles as Sunday's Second Puzzle. I always post praises for the Acrostics and the Split Decisions, although the brainier guys in the forum do not like them. |
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| Nancy |
| Posted: Fri Mar 16, 2007 7:38 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 4607
Location: Norman, OK
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| A friend and I used to team up to tackle the London Times crosswords. Sometimes we even managed to solve one. |
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"All in all, it's just another feather in the fan."
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Fri Mar 16, 2007 7:49 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 20618
Location: New York City
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Ghulam wrote: Billy said, "My favorite puzzles of them all are the Diagramless kind, of which they used to have two (two!) every four weeks like clock"
Shortz has said he would like to give us a diagramless every other week, but the pressures on him from lovers of other kinds of puzzles makes him give a variety of puzzles as Sunday's Second Puzzle. I always post praises for the Acrostics and the Split Decisions, although the brainier guys in the forum do not like them.
Where did Shortz say this? I'm not surprised. Anyone who really loves crosswords has gotta adore diagramless puzzles. They are the best!
Incidentlly, I absolutely abhor Sudoku with every pore. |
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| Ghulam |
| Posted: Fri Mar 16, 2007 7:56 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 4742
Location: Upstate NY
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>> "Where did Shortz say this?"
In the Crossword Puzzle forum of the NYT, where he makes frequent appearances. |
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| Earl |
| Posted: Fri Mar 16, 2007 8:34 pm |
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Joined: 09 Jun 2004
Posts: 2621
Location: Houston
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Re the NYT puzzle:
I'm OK up to and including Wednesday. Thursdays can sometimes be tricky depending on if they're playing a funny game. Sometimes I get them easy, sometimes they take time and effort. Fridays and Saturdays, however, are nasty sumbitches. |
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| ehle64 |
| Posted: Fri Mar 16, 2007 10:55 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 7149
Location: NYC; US&A
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billyweeds wrote: Incidentlly, I absolutely abhor Sudoku with every pore.
What an incredibly oddly phrased confession. |
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It truly disappoints me when people do something for you via no prompt of your own and then use it as some kind of weapon against you at a later time and place. It is what it is. |
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| jeremy |
| Posted: Fri Mar 16, 2007 11:21 pm |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 6794
Location: Derby, England and Hamilton, New Zealand (yes they are about 12,000 miles apart)
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| I could understand those who criticise Sudoku as an unedifying and pointless waste of effort, but they can facilitate that intense level of pure abbstract concentration that empties the mind of all other considerations; a geek's version of transcendental meditation. |
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I am angry, I am ill, and I'm as ugly as sin.
My irritability keeps me alive and kicking.
I know the meaning of life, it doesn't help me a bit.
I know beauty and I know a good thing when I see it. |
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| jeremy |
| Posted: Fri Mar 16, 2007 11:23 pm |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 6794
Location: Derby, England and Hamilton, New Zealand (yes they are about 12,000 miles apart)
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| If you want to do a proper crossword, I suggest having a crack at those of the The Daily Telegraph or The Times (London). |
_________________
I am angry, I am ill, and I'm as ugly as sin.
My irritability keeps me alive and kicking.
I know the meaning of life, it doesn't help me a bit.
I know beauty and I know a good thing when I see it. |
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| Ghulam |
| Posted: Fri Mar 16, 2007 11:57 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 4742
Location: Upstate NY
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| British style cryptic crosswords are seen here as an occassional dish, and appear about once every six weeks as The Second Puzzle in the magazine section of Sunday's NYT. For the afficionado, there is the Cru Cryptic Archive offered on the Premiun Crosswors page of the NYT, but you have to subscribe to be a member (about $35/year). |
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| Joe Vitus |
| Posted: Sat Mar 17, 2007 3:22 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 14498
Location: Houston
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ehle64 wrote: billyweeds wrote: Incidentlly, I absolutely abhor Sudoku with every pore.
I've heard others make similar comments. |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Sat Mar 17, 2007 7:19 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 20618
Location: New York City
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| Jeremy's comparison of sudoku with transcendental meditation is interesting and valid. Sudoku puts me in a similar trance...and takes just about the same amount of intellectual intelligence. No, no, no, a thousand times no. |
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| marantzo |
| Posted: Sat Mar 17, 2007 12:11 pm |
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| No use for sudoku, And not knowing the rules of the diagramless puzzles, I've given them a try but couldn't figure out exactly what you are supposed to do. I do like the Crytoquote puzzles in the NYT Sunday. I like cryptic puzzle very much. The ones in the London Times and other British journals are wicked tough. |
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| bart |
| Posted: Sat Mar 17, 2007 12:19 pm |
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Joined: 05 Dec 2005
Posts: 2381
Location: Lincoln NE
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Sudo wrestling -- I don't like to work that hard unless I'm getting paid for it.
The NYT puzzlemakers love their puns, playing off a meaning of a clue word you don't expect. Once I get in that loose and limber mindset I'm okay -- the last one I did, for example, had some clue like "Hero might need this," and I strained for a moment along the lines of "hmm, what qualities does a hero need?" until I remembered how the puzzler's mind works and realized he meant the sandwich. I think the word was salami. |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Sat Mar 17, 2007 12:23 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 20618
Location: New York City
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marantzo wrote: No use for sudoku, And not knowing the rules of the diagramless puzzles, I've given them a try but couldn't figure out exactly what you are supposed to do.
One day back in the 1980s, faced with a long day of airplane travel, I decided (it was a Sunday and a two-diagramless day) that before the end of the day I would solve a diagramless or die trying (hopefully not flying). I had always had the same mindset as marantzo but kept being frustrated rather than accepting. Long story short, I cracked the technique and have never failed to solve a diagramless since. I looooooove diagramless puzzles! |
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