Marshy (Sunday brunch: October 19, 2014)

This is being posted on Saturday because 25 years ago today, The Other Doctor Mitchell and I were honeymooning in Toronto (after a few days in Niagara Falls—how traditional can you get!), and on October 18, 1989, we attended the Toronto-Vancouver game at Maple Leaf Gardens.  The home team won (we didn’t have a rooting interest), but to my delight, Leafs’ veteran defenceman Brad Marsh played a memorable game.

Being an old, slow defenseman myself (I wasn’t old or a defenseman until the end of my playing career, but I had a lifetime of slow), I was especially thrilled. The Leafs, who had had a pretty bad start to the season, got the go-ahead goal early in the third period, but the Canucks mounted a furious effort to tie the game.

One of the last NHL
players without a helmet
(not that I endorse that).

Late in the third, Marsh had a shift where he blocked two shots: dropping to the ice to put his shins in front of a slap shot (one of the unsung aspects of the game you can’t appreciate without having played it).  After the second one, he picked up the puck and lugged it up ice into the Canucks’ zone.  After all, even a stay-at-home defenseman knows that sometimes a good offense is the best defense.   The crowd roared its appreciation and Marsh was named one of the three stars of the game despite having no goals, no assists, and only one shot on goal.
A few years later, when I earned a place refereeing in one of the high school leagues here, and my number 5 wasn’t available, I took number 8, in honor of Marshy, who wore that number for the Flyers.  

Now it turns out that Marshy has joined Hockey Buzz and contributes a few blog posts each month. Maybe he’ll share a few memories of that game in T.O. with us.

Speaking of slow, it continues to be a slow cryptic month: nothing new recently from LizR or Kevin Wald, Harper’s is off this month, and in the national papers it’s a two-acrostic week: Mike Shenk in the Wall Street Journal and Hex in the New York Times (blogged with spoilers by Deb Amlen).  Solvers note: the week-long New York Times crossword contest will be going on all next week.  20 solvers who figure out the correct answer to the challenge will win a full year NYT puzzle subscription.  I got my win already, finding out (on my birthday no less!) that I’d won Aries’s Rows Garden meta sweepstakes, and another year of his timely and thoughtful puzzles

The National Post cryptic (blogged by Falcon) was a little disappointing because of the large number of ‘ing’ words. Probably an easier grid to construct, but it made it easy to get partials, and the words those partials intersected.  The syndicated puzzle in the Globe and Mail is your other new cryptic today.

So I solved some Sticklers this week.  Go out and give them a try.  Stickler’s an Aussie, but he’s quite welcoming to us Northern Hemisphere solvers, providing “overseas help” in the form of definitions of Australian slang and cultural references that show up in his weekly puzzles. Every constructor should be so considerate: making the explanations available to those who need them but not forcing them on those who don’t.

Planes, trains, automobiles, and boats (Sunday brunch: June 29, 2014)

Rounding Brant Point in Nantucket Harbor

Four trips, nine states, three hotels, and just about every mode of transportation short of a horse.  Business, family, and sports.  One drive that started before 6:00 am and another that ended after 4:00 am.  Can’t call it a vacation since I read only one book and I didn’t get to solve as many puzzles as I would have liked.  But I’m home and regular service resumes.

We have acrostics in the New York Times and Wall Street Journal this weekend.  As always, both Hex and Mike Shenk craft them well.  One of the hallmarks of a well-crafted acrostic is clues that hint at the quote or its source, and both constructors hit the mark.  

Cryptics?  The National Post (Hex: easy, comment and spoilers at Wordplay) and the Globe and Mail (Fraser Simpson: hard).  But the highlight of the weekend is the gigantic (25 x 25) puzzle LizR posted this week in honor of Matariki, the Maori new year.  Maybe I can convince Bangle to make another pavlova to celebrate.

Sure enough, Erica did blog the June Harper’s cryptic last weekend.  She’s trolling for comments so stop by and say congratulations to Sweet Vlad, who successfully defended his dissertation.

Bonus hockey (Sunday brunch: June 15, 2014)

I think it was Bill Pidto who popularized the phrase “bonus hockey,” and it’s so much a part of the Mitchell vocabulary that you’ll find “bonus fish” on the table, and “bonus laundry” being done late on Sunday.  Bonus hockey is great in the regular season, but in the playoffs it’s much more.

Congratulations to the Stanley Cup champion LA Kings, and also to the officials who were selected to work the Finals:  referees Steve Kozari, Wes McCauley, Dan O’Halloran, and Brad Watson, and linesmen Derek Amell, Scott Driscoll, Shane Heyer, Brad Kovachik.  

Good weekend for cryptics: Hex have a great variety cryptic in the Wall Street Journal (“Flower Cuttings”) as well as their weekly straight cryptic in the National Post (Falcon has interrupted his vacation to post it).  I’ve got hints for the WSJ puzzle elsewhere on the blog.

Meanwhile, the new Harper’s is out, with another Sixes and Sevens (and Twelves) from Richard Maltby.  That means Erica will be around soon to blog the June puzzle in her unique style.

LizR has your Brit cryptic needs satisfied with another new puzzle, while Fraser Simpson has his regular Brit-Canadian cryptic in the Globe and Mail.

The weekend’s New York Times variety puzzle (behind the paywall) is a Hex acrostic.  Deb Amlen blogs it (with spoilers) at Wordplay.

Add to that the 1974 Frank Lewis puzzle we started on Thursday, and a cluing challenge, and we’ve got a great variety of puzzles to have your brain working overtime.

More hockey below the fold.

Ref strike (Sunday brunch: June 2, 2014)

Puzzles first this week, then the hockey story.

Two acrostic weekend: the New York Times has a Hex acrostic behind the paywall: blogged (with spoilers) by Deb Amlen.  The weekend Wall Street Journal puzzle is an acrostic by Mike Shenk.  Mike made it a satisfying one by putting enough easy answers at the beginning that most solvers would have enough letters from the first time through the clues to be able to complete some words from the quote and have hints for the next time through.

Falcon is back from vacation to blog the National Post puzzle by Hex and post the ones that were published the weeks he was off in Europe.  This weekend’s puzzle was very easy.  As usual, there’s a harder cryptic in the Globe and Mail.

LizR is back too, with one of her Brit cryptics, and a diet of worms (see the comments for explanation).

Last week I hinted there were some league commissioners who weren’t so good about suspending players who got third-man-in penalties or engaged in otherwise egregious misconduct.    They’re how leagues get reputations as “goon leagues.”

Most men’s league players have a family to go home to after the game and a job to go to the next morning.  Brawling is not the reason they play hockey.  But like there are some hooligans among soccer fans, there are hockey players (who probably watch too much TV hockey) who make fighting (or at least scuffling) a big part of their game.

Most leagues, when they’re faced with players like this (or worse yet, a team of players who egg each other on), think of the guys who are going to work the next morning, and invite the brawlers to go find another place to play.  There are exceptions though, and usually for the same reason.  Men’s league is a pretty important source of revenue for most rinks.  Kicking a player or team out of the league costs them money, so they’ll avoid taking that step.  And some players have figured that out, so they’ll threaten to quit and take their money with them if a player is kicked out or suspended too long.

I had to deal with one of those teams in the Penn league a few years ago.  My partner and I gave one of their players a triple game misconduct (spearing, then fighting and pulling off the opponent’s helmet, all in the same incident) and we saw him back on the ice the next week.  He had a few more run-ins with the law that season, but fortunately, he didn’t come back the next season.

The officials in the Washington area (where I worked the 93-94 season) have a strong and well-run association.  They handle all the scheduling and payment of officials for most of the hockey in the region.  One time, a league gave in to a captain who threatened to take his team out of the league if the suspension of one of his players wasn’t overturned.  After finding the player back in action, the association stopped assigning refs to that league and instructed its members to stay away from that rink until the suspension was enforced.  The league tried to go on with refs who weren’t association members and a few who ignored the boycott, but that didn’t work for long, and the forces of order and gentlemanly hockey prevailed.

I wish I had that kind of backing in my day job.

Holy Week (Sunday brunch: April 20, 2014)

Happy Easter to all, and a joyous Passover as well.  I think these holidays are best when you get a good story to tell out of them.  This year, one of Bangle’s classmates was scheduled to lead the Palm Sunday procession over to St. Luke’s, where we join with our neighbor churches for the blessing of the palms. But she got hit with a softball Saturday and was sporting a lovely black eye.  Of course she went ahead and led the procession, and her father made sure to get lots of pictures.

“Truly, I tell you: one of you will betray me tonight.”
da Vinci’s painting brought to life in Glenside.

Usually during Holy Week, we’ll have the Passion story read at least once, if not twice, but this year for Good Friday, we instead heard the Living Last Words, a companion work to the Living Last Supper that our church has put on the past several years.  Both pieces tell the narrative as seen through the eyes of the participants.

The teens were the performers in the Living Last Words, and Sabers (as the centurion) and Bangle (as the shepherd) gained much praise for their portrayals.

Meanwhile, my friend Burt scored the one-liner of the season: “I thought my wife and I would never hear those words from my daughter: ‘Let’s have the Seder at our house this year.’”

Got a story to share?  Comments are open.  On to the weekend’s puzzles.

The Wall Street Journal has a Hex variety cryptic: quite appropriately an Egg Hunt.  The solution is posted elsewhere on the blog.  Ask there if you need any of the clues explained; some of them are pretty clever.

Falcon found the Hex straight cryptic in the National Post to be harder than usual for the second week in a row.  I thought the same, and we probably both finished on the same answer.  And the Fraser Simpson puzzle from the Globe and Mail (printable, Java) was pretty hard too.

We learn this week from her latest Brit cryptic that LizR likes King Crimson.

The New York Times puzzle (behind the paywall) is a Hex acrostic.  Deb Amlen has comments and some answers at Wordplay.

If you didn’t see the update to Thursday’s post, Puzzazz released a new book of variety crosswords by Mike Shenk, and it shows off the advantages of the app really well.

Daffodils (Sunday brunch: April 13, 2014)

Lots of them left even after I cut three dozen.
The daylillies in this bed multiply just as well as
the daffodils. 

With the late spring, it’s been a peculiar year in the garden.  We had crocuses and daffodils at the same time, and the forsythia bloomed only this week.  The compressed schedule means that the daffodils came in about a two week span rather than three or four.  It does make an impressive show in the back yard, but the main reason I divide and transplant bulbs every year is to have more flowers to cut and share.

Some for the dining room table, some for the office, some for The Other Doctor Mitchell’s birthday (they’re her favorite flower), and even bunches to hand out to the winners of the fencing tournament today.

Finish these puzzles and earn yourself a virtual bouquet.

It was kind of a weird weekend.  I had a particularly tough time with the National Post puzzle by Hex, which usually is a breeze.  Falcon agreed, and gave us a breakdown of his solving effort on his blog.   Meanwhile, I got a lot more of Fraser Simpson’s Globe and Mail puzzle (Java, printable) than usual.

The New York Times variety puzzle was a Puns and Anagrams by Mel Taub (paywall).  That was hard too, and there are still a few clues I can’t parse.  However, I think I’m learning enough to get better at the genre, and also learning enough to understand why I don’t like them as much as proper cryptics: terseness of cluing is valued over elegance.  But I solved it, and the solution is posted elsewhere on the blog.  Deb Amlen solved it too, and blogs the puzzle (spoilers) at Wordplay.

Patrick Berry fans are happy: he has a Beginnings and Ends in the weekend’s Wall Street Journal.  Solution and hints are also posted elsewhere on the blog (please welcome our guests).

On the right is a drift of double daffodils, the genetics of which are described here (no, I’m not a flower geek, just a backyard gardener).

LizR has a new Brit cryptic up, which she says goes well with coffee.  Some delightful clues there, worth a go even if you won’t finish the puzzle.

The new Harper’s is out this week.  The Richard Maltby variety cryptic is that old The Listener favorite: Theme and Variations.  Erica (who survived the battle with the bedbugs) blogs this puzzle, though on a month’s delay because it’s a prize puzzle.

Flowers doing their intended job.
The women’s saber winners were Helen, Shelby, and Vanessa.

Dumping a coach (Sunday brunch: March 9, 2014)

Well, I got three quarters through the season before I had to assess any game misconducts this year.  No more: I had to dump a coach last weekend.  Or more precisely, the coach did stuff that he should have known was going to get him a game misconduct, and I penalized him appropriately.

There’s a popular opinion that referees are out to get coaches, but aside from a few ego cases, most of us are trying to keep the coaches and players in the game.  Part of it is for the good of the players and the game, but there’s also a selfish reason: it’s a pain in the tail to dump a coach.  Most immediately, it risks turning the rest of the team and the spectators against you and your partner, and then after the game it’s just a boatload of paperwork and hassle. (continued below the puzzles)

I don’t think I made note of this month’s Harper’s puzzle.  It’s called Gremlins, and after a couple of relatively easy puzzles from Maltby, we get a tough one again.  Each and every clue has an alteration, and each and every answer has an alteration.

By comparison, the acrosses in the Kevin Wald Academy Awards puzzle are all normal, which made it considerably less difficult than his puzzles usually are.

Straight cryptics?  We have a trio: Hex in the National Post, Fraser Simpson in the Globe and Mail, and LizR’s Brit cryptic, in order of difficulty.  Some nice clues in the Simpson and LizR puzzles so if you don’t usually attempt them, consider a try this week.  Even if you don’t get all the way through (I often can’t), they’re enjoyable.

The New York Times variety puzzle (behind the paywall) is an acrostic by Hex.  Hex also have their weekly straight cryptic in the National Post while Fraser Simpson constructs for the Globe and Mail.

We also have an acrostic (by Mike Shenk) in the Wall Street Journal (Java and printable versions).  It was easy, perhaps because there was so much repetition.  I got several letters of a key word in one place, and some different letters in another, and nailed that word, which quickly led to the neighboring words and the rest of the puzzle.  A lesson there for constructors.

Elsewhere in the puzzle world, Puzzazz released an update to their app this week, and it’s a big one. You can now solve any .puz or ipuz in the app, if the author provides the download link.

(back to hockey below the fold)

Closing ceremonies (Sunday brunch: February 23, 2014)

With the Olympics winding down, it’s time to look back on the past two weeks’ action.  The hockey was fabulous (aside from the USA letdown in the bronze medal game), but at times the officiating didn’t match it, particularly in the women’s games.  I agreed with the penalty shot no-call that Canada fans complained about, but there were several other plays that got me yelling at the TV.

There’s a linesman who’s probably pretty glad that shot at the end of the game went off the post of the empty Canadian net, since if it went in, it could have been argued that her elementary positioning mistake ended up deciding the game.  The correct position for the linesman is on the determining edge of the blue line: that’s the edge away from the puck.  Reason one is that the rules say that the blue line, which is a foot wide, is considered part of the zone the puck is in.  So if the play is in the neutral zone, the puck is in the neutral zone and offsides isn’t determined until the entire puck crosses the entire line.  And if the puck is in the attacking zone, the play stays on-side until the entire puck goes outside the line.  Reason two for being on the opposite side of the line from the puck is to make sure you don’t interfere with play by stopping the puck from going in or out of the zone.

But at the end of the game, the USA winger brought the puck up along the boards to where the Canadian defender was pinching in on the blue line.  As she backed up towards the line, she backed into the linesman, who was still inside the zone instead of outside.  As she stumbled from the unexpected collision, the American was freed up enough to get a shot on goal, which as we know slid tantalizingly close to sealing a gold medal, and then bounced off the goalpost.

I think what happened there was the linesman was too wrapped up in the tension and excitement of the biggest moment of the biggest game she ever worked in her career, and she became a spectator rather than maintaining concentration on the job.  It happens to me too a couple of times a season, but the stakes are a lot lower.  The root cause is that the women’s officials don’t have enough experience with games like this.  While the number of good female officials is growing and they keep getting better and better, the guys working professional hockey get 60 or 70 big games a year plus playoffs: for every one of them almost twenty thousand in the stands and many thousands more watching on TV.  The Olympics are a novelty to them like State Games was to me, but once the puck is dropped, it’s another game with the same NHL players they see all season.  The top women might get one or two of those international games or an international tournament, but that’s it for their big games in a season.  Maybe the answer is to give the top women officials some AHL or NHL pre-season games or European league games, or perhaps bring in the best officials regardless of sex until we have some women with that much experience.

Meanwhile the ISU and the figure skating judges deserve all the grief they got over the judging in the women’s competition.  I don’t think they blew the call--as some of the commentators said, the Russian skater took better advantage of the IJS point system and won the event with what The Other Doctor Mitchell and I thought was a less impressive program.  But when the ISU not only reinstates one of the judges involved in the 2002 scandal but also lets her judge the most important competition in the sport, it makes clear that their leadership puts taking care of their friends ahead of the integrity of the sport. That is my pick for the worst officiating call of these Olympics.

This weekend also brings the end of Olympic-theme puzzles for another two years, but the Wall Street Journal has an appropriately themed cryptic by Hex (printable version).  It has ten unclued answers and no numbers in the grid, so some of you may find it hard to get a toehold on.  If you are one of those people, I have hints posted.  Then when you’re done, you can check against the solution post.

Hex also have their straight cryptic in the National Post, blogged by Falcon.   I don’t see a theme in it even though it’s been an excellent Olympics for Canada: winning both men’s and women’s curling and women’s hockey, and facing off with Sweden for the men’s hockey gold.  Fraser Simpson’s weekly Brit-style cryptic is in the Globe and Mail (Java, printable).  I haven’t solved it yet, but I don’t think he does themed puzzles

The New York Times puzzle (behind the paywall) is an acrostic.

Kevin Wald has a new (and difficult) variety cryptic up, and LizR has a new Brit cryptic too.  She thinks Araucaria would have liked it.  I think Araucaria would be happy just to know that there are plenty of constructors still taking inspiration from him.

News from the Cryptic All-Stars project is that their print books have shipped, and those of us who contributed to the Kickstarter have also received a PDF of the puzzles.  I think some of the grids are too small, but with the PDF, it’s easy to clip out the grid and print an enlarged copy.

Hawthorne effect (Sunday brunch: January 12, 2014)

An interesting juxtaposition of work and hockey this week.  I’ve been reviewing studies of devices that keep track of when doctors, nurses and other health care personnel wash their hands when entering and exiting a patient’s room.  Their impact is based on the Hawthorneeffect, also called observation bias.

If you have children, you know exactly what that’s all about.  They’re much more likely to obey you if you know they’re watching.  Of course it’s not just children who slack off if they think they’re not being watched.  I had a teenage partner for a squirt game (9 and 10 year olds) last Sunday morning.  Like a lot of teen refs, he’s still a player and sees refereeing as a way to earn some pocket money.  Skate around, blow the whistle when there’s a goal or an offsides or a penalty, pocket the check, save the real effort for practices and games. 

So he hung out in the middle two-thirds of the ice instead of getting down to the goal line to watch the play in the offensive zone.  He called one of the goals from up around the hashmark; fortunately the coaches weren’t the type to yell at us for being out of position, but I quietly got on his case at the next stoppage.  It didn’t really change him much though; all I can do in these situations is skate hard and set a good example.

The game ended uneventfully, and when I got back to the dressing room, I found our supervisor was there.  He’d come to watch the third period and check up on us.  He was pointing out to my partner all the times he was making calls from a bad angle or too far away, and I imagine he must have felt pretty bad on the ride home. 

I’m not immune to criticism, so it was good to have someone looking at my performance.  I was pleased that the main thing Monty wanted me to fix was my line-change routine: I was putting up my had twice when I should be doing it only once.  It’s a little thing, but better to have something of mine critiqued than to hear nothing bad and wonder if there are problems we just didn’t have time to talk about.

As for my partner, we’ll see if the experience will put a little more hustle in him at the times when nobody else is watching. 

Do you solve differently when nobody is watching?  Resort to Onelook or Google or the Anagram Server right away?

Double acrostic weekend.  Wonder what caused Mike Shenk to pick the quote he uses in the Wall Street Journal puzzle this weekend.  It’s seasonal, but a bit dark.  The Times puzzle is behind the paywall.  One good thing about the Times is that Deb Amlen usually gets some comments from the constructors of every puzzle and Hex usually have something good to say.

On the cryptic side, there’s the usual National Post puzzle by Hex, and LizR has a new Brit cryptic up.  Liz borrowed an interesting grid from Nutmeg: it has a ring of threes in the middle.  Usually constructors (especially British ones) cope with something like this by linking the threes with other answers; Liz made a mini-theme out of them, cluing them all in the same way.  Catch the original title of her post too, hidden in the URL.

Kevin Wald has posted his MIT Mystery Hunt warm-up.  This year’s hunt begins Friday at noon.  Some people participate without being on campus, and some teams will be willing to accept extra hunters who are looking for a team to participate with.  I think that his “Tripling Hither, Tripling Thither” is new too.

An interesting variety crossword this week too.  BEQ posted a “From A to Z” where you have to figure out the missing first letter of each clue, which in turn will tell you where some other answer will go.  A couple of bugs in it though.  Philip Morris hasn’t been making the product in answer 23 for years, and I can think of at least two possible answers that would fit in 7d.

Finally, if you’re looking for more puzzles, Will Johnson has updated his links page for 2014.  However, most of the cryptic links are to series that have stopped posting new puzzles.

Left-handed cronuts (Sunday brunch: October 20, 2013)

I had a split doubleheader last Sunday: you heard about the morning game, and the afternoon game was better in several ways.  Next age group up, the ice felt a little less dead, the coaches had a better grasp of things, and a decent partner: not only is he pretty focused and conscientious for a high school kid, he’s also left-handed, which is rare among referees.

Because of my bad shoulder (the injury that got me into refereeing), I keep my whistle on my right hand and signal with my left.  When you’re signaling a delayed penalty, your arm should be right against the earhole of your helmet, and I can’t raise my right arm that high.  In other sports, this doesn't matter too much, but in hockey, you have to pass the puck to your partner after you pick it up and he establishes the face-off location.

Now stop and think of what would happen if I skated up to my partner holding the puck in my left (non-whistle) hand while he was holding his right (non-whistle) hand out to receive it.  We’d crash into each other, one of us would probably end up on our butt, and everyone in the rink would have a laugh at our expense.  So in most cases, before I pick up the puck for my partner, my whistle goes into my pocket, and I hold the puck in my right hand so we can pass right to right.  When I work with Joe, we get to pass left to left, and I appreciate every one of those passes.

So even though it was just another day at the rink, gamewise, I was feeling pretty good after the second game: a blend of tired and satisfied.  This is the rink on the way down to the city, and just down the road is a gigantic Korean supermarket.  We needed more chopsticks (Bangle likes to use them for rice, and I find them very convenient for cheese curls (no orange powder clinging to my fingers) and I felt like getting some noodles and dumplings, so I went down there after the game.

In the mini-mall there is a pastry shop, of French and Indochinese influence.  The perfect place for a light post-game snack, and they had a batch of cronuts there.  Now I’d heard of cronuts and how they were the big thing in New York; now I could see what all the hype was about.

A cronut is a pastry made out of croissant pastry, cut and fried like a donut.  That would be pretty good for starters, but a cronut needs more: specifically some kind of cream filling (in this case lemon) and a bit of compllentary flavoring on the outside.

Verdict?  Darned good.  Decadent but not deadly.  Over the top, but not overpowering.  A fine reward for two hours plus of skating.

Puzzles?  Yes.  This week they were just as tasty.

It’s a two-acrostic weekend.  Mike Shenk has a seasonally-appropriate puzzle in the Wall Street Journal: pretty easy, especially if you know it’s themed and Shenk is a good constructor.  Hex have their regular acrostic in the New York Times (paywall) and commentary on Deb Amlen’s blog (spoiler warning)

Want cryptics?  There’s Hex in the National Post with a puzzle less easy than usual; and Xanthippe with her brit-cryptic with a nice central answer.  And we learn that Nathan Curtis 1--merits having Kevin Wald construct a birthday puzzle in his honor and 2--is remarkably humble about the honor.  You know you’re someone in puzzledom if you can get such a fine constructor to come to your potluck.  Hooray for both of you.

Nathan didn’t let the honor go to his head: he kept up with his commitment (hint: someone give him a regular gig) and provides us with a Snake Charmer this weekend (very easy, I thought).

We should also note that Puzzazz has updated their app for iOS 7.  I had a long wait for the train this week during which it was a real pleasure to have cryptics I could pull up and solve on my Pod.  The latest edition of Puzzazz is a significant improvement: saving you taps and time by bringing you back to where you left off instead of making you find and open the virtual book.  And the Touchwrite feature is feeling more and more natural: to the point where this Luddite is ready to dispense with a keyboard.

Parsing the question (Sunday brunch: September 22, 2013)

I’ve been spending a good deal of time parsing out questions recently, and only some of them were related to cryptics.  I’m teaching Sabers how to read and interpret a rulebook, and while he’s taking the test to referee fencing, many of the same principles I’ve learned from hockey rules exams apply.  You reconstruct the situation as the question puts it, and walk through it one step at a time.

So if fencer X makes an attack against Y’s point in line, and finds Y’s blade, Y places point in line again while X continues the attack and both fencers hit, who gets the point?  Take it one step at a time.  Y’s first point in line establishes right of way, which X must take away.  X does that, and then gets the right of way by doing so.  OK so far?  Once X gains right of way, X keeps it even when Y goes back to point in line because Y didn’t do anything to take it back.  Touch for X.

Parse these puzzles out, and remember they’re for relaxation, not for torture.

The only new cryptic on our side of the pond this weekend is Hex’s in the National Post.  Falcon has worked it out for you as usual, and reports his mind is in better “shape” for the experience

Want another cryptic?  Try Xanthippe’s British puzzle called Girls Just Wanna Have Fun.

Kevin Wald has been kind enough to post his variety cryptic (a bonus puzzle) from the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament.

It’s a two-acrostic weekend.  The Wall Street Journal puzzle is by Mike Shenk.   After my first pass through the clues (either having no idea or too many ideas for most of them), I was resigning myself to this one being a real slog.  But surprisingly, I wound up getting most of the quote from partials in it and from discovering a few words that were repeated several times in the quote.  So on one level, I liked the puzzle because it made me approach the answer from a different direction, I also disliked it because of all the repetition making the quote so easy to find.

The New York Times acrostic (by Hex as usual) is also behind the paywall as usual.  Deb Amlen blogs it as usual at Wordplay (spoiler warning).  Note also that the straight crossword in today’s Times (by Mike Selinker) is a prize puzzle.  See Wordplay for instructions on how to win one of their new 2014 calendars.

Nathan Curtis’s weekly variety puzzle isn’t up yet (I’ll post an update when it is), which is probably OK for those of you still working on last week’s Pathfinder.  [UPDATE: Did you finish the Pathfinder? I did.  Nathan now has another Snake Charmer for you to solve.  Thanks, Nathan!]

Siasconset Bookstore (Sunday brunch: August 25, 2013)

If you are the parent of a 12-year-old and a 15-year old, you have to be prepared for awkward questions: “Why is Dad going into the bookstore for a bottle of wine?”

The answer is something of an inside joke, peculiar to Siasconset (pronounced and often spelled ‘Sconset--that's a great entry for the bottom or right line of a crossword by the way, with all the common letters.)  ‘Sconset is a village at the east end of Nantucket Island, where Raydoc and my mother have had a series of summer places and eventually retired to, and where I’ve spent the last week or so of August the last thirty years or so.

You see, as a bumper sticker once said, “Siasconset [is] a quaint little drinking village with a fishing problem.”  And since it’s a small village, there’s only a handful of shops.  As long as I can remember, there was the bookstore, which doubled as a “packy.”  And yes, they did have books on a few of the shelves (there are a lot fewer now, but the name remains).  It’s a little sliver of a shop, but the merchandise is very well selected, and you can find something to accompany any meal or any other occasion (there are many such occasions in ‘Sconset).

So one of the more coveted possess--ions of mine is the Siasconset Bookstore shirt, in proper Nantucket red, and collared, so I can wear it to the office in the summer.  

In between sips of a gin and tonic, or a glass of pinot noir, here are some of the puzzles I’m working on:

It’s the monthly two-acrostic weekend: Hex in the New York Times (behind the paywall) and Mike Shenk in the Wall Street Journal.

Falcon is back from vacation (did he have as exciting a time as the Human Cannonball and the other participants in last week’s Hex cryptic?) and blogging the National Post cryptic.  Hex spent their Saturday morning watching cartoons.

Also in the cryptic vein is Trip Payne’s ConTex puzzle.  Proof everything’s bigger in Texas.

Nathan Curtis’s weekly variety puzzle is another Around the Bend.  Just a bit harder than usual, but good for a quick warm-up.

You probably haven’t finished all the puzzles Xanthippe posted last week, but just in case she’s got another for you, and some interesting art to go with it.

Linesmen should be seen and not heard (Sunday brunch: August 4, 2013)

Temporary post: internet access is spotty, full post with links to follow.

My first games of the State Games of America went pretty well.  Since three of my assignments are as linesman and only the first was as referee, and all the games I worked last season were as referee, I was a little concerned about remembering the division of labor and my proper skating lanes.

The National Post cryptic by Hex has a linguistic theme.

The New York Times has a Fred Piscop Puns and Anagrams behind the paywall.  Look for a solution posted here tomorrow.

The Wall Street Journal has a Rows Garden by Patrick Berry which is one of the easiest Rows Gardens I’ve ever done.  I got a decent number of the acrosses on the first go through, some of the blooms snapped into place, and that resolved more acrosses.  I was down to one row before putting the puzzle down and got it the next time I picked it up. 

Nathan Curtis had a bit of a hiccup with his planned post, so he gives us a quick and deceivingly tricky variety crossword with a simple minimally-intersecting grid.  The puzzle is in fitting the answers into the grid.

Xanthippe has a new Sunday-size brit-cryptic, but no PDF yet.

I was remiss in not noticing some new Kevin Wald variety cryptics: not on his regular page but on the convention cryptics page.  The 2013 puzzles were unveiled in Austin.  They are definitely hard, but not the hardest I’ve seen from him.

“I'm going to put the puck on this side of the dot because the ice on that side is still wet.”

Training camp (Sunday brunch: July 21, 2013)

Wouldn't you like to be in a nice cool ice rink on a very hot weekend?

The State Games of America are just two weeks away now, so the Mitchell participants are working themselves into top form.  Sabers is at his training camp, doing fencing-related activities eight to twelve hours a day.  Bangle and The Other Doctor Mitchell are at the rink most of the day: two to three hours of skating each day and an off-ice class.

They all have some additional competition prior to State Games: a home fencing tournament and the Lehigh Valley Sportsfest this weekend and Skate Wilmington next weekend.  Me?  I get to write the checks and do the laundry.  I'll do two puzzles a day too.

This weekend's puzzles start with a Section Eight by Patrick Berry in the Wall Street Journal.  I posted some hints earlier in case you get stuck.  Don't resort to them too soon.  If you get some of the ring 1 sections completed and figure out a few of the middle ring words, you can get an approximate location and direction for those middle rings.  Then the rest of the ring 1 sector will give you a letter bank for the rest of the middle ring word.

The New York Times variety puzzle (behind the paywall) is a diagramless by Fred Piscop.  Deb Amlen calls it “sensible.”  I'll be back with a solution after I get my copy.  Update: the solution is posted.

Nathan Curtis has a Pathfinder up for us this week.  I like these puzzles a lot.  When they're constructed well, one answer leads to another and it's a challenging but smooth solve.

Falcon reports that the Hex cryptic at the National Post got him up on his feet.

Xanthippe has another new British cryptic: xii if you're counting.

Finally, we say "thank you" to Aries, who is laying down the pencil after creating 117 Rows Gardens.  That's enough for a couple of books: it would be great if he could find a publisher for them (maybe Puzazz?)

Danger!  Saber fencer!

Tour de France (Sunday brunch: July 14, 2013)

For many years July in our house means watching the Tour de France.  The recent doping scandals and revelations tarnish the individuals involved, but they don't detract from the drama of the event itself.

Once you get to know the event and some of the personalities, your enjoyment of the Tour increases exponentially.  There is a lot more to it than who will wear the yellow jersey in Paris: the effort of the leaders' teammates to set the pace, throw off opponents, and deliver their man to the finish; the opportunistic riders who go off in a breakaway and the tactical riding of the sprinters' teams to keep the break from getting too far ahead; and much more.

The scenery and the crowds also make the event.  There are many familiar faces: human (commentators Phil Liggett and Paul Sherwen; The Devil, who shows up during the mountain stages), and non-human (the familiar curves of Alpe d'Huez).

Today is one of two "queen stages" of the Tour: days expected to be the toughest and most decisive.  Today's stage finishes with the long lonely climb up Mont Ventoux, while Thursday the race climbs the Alpe not once but twice.  I'll bet fans are already camping out there today in order to get the best viewing points.  There'll be a quarter million lining the road there by Thursday, and they'll get a fabulous show.  Check your local listings, so you can be there in spirit.

As frequently happens, acrostics show up together this weekend.  The Wall Street Journal's acrostic (Java link) is by Mike Shenk.  Not many comments posted so far, but the majority note it is fairly difficult.  I don't think it had the polish of Hex's acrostics (of which there is one behind the New York Times paywall), but I liked the fill (aside from the one which obviously was the last one Shenk clued--J): a reggae artist, a backgammon game popular in the Navy, and a nice, happy pop song.

The new Harpers is out, with Richard Maltby's variety cryptic, but there are no recent posts over at Erica's blog.  She must be busy with her video directing.  Nathan Curtis also informs us he doesn't have much to say, but there is an Around the Bend puzzle for us this week.

There's a BEQ cryptic I missed last week (#553 if you're counting), and the regularly scheduled Hex cryptic in the National Post.  For the latter, a little French will help, but I think there's not enough there to call it a themed puzzle.

And hooray, hooray: Xanthippe is now offering printer-friendly versions of her (British) cryptics, starting with her Opus 10.  Go visit, solve, and comment.  Xanthippe is eager to improve her work, and she's blogging about the constructing experience as well as sharing her puzzles with us.