David Quarfoot + Friday puzzle = too hard for me.
I've worked on this puzzle for the better part of an hour and a half and have maybe 20 answers. My neck and upper back are tingling -- a sure sign that I need to give it up and go to bed.
Fellow blogger Rex Parker will be very happy to see this puzzle. I'm very happy to let him solve it, and I look forward to reading his blog in the morning.
This link will take you to his May archives...you'll have to scroll down from there. No peeking at other puzzles!
One of these days, I'll finish a Quarfoot.
Today is not that day.
But it is almost the weekend. Be safe and have fun.
Linda G
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9 comments:
It would be great if you would let us know which answers you did get -- before you continue on with the remainder after a good night's sleep! The clues were very duplicitous with multiple-consonant entries (e.g., CCRIDER, CSIMIAMI, RRATING) and a few odd ones (like ZARQAWI) -- what's one to say?
Linda,
I too am miserable at Friday's puzzles. I only started doing Friday's about a month ago because of Rex's blog. Last Friday I managed to complete the Friday puzzle for the first time. Today, however, I only managed to get the SE corner and a few scattered clues in the rest of the puzzle. I gave up and checked out the answers on Rex's blog. I feel better that I am in good company.
It takes a while before you start to get a feel for the whole weekend puzzle vibe. That and having different puzzle constructors using different words (This one with a ton of names and phrases, while others might lean more on literature or art or who knows what else) makes it even trickier.
Even after you feel confident enough to finish these more regularly, you're still bound to get stumped, just less often.
There was a CrossSynergy Sunday Challenge puzzle not long ago by Bob Klahn, I think, that I absolutely could not finish because of one corner - that puzzle is usually challenging, but not quite to the level of the Times/Sun puzzles (intentionally so). And yet after giving up and revealing the solution, I saw that there was nothing I could have done to complete that corner, since I didn't know any of the three answers I needed. I believe some of the regular bloggers had no trouble whatsoever with that particular puzzle, and yet given a year on a deserted island I would not have finished it.
Keep plugging away, and don't get discouraged ;). Even that one answer that comes to you later might help unravel things. And if not, feel free to look things up, and just chalk it up to something new learned.
Thanks for the encouragement. After I posted, Don gave me ANTIETAM, but that didn't open up much more.
Without Googling, I had Stan Getz, Retton (I remember that Wheaties box!), CC Rider, TMOBILE and Spano. Unlike Rex, I was plenty old enough to watch Hill Street Blues.
After Googling (and before giving up), I got DIANNE (Reeves), ANKARA, SULA, IRAQ WAR, and confirmation of the spelling of ZARQAWI.
Then I saw that Rex had posted, read his blog, and went to bed.
This is only the second time since I started this blog (in mid-April) that I've done this. The other was also a Quarfoot puzzles. I guess I'm just not on his wavelength.
Antithesis is his modus operandi.
Don't blame you - I get DQ's wavelength, generally, but others that delve more into the arts, playwrights, and other celebrity types? I'm right there with you.
Bob Klahn, Stan Newman's tough puzzles, David Kahn, etc. just to name a few... Excellent puzzles from them, but I'm always tangled up somewhere in those, either a book, author, or piece of trivia about an actress whom I barely know will inevitably squish me.
CC RIDER was tough for me in this one - I've seen it in a puzzle, but somehow don't know the song, although I'm sure I've heard it.
If you thought Friday was hard, Saturday is a Walden special.
this one took me a couple of hours or more, off and on.
i really wanted [many a surfer] to be LOLER rather than AOLER.
even now i'm not sure if it's WANNA BET or WANTA BET crossing either RANA or RATA.
i'm guesing RANA. now i'll go see how many seconds this puzzle took orange and rex and find the answer to that one square.
thanks again for doin this blog. i usually read yours before the others. those other guys are sorta intimidating.
rick
(i'm curious. does it drive you nuts to get comments from 6 weeks back?)
Rick -- I love to get comments, even from six weeks back. When I make the link to the syndicated puzzle, I read over the blog again. Sometimes I'll go back to Rex's blog and look at the completed grid.
Some day when you're fully addicted, think about subscribing to the NYT online. It's about $8 a month or $39 for the year. I tried it for a month first to be sure I wouldn't burn out. Haven't yet ; )
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