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Update 5 October

October 5, 2014 By Phixwd Leave a Comment

Having decided to raid the 2005 folder for a few puzzles over the forthcoming weeks, I have landed on an Independent daily barely three weeks from another already on the site.  But Nina-fans can rest assured that there is one to be found.

I received my first Christmas issue of a magazine this week, which feels a little odd though the local big department store has just announced the opening of its Christmas department, I suppose.  And it means, of course, that once we’ve put away the Christmas Day barbecue and demolished the pavlova, I can settle down to some nice Easter-themed solving before nodding off.

I spent a little time this week looking at the publicity surrounding Stephen Fry’s new book of memoirs.  A lot of the interviews had him mentioning how he’d settle down to do ‘difficult crosswords’ while toked up, but the book itself mentions very little.  (The book, however, does get a little wearying with a tendency for him to be self-deprecating about how self-deprecating he is.  And much too much name dropping, whatever else he may have been dropping at the time.)  I was intrigued by the claim that the drug assisted the solving because years ago I had a financial adviser who, having ascertained that I was good at crosswords, asked me what I was on.  He’d always found that having a spliff helped his solving no end, apparently.  To be fair, he did rather neatly observe that the then sponsor of the Times Crossword – Knockando whisky – supplied ‘no can do’ if the K was omitted, a lexical quirk I have yet to find a use for.  He had a surname (though I’ll spare his blushes) that wouldn’t have been out of place in an awkward corner of an American grid, although his predecessor (who I remember being called Zoob) outdid him in that regard.

Enough looking back: next week sees one of those little periods when I have a neat daily sequence of puzzles – you may start with a Telegraph Toughie on 9 October, an Independent Phi on 10 October, a prize puzzle in a third paper wherein I remain anonymous on 11 October, and Beelzebub in the IoS on 12 October.

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About me

This is the website of Paul Henderson, who sets crosswords for The Independent (London) under the pseudonyms Phi, for the Daily Telegraph (London) under the pseudonym Kcit, and anonymously for The Times (London) amongst many other outlets. For a more detailed biography see the About Me page.

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