NYT 5:20 ... LAT 4:28 ... CS 2:13 ... ND 9:00
Love that Karen Tracey! I hit a brick wall with four squares to go and about four minutes on the clock, in the "NoCal" region where WISP and HOAR meet WHIP and IONA. Nothing seemed to make sense since I wanted GASP instead of WISP, and I kept removing the first two letters of INHIBITION in case it was supposed to be DEHIBITION or EXHIBITION or something. But no, just good cluing. Finally figured out [Party leader] -- which is such a standard clue that it shouldn't have fooled me -- and finished. Points off for IONA and IONE in the same grid, and this may be the least Scrabbly KMT themeless in recent memory, but who cares, it was still plenty of fun.
New name on the Saturday Stumper: Sandy Fein. (Probably a pseudonym?) He, or she, turned in a good one with what seemed to be harder-than-usual clues. Brad Wilber's LAT includes AWNINGED (ick) but also PRBLITZ and SYNTHPOP (mmm).
4 comments:
Sandy Fein is a she, and used to work in the puzzles division of Random House. The stumper took me 7:28. :)
I also wondered about Sandy Fein, and whether or not it was a nom de puzzle. I enjoyed her Stumper, though the SE took me forever. I came up with ACHENES for "Trojan War participants" and didn't want to let go of it. Turns out I was thinking of ACHEANS (ACHENES are a type of seed), but it would have been wrong either way. I'm glad I didn't time myself on this one. :)
Thanks Ellen!
The SE was the roughest for me too, as I recall. Still don't quite get the AMAZONS answer, but I'm filing away the factoid!
dan: this link contains the AMAZONS explanation. it took me damn near forever to do that SE corner because i wouldn't let go of ACHEANS, even though it's normally spelled ACHAEANS. gah.
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