Life
Solution to 2537: My Lord!
The exchange that gave rise to the expression CURATE’s (19 Down) Egg was ‘I’m afraid you’ve got a bad egg,…
Mr and misses
In Competition No. 3233, you were invited to invent a new character for the Mr Men/Little Miss series by Roger…
Pixel this
When Magnus Carlsen won last year’s Meltwater Champions Tour, they made two trophies. One was for Carlsen, and the second…
Aussie Life
I live by the sea and like walking along the coastline including scrambling over the rock ledges in Noosa National…
Aussie Language
A letter writer to the Australian has pointed out that Anthony Albanese appears to have coined a brand-new oxymoron to…
Bridge
Almost everyone has a set of ‘carding’ agreements with their partners to convey information when defending. But I’m always amazed…
Puzzle no. 686
White to play. Gelfand–Karjakin, Tal Memorial Blitz 2008. Gelfand’s pawn is pinned, and moving the king runs into more checks.…
Lardy cake
Lardy cake has a branding problem. We don’t mind puddings or cakes which explicitly announce their richness or decadence —…
High life
Gstaad According to a little bird, Boris has gone from brilliant to bawd, and according to me this village has…
2539: Wider
Six unclued lights (all real words) are the names of 35/26 minus one letter. The missing letters match those that…
The turf
There is nothing like visiting a stud early in the foaling season. As amiable mums-to-be saunter up to the paddock…
Real life
‘Can I ask you why you don’t want a smart phone?’ said the chirpy manager, as I stood blinking in…
Low life
Sharon told me once that the best sex she’d ever had was with Tom in the town public conveniences, bathed…
Untenable
‘Nurse! The tenaculum!’ exclaimed my husband in the manner of James Robertson Justice playing the surgeon Sir Lancelot Spratt. I’m…
A lot of bottle
Thirteen years ago we shared an office building with a large international bank. A common lift connected both businesses to…
The Battle for Britain
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A multitude of queens
Here’s a challenge which appeared in a German chess magazine in 1848: place eight white queens on an empty chessboard…
A dram for Tam
The bleak midwinter. Actually, since I wallowed in curmudgeonly complaints about dreich days, everything has improved. Clear blue skies, pleasing…
Have I got news for you
In Competition No. 3232, you were invited to retell a news story from the past year in sonnet form. An…
Christmas crossword solution
The NATIVITY (89) of the ACTOR (37) HUMPHREY BOGART (47/13), the singers ANNIE LENNOX (112/12) and IAN BOSTRIDGE (4/61), the…
Dear Mary: Your problems solved
Q. A long-standing artist friend, whose work now commands high prices, has sent me out of the blue a present…
Sceptic shock
I got Covid a couple of weeks ago. Second time for me, which was annoying because I’d told Caroline that…
Aussie Life
I am writing this in Old South Wales, in the visitor suite of my mother’s assisted living facility. When I…
Aussie Language
In his column in the Weekend Australian just before Christmas demographer Bernard Salt expressed his fear that the Australian language…
2535: Green light! Cross!
In this pangrammatical puzzle, the unclued lights are of a kind near 21A. Ignore all accents. Across 7 Fresh…
