Daily puzzles/problems.

[billl]

I thought the Old Rockers had already come up with the next word: "Sexandrugcene".

[prendrelemick]

Did you know that, Mick, or did you look it up? Are you a former Geology student, an Old Rocker, so to speak?

I guessed it, and then looked it up. ( I have been watching "Men of Rock" on BBC2 )


Billl, I reckon "Hollow-scene" is about right for this era.

Below is a passage from one of Conan Doyle's stories. 5

"What!" he cried. 5 "Don't tell me that _you_ have had one of these preposterous telegrams for oxygen?" 7
I exhibited it. 2
"Well, well! 4 I have had one too, and, as you see, very much against the grain, I have acted upon it. 7 Our good friend is as impossible as ever. 2 The need for oxygen could not have been so urgent that he must desert the usual means of supply and encroach upon the time of those who are really busier than himself. 2 Why could he not order it direct?" 3

Each sentence has a value, (shown in red.) 5

Can you work out the criteria used to find that value?3

[kasie]

Number of capital letters and punctuation marks? (I can't make out the function of those two dashes in the second sentence, however.)

I caught only the last of the Men of Rock programmes - found it interesting but could not understand the complaint in this week's RT about the 'over-exposure' of the presenter; the correspondent preferred Tony Robinson's approach on a similar subject, calling him 'discreet'.

[prendrelemick]

That was so quick! I spent ages setting it! The two dashes were in the text I pasted, they seem to be the equivalent of Italics in a Dan Brown.

I'didn't think much to the Tony Robinson programme, though both were a bit simplistic.


your turn.

[kasie]

Sorry, Mick - there must be something wrong with me, can't think how the brain came to be functioning at that time in the evening!

My turn? I'll think of something while I'm pedalling away in the gym..... (Yes, there's definitely something wrong with me.....)


EDIT: I am going away for a few days so would anyone else like to provide a puzzle to be going on with, please?

IOU one puzzle when I get back early next week.

[prendrelemick]

Here,s a quickie. Finish the Metaphor.


As nervous as a **** ****** dog in a room full of ******* chairs.

[MarkBastable]

Here,s a quickie. Finish the Metaphor.


As nervous as a **** ****** dog in a room full of ******* chairs.

I hear this in a Gabby Hayes voice - I've certainily never heard a Brit say it. Anyhoo, as Gabby Hayes might also say, a four-tailed dog in a room full of rocking chairs?

[MarkBastable]

The underlines (not dashes) in the sentence in a previous puzzle, incidentally, were indeed italic indicators.

I'm just trying to piece together the history here, to explain why that was done. I've never thought about it before, but I think that that notation is a sort of transitional thing.

In the days before computers and word processing packages (yes, yes, dearly beloved, surely there was such a time), when people used typewriters, long before the elephant got his trunk, standard manuscript notation to indicate italics was to underline the entire word. You'd type it and then backspace and underline it using the underline key.

You were essentially using two characters in the same typed space - you were overtyping, but the underline (just) fitted beneath the letter.

When people started using computers, there was a problem. On a computer, the underline couldn't be typed in the same character space as a letter - but there weren't yet any word processing packages that could render italics. In fact, there weren't even any fonts. I'm talking here about green-screen terminals of big SMERSH computers in the basement of your office building. No one yet had a PC at home, and the summers were long and hot, the kids showed some respect and there was always clean snow on Christmas morning.

So the convention to express italics was to put the underline before and after the _word_ you wanted italicised. Looks ugly as hell, but everyone got used to it.

They got _so_ used to it, in fact, that even in the mid-nineties, by which time people had home PCs and MSWord and such apps, it was still required by some publishers and typesetters that italics be expressed in this way.

Christ, I feel old.

[prendrelemick]

As old as Methuselah,s Grannie! I read the dog and rocking chairs metaphor on a cricket blog. - Odd metaphors are very popular in the Cricet world at the moment.

[prendrelemick]

As old as Methuselah,s Grannie! I read the dog and rocking chairs metaphor on a cricket blog. - Odd metaphors are very popular in the Cricket world at the moment.

[prendrelemick]

To keep the thread ticking over...


Nun has lived-in look.

[MarkBastable]

I suspect it's sinister.

But usually cryptic clues have not only what you might call the constructive part (put the word 'in' into a word for 'nun'), but also the synonymous part (the answer is the equivalent of 'left',for instance). Without that second bit, you've got no corroboration, as it were.

So unless 'look' is the equivalent of 'sinister' - which I think would be a tough sell to regular Times solvers - my guess is only that, and not internally supported, really.


Anyway, assuming it's my go....

Which is the odd one out?

Milton, Heaney, Tennyson, Penn Warren, Betjeman, Frost

[prendrelemick]

The thing with Cryptic clues, is that there are many kinds. Different compliers use different clues as to the type of clue you have, so words like embedded, engulfed, mixed up, sounds like and perhaps, have to be watched for. Some need a deeply analytical approach, watching out for references and allusions and substitutions and such. Some need a carefull perusal for anagrams and words hidden between words and other trickery. Then there are those that are deceptively simple, where you have to stand back and clear your mind and the answer is obvious (once you've solved it.) They all contain (as you say) at least two hints at the answer, the bit to be worked upon and the bit for confirmation.




No, not sinister

[MarkBastable]

The thing with Cryptic clues, is that there are many kinds, though they all contain (as you say) at least two hints at the answer. Some need a deeply analytical approach, watching out for references and allusions and substitutions and such. Some need a carefull perusal for anagrams and words hidden between words and other trickery. Then there are those that are deceptively simple, where you have to stand back and clear your mind and the answer is obvious (once you've solved it.)


No, not sinister

Crap. In that case, put my entire peroration on hold, until we have an answer. I mean, it's still true, but it might not be true in this case.

[prendrelemick]

Granted sinister works nicely, but I would have put something like . "something strange left in a Nun, or Mostly inside left handed nun."