Well isle be damned

A slightly elderly tuxedo cat does the backwards banana on top of issue three of Unch magazine. On a grey carpet.

UNCH @unchcrosswords.com

Talk about a backhanded compliment... (Thanks though!)

Tom B had similar thoughts so I might just restore the old letter-by-letter links (saves the click of a dropdown) and then have A, AA, AB etc under each of these

Maybe. I didn't want to throw too much info at people at once in the default views. Really the "Filter by letter" pages are just there because the first version had them, but arguably redundant now there's a dedicated "Search by letter(s)" option

I think in that case I'd probably want to make [Common + Not So Common] the default view, and people have to tick to unleash the barred grid madness

Cheers, I hope it's useful!

Yeah that's deliberate - I figured nobody really needs to see all the As, AAs, ABs, ACs etc on one page. Though maybe it's confusing to have "Filter by letter" return just the As and not all the rest?

I think there should maybe be three tiers of rarity, actually: 1. Familiar to anyone who's been solving daily cryptics for a while; 2. Occasionally used in daily cryptics; 3. Only ever used in advanced puzzles

charliemethven.com/abbreviation...

My list of abbreviations now includes 2-letter abbreviations. I've also switched the "Usual suspects filter" to be ticked by default, but interested to see what people think of that change. As always, please let me know if you spot any errors/oversights. charliemethven.com/abbreviations

Unch magazine cover with yellow, black and red colour scheme, next to black cat with yellow eyes and red collar

Nice of @unchcrosswords.com to do one in her colours

It's a fact!

Adrian Chiles in half and half Croatia/England football jersey

Ha... it's a person

...ok, it's a person

A favourite fact: which UK broadcasting stalwart is named after a large European body of water?

Lots of them like "bee" and "see" are names for these letters backed up by dicts, so they should be fine. "You" fine IMO as it's commonplace and familiar.

Dislike "sea", "ewe", "cue" etc because they'd be an exception to how other homophones work, so complicate things rather than simplify them IMO

Feedback if you want it - it's a bit odd that "Show letter" is still presented to the user while the hint banner is obscuring the letter rack. Maybe "Show letter" could automatically close the hint banner & reveal the letter

And the US president side of the parse is twice as compelling for him

@twm-barlwm.bsky.social Wikipedia suggests there's at least one alternative answer to this actually

CLINTON 🎶

samuel beckett was born on this day 120 years ago. astonishing to think that if he had survived, and could run 100m in 9.57 seconds, he would be not only the oldest but also the fastest man in the world - together with his nobel prize for literature, an astonishing trifecta

If Ant & Dec were sommeliers they’d have to stand the other way around

From a puzzle where ANT/DEC appeared in lefthand/righthand solutions but were ignored by the wordplay. This one was a righthand clue, so the DEC was unclued

Man on the left meets monarch – one may supply the booze (8)

bigdave44.com/2020/02/15/n...

The Independent's Cryptic Crossword | Play Online for Free | Independent Play The Independent's Cryptic Crossword instantly online. The Independent's Cryptic Crossword is a fun and engaging Online game from The Independent. Play it and other games from The Independent.

I'm delighted to be making my debut in the Independent today as Nepeta. Sample clues:

Raunchy trio stripped naked (6)

Almost complete abstainer from pork eating English breakfast (6)

Side roads backed up after abattoir evacuated (7)

puzzles.independent.co.uk/games/crypti...

The person receiving those directions may need clarification, but someone who says "THE end" is picking out one particular end acc to some ordering logic (e.g. what way they're facing). But IMO since words like films have a natural direction, there's no debate over which logic is meant by "THE end"

Grid it up, grid it up

Crossword grid with Na Na Na Na Na Na Na Na Na Na Na Na Na Hey Jud round the edge

Now that is irritating

Interesting. See I kind of see a split b/t "clues should be based in ordinary English – that's the only way to avoid slippery slopes" and "anything goes – why would you restrict it?". First makes sense for recipes, second makes sense for poetry/jokes. (Of course clues are sort of all of these!)