I'm very jazzed about the band who plays my theme song. (I'm open to suggestions. ZZ Top's "Sharp Dressed Man"? LCD Soundsystem's "Never As Tired As When I'm Waking Up"?) But I'm worried about constantly having to watch my back for Finger-Quotin' Margo.

So the full results for the World Puzzle Championship test are in, and I did...not too shabby at all! 14th in the U.S., 19th North America, 28th global. I'm very pleased.

Since the end of the WPC test, I've gone back and solved Suspects, Atomic Fusion, and the Plus or Minus Kakuro ( Read more... )

Just sent in my answer for the World Puzzle Championship qualifying test. Alas, I'm not actually eligible since I registered two days late. (Until this morning, you see, I thought I was going to be at a party in Boston during the time of the test, so I didn't bother registering. But then Rose wasn't feeling well, and decided she wasn't feeling ( Read more... )

At some point, over at Heaneyland, I'm going to post a list of my favorite puzzles from the Mystery Hunt (of which there will probably be quite a few, since I thought the quality of the puzzle construction was quite high overall), but I've been waiting for the answers to get posted. Until then, here are some meandering reminiscences that probably ( Read more... )

Had no time for running this weekend (take a look at today's Heaneyland entry and you'll see why), so I woke up early today and ran one loop of the park, 3.3 miles, and improved on last week's time by a full minute (26:40 to 25:40, down from 8:00/mile average to 7:42/mile). Nice. The cooler weather is definitely agreeing with me ( Read more... )

I've been feeling a little out of shape lately, so I made a point of going to the park to jog both days this weekend. Not long runs -- just two miles each. These runs were more for getting my body to remember, hey! Running! I do that sometimes! Yesterday I did two miles in 15:45, and then today I felt like I was running faster...and I was, but ( Read more... )

I know, it's more boring crossword times. But that's why I have a real blog, for the interesting things ( Read more... )

NYT Mon 9/5: 2:59 ( Read more... )

Yes, I went back and did the Sundays. I need the practice.

NYT Sun 8/21: 12:45
NYT Sun 8/28: 13:45 (Man, 23x23 puzzles are tiring.)
NYT Mon 8/29: 2:45
NYT Tue 8/30: 3:18
NYT Wed 8/31: 4:33
NYT Thu 9/1: 5:51
NYT Fri 9/2: 10:30 (Bottom right was rough. ( And I've never heard the phrase at 11-Down. )