NG 33

New game 33 is now up (a touch later than promised -- apologies).


Round 1: P M E E E K S A N

I had PEEK, PEEKS, and finally SEAMEN.

Six turns out to be the best on offer; the other one is ENEMAS.


Round 2: N A N C U D T O B

I had a speculative NUANCE, but the E did not arrive.  That left me with DUCT and ABDUCT.  Some hours later, as I was casually glancing over this game, I noticed ABOUND as another six.

Once again six is the best possible; the others are TOUCAN, CANNOT / CANTON, COBNUT (another term for a hazelnut), and OBTUND ("to blunt; dull; deaden").


Round 3: Target 585 from 25 5 7 1 3 8

When applying the standard method here, 600 is the more tempting target as the cofactor of 24 is more easily formable than 23.  The offset is 15, and a quick tweak saw me home with 585 = 3*(8*25 - 5).  I then tried to use the factorisation 5*117 and found 585 = (5*25 - 8)*5, where one of those 5's is 7 + 1 - 3.  And finally I used the further factorisation of 15*3 to get 585 = 3*5*(25 + 7 + 8 - 1).


Round 4: T A R L A I C T D

I had ALTAR, TRAIL, LARIAT, wondered about CATTAIL (not valid; the Macquarie lists CAT'S TAIL for the same concept), wondered about CARDIAL (not valid -- the appropriate form is CARDIAC), and was relieved to avoid those dodgy words with RADICAL.

RADICAL turns out to be the only seven; some sources allow RATTAIL (the hairstyle), but the Macquarie insists on RAT'S TAIL for that.


Round 5: S U E I R H D I R

I had SURE, SHIRE, wondered about RUSHIER (valid), wondered about DISHIER (not valid), SHIRRED (SHIRR: "to draw up or gather (cloth) on parallel threads"), HURRIED, and DHURRIES (DHURRIE, also spelled DHURRY: "an Indian cotton carpet, usually made in rectangular pieces with fringes at the ends").  I was a touch concerned about that last in case the Macquarie had one of its failure-to-list-the-plural-form moments, but it turns out that DHURRIE is the main spelling.

I was pretty pleased about DHURRIES, and it is the only eight.  The other sevens are DHURRIE, HURRIES, and DURRIES (plural of DURRY, colloquial for a cigarette).


Round 6: Target 181 from 75 25 100 50 6 5

Four large in play, but it's a bit of a fizzer.  I found 181 = 100 + 75 + 6 and did not bother looking for more.


Round 7: S U E S M I E R S

I had USES, MUSES, MISUSE, MESSIER, and wondered about MISUSERS.  I was still riding high from finding DHURRIES so I decided to risk it, and that was rewarded -- it is valid.  The next morning it occurred to me that SURMISES would have been a safer anagram of it.

The other eight is REISSUES.  But there is a nine!  It is MESSIEURS, the plural of MONSIEUR.


Round 8: Target 805 from 3 4 9 2 8 5

I first thought was to make this as 800 + 5, but I could not quite get 800 from the remaining small numbers.  Then I was tempted by the factor of 5, more so once I computed that the cofactor was 161, which I knew was 7*23.  I could not get that to work, though, and with time running out I switched to considered 810 - 5 instead and was fortunate enough to scramble home with a solution: 805 = (4*8 - 2)*3*9 - 5.  Phew!


Round 9: INN DIGEST

The -ING fragment is always worth investigating, but it was only on my third revisit that I found DESTINING.  Note that some sources would have allowed INDIGENTS, but the Macquarie only lists INDIGENT as an adjective.