NG 90

New game 90 is now available -- apologies for the delay, I was out for the afternoon and early evening.


Round 1: L C E O T L O S A

I had COLE (a type of plant, in the mustard family according to Wikipedia), CLOT, COLLET ("a collar or enclosing band"), CASTLE, LOCATES, and COLLATES.

That's the only eight; the other sevens are COLLATE, COOLEST / OCELOTS, LACTOSE / TALCOSE ("containing, or composed largely of, talc"), and LOCALES.

My selection: COLLATES


Round 2: S D E M F A U C A

I had MEDS, FADES, MEDUSA (a type of jellyfish) / AMUSED, CAUSED / SAUCED, and FAUCES (relatively fresh in my mind from NG 85: "the cavity at the back of the mouth, leading into the pharynx").  After time I saw that FACADES was an available seven.

FACADES is the only seven; the other six is DECAFS.

My selection: MEDUSA


Round 3: Target 683 from 25 100 75 50 3 5

I went off in a few wrong directions before I stopped to think properly about this.  The offset for the standard method is 8, which can be made as 3 + 5.  Tweaking options are limited, but once I looked at the required base value of 675 I recalled that it could be made from the large numbers alone and a solution followed: 683 = (100 - 75)*25 + 50 + 5 + 3.  A case where having done the homework on the four large numbers helped greatly.

This is, as one would expect, the only solution.

My selection: 683 = (100 - 75)*25 + 50 + 5 + 3


Round 4: L T O P U M I D A

I had PLOT, POULT ("the young of the domestic fowl, the turkey, the pheasant, or a similar bird"), MOULT, and MIAOU (one of the several spellings of MEOW).

That felt insufficient on this mix; the letters kind of go together with each other reasonably, although an E would have been nice.  It took me a rather long time afterwards to find better, eventually getting the six of UPLOAD.  A bit after that I had the speculative seven of OUTPAID, but it is not valid.

A tough round?  Maybe, but there's many longer words than five.  The eight here is DIPLOMAT, and the sevens are DIPLOMA, OPTIMAL (given how often I talk about chasing the optimal game, that was a disappointing miss), PLAUDIT, OUTLAID (somehow I did not see this when I tried the far more dubious OUTPAID), and ALODIUM (variant spelling of ALLODIUM: "land owned absolutely, not subject to any rent, service, or other tenurial right of an overlord").

There's a few sixes, too, including some which have come up often enough: DIATOM, MODULI, and UTOPIA.  There's more, but I'll leave it at that for now; suffice to say, I wish I had found a longer word than MIAOU in this round!

My selection: MIAOU


Round 5: A O E R H B E T P

I had HEAR, ABHOR, BREATHE, and PROBATE.  After time I noted down OPERATE also.

Seven is the best on offer; the others are PREHEAT and POTHERB ("any herb prepared as food by cooking in a pot, or added as seasoning in cookery, as thyme").

My selection: BREATHE


Round 6: Target 925 from 25 50 10 6 1 8

A multiple of 25, and a little too easy.  I wrote down 925 = (10 + 8)*50 + 25 and left it at that.

My selection: 925 = (10 + 8)*50 + 25


Round 7: M R O A B W I R I

I had ROAM and BARRIO ("(in Spain and countries colonised by Spain) one of the divisions into which a town or city, together with the contiguous rural territory, is divided").

Six is the best on offer; the others are BARROW and MARROW.

My selection: BARRIO


Round 8: Target 873 from 50 3 9 10 1 5

The difference from 900 is 27, which is also divisible by 9 and highlights the factorisation 9*97.  However, I ended up tweaking my way to a different way of using that approach with 873 = 3*((5 + 1)*50 - 9).  Then I did look at that factorisation and found the alternative option of 873 = 9*(50 + 5*10 - 3).

My selection: 873 = 3*((5 + 1)*50 - 9)


Round 9: I HIDE COOK

I explicitly chose this conundrum, but it's rather unlikely I would have solved it in any case.  What actually happened is that I was presented with a similar mix with a Y instead of an I.  After being flummoxed for a bit I made the desperation try of HOCKEYOID, but the intended answer was DOOHICKEY.  A conundrum I rather liked, but the Macquarie does not list that spelling.  It does give DOOHICKIE, however, so I decided to use that.

My selection: [N/A -- conundrum explicitly chosen]