The Stickler Weekly 175 Solution

First, thanks for all the chatter regarding the financial model going forward. I’ve been away for a week and will endeavour to digest all comments and suggestions and reply soon. Thanks.

I’ve been a member of the Australian Crossword Club since its inception in 1990. The club was started by members of former SMH/Age setter Alan Eason’s crossword club after its demise. One of these members, Alan Walter, passed away suddenly last week. Alan was a unique solver with a meticulous nature. In the early years of the club an annual function was held at his home in Mona Vale, Sydney, and I met many keen crossworders who I still meet with every year. For 5 years I worked closely with Alan to produce the club’s monthly magazine, CroZworld. I used software to produce the grids and clues, and solutions from the previous month, and Alan used a typewriter, scissors and glue to produce the rest of the magazine. It was before the days when desktop publishing software was affordable and usable by the average computer user, so Alan did an admirable job cobbling the magazine together. Alan wasn’t only a great solver (he had a stack of completed SMH crosswords in his study that was the height of a man), but, for many years, he also compiled cryptics once a week for his local paper, The Manly Daily. Alan had a reputation for never giving up when solving, and would often go over his CroZworld competition crossword answers to double-check he had everything right. It wasn’t uncommon for him to adjust his answers before the cut-off date. If ever there was a dispute about an answer, Alan would present a case that a barrister would be proud of – such was the thought that went into every submitted answer.
Every five weeks I write a crossword for The Sydney Morning Herald called The Omega. It’s a hybrid crossword that features plays on words, picture clues, straightforward clues and labelled cryptic clues. Alan always sent me an email on publishing day with a critique of my work: clues he struggled with, clues he liked and didn’t like, and an assessment of how he went overall. I looked forward to his email as he is the only one to give me feedback on this crossword that I’ve been writing since the year 2000.
I shall miss him.