ooph - that was hard for me - i needed greens from beginning to end. only filled in 1 square before resorting to greens. nothing seemed to "flow" till the end...

yeah, same here, stuck from the beginning. Greens help, though.

done with no checkpoints or greens

done with checkpoints and green!

Started fast, got bogged down and had to dig myself out with greens. Oh well, on to the archives......

same here.got just one # before entering the greens and am still at it

Difficulty score 27. This is an exercise in region intersection analysis and cross hatching.

If you are doing it without greens, look for some naked pairs.

Good morning Doc, do you have any tips on how to spot naked pairs without using greens?

Sure, cross hatching often limits 2 digits to the same 2 cells.

So it's just a matter of being able to visualize and remember to results of cross hatching in my mind. Too bad my memory is so poor.

Perhaps it's not so much memory as pattern recognition.

Good point. I should continue to get better with practice.

Indeed, and your memory should improve too :-).

It can't get much worse!

Hint on cross hatching. It is much easier than you may think to do it mentally.

Just observe that the top 3 rows and the top 3 blocks enclose the exact same set of cells.

morning doc; what's the difference between scanning and cross hatching??

That means that the digit 1, for instance, can only appear once in each of the 3 rows and each of the 3 blocks.

If 2 of the 1s are filled in, you already have the missing 1 limited to no more than 3 cells.

Good morning gman.

For instance, if there is a 1 in the 2nd cell from the left in the 1st row and a 1 in the 5th cell from the left in the 2nd row, then there must be a 1 in the 7th, 8th or 9th cell of the 3rd row.

gman, how are those Colts doing?

sorry doc: I haven't had my coffee yet. Todays medium, I was only able to scan (or cross hatch) a 5 and a 1 before resorting to greens (ploddding sort of solution).

I have all my friends coming over for a playoff party on Sunday. I live in Indy but grew up in Chigo so our fingers are crossed.

That sounds like how I got started too.

I lived in Plainfield, just 30 miles from Chicago for many years.

OK Bears and Colts in Miami would be wonderful!!! :-)

I'm a Vikings fan now. Which probably explains why I don't follow football much.

Also, My wife's from Joliet so we get near Plainfield on occasion. Smal world!

Yes, Joliet is right next to Plainfield, getting closer all the time, so I'm told.

I missed the question about scanning and cross hatching. I follow the Wikipedia article on that. Cross hatching is a scanning technique. Any technique that actually reveals the location of a digit is considered scanning, everything else is analysis.

Thanx, this is an interesting Medium. I used a naked Quad in row 6 and a naked Quint in column five. Cool but maybe it was easier than I'm making it. That coffee might help!

Maybe you should switch to decaf!

Finally got it. That had a little everything except a force. On to the archives. Can't have the doc catching me!! Hee Hee.

Ive been staring at this puzzle for 20 minutes and have filled two squares. im thinking my level of sobriety may have smtg to do with it

chrissie2006--that's how this one goes. Probably a 5 and a 1?? Take a look at drwho's and my chat on this one over the last few minutes. It might help.

lol, your right it is a 5 and 1. i havnt been trying all that hard though

still feeling it from last night

Is drwho still about? I was born in Joliet.

on a cold december morning?

go

Grama, did you grow up in Joliet or get out quick?

this is a slow one, huh?

Hey b-fish, it's a good medium. I needed greens pretty quick. The good doctor has been trying to teach me how to visualize naked pairs in my head, so I'm doing it again.

it's coming along without greens so far, but it took awhile to get the first half dozen #s. just cross hatching and scanning at the moment

That's pretty good. I could only get two 1's and two 5's that way.

you can get two or three more pretty quick by switching your scan tactic at that point

AHA! A lone 7 in a cell! Yes...

That gave me another 7 and led to three 6's.

i have 17 #s but am still switching tactics to get one or two then back to something else. this is an interesting pzl

Took a while to warm up but quite easy once got going.

I'm stuck at 13 #s

just messed up somewhere, erasing slowly

15 now, a couple of 4's

now we're cookin

I agree. 3's and 9's and off to the races.....

and done. that was fun.

I'm stuck again.

34 min. yikes. no greens or fancy stuff, just wandering around scanning and xhatching

how many #s eagle?

22

Here we go, found a 2 that I needed..

scan rows, cols, & boxes. i guess i have been "visualizing" naked pairs... so to speak. did the dr get you going with that okay?

I think so, it seems slow to me. Practice, practice, practice...

Done. That was a tough one without greens.

i find that if i'm scanning a 3x3 box, for example, "1s can go here, 2s here, 5s in these corners, etc." i look for either (a) # can only go here, (b) # can only go in 2 spots, (c) # goes in 3 or more. if (b) then i look for another # that only goes in the same spot (naked pair, then rescan the box knowing the pair is now taken), AND see what that pair does to scans outside that 3x3 box, since it will "point" one direction or another.

drwho, if you're still here....sorry I had a phone call. I sort of grew up there. I'm not done yet.

That makes sense, but I have trouble remembering the results for more than a couple of cells.

practice helps, but i have a hard time remembering once i leave that box, row, or col scan. lots of mental rework.

start with boxes, rows, cols that have 3 or 4 opens, then work up to 5, 6...

My wife says I have CRS disease (Can't Remember S***) so this mental exercise might help.

I know I have CRS. This puzzle is called self-help.

Oh... thanks... I was wondering what "SuDoku" meant... LOL

Mt wife used to say it meant "waste of time". Now I can tell her it means "therapy"

Done! Only one guess!

Grama, I went to Plainfield High School. But I still haven't grown up :-).

that was fairly easy ...

for science, go!

congratulations!

go

hi helen!

done

hiya mama - sorry - didn't see you there

how've ya been, mama?

not so good - my MIL is very very ill

what's wrong?

this is just weird, I can finish experts but this medium is confusing the hell out of me

go

done

done