crossword help needed

[rhubarbodendron]

A colleague of mine is a serious crossword-addict and tells me that within the last weeks she has repeatedly come across the question:

"english word for ruin" with 3 letters.
(it refers to ruin like being pennyless, not ruin like derelict building)

I'm quite baffled. None of my dictionaries both online and as hardcopy list any synonym for ruin that has only 3 letters.

Can any of you native speakers help?

 

[sojourner]

The best I can come up with is SOL (shit out of luck).

 

[auntiehill]

Mar? End? Rot?

If related to the stock market, "Par?"

 

[rhubarbodendron]

ooooooh! That's an idea! I'll ask her first thing tomorrow if either of these fits.

It ought to be a noun, I forgot to add, but I noticed that in recent years the questions/clues have gotten less and less precise, so that I can't exclude that the correct solution might turn out to be an adjective or verb

 

[Christopher]

She hasn't been able to get it from the crosses?

And if she hasn't found the answer, how do you know it refers to financial ruin specifically?

Could it be "woe"?

 

[mari]

I'd say "woe" too. Fits a lot of kinds of misery, and it certainly shows up in English crosswords enough.

 

[rhubarbodendron]

She hasn't been able to get it from the crosses?

Unfortunately not. From what she said I got the impression it was most likely a corner word. The prob is I never get to see the crosswords she does - she's actually an ex-colleague who is pensioned off and lives 50 miles away: she calls me up whenever she can't find the solutions.
As she grew up during the war, she went to school only 6 years and doesn't know any foreign languages. So she calls me with all unknown English vocabulary

And if she hasn't found the answer, how do you know it refers to financial ruin specifically?

because in our native German we have 2 different words for financial and edificial ruin

Woe is a good idea! I can't call her up as it's already quite late over here, but I'll ask her tomorrow.

 

[Tora Ziyal]

^ I don't think I have ever seen edificial used before! Edifice, of course, but not edificial. I'm duly impressed.

 

[Christopher]

Oh, so the crossword puzzles are in German? Of course, that explains why the clue specifies an English word. Silly of me not to realize that.

What format are German crossword puzzles in? In the typical American format, every square is the intersection of two words, one across and one down, so it's possible to get the entire word from the crosses even if you don't know it; but there's another format which I have the impression is more common in England, though also seen sometimes in America, where only some of the squares are intersections of two words. It sounds to me like this must be the latter type, if she's been unable to figure out the word over the course of three different puzzles.

 

[rhubarbodendron]

Sorry, that I inadvertently mislead you. Most people here know that I'm German and I didn't expect that the topic would attract anyone but Auntie and Scotpens.

We actually have both types of crosswords. The first is called "American crossword". I like those better, but my ex-colleague loathes them.
I think it's possibly one of the other kind you describe. For some reason those are called "Swedish Crossword" here.

Then there are those, where you must only fill in either the horizontal or vertical words and the other ones will form automatically. We call these "Comb Crossword". I suspect my colleague's 3 letter word could also be from such a crossword since she couldn't name any letter of it.

We also have hexagonal ones that interlock. Those look like a honeycomb:

 

[mari]

That hexagon kind is the only one I haven't seen before, and I can't decide if I'm terrified or intrigued.

 

[Christopher]

Wow, I can't figure out how that hex one is supposed to work. How do you know what direction to fill in the words? Or are they all 6-letter words that wrap around the clues?

 

[rhubarbodendron]

all words are 6 letter words and are wrapped around the hexagon with the clue. The arrow protruding from each clue field shows where to start and in which direction to write.

Btw, I just called my colleague: Woe fits! She asked me to relay her heartfelt thanks to everyone and her best wishes for this new year. She was quite overwhelmed at getting international help =)

 

[Christopher]

all words are 6 letter words and are wrapped around the hexagon with the clue. The arrow protruding from each clue field shows where to start and in which direction to write.

That's what I would've guessed. Maybe not so hard to figure out after all. Well, except for the whole not speaking German thing...

Btw, I just called my colleague: Woe fits! She asked me to relay her heartfelt thanks to everyone and her best wishes for this new year. She was quite overwhelmed at getting international help =)

Whoa. She's welcome.

 

[propita]

all words are 6 letter words and are wrapped around the hexagon with the clue. The arrow protruding from each clue field shows where to start and in which direction to write.

That’s what I thought from seeing it. I like it! When I knew I’d have to wait awhile (doctor’s office or something), I’d always take a crossword. Now I play quizup.

 

[Christopher]

Now I play quizup.

I have never heard of that.

 

[propita]

Now I play quizup.

I have never heard of that.

An online app. It's like bar trivia. Lots of topics, including of course, Star Trek.

 

[rhubarbodendron]

I have heard of neither quizup nor bar trivia - Bavaria seems to be rather isolated, quiz-wise.
I love doing crosswords, sudoku and other riddles. The Scientific American used to have an excellent Sci-Doku every week. Alas, they gave that up in 2008 The old ones are still in their archieves, though. If you want to try them, go here and pick 2008 or a previous year from the menu, click update and then scroll down. There will be a list of the SciDokus from the year you chose and you can click on the one you like to try.
Ignore the years 2009-2014. They have no SciDokus.


I take it, you have no honeycomb-crosswords in the US? That's funny. I should have thought that with such a big market there (judging by the number of crossword magazines in the book shops at airports and train stations) you'd have pretty much everything.

Btw, do you have word-bridge crosswords? You get 2 words per line and must insert a third one that fits after the first and before the second.

Example: tree - - call. The middle word would be trunk (tree-trunk / trunk-call).
The middle words form a column that gives you the solution.

 

[mari]

In word-game books I've definitely done the word-bridge crosswords. The more I think of it, I may have done some honeycomb ones as well. It's been a while. Also some that look like a spiral, and the answers go both clockwise and counter-clockwise. Completely independently of this thread I was thinking I ought to dig out some of those books and do that instead of playing phone apps all the time, just for variety.

 

[Christopher]

There are probably puzzles of these types in Games magazine, which I used to subscribe to way back when but not for ages. These days I mainly just do New York Times crosswords (though only Thursday through Sunday, since the rest are too easy to be interesting), cryptic crosswords, acrostics, and the occasional sudoku.