pumpkinstrokemarrow

Yet another manufacturer. Made in Ireland for Arrow Puzzles from a picture from Pictor International of London. This last outfit clearly has existed with an address in Soho but I not very clear whether it still exists. Possibly mixed up with a defunct outfit called Imagestate PLC. Probably not, as one would expect a media outfit to have a web site. But somewhere along the way I came across the arcane discussion at http://www.nagele.co.uk/Stockphotochat/monkeys.htm about another picture outfit called Getty. Sadly I can't source his motto "semper in excreta sumus solum profundum variat" despite its extensive Google footprint: was it just made up in the bar by one of those Eton types who run our country these days? All good fun...

As was this jigsaw, taking rather longer than usual to complete. Pictured here on top of a go board which I painted - in india ink on top of clear varnish on what I think is an obeche drawing board - some 40 years ago. Not been used for that purpose for as long as I can remember.

Started with the edge, as usual, but there were mistakes and it was not completed at this stage. Moved onto the skyline which provided some useful corroboration of the width of the thing.

Next came the window and its reflection, conspicuously coloured and easy to pick out of the heap. Ditto the base of the tree occupying the top half of the right hand edge.

Worked up the tree for a bit, then, unusually branched off to do the sky, perhaps because it was a small sky which could be knocked off quite quickly. Then the gate, then the thatch.

The rest of the puzzle was a bit of a muddle, with no clear direction or strategy. Simply pushed out from areas of the puzzle which had been done into areas which had not. A rather random process spread over several sessions, picking first on one area then another. Somewhere along the way picked out the pieces for the right hand tree started earlier and knocked that off for a bit of light relief.

A fairly regular puzzle, so not clear why it took so long to solve. Perhaps the lack of strong markers in what was left after the thatch. But despite the cheap appearance of the thing, the pieces were OK to handle and it was a pleasure to solve.