Comments on: Guardian (Jumbo) 24,577 (Sat 20 Dec)/Araucaria – Christmas carols

By: Owen Jones

Owen Jones — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 14:17:45 +0000

I thought 6 CAESAR worked with “delivery” being a homonym indicator and CAESAR being a homonym for “seizer”. But maybe that’s a bit far-fetched.

By: Dave Ellison

Dave Ellison — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 16:43:49 +0000

I’m with Smutchin in that I found it surprisingly easy, too, and had finished it by the next day.

By: Rob

Rob — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 15:44:39 +0000

sorry Eileen – I’ve just noticed you pointed this out earlier!

By: Rob

Rob — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 13:29:46 +0000

in 45 the “not spruce” does work as anagram indicator but is also a nifty bit of misdirection – the Sitka Spruce is a variety of tree as is the Sitka Alder which sent me down a cruciverbal cul-de-sac for some time.

I thought this was an excellent puzzle for the two days it took me to solve.

By: Bill Taylor

Bill Taylor — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 13:14:08 +0000

The perfect crossword – I saved it for Boxing Day when I was flying from Toronto to Rome. It occupied me for the full 8-hour flight. I filled in the last answer, 62a (I greatly appreciate Geoff Moss’s explanation but I agree with Beermagnet’s opinion of the clue) as we were on final approach. I flew home yesterday, with another Araucaria puzzle (Saturday’s) to occupy me. I’m STILL trying to figure out 1a in that one!

By: smutchin

smutchin — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 12:50:51 +0000

I didn’t notice the alphabetical discrepancy – and me a sub-editor by profession! – so I filled in Torch and Tolpuddle, being the obvious answers, as Eileen says.

I found this surprisingly easy and had all but completed it by the Sunday afternoon at a couple of sittings, leaving the rest of the Christmas break free to ~~concentrate on the King William’s quiz~~spend some quality time with my family. The perimeters were pretty obvious and filling them in gave you the initial letters of all the nine-letter clues, which I guess is as good a head-start as you’re ever likely to get from Araucaria. But it was most enjoyable none the less – some great fun clues in there.

The only answers that eluded me were AITCH (though it seems so obvious now) and OCTADIC. I looked up April Rainers and from that guessed it started OCT… but didn’t manage to decipher the rest of the clue. I presume OCTADIC is in Chambers? It’s not in my OED.

I liked the MEDWAY clue, though some would balk at the first four letters of a six-letter word being described as the “start” of that word.

Shame that EATER appeared a few days later in a Paul puzzle with an almost identical (albeit differently worded) clue.

By the way, rightback, re 40: I think Omophagia is specifically the eating of raw flesh rather than raw food generally.

By: Eileen

Eileen — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 17:56:21 +0000

I’d forgotten about the alphabetical mistake, which I did spot, until today. I too resisted putting in TORCH for a while but it was so obviously right [as was TOLPUDDLE] that I gave in, putting it down to a compositor’s [are there still such people?] error rather than Araucaria’s. Had this been one of his rhyming ‘Araubeticals’ [copyright Muck] it would have been more obvious.

By: Bridge

Bridge — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 17:01:15 +0000

Agree with Beermagnet – just did not put in 57 as it broke the alphabetical flow and had put my faith in Aracuria! Guess – just don’t trust printers1

By: Eileen

Eileen — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 15:59:32 +0000

Rightback, this is weird: you couldn’t see ‘reputed owner’ and I couldn’t see ‘on the mat’, for the life of me, until just now. We must have been looking at the wrong WHEREUNDERS!

By: TwoPies

TwoPies — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 13:59:14 +0000

Yes, thanks. The only one I struggled with was 39. I knew the answer was Omar but I didn’t know any poets called Omar.