Comments on: Guardian 24,658/Logodaedalus

By: Barnaby Page

Barnaby Page — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 12:39:41 +0000

Are rosters really plans?

My other misgiving was that SOED has “high men” as two words but I see some online sources give it as one.

By: Will

Will — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 00:47:56 +0000

Regarding Duck = Egg and those that pepetuate the canard about it relating to l’ouef, look at:
http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-bre2.htm

By: Will

Will — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 23:18:56 +0000

Ok – I’ll go against the grain and say I don’t actually mind extremely easy clues like 12a too much – it doesn’t seem wrong as such. But this was indeed a strange mix. I (and I always have general knowledge/vocabulary shortcomings) didn’t know: arpeggione, bridge roll, Miriam, highmen, embonpoint, sagamores, Esme, salvia.

I didn’t get a few, one of which was sagamores – it crossed my mind but I’d have never looked it up because there was no indicaton that Roma was reversed – I’d have gone for sagalires or sagaliras instead (get it?). And embonpoint, which crossed it.

By: C & J

C & J — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 18:33:09 +0000

We agree with the nitpickers – did npot enjoy this one at all.

By: Geoff Moss

Geoff Moss — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 18:09:33 +0000

Mercurial

A (one) SS (steamship) A SS (then another) IN (at home)

By: Mercurial

Mercurial — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 17:47:10 +0000

Can someone explain 7d)Assassin, I just can’t see it at all.

By: Paul B

Paul B — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 16:43:12 +0000

That clue is well dodgy. And clued as ‘grass’, GREEN might be perilously close to having the same meaning in SI (an area of grassland, shurely?) as it does in the place name.

And yet, as others have stated, what a fab guy Don is. Anyone who writes

Matilda keeps hawk-headed god in sack

gets my vote.

In short, an awful puzzle by a compiler.

By: Sidey

Sidey — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 15:25:22 +0000

An extremely indifferent effort today. Most of my moans have been mentioned, but King George certainly does not sit atop a volcano in an across clue for Gretna.

Logodaedalus needs to reread his own writings on clue setting and fairness.

By: stiofain_x

stiofain_x — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 15:01:13 +0000

I agree that a couple of half-decent clues does not make up for the overall poor quality of this puzzle. Compared to Pauls tour-de-force from yesterday where not a single word, symbol or indicator was wasted this was very poor indeed.
Stiofain

By: crikey

crikey — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 14:41:27 +0000

Eileen,

I suppose that the use of “habitually” could be justified in the sense of a an addict ” using”, ie one with a habit … I think it also makes for a (marginally) better surface reading.

On reflection, there were a couple of nice clues – particularly 10a, as already mentioned by Smutchin in comment no.12.