Comments on: Guardian Cryptic No 25,186 by Rufus

By: morpheus

morpheus — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 20:57:20 +0000

at last, what this blog has been missing for some time – some good balanced political opinion.

By: stiofain

stiofain — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 20:37:12 +0000

A nice lite rufus though i agree EXPIRED is barely cryptic I did like SECOND HELPING.I remember slack as being put on top of the fire to make it smoulder and burn slower to save coal rather than being used for a quick fire.
N Williams @19 are you kidding? The Orange Order are as extreme as religious groupings get, responsible for murders, intimidation on a countrywide scale and civil unrest costing millions. They are the only identifiable legal grouping that have had no input into the peace process in Ireland. They were formed to persecute a large part of the population and did so very successfully for many years. I suppose the Klu Klux Klan are just good ol’ country boys and the Taliban cuddly little beardy gnomes?

By: Roger

Roger — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 19:33:43 +0000

Thanks PeterO. Was beginning to wonder if term had finished early with all these pupils/students/scholar(‘)s about !
A first glance at 17 said lignite to me, then I thought again … oh dear. Good to see tupu making one ‘L of an appearance, though.

By: N. Williams

N. Williams — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 17:21:15 +0000

The clue to 13 across was irritating. Orangemen are not necessarily extremists by any means. Surely judgements of this kind are better kept out of crossword clues.

By: john h

john h — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 14:31:40 +0000

George – you would normally need eight score draws to do much in the pools so it is unlikely that nun would be telling the pope where to shove his job. I got seven score draws once and won £1.42 which was not quite enough to retire on.

By: George Heard

George Heard — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 13:18:06 +0000

20 reminded me of an old joke.

Q. What’s black and white and tells the Pope to f**k off?

A. A nun with six score draws.

I thought this was a bit more restrained of a Rufus with the usual set of nice surfaces but not as many cryptic definitions.

By: Robi

Robi — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 13:09:26 +0000

Thanks,PeterO and Rufus. 8d seemed to be weak but I took it as a dd with reference to expired meaning dead, and thus out of time.

By: tupu

tupu — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 12:42:12 +0000

Re ‘slack’. My recollection is that (as a mixture of dust and smaller lumps) it burned more quickly than larger coal lumps, so that one might ‘put a bit of slack on the fire’ to get a quick blaze.

By: liz

liz — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 12:00:49 +0000

Thanks for the blog, PeterO. Nothing much to add to the above. An enjoyable Rufus — I liked the surface of 1ac and others. Didn’t think 8dn was crytic, though. I’ve never heard of ‘slack’ for ‘coal’!

By: Peter Owen

Peter Owen — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 11:56:17 +0000

To avoid confusion: I am not PeterO.