Comments on: Guardian 25,266 / Araucaria

By: Robi

Robi — Fri, 11 Mar 2011 13:30:00 +0000

BTW, in case anyone hasn't seen it, there is an Araucaria tribute by Hugh Stephenson on the at Guardian site,including an apology about the numeration of the Saturday prize puzzle!

By: Robi

Robi — Fri, 11 Mar 2011 13:09:45 +0000

Bit late in the day, but I was fairly busy yesterday – thanks to Araucaria and mhl for a nice blog, which explained a thing or two. I found this fairly hard as I couldn’t seem to get the long anagram for ages.

I fell into the Eiffel trap like an elephant. Forgot my Mother Hubbard and couldn’t parse ALL RIGHT, although it seems obvious now.

Amazing cerebral activity for a ninety-year old.

By: Chris U

Chris U — Fri, 11 Mar 2011 09:47:31 +0000

Hi MHL. Good blog. I came on here to see how you guys did with 22d, which I couldn’t get yesterday. But ‘steady’; I’m kicking myself now but repsect due to Eileen for sussing that out.
While I’m here, I’ll confess to a mistake that might have you chortling: ‘returns’ for 4d. My fallacious logic proceeded
queen = er which turns ( ie re + turns) which is where Street characters come in one after another. I suppose Corrie fans call it the Rover’s though…..I’ll get me coat

By: FranTom Menace

FranTom Menace — Thu, 10 Mar 2011 23:48:55 +0000

Odd that there’s a such a split in how difficult people found today’s puzzle!

Normally we struggle to get half way in Araucaria’s, but today we whizzed through half in five minutes. True to form we still didn’t complete it though, 21d had us groaning at ourselves and 8a I’d never hear of. 5d and 6d we got but couldn’t parse.

Perhaps it’s more Ximenean than is normal for Auraucaria, and that’s why people like us did so well?

By: gm4hqf

gm4hqf — Thu, 10 Mar 2011 18:03:45 +0000

Thanks for the blog mhl. Another cracker from Araucaria.

As usual with Araucaria it takes me ages to get started. So many clues given as See some other clue.

Particularly liked WET NURSE and BATH OLIVER.

By: Cosafina

Cosafina — Thu, 10 Mar 2011 16:56:43 +0000

Great puzzle, and am amazed it took me so long to get Central School considering I work next door to it! Favourites for me where 24,2 and 8a – both made me chuckle!

By: Carrots

Carrots — Thu, 10 Mar 2011 16:01:56 +0000

Luvverly Jubbly! The GOM on top form. But just when I thought I had a legitimate query about 1 Dn., mhl/Gaufrid teach me the error of my ways. Here`s how it goes (or, rather, went):

Although Ian Bell is a top order batsman, he is also a very handy all-rounder, with a strong, medium pace bowling arm. “cricketer” might be a tad more appropriate than “batsman”.

A PULL in clay-pigeon shooting is not a shot in itself, but a command to the trap loader to release the clay(s) so that a shot may be taken. (I`d completely missed the PULL batting terminology…I`m really good at this).

Whereas I can imagine a BELL PULL being extensively used in the 19th or early 20th century, it is hard to imagine Ian Bell finding one to announce his presence anywhere in the 21st. (Mmmm…dunno though: he probably gets invited to many more Mayfair gentlemen`s clubs than I do.)

So there we have it. The Wizard waves his wand and my trousers fall down.

By: Thomas99

Thomas99 — Thu, 10 Mar 2011 15:01:10 +0000

Dave Ellison @24
You are certainly not alone! See the comments on the Guardian site. Although I was the only one to essay a full parsing though, I think. The parsing was:

“Foreign metal” = F (FX=Foreign Exchange) + FE (iron), then “roll” = lie (an admittedly dodgy golfing ref. – if you get a good “roll” on the ball you get a good “lie” – not very convincing in the cold light of day…) , “raised” to make EIL, giving EI-FFE-L, with the definition either “Raised iconic building”, or “iconic building” or possibly the whole clue.

“Hubbub” and the brilliant 8a finally made me see sense.

By: Dave Ellison

Dave Ellison — Thu, 10 Mar 2011 14:42:45 +0000

I am in the medium hard camp for this one, due largely to the long anagram. I surmised SCHOOL early on, but this was no help in 21d CANAPE at this stage.

Am I the only one to tentatively enter EIFFEL for 3d (he RAISED AN ICONIC BUILDING)? It contains FE for iron, but, of course, I couldn’t explain the rest of the clue. Luckily, I suspected something was wrong and found PREFAB soon after.

By: Chas

Chas — Thu, 10 Mar 2011 14:02:15 +0000

Thanks to mhl.

I’m fascinated by the split: some people say it was easy and others say it was hard. I’m in the second school!

My biggest aha came with spotting All Right/None Left.

MartinH@5: before I retired I was in the Post Office support team and I can tell you that Postal Orders are going strong. They used to be pre-printed but now they are printed as required.