Comments on: Guardian 25,317 / Rufus

By: san felipe real estate

san felipe real estate — Mon, 09 Jul 2012 04:31:10 +0000

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By: Eileen

Eileen — Tue, 10 May 2011 08:29:56 +0000

Hi Martin

I went out, too. Apologies for omitting a line @28: after quoting your comment, I meant to say that I concurred with it.

[OUT TRAY is still one of my favourite clues. ]

By: Martin H

Martin H — Mon, 09 May 2011 23:02:27 +0000

Hi again Eileen – I’ve been out all evening since our last correspondence, and it’s struck me that there is yet another interpretation: ‘where office work is witnessed or overseen’, so by my reading we have work done, work yet to do, and also work being done, although – and here I’m on shaky ground, having kept away from offices ever since working in one for a month for a student summer job – I don’t think there’s a tray for the last one.

By: Jan

Jan — Mon, 09 May 2011 22:23:26 +0000

Thanks for the blog, Eileen – I’ve just done the puzzle before my cocoa.

I was defeated by NET CORD – not a familiar term to me. – When tennis courts failed, I pootled around with, ‘Froggy went a’courtin” – that led to TOAD for the second word – then, from Wind in the Willows I joined Rupert in NUT WOOD.

I blame all the Mr Men on Google, today!

By: Ian

Ian — Mon, 09 May 2011 21:14:16 +0000

Stella (#18),

Many thanks for the wiki enlightenment. Much appreciated.

By: William

William — Mon, 09 May 2011 19:24:32 +0000

Thank you Eileen and to Rufus for a smooth puzzle.

Bryan @ 1 & Rulei @13, I was always under the impression that going ‘ALL OUT’ was a reference to using every scrap of canvas available to a sea captain.

Would this do for your nautical reference?

By: claire

claire — Mon, 09 May 2011 18:05:02 +0000

Oops…sorry that should be FORTY years on. I’ve added 10 years to myself and inadvertently aged Eileen too, perhaps. If so, apologies.

By: claire

claire — Mon, 09 May 2011 17:39:39 +0000

Thanks Eileen, How odd (or maybe not really) that I too remember that definition of ‘queue’ from a French book. I instantly pictured the illustration from the book too – all of fifty years on! I don’t think I ever encountered that meaning before or since. Glad it came in handy today. Net Cord let me down though. Still – nice gentle typical Rufus to start off the week.

By: Geoff

Geoff — Mon, 09 May 2011 17:06:38 +0000

Martin and Eileen

Nothing like a grammatical spat, is there?

For what it’s worth, I agree that the clue as written is ambiguous, but I hadn’t realised that when I solved it myself. It can be read as “Where office work is seen [that is] to be done”, leading to IN-TRAY (Eileen’s gerundive comment, because the phrase ‘tp be done’ in this reading would be translated by the gerundive ‘facendum’ in Latin). However, I think the alternative reading: “…seen to be complete” is, I think, the less forced – the use of an adjective (eg complete) rather than a participle (eg done or completed) would have removed the ambiguity.

Note that a change in the word order: “Where office work to be done is seen”, gives a sentence that can only be parsed as IN-TRAY!

But, after all, IN-TRAY doesn’t fit!

By: Robi

Robi — Mon, 09 May 2011 16:39:45 +0000

Martin @23; ‘There was some disagreement a few months ago about a clue where people ‘in court’ were supposed to be watching or playing tennis. If that was tenuous ‘going to court’ is even more so.’

I can’t really see the problem with the clue. The competitors go to the tennis court to play the game and certainly catch the NET CORD quite frequently. As you say, the possibility of ‘cold’ as the second word was a nice misdirection.