Comments on: Independent 7,730/Tees

By: Tees

Tees — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 17:23:24 +0000

Maybe I should check out your rates, Sil. Are you on the cheap side? Or in Newgate Street?

As the definition for all the dogs is BARKER, I was able to have, um, any that bark. So I wasn’t restricted to breeds, and could have STARTER, which is ‘a dog that drives out game’ (says Chambers). TERRIER might possibly have been better, but then I would have been forced to add MISERERE to EYLIAD (and possibly ESOPHAGI with its US spelling), the one admittedly obscure entry in the down clues (which I attempted to give away).

The SHIBOS, fyi, is a cross (hence 22A cross = definition) between a Shiba-Inu and a Boston Terrier. Dog breeders just love doing things like that, apparently. LOO in B(LOO/ DH)OUND is defined as ‘game, tricky’ which is pretty close to the Chambers def.

Sorry if this one ended up being a bit too teasy: if it helps, in a recent project I’ve undergone something of a grid-filling revelation, and I’ll be deploying what I’ve learnt from that in any future thematic puzzles I set. No, honestly, I mean it.

Many thanks to Ali, Sil, and everyone who turned up to comment.

By: Sil van den Hoek

Sil van den Hoek — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 15:44:45 +0000

Thanks Conrad and Peter for explaining the Sam bit of 16d.
That makes sense!

BTW, seeing Thomas99 referring to STARTER, made me think of 15ac again.
I hope I am right that a ‘starter (dog)’ is not a breed – unlike the others? In that case Tees could have used ‘terrier’ in that clue plus ‘miserere’ in 1d.

But this is just nitpicking – there’s so much right in this puzzle!!

By: Thomas99

Thomas99 — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 15:09:15 +0000

I found this incredibly difficult. I’m not a dog person, but that certainly wasn’t the only reason. I’m still not quite sure how man=life in 1d, but that may be punch-drunkness from the effort of solving. There were some great clues, before I entered the seemingly endless twilight zone of the last few (Bandog, Eyliad, Starter, Lifebelt), none of which seemed to me quite as good as clues like Adjunct, Piano-tuner, Threshold etc. STARTER actually went in early and got scrubbed out and re-entered about 10 times. Surely he was going out of his way to be difficult this time, wasn’t he?

By: flashling

flashling — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 15:08:11 +0000

The Indy’s gone to the dogs. Almost impossible to complete unaided I fear. The clue for 9ac raised a smile, but I’d never heard to the breed. Well done Ali on blogging this.

By: crypticsue

crypticsue — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 14:55:32 +0000

A tricky theme, the last few stragglers of which did require the aid of lists and the interweb. As Kathryn’s Dad said, ‘enjoyable even though it did beat me’ too, thank you Tees. Not one I would have wished to have blogged, so thank you and well done to Ali.

By: Wanderer

Wanderer — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 14:36:57 +0000

Thanks Ali and Tees. Difficult but fun.

I have never played Loo (I don’t suppose anyone has since Jane Austen’s day) but I assumed that it is a card game in which one has to make tricks, hence “game, tricky”. At least that’s the best I could do…

By: Lenny

Lenny — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 14:30:59 +0000

Thanks Ali, a tough one to blog. I turned to my computer to help me finish it when I had only half the answers in. This turned out to be a sound decision as, even if I had worked out Keeshond, Bandog and Eyliad from the comparatively easy wordplay, I would have concluded that they were products of my over-fertile imagination. On the brighter side, I did get Shibos from the wordplay. I don’t know what that says about me.

Tosa is the Indy’s favourite dog, making its third appearance in a couple of months. At least I know how to spell it these days.

By: Kathryn's Dad

Kathryn's Dad — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 14:19:22 +0000

Sorry, Conrad, we crossed.

By: Kathryn's Dad

Kathryn's Dad — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 14:18:18 +0000

Thank you, Ali. I couldn’t quite manage to finish this one, with a number of the tricky down clues being too tough for me to see. But the theme was a bit of fun, despite my not being a doggy kind of person. I too appreciated the easy gateway clue, which got you going on the acrosses.

AIREDALE and SETTER were my favourite canine clues, and although I couldn’t get SHIBOS without cheating, I knew where Tees was coming from at least!

Sil, I think the (uncle) ‘Sam’ in 16dn is to indicate that it’s the American English spelling of ESOPHAGI; British English would have OESOPHAGI, and there are similar differences in words like FETUS/FOETUS, CELIAC/COELIAC.

Still enjoyed it even though it beat me; thanks to Tees.

By: Conrad Cork

Conrad Cork — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 14:14:15 +0000

Sil

I suspect that Sam in 16d is Uncle Sam, to indicate an American spelling.

I would never have got 9a, it not being in Chambers, and not seeing until the answer what a useless employer might be. No wonder they call him the Teeser.