Comments on: Guardian 25,880 – Rufus

By: Wilson

Wilson — Thu, 28 Feb 2013 11:16:06 +0000

I thought Boxer was an allusion to the character in Orwell’s “Animal Farm”.

By: brucew_aus

brucew_aus — Thu, 28 Feb 2013 03:46:12 +0000

Thanks Rufus and manehi

Late for this – have never taken longer than half hour to solve Rufus – but both 10 and 25 defied logic for me this week. Eventually wrote in VOTEE (more in hope than confidence) – and still don’t think that BOXER is any better a fit – which to me makes it a poor clue.

Didn’t twig to why BEGGARMAN was right – but really couldn’t be much else.

For HOSED – I interpreted it as a dd for piped (as in transferred water) and killed (as in one man down / to hose (shoot) someone with a gun).

By: Paul B

Paul B — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 19:59:33 +0000

Re 13, ‘Huw’, I think you’ll find it didn’t. That should ungrump you a bit.

By: Huw Powell

Huw Powell — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 01:28:12 +0000

Not my cup of tea at all. Nightmarish grid and far too many CD/DD/Not even clues. Sorry to be so negative, but I didn’t even care how the clues I couldn’t figure out were parsed – since most of them weren’t, really.

Boxer? Hosed? Garner? 13 lacked a homonym indicator.

The clues are poor and the grid is awful. I hate CDs and DDs because one can never “prove” the answer is correct. One or two in a puzzle are fine, since they usually fit in with the other answers. Puzzles built around them are just not cryptic. I was tempted to just fill in the NE and SW with words that fit and offer new clues for them.

Oh well, hopefully next week will be more fun.

Sorry to be so grumpy.

By: Tom

Tom — Tue, 26 Feb 2013 17:11:04 +0000

Interested to read comments from Brendan @24 and Mike M @ 22.
I decided to give up on Rufus after a particularly unsatisfactory and unsatisfying recent puzzle of his left me feeling rather cheated. Life is too short.

By: WBE

WBE — Tue, 26 Feb 2013 09:17:53 +0000

In fact 26a is a DD: ‘hosed’ is a – slightly slang – synonym for down when applied to IT equipment. As I remembered at 5 o’clock this morning.

By: Brendan (not that one)

Brendan (not that one) — Mon, 25 Feb 2013 22:09:33 +0000

Truly an awful crossword. Even for a Rufus.

Either write ins or terribly weak dd or cds. Half of them are barely acceptable others are simply wrong!

If it was any other setter this would be panned!!!!

By: Kathryn's Dad

Kathryn's Dad — Mon, 25 Feb 2013 21:13:54 +0000

I too gave up on this one. I’ve said it several times before, but at the risk of boring everyone, this grid (few starting letters and lots of clues with less than 50% checking) and the large number of cds and dds just make it too difficult, for me at least.

By: Mike M

Mike M — Mon, 25 Feb 2013 16:37:12 +0000

Didn’t enjoy this much – far too many cryptic defs and double defs, which Rufus obviously enjoys setting, but I don’t particularly enjoy solving.

So now someone will say “So why did you bother starting, if you knew it was Rufus?” – which is frankly an excellent question… I don’t think I shall again. Will hold fire for a Paul or a Brummie…

By: michelle

michelle — Mon, 25 Feb 2013 15:00:41 +0000

Dave Ellison@18

Sorry I did not pick up on the ‘chop/stick’ for cleave point you are making even though (as it happens) I am half-Chinese.

As I mentioned, I am a newbie to cryptic crosswords, so all of these clues are new and fresh to me.

You are a good researcher. Good luck with new clues for CLEAVE.