Guardian 26,446 by Paul

by

The puzzle may be found at http://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/cryptic/26446.

With a giant anagram which was, for me at least, far from obvious either from the fodder or the enumeration, I struggled more than usually for a Paul crossword, but it proved a satisfying workout

I also like Sophia Loren’s other take on the subject: “Spaghetti can be eaten most successfully if you inhale it like a vacuum cleaner”.

completed grid
Across
1 FALAFEL
Drop round eatery that’s not starting to produce Middle Eastern food (7)
An envelope (’round’) of [c]AFE (‘eatery’) without its first letter (‘that’s not starting’) in FALL (‘drop’).
5 CHELSEA
A man short, stuffed by other team (7)
An envelope (‘stuffed by’) of ELSE (‘other’) in CHA[p] (‘a man’) without its last letter (‘short’).
9  
See 19
10 ALBATROSS
Burden of success for Tiger Woods? (9)
Double definition: reference to The Ancient Mariner, and a score of three under par at golf.
11,18,25 EVERYTHING YOU SEE I OWE TO SPAGHETTI
“Hey, the pesto I eat!” Twiggy envious o’er fantastic endorsement for Italian cookery, attributed to 19 9 (10,3,3,1,3,2,9)
An anagram (‘fantastic’) of ‘hey the pesto I eat Twiggy envious oer’. Very neart
12 SKIN
Largest organ broke, farthest tip coming off (4)
SKIN[t] (‘broke’) minus its last letter (‘farthest tip coming off’).
14 ROLLER BLINDS
Car left secured by straps, which cover the windows (6,6)
A charade of ROLLER (Rolls Royce ‘car’) plus an envelope (‘secured by’) of L (‘left’) in BINDS (‘straps’).
18  
See 11
21 NUTS
Unhinged fasteners (4)
Double definition.
22 AMBULATORY
Walking about, army on manoeuvres touring Leatherhead (10)
An envelope (‘touring’) of L (‘Leatherhead’) in AMBUATORY, an anagram (‘on manoeuvres’) of ‘about army’.
25  
See 11
26 ICHOR
Content of sandwich, ordinary divine fluid (5)
A hidden answer (‘content of’) in ‘sandwICH ORdinary’.
27 SENDOFF
Thus accepting demise, French leaders leaving party (7)
An envelope (‘accepting’) of END (‘demise’) in SO (‘thus’) plus FF (‘French leaders).
28 NIGGARD
Scrooge sending back smoke and drink (7)
A reversal (‘sending back’) of DRAG (‘smoke’, a cigarette) plus GIN (‘drink’).
Down
1  
See 7
2 LARGER
Sponsor finally invested in drink, being more generous (6)
An envelope (‘invested in’) of R (‘sponsoR finally’) in LAGER (‘drink’).
3 FUNNY MONEY
Notes copied by rich figure confined to fringes of memory (5,5)
A charade of FUNNY (‘rich’) plus an envelope (‘confined to’) of ONE (‘figure’) on MY (‘fringes of MemorY‘).
4 LEASH
Lead sulphide at last found in smack (5)
An envelope (‘found in’) of E (‘sulphidE at last’) in LASH (‘smack’).
5 CABIN CREW
Wife after nice crab salad they serve up (5,4)
An anagram (‘salad’) of ‘nice crab’ plus W (‘wife’).
6 EATS
Food shortage at sea’s contained (4)
A hidden answer (‘contained’) in ‘shortagE AT Sea’.
7,1 STOCKING FILLER
Present a woman’s leg, perhaps? (8,6)
Double definition.
8 ARSONIST
Switched on, star is lighter? (8)
An anagram (‘switched’) of ‘on star is’.
13 FLAT RACING
Accidental French dramatist not entirely good — you can bet on it! (4,6)
A charade of FLAT (‘accidental’ in music) plus RACIN[e] (‘French dramatist’) without the last letter (‘not entirely’) plus G (‘good’).
15 LEITMOTIF
Coming up, cat and connection with leopard primarily, providing theme (9)
TOM (‘cat’) plus TIE (‘connection’) plus L (‘Leopard primarily’) all reversed (‘coming up’) plus IF (‘providing’).
16 HYPNOSIS
Issue partly cleared up in man’s unconscious state (8)
An envelope (‘in’) of SON (‘issue’) plus PY (‘PartlY cleared’), all reversed (‘up’) in HIS (‘man’s’).
17 QUATRAIN
Poem — quit leaving it on a coach (8)
A charade of QU (‘qu[it] leaving it’) plus ‘a’ plus TRAIN (‘coach’).
19,9 SOPHIA LOREN
Italian player being capricious, sooner bottle-fed? (6,5)
An envelope (‘fed’) of PHIAL (‘bottle’) in SOOREN, an anagram (‘being capricious’) of ‘sooner’.
20 HYBRID
Hardy, Balfour and Isherwood — all extremely cross (6)
First and last letters (‘all extremely’) of ‘HardY BalfouR and IsherwooD‘.
23 UNION
Brought up without the social graces, I maintained harmony (5)
An envelope (‘maintained’) of ‘I’ in UNON, a reversal (‘brought up’) of NON-U (‘without the social graces’).
24 SHOO
Something afoot, say? Get away! (4)
A homophone (‘say’) of SHOE (‘something afoot’).

52 comments on “Guardian 26,446 by Paul”

  2. Another fine Paul puzzle that I eventually solved. I was struggling with the anagram, but then I got Sophia Loren and guessed what it must be.

    My one objection is that Tiger Woods has never in fact had an albatross in any competitive round throughout his entire career. This doesn’t seem to have hurt him, though.

  3. Thanks Peter. 19D was last in: I was guessing an Italian footballer, but no Italian has -O-H-A as a first name (Joshua?). Funny=rich in 3D also eluded me for ages. Otherwise the puzzle was no end of fun and inventiveness, thanks Paul.

  4. Got this one (that’s two this week!) except for failure on ALBATROSS as a golfing term. My Scots ancestors will forgive me, I think.

    Thanks Peter and Paul.

  5. Thanks PeterO and Paul
    I do wish Paul wouldn’t do this sort of clue. I know it depends on personal knowledge, but for me, seeing “endorsement for Italian cookery” and (10,3,3,1,3,2,9) immediately gave me EVERYTHING YOU SEE I OWE TO SPAGHETTI and SOPHIA LOREN, so, unsatisfyingly, about a third of the crossword done. Yes, it’s a clever anagram, but I didn’t even bother to work it out – I just knew that it would be there somewhere.
    The rest then went in very quickly as well. I suppose I’ll have to read a book instead.
    I did like STOCKING FILLER and SKIN.

  6. Thanks Paul and PeterO

    I found this on the benign side for Paul, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t enjoy it hugely, as it has his usual humour and lightness of touch.

    I agree that the long anagram, once solved, broke the back of the puzzle, but I wasn’t consciously aware of the quotation. However I’d decided that the last word was probably going to be SPAGHETTI, the early down clues gave me the crossers for EVERYTHING, so the remainder was a process of elimination. I then recognised the quotatiom=n but didn’t know it’s source until I had more crossers for 19, 9.

    I also particularly liked 7, 1 and 20. And isn’t the penultimate row a long-dead tribe from the early Roman era?

    Looking forward to Maskarade on Saturday…

  8. @5
    What do you think of “Poetical scene with surprisingly chaste Lord Archer vegetating (3,3,8,12)”, then? That clue also had a fairly hefty hint in the surface – which “depended” on knowledge I actually had, unlike this Loren quote – but it’s widely admired. I thought Paul’s &littish surface was also very clever and entertaining, if not quite up there with Araucaria’s, and it was an enjoyable challenge trying to work out what Loren might have said (only fairly late on did I realise that it was something that might have annoyed the less curvaceous Twiggy, as per the surface). I think you must be fairly unusual in knowing so much about Sophia Loren that merely the words “endorsement for Italian cookery” plus the letter-count immediately gave you the entire quotation verbatim and her name. My first vague thoughts on spotting the clue were that it might be something to do with Elizabeth David and I only started trying to solve it when I’d got “Sophia Loren” (that clue would have been quite hard on its own – knowing there was a link with the long one helped me).

    I wouldn’t want one of these every day necessarily, but they are pretty rare and I thought it was nice to see the Araucaria-style long anagram clue hasn’t completely died out. I don’t, incidentally, think a good solver should have to work the whole anagram out in a case like this – Paul is right to give us other hints, as was Araucaria. I could be wrong, but I think you’ll be in a minority on this one.

    Crosophile is fairly tough in the Independent today if you want a longer solve.

  9. Herb @8
    I said it relied on personal knowledge. I don’t know why the quotation has stuck in my mind, but it has, to the extent that I didn’t even read the clue for 19,9 before writing in SOPHIA LOREN – I don’t think I would have found it as easy to solve this one first.
    Whenever a clue such as this is set, there is always likely to be a handful, at least, of solvers who can solve it from the word-letter pattern.
    Perhaps the solution would be, as for example in the Mephisto, just to give the total letter count instead of the break-up into words. I don’t think I would like this, though, so my preference would be for these clues not to be set; they do always mean that we are short-changed for actual number of clues in the puzzle.

  10. [P.S. is the Independent crossword available online?]

    [P.P.S. I do remember “The Old Vicarage, Grantchester”, and yes, I did solve it from the letter count and the hint.]

    [P.P.P.S. 8 x [ ] = seventy two – where’s my calculator?]

  12. Lovely stuff thank you Paul and Peter O. I think 7d/1d obviously counts as a ‘Christmas chestnut’ as it isn’t the first time I’ve met variations on that theme.

  13. Thanks crypticsue
    Yes it is blocked – never mind.

    (I didn’t really need the calculator, but it was one of the hardest ones I have been given! I am, in fact, a “child of the 50s”.)

  14. @9 etc
    Just shows how we’re all different, I guess – I ignored the long anagram completely, solved 19,9 separately early on, and only came back to look at 11 etc once the first word was obviously going to be EVERYTHING.

    Definitely on the benign side, and a bit short on the offbeat humour we’ve come to expect.

  15. Herb@8:

    “I think you [muffin] must be fairly unusual in knowing so much about Sophia Loren that merely the words “endorsement for Italian cookery” plus the letter-count immediately gave you the entire quotation verbatim and her name.”

    Then put me down as “fairly unusual” as well, because as soon as I saw those very words I too knew the answer. It doesn’t seem unusual to me, it seems perfectly normal to know that quote and the sauce. Source.

  16. muffin ad lib

    If you download & install Crossword Solver from http://crossword-solver.software.informer.com/ (I hope that’s still an active link) there is a pre-installed option to download the daily cryptic or quick from the Independent into a format which you can either solve on-screen or print & solve on Paper.

    I think that you can also download from other soucres if you know the URL, but I haven’t tried that.

    hth

  19. A very pleasant start to the day, though could have done without the “funny”=rich. As long as they are fairly rare, I quite like the long anagram clues, and certainly didn’t immediately write it in. Perhaps you should spend more time honing your tables, Muffin, rather than retaining obscure quotes!
    Thanks to both for the entertainment.

    PS ? -one = 1. More your style M?

  20. Hi Muffin @13
    “Yes it is blocked – never mind.”

    You’ve two options (apart from not solving any Indys): 1) download and install Crossword Solver ( http://www.crosswordsolver.info/ ) and use that program to access the Indy or 2) close your browser then Start / All Programs / Java/ Configure Java / Security and add http://www.independent.co.uk to the exception site list. Open your browser again and use the link that crypticsue gave.

  24. Thanks Paul and PeterO

    Enjoyed the puzzle but needed help with some of the parsing. Liked NIGGARD, ICHOR and FUNNY MONEY.

    Sophia Loren has denied ever making that spaghetti quote.

  25. Found this tough but enjoyable. For us the big clue was almost the last in, as we’d never heard of it, and the `bottle fed’ mystified us for a long time. But plenty of fun working up to this.

  26. Thanks all
    Enjoyable, the Loren quote was unknown to me but eventually revealed. I did not know the accidental musical reference and funny= rich was only a very vague memory.

  27. [I didn’t particularly enjoy the Crosophile, and I failed on URGE. I am still getting used to how Crossword Solver handles letters pre-exisitng in the grid!]

  28. Thanks Paul & PeterO. I’m one who doesn’t mind long anagrams, even is solvable only by definition and enumeration. However, that wasn’t the case for me today, as I’d never heard of the quote.

    An enjoyable solve; I particularly liked STOCKING FILLER.

    I wonder if NUTS will spark similar debate to what we had the other day over BANANAS. Indeed, one person noted that “Some editorial intervention is called for, I think. I can’t lay my hands on my Guardian Style Guide at the moment but I am 100% sure that no such terms would be allowed in journalistic content.” Whatever the morality of using such words, the back page of the sports section in today’s Graun uses “doollally”, “stark raving bonkers” and “crazy”. Fair enough, it’s a sports column intended to be humorous rather than a serious column on current affairs, but it does seem like, rightly or wrongly, such language is accepted at times outside of the crossword.

  29. muffin @27

    [Does the Independent have a ‘check’ aid. I cannot manage without that in the week as I take so long to solve the clues]

    My Captcha is 7 x ? = sixty three, just add the 6 and the 3, it comes to 9, so it’s x 9, get it muffin?

  30. [Cookie @29
    The Crossword Solver will download the Independent Cryptic and Concise crosswords in its File menu (I haven’t found any others it links too yet). I then works quite like the Guardian online except that if you are typing in a solution, the cursor usually (not always – I haven’t worked out the difference) skips over letters already entered. There is a “Check” option, as well as several other helpful features. I’m impressed and grateful to those kind people above who provided the links.

    btw SimonS’s link downloaded “Software solutions” first, then the Crossword Solver – I’ve uninstalled the former. I expect that Herb’s and Gaufrid’s links would go straight to the Crossword Solver site.

    P.S. I can do my times-tables – really!]

  31. Well I didn’t know the quote but like Letzbefair @14 13a was soon obviously EVERYTHING and you don’t have to know much about Ms Loren to work out what was going on – the more so when 25a ended in I.

    The very long anagram isn’t my favourite crossword device but it has its place. Basic rules, it seems to me, are that it needs to be gettable by winkling out and inspired guesswork from what the setter might reasonably assume is the solver’s general knowledge, and the anagram itself needs to be apposite in some way. Both very much followed here.

    FUNNY MONEY my last in, couldn’t decide between *O*E* alternatives for far too long.

  32. Thanks Paul & PeterO, better a Sophia Loren quote than an obscure literary one.

    I got the ‘I OWE TO SPAGHETTI’ from a few crossers and then had to solve the rest of the anagram, so it definitely wasn’t a write-in.

    I liked the ‘lead sulphide’ that wasn’t. I’m ashamed to admit that for ‘largest organ’ I was thinking of the liver – I should know better!

    Orlando (24,795) did: Pin that may be present (8,6)

  33. I liked this a lot. I didn’t know the SOPHIA LOREN quote so I did have to work it out while turned out to be easier than I expected. I spent more time trying to get NIGGARD and LEASH than I did on the rest of the puzzle. Don’t ask me why.
    As I said most enjoyable.
    Thanks Paul.

  34. Another highly entertaining challenge from the ever-reliable Paul. After last week’s Shakespeare I wonder if he has a new book of quotations. I liked the long and almost forgotten anagram mostly because having guessed everything and spaghetti from the crossers, the rest was manageable from the fodder. Last in was FUNNY MONEY, apart from that the SW corner was last to crack. Liked STOCKING FILLER, HYBRID and SKIN (the largest organ is a popular pub quiz question). ICHOR was only familiar from previous discussions here.

    Thanks to Paul and PeterO

  35. This of course is The Guardian’s puzzle as it should be, with all the quirkiness and none of the annoying grammatical and other errors SOME of the other compilers seem unable to avoid. Although it’s not ENTIRELY their fault, as should be obvious. This is the heritage of Bunthorne and Araucaria, I believe, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

    Thanks Gaufrid for the Indy links. I can get it, but not via Crossword Solver, so that’s great.

  36. I would endorse the recommendations for Crossword Solver – which is how I access the Indy puzzles on the rare occasions I find time for them. The online Java version only works if you are willing to accept regular Java updates (more of a pain on a slow 3G connection) and disable some of the browser security options (at least in IE or Chrome). There is also a semi-secret way to download puzzles for other dates, but I don’t think we’re allowed to divulge the details here…

  37. @35
    It’s not obvious. Who are you blaming for errors apart from the people who make them? The Guardian’s editor? If so it’s a bit of a canard. Boatman and Qaos are Guardian only and both have shredded the rule book – grammatical and Ximenean – on occasion (though less so recently), but you’ll find equally wild rule-breaking in the very entertaining Gaff (in the FT), to name but one. A lot of the setters set for several papers and seem perfectly capable of making errors in all of them. These things happen (though not quite as often as you sometimes seem to think). Araucaria’s grammar was very reliable but he broke just about every other rule, and certainly made mistakes.

  38. PS Congratulations to Paul on his 50th Guardian crossword of the year – Araucaria achieved this many times but nobody else has since 1999.

  40. Like molonglo I was trying to fit in an Italian footballer. Choosing Ms Loren was very cunning as she is incredibly well known and yet these days hardly ever thought of. Thanks to Peter for the parsing of that clue, which proved well beyond me. A very nice puzzle topped off by HYPNOSIS, which demonstrates the kind of cluing that I can only aspire to.

  41. Trailman @39, Rufus has also equalled his record this year but is still only at 43, so he can’t finish on more than 45 – he has a few Mondays off every year, though it is possible he managed more before 1999.

    Other setters who have equalled or beaten(*) their records this year are Chifonie*, Pasquale*, Brummie*, Puck*, Crucible, Boatman, Tramp*, Philistine, Picaroon*, Qaos*, Nutmeg*, Imogen*, Otterden* and Maskarade* (it would have been quicker to list the ones who haven’t!)

  43. I would have been chuffed if I’d known the Loren quote beforehand, but as it happens I needed several crossers to get a foothold in the mega-anagram. I enjoyed it immensely once I did get it though.

    My last one in was LEITMOTIF, which I’m afraid I needed OneLook to solve as it was an unfamiliar word and I couldn’t make sense of the wordplay. And I still couldn’t even after finding the answer, because I had a blind spot in thinking ‘providing’ was a link word so I couldn’t figure out where IF came from. I felt decidedly stupid – ‘mad’ even – when the penny finally dropped.

    Minor gripes:
    24d (SHOO) was mildly irritating with a homophone indicator sat between two four-letter definitions.
    27a (SENDOFF) should be two words, shouldn’t it? I note this is the second successive regular cryptic from Paul with such an elision – it was RIVERBED in the last one.

    Thanks for an excellent puzzle, Paul. And thanks for the ‘neartly’ laid out blog, PeterO. 🙂

  45. The AFI Fest 2014 celebrated Sophia Loren and Orson Welles; a coincidence I suppose that ORSON is on the 4th line from the bottom? Can’t find Welles.

    [Thanks muffin @30, and thanks to those who have provided links for accessing the Independent etc]

  46. Loved this although it was rather easy.

    I didn’t know the quote but the enumeration and clue made the “9” a pretty certain “spaghetti” which was present in the obvious anagram fodder. The plethora of easy down clues then made the completion straightforward.

    vinyl1 @2

    I don’t believe that 10A sugests or requires that Tiger Woods ever scored an albatross in a competitive or in fact any game of golf so I don’t understand your objection? 🙂

    Thanks to PeterO and Paul

  47. Two of my first entries were LARGER (2d) and NIGGARD (28ac).
    Leaving me with 19,9: ?????A ??R??.
    Just like molonglo (@3) and ulaca (@40) I was looking for an Italian footballer – even if the food reference in ‘that long one’ made it less likely.
    What about ANDREA PIRLO?
    Well, at that stage yes, but ultimately no.

    Another good puzzle by Paul.
    As I recently said, that he nearly always comes up with inspiring puzzles is something that has to be admired after setting so many crosswords.

    However clues like 11,18,25 leave me relatively cold.
    After finding most of the crossers the solution unveils itself and I then cannot be bothered anymore by writing out the anagram.

    Like Angstony @43 I was not sure about 27ac (SEND/OFF) as I also think it’s not one word. Which held me up, just like the definition (‘send off’ = ‘leaving party’?).
    And in that same clue FF for ‘French leaders’, not sure either and certainly not in line with Paul’s usual precision.

    All in all, a fine puzzle which I found slightly harder than the average Paul.

    Thanks PeterO.

  48. Angstony @43

    The SENDOFF / RIVERBED question comes up every now and then. Chambers gives the former hyphenated and the latter as two words; but neither looks too odd to me as a single word; the OED gives both hyphenated, but includes quotes as single words, SENDOFF from Mark Twain, and RIVERBED from Tennyson.

    The Crossword Solver allows you to access archived Indy cryptics by date; for example, to get yesterdays Dac, enter the URL

    http://independent.co.uk/independent.co.uk/editorial/xword/c_171214.bin

    Note the UK form of the date 17/12/14. I have not found out how long the crosswords are archived.

  50. Yes, Peter, I didn’t even bother to ask Mrs Chambers’ advice.
    Having said that, where does the party come in?
    I am so football-minded that a ‘send-off’ is almost just that.

    Oxford tells me that a ‘send-off’ is a ‘celebratory demonstration of goodwill at a person’s departure’.
    I wouldn’t want to explain this to Wayne Rooney or any other player who’s ever been sent off ….. 🙂

  52. You make ‘shredding the rule book (sic)’ sound like a good thing, Herb, which of course it is not. Clever misdirection and general subversion WITHIN parameters on the other hand leads to excellence and difference, and that’s why I’ve referred to the two compilers who, more than any in my view, are responsible for shaping what may LEGITIMATELY be called the ‘Guardian style’. It’s just a pity that some compilers go straight for it without apparently having done the ground-work (i.e. learn about the rules and conventions before you mess around breaking them).

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