Guardian Cryptic 27,792 by Tramp

74 comments on “Guardian Cryptic 27,792 by Tramp”

1. I’m not sure I buy a couple of the devices here. In 12d we are supposed to accept do means tour, because it means that in “doing Germany”. The problem here is that you can use “do” with almost any noun and it takes on the meaning of the most appropriate activity with that noun, in the current context. I can do a museum, do lunch, do my taxes, do my hair, do my nails, do the bed etc. etc.

   We must also believe that live=lead because “live a life”=”lead a life”. This supposes that you can do regular algebra with words, which is not always true because some phrases are idiomatic not compositional. On reflection this is quite ironic because doing cryptic crosswords is nothing but algebra with words.

   Finally, I find ASAP much more acceptable than yesterday’s SSSI. Not entirely sure why, maybe because you can pronounce ASAP.

   Thanks Tramp and PeterO.

2. I could not parse 5d, 18a, 16a dar, 4d.

   NEW caudated.

   I failed to solve 11a mark = model?, 10a, 9a, 3d, 24d, 27a.

   Thanks Peter and Tramp.

3. michelle@2, ODO has:

   4 (followed by a numeral) a particular model or type of a vehicle or machine: a Mark 10 Jaguar.

   Guess this must be it. Perhaps a bit confusing because, in the example, Jaguar would be the marque.

4. Didn’t mind lead, or do for tour, but I take your points Dr W. Retrocede was new, grab for interest was neat, yes took a bit to parse 27, bunged balladeers in lazily, and dnp stye because looker looked like locker in my draft print (stingy with ink). Also wondered whether caudate is already an adjective without the last d.

   Enjoyable, thanks Tramp and PeterO.

5. Thanks for the blog, PeterO. In 8d side = party not part.

   I don’t have a dictionary with me but lead = live is in Chambers (I checked at the weekend). Do has many meanings which is why its entry in the dictionary is very large; that’s what makes it a useful word for setters. Mark = brand is also in the dictionary. Once again, I come on here to defend clues which are supported by the dictionary.

   Neil

6. Tramp@5:

   > Mark = brand is also in the dictionary.

   But is “brand” the same as “model”. Don’t we usually distinguish the make/brand from the model? My recent car registration papers certainly do!

7. Thanks Tramp and PeterO

   Let me say straight away that I really enjoyed this. There were far more ticks than I normally give for any puzzle, let alone a Tramp one! These included MUSIC, SISSY, SCARABS and DRUMMER.

   As ever there were several unparsed, and a few gripes. These have mostly been mentioned. TOUR for “do”, ASAP as (4) (yes, unlike SSSI, it can be pronounced as a four-letter word, but it generally isn’t). Isn’t a PASS KEY a master key rather than a code?

   Some people would be disappointed if I didn’t complain about the “in” in 16a 🙂

8. Sorry. I don’t know why I typed “brand”. I meant “mark = model” is supported by Chambers.

   muffin: I would be disappointed if you did complain about 16a. Definition in Wordplay — what’s wrong with that?

9. Hi Tramp

   I don’t like the “in” construction. The “needing a lot of repair” isn’t in the church. I know that most people have no problem with this, but it leaps out at me every time I see it. At least I’m consistent!

10. I found it quite difficult and only got going with Rumpelstiltskin.  And then I got the e and the l the wrong way round and that held me up for ages, wondering what the tournament could be.

    Several clues I didn’t like, but have to admit they are fair.

    Couldn’t parse Spare Tyre and I’m still not quite sure I understand it.  Does ‘buttery layer essentially’ just mean ‘take two letters from buttery layer’?  Having a bad day!

     

11. Quite a few ticks and some question marks. Like michelle@2, I was unfamiliar with 20a CAUDATED. 4d LEAD was a bit of a guess, and I didn’t understand why 16a was CEDAR. But I liked the references to Rod Stewart in 26a and Keith Moon in 17d. And I enjoyed solving 1a STRIP CLUB, 6a BUSTS, 3d PARK, 8d SIDEKICKS and 22d PENCE. Many thanks to Tramp and PeterO, and previous posters, including Tramp for dropping in.

12. Entertaining puzzle and all fair enough. Like Anna @10, I was held up by having the E and L the wrong way round in RUMPELSTILSTKIN which, incidentally, was my favourite clue.

    Thanks to Tramp and PeterO.

13. [I also smiled a lot at 13d’s “Rock star” reference. Agree with Median@12 that RUMPELSTILTSKIN was goodie. I was trying to imagine the illustrations in a Mr Men book called “Little Miss Punk”. Some tats, spiky hair and safety pins???]

14. I saw the possible problem with RUMPELSTILTSKIN and left the EL blank until I had the crosser.

    Anna @10

    It’s specifically the central (“essential”) letters of “butTery” and “laYer”, as PeterO indicated.

15. A mixed bag for me – DNF due to “year” and “stye” but what really struck me was the mix of utterly lovely clues and ones I took no pleasure in solving (and the use of the personal, active tone is intentional – I do not mean they were bad clues by any objective standard, but my subjective take was that I did not like them).

    “cedar” worked well for me, with a nice surface, and “asap” I was fine with as it has become an acronym not an abbreviation (see my comments on this earlier in the week). I have heard people say “asap” as a word and usage defines our language. I’ve never heard anyone say “sssi” as a long hissy! “strut” worked well for me, as did “regnant”, “balladeers” and quite a few others. “pence” made me smile, as did “racecards” and “drummer” albeit with a rather odd surface (the result of too many years touring?)

    Like DrWhatsOn I was not sold on “tour” for “do”. I first put “line” for “live wire” as the “live” is more properly called the “line” these days and one can be “on the wire” or “on the line” if speaking on the telephone. Unfortunate but we’ve seen a few examples in the past week of alternative solutions. Otherwise I was just uneasy with some of the synonyms which were rather stretched as were some definitions – rumpelstiltskin is a children’s story rather than a book, surely? And another querying “pass key” for “code”. A pass key can be a password in computing, but it’s not a code.

    So lots to like here but a few too many niggles for my taste. Nevertheless, thank you Tramp for some innovative and misleading clues which gave my brain a fine workout, and PeterO for fathoming it all out.

     

16. Good crossword with quite a few entertaining clues.

    As has been mentioned, do can mean so many different things that one can’t really choose without crossers. Do = TOUR is in my Chambers Crossword Dictionary though, so no complaints. I would agree with some others that PASS KEY is not really a code – it might be coded at the reception desk but I don’t think that makes it a code. A difficult phrase to define without using key but master might be a possibility as some say ” a master” for the key.

    Thanks Tramp and PeterO.

17. Thank you Neil and PeterO,

    Taxing and highly enjoyable. Loved it !

18. Thanks for the blog, PeterO.

    Tramp really shouldn’t have to say, ‘Once again, I come on here to defend clues which are supported by the dictionary.’  We may not always like what we find there [CAUDATED, for instance, grantinfreo @4 😉 ] but there has to be some point of reference.

    Very recently, there was some puzzling [to me] discussion re do = cook – more common than do = tour, perhaps, but I’d readily use the latter, too: on a day trip, maybe: ‘Let’s do the museums and churches first – that’ll leave some time for the shops’.

    It’s the rich variety of the English language that makes it so ideally suited to the cryptic crossword and my favourite setters are those who manoeuvre and exploit it to the full – and take obvious delight in doing so.

    Like JinA, I had fun picturing Little Miss Punk [lovely clue!] and liked the Rod Stewart and Keith Moon clues. I also admired the construction and surface of BAR GRAPHS and  smiled at PENCE.

    [To be honest, muffin, it wouldn’t spoil my day if you didn’t complain. I’m one of those who see nothing wrong with Definition in Wordplay.]

    Many thanks,Tramp, for another highly enjoyable puzzle – and for dropping in again.

19. Thank you Tramp and PeterO.

    A very enjoyable puzzle.  As for PeterO, 27a was the last parsed, I got confused trying to work lAYEr into the answer.

    Travatore @6, the COED gives “mark n. 7 (usu. Mark) (followed by a numeral) a particular design, model, etc. of a car, aircraft, etc. (this is the Mark 2 model).”.

20. To muffin @14

    Thanks, I am grateful you took the trouble to explain what must be blatantly obvious to everyone else in the universe.  I understand it now.  So ‘essentially’ means ‘the middle letters’.  Yes, I’m sure I would normally have got that.

    And I am quite aware of what our blogger wrote.  For some reason, the use of the bold type sort of obscured the fact that they were the middle letters.

    Like I say, it’s a difficult day.  Not a happy bunny.

21. I parsed 8d as “party with” = “side’ rather than just “party”.

    I was okay with most of the quibbles but did think that “do” for “tour” was poor, ‘do’ can be a synonym for any and every verb or noun if the context is known so it stumbles across the line of acceptability for me.

    I also thought that 14A and 17 stood out in the wrong way, surfaces that would make Brummie blush and which telegraphed their solutions.

    Other than that I really enjoyed it with a special shout out for 22.

    Thanks Tramp and PeterO.

22. Some great clues here, STRIP CLUB, SUGAR RAY LEONARD, RUMPELSTILTSKIN and BALLADEERS among them.

    No harm at all in having a challenging puzzle and agree with Eileen@18.

     

23. Thanks to Tramp and PeterO. I generally found this tough going, particularlarly in the top half. In the end a DNF for me, though in hindsight I do not know why. I failed on park (obvious now) and Sugar Ray Leonard. With the latter I think I a must have tried anagrams of all combinations of words in the clue, except of course the correct combination (not helped by missing park). Still an enjoyable challenge and I did like racecards, spare tyre and pass key. Thanks again to Tramp and PeterO.

24. Some interesting comments today. As has been mentioned above already, I too needed to check the parsing of LANDMARK, BAR GRAPHS, SPARE TYRE & TOURNAMENT, but think Tramp’s clueing was ultimately fair and made for a more interesting puzzle.

    Thanks to Tramp & PeterO.

25. Eileen @ 18 Surely it’s an interest in the richness of language that draws people to cryptic crosswords, an interest in the usage, history and local variations in language? But so many discussions about what a word means are shut down with “it’s in Chambers” it’s as if nothing else has any importance.

    Take your example, why bother to specify whether you intend to tour, visit, paint, vandalise, tick off, rob, photograph, count, etc., etc. the museums and churches when you can just ‘do’ them?

    Posters have justified mark=model by reference to cars but manufacturers often use mark numbers to differentiate between different versions of the same model – so does mark mean model or version or both? Who cares, it’s in Chambers!

26. robert: can do mean tour? Yes it can. Do people say “do London”? Yes they do and that’s why it’s in Chambers. Do can mean other things but that is irrelevant. Can mark mean model? Yes it can. Mark can mean many other things as well but that’s irrelevant. I’m a statistician by profession and not a lexicographer and so I have to use dictionaries as my guide: most setters do the same. If solvers have concerns with dictionary entries they should take them up with the professional lexicographers, not the crossword setters.

27. I had fun with this. It was a DNF for me because of SPARE TYRE–I was thinking like an American again, and I just couldn’t see any words with the pattern _Y_E. (We spell it with an I, of course.) I have this problem less often these days, but it still sometimes gets in the way.

    On the other hand, in addition to the favorites identified by others, I giggled at the thought of Mike Pence peeing across North Carolina. (I’m no fan of the man.)

28. Thank you, Tramp, for this (and othe)r puzzles, and for your contributions to the blog.

    robert @25

    It is not that nothing other than Chambers is of importance; nor is it infallible. However, if you are concerned with the definition of a word, surely a dictionary is the prime resource, and among dictionaries Chambers has various advantages – it is widely available, reasonable compact, not outlandishly expensive, and has a huge vocabulary. As such. it is probably the most often quoted justification for a definition in this blog. Alternatives tend to be along the lines of “That’s what I mean when I say’There’s glory for you’.”

29. Thanks to Tramp and PeterO. Tough going for me. I had the same problems as those already mentioned but also with LEAD and BAR GRAPHS.

30. I think I agree with robert @25.  The issue is not whether two words are given rough equivalence in a dictionary, but whether this rough equivalence is clear enough from a clue to be helpful.  I imagine there were very few people approaching the clue who were able to say “ah … a word beginning with TOUR …” upon reading “Do …”.  For most, the equivalence would only have been spotted after working out from crossers and other elements that the whole solution had to be TOURNAMENT.  So as a cryptic element it was redundant.

    My quibble with “do = tour” is that in current usage “do” would more likely be used to refer to a perfunctory visit to tick somewhere off a list, rather than giving it a proper tour.

31. Seriously good puzzle. Muffin with no complaints reminds me of a 70s US ad using Don Rickles.I thinks it was a car hire firm that was supposed to be so good that even the Don couldnt complain.

    But I doubt he did puzzles.

    Thanks Tramp(also for pooping in), PeterO , Eileen, Muffin and    everyone else

32. DNF – RumpEL stiltskinned myself out of it.

33. Took me a while to find an opening, then about half went in quickly, then a real struggle – needed a couple of cheats to finish. Enjoyed the challenge.

    Thanks to Tramp and PeterO

     

34. To clarify an earlier comment: it is not that do has other meanings that disqualifies it, it’s that it has *so many* other meanings that it’s a very weak synonym.

    Regarding Chambers. It has been said that patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel, well I would like to think that a dictionary is the last refuge of a prize puzzle. Now I know there is no rule or convention that this be the case, but it strikes me that a nice distinction between daily and prize puzzles (amongst other things) is that you don’t need a dictionary to justify daily clues.

35. PeterO @ 28 I’m fond of Chambers and agree it has many advantages (and a few drawbacks) but it would not be my first choice dictionary for definitions – it has an openly stated policy of being light on definitions in order to make room for more entries.

36. Interesting discussion on dictionaries. From my perspective, the issue is (a bit like Van Winkle) one of directionality. To be an acceptable answer a word has to be in the dictionary, and ditto a synonym if not clued as an example etc. But is it a case of being a necessary but not sufficient condition?

    Neil (Tramp) makes a very valid point that, as a setter it is not his job to police the English language and others have commented that there has to be a line drawn somewhere, even if the line is a little fuzzy with different dictionaries. I cannot dispute these points.

    I think the reason I have qualms about a couple of these clues (and many others over the past – not picking on any setter) is, I think, to do with the translation backwards from synonym to original word, or definition to word. In the latter case, a neat misdirection or clever piece of camouflage is a joy (racecards did it here, as did Pence) but a simply obscure definition (IMO) should be justified by the surface – nutmeg’s use of the pedantic meaning of pedagogic yesterday raised eyebrows but few complaints. In the former, the problem arises when the mapping is one-to-(too) many and I think that’s where “do” and “set” cause problems. Some clue words are notorious for having various possibilities – monarch could be ER, R, GR, VR, Q, K…and a few more. But “set” has 2 full columns in my ancient Chambers so it is not a word I could look at and say “aha, it’s this, this or this”. In jigsaw terms, it’s a piece of pure blue sky and therefore the other pieces had best be pretty unambiguous.

    What does it come down to? I agree there are rules and dictionaries are a good source of them, with some leeway so as not to constrain brilliance and inventiveness – ASAP didn’t bother me where SSSI really did. But just because something is in the dictionary doesn’t make it a good or even a fair clue – that depends on the clue as a whole. Too much ambiguity, like too little, is no fun and so every clue is aiming for the Goldilocks zone. Unfortunately, that is pretty tricky when that zone has a different mean and standard deviation for every solver! So praise for the good clues and perhaps, in future, I should shut up about the ones I don’t like so much because setting is an impossible job if satisfying everyone is a criterion. Where there is room for criticism is outright errors such as anagrams that don’t work, wrong parts of speech and poor or unnecessary link words, which are the kinds of things that should be picked up in editing.

37. Apologies DrWhatsOn @34 my mega-post crossed yours, with much the same main point.

38. Thanks to PeterO and Tramp

    First of all, I enjoyed this crossword. A nice variety of devices, with some very good definitions – NOW POWERFUL, RING MAN ONCE, and others.

    Although I don’t share Muffin’s concern at the use of IN as a link between Definition and Wordplay, I think I can see his point:

    When the wordplay precedes the definition then IN reads naturally.

    When the definition precedes the wordplay then perhaps FROM reads a little better than IN e.g, Wood FROM church needing a lot of repair.

    However IN is valid, so no complaints.

    I have “given out”, about the chameleon word DO previously, so here I’ll limit myself to agreeing with Van Winkle@30. If I hear someone claim to have DONE a place or attraction I assume they mean “ticked off the list”. They may have taken an open top bus TOUR though.

    21a I don’t mind the odd abbreviation being used without (1,1,1,1,) etc. but my Collins now lists asap as a word now anyway.

    On the subject of new devices, I wouldn’t mind seeing a few indirect anagrams as long as the implied word comes from a very short list – AZED has even used them subject to that strict criterion.

    I wouldn’t mind for instance: First son, mixed race (4)

39. ps, I can’t find S as an abbreviation for SUN in any of my dictionaries. Is it in the full Chambers anyone?

40. Thezed: absolutely. It’s all about search spaces and priors.

41. I have not been hiding from the replies [particularly robert @25] to my comment @18: I had to go out immediately after posting it.

    Regular readers will know that I have no brief to hold for dictionaries: when blogging, I quite often say that I don’t like a definition  and then add ‘but it’s in Chambers’ – to let the setter off the hook. As I said earlier, there must be some point of reference and, as Tramp says @26, any complaints with the lexicographers should be taken up with them.

    thezed @36 – thanks for your comment. I didn’t rise to the comment re teachers on my Nutmeg blog on Tuesday. I don’t object to being called a pedant [in the field of grammar] – in fact I often admit to [or even boast of] it. The definition of PEDAGOGIC in the puzzle was not pedantic but ‘picky’, which, according to both Collins [my preferred dictionary] and Chambers means choosy or fussy – which covers a much wider area and which I would not like applied to me!

     

42. I found this both hard and tough going but then it’s Tramp! Some enjoyable answers though. SUGAR RAY LEONARD came by osmosis.I played with the letters and could make nothing of it and then suddenly saw it. 25ac was obvious to me and I didn’t bother to check the parsing. PENCE was lovely despite the man himself,as was MUSIC. CAUDATED was entirely new and I don’t think I’ve come across RETROCEDE before.
    Thanks Tramp.

43. It took me a while to make a start and then the top half fell into place nicely. But I found the bottom half much harder and slower. No idea why. My fave today was PENCE. Maybe because the Number One is a real Number Two. 🙂

    Today is/was a lovely sunny day with beautiful skies and the spring flowers looked wonderful in the local woods. Too nice a day to have a heated discussion about whether a word being in the dictionary makes it fair to use in a puzzle. 😛

    Thanks to Tramp and PeterO

44. Surely the last syllable in 20 is redundant. Caudate and caudated (if the latter exists) must mean exactly the same thing.

45. Thanks both,

    Although Chambers says ‘caudated’ is a zoological term. OED only provides examples in relation to poetry. In academic papers, Google Scholar finds 271,000 examples of “caudate” but only about 290 for “caudated”, some of which refer to poetry. At that kind of ratio the usage is usually a mistake or part of a name (Caudated brown butterfly). This is another example of Chambers getting things wrong, or so brief as to be misleading, which is why I find the ‘but it’s in Chambers’ defence. Putting it another way, when setters are using words that are obscure or where they are unsure of the meaning, it would be good if they checked them in a variety of sources rather than relying on one.

46. I enjoyed the crossword and subsequently appreciated the discussions on the use of dictionaries and around the validity and suitability of words like ‘do’ which have so many synonymous or matching words.

    There is no question about the valid use of ‘do’ in the clue for TOURNAMENT.  The only question for me is whether it is fair to give such a weak (albeit accurate) pointer to the word TOUR, in the context of the crossword as a whole and the pitch of the crossword.  It’s a matter of judgement, and I thought the use of ‘do’ made that clue more difficult than others in its vicinity but was completely fair.

    The only quibble I had was the use of L = live in BALLADEERS.  My Chambers has L = line (which I know from electrical wiring diagrams) but not L = live.  Perhaps another dictionary allows it.

    As a dictionary for uses away from crosswords, I prefer Collins to Chambers, but I think Chambers has established itself as the primary source of reference for setters and solvers of national daily cryptic crosswords, and that fact seems to be assumed in the discussion on this page.

47. I found this one progressed quite steadily.  However, I ran out of time at the end and did not get LANDMARK or SPARE TYRE.  I also accidentally (honest!) hit the “reveal” button to gift STRUT, so a DNF overall.

    No issues with the various synonyms discussed above.  I quite enjoyed the discussion.

    As cricket is such a perennial favourite resource for setters, I’m a bit surprised Tramp didn’t make use of “Rock star Bedser” in 13!

    Good puzzle.  Thanks, S&B.

48. Tramp @ 26 I can understand you being defensive but my comment was about the use of ‘it’s in Chambers’ to close the discussion about usage of particular words (particularly given it’s ironic usage in a post championing the richness of language).

    Yes, do can mean tour (I already described it as acceptable but poor in my opinion) and mark can mean model (I wrote that I was okay with most of the aforementioned quibbles).

    The clues are obviously supported by the dictionary and if that’s all that matters fine, personally I’m interested in knowing why people think they’re not and learning more about how people use language.

    If all we can do is post platitudes and recite ‘it’s in Chambers’ then we may as well move to the Guardian site.

49. I didn’t solve any crosswords today because Mr CS and I have been ‘doing’ Ironbridge so I thought I’d just say it obviously would work for me

50. crypticsue @49

    I think the point that people are making is that “tour>do” is much fairer than “do>tour”.

51. … and the point would simply be proven false if someone could claim (per me @30) that they made use of “do>tour” as a cryptic element in solving the clue – ie, were led to look for a word beginning TOUR…. .

52. I won’t use do = tour again even though I think it’s ok and I don’t think many people will have failed to solve the clue for TOURNAMENT.

53. I thoroughly enjoyed this puzzle – many thanks to Tramp. It was placed (only) just inside the boundary of my ability, so it was a tough mental workout for me, but I got there in the end. The lovely ‘aha’ moment when I finally parsed 18a was the highlight.

     

    Thanks to PeterO for the blog.

54. I’ve found today’s discussion fascinating.  I think it highlights the difference between a clue being technically valid and its being fair or reasonable.  Suppose we had, say, “Happy rock man (9)”, answer GLADSTONE.  Well William Gladstone was undeniably a man, so the clue is valid.  But I think most people would agree that “man” is a hopelessly vague definition for that answer and we would expect something a bit more specific.

    The point applies as much to elements of clues as it does to definitions, hence the unease about “do” for TOUR.  Occasionally we see “note” to indicate one of the letters from A to G, and some people will object to this on the same grounds of vagueness.  But we could take matters further, and any letter, H for example, could theoretically be indicated by the word “letter”.  The setter could respond to objections to this by saying, quite rightly, that Chambers has, for H, “The eighth letter of the modern English alphabet”, but that would surely be missing the point.

    Tramp, I’d just typed the above before seeing your comment @52.  I really appreciate you engaging in the discussion and I take your point that if the clue overall is gettable then elements of it can arguably be more vague or obscure.

55. Thanks Tramp and PeterO

    A puzzle I couldn’t finish for reasons of space and time.

    Dansar @ 39: yes, it’s in current eChambers as ‘abbrev’ definition 13.

    Alan B @ 46 L = live is common in the wiring diagram for a plug.

56. Plenty has been said and my view is setters can do what they like – and its up to us whether we like it or not. Personally I like the wide variety of setting styles and get more enjoyment from some than others. I think it’s great that Tramp consistently engages in discussions here and helps us understand his thinking.
    As for this puzzle I found it tough with several unparsed and a dnf as my misspelt RUMPLESTILSKIN meant I didn’t get the much discussed TOURNAMENT. There were also plenty of clues I liked with DRUMMER being my favourite – I’ll have to listen to some early Who now.
    Many thanks to Tramp and PeterO.

57. I’m with Dr W.

58. I’m sorry but “do”=”tour” is nonsense. Of course I completed the puzzle but not without reservations.

    When one says “we’ll do the museums” surely this is only a reference to a previous statement of something like “What shall we do today?”. To which the answer may be. “We’ll visit the museum, kick the dog, burn down the church and kill the vicar”

    Of course then we can say “We’ll do the dog first”.

    So of course “do”=”kick”. Absolute rubbish.

    Thanks for visiting Tramp but please try to be a little more modest (and accurate 😉 )

59. Now, let’s take 4d: “Live wire (4)”.

    In my opinion, this is a good example of how a setter wants a ‘double definition’ to be. The ‘surface’ makes sense and – on top of it – both components are pronounced differently. Like others I had my doubts about ‘live’=’lead’ but it is in the dictionaries. So, in the end, for me, an exquisite DD clue.

    Then, TOURNAMENT (12d), much discussed here today. I had no problem to find the answer (after a few crossers) but, indeed, didn’t immediately see ‘do’=’tour’. So, what’s next? You’ll think about how that works. And it works! Parsing it afterwards? Well, why not?  No problem for us. That’s part of the beautiful game.

    While this may not have been Tramp’s most inspiring puzzle (matter of taste, though), there’s no reason to put him in the role of Virgil van Dijk. For the few who don’t know who he is: apart from being a fellow countryman, he is a defender. Yes, I know Tramp is an Evertonian but if the comparison makes sense, Virgil is also someone who is reliable and creative. As is Tramp.

    Apart from, in our opinion, 22d [we don’t like these PeeWee clues anymore – see today’s Indy blog] another very enjoyable crossword – no quibbles here.

    Many thanks to PeterO & Neil.

60. Trovatore@3 and Tramp @4

    thanks for explaining

    My notes @2 were not a criticism, but a question. More like talking out loud on my sick bed. I was ill yesterday so my brain was not working all that well. Later in the day, I also thought of Mark 10 Jag, or mark = brand. Sorry if I offeneded anyone.

61. sorry for the typos above – should be Tramp @5, and ‘offended’

     

62. From today’s Times:

    Leave to see the sights of US city, adopting new water transport” = GONDOLA.

    Neil

63. Simon S @55

    Thank you for that.

    Tramp @62

    It displays parsing on “do” lacks substance

     

64. The Times clue supports muffin’s point @50 – it is using “see the sights” to imply “do”, not “do” to imply “see the sights”. More solvable.

65. Well done Neil; both Chambers and The Times in your camp…..

    …..and me. I liked the clue from the start, regardless of the fact it took me a while to see.

     

66. Having worked on one geometric problem for over two years, I don’t get much satisfaction from a puzzle that is immediately obvious.

    Keep up the great work and keep us guessing !

67. Simon S @55

    I too have seen ‘live’ in place of ‘L’ on wiring diagrams, and people know what it means, but my main point was that L = live is not in Chambers, whereas L = line is.

    I have just looked up ‘L’ in Collins.  To my great surprise, L = live is there, but L = line is not!

68. Alan B @42 a good example of a dictionary being definitively wrong – the wire in an AC circuit which varies in voltage and is not tied to ground is called the line. It and the neutral are the live wires, ie the ones involved in conducting the current responsible for power delivery. It has been thus for a very long time. The “L” on a circuit or plug refers to the line, not the live as it is distinct from the neutral. But then my copy of Chambers defines a loudspeaker as a device that amplifies sound, which is also wrong – it converts an electrical signal to sound. A loudhailer amplifies it. Outside the OED, dictionaries can be a little lax it seems.

69. Excellent as usual from Tramp, challenging with trademark misdirection, creativity and wit in abundance.

    Feel I may be commenting into a vacuum but just came here and can’t quite believe the fuss about ‘do’! I think it comes back to something that’s been discussed here about people’s preferences for bottom up vs top down solving – ie from definition vs building up from wordplay.

    My thoughts – for TOURNAMENT the synonym was an easy one so the wordplay can (and in my opinion should) be more obscure. Conversely, when a solution is an obscure word or the definition is loose, then the wordplay needs to be very precise.

    Vlad (along with Tramp one of my absolute favourite setters) I thought fell foul of this a couple of weeks back with ‘Mammal disconcerted eating Welshman (4,5)’ – answer TREE SHREW. Mammal has many possibilities and Welshman does too.

    Here though while do = tour may indeed be on a long list of possible meanings, for anyone to say that competition = tournament is not a fair clue is plainly ridiculous. Meanwhile do = tour is backed up by dictionaries so indisputably ok

70. Thanks nobby. Of the solvers that can spell RUMPELSTILTSKIN I wonder how many of them couldn’t solve TOURNAMENT because of the use of do. I also wonder how many of the comments above are from our resident troll: loser.

    The post about me being immodest is uncalled for and inaccurate. It should have been moderated.

    Anyway. Goodbye 225.

    Neil

71. Tramp @70

    That’s a shame. There are one or two on this site who specialise in ad hominem comments, as soon as I see their name I don’t bother to read the rest.

    I hope my comment @63 didn’t contribute to your decision – it was meant to be in support of your use of DO.

72. [Neil – Don’t be silly; you must know how much (many of us) admire and enjoy your puzzles and also your visits here. (I too have threatened to ‘leave’ 225, more than once, but….).]

    As for this most enjoyable puzzle, I saved it to savour with Saturday morning’s coffee since Tramp is one of my “top favourite” setters.
    Tramp – a couple of things I’ve noticed here. The Great Muffin tends to post early, tends to quibble (ofttimes vacuously) and perhaps thereby tends to set the tone (unfairly, if unintentionally) of some later commenters. As a statistician you must know the saying about politicians and statistics – I’m moved to restyle it slightly: “some people use their quibbles as a drunkard uses a lamppost – for leaning on, rather than illumination!”
    Personally (I’m with ‘il principe dell’oscurita’ here) I liked that you used ‘do’ as a synonym for ‘tour’ since it was precisely that which delivered the clue’s ‘aha’ moment……(to be cont.)

73. cont…..)
    I particularly enjoyed PENCE (beautifully constructed) and DRUMMER was delightful (a great clue that certainly did not, for me, “telegraph the solution” as robert suggests!)

    I had great fun solving this puzzle and would strongly counsel Tramp to alter nothing of his style by dint of any baseless comments here. Having read most of the Guardian crossword posts here for the last seven or eight years, I’ve noticed a correlation between volume of empty quibbles and a need to justify inadequacies in solving rather than setting. It makes me sad to see, but I would be even sadder if we were to be deprived of Tramp’s visits here. And it wouldn’t be fair to the likes of me!

    Many thanks to Tramp for the pleasure he invariably gives.
    And to PeterO for his sterling, and generous, work.

    (Phew – these posts took longer than the solve, but worth it to redress any imbalance above….and to keep Tramp from leaving us!)

74. thezed @68

    Thank you for your explanation of ‘L’, which confirms what I knew as a layman but is evidently written from an expert’s point of view.  I do find incorrect entries in dictionaries on rare occasions, and as I said I was surprised at what I saw in Collins.

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