Guardian 26,015 – Chifonie

46 comments on “Guardian 26,015 – Chifonie”

1. Thanks manehi.

   Carol Singleton was (is?) an actress and a character in a film, played by Brooke Adams. It meant I couldn’t get a handle on how to break it down – very clever. Excellent surfaces, as you expect from Chifonie – but I found TIPPER disappointing – there’s a TIPPER ale (small T) named after Thomas Tipper but I expect he thought it too obscure. Tipper truck is available to avoid the clunky agent-noun. Maybe just me. POTTER similar, though the agent noun stays in the clue there. Hogwarts? Or would that be more irritating?

2. Many thanks Manehi & Chifonie for a nice gentle stroll.

   Clearly, Chifonie is a GENTLE man because he used the same word in an earlier puzzle, blogged by Andrew on 6 July 2012:

   A gentle is a maggot used as fishing bait. It’s perhaps dialectical or archaic – I think I remember seeing it in George Orwell’s Coming Up For Air, when the narrator learns to fish as a boy.

   See: http://www.fifteensquared.net/2012/07/06/guardian-25681-chifonie/

3. Brian @ 2

   Me too (Coming Up for Air). GENTLES still currency in Yorkshire. When I had my short-lived career in fishing my uncle and brief mentor told me that the maggots in their pupal stage in their brown casings were the ‘gentles’ – no idea where he got that, never heard it since. Fishing can be a bit boring frankly and he may have made it up to fill in a couple of minutes.

4. I really enjoyed this elegant puzzle with its concise clues and story-telling surfaces. Every clue I solved made me smile! I particularly liked 9a,11a, 16d, 20d, 24d, 18d, 26a & 21d (last one in) and my favourites were 1a CURTSY, 3d SINGLETON, 17a CATNIP, 23d MAYOR.

   New words for me today were ESTAMINET, ALCOPOP, GENTLE = ‘maggot’.

   I couldn’t parse 5d.

   Thanks for the blog, manehi.

5. Thanks Chifonie and manehi
   Very straightforward. Is everyone else happy about RECEPTIVE = ACCESSIBLE?

6. Muffin@5
   I’m fine with it: e.g. a receptive/accessible person or audience

7. michelle @6
   Aren’t the processes going in opposite directions? A person can be receptive to an accessible work?
   Perhaps I’m missing something!

8. @aztobesed, your comment on agent nouns in 7dn inspired me look up “Snook: vi to snuff or smell about; to lurk, prowl or sneak about.” Chambers then gives the derivation of “snooker” as “from old military slang /snooker/ a raw cadet, perh from [the aforementioned] snook”. Anyway, as said above, I quite liked 15ac.

   @muffin: they’re both reasonably close to “approachable”, though I agree its not the cleanest definition. “Hear about gym being open” ?

9. Hi manehi
   I prefer your clue!

10. manehi @ 8

    As I remember, SNOOKER is horrible to track down. Imperial military slang originating in India or some such. In Oxford Etymology they invariably stick in ‘Orign Unkn’. Someone who tips being a TIPPER? And the definition ‘benefactor’? I wondered what a waiter might use – patron? Considerate customer? I can’t imagine the waiter saying “We had some good benefactors in tonight”. Maybe I’m being unfair and it was a really posh ESTAMINET. I just associate a benefactor with something a little more substantial than a tip. Pip’s benefactor was Magwitch, who went to Australia for ten year sweltering as a sheep-farmer so that Pip could swan around London in a high silk hat – now, that’s benfacting for you. 😀

11. @aztobesed: I’ve heard waiter friends talking of good or bad TIPPERs. Naturally they wouldn’t use “benefactor” in place of TIPPER – nor, especially the Oxford students accustomed to the red and white varieties, would they use “pink” in place of CARNATION. Still, both of these definitions are enough of a guide to the solution that they get a pass from me at least.

12. Thanks Chifonie and manehi.

    I have two thesauruses/i giving RECEPTIVE=accessible, so can’t fault the setter there, maybe, although manehi @8’s clue is a good alternative.

    Strangely, I noticed there were about nine ‘Ps’ in the puzzle and there used to be nine planets, including SATURN, in the solar system until Pluto was disqualified [spooky! :?] Must keep taking the tablets…….

    I particularly liked SINGLETON and DEBRIS.

13. manehi @ 11
    I’m not sure what your point is about “carnation” – I am sure though that you are right about the term NOT being applied to wine!
    Carnations are “pinks” (Dianthus). The term “pink” derives from the frilly edges to their petals (as in the dressmaker’s “pinking shears”), and the colour was named after the flower, not vice versa.

14. muffin: thanks, I wasn’t aware of that. My intended point was more that the “would you naturally replace X with Y in a sentence” test isn’t how I personally judge definitions, though I now realise it was a poor example. SATURN and “space traveller” might have been a better pick.

    [edit to clarify my obscure Oxford reference: students here wear white carnations to their first exams, red carnations to their last, and pinks in between]

15. Thanks Chifonie and Manehi; an easy day. Re ‘tipper=benefactor’, Manehi is surely right to point out that the operative notion of synonymy in crosswords must be a bit slack. Insisting on high levels of intersubstitutivity would rule out a great many decent clues. Just to take today’s puzzle: no mathematician would countenance the egregious ‘impetus = energy’ and how many of us would substitute ‘enlistment programme’ for ‘press gang’? In this as elsewhere, good enough is good.

16. Thanks, manehi. I’m amazed that people have found so much to talk about in what I had thought to be one of the most uncontroversial puzzles of the year!

    For those looking for something much more substantial, head over to the Indy where our friend Tramp is hiding out as Jambazi.

17. Thanks, manehi.

    Easily digestible puzzle which just slipped down. I did like DEBRIS.

    Further to muffin’s point about ‘pink’ @13, English seems unique in naming this pale red shade after Dianthus spp.; in most languages the flower referenced is the rose (unlike ‘orange’ and ‘violet’, which are widely named after the fruit and flower respectively). It seems incontrovertible that the colour is named after the flower, but the etymology of ‘pink’ = Dianthus is not firmly established – the allusion to the fringed petals is just one possibility.

18. Thanks to manehi for the blog. You explained something that had me scratching my head: Reading=R and I live here!

    I keep telling myself that ‘see’ in a clue can mean bishopric and I always forget. 🙁

19. Thanks Chifonie and Manehi. My LOI was GENTLE – I began by trying to find an obscure sense of “beet” as “fellow”. Overall, an enjoyable, reasonably gentle (!) workout.

20. My parents, now long gone, were avid gardeners. I remember they got very cross about people, usually me, confusing pinks and carnations. Yes they belong to the same family, but they are not the same. Carnations are relatively tall, whereas pinks are low clumpy things, hence they are found in different parts of a flower bed. As noted here for example http://www.greenfingers.com/articledisplay.asp?id=146 Maybe people are sloppier with the names nowadays. Let me guess, some dictionary contributor, who has never gardened in their life, has said they are the same?

21. Thanks manehi and Chifonie.

    I wouldn’t say I found this very tricky, but I was certainly held up (in retrospect unaccountably) in several areas. Plenty to like, however, my favourite being ALCOPOP.

    DL @ 20, I have no doubt that you are correct regarding the distinction between carnations and pinks (and I’m no gardener so I wouldn’t dare argue the point) but there are two other potential justifications for the clue: firstly, carnations certainly can be pink, but if that isn’t satisfactory, in heraldry carnation is the colour described as “the colour of pale or white human skin (i.e., pale pinkish peach)”.

    Either way, it was surely utterly obvious what the clue was saying.

22. Sigh! Somebody else who invents words that are not there. I never mentioned the clue. I’m aware that some people confuse the two plants, as indeed I used to do, so I just thought I’d be helpful, for future reference you might say.

23. Sigh from me too. I can’t remember the Roman writer who claimed that the aim of good writing was not that he could be understood but that he must be understood – but he probably wasn’t taliking about reacting to a daily crossword in twitter length posts. Of course benefactor can equal a tipper and the definition doesn’t have to be slavishly close to the word to be entered – but isn’t part of the discussion to point out that sometimes the equivalences are not so much relatives as vague acquaintances who’ve recently met on a train? Obviously there’s some overlap between a benefactor and a tipper – tips are basically good deeds to express appreciation, as are benefactions and a tipper can be said to be benefacting – but it makes for odd language. I merely meant that it didn’t produce a particularly satisfying clue and wondered whether ‘grateful’ or ‘satisfied’ customer. The same with receptive / accessible. Surely one of the aims of the clue should be an appreciation of wit in the definition part and if they ‘skid’ slightly they don’t feel quite so satisfying. ‘Mess about’ gives you POTTER which is sweet, especially with the jokesy snooker reference. Tipper / benefactor just doesn’t feel as witty – and if CARNATION doesn’t equal PINK maybe next time Chifonie will go for ‘People chase motor that’s milky’. Space traveller is a lovely definition because it’s the literal meaning of planet – but CAYENNE = SPICE is not so satisfying. I sometimes wonder if it a by-product of trying to keep the clues as lean as possible, which I think Cifonie and Rufus are both keen on.

24. I have noticed people inbventing extra candidates for themed entries too Derek!! Weird.People liek to overcomplicate the discussions sometimes, SINGLETON here is amn example, plus, I think it can only be a NOUN — ‘All alone’ is adjectival?

    I liked the jazz fan one too, but again the tense for the ‘def’ is a bit mysterious!!

    Cheers
    R.

25. Sorry Derek – my misunderstanding entirely. I just assumed – evidently quite wrongly – that you were being critical of the clue.

26. Rowly @ 24

    “People like to overcomplicate the discussions sometimes”…

    “Singleton here is an example…”

    “Weird”

    Unless I’m missing great swathes of the thread discussing SINGLETON I really don’t understand this. I haven’t seen anything beyond someone saying they liked it.

    “i have noticed people inventing candidates for themed entries too…”

    On Uncle Yap’s now infamous blog you observed that you thought my Ford pun was ‘weird’. I’m returning the favour – I honestly don’t get it. What candidates? What inventions? What theme? I’m not being shirty – it’s just so unspecific. Again.

27. aztobesed
    He may well correct me but I think Rowly is referring to your own comment #1 where in the first sentence you talk about an actress called Carol Singleton.

28. But this is what I mean. If that is his intention then why not address it unambiguously, Azto@ # 1 and I would have explained that far from inventing themes I was simply pointing out that there is a character and an actress called Carol Singleton whose first name appears in the clue and whose surname in the grid. I’m beginning to realise why some people lose their tempers when they come here. There’s far too much whispering behind hands to frieends for my liking. Why does he not address it to me rather than Derek??? The answer of course is that he can take a cheap shot which he can then deny if it doesn’t go his way.

29. aztobesed
    To my reading, Rowly’s first paragraph is split into two sentences. The first, clearly directed at Derek, is about ‘inventing extra candidates’. The second is a general observation using your comment #1 as an example. There is no suggestion that you were ‘inventing themes’ so I don’t see any evidence of a ‘cheap shot’, as you put it.

    With regard to ‘losing tempers’ and ‘whispering’, what evidence do you have or is this just an assumption or impression? As for being ‘not to your liking’, well I’m sure you know the solution as well as I do.

30. Extraordinary.

    I’m lost for words.

31. Mitz, Ta. But now you come to mention it…. Nah, can’t be bothered.

32. Gaufrid,

    I have gone out of my way, here and in the Other Place, to defend you and this wonderful site that is such a boon to crossword lovers everywhere and into which you and all of the bloggers pour so much effort. Goodness knows what has been the spark that has lead to so much – what to call it, tetchy bickering? – of late. Obviously there have been some unfortunate things said, to put it mildly. I don’t blame you for wanting to put a very firm lid on all unpleasantness.

    I considered sending you an email to express my feelings, but you seem to have a transparency policy, so here goes:

    He certainly doesn’t need defending from me – he’s a big boy – but I was incensed when I read your comment to Aztobesed @29, especially the last line. It is just plain rude. If Azto is guilty of anything it is trying to inject a bit of much needed jocularity in these pages, with original wit and eloquence. If his kind of humour (and indeed insight) is not wanted around these parts, then fifteensquared will be the poorer for it.

33. Derek: my father was a nurseryman. Yes, pinks and carnations are not the same, but the distinction parallels the old daffodil/narcissus debate. One was the other but not vice versa. That’s now been settled: perhaps the same’s now true for dianthus.

34. Yeah, there’s a thought. But obviously some, like the web site I found, stick to tradition. We need an expert then, not memories.

35. Ya know, during the day I get awfully bored and a good argument helps pass the time. Strange I was never in the current bust ups then. Life is full of surprises, especially about ones self!

36. A pleasant enough non-controversial crossword I thought. Although a disappointingly short solve. (20 mins) 🙁

    They say that riots often happen in hot humid weather. Well the current weather appears to be having a similar effect on the contributors here.

    By the way Rowland, singleton can be an adjective, as in

    “Unfortunately he was holding the singleton King to the Ace lead so the game was up!”

    Thanks to manehi and Chifonie

37. Hi Mitz @32
    When I came back to my pc it was with the intention of sending you an email to explain my comment. However, I am more than happy to have the opportunity to discuss this with you in public. As you say, in recent months there has been a lot more backbiting and bickering, with certain contributors appearing to attack some individuals personally. My previous policy was one of a hands-off approach, leaving peer pressure to control proceedings. This has obviously failed recently so I need to step in and take a more active role.

    In my opinion aztobesed had misread Rowly’s comment and had therefore reacted to it in a less than satisfactory way as indicated in my response regarding the ‘inventing themes’ and ‘cheap shot’. As I asked aztobesed, where is the evidence that visiting this site makes “some people lose their tempers (sic, can a person have more than one temper?)” and why does he think there is “whispering behind hands”? I don’t know how he formed the latter opinion but if he doesn’t like what he finds on the site then there is only one possible solution, don’t visit it.

    I agree that the loss of (most of) aztobesed’s contributions (I earlier re-read all of his 232 comments posted so far) would detrimental and, with hindsight, I wish I had put a 😉 after my last sentence as it was said very much tongue in cheek. It is not my intention to drive anybody away (despite the many disparaging remarks about 15², so I’ve been reliably informed, I don’t visit it myself, on the Guardian blog by some people who contribute to both sites – I sometimes wonder if there is a hidden agenda resulting in some of the comments on this site).

    What I want is a peaceful community where people can express their views on puzzles without the fear of being intimidated and/or belittled by others with a more forceful demeanour. In many cases it is not what is said but the way in which it is said.

    I am sorry that you were incensed, it certainly was not my intention to raise anyone’s hackles.

38. You’d think so, wouldn’t you B(NTO), but I can’t find it in Chambers, Collins, or my usual online haunts.

    Re other matters, I support those who see thread-padding as a growing problem here, especially in the Guardian blogs. Yes indeed, suggesting for no apparent reason additions to the obvious themed answers, or parsing clues in deliberately unconventional ways so as to initiate a ‘discussion’ about how ‘extra-clever’ the setter has been, or whatever. Essentially, it’s a way to make off-topic posts (because they are irrelevant) seem on-topic. Clever really.

    And yet, as someone has said, it is very hot and humid.

39. Paul B @38

    If you’re referring to “singleton” I found it in the SOED

    singleton ?s??g(?)lt(?)n ? noun & adjective. l19.
    A noun.
    1 gen. A single person or thing. l19.
    S. Middleton It had stood at the back of an ugly china cabinet…a singleton.
    2 In bridge etc., the only card of a suit in a hand. l19.

    ……….

    B adjective. Of, pertaining to, or designating a singleton. l19.

40. “…suggesting for no apparent reason additions to the obvious themed answers..”. If they aren’t apparent, maybe it’s because there are little-used meanings of certains answers that escaped the setter’s attention and fit the theme: if I were a setter I’m sure I’d be delighted to be told I’d included even more themers than I’d first thought.

    Re thread-padding: could you kindly provide a list of the sort of things that you think can be said here. It’ll probably be quite a short one.

41. Thank you both.

    Re SINGLETON, my Chambers, Collins and SOED have only the noun. I’m sure yours is much more up-to-date, and I’m sure you’re completely right, but I always feel much more comfortable when consulting dictionaries that are mentioned by editors (of the various daily puzzles) as being standard reference tomes. And they tend to be … Collins and (very rarely) Chambers (too many obscure Scottish words). SOED and (certainly) OED are not used, except in emergency.

    Re thread padding, I’ve already given a context, and I don’t think I’ll be too worried about failing to provide specific examples (apart from, perhaps, Carol Singleton) at this point.

    Ah, those ‘little-used meanings of certains (sic) answers’ in daily crossword puzzles.

42. Gaufrid – I don’t think azto “misread Rowly’s comment”.

    “Weird. People like to over-complicate the discussion sometimes, SINGLETON here is an example.” This is derogatory in an insinuating way, or as Chambers puts it, snide.

    “I have noticed people inventing extra candidates for themed entries too Derek!!” does not justify it.

    What Derek said was “Somebody else who invents words that are not there” and was directed, disparagingly,
    at Mitz, who understandably thought that Derek @20 was commenting on a clue when he was actually misdirecting our attention to a commercial gardening site as an excuse for another wrong-headed jibe at
    the compilers of dictionaries.

    However the substance of Rowland’s criticism is valid. It is better expressed @38 by Paul B (of all people!). azto’s musings on Carol Singleton, and indeed on agent nouns, are not really relevant to the puzzle.

    Now for the clues – I don’t think anyone has a real problem with CARNATION & pink but I agree with –

    Muffin re RECEPTIVE & accessible
    azto re TIPPER & benefactor
    dunsscotus re IMPETUS & energy

    Should I say more about why I dislike these? Well I don’t want to talk about “intersubstitutivity” so let’s just say, in duns’ other words, that they are not “good enough”.

    The other day I had lunch in a Brighton restaurant and when the waiter brought the bill he asked if everything had been “all right”. I said “No. It was much better than that.” I left an appropriate tip. Neither the amount nor my intention made me feel like a benefactor, in my white sport coat.

43. @rho

    Re SINGLETON – just staying with the issue itself and ignoring “matters arising” – B(NTO) has it right @ #36 and #39

    As a former Bridge player (just social) its use as either noun or adjective seemed natural to me without recourse to dictionaries, however checking a couple reveals:
    ———————————–
    Collins Online:

    Given as a noun but but out of 6 examples 4 are adjectival:

    : marriage and commitment in singleton society, published as part of the Institute of Ideas ‘ Conversations in Print series.

    He cashed the singleton ace of spades, then successfully finessed the queen of hearts.

    He felt that there might be real danger ahead in no trumps if his partner held only a singleton heart.

    If the 10 was singleton , declarer had to play an honour to pin the 10. If a high honour was singleton, a low club from hand would work.

    ———————————–

    In OED Online:

    also given as a noun but:

    [as modifier]:a singleton spade

    ———————————–

    which is (the latter) of course typical of the general case that nouns may be used adjectivally.

    In this particular case the match is exact – the two (def and answer) are interchangeable.

44. OTOH I can’t find “thread-padding” in any dictionary – and googling it brings me back here after only a few entries.

    What does it mean?

45. @JS – I have no problem with SINGLETON & alone.

46. Weel, I am okay with that. Ireally thought it is only a NOUN, and I have not looked in ‘OED online’ , but fair enough to you.

    BTw it is ‘all alone’ in the clues.

    Rowls.

    PS I dod not wish to start a ROW-ly!

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