Guardian 26,452 by Picaroon

48 comments on “Guardian 26,452 by Picaroon”

1. Thanks Peter. I give the setter perhaps more credit than you for the variety and ingenuity in this, eg in BICARB and CONFAB. I thought the bigots ref was a bit OTT but I don’t follow UK politics. Tks Picaroon.

2. Agree with molonglo that the bigoted clue needs a question mark, at least.

3. A pun-filled confection. “I sold E,” “stand-in groom,” and “O, live!” were all of a type–a type I really enjoy. “Deep south” and “red-letter day” both went in for me with just the numerations only, so all in all this was easier than expected.

   I’d describe 3d as a full &-lit., and 18ac as basically also &lit. by example.

   As for the quibble about 7d, I’d say that “Fortunes” can fairly be defined as “success.” The plural is a little off from most standard usage, but I’d say it’s close enough.

   For a while I was worried that you’d actually have to know the names of some Times setters down at 27 ac, but mercifully not.

4. Also, nice surface reading on “Deep South,” a region stereotypically noted for both its heat and its languid pace of life.

5. Personally no problem with 8dn but I guess UKIP voters among others might be offended. Probably not a good idea then for the setter to be so direct. Overall an enjoyable solve with ‘punter’s number’ at 21ac being the most memorable bit.

6. Thanks Picaroon and PeterO

   I struggled in the NE and SW, the latter because of two temporary wrong entries. I had BARBITONE ( a “number”) initially for 21a. Although this is obviously wrong, I think I had more of an excuse for ROT GUT rather than GUT ROT – in my usage the former causes the latter! I wasn’t happy with FORTUNES (plural) either, and raised an eyebrow at BIG shOTS.

   I liked several clues, though – I didn’t see how ALLITERATION worked at the time, but PeterO’s explanation shows what a clever clue it was. OIL RIG and OBITS were fine too.

7. ……btw a gondolier isn’t a “punter”. Punters propel the punt by pushing on the river bottom with the punt pole; gondoliers use a “sculling” motion with an oar. See here:
   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gondola
   (first paragraph of “History and usage”, which directly contradicts the opening paragraph!)

8. Thanks Picaroon and PeterO

   1a, I had never heard of that Russell, and tried to make BertRAND fit the clue.

   Liked BICARB, OIL RIG, BIREME and especially STANDING ROOM!

9. Thank you for the blog – I enjoyed this puzzle. In 9a is see = C just an (implied) homophone, or is there something more I am missing? Thanks. (Afraid I don’t have access to Chambers today!)

10. I second Mr Penney @3. In fact it was one of my favourite puzzles for a while – a bit too hard for me but every clue nicely done and I’m a sucker for those witty whole-word wordplays like 24a and 4d.

    ‘Fortunes’ for ‘success’ is just about all right, but I admit it was the weak point; ‘fortunes’ (‘The fortunes of Nigel’) has more of a sense of successes and failures in sequence. ‘Why do musicians get paid for breaks?’ would have done the trick, eh?

11. … or rather, ‘Why do musicians get paid breaks?’ (to avoid showing your hand with ‘for’).

12. BenP @9, I don’t know what Chambers says, but it always seems to say what people want it to say.
    ‘c’ is used for ‘see’ in text messaging, as is ‘r’ for ‘are’ and so on, so soon there will be ‘textese’ as well as ‘Chamberese’.

13. I thought there were some stunning clues here, and thoroughly enjoyed solving them.

    I can’t see why “Success is = Fortune’s” is causing any discussion.

    BenP @9: “see” is the word for the letter ‘C’, as ‘bee’ is for ‘B’ and ‘aitch’ is for ‘H’. I can’t think when they are used though.

    The only slightly cheap note was BIGOTS, as others have mentioned. The definition for bigot in Chambers is:

        “A person blindly and obstinately devoted to a […] political party, and dismissive towards others”

    which I would have thought described Guardian readers rather better than UKIP voters (who seem to be drawn from all political parties)

    …or can’t I say that? 😉

14. Limeni @13, it can ‘work’ the other way too, ‘Ceefax’ (seeing + facsimile).

15. I agree that the UKIP reference was out of order. I’m not a UKIP voter, but to me the clue suggested bigotedness on the part of the setter!

16. Thanks all
    Hands up all the UKIP voters who do not think they are bigots!
    Amazing.
    I enjoyed this and found it slightly easier than previous Picaroons.
    Last in was confab, my Italian is rather limited.
    I liked 25 ac.

17. Thanks PeterO and Picaroon
    Generally very enjoyable. Sadly, I missed ‘lite ration’ – inertia set in when I saw all the fs.

18. @muffin@7. Quite right about Gondoliers not punting. That level of pedantry, alas, despite being 100% correct, is probably, on Boxing Day, just tilting at windmills, with or without a punt.

    I agree with almost everyone about calling UK Members “bigots” a bit off.

19. Thanks for the explanations of see = C – much appreciated.

20. Ian Payn @18
    I think I would prefer “accuracy” to “pedantry”!

21. Too tough for me, but nearly got there. Apart from all the above, my query is ‘Funny duo’ in 3. I would have thought just ‘duo’ would have done it.

22. muffin @1

    Sorry if I came across as dismissive of this puzzle. At the time my principal concern was to put the blog and myself to bed at a reasonable hour, and I did not have much time to stand back and admire – and I agree that there is plenty to admire here.

    Being in an agreeable mood today, I would second Mr A Writinghawk @11 that fortunes plural tends to have more the connotation of ups and downs than just success. I like your suggested improvement.

    Beb P @9 and Cookie @11

    … and all those without access to Chambers. I needed something to follow “See see” and the alliteration was too much to resist – and Chambers does give the letter C as the third definition of “see”.

23. PeterO @22
    Molonglo @1, not me.

24. Apologies to muffin and molonglo. At least I got the comment number right.

25. Thanks, PeterO.

    A most enjoyable puzzle, as ever from this setter.

    Favourite clue: OBITS.

    I had no problem with the clue for 8dn but, like others, was surprised that it got past the editor, considering some of the things that, as we have heard from setters, did not.

    Many thanks to Picaroon.

26. I wish I hadn’t heard of Russell Brand-loved the clue though. I’ve no problem with 8dn and if UKIP voters are offended so much the better but as an unreconstructed Marxist I suppose I would say that!
    I suppose this was quite easy but I got rather stuck on the NE corner. I can’t say I liked CONFAB or OBITS, The,latter being my LOI. FAB = wicked does it? – a bit thin I think. Despite all that there was a lot to enjoy here.
    Thanks Picaroon.

27. Peter @26
    “Wicked” = “great”, “fantastic etc. in kid’s slang (a bit dated, I think). I’m reminded of the old joke – Why did Michael Jackson call his album “Bad”?…………………because he couldn’t spell “Appalling”.

28. Apostrophe misuse! ……….kids’ slang

29. Muffin, it’s not outdated if you’re a Bostonian. “Wicked” for “fab” came in and then back out in the rest of the U.S. at some point, but it’s long been part of the Boston dialect.

    (During my years at Harvard, I never managed to pick up the Boston accent, and if you don’t have the accent you shouldn’t be calling things “wicked,” since it just sounds wrong if you’re not also turning all of your r’s into h’s. I learned this the hard way when a native Bostonian classmate couldn’t stop laughing at how I said it. Tests at Hahavahd were wicked hahd, let me tell you.

30. mrpenney @29
    Tom Lehrer’s song “The elements” ends:
    These are they only ones of which the news has come to Hahvahd
    There may be many others but they haven’t been discahvahd!

31. Just had Offenbach’s BARCAROLE on France Musique, most appropriate.
    Thanks again Picaroon for a very enjoyable puzzle, and PeterO for a super blog under duress.

32. Muffin @27.It’s true that WICKED is dated but not as much as FAB which originated in Liverpool and became in general usage when it was used by the Beatles, along with the even older GEAR, in the early sixties. WICKED meaning GOOD was much later,and was probably American. WICKED used to indicate FAB is just poor clueing and CONFAB is just a private conversation which isn’t the same as GOSSIP and I’m beginning to bore myself now——

33. Peter @ 32
    Perhaps you remember that The Rutles (Eric Idle, Neil Innes et al) were known as “The prefab four”?

34. I enjoyed this as ever for puzzles from the “Pirate”.

    However I did object to 8D as this is based on the setter’s opinion which is clearly wrong as not all UKIP voters are bigots! (I am totally apolitical by the way)

    My second, even stronger, objection was to the the use of BRANDISH to refer to a person who I believe is a piece of excrement on the world’s shoe who should be ignored. (However I am willing to accept that this is probably not a universally held belief and is probably based on my opinion 😉 )

    Thanks to PeterO and Picaroon

35. Good fun, and got there in the end.

    I always thought BARCAROLE was spelt Barcarolle (as in Chopin, Offenbach, etc) but never mind.

36. I found this tough going and didn’t really enjoy and I do like Picaroon. Probably too much vino and turkey. However I thought 8d summed up UKIP perfectly because on the whole they are bigots how many of them have had to stand down as candidates because of offensive remarks? Loved the Michael Jackson joke Muffin. Thanks Picaroon and PeterO.

37. Fab=wicked is not remotely problematic if you are British, which is what the crossword is, and certainly doesn’t deserve to be called poor clueing. Both are slang which is now amusingly unfashionable but certainly not obsolete. They mean the same thing.

38. Great crossword – loved 18ac, 24ac, 4dn. As for 8dn, say it how it is – it’s a free country, for now anyway…

39. There is an MP named Michael Fabricant who in a previous role as a DJ was known as Micky Fab. He is noted for his remarkable “hair” which makes him stand out among his fellow conservative members.

40. Thanks PeterO for explanations of several I wrote in without really understanding the clever structure of the clues, especially 18ac.

41. UKIP voters = bigots = unindicated DBE is my main problem, I have to say.

    Ho ho ho.

42. I didn’t comment on this one last week because the hard disk of my laptop died over Christmas, but this was another entertaining and enjoyable challenge, as we’ve come to expect from Picaroon. BIG SHOTS made me laugh out loud – on the whole I agree with Picaroon’s view of UKIP, as would most Guardian readers…

43. Hi BH.

    I’m sorry to hear about your hard drive. (Hope your crossword archive is recoverable/backed up.) You’re welcome to to my “raw” data if not. It’s online anyway!

    I couldn’t fail to be astonished though by your pair of sweeping statements.

    ” on the whole I agree with Picaroon’s view of UKIP, as would most Guardian readers…”

    i.e. all UKIP voters are bigots (this must be true if the cluing is to be accepted) and MOST guardian readers would agree with this sentiment!!!

    Your perspicacity is to be admired. (Any chance of a hint at the New Year lotto numbers 😉 )

    By the way I had attributed the “last Araucaria to “Arauacaria and Philistine”. However I think I’ll go with the Guardian and others and attribute it to “master” alone. I’ll do this when I return home from this frosted narrowboat and can access my Desktop.

    All the best for the New Year.

44. Brendan, I agree that no generalisation would ever cover all UKIP voters, but I don’t think the clue implies anything more than a strong correlation. My reading is that the subset of UKIP voters in question is left to the solver’s imagination (after all we often see seeing words such as animal, bird, river etc. as definitions for more specific / narrower solutions).

    Fortunately I have a fairly recent copy of my spreadsheet (and Mitz’s version) in my mailbox and on the office PC, but thanks for the offer.

45. i hated unclued ‘aint’ in 14a although I did see that it had to be that.

46. Glad to hear that you have a usable copy of you spreadsheet.

    My comments regarding the UKIP/Guardian readers comments aren’t the same as those complaining about the types of clue you mention. i.e. such as animal, bird, river etc.. In these cases at least the answer is an animal, bird, river or whatever (although the clue may be loose in other ways). My point was that clearly every UKIP voter is not a bigot nor does every guardian reader believe they are. Therefore the clue is surely flawed.

47. Thanks Picaroon and PeterO

    Over a year on and this was still a cracker of a puzzle. Full of his trademark innovative and humorous clueing style mixed with a bit of controversy in 8d (only a very slight eyebrow raise from down here).

    Thought that OLIVE and STANDING ROOM were the standouts here. Although ALLITERATION, with the six F-word examples, was a very clever &lit clue as well. Was beaten with a couple of the parsings – had I SOLD but didn’t extend to the E (just wondered where it came from) and my Italian vocabulary doesn’t include CON=with unfortunately

    Finished in the NE corner with BIG SHOTS, OIL RIG and CONFAB the last few in.

48. Thanks to PeterO

    I’ll reserve my thanks to the setter until I hear a cogent explanation of 8d.

Comments are closed.