Guardian Cryptic 26715 by Boatman Fifty Variations on an Original Theme

by

The puzzle may be found at http://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/cryptic/26715.

Somewhat easier than the previous two days (luckily for me), but nonetheless a witty and inventive puzzle. My favourites were 10A GOLD MINER and 17D NATURALS.

Across
1 SUFFICIENTLY
Enough clues in fifty puzzles? (12)

An anagram (‘puzzles’) of ‘clues in fifty’.
9 ONION
A small number? I deny it! Reflecting, it’s enough to make you cry (5)

A reversal (‘reflecting’) of NO I (one, ‘a small number’; I think this is better than taking the I from the clue) plus NO (‘I deny it’).
10 GOLD MINER
Could be one of 49 or 50 — Boatman’s wiser, at last? (4,5)

A charade of GOLD (‘or’) plus L (’50’) plus MINE (‘Boatman’s) plus R (‘wiseR at last’). The definition references the California Gold Rush of 1849 (“… Lived a miner, forty-niner, and his daughter Clementine”).
11 EMIRATE
Islamic State overturns Middle East up in arms (7)

A charade of EM, a reversal (‘overturns’) of ME (‘Middle East’) plus IRATE (‘up in arms’).
12 LEAVERS
Refugees from the East taken by 50 states (7)

An envelope (‘taken by’) of E (‘east’) in L (’50’) plus AVERS (‘states’).
13 YOUR CHOICE
Whether to help, perhaps? Yes, most of the time that’s best (4,6)

A charade of Y (‘yes’) plus [h]OUR (‘most of the time’) plus CHOICE (‘best’).
15 TYPE
Some 50%, you see, of what you’re reading (4)

A hidden answer (sort of) in fifTY PErcent.
18 BULL
Here you’ll get 50 cobblers (4)

Double definition; the first references darts; the second was touched on recently by Pierre, and has the sense of nonsense.
19 LAND LEAGUE
Gain backing of European (Irish speaker) for old tenants’ association (4,6)

A charade of LAND (‘gain’) plus LEAGUE, a reversal (‘backing of’) of EU (‘European’) plus GAEL (‘Irish speaker’)
22 RAMPAGE
Anger about current disorder (7)

An envelope (‘about’) of AMP (measure of ‘current’) in RAGE (‘anger’).
24 DATABLE
The facts: old car maker’s failure ultimately having a place in time (7)

A charade of DATA (‘the facts’) plus BL (British Leyland, ‘old car maker’) plus E (‘failurE ultimately’).
25 TERMAGANT
Shrew put spell on a horse, brought back by Tam’s leadership (9)

A charade of TERM (‘spell’) plus ‘a’ plus GAN, a reversal (‘brought back’) of NAG (‘horse’) plus T (‘Tam’s leadership’).
26 ACRES
Camcorders even used in large estates (5)

‘Evem’ letters of ‘cAmCoRdErS‘.
27 BESIDE THE SEA
Where cliffs erode, ie St Bees Head (6,3,3)

An anagram (‘erode’) of ‘ie St Bees Head’.
Down
1 SPIRITUAL
Southern song from It’s Immaterial (9)

This seems to be a double definition; I tried to find some wordplay involving ‘it’s’, but have come up with nothing.
2 FAN DANCE
Erotic show is loud and a pole and cage is hollow (3,5)

A charade of F (‘loud’) plus ‘and a’ plus N (north ‘pole’) plus CE (‘CagE is hollow’).
3 INGLE
For a strong wind, where to put a fireplace (5)

If you ‘put a’ IN GLE, you get GALE (‘strong wind”).
4 ILL-PLACED
In poor position from mid-point: fifty-fifty on podium (3-6)

A charade of I (‘mid-poInt’) plus LL (‘fifty-fifty’) plus PLACED (‘on podium’).
5 NUMDAH
On the ground, it’s felt a number had retreated (6)

A charade of NUM (‘number’) plus DAH, a reversal (‘retreated’) of ‘had’. New to me, too; it is an Indian felt rug.
6 LUNGE
Thrust forward with no little power (5)

[p]LUNGE (‘thrust forward’) without the P (‘no little power’).
7 MOIETY
50% of USSR rejected mysterious perestroika (6)

An anagram (‘perestroika’, which means restructuring) of ‘mysterious’ minus ‘USSR’.
8 CRUSOE
The sailors — say 50 — seemingly leave the last one stranded (6)

A charade of CRU. sounding like (‘say’) CREW (‘the sailors’) plus SO (‘seemingly’? I suppose) plus E (‘leavE the last’).
14 ON AVERAGE
Usually, alcoves in the centre over body of church go up the wall (2,7)

A charade of O (‘alcOves in the centre’) plus NAVE (‘body of church’) plus RAGE (‘go up the wall’).
16 YOGI BERRA
He said, “It ain’t over ’til it’s over, Gary” — or I be mistaken! (4,5)

An anagram (‘mistaken’) of ‘Gary or I be’ for the baseball player and manager, given to such statements as this and “When you come to a fork in the road, take it”.
17 NEUTRALS
Naughty nature’s seized Fifty Shades of Grey (8)

An anagram (‘naughty’) of ‘natures’ plus L (‘fifty’).
18 BERATE
Slate with a step back on top would let air in (6)

A step back from B is A, and applied to the answer, gives AERATE (‘let air in’).
20 EVEN SO
All the same initial odds: below fifty-fifty (4,2)

A charade of EVENS (‘fifty-fifty’) plus O (‘initial Odds’).
21 HAWAII
State 50 initial hints at Welsh first eleven (6)

A charade of HAW (‘initial Hints At Welsh’) plus A (‘first’) plus II (‘eleven’) – the last two elements are perhaps better taken together.
23 MARGE
Woman uses 50% of butter substitutes (5)

‘50%’ of MARGE[rines] (‘butter substitutes’).
24 DUTCH
Fifty-fifty on first of dogs to take rabbit ’ome? (5)

A charade of D (‘first of Dogs’) plus [h]UTCH (‘rabbit ‘ome’ likewise unaspirated).
completed grid

62 comments on “Guardian Cryptic 26715 by Boatman Fifty Variations on an Original Theme”

  1. I don’t see how either “50” of “L” fits into 10a.

    Thanks, though for clearing up several elusive parsings.

  4. I had trouble parsing 10ac Gold Miner – and I’m afraid your parsing hasn’t helped me.
    If ‘or’ = ‘gold'(I’m happy with that) what is the ’50’ doing as the ‘L’ is already in ‘Gold’; and your parsing does not mention the ‘D’.
    Have to say I wasn’t very keen on this crossword generally – but thanks to Boatman and PeterO anyway.

  5. Phew – that was quite hard work. I agree about the extra L in GOLD MINER. Had to look up NUMDAH. Some clever clueing: favourites were CRUSOE, BULL, MOIETY and TYPE. Many thanks to Boatman and PeterO.

  6. Thanks, PeterO – rather you than me!

    I echo Ian’s query re 10ac. And where’s 50 in 8dn?

    I don’t understand how 6dn works – definition?

    Why does PLACED = ‘on a podium’?

    The butter substitute is spelt margarine, so I can’t make that one work. I’m going to stop now…

  7. In 8d CRUSOE, which was my LOI, I thought that “50 seemingly” simply refers to the fact that the figure “50” looks very much like the letters “SO”

  8. I think the 50 in 10A is gold as in gold wedding at 50 years.
    The 50 in 8D remains a mystery – the best I can do is to suggest that 50 is ‘seemingly’ SO, with 5 becoming S as in a tortured number plate on a car.

  9. @Eileen
    I can only assume “placed” for “on a podium” refers to the custom of the runners-up (those getttng a “place”) making it onto the rostrum/podium, although I have never heard of it being referred to in that way.
    Regarding “marge”, I suppose it is 50% of “margarines” although, as Eric Morecambe might have said, “not necessarily in that order”.
    Some wondeful clues from Boatman here, but a fair few initial/last letter devices too.
    I didn’t finish the puzzle without cheating.
    Well done on the half century and thanks to PeterO for a very helpful blog which put me out of my misery.
    Well perhaps not quite misery.

  10. Eileen – If you come in 1st, 2nd, 3rd PLACE in a race you may be rewarded eg with a medal presented to you while standing on a podium. I believe PODIUM may now even be used as a verb (as can MEDAL).
    Didn’t we have MOIETY only the other day?

    Thanks to boatman and PeterO

  11. Forgot to say that I can now add YOGI BERRA to the short list of baseball players (previously just Babe Ruth and Joe DiMaggio) that I have heard of.

  12. For 10ac I assumed that the California Gold Rush lasted until at least 1850, so the definition is actually “Could be one of 49 or 50” The rest of the clue then fits. I think the 50 was just added because of the theme.

    Couldn’t fit the 50 into 8d though. I was thinking along the same lines as bagel, that the 5 on number plates could look like an S.

  13. Thanks, baerchen and cholecyst – that makes sense. [“I believe PODIUM may now even be used as a verb (as can MEDAL” – Ouch!).

    We did have MOIETY the other day – in Tramp’s puzzle, which I blogged.

  14. Ian SW3 @1

    The L in my explanation for 10A was a left-over from a previous stab at a parsing; the 50 could refer to 1850, the first of the British Columbia gold rushes, but I like the explanation given by bagel@8.

    I will also follow bagel and blaise @7 on 8D.

    Eileen @6

    I took 8D (read: 6D) to be an &lit. I was not happy about PLACED in 4D but could think of nothing better. In 23D, I wonder if Boatman made the same error as I did (and I think a good many others – enough to establish an alternative spelling?). Alternatively, MARGE is 50% of margarines, just not consecutively so.

  15. Thank you, PeterO.

    Sorry, folks, but this was just not my cup of tea. it was perhaps unfortunate that my first 3 or 4 in proved unparseable so when I then came across the more obscure YOGI BERRA, LAND LEAGUE and unknown NUMDAH I started to lose heart.

    I seem to be a bit dim generally here – I still can’t parse GOLD MINER; I don’t really understand the ‘help’ reference in YOUR CHOICE; ‘placed’ for ‘on podium’ doesn’t seem good enough; I don’t understand ‘say 50’ in 8d (CRUSOE) & (lastly you’ll be pleased to hear) I still can’t parse LUNGE properly.

    This has not been an enjoyable week so far.

  17. Hi PeterO

    Thanks – I think you mean 6dn in your last paragraph. I still don’t get it, I’m afraid.

    I’ve always been puzzled by the spelling of margarine, which is why I remember it. According to the rules, the ‘correct’ spelling makes the g hard – but that’s not how [most] people pronounce it.

  19. Thanks Boatman and PeterO

    I generally like Boatman’s puzzles, but I didn’t enjoy this one. The repetitions of “fifty”, although very clever, became irritating, and there were also some obscure answers clued obscurely – LAND LEAGUE for instance. The LEAGUE part was easy enough, but “land” = “gain” to complete the name of an little-known organisation? Also I’ll just say “numdah”!

    I got LUNGE/(p)Lunge easily, but I don’t understand it – if “thrust forward” is “plunge”, where is the definition for “lunge”? Alternatively if “lunge” is defined by “thrust forward” (more convincing), where does the “plunge” come from?

    I had ringed 7 others for comment or explanation, but I won’t bore you all by listing them.

  20. Yogi Berra died a few weeks ago; presumably that accounts for his appearance here. Berra was a quote machine, leading him to also be high on the list of people to whom quotations are most often misattributed. Yogi-isms are marked by their peculiar mix of wit, folksy insight, and odd malapropisms, such that you could never be sure that the wit was intentional. Other notable Yogi-isms: “It was deja vu all over again”; “Baseball is 90% mental; the other half is physical”; “You can observe a lot by just watching.”

    As for the puzzle itself, I found it a mix of very clever and slightly baffling. I had to cheat on three entries this time out.

  21. I would agree completely with all the others who didn’t find this “easier than the last two” – I found this almost impossible, and indeed was a DNF, giving up on 8dn and 15ac, and with AERATE and a not-particularly-optimistic AWLS at 18ac besmirching the SE corner (and I also had to look up the unknown/hard NUMDAH). When so many of the clues appear to be not fully parseable even by the combined wits of so many crack bloggers and solvers, why should we continue to bash our heads against the wall of a puzzle? It’s a great shame because, as ever, there are some touches of real brilliance from Boatman here, lost in a sea of brow-furrowing.

  22. [There also is a U.S. children’s cartoon character named Yogi Bear, named after Berra. That Yogi, with his young sidekick Boo-Boo, steals picnic baskets from unsuspecting visitors to Jellystone Park. Many fewer good quotes from Yogi Bear.]

  24. I was well beaten today, I’m afraid, but thanks to Boatman and thanks to PeterO for the very helpful blog – especially for the explanations of INGLE, NUMDAH and BERATE.

    In 8d, I thought of the display on a pocket calculator to explain why “50 – seemingly” gave SO.

    In 1d, there really was a band called It’s Immaterial, back in the 80s. They had a song called Driving Away From Home, all about the roads in the north of England. As I recall, it gave a gentle and amusing nod to songs such as King of the Road and Route 66.

  25. Having to work a little harder than usual today? It wasn’t intentional, but I wanted to give you something more interesting than a long series of “L” references …

    Blaise and Bagel have understood 8 Dn correctly: “say” belongs with “the sailors” and “seemingly” belongs with “50”. The only thing that makes this clue difficult to penetrate is those pesky hyphens, which are placed very carefully so as to cause maximum distraction. You should know by now to be wary of my punctuation!

    Bagel is also on my wavelength in 10 Ac. The archery allusion spotted by Bembo was in the back of my mind – I believe that archers don’t actually score 50 for a gold, but the assocation of gold = bull = 50 sways, ghostly, in the background.

    To enjoy 6 Dn, you have to be on the lookout for possible &Lits: to lunge is to thrust forward with no little power, and to thrust forward with no little power is to plunge without the P. QED?

    As for numdahs, I had one on my bedroom floor for years. It was from Habitat, I believe. Allegedly, they were traditionally produced by legions of underpaid Indian workers jumping on bales of felt, which sounds a lot more fun that it probably was.

  26. I agree that gold is wedding anniversary in 10a- the San Francisco 49ers clinched it though;

    As for 5d, I had never come across it but followed the instructions, googled and voila!

    And Yogi Berra is much more known than say Little Mo on a certain puzzle yesterday.

    But my logic lead me to think that slate= berate and working back from b I entered aerate- wrong way round,

    But I still cant see the 50 in Crusoe.
    Otherwise, unlike some, I warmed to this but I have to admit to being Boatist.

  30. Thanks Boatman & PeterO.

    I found this pretty tricky; nice of Boatman to pop in and give us the correct parsings. I’ve just looked at 50 on my calculator and it does look quite like ‘SO.’ I didn’t have any issue with LUNGE as an &lit.

    mrpenney @22, Yogi Bear is very well-known over here. I didn’t realise the connection to Berra; from Wiki: ‘Berra sued Hanna-Barbera for defamation, but their management claimed that the similarity of the names was just a coincidence. Berra withdrew his suit, but the defense was considered implausible and sources now report that Berra was the inspiration for the name.’

    Back to the crossword, is this Boatman’s 50th crossword?

  31. I wondered whether Boatman might have had a personal relationship with a NUMDAH in order to include it. Thanks for dropping by Boatman to confirm!

    The obituary of YOGI BERRA appeared in the Guardian itself just a month ago, which makes it fair game in my book to include in a Guardian newspaper.

    I liked many clues, including SPIRITUAL (bet I’m not the only one who tried combinations like S+AIR, S+LIED), MOIETY (not least for its anagrind), RAMPAGE (in which I had confidently expected to see I for current, not AMP!). But a little too much shoehorning-in of the 50 device to make it a classic.

  32. Thanks to Boatman and PeterO. I shared the problems already listed with CRUSOE and GOLD MINER and needed help parsing DATABLE (I did not get the BL/British Leyland), INGLE, and MOIETY. Last in were NUMDAH (after a Google check) and BULL.

  33. I usually enjoy Boatman’s puzzles, but not this one, and I had the same queries and doubts as most of you on this blog. About half way through I decided to check what was written here (something I practically never do) to see if I was being particularly blind or dim-witted today, but I don’t think I was. That was the end of the crossword for me, despite my enjoyment of some of this setter’s ‘trademark’ tricky clues.

    As an occasional setter I know how time-consuming it can be to review and refine clues to give them the right qualities (it’s rarely possible to be as clear, correct, inventive, challenging, fair and witty as one would wish in any clue, never mind every clue), and I would boldly suggest that a bit more time might have been well spent on the clues to today’s and yesterday’s puzzles and the last Rufus crossword I solved (whenever that was).

    I am still looking forward to the next Boatman puzzle, I hasten to add, knowing I will have to be alert to his tricks.

  34. I’m not a particular fan of Boatman and this puzzle hasn’t changed my mind. I did like around 75% of this but I found much of the rest very frustrating. An attempt to be rather too clever, I thought, thus the puzzle wasn’t easier than yesterday’s in my view.
    Annoyingly, I had NAMMAD for 10DN which is, I now learn,an alternative to NUMDAH-but that’s my fault.
    God knows what we’ll get tomorrow!

  35. Enjoyed this puzzle – worked out fairly early on that 50 was the number of puzzles Boatman has had published in the Guardian. By Boatman standards, this was reasonably straightforward. Last in NEUTRALS. Favourite was BESIDE THE SEA. NUMDAH was unfamiliar but very fairly clued.

    Thanks to Boatman and PeterO, congratulations to Boatman on beating Philistine to the milestone

  36. An appalling puzzle, but true to form I guess.

    1a puzzles at, maybe; 9a construction doesn’t work; 10a why ‘so’?; 11a ME = middle east?; 12a why ‘the’?; 13a not a proper entry, and ‘most of the time’ could be anything; 15a why ‘you see, of’?; 25 ‘leadership’ doesn’t indicate properly; 26 ‘even’ is unfair and a grammar error, as so many G compilers these days, just to make their awful surfaces work; 1d as blogged, clumsy; 2s is and is do not work grammatically; 3d construction doesn’t work; 4d Guardianism; 5d why ‘a’: ‘small number’ surely; 6d why ‘the’? It’s not needed; 7d construction doesn’t work; 8d ‘seemingly’ isn’t enough, plus grammar problem for the ‘e’; 17d ‘seixzed’ implies the past tense not past participle; 18d ‘a step back’ is just rubbish; 20 ‘initial odds’ an error grammatically; 21d the same mistake again, and repeated; 24d why ‘on’?

    Just such a bad puzzle, and I really can’t see what’s clever anyway about having ‘fifty’ all over the place.

    HH

  37. Having gone back and read my previous post I realise my mistake. The or comes before the 50, so my comments make no sense at all.

    Enjoyed the puzzle, thanks PeterO and Boatman.

  38. Thanks to Boatman for dropping in. However, despite your explanation, I still don’t see how LUNGE works. “Thrust forward with no little power” is good, but I’m not convinced by the second part – “thrust forward” = “plunge”.

  39. Well muffin, it seems that the compiler, one of Hugh’s new breed of ‘really inventive’ ones, thinks the clue is &lit.

  40. I lost the internet, and then was out for most of the day, so I am rather late catching up with the comments.

    Firstly, thanks to Boatman for dropping in. I am surprised that archery was on your mind for 18A BULL, when the standard score in darts is 50 for a bull – the inner bull, that is. And congratulations on your 50th.

    Eileen @17

    Indeed I did mean 6D – I will add a correction to make sense of it. At least Boatman and I agree on that one. Wikipedia informs us that margarine was named after margaric acid, an extract from animal fats with a pearly appearance (and that in turn was named for a Greek word for pearl or pearl-oyster). This would have been present in the original margarine made principally from beef fat, a formula long since abandoned.

  41. Hello and re. 8d, I’d parsed the ‘soe’ portion of Crusoe as being sole (last one) with the ‘L’ (say 50) having seemingly left.

  43. Aaargh, should have read:

    Hello and re. 8d, I’d parsed the ‘soe’ portion of Crusoe as being sole (last one) with the ‘L’ (50 seemingly) leaving.

  44. Following on my comment @40, I would have corrected my comment @14 if WordPress had let me. Later: adding this comment has allowed me access the offending one, so now it is corrected!

  45. HH (@36), you have managed to find fault with nearly 75% of the clues (22 out of 30, which is actually 73.3%)! Either you are a perfectionist or you find the increasingly liberal style of certain Guardian compilers (probably most of them) incompatible with the standard (or style?) you expect.

    I agree with you that 6 or more of the clues could have been improved today (9A, 10A, 3D, 8D, 18D, 24D and possibly 15A, 2D), and I thought 13A (YOUR CHOICE) was just two words put together to make a phrase, which I think was your point. 15A, 2D and 8D, by the way, appear differently on paper and online.

    I wrote an earlier post (@33) giving my general thoughts on this puzzle.

  46. The G in margarine is of course hard, as it is in Margaret. The fact that the diminutive/familiar for both is Marge is no warrant for mispronouncing the full word. Nobody would address a woman as Marjaret so why say Marjarine? O tempora, o mores!

  47. Thanks Boatman – variations on an enigma. I thought it must be your 50th birthday or wedding anniversary but I see the explanation is rather more prosaic.

    Which describes my problem with 23dn. I guessed it was half of margarines but realised that either Marie or Marge would do, and then realised that it didn’t matter anyway.

    I struggled – enjoyably – through the day with this but was really chuffed to get YOGI BERRA (who he? – sounds an interesting coiner of epigrams as well as being a talented baseball player)

  48. Thanks Boatman and PeterO

    Hard work but I loved it. I think nitpickers should loosen up and get a sense of humour. Life’s too short.

  49. I’m afraid for once I agree with HH.

    A travesty!

    Again in desperate need of an editor!

    Thanks to PeterO

  50. Having been puzzled myself by the apparent extra L in the clueing for 1a, and still being confused after reading Boatman’s own comment, I think I’ve finally seen the light after putting together elements from various comments. The “or” is just being used as a conjunction between the definition and the word play. It just a fortunate/unfortunate (delete as preferred) coincidence that “or” is also the heraldic word for “gold”, which is actually being clued in the wordplay by the L (as in golden anniversary/jubilee and so on). For anyone still as confused as I was, my attempt at giving the parsing is now:

    The definition is “Could be one of 49” and the word play is a charade of GOLD (“50”, as in anniversary) + MINE (“Boatman’s”) + R (“wiser, at last”, with “or” just a link between the two parts of the clue.

  51. Having got that out of the way, I found this a mixture of very good clues and frustrating ones. My FOI was SUFFICIENTLY, and I love it. TYPE, on the other hand, had me puzzling for a very long time and was almost my LOI, but I love it too. I also liked that the 50 theme was used in a variety of ways (L, half, gold, anagram fodder, hidden answer, the bull score, evens). However, there were too many clues which felt as though they were just attempts to shoehorn in more 50s no matter how contrived and convoluted that made them.

    Nevertheless, thanks to Boatman for the enjoyable clues and thanks to PeterO for blogging it.

  52. Well said, jennyk (@51). Boatman seems to have polarised opinions with this puzzle. Like you, I found problems with some of the clues, and I couldn’t put it better than you did. I still enjoyed some of the clever and witty ones before I decided to call it a day.

  55. Jennyk @ #50 (ironically?) 10 across is parsed as you say, I think: it’s just unfortunate that ‘or’, an oft-used SI unit for ‘gold’ has been used as the link word. On the other hand, I think one’s gold (or indeed golden) anniversary is one’s fiftieth, rather than one’s fifty. A confusing clue at any rate.

  58. ” USSR rejected mysterious perestroika” Thanks for explaining that.

    The problem with Boatman puzzles apart from the irritating and rather pointless “themes” which nag rather like boring people at a party is that the clues don’t really work, most of them (a minor issue I guess). If ever a compiler should change his pseudonym to “Humpty Dumpty” (words mean what I say they mean or at least cryptic syntax does) It gets to the point where you can’t really trust any clue to be logically worked out, so you end up trying to find a word that will fit, then reverse engineering, if you can be bothered.

  59. “Has anyone worked out why 50% of MARGARINES is MARGE?”

    The blogger probably has it wrong: I think it is meant to be 50% of MARGARINES, bring the first four letters plus the E near the end.

  60. Curious as to how HH would have clued this particular crossword, given the answers, can he/she/it better what was given?

  61. Thanks Boatman and PeterO

    First of all congratulations to the setter on his 50th puzzle. Found this one seriously tough … certainly harder than Crucible (haven’t had a crack at Screw yet) and back to the devilish Boatman of old.

    Had ground my way through all of the puzzle, but got stuck with an untenable AERATE / AWLS at 18. Finally read the first word of 18d as ‘Slate’ rather than state (old man eyes, 🙁 ) to eventually find BERATE and then BULL to finish it off into the third day !!

    Got most of the parsing right, apart from the hidden answer with TYPE which was too good for me – had justified ‘what you’re reading’ as being 50% TYPE and 50% white space ! I parsed CRUSOE the same way as Bramspal@41 and though it quite clever – can’t see where the L comes in with the 50=SO logic.

    After fifty puzzles, I have just about become accustomed to the style of this guy – it is inventive, stretches boundaries, dabbles into the esoteric with both definitions and language (struggled with a couple of his French clues in the past) and get a lot of satisfaction after the struggle with him.

  62. Thanks PetetO and Boatman.

    Tough.

    I had Aerate at 18dn – and Petet, your blog actually reads as if that is the answer – so I was never going to get BULL.

    I also failed on TYPE – but that’s just me and my perennial difficulty getting on Boatman’s wavelength.

    So a slog for me and even harder than Crucible and Screw from the previous two days.

    My brain hurts!

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