Guardian 26,762 / Nutmeg

by

I invariably find the preamble to be the most difficult part of the blog to write and today is no exception. What can I say that hasn’t been said before? Good surfaces, good misdirection, a variety of constructions, a slight stretching of synonymity in places, all leading to an enjoyable solve.

I think my favourite clue today was the &lit at 14ac, though this was closely followed by 15dn for the image it created.

Across
1 Sound of fire in centre of nuclear storage facility admitted (7)
CRACKLE – [nu]CLE[ar] (centre of nuclear) around (admitted) RACK (storage facility)

5 See the light from bar — and there’s no turning back! (5,2)
LATCH ON – LATCH (bar) NO reversed (no turning back)

9 Seaman in Cork not good member of crew (5)
BOSUN – OS (seaman) in BUN[g] (Cork not good)

10 Top magazine published first (9)
OUTNUMBER – OUT (published) NUMBER (magazine)

11 County‘s rage after scheme’s denied initial funding (10)
LANCASHIRE – [p]LAN (scheme’s denied initial) CASH (funding) IRE (rage)

12 It might blow up before being put back (4)
ETNA – ANTE (before) reversed (being put back)

14 What gives rise to extremely elegant little shoe? (8,4)
STILETTO HEEL – an anagram (what give rise to) of E[legan]T (extremely elegant) LITTLE SHOE – &lit

18 Took flight, delivering right word to fix declaration (12)
ANNOUNCEMENT – [r]AN (took flight, delivering right) NOUN (word) CEMENT (fix)

21 Somewhat overblown part of speech (4)
VERB – hidden in (somewhat) ‘oVERBlown’

22 Topers’ group captain within seen swilling one on the rocks? (3,7)
SEA ANEMONE – AA (toper’s group) NEMO (captain) in an anagram (swilling) of SEEN

25 Study of tree roots (9)
GENEALOGY – cryptic def.

26 Outstanding leader knocked out in water sport … (5)
OWING – [r]OWING (leader knocked out in water sport)

27 … shuts up after river goes down (7)
DEEPENS – DEE (river) PENS (shuts up)

28 Took up residence, / no longer 26 (7)
SETTLED – double def.

Down
1 Search team ultimately missing key element (6)
COBALT – CO[m]B (search team ultimately missing) ALT (key)

2 Member of colony keeping brutish disease away (6)
ABSENT – ANT (member of colony) around (keeping) BSE (brutish disease)

3 Rural knight battling, not having left his commander? (4,6)
KING ARTHUR – an anagram (battling) of RURA[l] KNIGHT

4 He’s full of apprehension, standing up for a long time (5)
EPOCH – HE around (full of) COP (apprehension) reversed (standing up)

5 Time trial rearranged, without any parts changed (9)
LITERATIM – an anagram (rearranged) of TIME TRIAL

6 Outwardly tough, uncompromising ruffian (4)
THUG – T[oug]H U[ncompromisin]G (outwardly tough, uncompromising)

7 Dreadful abuse hit regular attenders (8)
HABITUES – an anagram (dreadful) of ABUSE HIT

8 In general, number perk up when male comes in (8)
NORMALLY – NO (number) RALLY (perk up) around (when … comes in) M (male)

13 Specified cutting’s inaccurate (7,3)
POINTED OUT – POINTED (cutting) OUT (inaccurate)

15 Wanton Hollywood star pursues the French round America (9)
LECHEROUS – LE (the French) CHER (Hollywood star) O (round) US (America)

16 Redeemed brute departs, crossing lake (8)
SALVAGED – SAVAGE (brute) D (departs) around (crossing) L (lake)

17 Break in shooting all bar one European (8)
INFRINGE – IN F[i]RING (shooting all bar one) E (European)

19 Cheery Jamaican’s first single in Test arena (6)
JOVIAL – J[amaican] (Jamaican’s first) I (single) in OVAL (Test arena)

20 Duke on far side of western border in a tight spot (6)
WEDGED – W (western) EDGE (border) D (duke)

23 Natural break in baby’s schedule … (5)
ABYSS – hidden in ‘bABY’S Schedule’

24 … when various people may arrive returning stuff (4)
SATE – ETAS (when various people may arrive) reversed (returning)

35 comments on “Guardian 26,762 / Nutmeg”

  1. Thanks Gaufrid – we think that the answer printed in the Guardian for 24D should be late which is et al in reverse. Sate means stuff, but why does ETAS mean when various people may arrive?

  4. A thoroughly enjoyable crossword. Literatim was a new word for me, but not difficult to puzzle out and confirm with a dictionary. I couldn’t see 24 down even after hitting “reveal”, so thanks for the explanation.

    I loved the misdirection in 25a – I spent ages trying to think of a word related to dendrology!

    Thanks to Nutmeg and Gaufrid.

  5. Yes, a really good puzzle! Favourites included INFRINGE, SEA ANEMONE, OUTNUMBER and LANCASHIRE. Got confused with SATE: thought it might be LATE (ET AL = ‘various people’ returning), but couldn’t reconcile with ‘stuff’. Many thanks to Nutmeg and Gaufrid.

  6. Thanks Nutmeg and Gaufrid.

    Great fun, but quite hard going for me. I too had to hit the reveal button for SATE, and even then failed to parse it. Favourites were GENEALOGY and STILETTO HEEL.

  7. Mostly quite gentle by Nutmeg’s standards, though it took me a while to finish the SW with SATE last in. All very pleasant – liked KING ARTHUR and STILETTO HEEL.

    Thanks to Nutmeg and Gaufrid, Happy Christmas to all…

  10. edymion @9 – I think it just makes the surfaces more meaningful to run them together, so no cryptic significance

  13. Thanks to Nutmeg and Gaufrid. I too initially chose “late” over SATE (though the ETA does make better sense) and needed help parsing BOSUN (I had forgot the OS = seaman and missed cork = bun(g)), COBALT, and INFRINGE, but I did manage to finish. Very enjoyable.

  14. Brilliant puzzle. Only 17 has anything remotely questionable in it.

    I can think of another way to do the extremely splendid and utterly polite &lit at 14, but then I speak as one who has seen what happens in Tenby on a Friday night.

  16. As has been said, a gentle solve but no less enjoyable for that. Thank you Nutmeg & Gaufrid.

    The compliments of the season to all.

  17. Thanks Nutmeg and Gaufrid
    Delightful – clever and amusing (SEA ANEMONE and INFRINGE too clever for me to parse). Lots of favourites, but BOSUN, OWING, COBALT, KING ARTHUR and EPOCH stood out for me.

  18. Thanks to Gaufrid for the explanations of 1d (I couldn’t explain COB), 13d (I had SOUNDED OUT, but now I see why I was wrong), 17d (I thought that “all bar one” European referred to FR, IN and GE, all but IN being European – I was wrong!) and 24d (just couldn’t get it, but now I see it is a fine clue).

  19. Did enjoy this, even though it needed a lot of winkling out on train journeys to and from a country walk in the sunshine. However I was LATE also at 24d – I had et al = “and other things” hence loosely “stuff” as my, evidently rather poor, justification.

    Loved the surface at 19d. Alas these days jovial Jamaicans might indeed be happy to get a single at the Oval.

  20. Didn’t find this gentle at all… NW and SE quite challenging. I was also in the LATE camp. Which reminds me .must be going…

  21. Herb @15, of course, that is why mothers have to measure out the “formula” if they are bottle feeding their baby – on the breast the milk runs out after a while so the baby can go on happily sucking until it falls asleep

  22. Thanks Gaufrid, and Nutmeg. Re 24d wonder what is the plural of ETA? Is it:

    Expected Times of Arrival or
    Expected Time of Arrivals?

    Brothers-in-law vs. brother-in-laws??

  23. I found this neither gentle nor delightful. I simply couldn’t get on the wavelength for this. There were several guesses- CRACKLE, COBOLT and it took me an age to get OWING, WEDGED and SATE. The latter I thought rather good once I’d sussed it- with some help from Mrs PA. I flirted with LATE but the reasoning behind it was a bit iffy.
    Not very enjoyable but-
    Thanks Nutmeg.

  24. Re #22, I think it’s almost certainly the first one,ilippu – when various people may arrive, not simultaneously, I’d say. Not in my experience this Christmas anyway. Clue works fine of course as plural of ETA is surely ETAs.

  25. I enjoyed my last Nutmeg very much, but this one not quite so much, probably because I was just slow-witted today. I got 26A only after 28A (they are connected), I struggled on 20D (but I don’t know why – it seems fair), and 24A was impenetrable – there are too many words that go -A-E, and I decided not to try too hard going through possible words, possible constructions and possible meanings. I don’t enjoy combinations like -A-E or -I-E much unless there is something more interesting about the clue – like a connection to another clue. In this case the ‘connection’ between 23A and 24A turned out to be false.

    Right, having got that over with, I must register my appreciation of this puzzle as a whole. It was a nice mental challenge after the idiosyncrasies of yesterday’s. Thanks therefore to Nutmeg – I look forward to more – and to Gaufrid – likewise.

  27. Am I the only one who finds clues requiring one to think of a word, then remove a letter, then anagram the results, deeply frustating and unsatisfactory? It’s as if the setter can’t anagram the answer so resorts to a “bitsa” approach to cobble a clue together. Seems to be an increasing trend so it is probably just me being old-fashioned and grumpy I guess.

  28. Liked this one a lot. Tricky but fair. Thanks Nutmeg and Gaufrid. One question, probably daft. Why does magazine = number?

  29. I got stuck in the SW when I tried to solve this puzzle this morning and I didn’t get back to it until late this evening. I’m kicking myself for not seeing VERB even though I looked for a contained part of speech. I’ve no idea why I couldn’t see it when it is so obvious. If I’d seen it this morning, the rest would probably have fallen more quickly, as they did tonight. SATE was my LOI.

    I am really too tired to post tonight and I need to be up early in the morning, but I wanted to add to the praise for 14a. 🙂

    Thanks, Nutmeg and Gaufrid.

  30. mike @27

    I see no-one has answered yet so I’ll have a go.

    My view is that it depends on how well the setter has constructed each clue. I think it is fair game if the setter succeeds in using any combination of cryptic devices (anagrams, subtractions, envelopes, …) and misdirections (using a word or phrase in a valid but unexpected way) provided the answer is clear and unique and is fully explainable from the clue taken as a whole and in all its parts.

    That’s a bit of a mouthful, but I think in the Guardian and several other national publications setters have been challenged more as solvers have ‘rumbled’ them and found the more straightforward cryptic clues too easy to solve. Therefore they have tried, usually with great success, to create clues that tax the solver – but not unfairly.

    Clues like the real or made-up example you give (“think of a word, then remove a letter, then anagram the results”), provided the above conditions hold, are what you must expect today. I hope, if you give them a chance over a period of a time, you get used to solving the trickier clues, as I have done over the last 2 years or so with the Guardian. These blogs are an excellent source of input on clues that stump you (or that you solve correctly but don’t know why!).

  31. Thanks Nutmeg and Gaufrid

    Got there in the end, but I didn’t think that it at all easy. Had no idea on the parsing of either BOSUN or INFRINGE and took along time to convince myself of COP = apprehension in 4d.

    Having said that, found it a very enjoyable puzzle with lots of wit, variation and overall cleverness about it.

    Finished all over the shop with BOSUN (unparsed), COBALT (parsed with difficulty) and SATE (which took a long time even when I clicked with the ETA business).

    Merry Christmas all …

  32. Ross @ 28

    A lot of magazines number their issues sequentially (hence the phrase ‘back number’ or ‘back issue’).

    hth

  34. Thanks Gaufrid and Nutmeg.

    Pleasant enough. I failed on SATE – only because I got to the end of my train journey and wanted to move on to a fresh challenge.

    I was pleased with myself for parsing BOSUN and EPOCH.

    I always struggle to understand the …..s linking clues. What have OWING and DEEPENS got to do with each other?

    Maybe just one of the deep questions of life?

  35. Having put Ancestory for 25a the rest of the sw corner was unsolvable, at which point the towel was thrown in. Pity, enjoyed the rest of it even if I couldn’t parse every one. One of nutmeg’s trickier efforts I thought.

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