Guardian 26,829 – Otterden

66 comments on “Guardian 26,829 – Otterden”

1. Thanks Otterden and Andrew

   I think you are too polite, Andrew – this was simply awful. Tedious theme, obscure examples (hands up anyone who knew ANGARA – Chambers Word Wizard didn’t!), sloppy clueing, all round poor.

   Particular examples: 23a “up” you mentioned, there is also an incorret “comes back” in 14d; “nail” sounds like NILE for Cockenys? I don’t think so; PM = “Ted” – since when have we been on firstname terms with PMs? You commented on the word order in 5d. VOLT = “power” I don’t thinh is acceptable, even in crosswords; “most of federal capital”?.

   In the interest on making a positive comment, I did like MODISH, for its neatly concealed definition.

2. Thanks for the blog, Andrew. Unusually, I have to disagree with you. Perish the thought that this might have been a Prize puzzle!

   I think I had at least as many niggles as usual with this setter. I often say that there are too good clues in a puzzle to pick out favourites, so it seems only fair to adopt the same policy and not enumerate all my reservations – but I have to say that 13ac is one of the most ridiculous definitions I have ever come across!

   [That’s how I knew VLTAVA, too.]

3. I should, of course, have said, ‘too *many* good clues…’

4. Absolutely shocking! I know of no place where nail sounds like nile- but I’ll stop there.

5. Several weak points but I enjoyed others. I think the crit above is overheated
   ..I hear nile in London and Birmingham, and *a* at the start of a river is surely a guide to the letter needed?
   At least 3 rivers too obscure for armchair and ‘tale told by 8’ might improve 12 which the ed should have kicked out.Is there an editor these days?

6. Got to say that I’m just starting to get into the stride of Guardian crosswords and, even when I don’t complete the puzzles, usually appreciate the wit and wordplay when I see the answers. I did manage to complete this, with a bit of cheating, and felt a bit cheated. Some of the wordplay was so contrived and 13ac… just careless.
   So what would a good clue have been for that one?

7. 17d could also be OLTAVA. Overall more of a google search exercise than a test of crossword solving skills

8. Thanks Otterden & Andrew.

   I just got my Chambers Crossword Dictionary list of rivers and banged them in. No, I don’t think volt=electrical power is colloquially OK. Even Chambers, which is not always the best at science, gives electrical potential.

   Getting 13 rivers in the grid is a bit of a tour-de-force, but maybe it would have been better to just put in, say, 10 and make the offering more attractive to the solver.

9. Absolutely hated it. Once I realised it was going to be a list of rivers I just stopped. Enough said.

10. I have not posted before and usually enjoy reading the erudite comments of my fellow solvers. However, today I think the over reaction is unwarranted. Yes, there might be a few clues which are below par, but the overall level of ingenuity is impressive.

11. re 17d: I seem to remember that power=volts x current, so if you reduce the volts by 25%, the power goes down by the same amount. Hard to see another way of cluing VLT – emf?

12. Thanks Andrew, your restraint is most creditworthy.

    I’ll start with what I liked; MODISH was cleverly concealed and I liked the nice partial anagram and &lit-ishness of HITMAN.

    Nail pronounced ‘nile’ is fine with me, I’ve heard it in many places, too.

    Cross with myself for forgetting GAM = school (whales) again.

    As for the rest, I don’t think shoe-horning these clues into a tedious theme helped, but that apart there were some rotten clues, notably, BANK ACCOUNT, SAN JOAQUIN, & VLTAVA in which electrical power cannot be volt. Tension, potential and a raft of others, but not power.

    Sorry to be a grouch, Otterden, I have enjoyed many of your other offerings.

    Nice weekend, all.

13. I had NOWISH for 6a which I think allows the definition to be “in a very short time”

    Sorry to be scientifically pedantic but….

    Would we accept MILE as a unit of time? No. So why expect me to accept VOLT as unit of power. Power is measured in watts – volts is the measure of potential difference, – the amount of “push” an electric current receives. Scientific illiteracy is as unacceptable as any other type.

    Thank you Andrew and Otterden. It’s been a good week.

14. Sorry – missed the previous posts about volt. Still it seems to be ok to be scientifically illiterate these days.

15. Hmmm . . . like others I felt there some dubious clues, particularly BANK ACCOUNT for which the definition was just weird. Unlike William @ 12, I thought SAN JOAQUIN was fine, in fact rather good. MODISH was very good; and I worked my way through all the rivers with a little googling for GAM and VLTARA, having tried OLTARA. All in all I though it was OK, but definitely not the greatest puzzle. Thannks to O and A.

16. Cryptocyclist @13/14 Couldn’t agree with you more. Don’t you find it strange that, in any given social gathering, saying something like, “Oh, I don’t know anything about books, I’m afraid” (or music, or art etc) would risk branding yourself as an illiterate moron, whereas, “Oh, I don’t know anything about science, I’m afraid” seems perfectly acceptable and reasonable. I wonder why there is this double standard?

17. drofle @15 SAN JOAQUIN……’spose. I think I’d just reached that moment in this crossword where I’d decided it was all a bit of a bore. Would you admit, though, that you had to find a river to fit the numeration and the crossing letters first, before even thinking about banjos?

18. I’d like to find something positive to say, so HITMAN was quite nice. Overall though too much of it seemed more like a geography test than a crossword. SAN JOAQUIN and ANGARA were new to me, as was Angela BRAZIL.

    Thanks to Andrew and Otterden

19. Thanks Otterden and Andrew.

    I enjoyed swimming against the current, the theme woke many happy memories, in particular SHENANDOAH, NILE, JORDAN and VLTAVA.

    Cryptocyclist @13, I think you probably do use “mile” as a measure of time; when one wants to drive somewhere, one usually asks “How many miles is it?”, not being interested in the petrol consumption, unless petrol is very dear or there is a shortage, but in how long the journey will take.

20. I didn’t hate it as much as some. Vltava and Angara were new rivers to me, and Angela Brazil a new person and the note led me to discover that there was a whole genre of girls’ boarding school stories, who knew? Having lived in California, where the San Joaquin Valley is familiar to many, I didn’t find it hard to realize that if there’s a valley there must be a river.

21. I don’t see a problem with NILE – wasn’t Eliza Doolittle famous for “the Rhine in spine” etc?

22. Unlike many I quite enjoyed this apart from the struggle with some of the rivers. I didn’t like volt = power, as it definitely is not. Bank Account I rather liked, perhaps because it was one of my first. The definition, it is true, could apply to several things, but then so could the definition of 15d and no one has complained about that. The one complaint I have is the use of initial letters esp. audio visual aid – ava without any indication.

    Thanks to Otterden and Andrew.

23. A curate’s egg! I had the same doubts as you, Andrew, and I would have expressed them similarly or perhaps more firmly.

    I was pleased to learn ‘gam’ in 16D and the river ANGARA at 25A.

    17D (VLTAVA) was easy for me, fortunately, knowing my Smetana and knowing Prague well. Saying ‘volt’ is power, though, is incorrect, as already pointed out.

    1D (CANBERRA), although straightforward, doesn’t work for me. After some interesting experiences on this site I am no longer surprised to find that words or syllables that don’t sound alike are considered to sound alike, so this clue probably works for many of you.

    I had a good laugh at myself for getting 6D (MODISH) last of all – I was successfully misled and should have read the clue properly!

    Thanks to Otterden and Andrew.

24. Thanks to Otterden and Andrew. As expected, I had difficulty with this setter. I got some of the rivers but then needed Google to confirm others (and also Angela BRAZIL)- and VLTAVA defeated me – and I missed the subtraction to get HITMAN.

25. Just to clarify a couple of points in the light of previous comments:

    1. When I said the puzzle was “more suited to the Prize slot”, I didn’t mean to imply that it would have been a good Prize, just that this kind of puzzle, needing Google or reference books for most of us, is less suitable for a weekday.

    2. Re “Volt” and “power”: as I said, the Volt is not a unit of electrical power (that would be the Watt), but words such as “power” have colloquial non-technical meanings that have existed since before their use as precise technical terms. I certainly don’t think it’s a great clue, especially as it’s so obviously open to criticism on these grounds, but I can’t get too worked up about it.

    In a similar vein, “species”, “family”, “class” etc have technical meanings in biological taxonomy, but that doesn’t mean they can’t be used as approximate synonyms in everyday speech, or even crossword clues.

    3. I don’t understand the objections to the Cockney nail. Cruciverbophile hits it on the head in 21.

    (I spent yesterday evening at a wonderful concert of the music of Steve Reich, including his “Clapping Music” performed by the composer himself and another. Perhaps this made me better inclined towards Otterden, and humanity generally, than is sometimes the case. Even the “points problem at Baldock” that delayed my train home by over half an hour didn’t seem to counteract the effect.)

26. I find much of the criticism of this crossword unjustified and rather churlish. I have no particular knowledge of the theme but had no difficulty completing all the themed answers from the wordplay without any need for reference books. Admittedly 25 across could have been Angara or Anraga, but the first one sounds right. As far as I am concerned the other answers were also impeccably clued.

    As for volts being used as a measure of electrical power, look in a travel guide.

27. BRAZIL and MODISH were quite good I thought and got the puzzle off to a decent start. And there are quite a few passable clues, BOUNDS and so forth.

    But oh, when Otterden gets fixated on things that are just plain wrong! Googled WATAVA at 17d because unlike the setter I could remember what my physics teacher had taught me. ‘Up’ does not mean ‘backwards’. Throw in the odd dreadful def such as at 13a, and maybe a copy of ‘Secrets of the Setters’ shouldn’t just go to prize winners … ?

28. Hi Andrew @25

    Yes, I saw what you meant, in that this puzzle might be harder to solve on the bus or train, but I would have been very disappointed to have had it as a Prize puzzle.

    Although I’m retired, I do still seem to have more to do during the week than on most Saturday mornings and so prefer something that’s going to make me think a bit more, or a theme that’s less obvious and leads to more interesting research. Although there were a couple of perhaps unfamiliar rivers here, it was quite clear early on that it was rivers we were looking for, even though WATERCOURSE was by no means one of my first ones in. The only one I’d never heard of was ANGARA – which, from the wordplay, could have been INGARA, but that seemed less likely and, since the first letter was unchecked, I couldn’t be bothered to look it up. I much prefer themes to be ‘ghost’ ones – or, at least more interesting than this.

    gerardus @22 – do you really think that ‘Indian food (3,5)’ is as vague as ‘most of us have at least one’? I had every one of the checked letters in before the answer occurred to me – and it wasn’t one of those satisfying penny-dropping moments when it did.

    Those of you who have never heard of Angela Brazil might be amused by this: http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/feb/14/angela-brazil-pioneer-of-girls-boarding-school-fiction . [Her name’s pronounced to rhyme [almost] with ‘dazzle’.]

29. There’s a good debate going on here on your blog, Andrew, and I was interested to read your comment @25 and David’s @26.

    I meant to say that I enjoyed solving this crossword, to balance what I said by way of criticism, but as an occasional setter I know that if I had compiled it and had the opportunity to change it after receiving the sort of fair criticism that you see here I would have improved a few of the clues.

    I liked the theme, by the way. Rivers are within the reach of nearly all of us, I would think – and they are not on my very short hate list of theme topics.

30. I didn’t dislike this as much as some others seem to have done but I’m not terribly keen on puzzles that require the consultation of a list pertaining to the theme. I got the theme from ODER way before I solved WATERCOURSE. I didn’t know VLTAVA-although I thought the clue OK in retrospect- or ANGARA. I liked BRAZIL and AMAZON and I did get BANK ACCOUNT from the clue
    By no means the worst puzzle I’ve come across.

31. Eileen @ 28 – I thought Indian food was rather a general definition – it could have been hot curry for example. Certainly not as vague as 13ac, but surely vague definitions are not uncommon. Other than that I thought 13 rather pleasing in its misdirection, as it could have been something like Aunt Matilda. Don’t we most of us have a bluff relation lurking somewhere in our history?

32. It happens again. Otterden’s name appears on a crossword and everybody gets all hedgehoggy. What for other setters would be delightful misdirections and creative allusions now become almost affronts to decency.
    For instance, 23a. What direction is “up” when in reference to a river? Against the flow. There is therefore every justification in an across clue about a river to use “up” to require a reversal. Remind me not to let you take the tiller the next time we take a cruise up the Rhine.
    And in a crossword about runners, then it is a small jump of the imagination to flowers and bankers, such that part of the solution to 13a should be bubbling up in the thoughts of most experienced solvers, with the whole providing an apposite description of the crossword.

33. Couldn’t get on with this at all, and after 3 hours bafflement I confess I gave up, with only about 25% completed.
    As always, turned to 225 for illumination and education, and found an unusually large number of people who also
    didn’t get on with today’s offering. I was taken aback by the level of vitriol it’s attracted, both here and in the Guardian comments. Completely agree with the objections to the misuse of volt, and with William’s observations. Nevertheless, I can’t claim that this was the reason for me not being able to solve the clue. There were a lot I couldn’t work out, and overall I just couldn’t get to grips with the whole thing. That can’t be all Otterden’s fault though.

34. Van Winkle 13ac BANK ACCOUNT. You may be on to something, and if so, well spotted. This would just about redeem the whole puzzle and would turn it from an object of disdain into one of admiration.

35. Van Winkle @32

    13A (BANK ACCOUNT) has certainly provoked much comment – not to mention polarisation of views! I admit I didn’t see the connection between BANK and all the rivers (and WATERCOURSE at 8D). If this was intended, full marks to the setter.

    In that case, however, surely 13A was a lost opportunity. Instead of what Eileen (@2) called “one of the most ridiculous definitions I have ever come across” (I can’t disagree with that), the clue should have incorporated a link to 8D, just like all the rivers. What about:

    “Story about either side of 8”

    This might need a bit of refinement, but that’s the route I would have taken.

36. I didn’t dislike the theme as much as did many others, but I might have hoped to see some variations – perhaps with watercourses such as culverts or aqueducts or gutters instead of only rivers. Setter Paul is very adept at tangential themes.
    I share many of the misgivings already expressed but, on the positive side, I liked the clue for MODISH, and I learned about the ANGARA and about Angela Brazil. Liked cruciverbophile’s comment @21.
    Thanks to Otterden and Andrew.

37. Van Winkle’s point @32, taken together with Alan Browne’s amendment @35, would remove any reservations I had about 13a.

38. Well spotted Van Winkle, and BANK ACCOUNT runs across the middle of the puzzle while WATERCOURSE runs down the centre.

39. I had TEST for “to end socialis[T] [SET]back” — well, there is a River Test, and at least I’d heard of it.

    For that and many other reasons, mostly covered in other comments, regrettably I did not enjoy this puzzle so much. Contorted constructions, misleading definitions, obscure references, obscure answers, plus a theme…

    Thanks though to Otterden (I am least better informed) and Andrew (for rather more enlightenment than I usually need from this site).

40. I’m fine with themed puzzles like this normally, even when (as here) I’m not familiar with the thematic content. However I didn’t like this one – there is a convention that obscure words should be clued with unambiguous wordplay – a fortiori so should obscure proper names. But in this puzzle there are several clues for obscure thematic names which are far from unambiguous in their wordplay eg

    12a I could see it was an anagram but that left all the unches unclear – impossible unless you already knew the obscure river.
    18a Far from unambiguous wordplay for another obscure river.
    25a Clearly an anagram of Niagara minus ‘I’, or possibly ‘A’ – again leaving unches unclear without knowledge of the obscure river.
    17d Could equally be OLTAVA from the wordplay even with the crossing letters.

41. Re BANK ACCOUNT: yes, maybe it was a very reference to the theme, but if so it wasn’t clued as such so an opportunity was missed.

    I don’t like panning setters at all, but for some reason Otterden does seem to attract criticism more than any other setter, as Van Winkle says. It’s a mystery why our esteemed editor doesn’t seem to address this issue. Surely most of the dodgy clues could have been sorted out to everyone’s satisfaction.

42. Besides being apparently unedited this was irredeemably dull.

    This must be the worst puzzle we have seen for years.

    A waste of time and space.

    I didn’t enjoy this by the way 🙂

    Thanks to Andrew and Otterden

43. Bank account in a river themed crossword?… Surely ‘tale by the riverside’?

44. Like it, phil!

45. Not everyone’s bothered about pangrams, but FOXISH for MODISH would have given one here.
    (Only, I’d have lost my COD.)

46. I’m a geography buff so I liked the river theme, although I would never have seen through the power/volt confusion to get VLTAVA, and with GAMBIA, no matter how many times I see it, I never can remember that a “sounds like” clue usually means “just drop the r”.

    While I was irritated by former Prime Minister “Ted”, the only true foul I call is that Ms. Brazil is far, far too obscure for so broad a definition.

47. Nice one phil (@43) concerning 13A (BANK ACCOUNT). Yours is more succinct than my effort (@35) – although I wanted to reference 8D. To make it complete, with a definition or indication as well, I would have something like

    “You might credit this tale by the riverside”
    [or “… tale of the riverside”]

48. Brendan @42

    This was my least favourite puzzle of 2016, although having called it a curate’s egg I wouldn’t slate it like you were driven to do. The standard is very high now. I actually enjoyed solving it unaided, guessing one (ANGARA) and glossing over the faults that you and I and others encountered. Sorry you found it so bad.

    [Btw, I briefly replied to your late post on yesterday’s puzzle.]

49. I’m with Brendan, this was a really disappointingly dull crossword and I could hardly finish my jellied eels when I realised what a dreadful clue 21across was

50. I think a lot of these problems could have been resolved at edit. Not all of them! When the writing is questionable, it makes solving so much more difficult.

51. Andrew @ 23

    Steve Reich, Clapping Music, with the composer? You lucky person, you! I remember hearing it on Radio 3 about 40 years ago (Music In Our TIme?), and thinking it was tremendous. Never heard it since.

    I’m saying nothing about the crossword!

52. Just too hard for me so I gave up. Embarrassed to admit I didn’t even get the Aussie answers: 23A (the Mighty Murray) and 1D our national capital (which might have been a fairer reference than “Old liner”). I got the rivers theme but for me there were too many obscure names and I thought the clues were at times unhelpful. But thanks to Otterden and Andrew, I now know a lot more about rivers of the world. Took this as a learning experience. Prefer not to blame the setter just because I was a “bear of little brain” with this one. I remain in awe of the cleverness of all the setters, as well as all the forum posters who are far and away much more intelligent (and experienced) solvers than me.

53. Thanks Andrew for a fine review of this curate’s egg, to say the least.
    As many posts made clear there is a lot that Otterden can be criticised for.

    After some hard work we only failed on VLTAVA (17d) – a river that I’ve seen (and been on) many many times in beloved Prague.
    So, it cannot be that bad then?

    We had a big discussion on the obscurity of SPIRAEA in Maskarade’s puzzle.
    But at least, that one was clued in a completely fair and unambiguous way.
    However, today we had ANGARA (25ac) which was not unambiguously clued.
    In this I disagree with david @26 (who also should not rely too much on travel guides when it comes to VOLT = power).
    Eileen, however, hits the Nile on its head: it could have been INGARA.
    General knowledge solutions, especially ones not very well known, should not be clued like Otterden did.
    Pasquale is often criticised for such things but, generally, one cannot fault him on lack of fairness.

    I think the definition in 13ac was perhaps vague but not as bad others thought it was.
    It’s a cryptic crossword, you know, and if it is still possible to get the right solution (and it was) I’m fine with it.
    I was less taken by the definition of KRAKATOA (14d).

    One of the main objections for me today, not mentioned by others if I read the posts well, was the anagram indicator in 2d (‘spreader’).
    Some people are against nounal anagrinds anyway, I am not one of them.
    But there are nounal indicators and nounal indicators.
    I think e.g. ‘change’,’treatment and ‘trouble’ are, when positioned behind the fodder, acceptable.
    For example, ‘heat treatment’ means ‘treatment of heat’ – valid for (HEAT)*, in my opinion.
    However, ‘grit spreader’ only works for me when ‘spreader of grit’ does the trick.
    It doesn’t.
    It doesn’t tell me to do some with ‘grit’, it refers to someone who does something with ‘grit’.
    It’s the same as seeing ‘playing’ as a valid anagrind but rejecting ‘player’ being one.
    Apparently the editor disagrees.

    So, what’s the verdict?
    Not really the best crossword this week.

    S.

54. Sil @53

    I enjoyed reading your analysis. (It’s a pity you failed on VLTAVA, by the way, since you know it well, as I do.)

    Yes, 13A (BANK ACCOUNT) was vague – but it was too vague. There are many kinds of things it could be, not just many things. The fact that you get it when you have enough letters does not exonerate the setter!

    I didn’t notice anything amiss with ‘spreader’ as an anagrind at the time I solved TIGRIS (in fact, it was my first one in!). It’s one of countless examples of a smooth surface triumphing over precision. It happens with other setters too, and I know how hard a job it is sometimes to get it right.

    You mention the editor. He keeps popping up in comments but never in person. He gets a lot right, or we wouldn’t enjoy solving Guardian crosswords, but by now I’m convinced these crosswords are not checked for technical errors or even for typos. He probably needs a good proof-reading assistant who can solve crosswords. What do other papers do? (Rhetorical question?)

    My verdict is: a curate’s egg! Which is how I started my post @23.

55. Looking at BANK ACCOUNT again at 13a, there are 13 rivers in total, thus a full account. Also, Westdale @5 spotted the connection with WATERCOURSE (but gave the clue as 12), and suggested “tale told by 8”, before Van Winkle @32 pointed it out.

56. River is under grit spreader? Are you sure that’s a triumph of surface sense over precision?

57. Paul

    Actually yes! But it’s all relative. “River is under grit spreader” works (a mental image is possible), but “River is under spread grit” (or whatever other anagrind you might choose) does not work as a surface, or not nearly as well, which is why I call the clue a (relative) triumph of surface over precision.

58. River is under grit spreader for Tigris seems a perfectly ok clue to me. Why so sniffily nitpicking about this crossword? Yes, you could have ruined it for yourself by painfully plodding thru googled rivet lists but more fool you. Otterden, I really enjoyed this crossword. And for your next one, a physics units theme perhaps? Seems everyone knows so much more about this than rivers.

59. Caroline @ 58: I’m not usually too fussy about cluing, but ‘grit spreader’ really isn’t right. An acceptable anagrind would be ‘spread’. The anagrind in this context would need to be a verb, I think.

60. Yes Caroline, I could have gone through a rivet list, and that would have nailed it I reckon. And yes, more fool me for not having considered it. I just miss these things you see.

    Alan! Hello. Well, both scenarios seem utterly implausible to me, I mean, can you name me a river that is under grit spreader/ spread grit? Grit that needs shifting is in river, OTOH, could work. These rivers are full of grit that never gets used, in my opinion. Then I’ll put my rivet list with it and we can have some Virgil stretti.

    I’m sure you know what I mean.

61. I enjoyed this one, but agree with comments regarding misuse of VOLT, in my view as bad as implying the hectare is a unit of volume.

62. Paul @60

    I enjoyed your response – I was riveted.

    On my original point, we disagree. It is only a detail, and it was something some-one else picked up on and I agreed with.

    I would welcome a theme of physics units. I could probably tackle rivers again – I surprised myself by knowing all these rivers except ANGARA.

63. SeanDimly at 45 – it was for exactly the reason you refer to that I could not get 4d and 6a. No matter how hard I tried I could not fit in the remaining F and X.

    There was me thinking I was really clever for spotting a pangram for the first time !!!

    Oh well, I found the rest of the clues fine.

64. http://www.finwake.com/1024chapter8/1024finn8.htm

65. Thanks Andrew and Otterden.

    I’m a bit of a map nerd and am pleased to say I knew all of the rivers cited so on this particular theme I was OK.

    But like many above I object to VOLT = POWER. That is just plain wrong.

    Similarly, NILE as a cockney homophone for Nail is surely wrong too – Aussie maybe.

    Which reminds me of the encounter between a British Captain and an Aussie private in the trenches of Flanders. “Did you come here to die?” asked the former.

    “No, I came here yisterdie” was the response.

    As William would say ……I’ll get my coat!

66. Thanks Otterden and Andrew

    Actually started this one on publication date and finished all bar one clue on or near that time. -O-I-H remained like that up until late July when I ventured a tentative MODISH in from a version of the word play but without understanding fully why. Placed it in the back pile to be reviewed from time to time … and only today did I spot the devilishly and cleverly disguised definition of ‘In’ !!! What a top clue and I’m glad that I persisted with it and finally worked it out !!

    What a difference there is in the comments of the ‘expert solvers’ here and the comments and respect for his work that was posted by fellow setters in his memorial tribute back in April. It is true that his style was quirky and bucked convention in many ways but there was only one clue in his 21 puzzles that he set for the Guardian that ever stopped me deriving the answer – and that was based on my ignorance of geography of the Isle of Man and its SNAEFELL mountain.

    Anyway, I enjoyed this one as per normal and learnt something new of the rivers that i had to look up to find or confirm the word play here. I’ll miss his name on the banner of crosswords and was glad that I had the chance to solve the score and one that he did set for the Guardian.

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