141 comments on “General Discussion”

  1. I am still disturbed by Chifonie’s use of M as an abbreviation for ‘man’ in clue for RED ARMY on Wednesday (27,295). Can anyone supply a justification?

  2. William @1

    I certainly cannot. By way of comment, though, I would just say that M = man is not recognised in my editions of Chambers and Collins at home. M for ‘male’ or ‘masculine’ is allowed in both those sources, and this usage is also familiar to me.

    I would say that the use of ‘man’ to mean M is a simple error, and ‘male’ could have been used instead.

  3. I have recently discovered that the verb “to biff” (an answer), which I first met on 225 and correctly divined the meaning of, probably derives from BIFD. Would I be right to surmise that this itself stands for Bung In From Definition?

  4. Alan B – Thanks for response. You exonerate Chifonie gallantly, and I tend to agree. A pity though – most unusual to have a ‘mistake’ neither resolved nor even acknowledged. But most grateful to you for confirming that it’s not some basic oversight on my part… [BTW – It was indeed you, and not an “Andy B”, whom I was praising recently as you correctly surmised].

    Tony – yes you are correct, the term BIFD coined first at TftT (the ‘Times for the Times’ site, which provides a similar blog/commentary as 225, but for Mr Murdoch’s offerings and with a greater onus on speed of solving which might put some off?). In my view, fifteensquared is of course the warmest little corner of cyberland!
    Love and peace for all – and if you don’t agree, the boys will be round later (“we come in peace, shoot to kill!”)

  5. Thanks, William. I’ve only recently discovered TftT, and while I don’t expect to spend much time there, it’s handy for checking/understanding the odd crossword in copies of the Times I pick up at the cafe, when their own site requires payment. I don’t expect to compete in the Times’ speed trials any time soon, btw!

    225 is certainly a cosy place to hang out most of the time, but I didn’t realise the love and peace was compulsory. Who was it said “Fighting for peace is like fucking for virginity”?

  6. Tony
    The answer to your question is George Carlin, a late US comedian and author, although unfortunately you’ve misquoted him, using one of the seven words that Carlin himself said nobody is allowed to use on US TV. In the quote about fighting for peace he used the word ‘screwing’.
    Whether that’s funny or not is another matter. I just wanted to set the record straight.

  8. Tony
    I have my doubts now. I got my info from Wikipedia, and what I saw there may well be a sanitised account. The ‘original’ might have been bowdlerised early on in its history.
    Thanks for the link.

  9. Alan,

    I put the question to Nigel Rees of BBC R4’s Quote Unquote, and he says:

    “00   Fighting for peace is like fucking for virginity.
     
    Anonymous (graffito). Included in my book Graffiti Lives, OK (1979) and said to have been observed in Covent Garden, London, in 1978.  +++ ‘Fighting for peace is like fucking for chastity’ was quoted in Knave magazine (March 1977).”

  10. I recall the original as you have, Tony@5, 7 and 9. It certainly packs more punch than the toned-down version. Thanks to you and Alan B@6 and 8 for the interesting discussion about the background to this slogan.

  11. I don’t know whether anyone will find it here, but I’d like to say thankyou to John and Jane for organising another enjoyable S & B event in York yesterday (28 September).
    As usual, it was a pleasure to see acquaintances from previous years, and to meet some folk with whom I have corresponded through Fifteensquared and TftT but not met before.
    A lot of work goes into arranging such events – especially when it is done so well – and I know that John and Jane are both very busy people.

  12. Readers of this blog who access the Live Journal Times for the Times blog at https://times-xwd-times.livejournal.com/ may be interested to learn that a user of a forum where I posted a link to one of their posts says three Russian websites tried to plant a cookie on him when he followed the link. Anyone know anything about this? I tried to post a message like this on today’s post there, but it was rejected as spam.

  13. Using Crossword Compiler on a Mac.

    Apologies if this has been covered elsewhere and I’ve missed it, but I was wondering if anyone here has experience of Crossword Compiler on a Mac using virtual Windows software.
    I haven’t bought CC yet because I’m wary of the extra cost involved in buying extra software when it may turn out to be glitchy or even incompatible altogether.
    The CC website mentions VirtualBox as a free alternative to eg Parallels – does anyone have any experience of using that?

    I’d be very grateful for any advice, although it’s probably a bit of a long shot, most setters having Windows PCs.

    Thank you.

  14. Nila @13

    If you’re still looking in on here for answers….

    I’ve been setting using Crossword Compiler on a Mac for many years now. For this, I am using Windows in a VMware Fusion virtual machine. I’ve never had any problems with the software, although there are one or two issues that have cropped up. From time to time I have had to pay to upgrade the Fusion software in order to use the latest version of Crossword Compiler. It’s also not possible to operate the Fusion software remotely from another computer, although I think this might be possible with Parallels. This hasn’t proved a problem for me, as I’m seldom apart from my Mac. Another more recent issue has revolved around different versions of Windows. I’ve been using Windows XP for years, but this is not supported by Windows any more and also is incompatible with the latest version of Crossword Compiler. So I’ve now updated to Windows 10, which again works fine within a virtual machine via Fusion. It does however need more memory to run, so I’ve had to upgrade my Mac’s memory from 4GB to 8GB. I’ve no experience of any free alternatives such as VirtualBox, as I decided to go down the Fusion route before knowing of free software, and I was happy as a professional setter to pay for the software anyway.

    Hope this is of some help, and good luck!

  15. Hi Puck. Still regularly checking for answers here (I haven’t asked anywhere else) and chuffed to see your reply.
    I’m okay with the 8GB memory at least! The Windows info is particularly handy as I obviously have to buy a cheapish edition of Windows, and now know not to choose XP.
    I was a little wary that the CC site said CC “works well” on Macs, which seemed to imply it wasn’t perfect, but your reply has reassured me that the imperfections aren’t dealbreakers.

    I hope to bite the bullet soon. I think I can write passable clues – allowing several hours for each one 🙂 – and I hope to improve that skill, but I know I have everything to learn about the practical art of creating an enjoyable and fair puzzle, the art of grid construction etc.

    Thank you very much for your help.

  16. The (imprecise) Science/Art of Clue Classification OR the Ugly Sisters’ Size 10s and the Glass Slipper.

    “We could go to the beach tomorrow.” is a difficult sentence to explain to a student who has been told that ‘could’ is the past tense of ‘can’. The endless contradictions in our mongrel language, and the foolishness that ‘experts’ in it wade into, have, for me, come to be a source of joy and amusement rather than frustration.
    Similarly, when our sometimes thankless setters come up with a clue that refuses to be classified, I prefer to admire the weird and wonderful ‘foot’ rather than risk shattering the ‘VERY delicate glass footwear’.

  18. @Tony,

    I don’t know where you might be able to get hold of the whole puzzle, but the clue in question was as follows:

    Here ‘n’ there in the heavens’ watery mire are tiny slits, so the harsh weather is slight, not bulky, perhaps? (Spike Milligan) (5,3,5,2,3,3,5,3,4,4,2,3,6,4,2,5,5,3,4,2,4)

  19. Thanks, Mitz. In fact, although that has been quoted elsewhere as the text of the clue, I’ve a feeling (based on one source I’ve read) that there was a cross-reference to another answer as part of the attribution in brackets, viz:

    …. ([clue number] by Spike Milligan)

  20. MY 93 YEAR OLD FATHER COMPLETES THE I NEWSPAPER CRYPTIC CROSSWORD EVERY DAY. HE IS VERY COMPUTER LITERATE. CAN HE JOIN YOUR GROUP AND BECOME A BLOGGER?

  22. This is a comment on an unusual type of clue in Boatman’s Guardian crossword of 26 January 2018. The clue was “What you need to make out with this fish! (5)”, and the answer was TROUT.

    This clue has the definition ‘fish’ (or rather ‘this fish’), plus an original device that gives you OUT (which is telegraphed in the clue once you suss the device) but nothing else by way of wordplay.

    This type of clue breaks the unwritten rule that the wordplay must lead you to a unique answer. When this rule is occasionally broken, some solvers do not take exception to it and are satisfied when crossing letters, as well as the definition, give you the answer, in exactly the same way that they would in a non-cryptic crossword. I call it a blemish.

    The clue as written works for any word ending in OUT – you just supply an appropriate definition at the end. If I clue MANGETOUT in the same way with “What you need to make out with this vegetable” (9), you again have OUT telegraphed for you, and you guess MANGET from the crossing letters and/or the definition.

    I think this is unsatisfactory. Some solvers say things like “I had no problems with it”. Well, I had no problems with it either, but I think these clues (the original one and my similar example) do have a problem, which is that they are not complete, and they flout a rule for no good reason. Wordplay that gves you parts of the word should give you all the parts, not an arbitrary subset of them. (This argument may not always apply to other types of clue like cryptic definitions and double definitions, but I don’t want to extend or complicate the discussion by analysing clues by type. Whether a clue is of a recognised type or not, it must still stand up to reasonable scrutiny and be clear and complete – cryptic, but clear and complete.)

    What do others think?

    [I haven’t flagged up this comment anywhere in the daily blogs yet, but I’d be happy for anyone to do so if they wish.]

  23. I posted the above comment (@22) two days ago, and my take on that strange clue for TROUT is a little different now.

    As the setter (Boatman) himself said, the clue was ‘tongue-in-cheek’, and on that basis, and for one other reason, I now don’t object to it. That other reason is that the unclued part of the answer, ‘TR’, is only two letters long, making the answer easy enough to get once you see the trick. As it turned out, there were two answers that match the clue: TROUT and SMOUT. But only TROUT fits the crossing first letter (T), and TROUT happens to be the more familiar fish.

    Using the same device for a longer word like MANGETOUT (as in my earlier comment) would of course be ridiculous, and I wanted it to look that way in order to make my point. Having a large chunk (MANGET) of that word unclued is not at all satisfactory.

    Unlike some solvers, I get little or no satisfaction from solving a clue in spite of the wordplay, or, to put it another way, solving it because you know what the setter meant but the clue doesn’t say it properly – or it isn’t complete. In the same vein, I tend not to comment “I had no problem with that clue”, or some such, mainly because it doesn’t really say anything about the clue (which might indeed have a ‘problem’).

    I liked the little clue-writing competition (for TROUT) in the late, late posts on the blog for Boatman’s crossword on 26 January. There is so much inventiveness out there among solvers as well as professional setters.

    After a short discussion (!), this topic is probably closed.

  24. Alan,

    I didn’t do the puzzle and only became aware of the clue because of your post here. I must say, I don’t like it and don’t really see that it quite works.

    “TR out” is what you need to make “out” from TROUT, surely, not with it?

    Even if the surface still worked using “from”, I don’t think I would like it much for the reasons you first stated. You say you’ve decided it’s ok because you can get it once you have the initial T, but I don’t think you should have to get crossers to even be able to solve a clue, even if that’s usually helpful.

    I’m all in favour of novel and interesting devices in cluing in general, but this isn’t one of them.

  25. Tony @24

    Thank you for (a) noticing my item and (b) replying to it!

    I agree with you in the main.  I don’t like the clue, but I now don’t object to it.  I regard it as a harmless experiment that is best not repeated.  Boatman, as you know, called it ‘tongue-in-cheek’ (after the fact).

    I have a rule, with which many solvers agree but some don’t, is that a clue in a cryptic crossword should lead you to a unique solution that therefore does not rely on crossers to make it unique.  The opposite, in fact, of straight (non-cryptic) crosswords, where the definition can and usually does lead to many possible solutions and the crossers determine which one is right.

  27. Alan (1 & 2 above)

    “Thank you for … noticing my item”

    As I’ve mention elsewhere, I take a feed from this page in Feedly, so (unlike many others) I’m alerted to new comments.

    “I have a rule …”

    Yes, I remember some discussion about this.

    “the word ‘is’ should not be there”

    Or you could insert “which” 😉

  28. Thank you Tony @27.

    Yes, I had a choice to make it right.  Inserting ‘which’ would have been even clearer, but either would have made the correction.

    I sometimes make slips like this because I don’t ‘overthink’ my comments and responses or try too hard for the perfect phrase.  I do scan the text for obvious errors before sending, but some do slip through.  I’m much better at proofreading text on a printed page than on a screen.

  30. Regarding my enquiry @17 regarding Paul’s old Milligan puzzle with the long anagram, I have now been advised by Puck(!) that the puzzle in question was Guardian Prize Crossword No 20,882, published on Saturday February 8 1997. He, in fact, has retained his own filled grid from the paper and stored it with other “puzzles of interest”.

    I am still looking to acquire a copy myself.

  32. Guardian setters: degrees of difficulty:  I have got into the rather nerdy habit of noting the time taken to solve the Guardian crossword, which I make time for on most days, and eventually thought I might as well do something with the accumulation of data: see the list below, which tabulates my personal average solving times for the various setters over more than a year. I stress the word personal: it would be interesting to see how far the experience of others tallies or otherwise with my own.

    Qualification: at least six puzzles per setter, to enable a significant average. This unfortunately eliminates some notable setters, e.g. Boatman, Enigmatist, Maskarade.  I do not note actual times here, only comparative ones, in order to avoid the parallel dangers of seeming to boast about speed or of appearing embarrassingly slow. The baseline is Rufus time. Before retiring in his mid-80s, late in 2017, after a fantastic setting career, Rufus had become the regular Monday setter, deliberately giving a fairly gentle ‘entry level’ introduction to the week, and my average time was indeed consistently shorter with him than with other setters. That average Rufus time is registered as 1.0, and the average time for other setters is measured against this: Chifonie’s puzzles, for instance, have taken me on average half as much time again as those of Rufus, and those of Tramp and of Vlad nearly four times as long.

    Column 1: setter. Column 2: number of puzzles in the sample. Column 3: coefficient of [for me] difficulty, using Rufus time as the baseline

    Rufus            57                1.0

    Chifonie         16                 1.5

    Pan                 7                 1.7

    Shed               9                 2.4

    Crucible         15                 2.5

    Puck              11                 2.5

    Nutmeg         25                 2.6

    Brendan         11                2.6

    Arachne         13                 2.7

    Pasquale        15                 2.7

    Picaroon         26                2.7

    Philistine        13                 2.8

    Brummie         9                 2.8

    Imogen         11                 3.3

    Qaos             16                 3.3

    Paul              58                 3.7

    Tramp           17                 3.9

    Vlad              12                 3.9

  33. Interesting stuff quenbarrow, and I applaud the way you have presented the data.  I think my experience would largely chime with yours, but I’m surprised that Philistine and especially Paul have their respective difficulty quotients.  Paul can be tough, certainly, but I would put his average toughness lower than that.  Similarly, I think I would generally find Crucible and Puck a little tougher than in your table.  Setters like Arachne and Brendan being somewhere in the middle feels right, as they can set at any difficulty from Quiptic to fiendish.  If you had conducted this experiment a few years ago I fancy that Shed would have received a tougher score, but he definitely has mellowed.  I imagine that if you did have sufficient data on Boatman he would probably be at the tougher end, with Maskarade up with Tramp and Vlad, and Enigmatist in a class of his own.

    If you have time to delve into the Guardian’s archive, I would be interested to see retrospective scores for Araucaria and Bunthorne especially.

  34. quenbarrow @32

    I was very interested to read your analysis, as I know that contributors often post comments about how easy or difficult a puzzle is or whther they solved it quickly or not.

    Your list is particularly illuminating for me because the time I spend on a Guardian crossword doesn’t vary much – certainly nothing like a factor of 3.9 when you compare the bottom of your list to the top – even though I do sense varying difficulty levels (or ‘levels of challenge’ as I sometimes describe them).

    I’m not a quick solver anyway, and I admit to being curious as to what range of completion times covers the 57 Rufus puzzles that you solved (but I’m not asking you to reveal anything). In 2017 I remember that two Rufuses were write-ins, and they took 10 minutes each, of which a minimum 3 minutes was simply writing the letters in the grid, but they were the exceptions. (I never time myself, by the way, but I did note the time for those two write-ins.)

    I don’t know what the relative difficulty levels are between today’s Vlad and yesterday’s Chifonie, but for me the completion times were very similar, the Chifonie probably taking about 5 minutes less. This is typical for me. I had to ‘think more’ (or rather think through more possibilities) for the Vlad, but in both cases I had to deconstruct the wordplay while thinking of possible answers in the way that I always do, and the experiences, while qualitatively very different, were in other ways, like the time taken, very similar.

    I get the feeling that puzzles by Boatman and Enigmatist are published much less often than most of the other names in your list, so I’m not surprised you can’t include them (yet) in your analysis.

    Thank you for producing such interesting stats.

  35. Quenbarrow

    I wonder if you kept notes of what day of the week the puzzles appeared? It’s worth noting that, as I believe, it’s traditional for newspapers to run crosswords of increasing difficulty through the week, culminating in the Prize Puzzle on Saturdays in the Guardian for example. Paul sets roughly 50% of the Prize Puzzles, so it’s right that his average “hardness” is at the top end of the scale. Setters pitch their puzzles to the slot, too. Rufus, as I understand it, always liked to set easier puzzles because his accent was on “fun”, while such as Enigmatist, it seems to me, like to be more challenging (which is fun too, of course — unless you can’t solve them). As Rufus showed again and again, easier clues can shine as much as the hardest.

    Harry Hoskins, who sets for the Indy as Hoskins and under various names elsewhere (but not the Guardian), prides himself on his ability to tune the difficulty of his puzzles and, amusingly, he rates them by “chilli factor” from korma to vindaloo (or is it phall?).

    Great that you managed to finish every one of those puzzles, btw!

  36. Responding to Mitz + Alan B + Tony after a couple of days away on family business – sorry for the delay. Really pleased to have got back to find such thoughtful feedback, after going ‘out on a limb’ as I did (a good phrase to clue: it must have been done).

    Mitz: I absolutely agree that Shed has mellowed over the years. And about the serious challenges of Maskarade and Enigmatist, though the latter has, for me, become slightly less formidable on his rare appearances, whether because of his own mellowing or because of growing familiarity with his style. I may have some data for Araucaria and Bunthorne on an old computer – I had a period of noting down times a few years ago, ahead of a long gap – and will see if I can retrieve data. Incidentally I’ve never done the Quiptic, being purely a hard-copy solver, at least so far – the new tabloid Guardian does continue to strain the loyalties of hard-copy subscribers, with its proliferation of Sun-type punning headlines, not to mention the loss of the Pieceword puzzle while things like wordsearch remain… I won’t go on about this,

    Alan B: this week I find that I took 14 minutes longer on Vlad than on Chifonie, thus a very different discrepancy than your own. And roughly the same (slightly descending) time as that for Picaroon and then for Imogen today, viz: in the 20s for each of those three. We all have our different rhythms!

    Tony: my sense is that the grading throughout the week is, after Monday, less systematic than for – the obvious comparison – the New York Times, though I have no statistics to back this up: will work on this question next time, if there is a next time. But certainly, for me, the prolific Paul swings between the hard and less hard ends of the spectrum, e.g. between Prize puzzles and others, though not all his Prizes are in fact necessarily at the hard end.

    Sincere thanks again to all for the feedback.

  37. Practical query. The Guardian crossword app on my android tablet has suddenly started highlighting clues in black rather than blue. Result of black on black is illegibility. Has anyone else had the same problem and is there a remedy please.

  38. quenbarrow @36

    (Sorry this is a bit late.  I saw your post two days ago but have not had time to respond until now.)

    I was interested in your further comment.

    I’m happy to reveal that I normally spend between 20 and 40 minutes in total on Guardian daily cryptics.  I’ve done enough by now (more than 600) to be sure that this is approximately true even though I don’t time myself and often don’t complete a puzzle in a single session.  In my imaginary stats there would be a concentration around the 30-minute mark for my solves, I believe – in line with what I wrote earlier when I said the time spent doesn’t vary very much.  I remember, incidentally, that with the latest Vlad a couple of key answers seemd to come more readily than I would expect from that setter, so my time to completion may have benefited.  I also found the Chifonie a bit more challenging than I expected and was stuck on one answer that I particularly wanted to solve next, with about one-third of the grid remaining.

    I never spend more than an hour on a daily crossword.  I just would not give that much time to it unless it is of exceptional quality and interesting with it, 40 minutes or so being my comfortable limit.  In 2017 I think two crosswords took about one hour to complete, one of them by cheating.  (It was a Vlad!  I had 5 clues still to solve, the key one being impossible to solve because it was a name I did not know and the clue didn’t offer enough for me to work it out.  That one answer unlocked the rest of the corner, and I promptly completed it – an hour well spent.)

    In 2018 I’m trying to complete the crosswords without looking anything up.  I solved approximately half of all last year’s crosswords that way, because I often do them when I’m out, with no online access.  I already have two DNFs this year (that being my total for 2017) because of that self-imposed rule, but failing to complete a puzzle doesn’t bother me much.  For an exceptionally good puzzle I will willingly spend up to an hour or so on it, and break my rule if I need to.  I know many solvers persevere anyway and feel they must finish a puzzle having started it.

  40. I couldn’t get the Indy crossword to load from my Windows 7/IE 11 system (with or without advert blocking); I had to use Chrome instead.

    Anybody else have this problem, and is there a workaround for it?

  42. Robi@40/41: I had a lot of trouble getting the Indy puzzle to load with ad blocking on.  So as I prefer to do the crossword on paper my routine now is to open 15squared (and check for any further responses to the previous day’s puzzle), then turn the ad blocker off, click on the link to the Indy, and go away to do something else for a few minutes.  Then when the puzzle has loaded turn the adblocker back on and print off the puzzle.  This is using Firefox /Windows 10.  The only snag is that occasionally I come back to find a ‘supersize’ advert obscuring the puzzle and the only way to shift it seems to be to close Firefox and start again.

  43. Robi, I’ve found the same thing using Adblock Plus with Windows 8.1/IE11. For the past month the crossword won’t appear, and none of the “solve now” links will work, unless I disable the adblocker. The Indy site still works OK with Adblock enabled on Firefox.

    There is a  workaround for IE11 (this is for Adblock Plus, I don’t know if it’ll work for other adblockers). Disable the adblocker, open the Indy page, and as soon as the ad starts to play re-enable the adblocker. This cuts the video off immediately and the crossword will load. The advertisers presumably register a viewing for the ad and you don’t have to watch it!

  44. Milligan anagram

    Re my post of 23 Dec 2017 and ff, I can now say that the puzzle in question has been reliably identified as Guardian Prize Puzzle No.20,882, published on 8 February 1997. The solution was published on Monday 17 February. I haven’t managed to get a copy yet.

  45. Responding to Alan B @38 after a long gap – apologies – I’m still not used to looking at all regularly at General Discussion. You are surely sensible in not noting down specific times: why be so obsessive? I give two answers to that, in my case: (1) getting drawn in, a few years ago now, to entering the annual Times championship, where obviously every second counts (not that I aim for anything more than a mid-table position); and (2) the sense that monitoring the time taken can serve to keep a check on mental acuity as the years advance. Crosswords are supposed to be a good way of avoiding, or slowing, mental decline; but it doesn’t work for all in the same way. My octogenarian mother-in-law was a brilliant cryptic solver until a few years ago but can now, sadly, manage only a few non-cryptic clues. I would like to be able, at least, to see that coming, if it does come.

    @17 and after, regarding the Milligan anagram (which I recall working out, with a friend’s help, on the day it appeared): Paul mentions it, along with some other long anagrams, on p.184 of his book ‘The Centenary of the Crossword’ (2013), for me the most enjoyable of the several good books in that genre. p.176 has another Milligan reference, to his testing one-square crossword.

  47. Tony, above:

    You may able to find the book by Paul (as John Halpern) at a cut-price bookshop, as I happened to do. £3.99 down from £14.99, mint condition. Not easy to track that offer down online . But worth it at the full price!

     

  48. Quenbarrow, 1 above

     

    Thanks for the tip, but I’ve already ordered a used copy in good condition for £2.74 via AbeBooks.

  49. quenbarrow @45

    Thank you for your comment.  I’m a regular but not a frequent visitor to this page – I come here about once a week, and I saw your comment yesterday.

    Not only do I like doing cryptic crosswords (I have time for about 5 a week), I’m convinced that they are beneficial to one’s brain health.  As are other brain activities, of course, such as quizzes and Killer Sudoku which I also like doing or taking part in, but crosswords have been a lifelong favourite activity, the Guardian becoming my standard fare only a few years ago.

    Timing myself is not something I’m likely to start doing, as it woud be too much of a distraction and imposition.  For one thing, I hardly ever complete a crossword in a single session; also, I take my time over a crossword, and other things often intrude that I want to deal with there and then.  But I do take your point about about keeping “a check on mental acuity as the years advance”, and at my age I can’t ignore valuable advice of that nature when it comes along.

    I too have John Halpern’s book, although the title of my 2016 edition is The History of the Crossword.

     

  50. In my comment @49, for ‘about about’ read ‘about’.  [Senility?  Possibly just carelessness in checking what I’ve typed.]

  51. Milligan anagram

    Re my posts of 23 Dec 2017 and ff, and 17 Feb, I am now the proud possessor of a copy of the puzzle, thanks to the beneficence of the Guardian’s crossword editor, Hugh Stephenson. The full clue, as printed, is:

    21,1,7,18,4,8,24,21down,23down,16,4,3 Here ‘n’ there in the heavens’ watery mire are tiny slits, so the harsh weather is slight, not bulky perhaps (4 by Spike Milligan) (5,3,5,2,3,3,5,3,4,4,2,3,4’2,4,2,5,4’1,3,4,2,4)

    4 is, of course, RAIN, the title of the poem

  53. This comment is about homophones.

    Well, not exactly, because ‘homophone’ never appears in a crossword clue (to the best of my knowledge). It is therefore about a device (some call it a ‘punning’ device) whereby the answer to a clue sounds like a word or phrase indicated by the clue but is actually different in meaning and spelling. It is best to call such a pair of words ‘sound-alikes’ – a more appropriate term, and safer to use then ‘homophone’, which tends to extend debates unnecessarily.

    This comment was prompted by yet another mini-debate about ‘sound-alikes’ on the blog of a Guardian crossword by Paul published on 28 February.

    In the Paul puzzle, the setter intended the answer, ‘canter’, to sound like what you get when you take the sound of ‘knees’ away from that of ‘Cantonese’. For me, that just works, because I use just the schwa (the unaccented vowel in English often represented by an upside-down ‘e’ in phonetic transcriptions) to articulate the second vowel sound in ‘canter’, which is unquestionably similar to the sound of the middle vowel of ‘Cantonese’ when I say that word. (It’s not quite the same, actually, but close enough for a ‘sound-alike’.) For other people, though, as is abundantly clear from their comments on the blog, it’s more than stretching it to say that the sounds are similar, and the wordplay therefore doesn’t work. It’s not just the vowel sound in some cases – it’s also the voicing of the ‘r’ in ‘canter’.

    Solvers are aware, of course, that English speakers everywhere use a wide range of different sounds for the same syllables, and the setter should be allowed, I feel, to use either RP (Received Pronunciation) or what is indicated phonetically in a dictionary. If Paul had looked up these words in the Collins dictionary (which is the one I normally use for pronunciations), he would have found identical sounds in the two words ‘canter’ and ‘Cantonese’ – except for where the stressed syllable is. I know that most non-British contributors generously and uncomplainingly allow for British ways of speaking, as these are British crosswords.

    But I think setters should also be alive to the many different ways in which people articulate sounds in English, particularly vowel sounds, and at least give some thought to the ‘accessibility’ of the clue as a whole if a potentially doubtful (or contentious!) ‘sound-alike’ is intended.

    By way of ending this piece, I would just say that setters have once or twice given themselves an excess of latitude for words that supposedly sound alike but clearly do not. The only instance that I remember is a clue for EXETER in which the solver is asked to imagine what the setter himself would be after he has retired. First you had to get ‘ex-setter’, and then you filled in the similar-sounding name of a town. He didn’t get much stick for that, and I think commenters generally felt that he got away with it because it was whimsical (and fun).

  54. Thanks for that contribution, Alan (to show that I read it)

    “Spooner” clues are a bone of contention too, as they rely on “sound-alikes”. (I only accept Spooner clues as valid when both ways round are genuine expressions.)

    Here’s a lovely clue from Radio Times a few week’s back

    Spooner’s metric conversion of crime series (9,5)

  55. A thoughtful exposition of the issue, however I’d just note that it’s not really about British versus non-British. Rhoticism is geographically messy and many British speakers have the same issues with this stuff as does Johnny Foreigner. Speaking personally (!) I would add that I would be less bothered if the situation weren’t so one-sided, strongly favouring the non-rhotic pronunciation in almost every case.

  56. Alan,

    The difficulties of homophones/sound-alikes (aren’t they synonyms?) were covered in a recent post by the Guardian’s crossword editor, prompted by complaints that sure and shore are pronounced differently. Rhotism (pronunciation of R) also provokes a lot of complaints, so it’s strange that you minimise that.

    Muffin,

    What a marvellously “dexterous” piece of misdirection!

  58. Thank you all for your comments to date.

    I would just like to say that I did not mean to overplay the British vs. non-British angle (although I did of course mention how accommodating our foreign freinds are – with our vocabulary as well, I could have added) or underplay the ‘rhotic’ issue.  By implication, I asked for a little bit of consideration of these issues by setters.

    I loved muffin’s Radio Times clue.  Spoonerisms are subject to very similar considerations, in my view, and I think I agree with muffin about the ‘spoonerised’ phrase being a genuine expression – I would say, though, that it can be whimsical or even nonsensical in real life.

  59. Thank you Alan.
    You took/toook[Mancunian/Scottish?] the [SCHWA!] wo(r)ds/worrds [NA] right/reeet out of my mouth/maaaf [London cabbie].

    Collins is also a frequent reference work for me. As I say to my students, who are lucky to come from an area of their country where the 5 vowels = 5 sounds, English, unlike your beautiful language, is a mongrel. One of its less appealing aspects is that it contains a very ugly sound, alien to you, the schwa, which we lazily substitute whenever we can.
    PHOTOGRAHER, SATANIC and CANTONESE are examples that come to mind, whose vowel sounds differ from the words from which they are derived.

  60. As I write I am listening to Wuthering Heights on the radio.
    It’s absolutely wonderful in Italian and works beautifully !

  61. il principe

    I deciphered your examples of accents!

    PHOTOGRAPHER is of course one of a troublesome triplet of words: photograph, photographer and photographic.

  62. Guardian Saturday 27,447

    21 Across – Sad lover’s essentially missing you

    S-L-E-S

    Anyone?

  63. Evershed @62

    We don’t comment on prize puzzles on this site until after the closing date for entries, so please don’t expect a reply.

  64. Evershed @62, ignore Gaufrid, it’s …
    Admin: edited to remove content relating to a prize puzzle before the closing date for entries.

  65. ^  Admin… I invented word with a parsing that was obviously a joke. I wouldn’t have thought Evershed or anyone else would have taken it seriously, especially as I ended it with “you can trust me 100%”!

  66. Surely Evershed’s original comment should have been deleted, or at least had the partial solution edited out?

  67. Tony @66: well, quite. Can’t say I like the way my post was selectively edited with the obvious joke removed and the intro weirdly kept in, which made it look like I was seriously defying Gaufrid and giving Evershed the answer.

  68. Why, when you first click on to ‘General Discussion’, does it always display this message?

    No Responses to “General Discussion”

    It’s not exactly welcoming, unlike the way we are welcomed into discussion of particular puzzles. Maybe there are ways of adjusting the threshold to encourage more people to cross it.

  69. … and having posted this response, I have gone back immediately to the threshold page, and it continues to say “No Responses”. So what is that stern sentence supposed to mean?

  70. quenbarrow @68/69

    The WordPress theme that this site uses is very old and a lot of the code had become depreciated. Therefore, about three months ago, a member of the blogging team very kindly updated all of the code and, after extensive testing in the sandbox, I updated the live site shortly before Christmas. I thought at the end of testing the updated code that I had picked up all the errors and that they had been rectified.

    However, there were a couple of items that I missed, including the reference to ‘No responses’ being displayed on pages (ie the entries on the menu bar) which are closed to comments. This error is on the ‘to-do’ list for when the theme is next updated.

  71. Gaufrid @70

    Thank you for rapid response – within the hour – could not ask for more. I can’t claim to follow all the technicalities, but look forward to the promised updating.

  72. Laccaria,

    Where is the solution to your crossword? I don’t do crosswords unless I know I can get the solution if ñecessary. I did solve one clue before noticing there was apparently no solution lnk — but that was one I helped create, I believe (“Shakespearean story-teller”).

  73. Hello Valentine, if you’ve come over

    “So this family have a cook, a gardener and a “servant” (who neither cooks nor gardens).”

    No –  Grumio [no 5 ] and Clemens [no 4] are both servi [slaves] , who were an integral part of a well-to-do Roman household and were usually well treated, as these two are portrayed here. For slavery generally, see here

    Caecilius is an authentic citizen of Pompeii and has been used in the Course to typify Roman society. Sadly, he perished in the eruption of Vesuvius but his son Quintus [the hapless discus-thrower] survived and turns up in Book 2 of the Course in Roman Britain – not authenticated!

  74. Thanks,Eileen. I am definitely going to renew my interest in Caecilius and family. I had forgotten about them all but the memories have come flooding back. Crossword solving is certainly more than just that and this page looks great for following some of those strange trails which arise.

  75. Tony@72

    Apologies for not getting back to you in this section of 225, earlier.  In truth, until today when you drew my attention with a post under the Prize blog, I was totally unaware of this section!

    And apologies in general for posting off-topic comments on the puzzle-specific blogs.  I was unaware that people have set up to receive alerts on every new post (I haven’t).  Now that I know GD exists, I shall stray over here for OT stuff.

    Yes, I admit I tend now to enable only the ‘Check’ button on puzzles I put online, not the ‘Reveal’ button.  And I recall now that you helped me out with IAGO – sorry I didn’t acknowledge it.  My memory! 🙁   Anyway, I can certainly enable the ‘Reveal’ button either when you ask for it, or at some future date – as you wish.  This would work in the same way as it does on the BD site.

  76. Laccaria @75 – “I was unaware that people have set up to receive alerts on every new post (I haven’t).”

    Neither have I! – bloggers receive emails of all comments on their blogs, hence the references to my inbox.

  77. Ah – now I understand.  Perhaps now is the time to set up a separate webmail and use it for the sole purpose of linking to your blogs on 225 and nothing else!  (at least – that’s what I do elsewhere, to avoid being flooded with junk on the ‘house’ E-mail!)

  78. Laccaria,

    Thanks for getting back to me. One of the problems with this page is that people don’t check in here very often. I don’t think you can get email alerts from 225 (but you can and should, maybe, from WordPress blogs like BD, Listen With Others, 1across).

    What I have done is set up a feed to this page in an app called Feedly. I also create a feed from individual puzzle pages I’ve contributed to or otherwise want to follow. I check my feeds (from 225 and other sites of interest) at least once a day. That works for me.

    I think it would have been better in any case to have commented on my puzzles, which we discussed on last Saturday’s Guardian Prize 225 post, on the puzzle pages themselves. I would have received notice, having set up email alerts to my own puzzles (obviously).

    Yes, please do enable Reveal on your puzzle and I promise to give it at least an hour (though I’ve found your puzzles too difficult in the past, so might not finish in that time). As I said when we discussed IAGO, I probably wouldn’t have understood “Shakespearean story-teller”, and certainly not just “story-teller”.

  79. Tony, OK I have enabled the Reveal button.  In order to do this I could find nothing better than to completely re-upload the puzzle from the copy on my PC, and re-type all the headers including the preamble.  There must be a simpler way – is anyone familiar with this hosting facility (provided as part of the Crossword-Compiler package)?

  80. Thanks, Laccaria. I’ve never used the hosting facility, but I’m surprised the headers didn’t automatically go up, assuming they were in the Headers fields under the File tab.

  81. Is there a way of getting a direct link to an individual comment on (the android implementation of) 225? I thought the datestamp had a link behind it. Was that before the plug-in change? Or am I thinking of the desktop version (or another site entirely, perhaps)?

  82. Tony @81

    In the desktop view, the date/timestamp does indeed have a link to a specific comment. However, the plugin that generates the mobile view does not include this feature, nor does it show the time at which a comment was posted. If you wish to obtain the link to a specific comment when using an android device you will need to scroll down to the bottom of the page and switch to the desktop view. Once you have copied the link you can then switch back to the mobile view.

  83. Ah, good idea. Thanks, Gaufrid. Another slightly more long-winded way to do it I’ve found — if you have a Feedly feed from the post in question — is to select the particular comment in Feedly, then click “Visit Site”. Which will deliver you to the comment’s URL in the selected browser.

  87. On 31 March the Guardian had TWO prize puzzles, both numbered 27471, one by Maskerade, which has been blogged, and the other by “Dogs”, which has not been blogged.  Will there be a blog of Dogs’ puzzle?

     

  88. ChrisH @87

    I have had a look at the Guardian site and it would appear that the ‘Dogs’ puzzle has been titled/enumerated incorrectly. It isn’t a cryptic crossword, just a general knowledge one (or rather specific knowledge relating to canines), and so will not be blogged here.

  90. Re the comment linked in mine 4 above, I had a similar experience today (Captcha demanding return to comment after refusing correct answer to single digit subtraction). Thankfully, today my comment was left intact (although I had taken the precaution of copying it to the clipboard this time). If this is due to action taken in response to my unreplied-to comment, thank you.

  91. Tony @90

    “… in response to my unreplied-to comment …”

    But I did reply, see here. There have been no changes made to the site recently so you must be using a different browser today.

  92. Gaufrid,

    Ah, yes, sorry. The fact is, I neglected to set up a feed for that post, so wasn’t notified of your comment (or the subsequent ones).

    Regarding the browser, I only use Firefox on both laptop and smartphone (for 225 at least), but it could be that the long comment I lost was on laptop (can’t remember now), whilst the one I didn’t lose was definitely on (android) smartphone.

    Thanks for your sensible advice about holding a copy, which I usually do anyway and certainly will do my best to remember to do in future. Of course, your instructions for saving to the clipboard needs slight modification for touchscreen, but the necessary is obvious to regular users of such devices like me. (Though I was just about to post this without taking a copy!)

  93. Point of info: I’ve also been getting these ‘…valid captcha’ warnings – so I’ve got wise now on Firefox, and if it’s a long comment*, I automatically do a ctrl/A-ctrl/C before posting.  Once bitten….etc. etc.!

    *Incidentally, are my posts too long?  Someone remarked (rather rudely, I thought) to that effect recently under the recent controversial ‘Picaroon’ puzzle.  I suppose, there are long posts with detailed comment, and ‘long’ posts, i.e. long and rambling and mostly irrelevant.  I think I’m trying to strike a balance…

  94. Laccaria,

    It’s up to you how long your comments are, but it’s up to others if they want to read them. I didn’t do the Picaroon with the mistake (Guardian 27,480) or read the blog at the time, but having done so now, I think Simon S’s rather blunt tone was probably a direct response to the tone of your own remark about the setter and editor. I don’t think Picaroon uses Crossword Compiler, btw, but rather qxw.

    [Re the crossword of yours I promised to do, I spent quite a long time on it without finishing. I’d never heard of the main theme answer, and even after researching it on the internet didn’t find any mention of the string of related theme words which I guess are names of the elements making up the main thing? Not much fun, I’m afraid.]

  95. Tony,

    No problems about the ‘challenge’ I offered you – I’d clean forgotten about it until you reminded me!  But sorry you didn’t find much to your liking.  Admittedly the hidden theme was absurdly ‘fannish’; I should have left out the preamble and then nobody would have been the wiser, except perhaps puzzled at the number of girls’ names cropping up (yes, they were inscribed on the sides of the Pullman cars).  I originally concocted this one for discussion in Boatman’s masterclass last autumn (his day job involves commuting up and down the London-Brighton line, though not on the train in question!), but we didn’t get round to it.

    As to your other remarks – yes I was a bit annoyed (to put it mildly) and it showed – but I was one of many.  We army of solvers are the most pedantic of the pedants!  And plenty of 225 comments testify to this!  Also I was pressed for time on that day – never a good situation for a solver.  But I apologised later.  And personal attacks on other solvers are not in my chemistry – or so I like to think!

    I have one in the pipeline with BD at the moment, though God (and BD) only know when it’ll come up.  It too has a ghost theme – hopefully a bit less arcane than the BB one!  I’ve been wondering how one ever gets that magical promotion to BD’s “NTSPP” slot, but I reckon I’ve a long way to go…..

  96. Hmm.. you apologised for being “terse” — which could suggest you thought it might have been better to have expounded further on your calls to lynch editor and setter (wasn’t it?).

    [Ah, yes, perhaps your puzzle would go down well amongst a local crowd. I think I had a couple of parsing issues too but can’t remember now.

    My advice for BD puzzles is put aside for now any exciting new approaches to cluing Boatman may have inspired and make one you yourself think is far too easy, with tight cluing and interesting, but not unusual answers.]

  97. Tony – yes I’ve seen that advice about BD before 🙂 .  Boatman said – if I recall him correctly – that it’s not that simple!  It’s like a cat climbing a tree – easy to get up to the ‘difficult’ bit, not so easy to get down again, hence the Fire Brigade call-out…

    I’ll do my best.  Hopefully without the assistance of the cruciverbal Fire Brigade… 😮

  98. Nearly 100 up… maybe the landmark will be reached soon, if this provokes any response.

    Is this the right place to raise a (too-often) recurring issue? – errors in the print and/or online version of the puzzle, and how they are dealt with, Today’s Prize Crossword by Paul has a significant error in the bracketed word-lengths: either that, or the conventions have suddenly been changed without notice, in the direction e.g. of the NY Times conventions. Because it it is a Prize, there is no current blog; in today’s blog of Tramp’s puzzle from last week, uncleskinny picked up early (7.15 a.m.) on this week’s error, but there is so far little follow-up, partly because of justified inhibitions about discussing a prize puzzle in advance of submission date. Meanwhile I am sure that plenty of people have (like me) wrestled frustratingly with the seemingly unsolvable clue, before realising (or not) what must have happened. Compare yesterday’s errors, which Brummie in due course stepped forward to resolve (easier to do so on a non-Prize day).

    Should there not be a mechanism by which, as soon as anyone picks up this kind of error, it is at least put right quickly online – and ideally, also, by quick intervention on the 15squared site (though I’m not sure where such a correction would go, on a Prize day.) It’s tiresome to keep having the protracted debate as to whether an error was made, and if so what, and then eventually the setter (NOT the editor) comes forward – cf the ????/amanuensis muddle a few weeks ago. Or is this all, perversely, part of the fun?!

    I have just checked again (2.45 p.m.) and there is no correction to be found in either place. Do we really have to wait a week for the inquest?

     

  100. Ah well, to return to William @1,
    I think IoM is a pretty widely accepted abbreviation of Isle of Man, so perhaps that’s it?

  101. I wonder if anyone came across this:

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5628921/Cryptic-crossword-hardest-fans-two-years-crack.html

    It was given to us (printed, in the Daily Express) by a non-crosswording relative some time ago.  Being busy, and put off by the “hardest ever” tag, we didn’t attempt until a few days ago, when he asked how we’d got on.  Of course, it wasn’t that hard, about the standard of a Guardian Bank Holiday special – it took us about 3 days, on and off, probably may contributors to this blog would have been far quicker.

    I guess the hype was all about promoting the setter’s book

  102. BUSED vs. BUSSED

    A mini-discussion took place on the Guardian Tramp thr4ead on 3 July 2018 concerning the plurals and past tenses of nouns and verbs ending in ‘s’.

    The origin of the discussion was the answer BUSED, the past tense or past participle of the verb ‘to bus’.
    I’d like to summarise here what the dictionaries say about the words ‘gas’, ‘bus’ and ‘focus’ plus, to begin with) what I think is ‘normal, correct’ British usage.

    British (according to Alan B)
    noun and verb: gas; noun plural: gases; past tense: gassed
    noun and verb: bus; noun plural: buses; past tense: bussed
    noun and verb: focus; noun plural: foci or focuses; past tense: focused

    Chambers
    gas; gases; gassed
    bus; buses, less commonly busses; [not given]
    focus; foci or focuses; focused or focussed

    Collins
    gas; gases or gasses; gassed
    bus; buses or busses; bused or bussed
    focus; focuses or foci; focused or focussed

    I hope this helps.  I have just two points to add:

    (1) US and other English usage may (and probably does) differ from the above.

    (2) Dictionaries cannot possibly give individual authority and references for every meaning and every spelling that they allow, and sometimes we have to be guided by what good speakers say, what good writers write and what good teachers teach.  I think this way of looking at the issue lies behind what some commenters, including me, said about BUSSED being more in keeping with our language than BUSED, which you have to read in an uncharacteristic way in order to pronounce it.

  104. muffin @103

    This may not be relevant, but GETABLE reminds me of GETATABLE, which I think should be spelled GET-AT-ABLE, which I have seen in a Guardian Cryptic.

  106. Thanks Alan. That “busses” as a plural for “bus” is acceptable in the dictionaries makes me wince a bit. Surely any schoolyoungperson knows that that’s not right?

  107. Alphalpha @106

    Quite.  ‘Busses’ looks wrong, and I regard it as wrong.  But I recognise that dictionaries have a balancing act to perform in many instances, and the ones with reputations to protect generally do well with their guidance on spellings as well as meanings.

    I was taken aback a few months ago when I was watching an episode of Pointless, and Richard Osman (the man at the desk) said, in introducing a round in which correct spellings were required, that their authority for spellings was the online dictionary dictionary.com.  When the word ‘barbecue’ came up, Richard said, with a straight face, that ‘barbeque’ was the correct spelling, and ‘barbecue’ was an allowable alternative.

    Not all dictionaries have equally credible authority for what they tell us.  There is a salutary follow-up to my anecdote: I have just looked up ‘barbecue’ in both Chambers and Collins.  Collins has only ‘barbecue’.  Chambers has the headword ‘barbecue or barbeque or bar-b-q’.  Alan B has ‘barbecue, or informally bar-b-q on boards outside pubs.’

  108. Alan@107

    Indeed, the day that barbq turns up as a crossword answer will be a sad day. Tomorrow probably.

  109. I have just finished reading The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August, and of course I was infuriated by the unresolved crossword clue, and of course I googled it, and of course – wonder of wonders – ended up on the fifteensquared site, where it was mentioned by Cass on 19th January 2015 in the old general discussion thread. I’m posting a solution here (I think previous suggestions are wrong) in case anyone else googles for the answer. Here’s the clue:

    Hark – a twist in the road I perceive (8)

    We shouldn’t expect this to be particularly rigorous or tortuous – it can be early 1970s at the latest given that Harry is at the Foreign Office. So I suggest that the answer is simply LISTENER. “Hark” = LISTEN,  “a twist in thE Road” is ER, and the definition is “I perceive”.

    Beats me why Harry didn’t get it, especially since he’d done this crossword in another life before and since he’d have had all the checking letters. But then, it seems to have stumped a lot of readers of the novel too.

  110. I happened to come across a copy of the Times last Thu and really enjoyed the crossword (27,100) which it turns out was harder than most of late and had quite a few of the clock-watchers at that other place rattled. Of course we don’t mention times here (we solve in comfort, not at speed), but I’m pleased to say I managed to finish it, over a few sessions, by Friday night, with only a little help from Word Wizard. Recommended if you’ve got access.
    Favourite clue, ironically, was:

    4a A stroll in the park leads up the garden path to gorge (4,5)

    Come on: it’s easy!

  111. Tony @110

    I’ve been trying to cold solve that clue for four weeks but can’t do it without help.  What’s the answer?

  112. So sorry, Alan. I should have come back to post the answer.

    KIDS = leads up the garden path
    STUFF = Gorge (vb)
    A stroll in the park

    Told you it was easy!

  114. Hello – not sure if this is the best place to post my query but will give it a shot. I have no printer which is usually no issue as I do the guardian cryptic online. But the bank holiday specials (eg the maskerade puzzle on 25/8/18) with the larger grid are not available to fill in online. Does anyone know a workaround to get an editable version of the grid to work on? I tried printing to pdf (the pdf link itself did not work for me) and then exporting the pdf to editable formats – excel and word. In both cases the grid did not come out properly. Also I live in Australia so I can’t just pop out to buy the paper!

  115. Tony @113

    Thanks for the answer.  (I hope I didn’t lead you up the garden path by saying I was working on this for four weeks.  I wasn’t.  I gave myself weekend breaks.)

    Either it comes to you or it doesn’t, and it just didn’t come to me.  I was aware of the ‘other place’ (Times for the Times) but didn’t think of going there.  When I’m in Australia I sometimes visit that site.

    kieran @114

    When I tried (here in the UK) to download the pdf for printing it appeared as five blank pages except for the solution to Friday’s puzzle on page 3.  I assume it’s a known error that is being worked on, and I’m giving it time to be fixed.

    On the crossword page itself, though, the interactive grid is there and is apparently working (although I haven’t tried to use it because I prefer to solve on paper).

    Where in Australia are you?  I only really know the Sunshine Coast of Queensland and places around there.

  116. Alan b @115 – thanks for your response- i’ve gone back to it and it is fine now – perhaps it was part of the same glitch that was affecting the pdf link.
    I am in Melbourne, so a fair way from the Sunshine Coast (although I have visited Noosa and surrounds and it is a lovely part of the world).

  117. kieran @116

    I eventually got a blank grid and clues from someone else and am enjoying the puzzle.  I don’t know what the problem was.  I hope you are enjoying it too.

    I know Noosa quite well, although my daughter and her young family live near Maroochydore.  I have visited Melbourne 3 times, but they were short family visits and I have not seen much of your city or the surrounding areas.

     

  118. Alan b@ 117 – yes it was a fun puzzle although i’d be impressed if anyone finished without resorting to looking up a list of the theme words…I certainly had to! Would happily provide a mini-guide to Melbourne/Victoria but I fear it would be considered a bit too far off topic…

  119. Sorry. I’m back again.

    I heard on the news tonight that there is some emergency somewhere. “Residents are being urged to evacuate”.

    Yes, jolly good show. I am not actually sure what they are required to do. If they need any more toilet paper, I am happy to contribute.

    Stefan

  120. @Kieran, perhaps you’ll raise that point on the blogpost tomorrow?

    @Marmite Smuggler, if the emergency is serious enough, they shouldn’t need much urging, I’d have thought?

  121. Hi there, I’m not sure if this is an appropriate place to do this and I apologise if so, but does anybody know what the solution to “Miller’s answer (5)” might be? It’s from an Araucaria puzzle included in the sample puzzles on 1 Across’s website, so perhaps some of 15^’s readers are familiar with it. As far ass I can tell it must be D_S__, although I’m also pretty sure the last letter is Y. Could the end be AY as in yes, an answer?

     

    Apologies again if I should not have posted this here.

  123. DP and sancho panza

    So, I’ve listened to the Ferrier/Walter recording of Das lied von der erde, and I must say that I’ve changed my mind. I thought that she had a wonderful instrument, but didn’t play it very well. – however the amount of vibrato she sings with in this makes it quite unpleasant to listen to; not such a wonderful instrument after all.

    I’m now listening to my Janet Baker recording – a live perfomance with Kempe conducting. Yes, there is some vibrato, but it’s much more pleasing to listen to.

  124. I was wondering if I could have a little help. I have been away from crosswords for about a year now owing to an illness. I used to try the Rufus crosswords, however, I see Rufus has gone from the Guardian. I would like to resume crosswording and would appreciate some guidance on any setters or crosswords that would be suitable?

  126. Many thanks Tony, I will try the Quiptic. Very sorry to read that Rufus has retired as I did enjoy his puzzles. Again many thanks for the reply.

  127. Martin @ 126
    Rufus’s puzzles are available on a number of websites without credit to the setter but only copyright notice of the agency that supplies them. These are syndicated puzzles and the agency still distributes the past puzzles in different bunches to different papers the world over. The Canadian paper The Globe and Mail has it online

    https://www.theglobeandmail.com/puzzles-and-crosswords/cryptic-crossword/

    and it has a printable version too.

    Note that these are on the easier side. I know that one of a set of seven puzzles uses 15x grid while the others use 13x. I don’t know if G and M uses the 15x grids at intervals. 

    Hope this helps the Rufus fans.

     

     

     

  128. This stand-alone comment discusses whether the DUP is British or Irish.

    It arose from a discussion on Vlad’s crossword on 26 October, in which he clued DUP (a part of the answer) as ‘Irish politicians’.  I queried that because I thought ‘Irish’ was a loose descriptor for the DUP or its members.  Using the definition of ‘British’ as being ‘of the UK’, the DUP is a British party, and I have never seen it described as Irish.

    The response to my query was, in effect, to assert that the DUP is both British and Irish.  I’m posting this comment now because I took the trouble to find out more about Ireland, the Northern Ireland Assembly and (unfortunately also) the DUP itself.  The DUP sees itself as British, and its main (defining) ideology is British nationalism.  It opposes a united Ireland and abhors Irish and Gaelic language and culture.

    The DUP would not, and does not, describe itself as Irish.  However, it should be defined from outside itself like everything else.  As the DUP is represented in both the NI Assembly and the UK parliament it is unquestionably British.  In what sense is it Irish?  ‘Irish’ primarily refers to the island of Ireland and everything to do with that place and its people.  (It can also mean ‘of the Republic of Ireland [Eire]’, but that is not relevant to this discussion.)

    My answer to my own question is that the DUP is ‘Irish’ only in the sense that it is based in Ireland and through its Members represents some Irish people in Northern Ireland directly and, as part of the NI Assembly, the NI population as a whole.

    The DUP, then, is primarily British but can also be described as Irish.  The fact thet the DUP themselves do not like to be described as Irish can give me and others cause to compliment Vlad on his clue.

  131. Muffin: Guardian Suguru from 20/11/2018.

     

    In case you still haven’t cracked the start, it was a question of L shapes and negativity. For example, the given 3 implies a 1,2 or 4 in the L shape left over in that cage (I think this is the correct term, which is used in Killer Sudokos). This means the number cushioned by the L shape must be a 3 (in the top left T shaped cage). The rest of the solution is mostly a great deal of applying this technique spreading throughout the grid, and repeatedly revisiting all of it.

  132. AdamH@100 – thank you for your interest and suggestion. Unfortunately, that’s rather like arguing that, by dint of BBC, ‘B’ is an acceptable abbreviation for “broadcasting”. No, I’m not convinced and my original concern remains. In fact, since my first post above, we have had further similar errors; I can’t recall whether it was ‘g’ for girl or ‘b’ for boy (or even both!) No Ximenean I, but still think these are liberties too far…. So sad – almost Trumpian. Bigly!
    Wx

  133. William, I think you are right to reject Adam H’s suggestion, for the reason given.

    I believe the thinking is, as AlanB suggests, M = male — and man is an example of a male. I don’t know what the original Chifonie clue was, but if the text included, say, “man, perhaps” or even “man?”, could that not be interpreted as “the abbreviation of something of which ‘man’ is an example”?

    Of course one often encounters ‘student’ coding directly for L (= ‘learner’), which is on a par with M being represented by ‘man’. Of course L = learner is despised by some, too, though I have seen it used recently by a well-respected setter.

  134. Anyone else having problems printing out the pdf version of today’s Guardian Prize (27,699)? I get a grid which is not entirely on the page, and all the characters look like Chinese.

  135. Tony @134

    I have just tried (I printed the ‘print’ version early this morning). There appears to be an error in the pdf. On my print from it, using the pdf reader built into Chrome, there is no title or attribution. At the top of the page there is a complete grid on the LHS and yesterday’s filled grid on the RHS. Then there is a large gap before the clues, which are in a very small font but still legible. At the bottom are the special instructions with the last two lines having dropped off the page and so not visible.

  136. Thanks, Gaufrid. For the record, I downloaded the pdf from Firefox, then printed the pdf (twice, with same results) with Adobe Reader. The grid is on the far left, going off the page with a solution grid on the right. All the characters in that grid and in the clues are illegible. I will write to Hugh and hope he has time to fix it tomorrow.

  137. Guardian elves are working on the pdf problem as I write (unless they’ve already fixed it). Meanwhile ‘print’ works ok, and even fits on a single page of A4 if printed @80%.

    Happy Christmas all.

  140. Was it worth waiting for the correct pdf for Prize 27699? I managed to cobble a workable version for myself.

    Yet another tedious slot from Maskarade. Why does the Ed persevere with this dull setter? I finally got there but again felt I had wasted time better spent on something more entertaining.

    I see the blog hasn’t arrived yet. Probably the poor sap who landed the the job lost the will to live. 🙂

  141. Alex @140

    The Maskarade blog hasn’t been published as yet because it is a prize puzzle and the closing date for entries is first post Thursday 3rd Jan.

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