Guardian 27,260 / Paul

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First of all, my thanks to Gaufrid for standing in for me last week, especially on what turned out to be not a good day for him.

I think this must be one of my quickest solves of a Paul puzzle. Lots of straightforward clues – some of them old favourites – and no real problems in parsing. No bad thing, as I have a rather busy day.

As usual, there were a few smiles along the way, particularly at 11, 2,20, 3,8, and 7,27,29. Thanks, Paul, for an enjoyable puzzle.

Definitions are underlined in the clues.

 

Across

 

1 A blast this, room shelled in sound of mild explosion (7)
ATISHOO
A + an anagram [blast] of THIS + [r]OO[m]

5 Change round model of Oxford and Cambridge, say? (7)
VARSITY
VARY [change] round SIT [model]

10 Islanders detailed? (4)
MANX
Cryptic definition, referring to Manx cats having no tails [detailed]

11 Agents placing ewe initially with most beautiful ram? (10)
EMISSARIES
E[we] + MISS ARIES – whimsically, the most beautiful ram, cf Miss World

12 More than one runner smuggling French fags heads for rowing boats (6)
SKIFFS
SKIS [more than one runner] round [smuggling] F[rench] F[ags]

13 Ultimately cynicism in fashion, a typically British affair (5,3)
CREAM TEA
[cynicis]M in CREATE [fashion] + A

14 Provided accepted by House, chairman welcomes published statement of intent (9)
MANIFESTO
MAO [chairman] round [welcomes] IF [provided] in [accepted by] NEST [house]

16 Dull grey pan (5)
SLATE
Double definition – Collins gives ‘to criticise harshly’ for both slate and pan

19 Where a foot may be including diameter, doubly confused (2,1,6)
IN A MUDDLE
DD [diameter, doubly] in IN A MULE [where a foot may be]

23 In extremes of torment, Spacey furious, given predictable roles (8)
TYPECAST
Anagram [furious] of SPACEY in T[ormen]T

24 Abomination of a clue, Paul’s first to get the boot! (4-2)
LACE-UP
Anagram [abomination] of A CLUE P[aul]

26 Pasta in Italy beyond peak, report follows (10)
TORTELLINI
TOR [peak] + TELL [report] + IN I [in Italy]

28 Fine poem about wife punching nose (7)
POWDERY
ODE [poem] round W [wife] in PRY [nose]

 

 

Down

 

2,20 Saved by cat from Sri Lanka, Tom cheers (6,1,7)
THANKS A MILLION
HANKS [Tom] in [saved by] TAMIL LION [cat from Sri Lanka]

3,8 Beating the Foxes is difficult, with investment of billions then ending in regret (3,2,3,4)
SIX OF THE BEST
Anagram [difficult] of THE FOXES IS round B [billions] + [regre]T – fond memories for this Leicester resident 😉

4 Run done prior to date (7)
OVERSEE
OVER [done] + SEE [date]

6 Novelist, antipodean figure? (6)
AUSTEN
AUS [Antipodean] + TEN [figure]

7,27,29 Possible breakfast gems, cold bangers damaged your health, perhaps? (9,4,2,5)
SCRAMBLED EGGS ON TOAST
Anagram [damaged] of GEMS COLD BANGERS + TOAST [‘Your health’, perhaps]  – I thought Paul, of all people, might have exploited the classic GEGS clue, featured long ago in ‘Drop the dead donkey’

9 Artist touring English principality (13)
LIECHTENSTEIN
LICHTENSTEIN [artist Roy]  round E [English]

15 Changed, fifty pestilent houses (9)
INFLECTED
INFECTED [pestilent] round [houses] L [fifty]

18 Country supporting method that’s great in America (3,2,2)
WAY TO GO
TOGO [country] after [supporting, in a down clue] WAY [method]

21 Lies about opposition leader suppressed by attacking moves (7)
LOUNGES
O[pposition] in LUNGES [attacking moves]

22,17 A flirty swot, bubbly singer (6,5)
TAYLOR SWIFT
Anagram [bubbly] of A FLIRTY SWOT

25 Belief in sacred orders (5)
CREDO
Hidden in saCRED Orders

50 comments on “Guardian 27,260 / Paul”

  2. After yesterday’s failure, I thought I was going to come up short again with one clue left – but I got there in the end. LOI was LIECHTENSTEIN which I struggled to see despite all the crossers.

    Lots of Paul’s usual playfulness to enjoy – especially IN A MUDDLE and EMISSARIES.

    Thanks, Paul and Eileen.

  3. Thanks Paul and Eileen

    Too many “one-way” clues for me to enjoy this (by this I mean “guess the answer, then try to parse” – or not). Take 2,20 for example; yes it works, but I don’t think anyone will have built it up from its parts. Similarly 14, 19, 26, 7,27 and 9 (artist? That’ll be Roy Lichtenstein then!)

    MANX simply doesn’t make sense. Who or what has been “de-tailed” on the IOM? Certainly not the cats – they are born that way.

    I did like EMISSARIES.

  4. Loads of fun from Paul today, and a great blog from Eileen. I particularly loved the link our blogger gave to the delightful GEGS article – 7d,27a,29a SCRAMBLED EGGS ON TOAST was certainly my clue of the day.

    I failed to parse the ARIES/”ram” part of 11a EMISSARIES, and did not get the “Artist” clue in 9d LIECHTENSTEIN. That’s why the forum rather than the puzzle itself often provides those light bulb moments.

    Other favourites for me were 1a ATISHOO, 10a, the de-tailed MANX cats/Islanders, 12a SKIFFS, 26a TORTELLINI, 6d AUSTEN (Jane the Novelist’s anniversary keeps cropping up in our puzzles), and 21d LOUNGES.

    Many thanks to both Paul and Eileen.

  6. [I think the GEGS? clue predates “DtDD”. I remember reading it, possibly in an early Len Deighton book (or was it Morse?) Can anyone help place it?]

    Thanks for the commiseration, Julie. Paul generally doesn’t appeal to me as much as to most others here.

  7. I agree with muffin @3 to some extent but I think you’re being a bit harsh as some of the clues you mention were gettable in parts – enough to make a start. Fro example you wouldn’t think of pry for nose in 28 but the rest was enough to work it out.

    Manx has been done before and I think just about acceptable

  8. I know this is going to sound perverse, but I had AUSTER at 6D, being an author, and also the personification of the South Wind after which Australia is named. Acceptable?

  9. muffin @6

    ‘I think the GEGS? clue predates “DtDD”.’ – yes, I think the point of the ‘joke’ in the show was that it was already a classic and shouldn’t have taken all day to get.

  12. Thanks Paul, Eileen
    I really enjoyed this one.
    I put TORTELLONI originally, with ‘tell on’ being report, and the in before Italy just a link. O seemed more likely, giving -TION at the end of 9d, which was therefore LOI.

  14. I also had AUSTER for 6d, and couldn’t get LIECHTENSTEIN despite much staring. Favourites were POWDERY, THANKS A MILLION and TAYLOR SWIFT. Thanks as ever to Paul and Eileen.

  18. Thanks Paul and Eileen.

    Yes, more straightforward than some other Paulian efforts. Quite enjoyable, although I thought that, for example, IN A MULE was a bit silly, but I suppose that is the point.

    Thanks for the parsing of MANIFESTO, which eluded me. I would have thought that ‘Detailed islanders’ would have been better, but maybe that was considered to be too easy. I liked the Tamil lion.

  21. Re 11a I parsed it separately as ‘Miss=most beautiful’ (as in Miss World, Miss UK, Miss Skegness, etc) and ‘Aries=ram’ which seemed more logical given the gender difference.

    (p.s. Any ‘top bananas’ want to put it away?)

  22. Very much at the gentler end of Paul’s range, though LIECHTENSTEIN took me longer than the rest of the puzzle – no excuses in retrospect! All quite enjoyable.

    Thanks to Paul and Eileen

  23. Thank you Paul and Eileen, especially Eileen!

    I got IN A MUDDLE trying to get THANKS A MILLION from an anagram of LANKA TOM + ? – 75% of the Sri Lankan population are Sinhalese, which is from the Sanskrit word Sinhala, meaning literally “of lions” and the flag of Sri Lanka is called the Lion Flag or Sinha Flag, but there are no extant indigenous lions on the island, so “TAMIL LION” did not come to my mind.

    I liked the clues for ATISHOO, EMISSARIES, SKIFFS, MANIFESTO and LOUNGES.

  25. Thanks to Paul for the fun and Eileen for the explanations. Like others, I particularly enjoyed the ‘most beautiful ram’

  26. Struggling to see where ‘mule’ comes from in 19 – got it only because I’d got everything around it. A foot in a mule? What?!

  28. If the most beautiful ram is Miss Aries, I’m guessing Donald Trump wouldn’t allow it to join the military.

  30. Thanks to Paul and Eileen. I needed help parsing THANKS A MILLION and POWDERY (I missed the pry = nose connection) and had not come across the ATISHOO spelling for a sneeze. Lots of fun here.

  31. Many thanks Eileen for parsing of THANKS A MILLION,. AUSTEN was tea tray moment and I had the Swiss place with the I and E the wrong way round at first so had to revise my spelling to get EMISSARIES(and thanks again Eileen for parsing of that-very chucklesome)
    In fact the whole puzzle was chucklesome.

  32. Had to laugh at SIX OF THE BEST. I hope Eileen’s ‘fond memories’ are of the team, not of the punishment! I have to say, back in my schooldays, the most I ever got meted out to my posterior was two, not six. That was painful enough, I can tell you! “Ending in regret” indeed!

  33. AUSTER seemed fair enough to me and was the author I plumped for.
    Took me a while to get started on this for some reason but once 9 dn went in-albeit misspelled- things unravelled quite nicely. I liked WAY TO GO,POWDERY and SCRAMBLED EGGS ON TOAST.
    Thanks Paul.

  34. Quite a bit gentler than Paul’s recent puzzles, but just as enjoyable. I liked POWDERY, the ‘TAMIL LION’ bit of 2,20 (even if it was bunged in first and parsed later as muffin@3 says) and TAYLOR SWIFT showed how good a ‘simple’ anagam can be. In my ignorance, and uncertainty about the spelling, I had the ‘artist’ and ‘principality’ the wrong way round in 9. I’m with you on the parsing of EMISSARIES, robert@21.

    I’ll raise you one, FirmlyDirac@32. Three for me.

    Thanks to Paul and Eileen.

  35. Easier than most of Pauls offerings but great fun nonetheless. Particular favourite was powdery which we got from the crossers then parsed it in reverse. Thanks to everyone.

  36. Wordplodder@34. I recall one ill-omened day, although lucky for me I wasn’t involved (I couldn’t play rugby for toffee). Apparently the junior first XV had been reported having a bit of a ‘romp’ in the changing rooms of a neighbouring school after an away match. Our games master took serious umbrage at this, and decided that the appropriate action was to beat every member of the team. Four strokes each – that’s 4×15 = 60 strokes in all. Must have been quite an effort for him – but then he was the games master! Although he did this in a classroom, as word got around practically the entire school were clustered around the door, commiserating with each victim as he stumbled out….

  37. I enjoyed this a lot, laughed out loud at the most beautiful ram and didn’t manage to parse 2,20.

    And I didn’t see any complaints above about someone never having heard of Taylor Swift …

  38. I don’t generally fare well with Paul so was often tapping the reveal button. SIX OF THE BEST brings back school memories to me as well, but caning was comparatively rare at my Derby grammar school for boys in the 1950s. Those at fee-paying establishments presumably had to endure worse than I did, but then they were getting ready to govern the country, weren’t they!

    Many thanks to Paul and Eileen.

  39. I’ve been an interested reader of this site for the past ten years or so, but am usually solving a few days late and haven’t posted to date. Many thanks to Eileen and Paul, as ever. Regarding gegs, I dimly recall a feature on the Today programme many years ago (probably 25+) about the Times Crossword, and that geg was mentioned as a clue in the very first Times Crossword. Some listeners phoned in with the solution “scrambled egg”. It was probably on a significant anniversary for the Times Crossword. I’m sure that it would be easy to verify.

  41. I’ve just found on The Times website that the first Times Crossword was on 1st February 1930, and there is a link to further information. However, further information on this is only available to subscribers.

  42. Martin@38 – yes I was at a fee-paying school (day school not boarding) – but I was on a scholarship :-). There was indeed a fair bit of the ‘swish’ (as we called it) going on in my day, though I got off lightly. Unlike some. I think the limit was set at six in those days – but I don’t recall anyone claiming to have had six. Caning was supposed to be done in private, but the rules weren’t strictly observed (as I said above).

    Happily consigned to history now – like many other things.

  43. FirmlyDirac @36
    Yes, of course, I meant The Team [as was] but I’ve been interested in others’ experience of the answer. My Primary School Headmaster used to carry around a cane precariously held together with black sticking plaster. We girls were subject only to a couple of mild taps on the palm of the hand, as I remember. Goodness knows what happened the boys.

  44. Muffin @3

    I think you are misunderstanding 10A.

    As Eileen indicates this is a CD. I took the CD as Islanders detailed. “Detailed” as in described as Manx can be used as a plural noun to describe the inhabitants of the IOM. The cryptic part of the definition being a whimsical reference to the de-tailed cats.

  45. Hello FirmlyDirac@36.

    One of the few occasions during your schooldays when not being good at rugby served you well!

    Amazing to think that such things ever happened isn’t it. Thank goodness they don’t – or at least I hope they don’t – any more.

  46. This must have been one of Paul’s more straightforward puzzles as I didn’t experience the frustration I often do with what I see as his convoluted clueing which meant I enjoyed it with favourites as highlighted by others. Thank you Paul and Eileen.

  48. Don’t be such a pedant M. The reference is whimsical and comparing the Manx cat to a generic cat!

    The clue doesn’t actually suggest that the Manx has actually had a tail and that it has been removed. However I will argue that this IS actually the case. I suggest that the far ancestors of the Manx cat millions of years ago did have tails but that the process of evolution has changed them into a breed which no longer does. Therefore they have been “de-tailed”. Quod erat demonstrandum.

    You know, it is possible for some of us to make a statemennt which isn’t actually correct. Even you!!! (Of course I personally am exempt from this rule 😉 )

  49. Of course not (you I mean) 🙂

    Actually it probably isn’t “millions of years” and “the progress of evolution”; a few hundred tears of artificial selective breeding is more likely. However I don’t think you would be able to show me a single Manx cat that had been “de-tailed” (some dogs are, of course, and as for blind mice….)

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