Guardian 27,340 / Picaroon

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An impressive prize crossword from Picaroon, for reasons I’ll explain below….

There was some rubric for this puzzle, which read:

Wordplay in each clue ignores a letter required in the solution

What only became apparent after solving a couple of clues was that it was the same letter, X, that present in every answer, and missing from the wordplay of every clue! The puzzle got a lot easier after realizing that, but I’m impressed by this construction, particularly since there are very few obscurities here – the only ones we didn’t know were IMBREX and GENETRIX, and it was easy to hazard that the latter was a word.

Across

5. Lives first lost in robberies (6)
EXISTS
[h]EISTS = “first lost in robberies”
Definition: “Lives”

6. Tough material with zero camouflage (6)
OXHIDE
O = “zero” + HIDE = “camouflage”
Definition: “Tough material”

9. Complaint of stock company with receding work (6)
COWPOX
CO = “company” + W = “with” followed by OP = “work” reversed
Definition: “Complaint of stock”

10. Show model pirouetting round American transport (3,5)
AIR TAXIS
AIR = “Show” followed by SIT = “model” reversed around A = “American”
Definition: “transport”

11. Popular eating area for Asian city (4)
XIAN
IN = “Popular” around A = “area”. (This was the first one we guessed, but without enough confidence to enter it into the grid until solving some others.)
Definition:

12. America’s opponents thrashed 5-1 also (4,2,4)
AXIS OF EVIL
(FIVE I ALSO)*
Definition: “America’s opponents”

13. Communication problem during Vietnamese New Year period (4,7)
TEXT MESSAGE
MESS = “problem” in TET = “Vietnamese New Year” + AGE = “period”
Definition: “Communication”

18. Grotesque capital city is a disappointment (10)
ANTICLIMAX
ANTIC = “Grotesque” + LIMA = “capital city”
Definition: “disappointment”

21. Twirling figure is succeeding (4)
NEXT
TEN = “figure” reversed (“Twirling”)
Definition: “succeeding”

22. Do beers get drunk in official containers? (3,5)
RED BOXES
(DO BEERS)*
Definition: “official containers” (as used for ministerial documents)

23. Fool? Wrong, half a fool (6)
OUTFOX
OUT = “Wrong” + FO[ol] = “half a fool”
Definition: “Fool?”

24. Order for players playing tune, following tab (6)
EXEUNT
E = “tab” (referring to ecstasy tablets) + (TUNE)*
Definition: “Order for players” (a stage direction for actors)

25. A contender to be a Catholic saint (6)
XAVIER
A + VIER = “contender” (i.e. “one who vies”)
Definition: “a Catholic saint”

Down

1. School subject’s stopped because it’s of little value (8)
SIXPENCE
PE = “School subject” in SINCE = “because”
Definition:

2. Party animal regularly shows lack of physical control (6)
ATAXIA
[p]A[r]T[y] A[n]I[m]A[l] = “Pary animal regularly”
Definition: “lack of physical control”

3. Affectionate, posh men given obligations (8)
UXORIOUS
U = “posh” + OR = “men” (from Other Ranks in the military) + IOUS (IOUs) = “obligations”
Definition: “Affectionate”

4. Be obsessed with order, close to compulsive (6)
FIXATE
FIAT = “order” + [compulsiv]E = “close to compulsive”
Definition: “Be obsessed”

5. Eye-catching and stimulating Romeo’s dumped (6)
EXOTIC
EROTIC = “stimulating” without R = “Romeo” (from the NATO alphabet)
Definition: “Eye-catching”

7. One poking needle around gets amazing remedy (6)
ELIXIR
RILE = “needle” reversed around I = “one”
Definition: “amazing remedy”

8. He’ll stuff fish covered in salt water droplets (11)
TAXIDERMIST
IDE = “fish” in TAR = “salt” + MIST = “water droplets”
Definition: “He’ll stuff”

14. Contacting relation, dropping line about Spain (8)
TELEXING
TELLING = “relation” (as in “the telling / relation of a story”) without L = “line”, around E = “Spain”
Definition: “Contacting” – OK, so maybe this is a bit obscure – at 41 I’m probably about as young as could be expected to remeber Telex

15. Old lady having issue with complex integer (8)
GENETRIX
(INTEGER)*
Definition: “Old lady having issue” (“issue” as in “son or daughter”); a GENETRIX is a mother

16. English queen’s clothing is appropriate (6)
ANNEXE
E = “English” in ANNE = “queen”
Definition: “appropriate” (as a verb)

17. East African’s wild region in south-west (6)
EXMOOR
E = “East” + MOOR = “African”
Definition: “wild region in south-west”

19. One doctor touching Roman tile (6)
IMBREX
I = “one” + MB = “doctor” + RE = “touching”
Definition: “Roman tile”

20. South African sailor kidnapped by Chinese people (6)
XHOSAN
OS = “sailor” (Ordinary Seaman) in HAN = “Chinese people”
Definition: “South African”

33 comments on “Guardian 27,340 / Picaroon”

  1. While it was an impressive construction, I have to say I didn’t really enjoy this one much. I filled it all in, largely thanks to the common X in all words, but several of the clues I had no idea of the parsing, even several hours later. Some of them I just couldn’t see (telling = relation). Some of them I didn’t know (OR = men), and some of them just seemed plain unfair ( 5-1 = FIVEI ). So at the end, even having completed it, I was denied the satisfaction of understanding it.
    Anyway, lets see what this week holds. Thanks for the explanations and therefore the closure.

  2. Thanks mhl. Stuffed until 8D and then the missing factor was plain to see. Many nice misleading clues, though the ‘old’ in 15D was needlessly misleading. I did like LOI EXMOOR. Thanks Picaroon.

  4. I was a bit scared by the instructions, but managed to get EXISTS and AXIS OF EVIL on the first pass and once I realised it was going to be the same ‘X’ missing in each case it turned out to be less tricky than I’d feared.

    I enjoyed this more than Bodge@1, but I think I’m rather tolerant of finding I can’t parse some of the answers I get (one of the things I like about this blog is that people who are better at parsing than I am explain the bits I missed). But this one did stand out for me as having more unparsed solutions than usual. I couldn’t parse TELEXING (although it’s something I’ve done quite a lot of), TAXIDERMIST, ANTICLIMAX, and a couple of others, including ANNEXE. I wasn’t at all sure about ANNEXE – my (very old) Shorter Oxford, and my more modern Chambers both think ANNEX is to take something over and an ANNEXE is a bit of a building, so the extra ‘E’ went down as just another thing I didn’t understand.

    But, quibbles aside, I thought it was a nice piece of work, so thanks Picaroon, and thanks – even more than usual, given how much I needed the explanations – to mhl for the blog.

  6. Still no Prize Puzzle for this week, Flavia@3. Though I subscribe to “The Guardian” online, I don’t actually know how to access the puzzle page if it doesn’t automatically appear when I click on my favourites, in this case
    https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/series/prize

    I nearly gave up on the Picaroon Prize Puzzle last weekend, with only two answers completed on my first pass, one of which actually proved to be incorrect in the wash-up. However when I came back later with fresh eyes , I actually got a couple more out in the NW corner. When I saw they both contained “xes”, like my FOI, TAXIDERMIST at 8d, I re-read the special instructions and then thought, what if Picaroon means that the wordplay in each clue ignores a letter required in ALL the solutions? So after that penny dropped, the solve was somewhat easier.

    It was still hard going in the SW, though. I had to google both 17d EXMPOOR and my LOI 20d XHOSAN to confirm my guesses (the latter only coming to me because I thought it might have something to do with the Han Dynasty. I was with mhl in not knowing IMBREX, and google was required for that one as well.

    I actually thought when I discovered the omission of “x” was a commonality that the Special Instructions were a bit unfair, but then I decided I should not be so begrudging: it was a Prize Puzzle after all, and if that had been in the directions, then it might have been too heavy-handed a hint.

    My conclusion was that it takes a clever setter to have every word in the grid include an “x”.

    Favourites were EXEUNT, and two of my last ones in, 25a XAVIER and 15d GENETRIX

    With hindsight, I am glad I persisted, as I would have been stuffed if I had only solved TAXIDERMIST!

    Well done Picaroon and mhl.

  7. Thanks Andrew – we crossed because of my tediously long post!

    You are a legend: I accessed the link and have now printed off the jigsaw by Paul, still my favourite setter!

    Good things come to those who wait and all that.

    (Famous last words, I have found jigsaw puzzles very difficult in the past!!!!)

  8. Thanks mhl and top marks to Picaroon for a brilliant puzzle. The only oddity was that the verb is ANNEX rather than ANNEXE. Re Bodge @1: ‘5-1’, a football score, is uttered as ‘five one’ and the Latin numeral i/I is used for the second number. Re molongo @2: ‘old lady’ is a colloquial term for one’s mother, and a mother is precisely what a genetrix is.

  9. A very minor amendment to one parse, mhl. 9a COWPOX – the ‘with’ in the clue gives the ‘W’ in the middle of the solution. Not sure that’s clear from your post. Otherwise, many thanks for making sense of a tricky puzzle.

  10. There’s also a minor typo at 10a, “AID” instead of “AIR”.
    A nice puzzle, with a definite ‘X’ factor (groan!) (I was tempted to use the word ‘literal’ there, but I don’t like it, even when used correctly.)
    Thanks Picaroon for the work-out, and mhl for the blog. Happy weekend all.

  11. Thanks Picaroon and mhl

    The special instructions nearly put me off doing this, but I’m so glad they didn’t, as I thought it was a cracker!

    I planned to be methodical, so made a note of the missing letter as I solved each clue – it didn’t take long for the penny to drop. I did have to Wordsearch a couple and look up some too, but it was all a pleasure.

  12. Thanks, mhl and Picaroon.

    I enjoyed this, but like others I was off put by the instructions until I saw the x in several answers. This certainly helped with solving the rest.

    I needed help with parsing three (13a, 1d, 8d); all these years I had thought “Tet” (as in Tet Offensive) was a synonym for Vietnamese, not realising it was the Vietnamese new year.

  13. I really enjoyed this one once I got going. It was so cleverly constructed.
    I had a problem with 1d to begin with as I was working around science as the school subject!

  15. I’d been doing pretty well until I somehow convinced myself that the answer to 22 was ‘six packs’ (something to do with beer = IPA, and sacks = containers). So thereafter I was stymied for most of the SW corner, not that I’d have had much chance of getting obscurities like IMBREX or XHOSAN anyway.

    Still, fun while it lasted, so thanks to Picaroon for cleverness, and to mhl for elucidation.

  16. Thanks Picaroon & mhl. A regular visitor to this site but this is my first time commenting. I loved this puzzle and once I realised X would feature throughout I thought that as a symbol of multiplication it could be a case of adding “Times”, or with GMT around the corner Time’s added?

  17. Like most, I really enjoyed this and found it relatively easy once the X penny dropped. I would like to congratulate Picaroon for the construction, as it could not have been easy to shoehorn so many X words into the puzzle. My late Father claimed to have solved a ‘special’ where every crosser was an A but to his frustration could never find chapter and verse. Has anyone else heard of this and perhaps recall the setter.
    So, many thanks to Picaroon and to Mhl for much help with the parsing.

  19. Thanks Picaroon and mhl.

    I thought this was a hugely impressive puzzle: the only drawback was that once I had twigged that X was always the missing letter, it became quite easy, though I needed to solve one or two words like I do with Azed, looking them up to see if they actually existed.

  20. Thanks to Picaroon and mhl. I usually do not do well with special instructions, but this time my first in was ATAXIA so that I got off to a good X-ing start. Like others I had to use Google to be certain of several X-words, but my major problem was that I had settled on AXEL rather than NEXT and was stymied in the SE corner with EXMOOR and XHOSAN. All in all I enjoyed this puzzle.

  21. Thank you Picaroon and mhl.

    A clever crossword and enjoyable. Like ACD @20 ATAXIA was my first in, but even after getting EXISTS, and twigging that X was the letter for all the answers, I failed to fill the grid.

  22. Thanks Picaroon and mhl. With 26 clues in the puzzle, I started off thinking each would have a different letter of the alphabet missing. I spent a while trying to find an alternative for XIAN with another initial letter. No problems once I realised my mistake. An impressive and enjoyable crossword (although ANNEXE does look like a mistake).

  23. As Muffin says,this was a cracker. One of the most enjoyable puzzles for a while and,for once,just right for the prize slot. RED BOXES and TAXIDERMIST were write ins,and they indicated that X marked the spot and everything else went in steadily.
    Quite excellent.
    Thanks Picaroon.

  24. Yes, very enjoyable and a relief to discover it was X missing in every case. It was a clever fill, but I happen to know that Picaroon uses qxw to create (at least some of) his puzzles, which allows the setter to

    “Apply any of the built-in answer treatments (ciphers including Playfair and Caesar, misprints, ‘letters latent’ and many more) or make your own by writing a simple plug-in”,

    so I wonder if he was able to use that feature to create the grid. I haven’t actually used the software, so don’t know whether that would be possible. Hard to imagine Picaroon’s recent perimetrical pangram was filled by programming qwx, but maybe that’s possible too? Apologies to P if both these fills were in fact produced by sheer blood, sweat and tears. Whatever, the clues were typically tight and elegant. Pity about ANNEXE.

  25. Tony @24
    Thanks for that interesting link. I’ve bookmarked in case I ever feel moved to construct a puzzle – creating the grid always seems the hardest part of the process!

  26. TAXIDERMIST was first in for me, and I got the gimmick right away. Failed at XHOSAN simply because it isn’t in the dicrionary of the web site I use to cheat. But I did well and enjoyed it.

  27. I believe there was an araucaria about 25 years ago where the only vowel in the entire puzzle was A and published on April 1st of course

  28. Many thanks Tc, that will be the one my Dad talked about. Now all I need to do is discover who set HIJKLMNO for WATER and I will be happy!!

  29. Re #17 & #27

    I can remember solving that one. I’d guess that it was more than 25 years ago, but with so many decades to chose from, who can be sure?

    My memory tells me too that it was by Araucaria. It was a jigsaw as well, the joke being that there was no one correct way of entering the answers in the grid, with all the crossers being the letter A.

  30. Whilst I appreciated the skill of the setter in compiling a puzzle with an x in every clue I didn’t find it a very enjoyable solve once the penny had dropped early on. I’m sorry to be a bit of party pooper as Picaroon is one of my favourite setters and this one didn’t provide the challenge I expected when I saw his name. There were lots of nice clues (I particularly liked AXIS OF EVIL)………. but a bit of the fun in solving was missing for me. Thanks for the blog mhl and to Picaroon for the setting tour de force.

  31. A brilliant feat of gtid filling but inevitably rather a straightforward solve. IMBREX was last in and the only unfamiliar solution.

    Thanks to Picaroon and mhl

  32. Thanks ! I enjoyed that a lot. I felt like 10a should have been transports (plural) in the clue, but I guess the singular as in “means of transport” is OK. Uxorious was new to me, I had to resort to cheating on that one.

  33. Sorry. Another contrived effort. If you spot the missing letter is x the solutions roll in easily (for the most part); if you don’t then it’s unsolvable. Dreadful

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