Guardian 27,907 – Picaroon

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I’m usually a big fan of Picaroon’s, but I didn’t think this was one of his best. There are some nice clues, of course, but also a couple of slightly dubious definitions. Still, even a second-rank Picaroon is still a pleasure, and maybe it’s just me, so thanks to him for the puzzle.

 
 
 
 
 
 
Across
7. SEDATIVE Drug case follows that of suicide (8)
S[uicid]E + DATIVE (grammatical case)
9. AWNING Crawling fellow leaves cover outdoors (6)
FAWNING (crawling) less F
10. AMOS Intoxicating drink from the right prophet (4)
Reverse of SOMA, “a ritual drink of importance among the early Indians”, giving the OT prophet
11. TO CAP IT ALL Time round Great Lake as the final thing (2,3,2,3)
T[ime] + O (round) + CAPITAL (great) + L[ake]
12. NUDISM Rolling around in mud’s a revealing practice (6)
(IN MUDS)*
14. GABFESTS Spooner’s wonderful company for social chats (8)
Spoonerism of “fab guests”
15. CHIPPER Bubbly‘s cold, getting cooler (7)
C + HIPPER (more fashionable, cooler). Chipper/bubbly in the sense of cheerful
17. MESSIER Compiler of heavenly catalogue that’s less orderly (7)
Double definition: Charles MESSIER created a catalogue of astronomical objects, still referenced today: M1 is the Crab nebula, for example
20. SUBDEPOT Person sitting on bench drank around warehouse (8)
SUB (substitute, in football etc) + reverse of TOPED. Chambers doesn’t have this compound: I’m not totally convinced by the definition
22. ENDIVE Leaves to eat in French bar of ill-repute (6)
EN (French “in”) + DIVE (dodgy bar)
23. PERMISSIVE A letter for free (10)
PER (each, a) + MISSIVE
24. CIAO People of intelligence love to have the last word (4)
CIA (Central Intelligence Agency) + O. Ciao can mean hello or goodbye, so in the latter case would be “the last word”
25. RUNNER Dashing fellow who’s caught up in traffic (6)
Double definition: someone who dashes or runs, or a smuggler (trafficker)
26. MEATBALL This person attending dance is a bit of a dish (8)
ME (this person) AT BALL
Down
1. VERMOUTH Really brief speaker shows it (8)
VER[Y] (really) + MOUTH (speaker). “It” = Italian vermouth, as in “gin and it”
2. PASS I don’t know what a poor student gets (4)
Double definition – “I don’t know” as in quiz shows (originally from Mastermind I think), and a poor exam result, at least relatively: perhaps “what a poor student may get” would be better
3. VICTIM Two boys one persecuted (6)
VIC + TIM
4. PALPABLE Bachelor, defended by two friends with energy, is possibly touched (8)
B in PAL PAL + E
5. UNSTRESSED University course taken up by Poles with no accent (10)
U + N S (poles) + reverse of DESSERT
6. ANKLET Talk with one criminal shedding ball and chain (6)
Anagram of (TALK ONE) less O (“ball”)
8. ENCAGE Cover of Elton composer put in bars (6)
E[lto]N + [John] CAGE
13. IMPEDIMENT Check setter’s trapped, without a little money (10)
DIME in I’m PENT
16. EXPOSURE Erstwhile show-off lowering level of European publicity (8)
EX-POSEUR with the second E “lowered” or moved to the bottom
18. ENVIABLE Appealing sort of dash, like a 25 (8)
EN (dash, in typography) + VIABLE – if something is viable then it can be described as a runner, though again Chambers doesn’t seem to have this meaning
19. ATRIUM Navratilova triumphantly covering court (6)
Hidden in navratilovA TRIUMphantly
21. USED UP Finished milk dish that’s on the turn (4,2)
USE (to milk) + reverse of PUD
22. EVEJAR One may take flight the day before clash (6)
EVE (day before)+ JAR (to clash) – new to me, it’s another name for the nightjar
24. CUBE Young animal on earth possibly eight (4)
CUB + E, and 8 is the cube of 2

29 comments on “Guardian 27,907 – Picaroon”

  1. I found this very tough indeed, but enjoyed 9a AWNING, 12a NUDISM, 22a ENDIVE, 3d VICTIM and 6d ANKLET.

    I had nothing on the first pass until the very last clue, 24d, CUBE, which then gave me 24a CIAO, but it was like puling teeth from then on and took me an inordinately long time. Held up for quite a while in the NE by filling in 11a as TO TOP IT OFF, then having to rethink my unparsed entry.

    Fortunately I knew the reference to 1a VERMOUTH as IT from previous cryptics, which gave me a toehold in the NW.

    I needed your blog for several explanations, Andrew, so many thanks, and to Picaroon for the challenge of what was an almost insurmountable mountain.

  2. I was baffled by the link between 18 and 25 so thanks, Andrew.  It is fairly common usage to call a likely winner (or concept etc) a “goer” – or something that will “run.”  It’s just a bit hard to think of instances when “it’s a runner” would be used but it must be OK. I  loved getting 22d just by parsing – but disbelieving – and was tickled to see it is an alternative for nightjar.   Lovely Friday challenge.

  3. Pottered quite happily along until staring dumbly at the last six in the NE, don’t know why now; I mean pal pal plus e around b is hardly fiendish, ditto the Spoonerism, and the other four. Messier and evejar were dnks, but the former had to be, and if nightjar, then… and there it was, meaning no. 2 in the SOED, no. 1 being mole-cricket, ho hum. Also slow to come was subdepot. It for vermouth is having a bit of a run recently. So, yes, not as elegant as the pirate’s best, but enjoyable ntl, so thanks to him and to Andrew.

  5. Excellent blog Andrew. I loved the battle with Pickers. he sure knows how to bob amd weave and drop his shoulder-like Best or Messi.

    I think 18 and 25 are really the only ones anyone could really have any issue with but they didnt bother me,

  6. Thanks Picaroon and Andrew

    I thought that this was mostly good – I enjoyed the delayed realisation of parsing of, for instance, VERMOUTH and PERMISSIVE.

    I knew MESSIER as a star/nebula cataloguer. I didn’t know EVEJAR, but guessed it from nightjar. I’ve heard “it’s a runner” for a viable enterprise quite often, so I’m surprised it’s not in Chambers.

    I didn’t like the definition for PASS – I’ve known lots of students who would have been pleased to get one, instead of their “fails” (though current grading has done away with the concept of “fail”!)

  7. Thanks for the explanation of MESSIER – I’d never heard of the person, and had half parsed it as ME (compiler) + SSIER, which didn’t lead anywhere useful.

  8. Most of the top half went in very quickly, but there were a few trickier ones, and GABFESTS and EVEJAR took a bit of teasing out.

    Thanks to Picaroon and Andrew

  9. I think “it’s a runner” comes originally from horse-racing, where there are often “non-runners” in a given race.

  10. I get very frustrated with this setter. Most clues are brilliant, so why hit us with an evejar or Messier? Guessable, but I hate having to Google to check. (By the way, this poor student got a fail!)

  11. Oofyprosser @10

    Not a lot of alternatives for E?E?A?. I’m rather relieved he didn’t go for ENEMAS – how might Paul have clued that?

  12. I was taken by surprise by Andrew’s opening remarks as my experience had been very different. I thought this was a very classy offering from Picaroon. But that’s how it goes.

  13. Thanks, Andrew. I very rarely disagree with you but my reaction to your preamble was the same as Xpotter’s @12.

    Ofyprosser @10,  ‘less orderly’ could hardly  have been clearer as a clue for MESSIER and I had no qualms about googling to discover a person I’d never heard of but now think I perhaps should have. As others have said, the wordplay for EVEJAR was also quite clear and close enough to ‘nightjar’ to warrant googling, which I never mind doing to discover something new.

    I think 2dn is quite fair with reference to university students gaining a PASS degree.

    My favourites today were SEDATIVE, GABFESTS, ANKLET, UNSTRESSED, EXPOSURE and ATRIUM.

    Many thanks, as ever, to Picaroon.

  14. Ok, I had to look up EVEJAR to check it was one of the many names for the Nightjar or Goatsucker, but, as always, I enjoyed this Picaroon offering. I knew about Messier – the easily-seen nebula in Orion’s belt is M42, for example, the 42nd in his catalogue of non-stars. I agree about SUBDEPOT though; perhaps a changed clue (3,5) for BUS DEPOT would have been more acceptable.

     

  16. I’ve also come across RUNNER when problem solving at work, as in ‘Do you think that’s a runner?’ meaning ‘is this idea viable?’

  17. I hadn’t heard of an evejar, and I didn’t bother to Google it. So I came here pronouncing it in my head as if it were Spanish (e-ve-har). It’s an odd-looking word. I think it’s because we rarely put a J into the middle of a word in English, and even more rarely does it appear after a vowel.

    I quite liked much of this–many of the definitions were devious (“leaves to eat” for ENDIVE makes it sound like the start of a container clue, for example), and some of them definitely made me smile. I liked MEATBALL and ANKLET in particular.

  18. A DNF for me – “evejar” defeated me (I wondered if “evewar” was a word) and the parsing of “impediment” also passed me by. There were some lovely clues here (“vermouth”, “runner” for example) but also a few dreadful ones and it seemed like Picaroon had painted himself into a corner with “subdepot”, “evejar” and “gabfests” (what an awful word!). “Messier” was familiar, having a physics background, so was almost FOI. That’s the nature of GK – if you know it, it’s easy!

    A bit like yesterday where I felt the theme spoiled an otherwise decent puzzle, here a few jarring weak ones spoiled (for me) a puzzle which had some clever misdirection but which otherwise left me a bit flat.

  19. I got there in the end, but for some reason didn’t have as much fun with this as usual. Evejar was particularly problematic if you hadn’t heard of it before because the crossers and clue didn’t uniquely specify the last syllable – clash could conceivably be war or ram, for example. If you try a multi-dictionary search via Onelook you only get 2 hits, as opposed to 20 to 30 for most words, which fits my definition of obscure.

    Surprisingly, this puzzle seems to have weakened the previously strong correlation between acceptability here and being in Chambers.

    Thanks.

  20. Thanks to Picaroon and Andrew. Much of this puzzle came easily, but I struggled with MESSIER, EVEJAR, SUBDEPOT (I’m another who started with bus depot), and PASS (my LOI).

  21. I also hadn’t heard of EVEJAR; and a friend told me about MESSIER’s star catalogue as were were driving somewhere this morning; but I really liked AWNING, TO CAP IT ALL, CIAO and GABFESTS. Many thanks to P & A.

  22. I’m a bit surprised by some of the comments. I enjoyed this and don’t see anything wrong with unusual words like EVEJAR. I was glad to learn of it. SUBDEPOT is in Collins online and others, so not sure why Chambers doesn’t have it.
    I liked SEDATIVE, NUDISM, ANKLET and EXPOSURE. I was not so keen on the dd for RUNNER, which seems to need “fellow” to do double duty.
    Thanks, Picaroon and Andrew.

  23. re 1dn “Vermouth”, I always thought the “i” and “t” in “gin and it” was “ice and tonic”? but I’m not a gin drinker so I had no idea it was Italian Vermouth

  26. PiersMcQ @23

    “Gin and it” was short for “gin and Italian” (vermouth).

    Paradoxically, although Martini make Italian vermouth (dry, bianco and rosso), a “dry martini” should be made with French vermouth, specifically Noilly Prat.

  27. Eventually gave up on this about two-thirds of the way through. There was some initial unease with AMOS as my only previous encounter with ‘Soma” had been in “Brave New World” where it was a solid substance rather than a drink. There were some great clues, though, before I hit the buffers – SEDATIVE (clever), CIAO (witty) and NUDISM (audible laughter, can’t bring myself to use LOL)

  29. Actually, EVEJAR is really obscure. Wikipedia doesn’t know it, and the only reference in the first 3 pages of Google images is this poem (in which, note, it is hyphenated).

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