Guardian Cryptic 28,617 by Pasquale

109 comments on “Guardian Cryptic 28,617 by Pasquale”

1. ETERNITY gives me my chance to air one of my favourite Stephen Hawking quotes: “Eternity is a very long time, especially towards the end.” Lovely clue. I am clearly getting old, though: for some reason the first PM’s wife to come to mind was Harold Wilson’s Mary! And a bit of Internet research surprised me when I discovered POPEYE is still going! MAMMOTHS made me smile and HEAD RESTRAINTS is a splendid surface/anagram. PLASTER SAINT appeared recently – thank Goodness.

   I normally stay away from homophone discussions, being fairly relaxed about the device. But I honestly struggle to equate ‘deed’ with the second syllable of TIDIED which sounds far more like ‘did’ to my ears. Only quibble in an otherwise top notch (if, as loonapick says, not the most difficult) puzzle.

   Thanks both.

2. Ooh! Post Number 1 – it’s been a while!

3. Thank you, loonapick.

   The gentle grid helped this enjoyable, if brief, tussle.

   Re the homophone mentioned by PM above, I took the Asian performance to be what the Thai did. Others may disagree of course.

   LOI was the elegant DISOWNED which was also my COD.

   Fine offering from The Don, many thanks.

4. Not having children, INSET remained unparsed for me. Otherwise, a straightforward and enjoyable solve.

5. I agree that this was towards the easier end of Pasquale’s range, but it offered an enjoyable and gently sustained challenge right to the end and I don’t think there is a weak link in the cluing anywhere.
   MASHIE and BISCOTTI are both straightforward but sufficiently cryptic pointers to not particularly familiar words – very nice. Personally I quite liked THAIDEED, but then I never did talk proper. HEAD RESTRAINT, DISOWNED and STATISTS are very neatly done, and the surface of 13a is positively 23a.
   Thanks to Pasquale and loonapick

6. As a non-UK resident without children, INSET had to go in, not very confidently, from the first def alone. It wasn’t hard in retrospect, but I spent a long time trying to work out MENUS with ‘enter’ as an insertion indicator.

   Otherwise, surprisingly few obscure words for a Pasquale. Favourites were MASHIE, the ‘winged creatures’ getting a couple of mentions and the reverse anagram for REASON OUT.

   Thanks to Pasquale and loonapick

7. I recall INSET days were originally colloquially referred to as “Baker days”, from the oleaginous Kenneth (one of the delights of Spitting Image in the 1980s was the depiction of him as a slug), who came up with the idea as Education Secretary. There always seemed to be a bit of an assumption that they wouldn’t inconvenience the parents at all, Nanny or the au pair just doing a few more hours.
   He always seemed remarkably pleased with himself. I think, long before Priti Patel was even heard of, he was the original subject of the line “I have seen the future, and it smirks”.

8. Enjoyable puzzle. Solved SE corner last.

   Favourites: INCONSIDERATE, SALTATION, BISCOTTI, DISOWNED, REASON OUT.

   New for me: PLASTER SAINT.

   I did not parse 3d INSET.

   Thanks, both.

9. Only ever heard of an In Service day, but got it from the def.

10. William @3: when I solved, I rationalised it as ‘did’ you but it didn’t feel quite right. A missing tense indicator, perhaps.

11. Struggled a bit with some of the definitions today, especially HEAD RESTRAINT, and MENUS where ‘first to enter’ held me up for a while. TIDIED as a homophone works for me.
    On reflection all seems fair though, except for INSET, which I remember as extra days’ attendance imposed on teachers by the aforementioned Mr. Baker, rather than days off for children!
    Thanks to Pasquale and loonapick.

12. I think 7d should be parsed as “Thai did”, shouldn’t it? Phonetically, at least, it’s closer than “Thai deed”.

13. Relatively straightforward, as others have commented, with well constructed clues. Favourites were REASON OUT and CHERISHES – the latter for its great surface.

    MASHIE seems to survive only in crosswords and golfing museums, but is more frequently seen than ‘niblick’. I had no difficulty with the homophone for 7d – I wouldn’t pronounce TIDIED the same way as ‘tided’ (which would certainly be ‘Thai did’) although the vowel in the second syllable is not quite as long as in the separate word ‘deed’.

    Thanks to S&B

14. [A reflection on BISCOTTI: in Italian the word is simply the generic term for biscuits (UK usage) or cookies (US usage), but in English has come to be used specifically for the variety known in Italian as ‘cantucci’]

15. Ah, homophones!

    One of my favourite subjects on this site. I am forever being told that just because I pronounce a word a certain way, I shouldn’t assume that others do. I comment that REAR and RHEA are not homophones (I’m Scottish so pronounce the second R in REAR) and I’m told that for some they are homophones. Today, I immediately saw THAI DEED as a straightforward homophone and others tell me they’re not. What a wonderful thing accents are!

16. Nothing too tricky and very enjoyable. I was introduced to PLASTER SAINT by Vlad, only last month, so that’s truly fixed in the memory bank. I thought TIDIED was fine and I had the same ticks as Michelle @8 with REASON OUT a clear favourite.

    Ta Pasquale & loonapick

17. There was a time when “Baker days” were abbreviated to “B-days”. BIDET almost fitted!
    Thanks to loonapick and Pasquale.

18. Like others, I’m not convinced by the homophone at 7d. In 15d, I presume that ‘drunk’ is being used as a verb, but it gave me some pause when solving.

19. Thanks, Pasquale and loonapick!

    “Thai Did” doesn’t fit in the clue. Pasquale must have meant Thai deed.
    Neither the ‘Ti’ part sounds exactly like ‘Thai’ nor the ‘died’ part exactly sounds exactly like deed.
    It works for me anyway! 🙂

20. Thoroughly enjoyed this, but I feel obliged to point out that “one snack” would result in a BISCOTTO, not as BISCOTTI. And don’t get me started on the general misuse of “panini”!

21. 3d a bung and move on. The UK (English?) meaning no use at all to the many non-UK solvers. Think that compilers could be more aware of their cross-ditch/-equator reader-(!)ship.
    Saltation terrific word, what little sand grains do on a windy beach.
    18d also enjoyed, with the ‘ye’ the top feller fell into place for spinach man himself. As a once worker in health stats 16d also appreciated.
    Ta Pasquale, and L-pick for explaining 3d.

22. 3d bung from crossers.

23. I wonder if Pasquale had something like this in mind for the avaricious ex-PM’s wife? https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2010/oct/27/cherie-blair-ebay-shopping-list?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

24. Thanks Pasquale and loonapick. Enjoyable, sound fare as expected from the ever-reliable Pasquale. POPEYE was my favourite. And I agree with Chinoz that SALTATION is a lovely word.

    Homophone in 7d was ‘close enough’. Move on already.

25. I was flicking through Don’s crossword manual the other day. This was a pleasant puzzle – by the book and lots to like.

    New: MASHIE (I also didn’t know HIE = HURRY), BISCOTTI, SALTATION.

    LOI: OMAHA for, in hindsight, some unfathomable reason.

    For 7D I thought (mistakenly) it was a homophone for TIE-DYED (as in t-shirt) possibly because I thought the phrase is actually spelt THAI-DYED!

    michelle@8: PLASTER SAINTS was new to you and me on 4 Nov when Vlad used it 😉

26. tandemist @20. If ‘snack’, singular, can be defined only in terms of another singular noun, then ‘crisps’ could not be defined as a snack. More than one item of a similar kind may be consumed while snacking!

27. These homophone debates all sound the same

28. Hear hear?

29. Spooner’s catflap @26 – Quite. A single biscotto is barely a mouthful, never mind a whole snack.

    Bodycheetah @27 – LOL, as the kids say.

30. All reasonably fine until I came to a halt with four in the top to go. Mums is surely MAS? But what to go after it. Dredged up INSET from my last stint teaching in England over a quarter of a century ago, then noticed HIE but had to check the full word. TIDIED is a homophone for me, when at last it clicked, so the weird Italian biscuit came last. I liked OVERT/RAIN and EXQUISITE was, well, exquisite – and also REASON OUT, DISOWNED and CREDOS. Thanks, Pasquale and loonapick.

31. Bodycheetah @27 – to be fair, there are two (possibly related) debates: is it a homophone for someone (familiar and boring) and what the homophone of the answer actually is (fair enough).

    Thanks PM@1 for eternity quote, Neil@7 for the INSET story and Auriga@17 for b-days/bidets 🙂

    Thanks P&L too.

32. Thanks Pasquale & loonapick
    Liked HEAD RESTRAINT for surface and the Mammoth /Tiger Moth combo.
    Also liked ‘Abandoned drunk’ for its two unused anagrinds.

33. Not really on the right wavelength today but got there in the end.

    Got OMAHA straight away remembering ham being used in a similar way before. Also, for what must be the first time, I got the reverse anagram REASON OUT.

    Like others liked MASHIE, MAMMOTHS, SALTATION (which was new for me too) and even remembered PLASTER SAINT

    Thanks to Pasquale and loonapick (and of course rear and rhea are not homophones……)

34. Another crossword in my Goldilocks zone – looking impossible to start with but surrendering gracefully with persistence. On INSET days and Baker Days – I was teaching when they were first introduced, and we called them B-days once Kenneth Baker was no longer Education Minister. Because everyone thought they were a good idea, but no-one really knew what to do with the !

    I loved the EXQUISITE clue.

35. them

36. I remember my nieces (now post-grads) talking about ‘sets’ at primary school, not to do with ed training, so unrelated … thought at the time they were like teams, but I could be wrong …

    Fun puzzle, nice gentle potter; overt rain and Thai deed were cute, and plaster saint was recent. Thanks both.

37. I had CALQUE in 19d which, though not as satisfying, still works I think.

38. I didn’t know Baker days as ‘inset days’ but got 3d like grantinfreo@36 from ‘set’ as a group from a class working together.

39. Reliable, entertaining setting from Pasquale.

    Both MASHIE and HIE are words I’ve learned from crosswords; likewise, PLASTER SAINT. Hamish was a change from Ian as the scot. I think TIDIED can be pronounced as either thai deed or thai did, so no problem there. I liked DISOWNED, my LOI as I couldn’t think of words for drunk as a noun to put in. It was also good to be reacquainted with POPEYE.

    Thanks Pasquale and loonapick.

40. I am pretty confident that the vast majority of English native speakers distinguish between the vowel sounds of ‘pick’ and ‘peek’ (hold on to that difference!) — and that the vowel sound produced at the end of the word ‘tidy’ lies much closer to ‘peek’ than ‘pick’. The same vowel sound distinction separates ‘did’ from ‘deed’. So I think Pasquale has a very strong case for claiming that ‘Thai’+’deed’ is phonologically equivalent to TIDIED.

41. I only ever come across MASHIE and niblick in crosswords and P.G. Wodehouse. In neither case does my incomprehension get in the way of my enjoyment. OMAHA reminded me of the wonderful Paul puzzle (28153) themed on Normandy beaches.

42. Popeye favourite. When you say tidied out loud it makes sense although I couldn’t see it admittedly when I could see the answer! Good Xword.!

43. You might try saying aloud a string of those verbs which end in a consonant+’y’, and listen to the final vowel as you alternate between the base form and the past tense -ed form: carry/carried, worry/worried, muddy/muddied, hurry/hurried, bury/buried, rally/rallied, etc.
    Does the vowel sound shift or not?

44. Which reminds me of the phonologists’ and EFL teachers’ joke about the English class in Madrid: Pablo puts his hand up and says “Please, I need a piss” and the puzzled teacher responds “What’s the matter, Pablo?” and he says “A piss — I need a piss of paper”. “Aha!” says the teacher, concerned about the misunderstanding arising from Pablo’s pronunciation, “It’s better to use the word ‘sheet’, not a ‘piece’ of paper but a ‘sheet’ of paper”. “OK, right”, says Pablo, “so, I need a shit.”

45. I can’t speak for the vast majority of English speakers, but certainly the vast majority of North Americans make the second syllable of “tidied” a perfect homophone of “deed”. Having been stumped more often than I want to think about by homophone clues that depend on non-rhotic pronunciation, I feel that I am getting a bit of my own back.

46. [Spooner’s catflap @26 – but not relating to this crossword.
    I left a message for you @77 on the blog for Pan’s crossword on Monday.
    It’s about an Araucaria crossword you expressed an interest in locating.
    Won’t repeat the info here.
    And I’m NOT stalking you, honestly I’m not!]

47. I’m another THAI-DID. No problem knowing what an INSET day is, but equating inset=picture was another matter.
    Plenty to enjoy here: REASON OUT, HOME STRAIGHT, ETERNITY, MAMMOTHS… But I was mentally staring at Pope – ye for a while before it resolved itself into POPEYE: COTD.

48. Nice crossword and blog. Thanks to setter and blogger.
    My only quiblet is that I have seen many cricket matches where one of the teams were praying for rain.
    I usually don’t comment on homophones because it seems an arid discussion, but I’d just like to add on 7d that the only difference to me is that the vowel sound in the word ‘deed’ is slightly longer than that in the second syllable of TIDIED.

49. One last comment on the homophone at 7d. As others have said, it all rather depends on your regional accent. As a Scouser-born person, I’ve had comments on the way I seem to emphasise the long e in any word that includes it, or possibly(!) includes it. But I suppose that no-one would agree that you can pronounce “film” as “fillum”, as I always did. My thanks to setter and blogger, of course.

50. … and if you really want to read more about it, I refer you to the section on the happY vowel in my Accents of English (CUP 1982), vol. 1, section 2.2.3 (p. 165-166).

51. AndyR @46. Thank you so much for the chasing that down on the basis of my earlier query. I did check the crossword to which you directed me, but by the date it was published I had, for various reasons, disengaged from G crosswords – a 20-year hiatus that did not end until the middle of last year. The one I was remembering was probably 7 to 10 years earlier, and in pursuit if its theme of the Bronte sisters’ ‘Bell’ pseudonyms, unless my memory is completely deceiving me, the grid was not an orthodox square, but took the appearance of a set of vertical ‘bell ropes’. Perhaps my memory IS deceiving me on this. All best, SC.

52. [Spooner’s catflap @51. Really sorry to hear that’s not the one you had in mind.
    And I’m afraid I don’t recall the one that you are talking about. Sounds great fun.

    I’m a life-long Araucaria fan. Well, since my late teens anyway (1972). Must have missed that one, though.
    He was SO inventive – like for instance the alphabetic jigsaws – he found so many ways to vary the formats.

    Or maybe I should have said “so many ways to ring the changes”??? I’ll get my coat . . . ]

53. I’m flummoxed by this homophone discussion – “-ied” for me has an “ee” sound and I’ve never spotted anyone in particular resorting to “ih” but if PM@1 says it is so it must be so; I’ll have to cock a more discerning ear. I thought the discussion would centre on the “Ti-” and “Thai” equivalence. Perhaps I am to be told that “Thai” is always pronounced with a hard “t” or that the “h” is silent.

    A fine puzzle but quibbles with the small excesses of fat in some clues: “you’ve” in BISCOTTI, “enter” in MENUS, “lowly” in ORDER. Nothing fatal but an unnecessary drain on the old CPU. POPEYE took far too long.

    Much entertainment so thanks both.

54. A very neat crossword, with nothing obscure, although I entered SALTATORY which slowed me down. It’s a word that’s used in entomology for insects that jump, like flea beetles. I don’t like “fly” as an anagram indicator. 23 is one of many great surfaces.

55. Alphalpha @53: ouch. He only said it sounded like ‘did’ to his ears. And not only did it; it still does. But he’s not too worreed about it.

56. Thought this a bit of a mixed bag today, last one in the rather unimpressive OVERTRAIN, I thought,. Similar device of removal used for both SALTATION and STATISTS. The anagrams, as per usual for me, provided a way in initially. BISCOTTI and PLASTER SAINT I didn’t know, POPEYE and MASHIE I did. All perfectly clued, however. HOME STRAIGHT should perhaps have been one of the last ones in, but it was the very first for me. Liked the assembled in gradual bits INCONSIDERATE and EXQUISITE. Thanks to Pasquale and Loonapick…

57. …oh, and usually found INSET days were a real drag in my teaching career…

58. Thanks loonapick, I had to dredge INSET days from somewhere in the back of my mind but out it came, after eventual favourite MASHIE had held out for as long as the rest put together, deciding it had to be MAS… when I couldn’t think of anything to follow MUSH.. to make a synonym for pregnant! I only know the word from Marx Bros (a Groucho monologue but can’t recall the film).
    I thought this was full of smooth, clear and witty clues (I always think Pasquale is precise and fair but sometimes a little dry) so thanks Pasquale.

59. Norfolk Dumpling @49. “One last comment on the homophone at 7d.” You don’t know this site very well if you think a comment as early as 49 will be the last to mention a homophone! 🙂

    I found this a very user-friendly set of clues, with plenty of anagrams and straightforward wordplay. For example, I thought QUI in the middle of 23a looked a possibility, so tried the resulting Q in 19d, where it worked a treat. MAMMOTHS raised a smile, with the thought of massive, hairy beasts flying around in the morning.

    Thanks to Pasquale and loonapick.

60. My take on INSET is this. If you conjecture the answer from half of the clue, and figure the other half refers to a meaning that is obscure (to you), then it is perfectly fine to look that word up (without wild-card searches) to confirm your guess. Then you can enter it without the “without parsing” association, but also without having cheated. Just my way of treating such words, YMMV.

61. tandemist @20 at the risk of picking nits in your nit picking 🙂 the ONE is the wordplay refers to the I in the solution so plural BISCOTTI for snack is fine no?

62. Here in South Wales, “tidied” sounds fine as a homophone for Thai deed!

63. PM@55: No cause of “ouch” intended – my bad if so. (Always anxious to live and learn, this pronunciation meme is my TILT and I thank you for it.) (If forced to choose I could live without the learning…)

64. My approach too, Dr WhatsOn@60

65. Oh, Baker days! I didn’t know they had a new name now.

66. A surprisingly gentle but enjoyable work out.

    Some lovely constructions eg HEAD RESTRAINT, INCONSIDERATE and DISOWNED

    I take the panino/biscotto point – but can’t you also have a snack of biscuits? Just because snack is singular doesn’t mean it can’t comprise multiple elements.

    Thanks Pasquale and loonapick

67. Hello, I’m a frequent visitor, first time commenter dropping in to say that, if I remember correctly, ‘Eternity is a very long time, especially towards the end’ is by Woody Allen, from the brilliant ‘Love And Death,’ his comic pastiche of the great nineteenth century Russian novels, and was being quoted by Stephen Hawking.

68. [ Spooners catflap @51. Your description got me really intrigued. Had a dig around and I think I may have found it.

    There’s an Araucaria crossword from Christmas 1995 mentioned in this Guardian article, with a hyperlink to a rather grainy JPEG. (It’s described as “a touch of bob doubles with tenor covering.”)
    http://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/crossword-blog/2021/feb/15/crossword-blog-vintage-guardian-setter-araucaria-puzzles

    It’s not quite the format you described, but very close – certainly close enough for a memory from 26 years ago! ]

69. Thanks Pasquale, that was just about right for me. I missed MASHIE and SALTATION, both new to me. I enjoyed OMAHA, REASON OUT, and EXQUISITE, the latter for its surface. Thanks loonapick for helping me understand BISCOTTI, TIDIED, and the 2nd definition of INSET.

70. Thanks for the blog , neat and tidy, even an Everyman rhyming pair.
    Two mentions for Moth@34 , one in an answer and one in a clue.
    DISOWNED was the pick for me.
    Did anyone notice the homophone for 7D ?

71. So there were! Thank you – I hadn’t noticed.

72. Welcome aboard slightly @67; interesting fact!

73. slightly @67: always good to welcome a first time poster and thanks for that nugget. Doesn’t detract in the slightest from its neatness but I shall reattribute it from now on. On balance, Woody Allen has tended to be funnier than Stephen Hawking, though he’s contributed less to theoretical physics. Apart from once observing “This year I’m a star, but what will I be next year? A black hole?”

74. I’ve been out and missed all the homophone fun!

    Thanks to John Wells for dropping in @50. If anyone would like an online summary of the ‘happY vowel’ question, there’s quite a good one here. The paragraph on geographical and social variation is based on John Wells’ work, and for those who don’t like clicking on links I’ll quote from it:

    Conservative RP has the laxer [ɪ] pronunciation. This is also found in Southern American English, in much of the north of England, and in Jamaica… The tense [i] variant, however, is now established in General American, and is also the usual form in Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa, in the south of England and in some northern cities (e.g. Liverpool, Newcastle). It is also becoming more common in modern RP.

    [By way of explanation:
    ‘Conservative RP’ is how BBC newsreaders used to sound 50 years ago (think Robert Dougall).
    ‘Modern RP’ is how they sound now (think Sophie Raworth).
    ‘Lax’ /ɪ/ is the vowel in ‘did’.
    ‘Tense’ /i/ is the vowel in ‘deed’.]

    Interesting (for me, anyway) to hear our various contributors’ perspectives from around the world. Vive la différence.

    Oh, and thanks Pasquale and loonapick!

75. Roz @70. I’m sure quite a few people have noticed the homophone in 7d, but fortunately no one has commented on it so far. Fingers crossed!

76. … except essexboy, of course, while I was typing. ?

77. [ the ? should have been 🙂 of course]

78. MrPostMark@73 perhaps it was vanity. Only the biggest stars become black holes, it can happen in far less time than a year and is very spectacular.

79. I wish there was a record function on this website so that I could hear how others are pronouncing “tidied”. I’m definitely on the deed side but I’m going to get nothing accomplished today because I’ll be occupied trying to imagine the alternative pronunciation. Alphalpha@35: your comment helped me a great deal because I was trying to think of alternative pronunciations of “deed” and I wasn’t getting very far.

80. [Roz @78: knowing you might comment makes it a very nerve-wracking experience to make any mention of theoretical physics here. I felt I was on relatively (see what I did there?) safe ground, restricting myself to Woody Allen’s contribution… 😉 ]

81. [ We may actually be lucky enough to witness a supernova, one is overdue but the average rate does not really mean very much. My money is on Rigel or Betelguese , both highly visible later tonight. Orion is approaching its most spectacular display of the year. We will not be able to hear it of course or see the black hole remnant afterwards. ]

82. [Mark @80. The more we get to know about people in the public eye, the more unpleasant they seem to be. Those of us whose public appearances are limited to comments BTL can make themselves seem as pleasant as their facility with language allows. Not sure whether that means we’re going to become black holes any day now.]

83. Enjoyable puzzle, but I thought some of clues have stuff that doesn’t appear to be necessary.
    E.g., the “you’ve” in 4 ac. or “enter” in 9 ac. or “wandering” in 20 ac. or “lowly” in 22 dn. But I guess it’s all fair game…

84. Andy R @68
    Thank you indeed for unearthing Bob Doubles (who he?) (amongst other gems.
    I’ve wanted to meet him/it again for years

85. [Roz @81: I’ve been listening to the wolf whistling from both supergiants – whilst composing my posts – plenty of time. Neither seem more concerned than usual so I anticipate no explosions tonight…]

86. hatter @82: that’s a dark perspective but I can understand your view. (Driving up to Scotland for a weekend tomorrow and will pass Jimmy Saville’s cottage in Glencoe which is nowadays a sobering reminder). As a happy BTL commenter though, I shall continue to attempt to appear pleasant – though the language may fail me…

87. Enjoyed this fairly straightforward one. Jumped here from PostMark @1. For someone who rarely quibbles about homophones you have picked a difficult example with TIDIED rhyming with DID (for you). Is that a Scotch (sic) thing?
    Thanks both

88. Dimmer than usual today:
    a) seriously, has no-one else got a problem with ti- = thai?
    b) is there urinary extraction afoot on the above @70/75 or am I missing something else?
    c) BTL? Not a sandwich I think…..

    Jay in Pittsburgh@83: thanks for the agreement with me@53. Makes me feel less disconnected.

89. … whoops got error message and doubled up there. But now noticed PostMark is all over the blog.
    Fireworks tonight will be at Goodison if we win…..some hope!

90. Couldn’t visit here earlier (last-minute babysitting duties with a massive hangover), and I hate to be pedantic, but I’m amazed that nobody’s mentioned the easy-to-understand (autocorrect?) bug in the explanation of 1D MAMMOTHS. It’s ante meridiem not ante meridian

91. Didn’t get to this one until late, so I admit I’ve only skimmed the comments.

    In America, we certainly do have the concept of days off school while teachers do their continuing education, but I don’t think there’s a standardized term for them. Here in Chicago I believe the term I’ve heard thrown around is PD days (professional development). Anyway, INSET was a BIFD for me. But to be clear (since when I comment on Anglo-American cultural differences I’m usually misinterpreted here) I don’t object to the appearance of the term–I mean, it’s a British puzzle, and British general knowledge should be fair game.

    TIDIED is a far closer homophone than we sometimes get, so I don’t think it’s objectionable. Sure, it’s a stretch, but if you got there in the end…?

    Overall I agree that this is on the easier end of the spectrum for the Don, with only one obscure word, and that one clearly clued.

92. …and I didn’t have any problems with the pronunciation of THAIDEED, but it did remind me of the almost infinitely extensible story of the bloke who went to a pub with an Ozzie, a Brit, a Frog, a Spaniard, a Czech, a Scot, an American, a Tunisian, a Jap, an Andaman Islander, an Omani, a Manxman, a Sri Lankan, a Saudi Arabian, a South African, a Sicilian, and a Swede. The bouncer said “I’m sorry, you can’t come in without a Thai!”

93. Alphalpha@88 are you pronouncing the h in Thai? UK and American dictionaries don’t support that afaict.
    Took a while to get going, but once past PLASTER SAINT it was steady. Thanks Pasquale and loonapick.

94. Gonzo @93. I assume that Alphalpha @88 is equating Thai with the pronunciation of TI (for the first part of the solution, since most of the discussion has been about the second part), which would indeed be incorrect, but the clue requires a homophone of the whole expression ‘Asian performance’=Thai deed=TIDIED.

    Sorry for getting dragged into the homophone debate, when what I wanted to say was how much I enjoyed the 18 guys without a Thai not getting past the bouncer. Thanks Blaise @92 for some much needed levity.

95. [Alphalpha if you’re still with us, BTL is “below the line”, i.e. commenters rather than the original author of the blog. No lettuce or tomato involved.]

96. Still trying to work out why it seems blindingly obvious to all but me that INSET=picture.

97. [Mark @86. Sorry about the gloom. I envy you your Scottish holiday. Your contributions are always thoughtful and well written, and any slips only reveal good intentions. No black hole for you ]

98. gladys @96. An INSET is a picture set within text, or perhaps more often within another picture. (I’m answering the question behind the question. Hope that’s what you wanted. 🙂 )

99. I’m aware that I appear to be hogging the blog, but I must just answer Jay in Pittsburgh @83, because the ‘you’ve’ in 4a caught my eye when solving as something that might cause a problem for some solvers. I justified it thus: [word meaning] snack = you’ve [got] wordplay = BI(SCOT)T+I. Or in short, ‘you’ve’ is a link word between the definition and the wordplay. Hope this makes sense.

    I can’t help you with ‘enter’ in 9a, but your other queries have been dealt with in the blog by loonapick.

100. hatter @99: you’re not hogging the blog. I’m all over it, mate! 🙂

101. gladys @96 – I also baulked a bit at inset = picture. The former describes location (‘see inset’ is short for ‘see the inset picture’, I would have thought). But I guess a shorthand way of referring to something can become (sort of) the thing itself.

102. Thanks Pasquale and loonapick
     Easy for a Pasquale – the only obscurity, PLASTER SAINT, turned up quite recently.
     I’m usually on the other side of homophone debates, but I’ve never heard anyone pronounce TIDIED as other than THAI DEED.

103. [We used to stay in a hotel/restaurant near Lake Como. They had a dog called Salti, whose main job wqs to keep the feral cats out of the restaurant. He had reached n agreement with one, though – he let him in as long as the cat would jump up and push food off the tables.
     When we went walking up the mountains, Salti usually came with us, taking him away from his duties, to the displeasure of the owners.
     We translated “Salti” as “Bouncer”!]

104. Next time I run into a herd of MAMMOTHS I’ll probably notice that they are huge. Until then they remain firmly in the past tense for me.

105. Personally I’m a [taIdId] guy. Nobody’s explained the problem with the Thai part of the homophone. To me INSET is not just a picture. In the magazines I read, it’s more likely to be text.

     Otherwise a slow start but enjoyable.

106. Well I’m not married and I don’t have children (lol) go figure but I have never heard of PLASTER SAINT – what is that? I cannot find it on Collin’s online dictionary.

107. Hello again,

     So, I am a novice but I really do love cryptic crosswords – because they are not as easy as regular crosswords but I do need help please with understanding the role of the word “possibly” in a cryptic clue. For example – 24 across – why was “possibly” placed after “Eats”? I’ve seen it before of course but never understand what “possibly” really means or indicates, so to any one who can care to tell me, I’d greatly appreciate it.

     Sincerely.

108. Hi Amanda @107

     That’s an interesting question – thanks for raising it. I’ve always understood ‘possibly’ in a clue as a DBE (definition by example) indicator. (Others include ‘maybe’, ‘for one’, ‘for example’, ‘say’, or sometimes just a question mark.) ‘Morse, possibly’ might be a clue for CODE, because Morse is one possible example of a code.

     However, that still doesn’t explain 24a! To my way of thinking, ‘to dine’ is a sub-category of ‘to eat’, not the other way round, so I really don’t see the need for a ‘possibly’. Anyone else have any ideas?

     P.S. I wouldn’t have been familiar with PLASTER SAINT either had it not appeared in another crossword recently, but it’s in Lexico.

109. @Essexboy, I thank you, most wholeheartedly for responding to both my queries. Cheers!

Comments are closed.