Financial Times 17,033 by STEERPIKE

9 comments on “Financial Times 17,033 by STEERPIKE”

1. Thanks to Loonapick for the blog
   I hope your backache paases soon. Once again there is a difference between a clue (2 down) that I submitted, and the clue that was published. My original clue read ‘Hack riles BBC sports reporter, initially’. With ‘sports’ as the anagram indicator. Although, with hindsight, perhaps ‘roving’ would have worked better.

2. Steerpike@1 I am still getting used to your style of cluing so it was fun sorting it out as there is no check button in the FT
   Apart from IONIC which was obvious but maybe a tad clumsy and LINGO, also obvious but…..
   I liked all the others particularly SOLD OUT-WINO not bad either
   Keep em coming and thanks loonapick

3. I can’t say I noticed the problem with SCRIBBLER. Anyway, I enjoyed the challenge, particularly PERSEPHONE and NOBEL PRIZE.
   Actually, I’m rather glad there isn’t a check button, as with The Guardian. I’d be too tempted to use it and it sometimes gives the game away when I really want to stick at a puzzle unaided (when possible, that is!)
   Thanks both to Steerpike and Loonapick.

4. Yet another “I’m embarrassed to admit I didn’t know…”, this time for RENT as a ‘musical’. I had “double duty” marked against 2d as well so thanks to Steerpike for explaining his/her originally intended version. IONIC did seem a bit strange. I liked FRIPPERIES, my last in.

   Overall v. enjoyable with enough effort required to make this satisfying to solve.

   Thanks to Steerpike and loonapick – hope your back problem improves soon.

5. Loonapick: I hope your backache clears up quickly. It didn’t interfere with your clear and precise explanations, for which I am grateful. I had the same reaction you did to 2d and 11a — thanks to Steerpike for explaining what happened to the clue for 2d. (And, yes, “roving” would have been perfect!)
   I needed help with an anagram solver for 2d, perhaps because I don’t think we Yanks use the word “scribbler” for a writer very often. And I needed help from a word finder for 21d, because I forgot that you Brits spell the word differently from (or to, if you prefer) the way we spell it.
   Despite those issues, I found this puzzle to be one of the most fun to solve in weeks. For many, perhaps most, of the clues, my initial reaction was “I can’t make head nor tail of this.” Then I’d pause, try to look at it a different way, and say to myself “wow, that way the answer is clear and very clever.” That’s exactly the kind of puzzle I like. So thanks to Steerpike for so much fun this morning (even though I’m posting this in the afternoon, London time).

6. Thanks for the blog, a hot-water bottle is best for backache, old-fashioned but it works.
   I really enjoyed this. Many fine, clever clues . I did wonder about SCRIBBLER and glad to see it is cleared up. Very often when a clue does not quite work it is due to a late edit an not the fault of the setter.
   I will just add RUBY to clues mentioned above, simple and concise but clever with the capital P at the start to mislead us.

7. Sorry to hear about your back, loonapick. I hope you feel better soon. I agree about IONIC. Steerpike@1 notwithstanding, I don’t see a problem with 2d as printed; why shouldn’t a word do double duty in a clue?

   I thoroughly enjoyed this puzzle, with SOLD OUT, FRIPPERIES, and PERSEPHONE as particular favorites. That said, I’m not so thrilled about DAEMON: single-letter abbreviations like N for nationalist always seem cheating or lazy to me. Thanks to setter and blogger.

8. Thanks Steerpike, that was fun. It took several sittings to unravel and I needed a word finder for LINGO which I still didn’t understand until I read the blog. I couldn’t parse APHORISM but all else made sense. Favourites included FRIPPERIES, NOBEL PRIZE, ODIOUSLY, and ABBOTS. Thanks loonapick for working even while under the weather.

9. Thanks Steerpike and loonapick (hopefully a month on your back has improved)
   One that was left undone whilst travelling and only got to it last week and with so much to check had to wait till the weekend to do that.
   Didn’t find it too tough, solved 15 minutes under my average time – a lot of use of single letters in clues helped it along a bit. Nice to see the return of the favoured crossword ruminant at 21a (with a unique and clever way to clue it).
   Started off with SKIT right down the bottom and finished in the NE corner with SHUFFLED, LINGO (which took some thinking to finally remember the Klingons) and DECREE the last one in.

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