Guardian 28,732 / Paul

77 comments on “Guardian 28,732 / Paul”

1. Took a while to get going but once I got a few in the SE made steady progress but there were a few I didn’t parse.

   Loved TOMATO KETCHUP. Took a while to realise that the male was TOM

   AMMONIUM was very clever – couldn’t parse at first then it suddenly hit me when I read the clue out loud putting in the answer at the beginning and substituting the word PANNED for 24 across – I don’t usually manage to parse these clues.

   VEG OUT made me laugh

   Also liked: PANNED, COSMETIC, LOOK SNAPPY, GEAR LEVER

   Thanks Paul and Eileen

2. Excellent Paul and straight in with a smutty one. Thank you for starting my day with a smile. Thanks also to Eileen.

3. Thanks Eileen – “written in characteristic style” is nicely put! As is often the case with Paul, it took me a while to break into it, but once I got going it all fell quite quickly. And all very enjoyable, especially the lovely VEG OUT.

   Fiona Anne @1 – I had trouble making the letters for 9d add up, but with clues like this I find it helps to write out the solution and systematically cross them off to see what you’re left with.

4. Nice easy one, although as a former science teacher I should have got 13a sooner

5. Ian @36 yesterday won’t be happy …

6. … but I was. Great fun. As Jerry G noted, quite funny to have ‘signed off’ yesterday’s discussion regarding smutty clues then straight into a BALLS UP!

7. We’re still laughing at (panned) ammonium

8. Nice explanations Eileen. Favourite was AMMONIUM. Not sure I laughed like Panthes @7 but it certainly brought a smile.
   Other ones I liked were BALLS UP, LOOK SNAPPY and POTTY MOUTH if only because I’m entertained by the wowsers’ comments.
   Thanks Paul and Eileen.

9. Couldn’t parse AMMONIUM, now see what was going on – very clever. Lots of good and tortuous clues from Paul as usual. Hadn’t heard of VEG OUT, so that was LOI for me. Many thanks to Paul and Eileen.

10. Managed this, all except VEG OUT, a new one to me too. A slow start, but STATEHOOD gave me the O that suggested TOMATO and therefore KETCHUP for 9d. A steady solve thereafter, but quite a few I couldn’t properly parse – NIGER, AMMONIUM, COSMETIC. Many thanks for elucidating, Eileen, and to Paul with his usual smattering of smut…

11. Amusing to see POTTY MOUTH in there, given it’s the sobriquet occasionally lobbed in our setter’s direction though nothing too risque this morning. 1a isn’t that bad, these days, and, frankly, quite likely to be heard on the BBC News, given they have to comment on daily goings-on in Westminster.

    Over and above the excellent AMMONIUM, I had ticks for COSMETIC, UNLATCH, TOMATO KETCHUP, LOOKOUT and COP SHOP. I know I stick my neck out in being critical of Paul but I did raise eyebrows at the odd definition. As well as STATEHOOD where I share Eileen’s feeling of vague discomfort, I raised a quarter of a brow at the white kit in TEST MATCH (as muffin pointed out fairly recently, rugby also has test matches – but it was clear what Paul had in mind). Looser, though, imho was ‘One of billions’ for BRAIN CELL. Factually correct (aren’t there 150+ billion or so?) but quite how anyone might find that definition helpful in getting to the solution, I do not know. I now fully expect to be shot down!

    Thanks Paul and Eileen.

12. As is increasingly the case with Paul’s puzzles, I completed the grid successfully but couldn’t be bothered with parsing the clues. I’ve never knowingly heard of ‘veg out’ or ‘potty-mouth’; neologisms I shall be quite happy to forget.

13. That was fun and reasonably quick – with, to me, various familiar phrases. Surely the LIMBO of an Easter weekend is to VEG OUT in front of the TV with a beer in front of any TEST MATCH or Prosecco for a romcom, minding your POTTY MOUTH in front of the kids, particularly if everything on is a BLAST FROM THE PAST. If there isn’t to be a BALLS UP on Sunday, you’ll have to LOOK SNAPPY to buy any eggs and the ARABICA to PERCOLATE to UNLATCH the remaining BRAIN CELL in time to RESUME usual activities next week.

    Giving up now, but I filled in a satisfactory number on the first pass with BLAST FROM THE PAST going in as I read it (which is unusual for me).

14. LIMBO doesn’t quite work for me. I get MB in a reversal of OIL, but shouldn’t ‘lubed’ in the clue be ‘oiled’?

    Thanks, Paul and Eileen.

15. Median@14 as the MB is immersed in OIL it is lubed.

16. Slow start and same likes as Fiona Anne @1 but flew in after a few solutions. Like PostMark @11, I smirked at POTTY MOUTH, considering all the (unfair IMO) criticism this setter endures. I thought VEG OUT was a pretty common phrase but perhaps not.

    Ta Paul & Eileen for the excellent blog.

17. Shanne @13: nicely done.

18. I’m surprised so far at the number of responses saying VEG OUT is unknown to them. Maybe it’s an Aussie thing but Chambers 2014 has veg2 (inf) vi (often with out) to laze about…. It’s fairly common here.

19. AMMONIUM was the outstanding clue for sure.
    Have to admit I am here (225) because I did not see it, well done Eileen!

    I could not get started last night , with only AED completed in the PANNED clue.
    Laid back gave me the D in the final letter, the E then looked obvious and I guessed wrongly to gain the A , before going to bed!

    That helped with the E giving me FROM THE PAST and that leads to my one complaint!
    I cannot see what “nostalgic” is supposed to give us in “Nostalgic memory of Vesuvius (AD79) (5,4,3,4)”

    It diverted me away from the answer because I was looking for something that is sentimental!
    “Memory of Vesuvius” would have been a better clue imho! Vesuvius gives some humour to the answer, because “Memory” would have done on it;s own?

    I seldom do a Friday puzzle within an hour , especially one from Paul , but once I got started this was thoroughly enjoyable , as expected from Paul.

    WOW – I have just heard the Moskva, (Russian warship in the Black Sea) has sunk!!!
    I am proud to be living in part of the UKraine! The basis for a cryptic clue?
    Putin would have done better to arm the Ukrainians and invade Russia to achieve his goal?

20. Thanks, Petert @15. That makes sense.

21. Veg out is also common here in the US. What i had trouble with was GEAR LEVER, because we call it a gear shift, and although i always remember to account for the non-rhotic accent in homophone clues, I forgot that Brits use a long E in LEVER (for us it rhymes with never, not fever), so that one beat me!

22. Tim C@18 Like you I was surprised that VEG OUT seems to be a relatively unknown phrase. I’ve known and used it for years. I don’t think it’s Aussie, and I’m certainly not down with the kids, so it’s not just a young person thing either.

23. akarebornbeginner @19 you may not be aware of a fairly well known English phrase which is when someone sees or hears something that reminds them of past events they say “that’s a blast from the past”. So the “nostalgic memory” refers to this, and the other literal definition is the Vesuvius eruption.

24. Further to TimC@23, I usually associate the phrase with an old song that brings back a memory of a particular time and/or place.

25. For veg out and potty mouth to have bamboozled so many on here does rather point to the average age of contributors rather than anything else. Both are hardly rare and the former is very commonplace (in the UK anyway).

    Did think 27, 16 was Paul stretching it a bit to provide a smutty clue to annoy the purists when it wasn’t really necessary and doesn’t satisfy. I’m not one for a whole set of strict ‘rules’ in cryptics but do prefer phrases that are in common (or even rare) usage. I can’t imagine anyone ever having said “gear leaver” except by accident.

26. akarebornbeginner @19, and tim@23:
    this exchange over 17-10-21 brought to mind an enjoyable 1999 film:
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blast_from_the_Past_(film)
    engaging with Cold War issues, thus suddenly horribly topical again

27. Indeed, crossbar @22. I am (pace Deegee @25) well into my 70s and so part of the senior demographic here, but I have known VEG OUT for more than 40 years, having learned, possibly from my American students, that it was something that couch potatoes do.

28. I guessed that 13a had to be AMMONIUM but couldn’t work out how it worked. Thank you for explaining, Eileen; and thank you for a very clever clue, Paul.
    I thought VEG OUT was very neat and PERCOLATE quite brilliant. Liked BALLS-UP, LOOK SNAPPY and TOMATO KETCHUP as well.
    If we are being pedantic, I think 17, 10, 21 should have a question mark at the end of the clue, but it’s quite gettable as it is.
    Deegee @25 – even though I now drive an automatic, I remember my driving teacher fifty years ago intoning “Cover the lever, palm to me…” where lever was clearly short for GEAR LEVER.
    Thanks, both.

29. Nice to see Paul taunting his more po-faced critics with an unusually heavy sprinkling of ribaldry.

    Fun puzzle with some nice constructions and surfaces but a few rather vague definitions: ‘beans’ for ARABICA, ‘One of billions’ for BRAIN CELL, ‘It’s positively charged’ for AMMONIUM (although Chambers lists this as a noun, it is never used as such in isolation by chemists – always as ‘ammonium ion’ or as part of the name of a salt). All great clues though.

    I also particularly liked TK and UNLATCH for their constructions and surfaces.

    I’m just a few months off the threescore and ten myself 🙁 , but none of the expressions were unfamiliar to me!

    Thanks to Paul and Eileen

30. Failed 12ac VEG OUT.

    Liked ARABICA.

    New: AMMONIUM.

    Thanks, both.

31. Nice puzzle, nice blog. Really liked PERCOLATE.

    I’m another to think VEG OUT is a straightforward synonym rather than a cryptic definition. But if we look at Eileen’s comment through cryptic eyes, and imagine she was using a cryptic definition of the word cryptic (obscure/unknown, to some), then she was bang on!

32. Amuses me that fans of Paul’s humour are so keen to put one over those less entertained. Chacun a son gout, after all. 😉

33. Quite approachable for Paul, I thought. PANDEMONIUM – should I say PANNED AMMONIUM was absolutely brilliant. I also had LOOKS S… and was trying ‘sharp’? ‘smart’? – and snorted when the penny dropped on the poo-ey towelling. Would youngsters get this? They have only ever seen disposable nappies (except, perhaps, whe they were very young). Talking of youngsters, neither VEG OUT, nor POTTY MOUTH were anywhere near new to me. PostMark @11: ‘One of billions’ led me to pick out CELL, then make BRAIN from the rest of the fodder, so consider yourself shot down 🙂 . Gervase @29: ‘+ve charge’ led me directly to consider +ve ions, so a good definition there too. BLAST FROM THE PAST also excellent. Thanks, Paul and Eileen.

34. Thanks both,
    It took me a long time to see 9d since I’d call tomato ketchup a tracklement rather than a condiment, which I think of as something like salt or pepper that is sprinkled on food. But TK falls squarely within the definition of condiment given by OED.

35. As far as I know, batters are playing baseball and batsmen are playing cricket. Is there a move to de-gender the term?

    The PANNED AMMONIUM completely escaped me, not even a flash in the pan.

    I had the same trouble as Iroquois with GEAR LEVER for the same reasons.

    Anybody else get stuck on NIGER, which is certainly an African country, but … ER behind NIG? GIN?

    Great fun from Paul (filled in mostly last night but with some left for the morning, just the way I like it) and pleasant accompaniment from Eileen’s customarily excellent blog.

36. Thanks for the blog. I think for NIGER it would perhaps be better with – Finish off queen BEFORE uprising …..

37. Valentine@35 Women’s cricket has become much better reported and televised in recent years, and much more widely played at all levels. Since then it has become usual to refer to batters rather than batsmen, even on programmes like Test Match Special on the BBC radio

38. After a good week…Paul’s crosswords are completely meaningless to me, unfortunately.

39. Valentine @ 35: That move has been made. The MCC officially made the change in 2021, and the ICC followed afterwards. I think the fantastic rise in prominence of the women’s game (which I enjoy as much as the bloke’s) meant it was inevitable.

    Smashing crossword – lots of fun. Thanks S&B.

40. MarkN@39 That’s good news. I hadn’t realised it was an official thing.

41. Sorry to be dim…I spotted the pandemonium gag, and gaily put in the answer, but so far failing to see why AMMONIUM is positively charged. Is this something to do with chemistry?

42. HoofItYouDonkey @38: Yes, I know what you mean. Paul’s offerings are a bit like anchovies on your pizza – not everyone’s a fan.

43. Thanks Paul — this crossword has me in your fan club again. I can’t think of another setter whose fan club I have joined and quit so many times. I had many ticks including COSMETIC, PANNED, BRAIN CELL, TOMATO KETCHUP, STAMEN, and NIGER. Thanks Eileen for the blog and parsing the clever AMMONIUM and explaining the definition for TEST MATCH, both of which escaped me.

44. Tim Phillips @5: Yes, I always groan whenever Paul’s name comes up – it’s such a shame that he feels the need to spoil his otherwise excellent crosswords in that way. So today we had poo-filled nappies, a lubed doctor pole dancing, and of course started the whole thing with a balls up! But to be fair… you do know what to expect from Paul, and I have to say that I do enjoy his crosswords, despite those tourette-like symptoms that he so clearly suffers from!

    William @41 I’m with you on that question, which was the one that I’d hoped that 225 would answer today – why is AMMONIUM “positively charged”? If it’s purely a chemistry thing, that seems like weak cluing, as surely there are hundreds (at least) of similar substances that would fit that definition???

45. William and Ian
    The ammonium ion is NH4+ (sorry, the subscript and superscript didn’t paste), so it is positively charged. I agree that that definition doesn’t narrow the field much.

46. Muffin @45 Thanks – had thought that was probably the case, but had been hoping there would be something more specific. Rest of the clue was superb, of course!

47. Thanks Eileen, ashamed to say that after finally constructing STATEHOOD I bunged it in as clearly having some connection with a nation without further thought, and I can’t now think of anything to assist your fine effort.
    Valentine@35 for a while I also had NIGER as reversed IN + GER and wondered at what point Ginger Spice was enroyalled. (Prefer Roz’s alternative wording.)
    William@41 et al, at first I just had the initial A and tried to do something involving ANION (the general term for a positive ion). I think of all the definitions AMMONIUM might be the least obvious and the construction is pretty tricky too. But as I got it, eventually, I think it’s great!
    One question: is the derivation of Cop = Copper = policeman from the same source as Cop meaning grab?
    Very nice, thanks Paul.

48. Mmmm, Gazzh…..anions are negative ions; positive ions are cations.

    Thanks Paul and Eileen
    The only problem I had with this was the parsing of GEAR LEVER.

49. Thanks muffin@48, I must have been thinking of the Anode to which the anions travel, vs the cathode/cations. In my defence it is 30 odd years since I actually needed to know it for an exam!
    And Iroquois@21 I did consider GEAR SHIFT as it sort-of fitted the wordplay and Paul has used US terms in the past, but wasn’t entirely convinced and decided to wait for some crossers in the 2nd word, luckily.

50. Gazzh @47
    Does it derive from “it’s a fair cop”? Not sure!

51. Enjoyed that although I was beaten by a few (AMMONIUM, the parsing of NIGER).

    Share the general feeling that definitions were a bit on the watery side. But no complaints.

52. Very much enjoyed PANNED AMONIUM, but struggled with ARABICA and GEAR LEVER so thanks Eileen. And thanks Paul, enjoyed it, though was a bit squeamish about the POTTY-MOUTHed 11ac. I also don’t think I’ve ever used the phrase LOOK SNAPPY, I think ‘look lively’ does that job for me? Although I am in the UK and very familiar with VEG OUT.

53. me@51: Also the parsing of GEAR LEVER – I was working on ‘girl Eva’ as representing possibly a famous burlesque artiste. Thanks for the blog Eileen and to Paul for the distraction.

54. re: NIGER — I had the standard queen = ER, but couldn’t figure out how GIN could it in.
    Another sneaky trick, using the whole word instead of the abbreviation!

    There are so many condiments, I was late in figuring out TK. [In my family, we called it “catchup”, but when I started reading food labels, I only saw “ketchup” or “catsup”.]
    Tyngewick@34: One of the joys of eating out is see what you get on the table, depending on the cuisine. Condiments in my own kitchen include Worcester sauce, soy sauce, chili oil,
    horseradish, mustard, miso, hoisin sauce, etc.

55. Gazzh@47 — according to the Online Etymology Dictionary
    to cop = to take or seize is a meaning going back to Old English
    By the 1700s, it was also used in to mean to seize or arrest
    Hence, copper = one who arrests, then shortened to cop

56. Oh, and the origin is *kap- from Proto-Indo-European “to grasp”

57. I didn’t see anything nostalgic in BLAST FROM THE PAST ..Vesuvius. Nostalgia is a longing for home (or the past). It’s not just a memory.
    But I quibble. It was good.

    Thanks Paul and Eileen

58. So many excellent clues, all of which have been singled out by others. Although I got 13, with a broad grin and an “aha!”, like several commenters I found the positive definition too vague and was hoping to be fully enlightened. Remembered the ion was positively charged but the clue didn’t indicate a part of the atom was required, so wasn’t comfortable despite the brilliant pandemonium reference. Thanks to Paul and Eileen for her succinct deconstructions.

59. I’ve lived in the US for close to 60 years where lever is pronounced levver,. I extend my solace to those similarly stymied.

60. I’m surprised that those in the US don’t understand spelling – if it is to be pronounced “levver” it would be spelled “levver”! (I have noticed that their doubling of letters is a bit random, though.)

61. Never ever sever? whatever 😉

62. (I think the Irish might rhyme leave-a with Caoimhe?)

63. Fair point, EB – just goes to show that spelling isn’t logical.

64. essexboy@61 — how clever!

65. [Valentine @64 – I do endeavour.
    (me and Trevor thought of that togever)]

66. Muffin, English has the least phonetic spellings I’ve encountered. I’m amazed how many people have been able to learn it as a second language! If you encounter a new word like “slough”, does it rhyme with tough, trough, though, through or something altogether? (And apologies, I know of the town of Slough, but I first encountered the word driving through marshy areas of rural California.)

67. Neil@28 I know what a gear lever is. I was doubting that gear leaver had ever been in common usage for someone stripping off. Tentative for me.

68. Calgal @ 66

    As you’re focusing on ‘ough’, don’t forget (b)ough(t) and (l)ough as well.

69. [@66 Cal Gal & @68 Simon S: at the risk of repeating myself (apologies to Essex Boy etc for a previous mention), the mnemonic for the seven pronunciations for *ough* (there are only six in America because they rhyme borough with dough) is: “We thought we’d coughed up enough dough through the borough of Slough”]

70. AlanC born and raised in NI assured me that LOUGH is very similar to LOCH.
    Just to add I thought the cryptic sense of GEAR LEVER was the best bit.

71. I for one am appalled that use of words like balls, winkle, poopy plops, botty, titty, and wankel rotary engine are allowed anywhere. But in a crossword? And on Good Griday too!

72. …is allowed…

73. Calgal@55 thank you for that. It does diminish the clue a little for me as the cop in the definition is essentially the same as in the wordplay. Never mind, there was plenty else to enjoy. Agree with you on the impenetrability of English spelling. My son is learning German at school and it is a much more straightforward language both in terms of Individual and compound letter pronunciation. On the other hand the eccentricities of English are what make cryptic crosswords possible so we shouldn’t complain I suppose. And our numbers make much more sense.

74. Saw a brilliant poem a while back but don’t remember it all or whether it is attributable to anyone. Some bits I remember follow.
    “I take it you already know of tough and bough and cough and through.
    Others may stumble but not you on hiccough, thorough, lough and ??…..
    A moth is not a moth in mother, nor both in bother, broth in brother….”
    It ends with
    “A dreadful language? Man alive! I mastered it when I was five.”
    If anyone knows to full thing or to whom credit should be given, I’d love to be enlightened..

75. Muffin @60, I don’t think it’s the Americans whose doubling of consonants is random when you consider that we spell “travelling” like “propelling”.

76. [MarkOnCan @74 – it’s not entirely clear who should be credited. Many websites attribute it to T.S. Watt and say it first appeared in the Guardian in 1954. (Other books mention Richard Krough – and no, I‘ve no idea how to pronounce his name 😉 )

    Anyway, here’s the full text – along with a similar but longer poem, ‘The Chaos’.]

77. Thanks, EB @76. Not sure where or when I first saw it but it would have been after 1954. The longer poem is brilliant too. English is so rich partly because it has adopted words or roots of words from so many sources. Fascinating.

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