Enigmatic Variations No. 1575 – Follow The Instructions By Kcit

As I may have mentioned before, my natural instinct on seeing a ‘carte blanche’ used to be to avert my eyes and walk in the other direction to avoid it…but I have gradually persuaded myself that I must at least try them…and needs must when one falls on my blogging slot!

The preamble states that:

“The final grid would show 180-degree symmetry in the bars that could be unambiguously entered. However, several answers could only be read in full if bars limiting other answers were omitted. Hence, neither bars nor numbers are to be entered on solutions, but solvers must FOLLOW THE INSTRUCTIONS revealed. Chambers Dictionary (2016) is recommended.”

Short and sweet! No mention of jigsaws, or clues in alphabetical order of solutions, etc.; but, equally, no mention of clues being in ‘regular order’, which I decided must be the default case here. And I didn’t really make much sense of that second sentence from the first couple of reads, so I decided to get on with some cold solving to see what would transpire.

(I also mentally prepared myself to reach out to my fellow bloggers, for help, or even to have someone take over the blog, if I didn’t make sufficient progress…)

No clue number, no bars, no enumeration – the coldest type of cold solving there is – somewhere on the Kelvin scale of solving!

After several sessions of scanning, picking off the occasional clue and then putting it down again, it seemed I was destined to ‘phone a friend’ and admit defeat. But then SHAD-BELLIED jumped out at me – most likely an anagram of SHIELD and BLADE, and a little anagram solver use and checking that it is a word confirmed that. Given its position as the fifth Down clue, I took an educated guess and pencilled it in down the middle column.

That allowed me to put ESSAY down next to it, and EASTER along from its last E…again guesses, but with reasoning. That gave me AD in row 4, and I tentatively put SHAHADA in there, although that seemed a little low down. Looking back, it could also have used the SH in row 2, which might still allow for three Across clues before it.

With EASTER and DESCRY across the bottom right corner, I pencilled in SENSORY and NESTER.

And then I moved to a technological solution – I created the grid in an Excel spreadsheet, copy-pasted the clues in and started putting the solutions so far next to them. Now I could experiment much quicker, and undo any blind alleys or wrong turns without having to destroy my working copy with an eraser!

The first PDM came when I got TAMASHA – if that was the third Across, and SHAHADA was the fourth, then either SHAHADA had to go be in the fourth row, or they could overlap – TAMA|SHA|HADA. This kind of tallied with that second sentence of the preamble – putting the bar in for either would invalidate the other.

Those two allowed a few more Down clues to be tried out, and then another potential overlap appeared – MUSCA|DET|AIL. At this point, I started highlighting the overlaps in my Excel sheet, to make them more obvious.

And, as is often the case with cartes blanche – jigsaw or regular order – once you reach a critical mass of entries, as long as you have enough solved fodder they will usually start to slot in more easily. And the more you slot in, the more possible crossers you get to help you go back and solve the stragglers…and momentum builds….

The overlaps seemed to be every other row, and with my highlighting I eventually saw the instruction take shape: ‘SHADE THESE AREAS’.

 

And that seemed to be that – time to transcribe it all on to a clean copy and scan/submit. A fiercely daunting puzzle, on first sight, that actually fell out quite nicely, once I’d had that first revelation/educated guess with SHAD-BELLIED. And the dénouement was fairly simple – no grid manipulation or substitutions – just SHADE THESE AREAS, which I had serendipitously already done!

There were several obscure/new to me words – TAMASHA, SHAHADA, AMICES, HESIONE, SHAD-BELLIED, BAEL, to name a few, which meant a lot of checking of meanings in Chambers. There was also, I’m not ashamed to admit, a lot of use of pattern matching in e-dictionaries, and anagram solvers. Interesting to see LAB in wordplay twice – as a dog (Labrador) and a workroom (laboratory). I also didn’t help myself by initially solving the last clue as LINE, which slowed the momentum down a bit in the final knockings!

Overall, it was still a pretty tough challenge – for which thanks to Kcit – and a satisfying one to finish. I trust all is clear below…

 

Across
Clue No	Solution	Clue (definition underlined) Logic/Parsing
*	AMICES	Novelist’s written about church garments for religious orders AMI_S (Kingsley or Martin, novelist) around CE (Church of England) [from long experience, ‘novelist’ can often be one of the AMISes]
*	SAPS	Sources of water recalled in such drains SPAS – sources of water, reversed, or recalled = SAPS – drains
*	TAMASHA	Entertainment in Chennai: Cheers (a US show imported) T_A (thanks, or cheers) around(importing) A + MASH (US TV show)
*	SHAHADA	Quiet area possessed a statement of faith SH (interjection, quiet!) + A (area) + HAD (possessed) + A
*	ONERS	Experts on energy leading body of scientists ON + E (energy) + RS (Royal Society, body of eminent scientists)
*	FREE	King brought in charge, seeing no charge in force? F_EE (charge) around (bringing in) R (Rex, king)
*	MUSCADET	Quantity of money backed Kiwi training to produce variety of grape MUS (sum, amount of money) + CADET (New Zealand, or Kiwi, for one in training/apprenticeship) [this was my last one parsed – LOP)]
*	DETAIL	Expression of thanks interrupting Schubert song recalled in particular account DE_IL (lied, or song, in German, of which Schubert was a celebrated exponent) around (interrupted by) TA (thanks, again!) […although Schubert was actually Austrian…]
*	BALD	Bare workroom reflected on department BAL (lab, or work room, reflected) + D (department) [LAB is clued twice in this puzzle, here as a ‘work room’ – laboratory – and later as a ‘dog’ – Labrador]
*	SLASHES	Criticises line adopted by bands S_ASHES (bands) around (adopting) L (line)
*	HESIONE	Prisoner of monster is held back by male individual HE (male) + ONE (individual), around (holding) SI (is, back) [Greek mythology, she was rescued from a sea-monster by Hercules]
*	REAL	Queen’s putting out good material RE(G)AL – royal,or queenly, putting out G – good
*	AREAR	River behind field? No longer behind AREA (field, realm) + R (river)
*	EARLINESS	Auditors accepting punishment, arriving too soon? EAR_S (auditors) around (accepting) LINES (punishment at school)
*	LAER	Exotic defensive structure subsequently seeing centre destroyed LA(T)ER – subsequently, destroying, or removing, centre letter
*	MESTO	Succeeded when interrupting most of campaign empowering women, sadly ME_TO(O) (most of the ‘me too’ movement, or campaign) around S (succeeded) [mesto being a musical direction to play ‘sadly’]
*	PANACEAS	Remedies article stuck in internal organ – right for excision PAN_C(R)EAS (internal organ, excising R – right), around A (indefinite article)
*	EASTER	European boss cancelling start of music festival E (European) + (M)ASTER (boss, losing, or cancelling M – start of Music) [again, from long experience, ‘festival’ is often Easter)]
*	ISLE	Man, perhaps, confused when out of care of doctor (M)ISLE(D) – confused, removing MD (Medicinae Doctor, Latin, doctor of medicine) […and ditto with Man <-> Isle (of Man)]
*	DESCRY	Condemn annexing special spot DE_CRY (condemn) around (annexing) S (special)
Down
Clue No	Solution	Clue (definition underlined) Logic/Parsing
*	ATOMISM	Girl, without repetition, skewering a male philosopher’s theory of indivisibility A + TO_M (male) around (skewered by) MIS(S) (girl, without the repeated S)
*	MANUAL	Source of guidance one used to catch wildcat? On the contrary MANU_L (Pallas’ Cat, Asian wildcat) around (catching) A (one) – i.e. not ‘one’ catching ‘wildcat’
*	CARCASE	Ruin traffic offence? CAR (traffic) + CASE (offence) [carcase, or carcass, can refer to a framework generally, so a ruin, as well as a dead body]
*	ESSAY	French are to speak, or try ES (French, are) + SAY (to speak)
*	SHAD-BELLIED	Sloping away, waving shield and blade anag, i.e. waving, of SHIELD and BLADE
*	SAVE	Spare line removed from connected mechanism S(L)AVE – connected mechanism, removing L – line
*	PARADOX	Bumpy road welcomed by passengers? It’s apparently absurd PA_X (passengers, abbreviation used in transport, particularly aviation) around (welcoming) RADO (anag, i.e. bumpy, of ROAD)
*	SDEIN	Players dismissing one in scorn? Not any more S(I)DE (players, team, dismissing I – one) + IN
*	BAEL	Dog upset after eating English quince BA_L (lab, Labrador, dog, upset) around (eating) E (English)
*	CAREENS	Turns over, concern being expressed here CARE (concern) + ENS (entity, being)
*	LIONESS	Agreed upon blocking fake news with singular element of pride LI_ES (fake news) around (blocked by) ON (agreed upon), plus S (singular)
*	SENSORY	Nurse with timeless tale affecting the feelings SEN (State Enrolled Nurse) + S(T)ORY (tale, without T – time)
*	NESTER	Many a bird never collecting stone NE_ER (never, poetic) around (collecting) ST(stone)
*	BRAAI	A lot of intelligence about a party in East London BRA_I(NS) (a lot of brains, or intelligence) around A […and again, from long experience, East London can sometimes lead you to Cockney rhyming slang, or to East London, a city/port in South Africa]
*	RIMAE	Argon no longer trapped in ice in fissures RIM_E (ice, frost) around (trapping) A (obsolete for Argon, now Ar)
*	ALPS	Hollows with elevated area forming mountain pastures LAPS (hollows) with A (area) elevated (for a Down clue) gives ALPS (mountain pastures)
*	RACE	Stock snatch of poetry double defn. – one’s RACE can be one’s stock, or lineage; and RACE is Spenserian, i.e. poetic, for ‘snatch’ [I had this initially as ‘LINE’ – a line of stock; a line of poetry…]