Enigmatic Variations No. 1663: The Right Fit by Piccadilly

Ah, yet another jigsaw EV, albeit one with a piece missing from the middle. Let’s hope I can get the RIGHT FIT of entries in the grid…although the preamble mentions ‘ambiguities’, which may add some jeopardy to proceedings…

The preamble states that:

“Clues are presented in alphabetical order of their answers, which are to be entered to find THE RIGHT FIT. In 38 clues the wordplay leads to the answer plus an extra letter, not entered in the grid. When arranged in conventional clue order (across then down), these extra letters describe an apt sentence to be located and highlighted in the completed grid (20 cells), resolving ambiguities. Remaining clues are normal.”

Once I’d had an initial scan through the clues and got a few solved, the usual jigsaw/carte blanche modus operandi kicked in – annotate round the grid to more easily see the entry lengths in each row/column; draw up groups of dashes arranged by word lengths to help match the ‘pieces’ to those entries; check group sizes to see what might be the way in – there are two each of 3s, 7s and 8s, eight each of 4s and 5s, and twenty-eight 6s!

And I often do this in Excel – reproducing the grid and bars; pasting the clues into a column; and adding columns for: solution; extra letter; entry length; original list position; normal clue order position; etc., to allow for sorting in the later stages of the solving process.

So, in this case, there were two possible 8s, intersecting with the middle letters of the two possible 3s, so that seemed a sensible place to start – assuming you have solved some of those! And the 7s would help, with only two possible positions.

A bit more solving was needed to get a few of those 3s, 7s and 8s, with some others as extra collateral along the way, but I was eventually able to place ARE and RETREATS, and TOURISTS and ASS in the top left and bottom right respectively. Once I had the two 7s, both beginning with D, a little experimentation and educated guessing led them to what seemed like the right places – there was only one 4-letter word beginning with D, so DADA had to go bottom left, and eventually DEITIES seemed to provide a few matches with other candidate entries, so DRIFTER was probably top right.

And so on, in an ever shrinking virtuous circle – pieces started to slot into the jigsaw, and they in turn helped give crossers for others, which reduced options, which helped determine positions and so forth. In fact, it was all going so swimmingly I had forgotten about those ‘ambiguities’, but they soon came back to bite me, as SHRIMP and SCRIMP, LATENT and LATEST, PISTOL and POSTIL all had pesky ‘unches’ in their differentiating letters…

What I should have done at this point was to put all the ‘conventional’ clue numbers into my spreadsheet – A01 for 1A, A02, etc, and D01, D02… for Downs. I could then sort on that column and all would be revealed by the extra letters. But instead I stubbornly chose to stare at the grid for a while – nothing obvious in the main diagonals, nothing perimetral or linear. In my paper copy I had put the letter options in the cells – H/C for SCRIMP or SCRIMP; N/S for LATENT or LATEST, I/O and O/I for PISTOL/POSTIL. And as I scanned diagonals in every which way I could, I eventually saw ‘ORRECT’  in a mini-diagonal upwards in the top left quadrant, with a C just below, helping to make CORRECT, but also an H/C next to that. And following the shape made with the other three symmetrical mini-diagonals, using the correct letter options along the way, I eventually saw ‘THIS SOLUTION IS CORRECT’!

(I should also have re-read the preamble, as it would have helped to remind me I was looking for 20 cells…)

At this point, I did put all the conventional clue numbers into my spreadsheet, for completeness, and because I had to write up the blog, and lo and behold, they confirmed I was looking for ‘FOUR WORDS BEGINNING AND ENDING SAME PLACE’. I would still have had to do some grid-staring, but I might have had more of an idea what I was looking for…

 

 

And that was about that – a pretty tough mental workout, an impressive grid construction, and a satisfying puzzle to complete! Given the complexity of the jigsaw, the ambiguities and the extra letters, I felt that the clueing was reasonably gentle, in mitigation.

There were some new/obscure (to me) words, like COELOM, GABBA (not just an Australian cricket ground!), POSTIL, SIUM and STADDA, as well as the meaning of TACT used here. However they were all pretty clearly clued and just needed a few look-ups to check their definitions.

My thanks to Piccadilly – I think this is my seventh Piccadilly EV blog, stretching back to Jan 2011, so nice to shake hands with an old face! – and I trust all is clear above and below…

 

Across
Clue No	Extra letters	Solution	Clue (definition underlined) Logic/Parsing, extra letter bracketed and in B(O)LD
*	N	AMLAS	Old Germans missing island dancing girls (5) subtractive anagram, i.e. dancing, of ALMA(I)(N)S, missing I (island)
*	I	AMYTAL	Gracious within a train to provide sedative (6) A + MY (gracious me!) + TA(I)L (train)
*	G	ARE	It’s used to measure land in French station (3) subtractive double defn. – a (G)ARE is a French station; and an ARE can be a land measure
*	E	ASS	Animal moves very gradually, heading away (3) (E)AS(E)S, moves gradually, losing first letter, or head
*	F	ASSIST	Help supporter of Mussolini about to be replaced by son (6) (F)AS(C)IST, supporter of Mussolini, changing C (circa, about) to S (son) = ASSIST
*	P	ASTARE	Old-timer’s glaring at spear suspiciously (6) anag, i.e. supiciously, of AT S(P)EAR
*	E	BISHOP	Mistake rising American author for member of clergy (6) BISH (mistake) + (E)OP (Edgar Allan Poe, American author, rising)
*	A	COELOM	Camel poo, quietly evacuated relaxes body-cavity (6) subtractive anagram, i.e. relaxes, of C(A)MEL (P)OO, losing, or evacuating, P (piano, quietly, music notation)
*		CORNET	Instrument performing central parts in concerto (6) anag, i.e. performing, of central letters of (C)ONCERT(O)
*	E	CORSET	Gang, determined, stays (6) COR(E) (company, gang or shift) + SET (determined)
*	A	DADA	Leaders of distinguished academy are deriding an artistic movement (4) first letters, or leaders, of ‘Distinguished Academy (A)re Deriding An’
*	U	DEATH	Mortality taking toll at hospital (5) D(U)E (toll) + AT + H (hospital)
*	G	DEITIES	I get side organised: they may be worshipped (7) anag, i.e. organised, of I (G)ET SIDE
*	W	DRIFTER	Compose letter describing female aboard doctor’s fishing-boat (7) D_R (doctor) around (boarded by) (W)RI_TE (compose letter), itself around, describing, F (femal)
*	O	EARNED	Review Roedean deserved (6) anag, i.e. review, of R(O)DEAN
*		EMEER	Mounted regiment captures eastern Islamic ruler (5) RE_ME (Royal Electrical & Mechanical Engineers, regiment) around (capturing) E (eastern), all mounted to give EMEER
*	I	ENTETE	Infatuated nut that is holding festival (6) EN (half an em, printing, also called nut?!) + (I)_E (id est, that is) around (holding) TET (Vietnamese Lunar New year festival)
*	G	ERRATA	Amateur in garret corrected mistakes in writing (6) ERR_TA (anag, i.e. corrected, of (G)ARRET, around A (amateur)
*		GABBA	Dance music originally generated by Swedish group (5) G (Generated, initially) + ABBA (Swedish group)
*	M	GEISHA	Precious stone Henry accepted to carry is for Japanese entertainer (6) GE(M) (precious stone) + H (henry, SI unit) + A (accepted), around (carrying) IS
*	L	IDIOT	Papers I set identifying stupid person (5) ID (identity papers) + I + (L)OT (set)
*	R	INSETS	Excited sister accepts new implants (6) I_SETS (anag, i.e. excited, of SISTE(R)) around (accepting) N (new)
*		ISSUED	Is taken to court and turned out (6) IS + SUED (taken to court)
*	S	ISSUES	Publishes sissy Seuss verse regularly (6) regular letters from ‘sIsSy SeUs(S) vErSe’
*		LATENT	Concealed obesity hiding first sign of flab during fast (6) L_ENT (period of fasting) around (F)AT (obesity, hiding first letter of Flab)
*		LATEST	Most recent cargo includes shell of turtle (6) LA_ST (load, or cargo) around (including) TE (shell, or outer letters, of TurtlE)
*	N	MESSES	Bungles putting Scottish ornaments around saint (6) ME(N)S_ES (Scottish ornaments) around S (Saint)
*	N	ONDINE	Water spirit, fourth of avatars eliminated playing Nintendo (6) subtractive anagram, i.e. playing, of NIN(T)E(N)DO, eliminating T – fourth letter of avaTars
*	D	ORRA	Put back some pear drops left over in Perth (4) reversed hidden word, i.e. ‘put back’ and ‘some’, in ‘peAR (D)ROps’
*	C	PASS	Special Constable gets into dance showing free ticket (4) PA_S (ballet, step or dance) around S(C) (Special Constable)
*		PISTOL	Guides many to reverse weapon (6) PI(LOTS), guides, reversing LOTS (many) gives PISTOL
*		POSTIL	Homily from Bible oddly overlooked following Job (6) POST (job) + IL (even letters, so overlooking odd ones, of ‘bIbLe’)
*	D	REEFS	Shoals of fish primarily seen among water grasses (5) REE(D)_S (water grasses) around F (Fish, primarily)
*	O	RETREATS	Secluded places to rest are repaired (8) anag, i.e. repaired, of T(O) REST ARE
*	N	SALMON	Man left son at sea to find fish (6) anag, i.e. at sea, of MAN + L (left) + SO(N)
*		SCRIMP	Be sparing with money ancient pilgrim’s pouch contains (6) SCRI_P (obsolete, or ancient, for a pilgrim’s pouch, or satchel) around (containing) M (money, economics notation, e.g. M1, M0)
*	N	SEVENS	Limits to solve Venn diagrams at last revealing odd numbers (6) SE (limits, or outer letters, of SolvE) + VEN(N) + S (last letter of diagramS)
*	S	SHAME	Be quiet as note exposes disgrace (5) SH (interjection, be quiet!) + A(S) + ME (note, in sol-fa notation)
*		SHRIMP	Bright pink border taken for nothing in retail outlet (6) SH(O)P (retail outlet) swapping O (zero, nothing) with RIM (border)
*		SIUM	Letter from Greece is about genus of water plants (4) MU (Greek letter) + IS, reversed, or about, to give SIUM
*	B	SLIM	Square leg, perhaps, is to lose weight (4) S (square) + LIM(B) (leg)
*	E	STADDA	Double-bladed saw beginning to scrape small amount on cedar with ends removed (6) S (beginning to Scrape) + TAD(small amount) + (E)DA (cEDAr, with end letters removed)
*		START	Clever time for Miles to break away (5) S(M)ART (clever) with M (miles) removed and replaced with T (time) = START
*	I	STEP-IN	Garment pinches back with tie inside (6) S_PIN (nips, or pinches, back) around T(I)E
*	A	STIR	Prison art is quirky (4) anag, i.e. quirky, of (A)RT IS
*	D	TACT	Stroke, keeping time, raised whip to finishers in second eight (4) TAC (cat, lash or whip, raised) + (D)T (finishing letters of ‘seconD eighT’)
*	N	TEHR	Himalayan goat stirred then runs (4) TEH (anag, i.e. stirred, of THE(N) + R (runs, cricket notation)
*	R	TERRET	Finally get tackle together for rider, complete except swivel-ring (6) final letters of ‘geT tacklE togetheR foR ride(R) completE excepT’
*	N	TOURISTS	Acrobatic trio stuns sightseers (8) anag, i.e. acrobatic, of TRIO STU(N)S
*	I	TROPIC	Here in France wine rotates making imaginary circle (6) (I)CI (here, French) + PORT (wine) = CIPORT, rotated to give TROPIC!