Guardian cryptic No. 29,522 by Yank

129 comments on “Guardian cryptic No. 29,522 by Yank”

1. Great fun last night solving this with lots of interesting words. The top half was a bit of a write-in but struggled with the SW. I had to google ‘bank’ to understand POOL TABLE, nho DEEP SIX and couldn’t parse ARRAY. FED UP parsed as you Leedsclimber. METER MAID obviously linked with CONFAB (only knew conflab) but no theme as far as I can see. Favourites were SIT AROUND, OPERA STAR, HOME BREWS, BELLY UP, IN DIALECT and SCRIMP.

   Ta Yank & Leedsclimber.

2. 23: Boxer SugAR RAY Leonard, with the removal of ‘Gus’ reversed + ‘Leonard’.

3. 29a ER I’s favourite was ESSEX. (Robert Devereux, 2nd earl of…)

4. For RAPIDS, I think only PAR is reversed, then add IDS (Photos)

5. Earl of Essex was Elizabeth I’s favourite.

6. 29: I think this is “with” and Essex, a different Elizabeth’s favourite?

   I have the same parsing for 10. Quite the challenge, chasing down the transatlantic connections today, but entertaining.

   Thanks, Y and L

7. Isn’t catchup a double definition?

8. For RAPIDS I parsed as IDS (photos) rather than SDI. Agree with posters @3, 4 & 5 for WESSEX and crossed with Crispy @4.

9. I parsed WESSEX as W/ESSEX, Elizabeth 1s favourite Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex

10. Thanks Yank and LeedsClimber
    Positive first – I liked LARCENIST.
    Apart from that, I thought this was awful. I have quibbles/queries against a record 18 clues. I can’t be bothered to go into them.

    The Earl of Essex was a favourite of Elizabeth I, with W(ith) in front.
    Our Ketchup is sometimes called CATSUP in the US, I think, but that’s still a step from CATCH UP.

11. 29a refers to the earl of Essex who was a favourite of Elizabeth 1. W + Essex. I actually found that clue one of the easiest unlike some of the American ones. Thank you Yank and Leedsclimber

12. [typo? 7d RAPIDS – why reverse the IDs (photos?)] {edit: see Crispy@4}

13. Oops. 3, 5 & 6.

14. I am with muffin all the way- I was beginning to think I was the only one who disliked it.

15. I parsed 16d as OL (rev. of LO) with POT (drink) around it, followed by ABLE (you can) – with the defn. “bank on it”. Not really happy with either parsing, though.

16. 18d CATCHUP is just a variant of CATSUP = sauce. ‘Now chiefly North American. See ketchup’

17. Joan Watson’s boss was Marcus Bell in the American TV show Elementary for BELLY UP.
    WESSEX is W(with) + ESSEX (Elizabeth’s favourite).
    IDS are photos in RAPIDS.
    Sugar Ray minus Gus reversed in ARRAY as Balfour @2 says.

18. Sorry ran out of time to edit – prince Andrew was the Queen’s favourite son!

    I knew BANK SHOT, so shouldn’t play pool down with the yoof. I thought mID EASt was another Americanism, as we’d call it the Middle East. As is LIFER, UK lifers tend to serve a sentence of 15+ years and are the released on licence.

    Thank you to scchua and Yank

19. Anyone distracted by “on the list” for 14d?

20. Ta Balfour @2: that was a real head-scratcher.

21. DEEP SIX seems to mean to destroy or permanently remove. I assume this refers to some variant of “six feet under”.

22. I have seen catchup for ketchup in the US, but ARRAY is beyond obscure if your explanation is correct. IDS for photos seems weak

23. Criceto @19 – no, but I only entered IN THE until I had crossers as I was thinking lists for jousting, and trying to remember specialist names for jousting poles and targets.

24. Auriga @21 – sea burials, the amount of water required (I looked it up).

25. Liked KAMALA, HOME-BREWS, WESSEX, IN DIALECT, RAPIDS, POOL TABLE and ARRAY (def: grand display).

    Good puzzle. Thanks Yank.
    Thanks Leedsclimber for the blog.

26. [Leedsclimber: re 29, please, please correct ‘I’m lead’, and Andrew was Queen Elizabeth II’s favourite, not Edward. Also check out “The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex” with Errol Flynn and Bette Davis.]

27. Kashmir would not be a ‘sound alike’ if pronounced the way we do in India. Kash is pronounced like hush and mir is …well meer not mere

    But this is a UK crossword, so I can’t complain

28. The challenge for a cryptic setter is to be clever, but not too-clever-by-half. Some of Yank’s clues struck me as quite brilliant, notably INDIA LECT; F-ED UP when the penny dropped; the jouster IN THE MAIL. And others…
    Are stripes really parts of a skunk?
    An observation which others have made – we complain about indirect anagrams, but in 23d we are supposed to see Leonard, substitute Sugar Ray, invert Gus, take one from the other.
    And the GK expected of us includes: which actors have played an implausible spy; obscure songs by the Beatles; Monagasque royalty (with imprecise wordplay, IMHO); the identity of Alexander Graham Bell’s assistant (or, as suggested by jugular @ 17, two characters in an obscure American soap) ; who Elizabeth I fancied; which bits of Asia are disputed; pool terminology; extremely obscure American slang.
    I wouldn’t go as far as muffin @10, but I certainly felt there was a fair bit of too-clever-by-half here. But thanks to Yank for putting in the hard yards and Leedsclimber for the explanations.

29. Another in Muffin’s camp. I knew to expect some Americanisms, and have lived in the USA for a couple of years, but still found some of these a real stretch. I’ve never heard anyone in the UK refer to the “mid-East” for example.

    I was really unsure about many of the clues and am still unconvinced by 10A. If it is meant to be “effed up” then where is the homophone indicator? Why is “rainier” “not so thirsty”? Why are photos “ids”? You can have a photo on an ID (or not – our old driving licences lacked photos but were a form of ID) but you can have photos that are not IDs and IDs that are not photos. Why is a jouster “in the mail”? “In mail” at a stretch, but no-one ever said “in the mail” for armoured. Why is “potable” equivalent to “there’s drink”?

    There’s poor cryptic grammar, mismatches of parts of speech and weak synonyms. At least it was free…

    Thanks to Leedsclimber for disentangling a couple I had no idea about, like “ecstatic” (never heard that expression “in orbit” before).

30. 16d oed.com has POTABLE as a noun, but only in the plural. Wiktionary‘s only citation is plural and from 1708.

31. Overall, I’m with Muffin@10 – far too many quibbles to list.

    Cricet0@19 – me too.

    Thanks, Muffin, for letting me know it wasn’t just me, and thanks to LeedsClimber for all the enlightenment.

    Thanks, I suppose, to Yank for the odd clue that I liked.

32. Thank you Shanne @ 24. Fathoms perhaps?

33. Re CATCH UP.
    Joke from Pulp Fiction
    Three tomatoes are walkin’ down the street. Papa Tomato, Mama Tomato and Baby Tomato. Baby Tomato starts lagging behind, and Papa Tomato gets really angry. Goes back and squishes him and says: “Ketchup.”

34. For 24d [s]TRIPE[s] think Pepé Le Pew and that pauvre pussy cat, always having an accident with white paint, before receiving his unwelcome attentions.
    [TiLT: she was retroactively named Penelope.]

35. Utter pish

36. Is YUP a standard abbreviation for yuppie? A much easier puzzle than yesterday’s, but awkward parsings and a lack of patience this morning meant I relied on the check button far too much for the second day in a row.

37. Great fun but I raised a Roger Moore style eyebrow at STATIC, RAINIER and BELLY UP

    Top marks for ARRAY, IN DIALECT & WESSEX – having gone to Hardy’s school in Dorchester I spent far too long trying to make DORSET work

    Today’s ear worm courtesy of Led Zeppelin & KASHMIRy

    Cheers Y&L

38. POOL TABLE
    POTABLE is given as a noun meaning a beverage in Chambers and Collins.

39. I considered RAINING as a solution for “Prince is not so thirsty”, though I suppose it lacks a homophone indicator and the definition is just as dodgy as for RAINIER.

40. Well, that was a breeze in comparison with yesterday’s offering. I hope the clue for 1A was intended to refer to what Kamala is up against rather than a comment on her (!) I thought SPOTTED and CATCH UP were weak. I liked KASHMIR and CONFAB. With thanks to both.

41. RAINIER
    If we consider the ‘dry/arid’ sense of ‘thirsty’ (as in thirsty fields), not so thirsty/dry=RAINIER works okay?

42. bodycheetah @37: my earworm as well, knew you wouldn’t let me down 🙂

43. Monkey@36 YUP, it is.
    ‘Etymology 2 Shortening. Noun yup (plural yups) (informal) Clipping of yuppie.
    2008, Jeff Gordinier, X Saves the World, What we have these days is a diverse spectrum of yuppiness:
    guppies, buppies, indie yups, paleo-yups, luxe yups, schlub yups, dharma yups, tyro yups, crypto-yups.’

44. Got there in the end but I agree with Muffin. There’s a definite sense of trying too hard (or too clever by half) about many of these clues. FED UP was by a long stretch my least favourite.

45. This was quite tough for me. I failed to solve 14d and guessed 17ac STATIC=stalled but could not parse the rest of it.

    I also didn’t parse 10ac apart from the def = sick and tired; 7d; 23d – I am Australian but I never heard of that cheese and barely understand the complicated parsing… Ah, I see a more user-friendly parsing by Balfour@2 but that was also way beyond me to get!

    I agree with others re 29ac W+ESSEX = Elizabeth I’s favourite/lover/toyboy who was the stepson of Elizabeth’s earlier favourite/lover Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester.

    New for me: DEEP-SIX; the fact that Hardy novels are set in Wessex; Watson’s boss = Thomas Augustus Watson was an assistant to Alexander Graham Bell) – thanks, google; YUP as shortened version of yuppie; CATCHUP = ketchup. I never hear of the Middle East referred to as the Mideast but I see it is sometimes used.

    Thanks, both.

46. I also concur with muffin. Ended up revealing 14d as I could no longer be bothered. Far too many “really?” moment and too much GK for my taste. I never mind learning something, but it just felt like there was too much and too obscure today.

    I parsed POOL TABLE as a reference to them usually being in pubs in the UK.

47. Sorry, I’m with Muffin and other complainants – I’ve seldom completed a crossword with such dissatisfaction. In addition to the grievances aired above I would add that ‘mere’ does not mean ‘pure and simple’ and ‘murmur’ barely means ‘grouse’. And if Irvine Walsh writes in dialect I’m glad I have never read him – Walter Scott is bad enough.

48. What NeilH@28 said.
    Thanks to Leedsclimber, and Yank for the compilation variability

49. Gosh, these responses tumbled in at a very rapid rate after nine eleven this morning, almost falling over themselves to put the record straight re the (W)ESSEX parsing for one thing. Forty posts within the first hour.
    Nothing further to be added to the plethora of comments, except to say that loi for me was SOLDIER, which surprised me, as it was fairly obvious in retrospect…

50. NW was a write-in, but then I had too many clues which “had to” be right, but I simply couldn’t make sense of either the definition of the wordplay. Some was GK (e.g. the boxer didn’t come anywhere near my mind for Leonard), some was NA (nho DEEP SIX, MID EAST isn’t a UK phrase etc.), and some just felt a bit loose? RAPIDS, TRIPE etc. went in but not entirely satisfyingly parsed.

    Setting is really hard. This one wasn’t for me, but remember setters do pop in here, so please try to be constructive (and help them see what works and what doesn’t) in your comments…

51. I get why Yank has been criticised on this. I thought it was a good experiment and a bit of variety, lots of general knowledge, almost half crossword/half quiz. Having said that, I’d rather he didn’t do it again!

52. No disrespect to LeedsClimber, who has my sympathies with this puzzle, but do we have anything different for FED UP?

53. This may be completely left field, but there was talk after SCOTUS ruled on Trump’s immunity from prosecution in office, that Biden would thus be able to send in the Navy Seals Deep Six to eliminate his political opponents. Perhaps a really extreme example of ‘trash’

54. We used to DS computer programs when they went wrong. (Burroughs, then Unisys.) Always thought this was short for DEEP SIX, to chuck overboard.

    I think NeilH@28 says it for me. I quite enjoyed it, but some of the parsing beat me.

    Thanks both.

55. 25d oed.com: ‘MIDEAST noun & adjective | Chiefly North American and Journalism. | noun 1865– = Middle East n. | adjective c1944– = Middle Eastern adj.’

56. I don’t mind Yank importing the odd Americanism into his puzzles – it would be a bit odd if he didn’t – so when a Google on DEEP-SIX works out, it’s fine; fairly clued, after all. And overall, at least I finished this one, so it can’t be all bad. But the crossing BELLY-UP / ARRAY only went in because they fitted. Coming here, I guess I was not alone.

57. When I saw Leonard, my first thought was Sugar Ray, for others it might well be Nimoy or even Hutton. After yesterday’s Yankee betting, I assumed banking on a POOL TABLE was a way of raising the stakes on a game.

58. Finding myself in the slightly strange position of sharing many of the misgivings expressed above, knowing I’d never get as far as actually parsing a number of the answers, and yet still having enjoyed it.

    Despite the volume of ‘bung in, parse later (if at all)’ answers, it felt a more fun, certainly less harsh experience than yesterday’s.

59. To be contrarian – I quite enjoyed it, and found it easier than yesterday’s. I was fortunate enough to know most of the requisite GK and even where I didn’t (deep six) I got it from the rest of the clue. Thanks to Yank and to leedsclimber for the blog.

60. I think Yank’s puzzles show us how non-UK solvers feel when faced with clues from a different culture. I did eventually remember all the various people, but weren’t there a lot of them! In orbit=ecSTATIC passed me by, as did DEEP SIX. A “bank shot” in pool is what snooker players call a double, but I had to look it up.

    Some American dialects say ketch for catch, so I expect CATCHUP is an alternative spelling – but not a familiar one here: I only knew catsup. News to me that Elmore Leonard writes IN DIALECT.

    Anyway, I liked OSPREY among many othrs.

61. Give Yank a break. You know from the start that he’s American, so Americanisms should come as no big surprise. It is, as always, startling to find so many clearly intelligent people so happy to admit ignorance on so many fronts.

62. I do have some sympathy with muffin and Jack of Few Trades@29 yet couldn’t help rather enjoying this puzzle …
    A mixture of the neat and the scratchy for me; some a write-in with other bits needing a good old think; nothing actually defeated me apart from the parsing of ARRAY … perhaps I was just being lazy, now I’ve seen the Sugar Ray explanation, though a pugilistic allusion may have rendered it fairer
    I thought METER MAID was a lovely clue
    Yes, I rather enjoyed this Yank today
    Is Yank a rough diamond in need of some polishing? I sensed some twinkling ….
    Many thanks, both and all
    (Nice to have you walking on the wild side, leedsclimber!)

63. Thanks leedsclimber; I’m normally loath to criticise setters too much, as they give me a lot fun, and it can’t be easy to do their job. But there were far too many clues here that I thought were just awful. Sorry Yank.

64. I’m afraid, on any day Yank is the setter, I’ll buy a different broadsheet. I have not enjoyed the Yank puzzles so far. Too many dodgy definitions, trying too hards and obscurities. I’ve been playing pool for 50 years and have never heard of a bank shot. Australian cheese and US slang? No ta.

65. Petert @57, my first Leonard was Woolf. What chance have I got?

66. Trailman @65: more than me. My first thought was Rossiter!

67. Not sure I agree with the criticism of BELL. The first words ever spoken/heard on a telephone were “Mr Watson, come here. I want to see you”
    We all know “One small step…” and Bell’s quotation is similarly iconic.

    Criceto @19 – yes, my solving partner rashly put that in!

68. I’m surprised the Bell-Watson connection is unfamiliar to so many – Bell’s first call with an experimental telephone was “Mr Watson, come here. I want to see you”.

69. Expanding a little on the first comment by Petert@57, you can probably tell a lot about a person from the first five Leonards they can name. For me, as I tried to work out the answer to 21d, they were: Rossiter, Nimoy, Bernstein, Cohen and Sugar Ray – the last of which quickly gave me ARRAY.
    Unlike so many others, I enjoyed this crossword. Yes, there were quibbles, but I like the attitude of bodycheetah@37 – just raise a Roger Moore eyebrow.
    Especially liked METER MAID, OPERA STAR, IN DIALECT and LARCENIST (good spot).
    Thanks to Yank and Leedsclimber.

70. Alec @61 – another way of looking at ‘so many clearly intelligent people so happy to admit ignorance on so many fronts’ is to say that we all know we have our limits, blind spots etc, and isn’t it ok to come here and say so, rather than pretend we actually know stuff that we don’t?

    I find it refreshing rather than frustrating that that’s the case.

71. Wow. You lot are very lively in the comments! Thanks everyone for the suggestions and tweaks, all very gratefully received.

    Particular thanks to Balfour for the parsing of ARRAY. Way more elegant than my efforts on that one.

72. This was an odd combination of write-in for three quarters and bung-and-hope for the SW. As an English transplant to the US I knew all the GK bar Irvine Welsh, whom I googled and was none the wiser. I suppose if I had bothered to read his entire Wikipedia entry I would have got it.

    I agree with some of the quibbles above – some very loose cluing and clunky surfaces in among some better clues.

    17a ecstatic for in orbit is new to me, but as usual I’m sure it’s in Chambers.

    28a yup as an abbreviation for yuppie is new to me, having lived through that era and never once heard it used nor seen it written. Also I couldn’t come up with the right Watson, rabbit-holing on Holmes like several others.

    23d array the parsing defeated me, but seeing the explanations in the comments I can see why.

73. I’m surprised not to see more complaints about 29a WESSEX. If you have either piece of GK (and I happened to have both) it’s barely a pub quiz question, with practically no cryptic element at all.

    If you have neither you are hosed. You could stare at it all day and not construct an answer.

74. Scraggs@70 well put. I have areas I would consider myself pretty expert at and others much less so. I value good general knowledge and I’ve learnt/learnt to live with the strange idiosyncrasies of the obscure and often outdated conventions of crosswords (Ian = Scottish). The fact I have very scant knowledge of US colloquialisms beyond what is inescapable from popular culture is not something I feel I should be ashamed of. Or, more correctly, of which I feel I should be ashamed.

75. I’m in the Muffin camp too.
    I hated all of this.

76. I had a lot of fun with this crossword and had lots of ticks similar to those already mentioned by others. I didn’t find the clues referenced in the preamble and in a couple of the comments too forced.
    My positive review is proffered despite not having heard of my LOI 20d DEEP SIX, but I’m glad others were in the same boat with that one. I always like learning new things.
    I’ve been thinking that I am not so sure of my ground when it comes to the ones I label the “newer setters” like Yank, but I need to watch out for getting too set in my ways now that I am in my seventies. Indeed there’s nothing at all wrong with a setter adding in some Americanisms to add flavour/flavor. Pangakupu was a “new setter” for a while but I now really appreciate the Kiwi twist in his puzzles. I wish I could set puzzles myself because I’d like to add an Australiana twist at times, but sadly that’s way out of my league. But I think it’s a good thing to be part of a truly international community when that includes setters and solvers from all over the globe.
    Thanks to Yank and Leedsclimber.

77. News to me that CATSUP is North American. KETCHUP is the only way I’ve ever met the word, and what it says on the bottles.

    The legend goes that the first message to go over a telephone was Alexander Graham Bell saying, “Mr Watson, come here, I want you.” So if you know that story (I did) you’ll recognize the refernce — if you think of it, which I didn’t.

    Suresh @27 How is “meer” pronounced differently from “mere”?

    I’m too sleepy to read any more comments just now, so here’s mine for starters.

    And thanks to Yank and Leedsclimber.

78. All solved but several unparsed. Like others, I appreciate the setters’ efforts but did not find the puzzle enjoyable.

79. Put me in the camp that enjoyed this. There’s nothing wrong with a bit of quirkiness and it would be a dull crossword that didn’t push some boundaries. FED UP was the only one that went in unparsed but there were a few that got a shrug or a raised eyebrow. I guess “in orbit” is somewhere between “on cloud nine” and “over the moon”. OSPREY and IN DIALECT were my favourites (though Welsh seems to have dropped a lot of the dialectic stuff lately).

    Thanks L and Y

80. That’s two puzzles in a row I didn’t really like. But here I’ll try to be positive and instead of complaining I’ll try explaining what I think is going on today. Both from my own solving and from reading the comments above it seems that in many clues Yank has left out a step (or two). That’s it. We’re just not used to this style.

81. Lots of awkward/obscure clues, but also lots of crossers to help once I got the easier ones. I would never have figured out the parsing for ARRAY, that’s for sure.

82. What a lot of comments! But nobody as far as I can see went wrong in the same way I did. I put in MURDER for 8d, with RUM and RED as the two drinks, thinking that a group of grouse might be a MURDER, like crows. This then led me to a brilliant anagram of DREAM TIME for 12a, figuring it must be a work of art by some Paul or other (it does sound lovely). It all seemed to make sense at the time. I was forced to reconsider by subsequent crossers.

    Overall I did have a lot of question marks, but still enjoyed this. Thanks Yank and Leedsclimber.

83. I had DREAM TIME too! And wondered if it was a painting by Paul Gauguin. 🙂 But LIFER and RAPIDS pushed my dream time away…

84. Thanks both,
    Like most here I had reservations about a few clues. The best I could come up with for ‘fed up’ was a reversal of ‘def’ as a possible synonym for ‘total’, but that leaves ‘disarray’ hanging.

85. I parsed 29a as w (with) + e’s + sex. Sex being a favorite activity. Thanks to Yank and Leedsclimber

86. I’m afraid I agree with muffin@10 and MikeB@47. I didn’t mind the Americanisms at all (bank in US pool = double in UK eg). The parsing for ARRAY required knowledge of that boxer but without any reference to his existence (except the name Leonard, which in my book is not enough).

    Theme – oh yes I spotted it! References to ancient popular culture and figures unknown to anyone under 40. Lovely Rita is a track off an album that is 57 years old. Dalton and Moore as Bonds! CATCH UP!!!

    Thanks to Yank and Leedsclimber, but not my cup of tea

87. A lot of griping here. As a relative novice I found this quite difficult, though much easier than yesterday. I agree that the parsing of some clues (ARRAY, which I would never have parsed, most of all) were tortuous, but it’s hardly unreasonable to think that someone reading the Guardian would know that Kashmir is a disputed area or where Hardy’s novels were set, and Bond actors are fairly standard GK I would have thought. I was led down the Holmes garden path by 28A, but every day’s a school day.

88. Glad to see I wasn’t the only one! Hated this with a passion, from the ridiculously easy clues that made it feel like a Monday, and an easy one at that… to the obscure (and foreign) GK requirements, e.g. had to reveal my LOI, as I’d never heard of DEEP SIX… to the clumsy clueing, such as trimming skunk parts and CATCHUP. Genuinely the worst crossword I can ever remember the Guardian publishing.

89. Difficult blog leedsclimber. One observation. I prefer bloggers to leave their original comments in when editing. The reference to Australian cheese wrt 23 dn in comment 64 is baffling otherwise.
    Also “grand” needs to be part of the definition I think.

90. ArkLark @86. Your experience is just like mine at quizzes – only the other way round. I used to be good, but lately hampered by my pre-1990s GK in sport & music. You just have to learn the stuff that’s holding you back. At least you’ve a young brain to do it with…

91. Firmly in the muffin camp.

92. Thanks for the blog, brilliant puzzle , learnt a few things but could get the answer purely from the wordplay, DEEP SIX for example and POOL TABLE . IN DIALECT is very clever and ARRAY .
    I know Sugar Ray Leonard from The Message – Can’t even see the game or the Sugar-Ray fight . ( and Robinson from Raging Bull ) .
    No doubt the next boring , middle-of-the-road Guardian puzzle from one of the usual suspects will get lavish praise on here.

93. This wasn’t my favo[u]rite puzzle, but I’m surprised to see the level of hatred directed at it. Maybe my relative lack of hatred is connected to the fact that I’m an American.

    I didn’t understand 10ac (FED UP), but I think Leedsclimber’s parsing makes perfect sense. I think “F’ed up” would be a perfectly reasonable way to write “effed up”, so there’s no need for a homophone indicator.

    Speaking of homophone indicators, I don’t like “detect” in 26ac. Sure, one can detect things audially, but there are lots of other ways to detect, so the word doesn’t seem to me to indicate what it’s supposed to. But that’s probably just a peeve of mine.

    I wondered about the parsing of 29ac (WESSEX), speculating like Dewey @85 that maybe “favourite” could mean SEX. But I don’t have a problem with the actual parsing. (Despite being an American, I had even known at some point about Elizabeth I’s favourite being the Earl of Essex; I just didn’t recall it.)

94. Middle-aged UKer here; I don’t think knowledge of who played Bond, or the Beatles song, or Prince Rainier constitutes “obscure knowledge”. And I’d heard of deep-sixing.

    And NeilH @ 17, “Elementary” isn’t a soap but a modern re-imagining of Sherlock Holmes. I doubt it has any bearing on the clue, though, beyond a coincidence.

    “Catch up” was rubbish, though.

95. [[Bobbob @ 87. I’m an ‘improving solver’ too and I really enjoyed this solve. The experienced campaigners are within their rights to murmur about breaches of setting protocols but even a “come on, that’s a bit of a stretch” reaction is part of the fun (at least for me). Yank came up with some really clever cluing here, even if one or two were a bit iffy
    Thanks also to Leedsclimber ]]

96. This was a mix of gently-amusing (HOME BREWS, METER MAID), write-ins (KAMALA, MURMUR), and guesses where the parsing was totally beyond me (DEEP SIX, FED UP and ARRAY).
    But I do know me Hardy and me Welsh, and I figured an American would be thinking of Watson with Bell, not Holmes.
    And frankly, after yesterday’s, this was way more fun.
    So thank you, Yank – and huge thanks to Leedsclimber for the blog.

97. OK-ish, but not a puzzle to remember, I fear. Lots of clues where I bunged in the solution, then parsed them ‘near enough’, which is also how some of the clues felt – RAINIER being approximately equivalent to ‘not so thirsty’ being one and FED UP still not working despite our blogger’s effort to explain it. WESSEX is clearly W/Essex, as many have said. No-one seems to have pointed out that Prince Edward has, for quite some time, been styled Duke of Edinburgh. Whether he still carries the burden of the Earldom of Wessex I don’t know, but Palace officialdom certainly doesn’t refer to him by the previous title anyway. (I’m a royalist, incidentally, but happy to concede that there’s a lot of flummery around that institution.)

98. Way, way too hard.
    I couldn’t do many of yesterdays, but at least I felt I could learn from the answers when I read the blog. Not today – I understand the answers from the blog, but I’d never be able to do a crossword this hard.
    Each to their own. I’m pleased to see lots of folks enjoyed it.

99. You people are being far too harsh. However, I would never have parsed ARRAY in a month of Sundays.

    Of course the Watson in question couldn’t have been the Holmes one–it says “Watson’s employer”. Dr. John Watson earned his living at medicine and only helped Sherlock, when asked to, as a sort of hobby (with, um, no hint of a same-sex crush in there anywhere, no siree Bob). So I did fairly quickly think of Bell and “come here, Mr. Watson”–that indelible first phone call.

    I had no idea that DEEP-SIX was unknown in the UK. Huh.

100. MrP @99
     What’s the derivation for DEEP SIX? Google tells me it’s something to do with soundings, but I don’t see the connection (or should that be “connexion”?)
     It reminds me of “full fathom five thy father lies”, but that would be deeper!

101. Thanks Yank, that was most enjoyable. Even though I couldn’t parse everything I liked the fresh feel of this — as Roz @92 implied, this wasn’t a ‘boring, middle-of-the-road Guardian puzzle’. My top picks were METER MAID, OPERA STAR, CATCH UP, and DEEP-SIX. Thanks Leedsclimber for the blog.

102. Muffin @100: I always assumed DEEP-SIX came from the standard burial plot which is six feet deep. To DEEP-SIX something means to bury it.

103. Tony @102
     Thanks – that makes more sense than the Google “explanation”!

104. [I guess I’m a little disappointed to read the comments about ‘boring, middle-of-the-road-Guardian puzzles’. I know Roz, in particular, wants to see more super-hard Enigmatists but if the boring, middle-of-the-roaders include Tramp, Picaroon, Pasquale, Philistine, Brendan, Vlad, Matilda, Brockwell … then I’m quite happy to admit I rather enjoy them]

105. MrPostMark@104 I would also like to see 2 very accessible puzzles a week for newer solvers , we rarely get this . Often even the Monday puzzle is not quite suitable. Before this week we had 3 weeks, 15 puzzles in a row that I finished between the same 2 railway stations so my solving time did not vary by more than 2 minutes either way , that is sheer monotony. Each puzzle may have been well set but it is like an easy listening radio station.

106. Well said, PostMark@104. And let me add Arachne and Qaos to your list.

107. I really get cross with the ‘that was so easy’ brigade telling us it was a breeze when a puzzle is clearly very tough to demonstrate their über-brilliance. So I’m in no way quietly smug, as a very average solver, that I got ‘array’ quite quickly, although I’m not quite sure the removal of Leonard is very well clued.

108. Not quite my cup of tea either, but it seemed more of a familiarity problem than anything else.
     I’ve lived in the US almost 30 years but never heard of DEEP-SIXING before. Strangely, I have heard of 86-ing meaning more or less the same thing. Wonder if they’re related etymologically.
     Enjoyed OPERA STAR and OSPREY the best.
     Thanks, Yank and Leedsclimber.

109. Muffin et al., Merriam-Webster online says:

     “Etymology
     Noun

     from the leadsman’s call by the deep six for a depth corresponding to the sixth deep on a sounding line”

     So, a bit like Mark Twain, then?

     phitonelly@108: for eighty-six, the bit of restaurant jargon, the same source gives us one of their little essays:

     “If you work in a restaurant or bar, you might eighty-six (or “eliminate”) a menu item when you run out of it, or you might eighty-six (or “cut off”) a customer who should no longer be served. Eighty-six is still used in this specific context, but it has also entered the general language. These days, you don’t have to be a worker in a restaurant or bar to eighty-six something—you just have to have something to get rid of or discard. There are many popular but unsubstantiated theories about the origin of eighty-six. The explanation judged most probable according to Merriam-Webster’s research is that the word was created as a rhyming slang word for nix, which means “to veto” or “to reject.” “

110. I enjoyed this quite a lot. From the comments it seems like it might be a mirror image of yesterday’s Enigmatist, with lots of Americanisms that leave the UK audience baffled (I had no idea that “bank” shots were strictly American). Even managed to get ARRAY from the wordplay without backfilling. FED UP and IDEAS were the only one unparsed though it took a while to see where STATIC was coming from.

     I guess there are a couple UKisms like OS, EC, and the East End accent, but those are pretty familiar to me by now.

     Thanks Yank and Leedsclimber!

     [Roz @92: Nice reminder! I never can keep Robinson and Leonard straight.]

111. Like Lord Jim@82 I went wrong in my own particular way with ALL IN at 10a. It seems to work quite well, with ‘in total disarray?’ suggesting IN ALL (=totally) with constituent parts changed around. The trouble with such loose cluing as we’ve had today is that the solver can’t be sure that the answer is right, or in this case wrong.

     I thought of RAPIDS for 7d, but the word play for PAR←and then IDS defeated me. I was pleased to have worked out DEEP SIX, which was new to me too, and POOL TABLE/’you can bank on it’ ditto. ‘Leonard’= Sugar Ray, take out Gus backwards was a huge stretch too far for me. I would have liked to have seen how Australian cheese created a different parsing!

     Thanks Yank but please don’t try so hard next time. And thanks to Leedsclimber for your splendid effort.

112. BigNorm @97.

     Yes, Prince Edward, the new Duke of Edinburgh still holds the title of Earl of Wessex but, as is the custom among the nobility, his lesser title is used as a courtesy title by his eldest (in this case his only) son James.

113. Pete HA3 @54,

     I DS’ed many a program in my Burroughs/Unisys years, when they didn’t DS themselves in a variety of interesting and original ways that is. Ah, the joys of debugging with only programdumps to help !

     Like many others here I thought a fair few clues were stretching the boundaries, and some of my solutions were entered on a “bung and hope” basis – or “bung and check.” ! But I managed to complete the puzzle without using “Reveal” so I’m happy. Ish !

     Thanks to Leedsclimber and to Yank

114. I can appreciate Roz’s view. However, I would think that the purpose of including puzzles in a newspaper is to sell newspapers. I doubt that the inclusion of puzzles that very few people can solve increases sales. In fact, it probably has the opposite effect. I would think that puzzles by the Enigmatist/Io are best reserved for the Genius Puzzle or the Prize Puzze, places where solvers should really be challenged, and the daily puzzles, while hopefully increasing in difficulty as the week progresses, should be accessible to a reasonable percentage of solvers.

115. The term ‘86’ originated shortly before 1933 as ‘soda jerk’ slang for ‘all out of an item’ before going on to mean other things such as ‘get rid of an item or unwanted customer’ more generally in the food and drink industry, that much is certain – the only real question is why the number ‘86’ was chosen rather than any other one. That may well be due to it rhyming with existing slang terms with a similar meaning like ‘nix’ or ‘deep six’. Why are you referring to Australian cheese, Sheffieldhatter @111?

116. Criceto@90 – your assumption is somewhat wide of the mark – I’m 66 – I get these ancient popular culture references. I just don’t think they’re fair on younger solvers

117. I’ve never seen a blog with so many comments! Quite entertaining – not quite schadenfreude but in that direction.
     Mrs S and I only had to look up the marvellous In dialect …. a kick ones self for missing it clue …. but were very grateful for the parsing here.
     I take my deerstalker off to people who are able to solve these all by their own. Perhaps due to our different neural networks, we get (and miss) quite different sets of clues.
     Chapeau!

118. ArkLark@116. Oh, dear. That makes my 60-year-old brain the young one!

119. Roz@92 and 105
     How many stations did this one take? I found it about the same level of difficulty as the middle-of-the-road puzzles about which you complain and which I like or dislike on the basis of the wit of the clueing, not the difficulty.
     I can put up with Americanisms and GK that I don’t have. As with many others here it was the clumsy clueing that irritated me.

120. @119 Pino, well said, I agree that difficulty is by no means the best measure of a crossword- wit, style and composition are much more satisfying. I’m afraid I do recognise the self-congratulatory satisfaction in overcoming difficult crosswords, but I still get much more pleasure (sorry vegans..) from a tender sirloin than a chewy rump. Not to say there weren’t some choice clues in this one – thank you Yank (and leedsclimber)

121. [mrpenney and Long Time Lurker,
     Many thanks for the extra information about 86-ing. Very interesting. I first met the term in a barber shop where I was asked if I wanted to keep my side-burns or 86 them!. I had no idea what she meant at the time!]

122. Maybe OPERA STAR was a hint to W/ESSEX. Placido Domingo has played the title rôle in Donizetti’s Roberto Devereux. Devereux was Elizabeth’s favourite aka the Earl of Essex. There’s a 1970 NY City Opera performance of it with Domingo on Youtube.

123. phitonelly@108 No,86ing and deep sixing are quite different. You deep six a thing, by throwing it away or omitting it from an activity; you 86 a person by banning them from, say, your bar.

124. FWIW, I agree with most, perhaps all, of the positive comments about this Xword.

     Yank, if you bother to read this stuff – don’t be disheartened by the negativity. It appears that many of us enjoyed this one. Thanks.

     And, Guradina Xword editor, I and others would welcome further contributions from this setter.

     And, thanks to leedsclimber for the blog.

125. Have just realised that me@60 substituted Elmore Leonard for Irvine Walsh – unfamiliar with both authors and still thinking about which Leonard was which in ARRAY, I suppose.

     For the record, I did enjoy this, Americanisms and all.

126. Long Time Lurker@115. Australian cheese was mentioned previously by the blogger, it seems, but when the correct parsing was pointed out, the original was deleted. (Regular bloggers tend to strike through their errors so that they are still visible. See #64, #71 and #89.)

127. Like quite a few others here, in the Muffin camp. And CJ @ 50, this is a national newspaper and to get a crossword published here (when there are so many other excellent compilers working for lesser organs) is quite an accolade. But just like actors, musicians etc sometimes you‘ll get a panning. C‘est la vie.

128. At least no British nursery rhymes or cricket references in this one!

129. Great puzzle, fun word-play just the right level of challenge to do over breakfast!

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