Guardian Cryptic 29,556 by Brummie

68 comments on “Guardian Cryptic 29,556 by Brummie”

1. Full of his trademark humorous clues such as CRUISE SHIP, HOUSE TRAINED, BRICK-KILN, INDISPOSED, TIPTOE and SPEECHIFY. I thought the bottom half was definitely more tricky and SPRUCE certainly required UKGK. CLAD, MALCONTENT, CREATIVE ACCOUNTING and PERSEVERANCE were my favourites. Nice bit of misdirection in EXTRA where I thought host was a container device. Again, I can’t spot a theme, after last week’s offering.

   Ta Brummie & manehi.

2. Adnominal was new, and I forgot about the cricket extra, and Ms Leith is a nho. So, a couple of shrugs, but nothing else to scare the horses. Thanks both.

3. Thanks Brummie and manehi
   ADNOMINAL was new to me, but it was gettable from anagram fodder and crossers. The rest was fairly straightforward. Lots to like; favourite CREATIVE ACCOUNTING.
   Space is a character in the ASCII set (32), but I agree that it isn’t a visible one.

4. Many thanks to Brummie & manehi. Good fun. Despite being a cricket addict, I failed to fully parse EXTRA.
   For CREATIVE ACCOUNTING I had AC as Bill and COUNTING as Telling, but it works either way I think.

5. Definitely a tale of two halves. I thought I would not finish because I struggled to get a foothold in the bottom half until I thought of ACCOUNTING, parsed the same way as jkb_ing@4, then CREATIVE, and the rest slowly followed. SPACE BAR was my LOI and had to get the crossers for BAR before I could solve it. Thanks for your help with EXTRA manehi, could not parse it and for a long time thought the answer must host R. Did not know the cricket term.
   Some lovely clues, and my picks for today are INDISPOSED and PERSERVERANCE.
   I couldn’t see a theme.
   My thanks to Brummie and manehi.

6. Enjoyable puzzle, neither too easy nor too tricky.

   New for me: ADNOMINAL.

   Favourite: EXTRA (loi).

7. Another who had never heard of Ms Leith, so SPRUCE unparsed. Didn’t think BRICK KILN sharp enough. Really liked CRUISE SHIP as of course I knew about this particular Tom. Some very helpful anagrams to get me going. Many thanks Brummie and Manehi…

8. Like manehi, it took me a while to get tuned in to this puzzle, but it was worth it.

9. Fun puzzle – I agree with AlanC about the humour of the clues, although I found the surfaces rather uneven.

   I failed to parse EXTRA, being deceived like others by ‘host’, and I agree with jkb_ing about the parsing AC+COUNTING.

   The unusual word ADNOMINAL is nicely clued, and I particularly liked PERSEVERANCE, SPEECHIFY and the cryptic definition for SPACE BAR.

   Thanks to Brummie and manehi

10. Prue Leith is well known as she’s currently a Great British Bake Off judge, in her 80s, had been a cookery writer and broadcaster for years before and used to have a cookery school I passed on the bus, and has had a colourful life (& son). Didn’t mean I got that fast, had to back parse with all the crossers.

    All in and parsed.

    Thank you to manehi and Brummie.

11. I looked at some explanations for “adnominal” online, and they didn’t seem to differ at all from “adjective”. However Chambers gives “adnoun” (adjective “adnominal”) as an adjective used as a noun, which does seem different. Can anyone resolve this or give an example, please?

12. Me @11
    It would make more sense for an adnoun to be a noun used as an adjective, not the other way round. Has Chambers got it wrong?

13. Thanks manehi for explaining a couple I didn’t fully parse, ROMP and EXTRA. Although I watched Bake Off, SPRUCE took me a while. I agree with jkb_ing’s parsing of ACCOUNTING. My rather elderly Chambers (1988) doesn’t have ADNOMINAL, but easily gettable from the crossers.
    Thanks again manehi and Brummie.

14. muffin @ 11&12. If my memory of undergraduate linguistics serves me well, I think that adnominal describes a word that functions in a phrase like an adjective but does not in so doing lose it nounal function. Examples might be ‘stone path’, ‘dog pound’, ‘grass court’ and the like. On the other hand, my memory may be letting me down, in which case apologies, and someone will ride to the rescue in due course.

15. As a Brit, I was vaguely aware of Prue Leith’s name but couldn’t have told you anything about her, so it’s not surprising if non-Brits struggle with that one.

    I put brick kiln in fairly early but the crossers weren’t coming so I briefly considered brick oven.

    My favourites were Cruise’s Hip because I like puns, and creative accounting because it was so obvious in retrospect; my parsing was the same as jkb_ing @4, but either works. Tiptoe had a great surface.

    I’m not keen on speechify though, one of those words that you might doubt anybody would use except ironically.

16. Thanks Balfour @14 – those seem to be nouns used as adjectives, as I suggested @11. Chambers is wrong?

17. Very enjoyable puzzle today. Thanks Brummie. The anagrams, of which HOUSE TRAINED was my favourite, gave a firm foothold. Liked many of the definitions, especially BRICK for ‘house builders’, ‘main means of taking a break’; and the whole clue for SPACE BAR. The SPEECHIFY clue brought to mind a striking image. Not sure that I fully understood the parsing of CREATIVE ACCOUNTING until coming here; I was looking for something like bill = account and a lift and separate to give the -ing. Thanks manehi for the blog.

18. Thanks manehi and Brummie. Not being a cricket follower, I was ‘stumped’ when trying to parse EXTRA. ADNOMINAL was also a new word for me. 16 d SPACE BAR was my favourite. I’ve just started doing this crossword and I’m enjoying the blog and puzzles.

19. Muffin @16. In a memorable scene in The Birdman of Alcatraz, Telly Savalas’s character is reminiscing about an old girlfriend and her parrot: a pair he describes as, ‘them two uglies’. That would be an adnoun, by the Chambers def, I think.

20. Muffin@11. As I understand the definition, adnominal is a wider term than an adjective as it can be a clause rather than just a single word, so, in ‘the house that jack built’, ‘that jack built’ would be an adnominal. In ‘the big house’, ‘big’ would also be an adnominal. So the set of adnominals is larger than the set of adjectives.

    I see I’ve crossed with Balfour whilst typing.

    I’m with those who parsed ACCOUNTING as ‘AC’ + ‘COUNTING’. Liked HENRIETTA and HOUSETRAINED. Thanks to Brummie and manehi.

21. Like others I took a long time to get the lower half. LOI EXTRA, having forgotten the cricket meaning. Lots to like as others have said. Thanks Brummie and manehi.

22. Thanks Davey and Tomsdad

23. muffin @16. I think it works both ways round. In my examples, the primary syntactic function is adjectival but the residual semantic function remains nounal.

24. That’s interesting, Davey. Maybe I am misremembering and misattributing the terminology (it was 50-odd years ago). At about the same period, I recall the term ‘wee hairies’ being in Glaswegian argot to describe teenage girls who dressed in a particular way.

25. All these years doing crosswords and I’ve never come across dis! Is it common. Seems handy.

26. Balfour – for something more up-to-date, what about ‘social’ as used either to mean a social event, or social media?

27. muffin passim: From Wiktionary:

    adnoun (plural adnouns)
    (grammar) an adjective used as a noun (sensu stricto); an absolute adjective (nominalized adjective).
    (grammar, dated) an adjective

    Related terms
    adnominal

    Take from that what you will. It seems an ‘adnoun’ can be a noun used as an adjective, or even just a plain old adjective, but not an adjective used as a noun. But either way, ADNOMINAL is descriptive 🙂

    But it doesn’t include nouns used attributively as in Balfour’s examples.

28. I was one who found the bottom half easier: first pass produced nothing before SPEECHIFY, and then SPACE BAR, TIPTOE (funny surface) and AGHAST gave me a foothold to work from. Failed to parse EXTRA, and ADNOMINAL was new. Thanks to those trying to explain what it is, but it sounds like one of those things you have to learn for O Level English and never need again for the rest of your life.

    I liked the cryptic defs, and HOUSETRAINED and parsed AC+COUNTING in two bits. Tried hard to make 3d be MALINGERED, but of course it wasn’t.

29. Gervase@27. Your penultimate paragraph seems to contradict what you have quoted from Wiktionary.

    The definition in the clue would appear to coincide with the “dated” use in that article, btw. Or have I misunderstood?

30. There seem to be people who found the top half easier than the bottom half, whereas for me it was the other way round.

    I’d forgotten the DIS = HELL reference (which I learned some months ago from this site, I think), and though I’ve heard of Prue Leith I don’t watch Bake Off so I was unlikely to ever get that. ADNOMINAL new for me also, but the clueing is clear.

    Didn’t like TIER, which was my last one in, but the rest of it kept me engaged for a good while this morning.

31. I’m a little surprised that after all the criticism of Vulcan yesterday, where ‘timeless’ was used to clue removing one of two Ts in the fodder, that no one has so far queried Brummie’s very similar use of ‘no hospital’ for the removal of just one of two Hs in 20d. In fact, there were excuses for Vulcan, as we can read his version as an arithmetical instruction, with less being equivalent to minus, rather than the state of having none.

    But surely ‘no H’ means exactly what it says? And there is an H in the answer! 🤔

    I do not mean this as a criticism of either of the setters, since both clues were eminently solvable, but I’m interested in why one attracted so much disapprobation while the other has so far not. Is it just a matter of different commenters with less exacting standards?

    Thanks to Brummie for an enjoyable solve and to manehi for the excellent blog.

32. 16D was my favorite, one of those that gives pleasure when the penny drops.

    New for me were ADNOMINAL (needed all the crossers), DIS as a name for Hell, and I needed the blog for the second definition of EXTRA.

    The NW corner held me up for a long time, with 1D LOI.

    Thanks Brummie and manehi

33. sheffield hatter @29: You’re quite correct – I got myself into a tangle there, just to add to the confusion over the meaning of the word 🙁 . Sorry!

34. sheffield hatter @31: It seems I’m not the only one to get confused! Where in yesterday’s Vulcan did you see ‘timeless’? But the answer to your question may be that when the answer to a clue pops into the mind quickly it is easy to overlook slips in the wordplay – we have very occasionally had an anagram clue with a letter missing, but not everyone will spot this.

35. I’m still confused! All the examples I’ve seen so far are of nouns being used as adjectives (stone road etc.), not adjectives being used as nouns.

36. Quite right muffin@3 and SPACE is 40 in EBCDIC if memory serves. 🤔 Happy days with core dumps.

37. Lots of fun, but I politely handed, rather than threw in, the towel thanks to the North West. Brummie’s misdirections are some of my favourites, usually because there’s something to laugh at. Many thanks!

38. Gervase@34. Sorry for misleading you! I meant to refer to this Picaroon prize from ages ago when I was on a camping holiday. I found it in my pile of incompletions and finally completed it yesterday. Hence the confusion with Vulcan. 🥺

    Anyway, comment #3: “it wasn’t timeless, it still had one T!”

    Perhaps everyone has mellowed since July…

    But I think you are right, the ease of solving allows us to overlook the slight inaccuracy.

39. Muffin@35 – Collins online defines adnoun as an adjective acting as a noun, with the example of “meek” in “blessed are the meek”.

    Thanks to Brummie and manehi

40. Ravenrider@15 I’m non-Brit, but recognised Prue from SA descent and The Great British Bake Off! I read Southern as SA. But Brummie is fun and chewy. Thanks Manehi.

41. [#38. Oops again! That Picaroon wasn’t a prize, it was a Monday “gentle start to the week”!

    Maybe I need to go for a lie down. 🥴]

42. DuncT @39
    Thanks, but doesn’t that make the definition in the clue – “describing a thing” – wrong? If it’s acting as a noun, it is a thing?

43. Lovely puzzle! Thanks Brummie and Manehi.
    I had BADDISH at 1a for a while (different sort of low, different sort of belt), which held up 1d for ages! Did anyone else go down that rabbit hole?

44. muffin @42: But the word ADNOUNAL is itself an adjective, so it is a describing word – though the ‘thing’ it describes is the use of a description as a thing. This all gets a bit fractal….

45. Is an ADNOMINAL both describing and a thing making it a sort of double definition?

46. Collins says that ADNOMINAL can be a noun or an adjective:
    noun
    A word modifying a noun
    adjective
    Of or relating to an adnoun
    adnoun
    noun
    An adjective used as a noun; absolute adjective

    I DNK Prue Leith (never watched Bake Off) and, like some others, was distracted by the host in the clue for EXTRA. I liked SADDISH, ADNOMINAL, HENRIETTA, CREATIVE ACCOUNTING, COLORADO, and SPACE BAR.

    Thanks Brummie and manehi.

47. Manehi in 4 d the anagram is of “a sheep” minus e for energy giving us “heaps”.

    Great crossword and blog. Many thanks, manehi and Brummie.

48. I loved the humour in this, especially the cruise ship, space bar, the frantic spy chief and ‘making up the numbers’. In 21ac (CLAD) I appreciate “C” for conservative is standard crossword fare for those in the know but I’m generally against these almost-arbitrary one-letter abbreviations; on the other hand, in 6d (ROMP) I’d have been happier with “Party politician following royal circle” as R for royal is indisputably standard. Sheffield hatter@31, I had the same thought about ‘no hospital’ but only briefly since, as you say, the solution was obvious. Many thanks Brummie and Manehi.

49. I put baddish in 1ac which seemed to work. Lots of good clues.

50. I stared at this one to very little avail this morning, only to watch it all slip in rapidly on the way home. I agree with those who found the bottom half easier than the top. Last one in was INDISPOSED as I always forget the hell/dis thing. Enjoyed the misdirection for EXTRA and the very funny cds for SPACE BAR and BRICK-KILN. Favourite was TIPTOE.

51. Late to the party, but there are any number of nouns so named for the substance from which they are made.
    So would words like “glass” “iron” “wood” “pot” be adnominal? A glass is clearly a noun, but also an adjective and so on

52. As far as I can remember, there is the category ‘nominals’ in linguistics covering both nouns and adjectives which in a way would solve this issue

53. sheffieldhatter@38 It brings to mind an old Simpsons joke, where Homer has a recollection of pointing out that another Homer has been allowed in the “No Homers Club”. He’s told “It’s no Homers – we’re allowed to have one!“

54. Another fun puzzle from Brummie.

55. Good fun. Always enjoy crosswords where you unravel the wordplay to reach the answer rather than spotting the definition and then parsing (or not). Thanks Brummie and Manehi

56. muffin@35: Is this any good? Nicklaus was one of the ‘greats’. He was a ‘great’.

57. Am l the only one who confidently put in ‘Shots’ for 26a as an anagram of hosts? Part of a film? The obvious answers to 29d and 20d soon put me straight. 10a made me think but otherwise an enjoyable stroll. Thanks Brummie and Manehi.

58. Alphalpha @56
    Yes, if it’s the adjective-used-as-noun way round!

    Paul @57
    I entered SHOTS too, but not confidently – it’s plural, but “part” is singular.

59. Prue Leith is very familiar; the Great British Bake-Off is one of the British shows that has found its way onto US TV. [The BBC era was broadcast here on PBS; the Channel 4 era has been on Netflix. But because flour manufacturer Pillsbury owns the US trademark to the term “bake-off” for their own very long-running amateur baking competition, the show is called “The Great British Baking Show” in North America.]

    I tried BADDISH instead of SADDISH, and I think it also fits: bash=belt=hit; bad=low in a morality sense.

60. Robi @46 has clarified for me that ADNOMINAL can have two distinct meanings:
    1 adjective
    2 relating to an adjective used as a noun

    (1) seems to be the intended meaning here, but (2) is surely the more unique, interesting sense. And indeed this latter is how the term was used by the same setter back in 2014, and glossed unambiguously by the same blogger, so that apart from the expected nho’s no confusion arose then about the term’s meaning.

    8D my COD of course. Thanks to Brummie & manehi.

61. For the reasons stated by mrpenney@59, this particular expat US resident had no problem at all with Leith – in fact as I read the clue I was thinking to myself, I hope this is the PRUeish rather than the Scottish sense.

62. Normal service has been resumed.

    I can solve 10a. That’s it!

    I have no idea what’s going on.

63. Steffen @62
    Very impressed! I wouldn’t have got 10a without the crossers!

64. Steffen@62 I’ve been staring at this crossword on and off all day, only just finished it, I couldn’t believe the comments about it being straightforward! And ADNOMINAL was one of my last ones in. Try glancing at it throughout the day, and remember each clue has a straight definition (almost always at the beginning or end) so if you’re getting frustrated try and choose the likely straight definitions and treat it as a quick crossword.

65. Travelling so just done it. Lovely puzzle full of riches. Thanks Brummie and blogger. Just a thought for those new to cryptics especially those over the oceans it pays to know the ins and outs of cricket!

66. James@43 I went down that rabbit hole twice – first with LADDISH and then BADDISH – before making a successful third descent.

67. Never heard of Prue Leith.

68. Nobody think FELL might work for bank drop?
    Doesn’t cause tensions, though.

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