Guardian Cryptic crossword No 29,806 by Vulcan

by

The puzzle may be found at https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/cryptic/29806.

Vulcan opens the week with aplomb; nothing too elaborate or obscure, but with enough meat to keep most solvers happy.

ACROSS
9 EARMARKED
Are strangely stressed and reserved (9)
A charade of EAR, an anagram (‘strangely’) of ‘are’ plus MARKED (‘stressed’).
10 AMINO
Sort of acid, do you find me? Not at all (5)
A charade of AM I? (‘do you find me?’) plus NO (‘not at all’).
11 TAUNTON
Relative settles in to new town … (7)
An envelope (‘settles in’) of AUNT (‘relative’) in ‘to’ plus N (‘new’).
12 UNCLEAN
… her husband has article needing a wash (7)
A charade of UNCLE (‘her husband’ – of the AUNT in the previous clue) plus AN (indefinite ‘article’).
13 VILE
Heart ripped out of French town is horrible (4)
VI[l]LE (‘French town’ – town in French) minus its middle letter (‘heart ripped out’).
14 LEFT-HANDED
Not using pen the right way? (4-6)
Cryptic definition.
15 RED CARD
Heart perhaps what will stop you playing any more (3,4)
Double definition; bridge and soccer often feature in crossword clues, and here they are together.
17 PILED UP
Where choice food is brought back for pet to eat, all in a heap (5,2)
An envelope (‘for … to eat’) of ILED, a reversal (‘brought back’) of DELI (‘where choice food is’) in PUP (‘pet’).
19 HEAD-TO-HEAD
Make for senior teacher for such a direct confrontation (4-2-4)
A charade of HEAD TO (‘make for’) plus HEAD (‘senior teacher’).
22 AVER
A most reduced state (4)
A charade of ‘a’ plus VER[y] (‘most’) minus its last letter (‘reduced’).
23 SNIFFER
Working dog, one with a cold perhaps (7)
Definition and literal interprtation.
24 THAT’S IT
There’s the problem: I’ve lost all patience (5,2)
Double definition.
26 DORIC
An order from duke: cut off Yorick’s extremities (5)
A charade of D (‘duke’) plus ‘[y]oric[k]’ minus its outer letters (‘cut off … extremities’). DORIC is an order of classical Greek architecture.
27 CLIMB DOWN
From summit, all one can do is make concessions (5,4)
Definition and literal interpretation.
DOWN
1 WENT OVER THE SIDE
Fell off boat in Devonshire (tweet circulated) (4,4,3,4)
An anagram (‘circulated’) of ‘Devonshire tweet’.
2 TROUBLED
Older, but dreadfully worried (8)
An anagram (‘dreadfully’) of ‘older but’.
3 FAST
Observe Ramadan ahead of time? (4)
Double definition.
4 SKINHEAD
Aggressive lad had Nikes for running about (8)
An anagram (‘for running about’) of ‘had Nikes’.
5 ADJUST
Notice gravy needs time to regulate (6)
A charade of AD (advertisement, ‘notice’) plus JUS (‘gravy’ – I would say that a gravy was a sauce, likely incorporating the roasting juices (jus), but dictionaries seem to think that the two can be synonymous) plus T (‘time’).
6 CATCH-ALL
What good fielder should do, covering every eventuality (5-3)
Definition and literal interpretation.
7 BIG END
Offer to retain information for part of engine (3,3)
An envelope (‘to retain’) of GEN (‘information’) in BID (‘offer’).
8 JOINED-UP WRITING
No letter is ever printed in this (6-2,7)
Cryptic definition.
16 ARTEFACT
Greasy spoon turned up in cooked tart, one hand-made (8)
An envelope (‘in’) of EFAC, a reversal (‘turned up’ in a down light) of CAFÉ (‘greasy spoon’ – indication by example) in ARTT, an anagram (‘cooked’) of ‘tart’.
17 PLANTAIN
Into the ground put a popular tropical crop (8)
A charade of PLANT (‘into the ground put’ – odd order, and the clue would read equally well with ‘put’ up front) plus ‘a’ plus IN (‘popular’).
18 DIVISION
Conflict died, I dream (8)
A charade of D (‘died’) plus ‘I’ plus VISION (‘dream’).
20 AVIARY
Area to change, incorporating one large cage (6)
An envelope (‘incorporating’) of I (‘one’) in A (‘area’) plus VARY (‘change’).
21 HORACE
Getting changed a chore for old poet (6)
An anagram (‘getting changed’) of ‘a chore’, for the Roman poet Quintus Horatius Flaccus.
25 ABBA
A popular group, whichever way you look at it (4)
A palindrome.

picture of the completed grid

61 comments on “Guardian Cryptic crossword No 29,806 by Vulcan”

  1. I couldn’t be bothered poring over a UK atlas to discover TAUNTON, but the parsing was straightforward once I had the intersecting clues. I didn’t know engines had a big end. I guess a lot of things do. And calling a dog a sniffer is new to me.

    Nothing too obscure, and a pleasant solve. My first in was ABBA.

  2. Knew that the big end is the thing that makes the crankshaft go round, but have only met Doric as a column, dnk it denoted an entire architectural order. Sniffer dogs are the airport ones, as opposed to tracker dogs for crime scenes etc. All good, ta V n PO.

  3. I’ll admit that usually when I see Vulcan’s name at the top it doesn’t make my day, but I quite enjoyed this. Maybe it’s just after being brutalised by Enigmatist over the weekend that I needed something tractable!

  4. Pretty straightforward solve. I enjoyed AVIARY and ARTEFACT, the latter just for the differences in the way we use words in the States versus the way you do. For us, a greasy spoon would be a dive or a diner. A cafe would be considered as a nice little restaurant. Thank you to Vulcan and to PeterO.

  5. … and in my part of the world a greasy spoon would be just that. Put it in the dishwasher bro. But I like Vulcan’s puzzles always and I enjoy the way his clues are a lot of fun as opposed to just being difficult for the sake of it. I know, I know, each to their own. I find clues like SNIFFER (for a dog with a cold) and the surface for VILE, among others, both gettable and immensely enjoyable. Thanks PeterG and Vulcan of course.

  6. Pleasant, as always with Vulcan; I knew there would be fun wordplay. Favourites LEFT-HANDED and HEAD-TO-HEAD. The two relatives are easy once you know they are spouses, so it didn’t matter that I didn’t know TAUNTON. Thanks Vulcan and PeterO!

  7. I had to smile at SKINHEAD as no skinhead worth their Ben Sherman’s would be seen dead in Nikes. Great surface.
    Whenever I see DORIC, it always reminds me of a Punch cartoon from many years ago (funny what sticks in the brain) with two binmen with the old galvanised bins which either had smooth sides or sides with corrugations in them. The caption is one saying to the other, “what’s yours Alf, Doric or Corinthian?”

  8. Nice gentle start to Monday morning. I particularly liked the long anagram for WENT OVER THE SIDE.

    Thanks Vulcan and PeterO

  9. That was a pleasant start to the week, thanks Vulcan and PeterO.
    My only hiccup was thinking the anagram fodder for 4d was “Nikes for” and spending a minute trying to see how foreskin could be an aggressive lad.

  10. My fastest Guardian outing in quite some time, helped by seeing the long one at 1D straight away. Good fun as always from Vulcan. I liked the AUNT and UNCLE.

    Thanks Vulcan and PeterO

  11. Thanks Vulcan and PeterO
    Very enjoyable. I liked how the ellipsis was actually meaningful between 11 and 12, and DORIC another favourite.
    As a chemist I winced at AMINO being defined as “sort of acid”, as the amine group is the part of the molecule that isn’t the acid, but I accept that it’s in common usage.

  12. Great Monday stuff from Vulcan as usual. A steady solve with a few chewier bits If you’re on wavelength with the cryptics a great way to start the week. Thankfully Inwas today with only JOINED-UP WRITING needing a longer think.

    Liked the TAUNTON and UNCLEAN connected clues.

    Thanks Vulcan and PeterO

  13. Yes, it was typical Vulcan fare but they are always enjoyable. I liked AMINO, RED CARD and CLIMB DOWN plus the married couple. HORACE makes another appearance after last week.

    Ta Vulcan & PeterO.

  14. Just echoing the general consensus above, in how pleasant and enjoyable this was. Lately I feel as though I’ve found a number of puzzles more difficult than how other people have found them: not a problem in itself, but it’s nice to be part of the crowd today.

  15. Very smooth., except that I found the PLANTAIN clue a bit Yoda-esque. The bloggers comment was what I felt, too.

    Enjoyed the way the 2 ellipsis clues actually worked together… not always the case with some setters.

    Many thanks both.

  17. Another ellipsis connection fan here. Otherwise nothing mind-blowing but nothing bad either. Solid. Thanks Peter and Vulcan.

  18. Agree with William @15 about 17d being Yoda-esque. It did mislead my better half to start with, with “into the” as fodder for the anagrind “ground” — which I suspect may have been Vulcan’s intention.
    Very enjoyable Monday morning outing.
    Joined-up writing made us both LOL.

  19. Lovely Monday puzzle. Like everyone else I particularly liked the parental siblings: not only is the ellipsis meaningful, but the solutions are adjacent in the grid.

    I agree with muffin @11 that the clue for AMINO works for crossword purposes although it’s chemically nonsensical – rather like saying ‘centre’ is a type of ‘left’.

    Thanks to Vulcan and PeterO

  20. Eoink@9 I made the same initial error. In my defence (?), there used to be a London skinhead band in the late 70’s/early ‘80’s called “The Four Skins”!

  22. What everybody else said*. I look forward to Vulcan’s puzzles in the same way I used to look forward to Rufus’s.
    *Except that I don’t get the quibbles about AMINO. An amino acid is a sort of acid in the same way as nitric and hydrochloric are. Perhaps even more so, as there are several of them (over 500 in fact).

  23. A solid and unspectacular Monday puzzle. Favourites were the TAUNTON/UNCLEAN pair, JOINED-UP WRITING, and the nice spot on the long anagram for 1D.

  24. Entertaining Monday solve, although I couldn’t get going in the NW corner for a while. Thanks Eoink @9 for the amusing tale of your wrong anagram. Another big like for UNCLEAN with the clever ellipsis, RED CARD for the dd and JOINED-UP WRITING, which was not printed. I DNK that DORIC could be just an order.

    Thanks Vulcan and PeterO.

  25. Blaise @22
    It’s that metonymy again. Yes, an amino acid is an acid, as it contains an acid group. It also has an amine group, which is not an acid. So chemically it only works if the full “amino acid” is given. “Amino” is standing metonymically for “amino acid”.

  26. Blaise @22: You’ve missed the point. Certainly, a chemist might say that an amino acid was a type of acid. But they would never say that an AMINO was a type of acid.

  27. So what kinds/types of acid are there? Well there’s nitric, amino, citric, lysergic, deoxyribonucleic, uric and fatty. Not said by any chemist ever.

  29. Thanks for the puzzle to Vulcan, and PeterO for the blog. I love it when I don’t have to “look anything up”. 24a THAT’S IT was my favourite.

  31. Well, at least SKINHEAD wasn’t defined as racist lad. But as it is it is still pretty broad brush. A class based trope?

  32. Glad not to be a chemist this morning, so AMINO posed no (incomprehensible to me) problems, unlike VILE, where for some reason my brain insisted that the answer had to be the four middle letters of some unknown French town – until the light eventually dawned. I liked the aunt and uncle and the RED CARD. Thanks Vulcan for a crossword I can do – Enigmatist is still unfinished and likely to remain so.

  34. Ed @30 You have been here a few times recently to enlighten us about how rapidly you completed the crossword. I remember it was ‘less than 20 minutes’ spent on Carpathian last Monday, I remember.You don’t seem to have picked up that it is considered bad form on this forum to mention, even less to brag about, solving times. No one is impressed by it, and it can only serve to demoralise less expert solvers who are still trying to master the art. I hope I speak for more than myself in asking that you please desist from doing it.

  35. Thank you for the blog, PeterO.
    Sorry but I’m afraid I still don’t understand the connection between “am I” and “do you find me” in 10A. (Characters in The Wire often said, “do you feel me?”, so perhaps this is the same sort of thing…)
    AMINO was a crossed-finger guess: there aren’t many acids that start with A and end with O. I can see why Muffin is troubled but I’ve come to the conclusion that “sort of” in a clue is on a par with “somewhere in”. I find both annoyingly vague and every bit as frustrating as random names being clued as man, boy, girl, etc – but this seems to be one of the instances where vagueness is acceptable in crosswordland.
    I also started out with FORESKIN: but that would be more likely in a Cyclops crossword…
    LEFT-HANDED made me smile.
    Thanks Vulcan

  37. Balfour @ 34 I agree – as someone still learning (and got a long way to go) I find it very demoralising.

    TimC @7 – Thanks – that made me smile – I will try to remember it.

    Gladys @ 32 – me too re Enigmatist – can’t even parse some of the ones I did get…….

    Lovely puzzle – thanks Vulcan and PeterO

  39. Muffin @ 38 Thanks no I hadn’t heard of it. Will have a look

    On Saturday I did however turn to the Julius puzzle in the FT which I very much enjoyed.

  40. A FAST solve this may have been for some, (ten minutes so far breasting the tape in first place) but in my case that was my very last one in, after quite a bit of puzzled thought, trying to find an equivalent three lettered word for Ramadan followed by T for Time

  41. Very enjoyable — thanks Vulcan and PeterO. I too baulked at the word order in 17D and was fearful of making an entry, but got courage once I thought of Stein’s advice in Lord Jim: “In the destructive element immerse!”

  42. The “do you find me” is puzzling, but I thought of “Am I/do you find me inconsiderate?”

    Here in the US I’ve occasionally seen something described on a menu as “with au jus sauce.”

    gdu@1 Your comment that a lot of things have a big end reminded me of the Lilliputians, who had a war with neighboring Blefuscu about whether one should open an egg at the big end or the little end — the Big-Endians fought the Little-Endians.

    Thanks to Vulcan for the puzzle and to PeterO for the help.

  43. Ed@30 I don’t believe you. Agree with Balfour@34. Thanks to PeterO for clearing up some parsings- I found Amigo somewhat incomprehensible.

  44. I’m another who agrees with @34 Balfour. I finished Enigmatist on Saturday and will no doubt be deflated by endless ‘at the gentler end of the spectrum for this setter’ comments next week.

  45. Got through this fairly steadily, but messed up 19a with HAND TO HAND for a long time. I fixed the first HEAD but not the second, so dnf. Mostly enjoyable clues, without too many standouts. 24a THAT’S IT was charming, 4d SKINHEAD a decent surface. I grudgingly entered 14a LEFT-HANDED!

    I know 7d BIG END from Flanders and Swann. Complaining about a car taking his parking spot: “What can I do? Maybe stick pins into a wax model of his big end!”

    Wellbeck@35, Valentine@42, Yes, I think it’s “Am I / Do you find me attractive?”

  46. Dave F @44. In addition to not mentioning solving times, on the site policies page of this forum it says “Prize puzzles should not be discussed, or commented on in detail, until the appropriate post has been published after the closing date for entries”.

  47. Crispy @46 It wasn’t in detail, I just named the setter and said I finished it. I’m also not the first to mention it but I’m the first to be pulled up so I presume you just didn’t like my post.

  48. Dave F. Apologies – you’re right, you’re not the only one. But I infer that you don’t normally finish Enigmatist puzzles, so the comment is saying you’ve solved it in a quicker time than normal. A bit like the commenter with his solving time.

  50. Chardonneret @43 Thank you for joining with me in the excoriation of Ed @30. Just to add that I apologise for the repetition of ‘I remember’ in my post. That is what happens when you stop to take a phone call in mid-sentence and then go and make lunch during the editing time.

  51. I enjoyed this while still not finding it “gentle” – my problem with Vulcan is that I look for hidden depths while not seeing what’s right in front of me in clear sight.

    I thought AMINO was my last in but realised I hadn’t solved 3d, not because it was hard but because I had skipped past it!

    Like others I enjoyed the uncle and aunt linked by an ellipsis – I wonder if this was planned or fortuitous? And the “Yoda-esque” put in 17d was also amusing, not to mention the misunderstood lad in 4d wearing Nike instead of Doc Martens. Hilarious.

    Thanks to Vulcan and PeterO for an entertaining solve and blog.

  52. 58Dave @21.
    I challenge anyone to amend the following to comply with the no preposition ending “rule”.
    Child to father at bedtime:
    “Dad, what did you bring that book I didn’t want be read out of up for?”

  53. The bloggers have some responsibility in setting the tone on what’s easy. My attempt at the previous Enigmatist prize had the penetrative impact of a juvenile skylark glancing off a jumbo jet. I came to the blog for enlightenment, only to be told it had been “less daunting” than some. If the role of this blog is merely explanation, then that’s fine. If it is also encouragement, then it feels wrong. We know the bloggers are brilliant; maybe their collective blind spot is gauging difficulty.

    I am less bothered if commenters share their relative experience. If a solve has gone swimmingly well, where better to do that? I’m not suggesting we start sharing solving times but The Guardian app supplies them and The Indie and The Times have live timers, so it’s part of the culture and it’s understandable that it happens. There are many ways of underlining one’s superior skills without sharing a clock reading and they are all used in the comments I never had the slightest pang of demoralisation when, for example, Roz would tell us she hadn’t been taxed in months. People are always helpful when someone asks a question and that’s the important thing. I have been assisted, educated and encouraged by this site on my journey to becoming a reasonable solver. Many of you will always be better, and a large subset will make that abundantly obvious; it’s fine by me.

  55. Balfour@34: +1, well said.
    Chardonneret@43: I don’t believe him either.
    Valentine@42: thanks for reminding me of the egg dispute! (Little-endian and big-endian went on to become computing terms). Also thank you and others for explaining “am I”, which had me puzzled.
    And thanks to all the bloggers for their sterling work.

  56. Simon@54. I would submit that a child who can construct a sentence like that doesn’t need anyone reading to them!

  57. Yes, Simon S @54. It’s not hard,is it? The ‘sentence must not end in a preposition’ convention (I will not dignify it with ‘rule’) is one of the ridiculous, unnatural affectations foisted upon English by 18th-Century grammarians who tried to model ‘correct’ English based on Latin, a language with completely different linguistic structures. The frowned upon ‘split infinitive’ is another.

  58. Jeceris@52, who was it who said “Ending a sentence with a preposition is something up with which I will not put”?

  59. GDU @58
    As 58Dave posted earlier, it’s attributed to Churchill.

    Balfour @57
    Yes on split infinitives. It was only frowned upon by grammarians because it was impossible to do . . . in Latin!

  60. Geoff Down Under @58

    It is attributed to Winston Churchill who was fed up with some civil servant or SPAD correcting his writing.

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