Guardian Prize 27,429 by Paul

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A typically witty and eclectic puzzle from Paul.

With one exception this all fell into place easily enough, although one word was unfamiliar.  I have been unable to explain one clue (8 down) to my satisfaction, but there is much else to admire, including an & lit clue at 11 across and a typical Paul toilet reference slipped in at 3 down.  I particularly liked the clues for BED-HOPPING and SWEAR LIKE A TROOPER.

completed grid
Across
9 RATIONALE Reason one is entertained by beer-swilling vermin? (9)
1 in RAT ON ALE.
10 ADELE Singer of serenade, Lennon (5)
Hidden in “serenade Lennon”.
11 TROTTER Extremity of foot on swine? (7)
(foo)T ROTTER.  I think that this qualifies as an &lit clue, where the definition and the wordplay are one and the same.
12   See 16
13 EXPO Attractive person shaved for public display (4)
(s)EXPO(t).
14 BEDHOPPING Sleeping around, breed regularly like rabbits? (3-7)
BrEeD, HOPPING (like rabbits).
16, 12 CURRENTAFFAIRS Possible shocker, business news (7,7)
A charade of CURRENT (which might shock you) and AFFAIRS (business).
17 SENATOR Reason Trump needs bottom wiped, incompetent US politician (7)
*(REASON T(rump)).  I was convinced that the answer was going to be SHYSTER, but couldn’t parse it.  It’s interesting that SENATOR and TREASON are anagrams, although Paul hasn’t chosen to exploit that in this clue.  The surface reading is unlikely to offend many Guardian readers.
19 EXPRESSION Phrase, fast one working (10)
EXPRESS 1 ON.
22 MARC Brandy, stuff knocked back (4)
CRAM (rev).  Marc is the name for grapeskins, or for brandy made from them.
24 PILOTED Very many in dish with 24 blackbirds, say? Then bird finally flew (7)
LOT in PIE, (bir)D.  The reference is to the nursery rhyme Sing a Song of Sixpence, which contains the line “Four and twenty blackbirds baked in a pie”.  An explanation can be found here.
25 TIMPANI Those in the pit not entirely fearful about God (7)
PAN (God) in TIMI(d).  The pit here is the orchestra pit.
26 REEVE Thread referring to the night before (5)
RE EVE.
27, 2 SWEAR LIKE A TROOPER Noble Swedish retailer, tucking into terribly poor stew, right to curse privately? (5,4,1,7)
EARL IKEA in *(POOR STEW) R.  The definition is nicely allusive.
Down
1 BROTHEL CREEPERS The Spanish worm has filled comrades’ shoes (7,8)
EL CREEP in BROTHERS.  I needed several crossers before the penny finally dropped.
2   See 27
3 POTTY Training target absurd (5)
Double definition; Paul has something of a penchant for clues referring to toilets.
4 HAIRIEST Most dangerous horse finally caught by girl in Kentucky Derby, perhaps? (8)
(hors)E in IRIS (girl) in HAT (a Derby is an American term for a bowler hat, hence “Kentucky”).
5 SERAPH God rises over local angel (6)
ARES (rev) over PH (pub, or local).
6 HALF A PINT Clue about a drink describing strong little tipple (4,1,4)
F(strong) in (“describing”) A LAP (drink) in HINT (clue).  Quite a complex structure, but pretty obvious once a few crossers were in place.
7 GEMINI Body removed from grave? Little sign (6)
G(rav)E MINI.
8 MESSAGE RECEIVED I’ve got your communication, as by some modem or nanotechnology? (7,8)
I am struggling to explain this, unless by “nanotechnology” Paul is referring to “microphone”.  There doesn’t seem to be any wordplay that I can find.  See now NeilW’s explanation of the hidden words @2.
15 SEVENTEEN Figure gathering spotted coats (9)
EVENT (gathering) in SEEN (spotted).
17 SHORT LEG Why the limp position? (5,3)
A position on the cricket field (apologies to US solvers!)
18 TIA MARIA Tiny boy penning a song for a drink (3,5)
A in TIM (Tiny lad, as in Tiny Tim from A Christmas Carol), ARIA.
20 POLLEX Cut off old thumb (6)
POLL (cut) EX.  This was a word I didn’t know.
21 SADIST Pious type caging a wicked god, the brute (6)
A DIS (wicked god) in ST (pious type).  Dis is another name for Pluto, or Hades, in classical mythology.
23 SMART Stylish sting (5)
Double definition.

*anagram

26 comments on “Guardian Prize 27,429 by Paul”

  1. Thanks bridgesong.  8D baffled me too: only the crossers gave the answer.  Quick googling shows the 17A device has been in regular use since puzzle 25,941 (Paul’s fat bottom wiped — fabulous! > MYTHIC) – most recently on 31 January.  Hate to see him clean up his act and deny us gems like POTTY.  POLLEX was the last to be extracted.

  3. Thanks NeilW@2 for explaining the inexplicable (for bridgesong, molonglo and me) in 8d. I stared at this one for so long and did not see those hiddens!. Very clever indeed (clever of Paul the setter and Neil the solver!)

    26a REEVE in the sense of (a?) thread was new to me, and like bridgesong, I was unfamiliar with POLLEX at 20d so only got those two from the wordplay. I loved 17a SENATOR, although prior to solving 18d TIA MARIA (another favourite) and before I spotted the anagram, I had been tempted to biff in an unparsed SANDERS which used two of the crossers. Although Bernie S. he is far from incompetent IMO – however I thought if the definition was “US politician” it might work in some way. 1d BROTHEL CREEPERS and 3d POTTY were other smile-provoking solutions – Paul being wicked!

    Thanks a million to Paul for a great puzzle and bridgesong for a great blog.

  4. Sorry about the grammatical booboo – forgot to delete the “he” – and it is not a proper sentence either!

    “Although Bernie S. is far from incompetent IMO…

     

  5. Thanks to Paul and bridgesong. POLLEX defeated me (and my spell-checker) and I did not parse MESSAGE RECEIVED, but even as a US solver I’ve learned enough cricket terms to get SHORT LEG. Lots of fun..

  6. I thought this was relatively easy for a Paul prize puzzle (who doesn’t love an alliteration?). A few DNK and like most, biffed 8dn when the crossers made it obvious. Also nice to have clues that raise a smile POTTY and BROTHEL CREEPERS to mention but two.

  7. Thanks bridgesong. Like the others I was left puzzling unsuccessfully over the explanation for 8d and POLLEX was new to me, I stared at POLLED for some time.

  8. Gotta love Paul! Where do I even begin? BROTHELCREEPERS was my LOI, and I basically got all the other across answers to get it. Then I had to look it up to make sure. Other “nudge-and-wink” favorites were POTTY, BEDHOPPING and the hilarious swipe at you-know-who in SENATOR. Leave it to a pro like Paul to forgo the all-too-obvious SENATOR/TREASON anagram. Anyone else probably would have said something like “Corrupt senator’s crime(7)”, and left it at that. Not Paul. He did, however, use the same wordplay for SEVENTEEN that I’ve seen all too often before. Yes. EVENT goes inside SEEN. we get it. Use whatever different words in the clue you want, it’s still the same thing. But I won’t hold it against him. Wasn’t sure about POLL meaning “cut” in POLLEX, or REEVE meaning “thread”, and of course, being an American knowing nothing about cricket whatsoever, I had to look up SHORTLEG as well. I had seen TIAMARIA in a past cryptic, though. Also, I had always heard it was “swear like a SAILOR”, not TROOPER, and I totally missed the hidden words in “soMEMOdem” and “naNOTEchnology”. Thanks NeilW, for pointing that out. I also hadn’t realized Paul had said “Kentucky Derby” to signify that “derby” is just an American term. I never knew Brits don’t use that word, they just call it a “bowler hat”. I kept wondering why IRIS was supposed to be a Kentucky girl’s name! Love your work, Paul! Keep it up!

  9. Thanks Paul and bridgesong

    In contrast to all the praise, I thought the clue for EXPO was terrible. An obscure word for an “attractive person” topped and tailed to give an obscure word for a “public display”?

    I did like TROTTER.

  11. Thanks for parsing MESSAGE RECEIVED which had me stumped.

    POLLEX and REEVE in that sense were new – and I think you could say I biffed TROTTER because the wordplay passed me by completely leaving only a barely disguised definition.

  12. A real treat, all in all, from Paul.  I had some difficulties:

    Like others, I couldn’t parse MESSAGE RECEIVED, and even NeilW’s explanation doesn’t really convince me, sorry!  Just had to write-in.

    When I got to POLLEX, I was sure it was spelt “Pollux”, like the star (which is in the constellation GEMINI, as it happens – and is also one of the Twins in Greek mythology).  Had to look that one up.

    MARC was a new word to me (my almost-TT habit doesn’t help!) but easy enough to write in from the crossers.

    I think I missed the wordplay in TROTTER – can’t recall now.  Often happens with &lit clues which one reads as cryptic defs.

    Loved the surface of SENATOR – as I’m sure many fellow-solvers did (sympathies to those who weren’t amused 🙂 ).

    BROTHEL CREEPERS took a long time to jog my memory – but eventually something clicked.

    Some of the double-defs were really cool – like POTTY and SMART!

    So we come to ADELE.  Although pop culture is my ‘weakest link’ in cruciverbalising, I had indeed heard of the (present-day) singer.  But I was helped by also bringing to mind the character in the Strauss operetta Die Fledermaus.  This must surely be a good excuse to put up a link to Florence Foster Jenkins’s (who else saw the movie?) hilarious mis-rendering of it!  Enjoy!

    Thanks to Paul for a super Prize, and bridgesong.

  14. Good, middle of the road Paul. I couldn’t work out MESSAGE RECEIVED either but it became obvious with the crossers in. I did like the cheeky EXPO and TROTTER.
    Thanks Paul

  15. Thanks to Paul and Bridgesong. Loved this and thought it was a fabulous puzzle. I like puzzles which both challenge me and raise a smile when the penny drops (in a couple of cases a laugh out loud). Thought it was going to be a problem at first but it gradually unfolded. For me it was like 4 puzzles which each corner going in turn, SE, NE, NW and finally SW with pollex last one in. Particularly liked potty (a laugh out loud) bed hopping and brothel creepers, though too many good clues to mention, and another who could not parse 8d. Thanks again to Paul and Bridgesong.

  16. muffin@9 I frequently agree with what you say, but today I must differ; I thought EXPO was a great clue.  I appreciated the innuendo of a sexpot being shaved and then being put on (pubic) display.

     

    Thanks to Paul and bridgesong – I needed you for 8d!

  17. Couldn’t finish this one. Unfortunately I knew neither POLLEX nor poll as “cut” (although I knew the related pollard). I biffed HAIRIEST, where I had the opposite problem to Patjberry, not knowing that Derby was American for “bowler”. Also failed to get SEVENTEEN — no excuse there, though. I couldn’t parse MESSAGE RECEIVED either. Thanks to NeilW for the parsing, and bridgesong for the others. Didn’t know MARC, but got it from the wordplay.

    Favouites were: 11, TROTTER; 14, BED-HOPPING; 7, GEMINI, 17d SHORT LEG

  23. Thanks Paul and Bridgesong

    While I thought this was better,or less patchy, than some of Paul’s recent puzzles have been, I thought 8 was a dreadful clue. Insoluble without at least a handful of crossers, iffy wordplay at best, and a completely redundant ‘AS’ in the middle of the clue.

  24. Thanks Tony, for pointing out I had a great clue for TREASON and not SENATOR. Sort of the point I was trying to make, the latter leading so easily to the former. One would have easily led to the other either way. A better way to say it for SENATOR might go something like this:
    Treason ruined politician(7)
    Just off the top of my head. In my haste I had obviously clued the wrong anagram the first time. Being an amateur cryptic setter myself, I should know better. Thanks again Tony, for setting me straight. See you on Monday most likely!

  25. [Good one, Pat. Or maybe, to up the difficulty slightly:

    Politician’s ruined, the reason he stepped down

    Have you got any puzzles on the internet, btw?]

  26. Several weeks too late, but must have a whinge about 25a. Speaking as an ex timpanist, I thought the definition “those in the pit” to be woefully vague and inadequate. As well as instruments, there are quite a few other things in the pit! What next? Those in the shop? Those in the street? Those in the city? Those on the planet? The only mitigating factor was the indication of plurality.

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