Financial Times 16,402 by VELIA

16 comments on “Financial Times 16,402 by VELIA”

1. There seems to be a problem with 5d. The anagram fodder gives SIGNALMEN (which is the answer I gave) whereas the definition suggests a singular.

2. Thanks Velia! nice puzzle and blog.  I too noticed the apparently superfluous homophone indicate for FAWN (maybe there was a faun called Bambi :).

   I really liked the deconstructed clue — took me a while to be willing to deconstruct deconstructed.

3. Good point Hovis@1… I’d assumed the singular and was a bit lax in checking the letters.

4. Oh, well.
   I was hoping to come here to find sympathy in a problematical solve only to find that the rest of you seem to have though it a Monday doddle, damn.
   Seeing Velia as the setter, I thought ‘Good-oh’ because I’m great fan.
   But I have to agree with Hovis re SIGNALM{A}N which I don’t think works in the indicated plural. DISULFIDE seems to be an exclusively American spelling (Chambers doesn’t give it). SONG CYCLE was also a bit duplicitous, I thought, with ‘Ring Cycle’ hovering, FAWN is iffy and GRAND MARCH again rather weak.. All of these slowed me up today.
   Still, GHOST-WRITE and DREAMCATCHER were good fun in the Velia tradition, so perhaps I’m just having a bad morning.
   Thanks to all.

5. GB @2. That’s interesting about Chambers. It does have SULFIDE but not DISULFIDE. The former is listed as US spelling although I thought it had become acceptable UK spelling some years ago so I didn’t even question it. Are there any chemists out there who can clarify?

6. I suppose at a railway worker’s wedding there could be an honour guard (collective) of signalmen, but it’s a bit of a stretch.

7. Morning all!

   Please accept apologies for the mistake @ 5dn. Many thanks to Teacow and others for your comments. Have a lovely day. Velia

8. Hovis @ 5: I am not a chemist but I do know that the IUPAC – the international body that decides chemical nomenclature – only allows for two alternatively spelled element names, and ‘sulfur’ (their spelling) is not one of them. The two are ‘aluminium’ and ‘caesium’. I’m sure I also once read – although I can’t remember where, so take this with a pinch of salt – that the original British spelling was in fact ‘sulfur’ and the ‘f’ was only changed to ‘ph’ in relatively recent times based on an erroneous presumption of the word having Greek origins.

   I don’t have much to add to what has already been said about this puzzle. Of course one is tempted to say it was completely spoiled by the aforementioned errors – although not acknowledged by Velia/Fran @ 7, I do feel the non-homophone in 10a is also a mistake – and a few other minor niggles, but that would be an exaggeration. Last year I went with some friends to see a stand up comedian who was heckled for a while by a drunken idiot. After the show some of my friends agreed the heckler had “completely ruined the night” for them. It seemed that one relatively short-lived annoyance had somehow wiped away all their memories of laughing heartily for most of the rest of the show. Such is human nature.

   Thanks to all.

9. I did a little more digging on sulphur/sulfur after reading your comment Angstony. I remember now that the F spelling has been allowed on Countdown, where American spellings are disallowed. It seems that the RSC nomenclature committee approved the F spelling back in 1992.

10. Grant @4. I,too, found it a bit tough. Not quite as straightforward as a normal Monday.

    Thanks both.

11. Thanks, Velia and Teacow. Loved 3D and 11D, and 1/23. I had no real problem with 5D if a “guard” means a group guarding? Are the Signalmen a regiment? I served in the US National Guard.

12. KEEPSAKE made me smile. Thanks, Velia. 3d was practically a write-in for me — I visited the Motown Museum last summer so I picked up the misdirect of Diana fairly quickly. Thanks Teacow for parsing.

13. I think signalmen is ok for guard. I mean, the Changing of the Guard, would not be spectacle if it only involved one bloke.

14. Thanks Velia and Teacow

    Good degree of difficulty for a Monday puzzle.  Had similar issues with SIGNALMEN (which I notice in the official solution is SIGNALMAN, so the anagrist is wrong) and FAWN.

    Hadn’t seen GRAND MARCH, SONG CYCLE, DESULFIDE or SITOPHOBIA before and completely missed the Diana Ross SUPREMES (doh!) in the parsing of 3d.

    Finished with those four unknowns in around 40 minutes.

15. Just to add to some comments above, I thought at the time that the guard, as opposed to guard by itself, as in changing of the guard, was ok for a plural. Given Bruce’s comment, it seems to be a genuine error.

16. Thanks Velia and Teacow: I enjoyed this puzzle, except for 19a.

    13d was great. 1a, although easy, was nice!

    Only a small thing: ET TU, meaning in Latin you too (rather than and you) is two words rather than one.

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