Guardian 28,454 – Vlad

83 comments on “Guardian 28,454 – Vlad”

1. I think the wordplay in 28 must be Can = toilet= convenience, scoff = food. Thanks for parsing 22 which eluded me.
   Thanks Vlad and Andrew.

2. Agree with Mark (the other one) @1 on 28ac – I was wondering at that point whether toilets were going to be a theme. I could not believe 1ac: I comment on coincidences occasionally but for a strange phrase such as that to have arisen twice in a few days is remarkable. (Less remarkable, but I think MERC is also a recent occurrence).

   A decent test from Vlad – I couldn’t parse DEARIE and the French phrase was lost on me: lucky it was an anagram which forced the last word to be FAUT and not FAIT which, in my ignorance, I’d have gone for. I was wised up to the statesman in 5d which was pleasing – but, as Andrew predicted – fell into the BAKING trap (guessing that bag might equate to chore – not my bag, not my thing, not my job…..) but not for long as 1ac was surely an anagram and containing no B. EUCALYPTI my favourite today -even though an initial E had me correctly guessing the involvement of EMUs somewhere. The anagram element is superb.

   Thanks Vlad and Andrew

3. Good thinking Mark – so that gives a toilet reference in rows 1 and 15…

4. Had to pop in as parsing for DEARIE eluded. (Huge relief, Andrew, my first Guardian miss in quite a while!) That apart, is this the gentlest Vlad ever?
   Many thanks both and all

5. Pretty sure i have never heard The Usual Offices used in common parlance but it is bound to crop up now . .

6. So we have two cans at 1ac and 28, a CAN envelope in CLEVELAND, a hidden CAN in SCANDALISE, and a CAN sandwich in CAMPION.

   [And now I see we have a canny (new ?) poster @5 😉 ]

   Is it Moulin Rouge Day? Or can it be coincidence? I suspect it can.

   Thanks to the museum.

7. As usual found Vlad’s puzzle difficult but I too found the top half easier and made good progress there – then ground to a halt and needed a lot of help with the bottom half.

   Liked TOODLE-PIP, OKLAHOMAN (I’ve not seen that use of statesman before), COSEC, EUCAPYPTI and although I didn’t get it DEARIE

   Thanks Vlad and Andrew

8. Well, the parsing of 14d is a relief – I had got as far as working out that the answer needed to be EUCALYPTI and that EU had to be added to a flaming of TYPICAL, but failed to get past EU = Wasting Money.
   Alexander de Pfeffel Johnson, you have a lot to answer for!
   I think where 23a is concerned, Vlad was adopting the (alleged) approach of George W Bush (who is, apparently falsely, supposed to have suggested that the French didn’t have a word for entrepreneur).
   Pleasant challenge on a filthy morning. Thanks to Vlad and Andrew.

9. Like Andrew I found the top half pretty straightforward, then things slowed considerably. With 23a I had _L so it had to be a foreign phrase, which helped. Wasted time trying to shoehorn EVEN (=flat) into 16d. Liked TOODLE-PIP and many others. Thanks to Vlad and to Andrew.

10. Thanks, Abdrew. I’m yet another who couldn’t parse DEARIE, although I now remember “A” for “ARE” coming up at least once before, a couple of years ago. Didn’t suss it then, either. Hard work today, but very satisfying when the last two dropped (15A and 16D).

11. Message to those looking for toilet theme: add “commode” in 7d

12. Favourite: CASTRATE
    New: THE USUAL OFFICES = toilets; COSEC

    Failed DEARIE.
    Did not parse EU bit of 14d
    I parsed 28ac same as Mark

13. Exactly as Andrew said: the top was solid before I had anything in the south and only because I encountered 1ac for the first time in one of last week’s puzzles. 23 ac was hard: how much French is one expected to know? Still, an entertaining challenge, so thank you, Vlad and Andrew.

14. Like blaise @10, I once again forgot A = are, so filed to fully parse DEARIE.
    I remember D for deserted being discussed here more than once. I think someone suggested it was used in military lists.

    As Andrew said, the challenge was made easier since we had been introduced to THE USUAL OFFICES so recently – extraordinary!

    Although The forest in ‘As You Like It’ is fictional, the Forest of Arden is real.

    Many thanks to Vlad for an enjoyable puzzle and Andrew for a good blog.

15. I too found the top half reasonably straightforward even if unable to parse all the answers – second half tedious till Mr SinCam came to my rescue for 28a and 24d (LOIs, I think my brain was hurting) but I didn’t smile or get that ‘wow’ feeling for any of this one I’m afraid.
    Thank you Andrew for the parsing. I am still very much a learner here!

16. I am always taken by surprise when I see ‘eucalypti’ in a crossword when I expect ‘eucalypts’ but I looked them up today and found they’re not quite the same. Failed on 4d, 22d and 15a.

17. Alan J Cannon @5: Didn’t the phrase ‘The Usual Offices’ tip-up the other day? I seem to remember PostMark mentioning something about it.

    For the first time in 15 months (yes, 15 months), I have a Reading Room pass at the British Library so completed this on the train on the way up which means it should have taken 40 minutes. But at St Pancras, it took a Pret Bacon and Egg roll and a cup-of-coffee which makes it more like 1hr15.

    My maths lecturers (the fabulously named Prof Swirles was the last one) will be pleased to know that COSEC was still a write-in – phew.

    As with Andrew, top half flew in helped by 1a but the bottom half – ugh. DEARIE was a DNK and several others caused words to be said but unfortunately not written-in…

    Thanks Vlad and Andrew!

18. Other toilet references – ladies in 20a and a homophone of PO at 25a

19. And the cleaning products at 22d

20. For some reason I didn’t feel so intimidated today when I saw that Vlad was the setter. Some of my ticks have been mentioned but I did like 20a SCANDALISE, 26a STIRRUP, 1d TOODLE-PIP (how very British!), 14d EUCALYPTI, 16d CLEVELAND and 17d CASTRATE.
    Lots of enjoyment, so thank you to Vlad. I also appreciated the explanatory blog, Andrew, so thanks to you as well. Our setters and bloggers certainly do a great job and every time I complete a puzzle and come here I am very appreciative of the work they do.

21. Re. 15 across: MERC. Try selling that homophone on the bonny banks of the Clyde! I’m surprised the RSVP (Rhotic Scottish Vigilante Petrol) has not yet visited.

    [True RSVP homophone story. Many years ago for a brief period I rented a place in the SE of England from a family who lived next door and had a dog called ‘Kernel’ (he was a bit of a nut, reportedly). During a visit, my father, who hailed from the bonny banks of the Forth, always addressed the dog as ‘Kurrnel’ (i.e. Colonel) until it was tactfully pointed out that he had placed his faith in the wrong half of an RP homophone.]

22. I ended up in the top as I had not heard the euphemism but with the odd crosser my original anagram thought proved correct.
    Very entertyaining an d sparkling puzzle
    And great blog too.

23. MB @17: Andrew referenced Friday’s discussion of The Usual Offices in his preamble and in the explanation of 1ac. Thanks for the namecheck but undeserved today 😀 .

    Looking back over both the toilet theme expanded upon by commenters above and some of the other words/phrases, one feels that there is considerable potential for smutty or lavatorial interpretation if so inclined. My own schoolboyish sense of humour was tickled by the appearance of CASTRATE shortly after ARDEN – I suspect Paul might have done something with that

24. Will I ever spot the A = are gag?!? DEARIE thus went in unparsed.

    On the gentler side for this compiler from whom I’ve taken a mauling in the past.

    Fine blog, too, many thanks, both.

25. Thank you, Andrew and posters, for shedding light on Vlad’s crossword.

26. Thanks Vlad and Andrew

    Eileen @ 14: I’m usually the one who gives the military link for D = DESERTED: it’s a standard abbreviation, along with the likes of MIA, KIA etc for ways of ‘leaving’ a service.

27. There’s also a STIRRUP toilet roll holder and toilet waste PIPE, a bit like a band in every clue although not many on show today. (LED without his Zeppelin). Defeated by DEARIE even though I tried EIRE at the beginning (humph). Not the toughest Vlad as already mentioned but lots to like, esp SCANDALISE and EUCALYPTI.

    Ta Vlad & Andrew

28. Ducks and DEARIE was the last clue to be unravelled this morning. Rather liked being referred to as “Duck” recently in the Leicester area, but pronounced as though I rhymed with “Book”. Lots of the usual Vlad fun and games, with other expressions such as TOODLE PIP, AND THEN SOME and LIKE MAD to be uncovered along with THE USUAL OFFICES…

29. I found this more challenging and fun than many a recent prize puzzle. Almost all the longer across clues were both commendable & chuckleworthy, especially COMME IL FAUT, which almost had me beaten me in my own backyard (anagrams). I was proud that my FOI was OKLAHOMAN – though I must confess I’ve seen slight variations on this clue several times previously. LOI was MERC, after badly stumbling over that US city (one of the few large ones I’ve never visited, as I recall).
    Thanks Vlad, for a first-rate puzzle.

30. A bit late starting this today, but it yielded somewhat more quickly than the average Vlad, albeit with some head scratching.

    I was another who failed to parse DEARIE. 1ac would have been much trickier if it weren’t for the recent office appearance – the buses analogy springs to mind.

    Lots of great clues, but a special mention for COMMODE: apart from its being a funny word, this is a great example of Vlad’s cleverly misleading clue construction. The caesura between definition and wordplay is in an unexpected place: “pot hidden in this // way after short search”. Masterful.

    S’s c @21: Rhotic Scottish Vigilante Petro (sic) sounds rather inflammatory…

    Thanks Andrew and bravo Jim.

31. …Petrol. D’oh – these mistypings make you sic

32. [Yes, sorry, Gervase @31. An hour ago I was too busy to proofread my comment properly before posting. I should have waited until other matutinal distractions were cleared out of the way. Just to add to my anecdote there, of course, once corrected, my father addressed the hound as ‘Kerr-nel’. As in ‘Merrc’ as distinct from ‘Murrk’.]

33. Pleasant crossword; I had the same experience as Andrew and others in that the top half went in quite smoothly, leaving a somewhat deserted bottom half to sort out.

    SC @21; the usual advice to use dictionary pronunciations – MERC and murk. When I saw CAMPION and ‘film’ I thought there might have been some link to Jane CAMPION, but apparently not. Like drofle @9, I toyed with putting in ‘even’ at 16D but it didn’t work.

    Lots of good clues; I particularly liked SCANDALISE, DEAD SEA, OKLAHOMAN, COMMODE, EUCALYPTI and DEARIE (yes, ducks is rather old-fashioned and a quaint Britishism.)

    Thanks Vlad and Andrew.

34. Like many others, this was a game of two halves for me. In fact, I had to leave it alone for several hours before trying the south again. It was 23ac which finally led the way once I finally gave up on English phrases. A hint that it was French would have helped!! Nonetheless thanks Vlad, you’re always a good challenge and Andrew for clearing up a few.

35. Another enjoyable challenge from the Impaler. Great fun to solve and a smile on my face at the end, not least because I spotted the theme

    Thanks to Vlad and Andrew

36. [Robi@33: “SC @21; the usual advice to use dictionary pronunciations – MERC and murk.” Do you suppose that I do not know this and have to be told? Lordy, I was just trying to make a lighthearted intervention, as it were to preempt any more combative input from the RSVP. But it remains the case that homophones which depend on a non-rhotic ‘r’ are the most difficult for rhoticists to recognise, and in some cases to reconcile themselves to. I probably pronounce ‘MERC’ and ‘murk’ almost identically, but having been brought up on the bonny banks, I cannot look at the two words and immediately detect a homophone. I don’t hear my own voice, but the voices that I grew up surrounded by.]

37. @essexboy
    Following on from last night, it’s 15a today – they definitely do not sound the same to me, but then I don’t live where you do.

38. Theme or not, these are several colloquial expressions in here: 1a, 10a, 12a, 23a, 1d, 22d.

39. Another tale of two halves here. Actually, they corresponded to different time-periods, so I could say a tale of two sittings. Sorry.

    Quite a while ago I think I had mentioned that SEC was my favorite trig function. Well, COSEC was my least favorite, except today I liked it better.

    To answer Auriga@13, O-level, or whatever it is called nowadays. Similarly with German, Latin, Chemistry and several others, apparently.

40. Thanks Vlad and Andrew.

    I am familiar with the phrase THE USUAL OFFICES (essexboy gave an example of its normal usage in last week’s Puck blog) and also with the term “office” as a euphemism for “toilet” but I seem to be alone in being unable to equate THE USUAL OFFICES with “toilet” – it has missed me completely.

    Can anyone give a sentence where the term is used in that context? Something like “if anyone wants me I shall be in the usual offices” perhaps – but that doesn’t strike me as being particularly slick.

    (I have a friend who actually has a fully filled bookshelf in the downstairs loo, presumably as an aid to extended occupation – that always seemed (thankfully) strange to me. For my own part the only reading material available in the sanitary facilities is a volume of Bob Dylan’s early lyrics – a post-it with the legend “Don’t think twice” was removed by some disgruntled visitor. Not a great joke perhaps.)

41. That was hard work, but enjoyable. I also sped through the top half then ‘hit the wall’ and rather stumbled across the finish line. Nice to see a reference in 3D’s clue to the late darts commentator Sid Waddell (“This lad’s been up practising all night, burning the midnight oil at both ends”)

42. Same as nearly everyone – top half done, bottom half slower, DEARIE unparsed. MrsW got COMME IL FAUT, favourite was CASTRATE, although the mention of it always sends a shiver down my spine! Thanks to Vlad and Andrew.

43. After reading several comments about “easier than usual for a Vlad” I was glad to see rodshaw @29 agreeing with me that this was challenging but fun. Last one in was DEARIE, when I finally managed to rethink the definition, though it took me a while to complete the parsing. (I remember in one of the Hornblower novels it was D for “discharged”, DD for “discharged dead” and R for deserted or “run”, but maybe it was different in the army – or did CS Forester get it wrong?)

    Thanks to Vlad and Andrew.

44. Thanks to Vlad, beautifully constructed and disguised clues. So many brought a smile esp TOODLE-PIP , PIPE DREAMS, STEWARDS ( with great reference to former darts commentator Sid Waddell) and COMMODE.

    Struggled with parsing DEARIE but bunged it in anyway, so many thanks Andrew

45. Alphalpha: I was intrigued by the phrase when it arose last week and your query has prompted research. I can’t aspire to Spooners catflap’s knowledge of the classics but a scan of Google Books throws up:

    From Words in Time and Place by David Crystal (a historical thesaurus) Office for toilet – A somewhat archaic euphemism, but still heard, especially in the phrase the usual offices. The word was generally used as a collective noun for all the parts of a house devoted to household work and storage, including any outbuildings. The euphemism appears either in the singular (as in Ngaio Marsh, Opening Night, 1951, ch:9 ‘I went to the usual office at the end of the passage’) or the plural (as in John Braine, A Room At The Top, 1957, ch. 1: ‘The bathroom’s to the right and usual offices next to it’).

    From If Anything Moves -Salute It! by HF Rowland (an autobiography) – Being a real first class establishment, many of the rooms had their own private bathroom with “the usual offices” attached.

46. For me it was a tale of three quarters. It was the left side of the bottom half that refused to yield. And worst of all was DEARIE, which I had to reveal — something I’m rarely reduced to, getting where I have to with liberal use of the check button letter by letter.

    Many French phrases have become common English parlance, but I don’t think COMME IL FAUT gets there. But perhaps “Pret a manger” has?

    Thanks for parsing STIRRUP, Andrew. I didn’t think of “anger” as a verb.

    I finally remembered the DUP before coming to the blog!

    The US isn’t the only country that has states. Couldn’t some state clues refer to Australia, Mexico or India? To Queensland, Sonora or Uttar Pradesh?

    Why is the definition for COMMODE “pot hidden in this” and not just “pot”?

    Has the UK adopted “jail” for “gaol”? Or am I a century out of date?

    Eileen@14 I’ve always been confused by the fact that the Forest of Arden is in England but the characters in As You Like it keep insisting that they’re in France. Ardennes only makes it worse.

    Thanks, Vlad and Andrew.

47. [Ronald @28: yes, I have fond memories of being called “me dook” when visiting Staffordshire as a young woman. Also, “my loverrr”, in Bristol!!]

48. PM@45: Point conceded with thanks for going to the trouble.

49. Valentine@46: A commode is a piece of furniture within which is stored a vessel or pot which can be removed for cleaning/emptying purposes. The vessel is replaced and the commode then masquerades as a pleasant side-table or whatever until needed. It’s the usual “out of sight, out of mind” attitude to such matters.

50. PM@45 Apparently the usual offices aren’t a bathroom but something attached to it. Presumably not, then, the place you’d have a bath. In San Francisco many flats (not apartments, in San Francisco they’re different) had split bathrooms, with the toilet in one part and the washing stuff in the other.

51. Thanks very much Andrew, I struggled with this one and you plus some helpful comments from the floor seem to have sorted it all out for me. With others above I enjoyed the allusion to Sid W and some parsing that I did manage to unravel eg DEAD SEA and eventually EUCALYPTI (I did try to do something with echidnas for a while). DEARIE was cheated from a list but I like to think I might have got it had there been a singular Duck for the definition. Well done Vlad, many of these kept me entertained and infuriated for a good while today!

52. Valentine @50: the Google Books entries – and there are lots of them – fell into two broad categories. The phrase is used to describe offices as in positions – the usual offices of state – and as in working compartments – the usual offices and shops – on the one hand, and then facilities of a lavatorial nature – either a room in which a toilet is situated or the toilet itself – on the other. Lots of architectural/estates magazines appear to refer to ‘the usual offices’ when describing the particulars of a property – which I would take to be referring to rooms. The HF Rowland quote @45 was clearly referring to a toilet itself in that it went on the talk about problems with attached pipes.

    I really do feel I’ve plumbed these particular depths as far as I want to!

53. sheffield hatter – (if you are still there) – in my ongoing quest for great oldie prize-cryptics, I dropped across one of the most challenging and superbly-clued of all time (Paul #23,077, 2004). I never thought I’d finish it, but eventually staggered to the line with everything parsed. If you try it, I suspect you will tell me you found it quite easy, but I always enjoy hearing from you when you do so!

54. [ I have a childhood memory of the Fonz calling the toilet in Al’s Diner the OFFICE, in Happy Days ?? Please correct if I am wrong, a long time ago ]

55. [rodshaw @53. Thanks for the suggestion. I did the Australian one last week (#23047) but had to reveal two answers: 1d & 10a). That one was easy in parts but some of the Oz GK was beyond me and some of the word play was pretty tough too. I think, to be fair, I can only recall one time that I found one to be easy that you struggled with, but as I said elsewhere, sometimes the difficulty is in the eye of the beholder. ]

56. [rodshaw again: I see already there are a couple of mistakes in the grid for the long ones: 3 should be 3, 25, 8; and 21 should be 21, 5, 1. But if you finished it I guess you knew that!]

57. sheffield hatter … those were the very same two clues that beat me in the Kookaburra #23047 .. so at least some of the time we behold these puzzles with the same eye!

58. sheffield hatter .. I don’t call those mistakes .. I think of them as additional challenges …

59. [rodshaw and hatter: gosh – the biggest challenge was definitely the enumeration/spacings on the grid which seem to be all over the place for the two long ones. It almost became like one of those jigsaw crosswords that I loathe! There’s a word in there I’ve never had occasion to use but I’ve – fortunately – seen before and one I can’t parse so I’m off to the 225 archives. Thanks for the recommendation, rodshaw]

60. [Mark: unfortunately this puzzle pre-dates Fifteen Squared!]

61. PostMark and sheffield hatter .. if I deduce that you two are already roaring away on #23077 .. you are already making a fool out of me .. after the first hour I had 26A and otherwise a blank grid.

62. [rodshaw: Yes, finished it in about 40 minutes. I guess I would have at least attempted this 17 years ago when it appeared in the newspaper, which may have helped, but I can’t say it rang any bells. The first long one was a write-in from the enumeration and one word in the clue, but the other required about seven crossers before I got it. Superbly clued, as you said. Thanks again for the heads up to this one.]

63. [SC @36; I realised your comment was probably light-hearted, so no worries! However, I’ve made this point many times before – if setters are to use homophones, there has to be a standard, otherwise homophones are unusable as there are many different regional accents.]

64. [By all means become bored talking about Vlad’s crossword, but it must be somewhat dispiriting for setter and blogger to have it rubbed in with tedious chatter about other completely unrelated crosswords. I had heard that there were some Site Policies and Comment Guidelines, but it seems that exemptions are available.]

65. Hey Van Winkle. Always a pleasure. You’ve been absent for a while and I do enjoy your contributions. What did you think of the crossword?

66. I caught the reference to the coincidence before I started this, which made 1 across even easier, but I needed all the help I could get. Would a user of rhotic pronunciation not also pronounce the r in murk? Just as I get used to “in” being a link word, rather than a preposition, Vlad uses it as an adverbial (with flat in) in 16d

67. Petert @66

    I think this time it’s not a rhotic issue but more to do with the pronunciation of the vowels. As an Englishwoman who’s had a Scottish husband, I’m sticking my neck out but I think his ‘murk’ would be ‘murrk’ and ‘merc’ more like ‘mairrk’. I’d be more than happy to be corrected by Spooner’s catflap. 😉
    I could distinguish between his ‘pore’ and ‘poor’ / ‘pour’ but couldn’t for the life of me hear the difference between ‘poor’ and ‘pour’, no matter how hard he tried.

68. Eileen: I have a daughter who lives in Dunfermline, and I think your “airr” is about right for how that is pronounced too!

69. Petert @66: yes, I’ve never had a Scottish husband, but I had the same thought as Eileen @ 67. Unlike us non-rhoticists, who tend to merge ER with UR, those who pronounce the R as R also preserve the vowel distinction. Think of Charles Kenedy’s ‘democratic mair-ger’ back in 88, and contrast with Taggart’s and other Scots detectives’ ‘there’s been a muRder’.

    (I would think the same issue arises with Northern Ireland speakers, given NNI’s post @37?)

70. [Roz @54: I think you’re right about Fonzie – see this clip. On the other hand, I seem to remember you don’t like clicking, in which case the comments under the video read ‘Before the men’s washroom, The Fonz’s office was located outside’ and ‘His corporation relocated to the men’s room!’. Wherever it was, he probably sat on it.]

71. I guessed DEARIE but a poor clue to an otherwise very enjoyable crossword.

72. essexboy @ 69

    NNI is Scottish.

73. [Thanks Simon S, I was led astray by the initials! – in that case I also got it wrong at the end of yesterday’s blog.]

74. An enjoyable challenge, giving me plenty to think about to parse and solve (or solve then parse) all the clues. My last in was DEARIE, as I was temporarily stuck on D = deserted (rather than A = are).
    Thanks to Vlad and Andrew.

75. [ Thank you very much Mressexboy@70. You are right that I do not know how to do links but I do appreciate the effort and I am glad my memory was not playing up. ]

76. Eileen @67 I agree. The vowel sounds make Murk and Merc sound totally different to me (from Scotland). Usually I can work out homophones but not this one sadly.

77. Many thanks to Andrew for a nice blog and to others who commented.

78. Isn’t there an extra e in the blogger’s parsing of 12 across? Presumably just a typo. I have great admiration for all the bloggers for their swift actions and ability to parse the seemingly unparsable (e.g. dearie).

    [GrannyJ @47: Further to your comment, my wife and I, having recently moved from London to Bristol, were most amused that a restaurant waitress with a strong Polish accent addressed us as “my loverrrs”!]

79. Thanks both.
    Can I just mention my favourite quotation from the late great Sid Waddell referring to a handsome darts player: “He’s not Adonis….. he’s The Donis”.

80. I think people may be missing the “self affirming” nature of 22d. The formed answer contains a duck in the form of EIDER, supporting the definition

81. First Commenter @80. That’s very imaginative, but I can’t think that it was in any way the intention of the setter, as it’s not supported by the wordplay – and the definition is ducks, anyway, not duck!

82. Given the theme, missed a trick maybe by not mentioning Cannes or Toulouse in 23a?

83. Did not enjoy that one.

Comments are closed.