Guardian Cryptic 28,754 by Paul

65 comments on “Guardian Cryptic 28,754 by Paul”

1. Another failure for me. Maybe the post covid brain fog has set in. I did like CRITERIA and NINCOMPOOP.

2. This was fun fun fun. OK there were a lot of homophones and I know not everyone likes them. But BOOZE CRUISE was brilliant! I also loved the delightfully old-fashioned NINCOMPOOP and the clever DJIBOUTI. I failed to parse SHORT BACK AND SIDES so thanks manehi. And thank you too Paul.

3. A very enjoyable solve. Loved booze cruise, live long and prosper and short back and sides. Thanks Paul and Manehi

4. Waiting for the day when Paul just gives us one big clue for the whole crossword.

5. Guffawed when the CRITERIA penny dropped. Not sure why there was a ? On DEEP PAN. Excellent stuff from Paul and many thanks manehi for parsing the long ones which I’m ashamed to admit I just biffed in

6. That was fun but chewy. Another impenetrable looking Paul grid that eventually came together. I read the clues in order, so when RICOCHET was the only clue solved on the first pass, it felt like a Saturday prize, but picking away steadily, it all unravelled into a satisfying solve.

   This one wasn’t on the Guardian paper app: the app has something against Paul puzzles, so solving in the wee small hours on my phone on the website made those run on clues even more challenging, and I forgot to write down SHORT BACK AND SIDES in a line to be able to parse it.

   Thank you to Paul and manehi.

7. Hmm. I find all these split entry solutions are getting tiresome, particularly when the sections are dotted around the grid non consecutively. SHORT BACK AND SIDES went in with just three crossers, as a well-known phrase which fitted – without the assistance of either definition or wordplay. Is this a ploy by Paul to reduce the number of clues he has to set?

   Some good clues, however – BOOZE CRUISE is a great homophone, and the Spooner clue is excellent as both the solution and its metathesised version are semantically related. I also enjoyed GRUYERE, APHORISE, CASTILE and STRIDE.

   PUNIISH doesn’t work for me – ‘like wordplay’ should be ‘punnish’ but there is no homophone indicator.

   Thanks to S&B

8. Crispy @4, Bunthorne used to set these run on clues even more than Paul. The barman at college solved the crossword during his shift, in the quiet spells. One crossword we’d all been staring at blankly one lunchtime. We’d met before disappearing off for the day. When we rolled back, late that night, wanting a quick pint before heading for bed, he’d mostly solved it, and the key clue that criss-crossed the grid was an anagram of a line from Patience (G&S), iirc.

9. As some have already said, this was a puzzle that looked extremely difficult at first but gradually yielded to deeper thought and persistent. So a 5 star in my book. I’m not a Trekkie but was familiar with 14/23 and it was the multipart clues which opened up the grid.
   Couldn’t see any trademark Paul smuttiness today (backside, maybe) so I hope he’s not listened to the naysayers!!
   Much thanks to Paul and manehi.

10. As manehi says, slow and tricky, but lots of fun. Hadn’t heard of LIVE LONG AND PROSPER but got it with enough crossers. Liked CRITERIA, DJIBOUTI, RICOCHET and NINCOMPOOP in particular. Thanks to P & m.

11. JerryG @9 he did manage to hide two POOs and a PEE in. the grid 🙂

12. Not coming up in the grauniad android app sadly.

13. Like others, this took a long time for me to get started. Only had 4d on my first pass, and I’ve never heard of it!

    But once LIVE LONG AND PROSPER fell in, things started to move. Like Gervase@7 I wasn’t sold on PUNISH. Also not sure about the definition of STEP CHANGE; what’s ‘required’ for? Didn’t mind the split entries. Maybe that’s hindsight talking, as they do mean you have fewer clues to try to get started.

    DEEP PAN, POOL PLAYER, and JUMP BAIL were my favourites of a very nice bunch indeed. I was surprised not to see any smut in the wordplay for NINCOMPOOP!

    Thanks Paul & manehi.

14. Jeremy Harding@12 came up fine for me!

15. I was looking for a …y for the PUNISH clue, but didn’t see it for DRAUGHTY, which I parsed as a homophone of draftee. I enjoyed BOOZE CRUISE and GRUYERE. I am another who couldn’t parse SHORT BACK AND SIDES. Thanks both.

16. Super puzzle. Same likes as yesyes @2 and the groan worthy POOL PLAYER.

    Ta Paul & manehi.

17. Although we are very used to Paul’s distributed, multi-word solutions, I think many of my favourite puzzles have been those where he’s restrained himself a bit with the device. Both because it gives me more of his clues to solve and because I do find the jumping about rather a distraction at times. That said, I did like BOOZE CRUISE along with everyone else. Other highlights include NINCOMPOOP, GRUYERE, CASTILE, DEEP PAN and POOL PLAYER. PUNISH and DRAUGHTY were both amusing and very Paulian.

    Thanks Paul and manehi

18. I despaired at the first read through, all those broken clues giving answers all over the grid, but gradually things fell into place and I started to enjoy it!
    I loved PANISH, foi, LIVE LONG AND PROSPER, IN THE BLACK, APHORISE and NINCOMPOOP. CYANIDE AND DJABOUTI last in, but satusfying.
    Thanks to Paul and manehi for a pleasant start to the day, even though it took me a while!

19. Shanne @8: Indeed, Bunthorne and Araucaria often had long split solutions in their puzzles – frequently as very clever long anagrams, with clue as definition. But in those days we all solved puzzles in the newspaper, where grid and clues were all visible at a glance. These days there are other options available, and for those of us for whom dead tree versions are impracticable, the only recourse is to online. On a smartphone, only the highlighted clue is shown, and without a lot of irritating scrolling up and down it is much more difficult to see the big picture.

20. Crispy/Shanne@4/8. I remember in the distant past the quotation from Lycidas that starts “Fame is the spur” taking up most of the grid. I think it was before setters were identified but I assumed it was Araucaria. May have been Bunthorne though.
    MikeB

21. I love Paul puzzles. I got very few on the first pass, but as I got crossers, more pennies dropped. Then the last few (GRUYERE, SHORT BACK AND SIDES, BOOZE CRUISE, IN THE BLACK, BEACON) needed a bit of a think. I went away and came back to them, and more delightful PDMs.

    I suspect those who don’t like split clues are not doing the crossword on paper. May I suggest in that case, that you have a pen and paper to hand to help.

    I do like split clues, because solving one often opens up more of the grid.

22. Thanks Paul and manehi.
    Great fun as ever. Took me long time to see CASTILE – retrograde solutions always floor me.
    I like that JUMP BAIL is paired with STEP BACK

23. Cry tearier wins GoD, with boos crews second.
    Have mates who were Trekkies, so that aphorism rang a vague bell.
    Good one Paul, and thx manehi.

24. Thanks Paul & manehi. I found this a very enjoyable solve, replete with Paul’s characteristic sense of fun. Interesting you should call it “slow and tricky”, manehi – I found it a *lot* more accessible than his prize puzzle of last week, which everyone else seemed to think was quite easy!

    Shanne @8 – only this morning, I dug out an old book of Guardian crosswords (published 2003!), and the first one I turned to was a Bunthorne with a long solution split over several lights across the middle of the grid…

    (the main reason I dug it out was to revisit some of Shed’s work – sad to see how many of the names featured in the book are no longer with us)

25. I use an iPad (other tablets are available) and the Guardian app. The whole puzzle is visible. Living in France the dead-tree option isn’t available. I could print it out I suppose but its easier to correct mistakes this way. And you get I nice message flash up when you’ve completed it.

26. Deadhead @25. I too do the crossword with the app on an iPad, sadly there’s the downside when you confidently fill in the last light and the cheery message doesn’t appear signifying you’ve still got work to do!

27. I guessed the trekkie and the haircut straight away, so romped through after that flying start. CRITERIA and POOL PLAYER were last in.

28. Deadhead@25. I may have been misunderstood. I wasn’t advocating online solvers change to buying the paper. But where there are split clues it’s useful to write the partial solutions out on a bit of paper, so you can see the whole phrase in one go. At least, I find that helpful.

29. Thanks for the blog , I like to solve the clues in order and split clues can be annoying. Today was mostly fine with the first word usually coming first. 25,24,26 did not matter as all three in together. Only 12Ac had to be missed out initially.

    At one time, Paul and Enigmatist were competing for the longest total entry.
    Paul had the Spike Milligan poem – There are holes in the sky …..
    Enigmatist had Roger Miller – Trailers for sale or rent …..
    Both over 70 letters but Taupi eventually beat them .

30. i failed to complete 9,3 mistaking it to be 3,9 and so CRUISE something. I also missed the draught board reference for 1, thinking a man on the water (or any mass) would be draughty. lots of fun once again. Thanks Paul & manehi.

31. Paul reminds me of Araucaria in that you can feel stuck and then make a little progress and get stuck again but you get there in the end which is very satisfying.

32. Gervase @7: You say that ‘like wordplay’ should be ‘punnish’ – but there’s a query at the end of the clue, so I read it as PUN-ISH (like a pun) and that works for me.

    It took me a long time to get on Paul’s wavelength today, so I’m envious of JimAZ @27 with his flying start on the two multi-light solutions.

    Sympathy for Paul Tutukaka @30 with the misnumeration, as I did the same thing with the pizza at 19d, but I couldn’t parse SEA-FOOD, of course! (Apart from ‘when served up inspiring English’=SEA.) I felt a bit of a doofus when the penny dropped. 🙂

    Thanks to Paul and Manehi.

33. Oops – got misnumeration and misnumbering mixed up! I did the former, Paul Tutukaka the latter.

34. Thanks to Paul for a customary challenging puzzle that yielded very slowly. I’m with Crispy@4 and waiting for the single clue solution to the whole grid. There’s a task for a future gathering of Paul’s wordplay community!
    Favourites: BOOZE CRUISE, DJIBOUTI, CASTILE and the Trekkie blessing LIVE LONG AND PROSPER ?
    Thx also to manehi for blog.

35. I’m not much of a trekkie, but in the third row there’s USS (as in Enterprise) and in the bottom row there’s Pine (as in Chris, who played Kirk) and in the fifth row Sir (as in Patrick Stewart). There’s also in the top row DSC as in DSC-01 – a shuttlecraft attached to the USS Discovery. In the 4th row there’s always a black alert before a jump. OTOH, there is so much trekkie geekdom around that these could be coincidence.

36. Another here who made an extremely slow and hesitant start, with only GRUYERE and RICOCHET (what a great onomatopoeic word that is) on first pass. Entertained by usual the Paul witticisms and aha moments. The NE corner last to yield as I couldn’t convince myself that 6d was POOL PLAYER was correct, so the COTDs for me IN THE BLACK in a photo finish with BOOZE CRUISE were the last two, preceded by the shining BEACON. Helped with the solving of DEEP PAN by remembering my childhood cricketing hero, Colin (Kipper) Cowdrey, a Kent and English (S)kipper, who was often found peacefully asleep in the pavilion before an important innings.
    Many thanks Paul and Manehi.

37. Agree with yesyesyes@2. Thank you Paul. You remain my fave. So much more fun than yesterday.
    Thanks also manehi for parsing SHORT BACK AND SIDES. Love it !

38. I do love a Paul puzzle, and this did not disappoint. I thought this was on the easy side for him. For some reason my eye was drawn to the Trekker clue and that went it straightaway.

    I think Paul is the nearest we now have to Bunthorne and Araucaria for humour and inventiveness.

    Many favourites inc CYANIDE, BOOZE CRUISE, POOL PLAYER and CRITERIA.

    Thanks to Paul and manehi

39. The planets are clearly aligned for a rare Paul completion, albeit that I bunged SKIP in as the first part of the Spooner clue.
    Much as I struggle with Paul, I’m the first to admit that I am lost in admiration for his ingenuity and wit. 8a was a great example.
    I thought STRIDE was a bit of a stretch, but doubtless in Chambers.
    Thanks both

40. Lovely, especially liked 14,23,ery clever. All round a great solve.
    Thanks Paul and Manehi for a fun puzzle

41. Thanks both,
    I was convinced 9,3 was a bilingual homophone – ‘A l’eau, c’est l’heure’ and ‘Hallo Sailor’ – until the crossers put me right.

42. Never heard of STEP CHANGE, but I bunged it in hoping that one or the other word would have something to do with it. Turns out that STEP CHANGE is a thing.

    No hope of parsing NINCOMPOOP, though I’m delighted to be reminded of the word. Parsing of SHORT BACK AND SIDES equally hopeless, thanks manehi.

    Had a lot left to do this morning, with some use of the check button.

    Nice puzzle, Paul, thanks. And thanks to manehi for saving my sanity.

43. As our resident Chicagoan, I gotta ask: do y’all really call our delicious thick slabs of cheesy, sausagy goodness DEEP PAN? Gotta screw with everything, you Brits. I mean, I’d just gotten over your deliberate misspelling of chili, and now this? Here in the home of Chicago-style deep DISH, we’d throw things at you–perhaps even slices of deep-dish. (Yes, “deep pan” is more accurate, but no one here says that.)

    Elsewhere, it was a fun puzzle with lots of bad puns, so enjoyable in that way, though I’m another who’s annoyed by all the multi-light entries, for reasons I’ve stated before. “Short back and sides” isn’t a phrase I know (I probably call the haircut something else) and for us a BOOZE CRUISE is a two-hour evening tooling around (e.g. Lake Michigan, locally) on a boat with an open bar. But I did finish eventually.

44. There’s a fine line between clever and silly, and too many clues fell the wrong side of line imho. I liked Nincompoop and it was a great anagram effort to work in Live Long & Prosper. I don’t see how the noun ’bout’ can equate to either the verb or noun ‘attack’. The first two clues are a bit random as homophones – gettable after you have guessed the answers but not really clues to the answers. Spruce as ‘turned out beautifully’? surely should be spruced up, or, at a push, spruced, but not spruce. And ‘bump jail’ is a weak Spoonerism (not a phrase that I can imagine anyone using) that doesn’t, to me, have much connection to ‘slam into prison’. Glad to have completed the grid fairly quickly, but it didn’t feel like much of a challenge – just guesswork and then ‘oh I see’. Thanks Paul & Manehi

45. Paul @44. If you’ve been spruced up you can be said to be SPRUCE. And someone coming down with a disease is said to have had an attack of the flu, measles, chicken pox, etc, which can easily be substituted by (dji)BOUT(i). For example, “Paul was stricken by a bout of grumpiness after solving the crossword.” 🙂

    I agree that bump jail is not a phrase anyone would ever use, but it works superbly as a Spoonerism as it is straightforwardly clued by ‘slam into prison’. For instance, footballers might ‘slam into’ each other, but the referee could decline to blow the whistle, saying it was just a bump. If it’s such a bad clue, how did you manage to solve it “fairly quickly”?

46. Paul@44 Spruce can be an adjective. Google gives “neat or smart in appearance.” Collins online says ” If you have a bout of an illness or of an unpleasant feeling, you have it for a short period.”

47. It’s true that “bump jail” is not a phrase anyone would ever use, but then neither is “shoving leopard.”

48. Champagne for HYD@39. Millwall 1 Brighton 0 .

49. Thanks manehi as I wondered where the homophone indicator in 1D had gone having exhausted the chess pieces and moved on to press ganging, and didn’t think of draughts even when I had the answer. There were plenty of homophones already so good that this had a better explanation! Jim@13 I agree re that “required” which makes good surface sense but muddies the definition I think. Yes there were a few Pauline stretches but I’ll take them for the fun they bring on resolution, thanks Paul (and echo the congratulations Hoofit).

50. [mrpenney @43, sorry to confirm your fears, but ‘deep pan’ is what I’d say, and so would fellow-essexboy Jamie Oliver. For some reason ‘deep dish’ makes me think of sheep dip, or even deep doodoo à la Bush Snr. However, I’m grateful for enlightenment as to the correct Chicago way of saying things, as it might decrease my chances of pizza-induced injury if I ever visit. (I already know to steer clear of Mr Brown in the baddest parts.)]

51. PS mrpenney@43 Maybe you have heard of a “Crew cut” which I recall as not a million miles away from a short back and sides, although it is a long time since I needed either. Can’t help with the pan/dish misnomering, sorry, it’s all thin and crispy here on the continent.
    [Also, from a fairly tame rugby song:
    Samson was an Israelite and very big and strong
    Delilah was a Philistine and always doing wrong
    They spent a week together but it didn’t get very hot,
    Cos all he got was a short back and sides and a little bit off the top.]

52. Roz @48 Thanks, but I know that the second leg will be a resounding victory for Brighton!!

53. I try not to post negatively about puzzles as I appreciate the effort that’s gone in to setting them.

    But I do think that Paul’s quality overall has dropped over the last few years, and that’s exemplified by 1D today.

    It’s one of his (in my opinion overused) -ish and -y tropes, and I don’t think it works anyway.

    I completely get ‘man on board’ when referring to a chess piece, as it’s common usage and they have individual names, but has anyone ever referred to a draughts piece as a man?

    For me, that was yet another “That’ll do” clue.

    Sorry, folks!

54. Simon S @53
    And the definition is off too. You might get cold because it is draughty, but not necessarily.
    Thanks Paul and manehi.

55. Surprised to read some negative comments. Thoroughly enjoyed the puzzle & thought POOL PLAYER, NINCOMPOOP & BOOZE CRUISE all great clues plus a decent Spoonerism & a groan inducing homophone – more than enough to keep me happy.
    Thanks Paul & Manehi

56. Mr Penney I have remembered that we changed the terminology to pan from dish so that we could put this joke in our Christmas crackers: Q: how does Good King Wenceslas like his pizza? A: Deep pan, crisp and even. I would get my coat but it’s been too warm for one today

57. Gervase@7 You may be in good company:

    Dr. Johnson having freely expressed his aversion to punning,
    Boswell hinted that his illustrious friend’s dislike to this species
    of small wit might arise from his inability to play upon words.
    “Sir”, roared Johnson, “if I were punish-ed for every pun I
    shed, there would not be left a puny shed of my punnish head.”

    [Gleanings for the Curious, p160]

    MikeB@20 I didn’t realise the title of Howard Spring’s novel Fame is the Spur was a quote from Milton

58. [One for Elaine from the same Gleanings, p172:

    A pedantic bachelor had the following inscription on his tea-
    caddy :

    TU DOCES.]

59. Eileen, sorry.

60. Simon S @53
    This is from the Wiki article on Draughts:
    “Pieces
    Man
    An uncrowned piece (man) moves one step diagonally forwards and captures an adjacent opponent’s piece by jumping over it”

61. I’m with mrpenny at 43 as to the definition of Booze Cruise (on Port Jackson, not L. Michigan).

62. This was like pulling teeth for me but I think I was just not firing on all four cylinders. Like others, I ticked NINCOMPOOP at 13d as a favourite, although I felt like one at times. Many thanks to Paul and manehi, and other commenters above.

63. Solved about half and ran out of time so I gave up. Life is quite esciting and hectic at the moment so it is hard for me to concentrate.

    I agree with Gervase @7 about the split entry solutions getting tiresome.

    Of the ones I solved:
    Liked PUNISH, CRITERIA
    New: booze cruise
    Guessed/bunged in but did not parse 14/23, 25/24/26.

    Thanks, both.

64. Like Shanne@6 and JeremyHarding@12 I too could not access the puzzle via the app. But Jim@14 reckoned he was able to. I use an Android phone, perhaps Shanne and Jeremy do too and maybe Jim is on Apple’s ios? It’s something that’s been happening on and off for years, and always only to Paul’s. I did once try to get a reply from the then crossword editor (in the days when he used to send out regular email newsletters) but no response. I’ve put it down to either a sad attempt to bump up online grauniad readership or maybe Paul just keeps forgetting to hit the right switch.

65. Put this by yesterday and finished it this morning in 1 minutes. Quite fun but, like too many Paul’s the “subsidiary indications” are no use if you haven’t already found the solution and the extra work is in trying to see how they work. “Joiner=and” in 25ac was typical. Would be no help at all in cracking Azed’s esoteric vocabulary..

Comments are closed.