Guardian Cryptic 28,807 by Vlad

51 comments on “Guardian Cryptic 28,807 by Vlad”

1. Nice puzzle, enjoyed this. Definitely needed some help with a few parsings, thanks manehi. Even having seen formic(acid) early I couldn’t believe it was right for ages! I thought I was flying the NW and SE early, but the other two corners took much longer to crack…

2. No chance of understanding AT LOGGERHEADS without assistance from Google as I’d never heard of the village. Didn’t manage to parse CHANGELING so ta for the explanation manehi. I spent too long trying to find a Grauniad type of typo such as Change Line. I almost missed the anagrind “supply” in ABBREVIATE again so I must try harder to remember it.
   Favourite was LONG-STANDING for the deceptive “evening”.

3. Typically tough and I needed manehi for some parsing. I haven’t encountered LOGGERHEADS as a village – which surprises me given the obvious clueing potential, I couldn’t get under the skin of the ARMADILLO and I had a rough time with SMOOTHIES. Everything else was delightful with particular favourites being LONG-STANDING for the surface, ORBS and BAD LOT – succinctly and cleanly done, FORMIC ACID for the amusing surface, ON TENTERHOOKS for the effortless anagram indicator and fodder, HOUSE GUEST- I don’t think I’ve seen a homophone indicated that way – very nice, and ABBREVIATE for the neat surface.

   Thanks Vlad and manehi

4. Lovely stuff from Vlad. Slightly marred by my subconscious mind popping answers into my head – correct fortunately – before I’d had chance to parse. I do like the word ESCHEWED – always makes me think of Brian Sewell for some reason 🙂

5. I was feeling pretty smug about completing and parsing all this with comparative ease (by that I mean comparing my experience with the comments in The Guardian forum) until I read your blog, manehi. Horrors – I got 1d wrong. I put “wrap” (thinking “that’s a wrap” means all done and dusted therefore “accepted”). I did vaguely think I could not see “rap” as an appreciation of music but only as a (tenuous) form of music but then rushed on and suppressed my niggling worry. Oh dear. Thanks for the great wit , Vlad, and the lucid explanations, manehi.

6. Stared at changeling for ages before the guardian angel penny finally dropped, d’oh. Speaking of guards, the only bit of Wales I’ve seen is driving to the Fishguard ferry, so at loggerheads, tho easily guessable, was a total bung and shrug. And speaking of guessing, house guest was a nicely gnarly Vladism. As for Formica CID, pretty sure I’ve seen that trick before, but a long while ago. Good workout, thanks Vlad and manehi.

7. As others have said, a really nice puzzle from Vlad with some fairly tortuous constructions. A few of the long ones went in quickly early on but then things slowed down, with SMOOTHIES and CHANGELING being LOIs for me. Many thanks to V & m.

8. I had a similar experience to Bodycheetah. The solutions came to mind, and then I worked them out later. BAD LOT and ON TENTERHOOKS were my favourites.

9. … oh yes and Eliot Ness had me thinking god that show was late fifties, you’d have to be at least as old as me, but of course there’ve been recenter versions …

10. Wonderful puzzle from the Impaler, with lots of clever constructions and shiny surfaces.

    PostMark @3 has already listed all my favourites, and I agree that ARMADILLO and SMOOTHIES were particularly knotty- but all the more pleasurable for that.

    LOGGERHEADS is not, I would have thought, generally well known. But it is very familiar to me as the location of Colomendy – a camp owned by the Corporation of Liverpool to which generations of Merseyside schoolkids like myself went for a week’s outdoor teaching and activity. (Familiar also to Vlad, presumably, as a Liverpool based educator).

    Thanks to S&B

11. Very enjoyably chewy puzzle. I managed eventually to winkle out all the parsing apart from SMOOTHIES, so thanks, manehi, for that.

    I’ll go along with all the favourites mentioned, for the reasons given. I smiled at ARMADILLO being a ‘being shelled’, and appreciated the novel treatment of the overworked Muse at 21ac. I had the same thoughts as grantinfreo about the ‘Untouchable’ and, like Bodycheetah, I do like the word ESCHEWED.

    Who’d have thought that LOGGERHEADS was a place? It made me wonder if that was the derivation but Brewer says: ”Loggerhead’, an old word for a stupid person, is probably from the dialect word ”logger’, a heavy block of wood, plus ‘head’. It was also used for an iron implement with a bulbous end that was heated to melt tar, and conceivably the expression originally referred to a fight using these or similar objects as weapons’ – so a bit disappointing, really.

    Many thanks to Vlad for a lot of fun and a number of ‘Dohs’ and to manehi for a super blog.

12. Not as difficult as the puzzle from Vlad’s alter ego Tyrus in the Indy last Saturday, but more than enough to keep the solver interested and challenged. Glad I wasn’t alone in not knowing LOGGERHEADS; as noted by PostMark @3, it’s surprising that it’s not referred to in crossword land more often.

    Everything otherwise eventually parsed. My favourites were the ‘Being shelled’ def for ARMADILLO (tricky parsing too) and the ‘workers supply it’ def for FORMIC ACID.

    Thanks to Vlad and manehi

13. When I was a boy sometimes staying overnight at youth hostels, I remember that the YHA handbook listed a hostel in LOGGERHEADS. So that was a Welsh village I knew of.

14. Thoroughly enjoyable. Particularly liked ESCHEWED; when wishing to avoid something in future I’ll be key cutting!
    Many thanks, both and all

15. Well, for me it was around fifty percent a write-in, and then I ground to a halt. A struggle from then on. That said, I liked this very much. I still have a copy of Lamb’s Tales from Shakespeare which I’ve had since childhood. Poor Charles suffered with periods of mental illness, as did his sister Mary. With thanks to Vlad and manehi.

16. LOGGERHEADS defeated me, but according to Wikepedia there’s another one in Staffordshire, worth noting for future reference.

    In my defence, I was also misled by the online page when I tentatively entered ST for the first part of the answer, and the Check button complacently said it was correct, which of course it isn’t. Not the first time this has happened.

17. Favourite was WRETCH for the surface, concise and witty.
    Clever homophone indicator ‘spokesman’s reckoned’ for guessed/GUEST.

18. Well, as I battled with the top half initially I really thought I wasn’t going to make much of an impression today. However, AT LOGGERHEADS and ON TENTERHOOKS, both rather aptly describing my state of mind at the time, then quickly came to mind. And they helped hugely. Found the bottom half easier to solve thereafter, especially the helpful anagrams with STRAIGHTEN and GIVE IT A WHIRL. Quite a few unparsed – ESCHEWED, LIAISONS (last two in), and EDGINESS. But by then I was simply content to have completed the grid, and happy to come on here for Manehi’s lucid explanations. I very much enjoyed quite a stiff challenge this morning, I thought…

19. Very tough.

    I could not parse:
    9ac apart from ILL in ADO
    24ac apart from [mil]E + rato
    25ac apart from rev of TOO
    4d
    6d

    Thanks, both.

20. Every day I finish the puzzle the same day. But this is the first time for maybe eighteen months that I could hardly get any and didn’t make any inroads at all. And looking on this blog at the parsings of some of them, I’m not surprised. Very tough. “Theist” and “eschewed” seem particularly difficult, but there are several others.

21. To start with I had CRICK for 11a -I think there was a cop called RICK so it seemed OK
    Until the crossers. So Plan B was engaged-I had to get the crossers before amending my original stab.
    Whereas with Tyrus, the political twin of Vlad I spotted the perimeter early on and guessed the Bratisms
    Great setter in either guise.
    Thanks all!

22. This was a tricky one. For me there was quite a lot of guessing the answer and then trying to figure out the parsing.

    Charles LAMB (and his alias Elia) used to be a crossword regular, but we don’t see him so much these days.

    I’ve always thought BAD LOT was an interesting expression. Is it the only context in which “lot” means an individual rather than several people?

    Thanks Vlad for the challenge and manehi for a very clear blog.

23. [Roz might be late to the party today. Beautiful images from JWST]

24. Can anyone explain why ‘high’ is an anagram indicator? Can’t get my head round it! Thanks

25. I used to live in a village called Loggerheads, but since it was in Staffordshire, not Wales, the solution did not immediately come to mind. I was told, incidentally, that the village was called Loggerheads because it was close to the borders of three counties (Shropshire, Staffordshire and Cheshire. I don’t know whether this is correct, but it is attractively plausible…

26. Bonnylass@24. High means drunk , and drunk and other synonyms are common anagrinds.

27. Bonnylass @24: ‘High’ in the sense of drugged up – hence scrambled

28. …omitted to say that I thought the cluing for BAD LOT, a bit sneaky. Having to provide “Told” for “Ordered” before being able to sort the answer out.
    Also, it’s always fascinating to see Tenter Grounds marked on old maps, e.g. for Spitalfields, where they used to hook up the newly produced cloth to dry in the open…

29. The last time I tried a Vlad puzzle I didn’t do too badly and thought that maybe I was getting better at his puzzles. Sadly not today. Like Lord Jim @22 I found I was guessing the answers a lot of the time then trying to parse them – and failing way too often – oh well.

    Thanks Vlad and manehi – really needed your help today.

30. Tricky but not impossible, but very enjoyable. Sometimes I wonder after the fact what made clues so difficult: here there was having to go through an intermediary, e.g ants, and also familiar operations indicated by unfamiliar operators, e.g. “not revealing”, “discontentedly”, “deposed”. All good, though.

31. Thanks for parsing ARMADILLO, TENNIS BALL, SMOOTHIES, CHANGELING and LIEN, manehi, those defeated me.

    I have the impression that “wear” in this sense happens only in the negative — “she won’t wear it.” You don’t see “I had to wear his behavior.”

    The Untouchable Ness is one of many reasons I’m glad I’m not a blogger. I’d never have made that connection.

    Once at a friend’s family Christmas, somebody gave somebody a bumper sticker that said “ESCHEW OBFUSCATION.” It was the conversation piece of the whole holiday.

    Thanks for the fun, Vlad, and for the help, manehi.

32. Great fun, with at least 3 unparsed or wrongly so. Spent ages trying to work TEAL into TENNIS BALL, couldn’t see where the rest came from and ended up with “well what else can it be”. I’ve sung along I don’t know how many times to the line “What’s a park if you can’t see a linnet” from HMHB ‘s “Chatteris” but still couldn’t see it. Just shows how unshakeable the human mind can be once it’s got an idea.

33. FJ@32 that’s exactly how I got to LINNET 🙂

34. Thanks for the blog, great puzzle and lasted one minute short of the perfect time. ESCHEWED and TENNIS BALL the pick for me.
    Don@25 the more important village of Loggerheads is of course in North Staffordshire along with the more important Florence, Dresden and Etruria.

35. [ PDM@23 there should be a lot more later today, they are on US time of course. Our MiddleSprog is a very junior member of a team that has some mission time later this year, she will get some actual, raw data. ]

36. Thank you, manehi, for parsing BAD LOT. I struggled with BADE plus OT, and finally just filled in the answer with a “Hail, Mary.”

    A great many satisfying clues. Thanks to Vlad and manehi.

37. [ Bodycheetah @33 good work, and I have no idea why it did not occur to me. Especially as I live not too far from Ely or St Ives . . . ]

38. Great fun! Some great wit and disguise here esp ABBREVIATE, WRETCH, CHANGELING and DEIFIC

    When I first saw the answer TENNIS BALL, I feared that the bird with muscles was a reference to Jessica Ennis! Thank goodness it wasn’t!

    Today I’ve learned about the place name Loggerheads.

    Thanks Vlad and manehi

39. Had no trouble with LINNET, the nickname of Kings Lynn Town FC, which along with that of its city neighbour, gives the unusual name for a local pub: the canary and linnet. NESS and LOGGERHEADS, on the other hand were only confirmed by a well-known search engine. ARMADILLO and CHANGELING needed a long, hard stare before the parsings finally made sense. All in all a very satisfying workout. Thanks Vlad and manehi.

40. Thanks manehi, I had no idea what was going on in SMOOTHIES nor CHANGELING.
    Good to see both LOGGERHEADS well known on here – I put “Wales Loggerheads” into G**gle maps and it took me to Staffs!
    I went down the same TEAL path as FieryJack for a while, and before 7d and 8d emerged was convinced that 5A was DECODE (parses and fits def but not the crossers).
    Luckily remembered ERATO and LAMB from other crosswords and T(au) cross from explanations on here so thanks everyone!
    poc@16 yes I used to get check errors when I solved online so gave up using it, of course now I have to accept being wrong and/or messing up the grid now and again.
    Last in BAD LOT as I always thought that was a situation rather than a person but it was the only ..O..D that made any sense.
    Tough but satisfying, thanks Vlad.

41. Not much to say that hasn’t been said already. I had a very high number (by my standards) of BIFDs, just about the same list of them as Valentine. So thanks very much for the blog, manehi.

    I suppose I also hadn’t heard of a village called Loggerheads, but the clue and the crossing letters left no room for doubt that there was such a place.

42. Satisfying to complete that one even if, like others here, I had more than the usual number of guesses and either reverse engineered the parsing or had it explained to me by Manehi. Favourites were WRETCH, a lovely simple surface, and ORBS, my FOI as I am finally remembering to look for disembowelled words. Thanks Vlad and Manehi.

43. The only Loggerheads I’ve visited is the rather excellent pub in Shrewsbury, back in the 90s!

44. Managed most of this, but had BAD JOB for 3d. I still can’t see what’s wrong with it.

45. Late to the party but had to pop in to say how much I enjoyed this – as per WordPlodder @12, I found Saturday’s Tyrus frustratingly impenetrable, but this was just the right level of difficult to gets the little grey cells working while yielding enough to keep me engaged to the end.

    I’m another who was bamboozled by the TEAL in TENNIS BALL (despite also being an HMHB fan), but otherwise just about managed to parse it all. Very satisfying.

    Thanks Vlad, and manehi.

46. Thanks to manehi for a fine blog and to others for their comments.

47. Hard work this, but did manage to finish in the end. LOGGERHEADS did sort of ring a bell, but I was put off by the English name so I had to look it up after writing-in (there’s a different LOGGERHEADS in England, so it seems).

    Spent ages trying to figure out an anagram of [O]N[E] + COMMANDO: shows the beauty of misdirection! Has to be the best clue here, methinks.

    Thanks Vlad and manehi.

48. …just noticed I had BID FOR (‘ordered’) in 3s but never got round to trying to parse it. So I’m wrong, this was a DNF 🙁

49. Thanks to paddymelon @26 and Gervase @27, Vlad and manehi.

50. Thank you Roz@34, important information indeed. Of course, there is no Florence in Italy, although there is a Firenza.

51. Well, it seems I’m in the minority. Some clever clues, but others just don’t stand the Araucaria test – they don’t follow grammatical logic.

Comments are closed.