Financial Times 17,163 by MONK

18 comments on “Financial Times 17,163 by MONK”

1. Two badger clues is good enough for me.
   Thanks PeeDee and Monk

2. I got HUSBANDLESS but couldn’t parse it till I came here. Likewise APRON. Hadn;t heard of Cirencester, nor a mashed potato dance, and I’ve had to add DUN to my lexicon. And I had no idea of the Times’ nickname. Everything else fell into place, and it was enjoyable, though not many smiles.

3. Quite easy for a Monk, though I did have to check that meaning of ‘thunderer’. Growing up, we said ‘welch’ for ‘cheat’, rather than ‘welsh’. Looking in Chambers, ‘welch’ is archaic, so I now feel very old.

4. Geoff DU, you’re obviously a lot younger than I am, but when I came to Australia in the mid-sixties, all the radio stations were playing “Mashed Potato” by Billy Thorpe and the Aztecs. It was quite a profound, erudite and complex song with some deeply philosophical undertones. To sum up, the first verse was “Mashed Potato, yeah, yeah” sang four times; the next verse was the same but the chorus (which was identical) did throw in the occasional “Oh” and a scream or two. If you missed this musical masterpiece (almost up there with “Total Eclipse of the Heart”) try this link:

   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tncT7WbvRls

   Other than that, it was pretty easy although I do agree with Hovis about the spelling of “welch”. Maybe that makes me archaic too.

5. I didn’t parse ‘husbandless,’ but noticed across answers that preceded it were I DO, CHEAT and ULTIMATUM. Monk sometimes shares with PeeDee what he was thinking if the puzzle has a hint of a theme but not something that I would usually notice. Thanks to Monk and PeeDee.

6. Peter, yes, it would appear I’m younger than your good self. I watched the first sixty seconds of the video you linked — all I could stand — and it most certainly wasn’t familiar.

   By the way, are you the Peter who occasionally contributes to DA trippers each week?

7. Always good to get a Monk crossword, even if I am old enough to remember both my father using 3d and the mashed potato!

   Thanks to Monk and PeeDee

8. Thanks for the blog, good set of clues. Just musing on a theme, our sprogs used to watch “Badger and bodger” and badger was obsessed with mashed potato.

9. Not so easy for me. I guessed ‘mashed potato’ must be a dance, but I couldn’t parse APRON and it took me ages to see how HUSBANDLESS worked. My favourite, which also took a long time, was ‘Bi’ for BISMUTH, which I’ll now add to the chemical symbols as definitions file.

   Thanks to Monk and the ever hard-working PeeDee

10. I managed to finish the puzzle, perhaps demonstrating that it is at the easier end of the Monk spectrum.

    Thanks for helping me parse the mysteries.

    I’m Welsh and I hate the use of the word meaning “to cheat”. It’s offensive and fortunately you don’t hear it in polite company.

11. I am another who remembers the word “welch” used in my childhood not “welsh” (1970’s), so certainly not obsolete as Chambers implies. As Moly points out the meaning originated as an offensive term (and remains so). Perhaps there was a deliberate intention at that time to distance “welch” from “Welsh”, to make it seem more acceptable.

12. Geoff DU @6 “are you the Peter who occasionally contributes to DA trippers each week?”

    Guilty as charged. I have been doing DA’s crosswords for many years. In fact, I have just finished watching David on “Celebrity Letters and Numbers”. To be honest I only watch the show to see Lily. She’s great but I remember Carol Vorderman – they are both wonderful, intelligent and beautiful ladies. Brains and beauty and I know that I’ll be castigated for some sort of sexism but we males can be allowed to appreciate fabulous and intelligent women.

13. Hovis at 3. I always like reading your comments. If you had to look up THUNDERER you are not that old.

    Thanks Monk and PeeDee

14. Peter @12, I too am a regular on DA trippers, but under a different name. I’ll leave you to guess …

15. trenodia @13. Thanks for the kind comment. I am only 66 but, believe it or not, have never read a newspaper in my life.

16. When I still lived in the UK (pre 1970) we pronounced “welch” as in “chose” and “Welsh” as in “shove”. You know, I never associated the former with the latter. Agree with the comments about the Monk puzzle. Thanks both.

17. I understand Moly’s disapproval of the derogatory use of “welsh”, and think only “welch” – preferably pronouced as John 16 recalls – should be used in a dishonourable sense. Confirmation of this exists in the naming of the protagonist’s bete noire as Professor Welch in Kingsley Amis’s Lucky Jim, his first and funniest book {written whilst he was lecturing at a Welsh university}, though that too dates back a long way now.

18. Thanks Monk for a well-crafted crossword. I almost always attempt Monk but seldom get as far as I did today. I used a word finder for THUNDERSHOWER and APRON, neither of which I could parse. The parsing of EPISTLE also escaped me but all else made sense. My top clues included DEWEY, ALBUM, EAGER, ADDING MACHINE, SHORT-TEMPERED, COMES INTO (great anagram, seamless compact surface), and BISMUTH. Thanks PeeDee for the blog.

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