Guardian 29,247 – Picaroon

78 comments on “Guardian 29,247 – Picaroon”

1. A decent “never heard of” list, but within the legal limits — JOKESOME, ENVENOM, VIATICA & IMISHI (which I was surprised to discover Collins labels “Australian military slang”). Nor did I know that “bird” can mean “prison time”. BULLINGDON CLUB was a bit mean for non-UK solvers, but I shan’t complain, as I surprised myself by recalling it from a crossword a few months ago.

   I began slowly, as I often do with Picaroon’s, but the tempo picked up and I felt fulfilled by the end. 🙂

2. Lovely light-hearted stuff from the ever-reliable Picaroon. Top marks for OVERPOPULATION ESCAPEES and SANDPIT

   I don’t usually worry about surfaces, but there were some delightful ones here

   Cheers P&A

3. JOKESOME, VIATICA and IMSHI were new to me too, sadly Cameron followed by Johnson as PMs meant BULLINGDON CLUB is well-known.

   A good workout from Picaroon this morning. Thank you to Andrew for the blog.

4. IMSHI may be familiar to readers of Agatha Christie…

5. GDU@1: Rhyming slang – Bird lime = time.

   Thanks to Picaroon and Andrew.

6. Auriga @5, oh, no! I’ve just been engaged in a rhyming slang conversation regarding the FT puzzle. I’m not a big fan of rhyming slang, as a some contributors here would be aware. 😉

7. Thanks to Andrew and Picaroon. Apparently no theme today or none picked up by me or so far. Themes not always everyone’s cup of tea, but I like them. Guranteed theme in a Qaos, who hasn’t appeared since 26 Sept. Anybody know if he”s OK? I don’t wish to pry. I just miss him.

8. Many thanks for parsing no-brainer, I just could not see it.

   Thanks Setter and Blogger

9. Did recognise imshi, must’ve heard it in a war movie. It was the last few in the other bottom corner I stared dumbly at … had to guess’n’check for the first i in nitwits (wondering how nits were so-and-sos), and then mop up bearcar and serf. Enjoyed it though, ta PnA.

10. Agreed, quite a number of NHOs. I have never heard Brownies called BROWNIE GUIDES before, though I suppose that is their official name. BEARCAT, JOKESOME, VIATICA are others, though IMSHI had to take the cake. We are expected to know Arabic too now? The BULLINGDON CLUB made the news here often enough, I would have thought: reading about the upper class twits that rule the UK plays to our Aussie image of the Poms. Thanks, Picaroon and Andrew.

11. Favourites: NO-BRAINER, OMNIVORES.

    I could not parse 16d apart from ESC=key. Whoops, should have seen that it was ESCAPE not ESC.

    New for me: IMSHI, VIATICA.

    Thanks, both.

12. Yes, enjoyable, but still feel I’m missing something in 18. Isn’t NITS just short for NITWITS or am I just being slow? I join the people who’d never heard of JOKESOME, IMSHI or VIATICA but the wordplay made the answer clear in each case. Likewise I never realised that brownies were BROWNIE GUIDES, but got there with the help of the crossers. Thanks to Picaroon and Andrew.

13. Thank you Michelle @11 for reassuring me that I wasn’t alone in failing to parse 16d.
    Some lovely clues in here, notably MENAGES A TROIS, NO-BRAINER, OVERPOPULATION.
    I guess that Brownies became BROWNIE GUIDES in the same way that (Wolf) Cubs became Cub Scouts.
    Some unfamiliar words – BEARCAT, VIATICA (apparently VIATICUM is also Holy Communion administered to one at the point of death – food for the journey…), JOKESOME, IMSHI – but all of them with wordplay that was clear enough to be fair on the solver.
    I wasn’t too impressed by NITWITS, but that’s a very minor cavil about a most enjoyable puzzle. Thanks, Picaroon and Andrew.

14. Thanks Picaroon and Andrew
    Not up to the Pirate’s usual standard, as far as I’m concerned. Several solutions unknown to me, including the crossing VIATICA and IMSHI, which I thought was unfair. There are two Is in the fodder for 11a, so the clue should have indicated that only one was to be removed (though it was my FOI, in fact). I agree that NITWITS doesn’t seem to work. I had NOTIONS before I checked, which I think is actually better (I in NOT-ONS).
    I’ll forgive a lot for the BULLINGDON CLUB clue, though.

15. Phil @7: funnily enough, I was thinking exactly the same about Qaos, after seeing the clue for KNOLL. I enjoyed seeing the word ‘Hooligans’ straight after BULLINGDON CLUB, describing their (SEM)ANTICS perfectly, NOBs or not. Unfamiliar words were clued fairly, so further educated again by the setter.

    Ta Picaroon & Andrew

16. Just in the middle of an Apex crossword where Laughsome is a key answer, so that helped with JOKESOME. Glad to hear I’m not the only one who shrugged a bit at NITWITS.

17. IMSHI is Arabic not Australian (though the Australian army probably brought it back from wartime service in the Middle East). I learned it, along with “baksheesh”, from my Mum’s fondness for playing “In A Persian Market” on the piano. Apparently it’s really much too rude to be included in such a genteel piece of Victorian music.

18. A good crossword with some satisfying solves. Particularly enjoyed NO-BRAINER and SERF. My thanks, as always, to Picaroon.

19. David. I love Agatha Christie but don’t recall the word. Do you have a book in mind?

20. As well as BULLINGDON CLUB, I liked SEMANTICS, ISSUE and NO-BRAINER. The unfamiliar words rang some kind of bell, so an enjoyable solve for me.

21. Far too many obscurities for me today to enjoy this challenge, even though I did manage to solve a (very) few. Enjoyed reading the blog, thanks.

22. Another NITWITS shrugger, here. I messed around with NO TWITS for a while, trying to substitute I (intelligence) for the O, but Andrew’s parsing is probably right.

    Really enjoy it when it’s possible to construct an unknown word from the immaculate cluing, then look it up to find it’s right!

    Many thanks, both.

23. This was tough, with some wicked parsing – the left hand side went in long before the right. I guessed VIATICA from viaticum, but it’s a new one to me, as was JOKESOME (though both gettable from wordplay). I had BROWNIE long before the second word: is that their official name now?

    I did enjoy PORCHES – one you’ve done it, you notice the absence of a hyphen in south-east… Also liked BULLINGDON CLUB once I stopped trying to fit GATE (scandal) into it.

24. I think there are two ways you can parse 18d. These (NITWITS) could be silly so-and-sos (NITS) without (outside) intelligence (WIT). Or, these (NITWITS) would still be silly so-and-sos without (lacking) WIT – they would be NITS.

25. There is only one person I know of that played a piano in the sandpit(who is amazingly still with us)
    It should be part of a theme
    Fave clue was PORSCHE to PORCHES

26. An enjoyable crossword, parts of which made me work hard. I agree with Lord. Jim about 18d

    Thanks to Picaroon and Andrew

27. Good enjoyable solve, although it looked like Picaroon got a bit tangled up in the SE corner.

    I liked the wordplays in OMINVORES, BULLINGDON CLUB, SANDPIT and OVERPOPULATION, and the good anagram for MENAGE A TROIS.

    Thanks Picaroon and Andrew.

28. Great puzzle! As Andrew says, the ever-reliable Picaroon. I thought there mght be a dastardly anagram indicator in the clue for OMNIVORES: “Unfussy consumers of noir movies ignoring current shot”: ‘movies’ ignoring ‘i’ = moves = anagrind. Many thanks to P & A.

29. Highly enjoyable. BULLINGDON CLUB, NO BRAINER, JOKESOME and OMNIVORES were highlights.

    I’m also in the camp that 18d doesn’t really work, or if it does it’s weak compared to the high standards of the other clues.

    Thanks Picaroon and Andrew

30. Not only does 18d work, it works in two possible and equally valid ways, as I said @24. And it’s an &lit! What’s not to like?

31. Mostly fun, but some unsatisfactory clues here.

    BIRD in 1A is a bit off because the origin of “bird” as slang for prison time is itself “jailbird”.

    NHO JOKESOME (although the construction was clear), BULLINGDON CLUB, VIATICA, BEARCAT, and IMSHI, the latter of which IMO goes beyond the bounds of fair GK. ENVENOM was new to me, but the derivation is reasonable.

    I have heard of Brownies and Guides, but never Brownie Guides?

32. I remember a Mexican colleague having a bee in his bonnet about people placing Mexico in Central America, on the not unreasonable grounds that there’s little point defining a continent for just two countries (plus, NAFTA).

    I can only imagine how Chilean solvers might feel about “South American” => “S US”.

33. Thank you for explaining ESCAPEES – oh that key!
    Challenging and fun, and learned some new words. So many great clues: NO BRAINER, OVERPOPULATION, SEMANTICS, OMNIVORES, PORCHES are favourites.
    Thanks Picaroon and Andrew

34. Lots to like here, especially for me: OVERPOPULATION, BULLINGDON CLUB, NO-BRAINER, the threesomes, SERF and the Qaotic KNOLL.

    I don’t think I’ve ever seen the plural of ‘viaticum’, but that’s what it had to be, and I didn’t recognise IMSHI despite having read practically the whole oeuvre of Mrs Christie (though admittedly for the plots rather than the language 🙂 ) – but that’s what the clue said. And of course NITWITS (LOI) was mystifying.

    Thanks to the Pirate and Andrew

35. Jacob@31: “bird” for time in jail is not derived from JAILBIRD but from rhyming slang (birdlime=time : see Auriga@5 above).

36. Blimey – we’re really scraping the bottom of the quibble barrel today which I suppose is ultimately a compliment to Picaroon 🙂

37. Lord Jim @30: Your parsing is convincing, but I’m not enamoured of the clue, as ‘nit’ in this context is most likely just an abbreviation of ‘nitwit’.

38. I’m another who was surprised at BROWNIE GUIDES: I’ve always known Brownies as the group for younger girls, and Guides for older ones. (I got slung out of both, the latter for voicing my discomfort at having to “swear allegiance to God & the Queen”, but this was a goodly while back and that requirement may have since been dropped).
    Loved PORCHES and MENAGES À TROIS, and OMNIVORES made me grin.
    Never heard of VIATICA or IMSHI – but got there anyway, so no complaints.
    Many thanks, Picaroon & Andrew

39. A round of applause for OVERPOPULATION! NHO IMSHI, ENVENOM or VIATICA but followed the clues and then googled to check that they were real words. BEARCAT seems to be a crossword setter favourite; I had not heard of the animal before becoming addicted to this pastime! Thanks Picaroon and Andrew.

40. Rather stumbled around the grid unsuccessfully at first, but eventually found a way in through the helpfully situated ABACUS, then the polyamorous MENAGE A TROIS anagram. Agree that nho VIATICA and IMSHI intersecting in the SE corner was a trifle unfair. Loved SEMANTICS, wasn’t quite sure how NITWITS worked. Last one in the clever SERF, once the penny dropped…oh, and though also didn’t know OP-ED, the clueing was precise, and I’d hOPED I’d inserted the correct answer early on.

41. As someone who’s deep into Girlguiding, BROWNIE GUIDES is not the current terminology, they are BROWNIES these days and have been for a while. Although there is a song around from when I was a Brownie, yea aeons ago, still sung that says “We’re Brownie Guides, We’re Brownie Guides”. but that was an official song in the 1970s handbook, if I remember correctly, and is not shown anywhere officially any more.

42. wellbeck @38: When I joined the Scouts they asked my religion. I replied “none” which apparently had no place on their form so they put me down as C of E. I always thought that said more about the CofE than about me. The religion requirement was only dropped in the past few years for volunteers. About ten years ago a friend asked if I could teach his son’s Cub group to rock climb (as a qualified instructor) but to volunteer I had to profess a belief in a minimum of one god. Any god(s) would do (apart from the Flying Spaghetti Monster, all hail his noodly appendages) but I could not pass that test so they had to go without.

    Paul @39: Only previous encounter with the word ‘bearcat’ was with the Stutz car of that ilk, from a MAD magazine cartoon in which a young man is given a small inheritance and wants to buy a car but his father insists he invests it. 30 years later his father points out how happy he should be that his $5000 has now turned into $20000. The son replies that if he’d bought the car he’d now have an antique Bearcat worth $50000… The name was just so poetic the phrase “Stutz Bearcat” has stayed with me for over 40 years.

43. Wellbeck @38, the current Brownie (and Guide and adult) promise no longer requires us to believe in God or serve our country, but to “develop our beliefs” and “serve our King and community”.

44. [Jack of Few Trades @42
    I was involved as a driver in some Venture Scout trips 40 odd years ago. Before the first one the organiser asked me what my religion was. When I said “none”, he said “I’ll put you down as a seeker, then”.]

45. Lord Jim @30 – since you specifically asked “What’s not to like?” for me the point isn’t so much whether it can be parsed (it clearly can) but that half of the wordplay and the resulting solution are remarkably close synonyms. Chambers even gives a possible etymology of NIT as being an abbreviation of NITWIT. So while technically the clue ‘works’, it’s rather unsatisfying — unless we’re all missing something rather clever?

46. Hamlet, Act V scene 2,” The point envenom’d too! Then, venom, to thy work!” Good enough provenance for me.

47. Excellent puzzle, IMSHI and VIATICA new to me

48. Bicicleta@19, Gervase@34
    I think it’s Mrs. Allerton in “Death on The Nile”, who says she brandishes her sunshade/parasol and yells “Imshi!” to shoo away the Arab children (I’m paraphrasing, don’t recall the exact wording)..

49. My ex-brownie partner denied that BROWNIE GUIDES was a thing so I googled it. Came across the song:
    “We’re Brownie Guides, we’re Brownie Guides, we’re here to lend a hand. To love our God and serve our Queen, and help our homes and lands.”
    I suspect that’s not still sung!

50. As with some others above, JOKESOME, VIATICA and IMSHI were all new to me. The first two I could work out. Not the last, which was the only clue I had left on the grid. Such excellent surfaces and very clever clues. With thanks to Picaroon (always a pleasure to see your name) and Andrew.

51. Rob T @45; and Collins says: nit3
    noun
    informal chiefly Brit short for nitwit.

52. Andrew, I think “where to play” should be underlined in 5dn as the definition of SANDPIT.

    SKYLINE = “panorama” seems a bit of a stretch to me.

    I read “academic staff” as “dons,” and wondered what the last three letters could be — could it be BULLINGDON SOUP? (Soup of the evening, beautiful soup?) Finally I separated “staff” and figured it out.

    Same nhos as the others.

    The wiki link (thanks!) also took me to the extremely entertaining Bullingdon Club story. Whoo-ee!

    I knew BEARCAT but only as an extinct car. It never occurred to me that it could be a real animal.

    :William@22 What you’re describing is what’s known on this site as a “jorum,” and causes joy in all of us.

    Thanks as ever to Picaroon and Andrew.

53. Robi @51
    It seems a bit circular. Isn’t a nitwit someone with the brain of a nit (egg of a head louse)?

54. [Copmus @25: are you referring to Brian Wilson? Wasn’t he depicted composing Good Vibrations in sand in his biopic Love & Mercy?]

55. Viatica new to me but solvable from the wordplay. Thanks setter and blogger.

56. Thanks Picaroon and Andrew

    Bobtato @ 32

    “I can only imagine how Chilean solvers might feel about “South American” = “S US”. “

    You’ve fallen for Picaroon’s misdirection. He’s clueing South as S and American as US; he’s not clueing “South American”.

57. Ah, the bearcat took me right back to the 70’s. It was the first word I learned in Chinese, xiong4 mao1 (= bear-cat). Means ‘Panda’, of course.

58. It is tricky to intersect VIATICA with IMSHI, but they are both eminently gettable from the clueing even if you’ve never heard of either (which I hadn’t).

    I never fail to enjoy a Picaroon puzzle. My favourites today were the nicely surfaced OMNIVORES, the “game senoritas” in the MENAGES A TROIS (an Anagram Of The Year contender surely), and the classy KNOLL. Thanks to Picaroon.

    Needed the blog for the parsing of NO-BRAINER, so thank you also to Andrew for that.

59. Rob T @45 (and others): some people (eg @14 and 29) had suggested that 18d didn’t work – I hope we’re now agreed that it does. Whether you like it is I suppose more subjective. NITWIT and NIT are of course closely related – I thought that was partly the point. Anyway I thought it was good.

60. Mandarin#58 The classy knoll – isn’t there a conspiracy theory about that?

61. Knew IMSHI from reading Billy Bunter books as a child.In stories where the Remove form ventured abroad for their holidays accompanied by their venerable form master, Mr Quelch would bark “Imshi” at persistent beggars.

62. muffin @53 – per Chambers, NITWIT is assumed to be a Germanic derivation of NOT + WIT and so unrelated to the head louse, interestingly. A bit like how PEN and PENCIL don’t have a common origin.

63. Thanks Picaroon. I found much to like including OP-ED, OMNIVORES, MENAGES-A-TROIS, SERF, SANDPIT, and OVERPOPULATION. I didn’t mind the oddities like ENVENOM, IMSHI, or VIATICA because they were clearly clued. I never heard of the BULLINGDON CLUB or brownies called BROWNIE GUIDES (I ended up revealing GUIDES) and I failed with ESCAPEES. Thanks Andrew for the blog.

64. An alternative song for cubs, brownies and the like comes from Paddy Roberts. I know the words, if not the title. “When I was a little wolf cub and you were a brownie, we learned all the regulations of which there were lots”.
    I believe it was called Follow Me.

65. Thanks RobT @62

    KateE @64
    You’ve reminded me of this Tom Lehrer song…

66. Thanks Andrew, I was relieved to see the interlocking SE pair correct – I needed some inspiration for the VIA of 22a which then resolved the IMSHI/myshi impasse.
    I knew the Stutz Bearcat from a set of Top Trumps (Classic cars, I think) – it was a good one, having either the largest engine or highest horsepower, amybe both. Never seen one (of either sort) in the wild. [Jack@42 our excellent scout leader was eventually forced out because of insufficient kowtowing to god and queen – a great loss.]
    Having seen him in the flesh with his metal band, clue of the day for me has to be for SANDPIT – if “Bublé does Bodycount” isn’t the album we are all buying our aunties this time next year, there really is no justice.
    Brilliant again, thanks Picaroon.

67. … my mind was similarly inclined, muffin @65 …

68. Gazzh @66
    I expected 23d to be MYSHI too.

69. I too did not like NITWITS and still don’t, despite Lord Jim‘s protestations. And also thought IMSHI very unfair. And also, never heard of BROWNIE GUIDES. We completed but with a certain amount of bung in and shrug. Thanks to Picaroon and Andrew.

70. Thanks both,
    ‘Escapee’ and its ilk, e.g. ‘Attendee’ still grate. Why not ‘escaper’ and ‘attender’?

71. Whew! That was tough. Took me several sessions spread over two days. Despite being an Agatha Christie reader of old I didn’t get IMSHI at 23d so in the end it was a DNF for me. Thanks to Picaroon for the fun of clues like 14a MÉNAGE Á TROIS, 16d ESCAPEES and 20d ABACUS, and to Andrew for the explanatory solutions.

72. Probably nobody will read this bot I parsed 18d thus: definition They may be silly. Wordplay Louse egg around WIT. The little so-and-so’s, I would use stronger language, that infest your children’s hair.

73. It wasn’t my favourite clue.
    Thanks both.

74. Liked VIATICA – optima sunt.
    Gratias P&A

75. Gladys@35: I remain unconvinced. I see that claim repeated online but without citations, and birdlime is hardly widely found in the east end of London. A lot of alleged rhyming slang is modern backformations, and I suspect this to be one such instance.

    The etymology of jailbird, on the other hand, is well-established.

76. Muffin@65 thanks for the Tom Lehrer link. I seem to be word-perfect for many of his songs.

77. JulieinAustralia@71 you have said everything I was going to say. I was determined to finish it and I put in imshi only because it made sense as the setter having an unfinished vessel. Thanks all.

78. I guessed the answer to 26a but couldn’t work out why this was a homophone. The only definition of serf that I have found describes a medieval vassal or slave.

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