Financial Times 18,159 by JASON

15 comments on “Financial Times 18,159 by JASON”

1. Very enjoyable indeed with the ‘motor that’s out of place ‘ my favourite. Needed help parsing LIVELY as that historian was unknown to me.
   Thanks to Jason and Turbolegs.

2. A lot of smooth surfaces. I thought some of the charades were tricky and made it more difficult than the DD5. So saying, I got it all parsed.

   Enjoyable and many nice surfaces meant too many likes to list – although I do second Diane’s pick.

   Thanks Jason and Turbolegs

3. Nice, crisp clean cluing throughout. Best of the GIFTs today. As Martyn says, some lovely surfaces. Several of my faves were anagrams: CHELSEA TRACTOR, SIDEWALKS and PLEBEIAN along with COCKROACH, SMASH HIT and SUPERB.

   Thanks Jason and Turbolegs

4. Yup vg puzzle.

   Like Chelsea tractor, plebeian, trapeze.

5. Nice puzzle. Neat blog.

   C TRACTOR was my fave too. Also liked LAMBS LETTUCE and SMASH HIT.

   SOLITAIRE
   Took ‘was displayed’ as ‘aired’ (the program aired yesterday on BBC).
   Otherwise, the ‘was’ hangs loose.

   Thanks Jason and Turbolegs.

6. Thanks Jason and Turbolegs. I agree with KVa@5 re 13ac (SOLITAIRE).

7. I was defeated (Ha!) by DEFEAT because I don’t think I’ve ever come across either best or worst used as a verb before. It’s a rather unattractive usage, and all the odder because two opposite words mean the same thing. (The only other verbs that that I know of that behave in a similar way are “let” meaning either to hinder or allow and “dust” meaning either to add or remove dust, though in their case one word has two opposite meanings; here two words with opposite meanings are meaning the same.)

8. Babbler @7 – there are a whole class of words, contranyms or self-antonyms*, that mean two opposite things – trim / cleave / sanction / bolt / best / clip / fast (as well as your example of dust), not all verbs, some are adjectives. I encountered this concept first in a photography challenge trying to illustrate both meanings in a single image. Best as a verb like this is older English.

   I really enjoyed this and agree with the plaudits for CHELSEA TRACTOR. Thank you to Jason and Turbolegs.

   * not the only terms to describe them, but ones I remember

9. If only the dreaded CHELSEA TRACTORs were confined to Chelsea

   They do seem popular with setters – pangakupu clued it; Ridiculous car Tatler chose as one for the smart set?

   Cheers J&T

10. 20dn, partly in response to Babbler@7: I am not sure what I think of this clue. I have said on previous occasions that I think double definition clues are best when two words of different origin have converged in spelling. Usually the most feeble type are when the two definitions for the answer also define each other, so that both definitions and the answer share a single meaning. Does the paradoxical nature of the fact that best and worst are synonyms as verbs compensate for that? Probably a little bit, but possibly not very much.

11. Yes, DEFEAT was my LOI and took some dictionary research. I thought that specific meaning for worst was an interesting find, and I did wonder how many people would know it.

12. Shanne @8. Given the setter, it’s a shame you didn’t recall they are also called Jason words (they look both ways, as it were).

13. Hovis @ 12 I think you mean Janus.

14. I thought this was a great puzzle.. because I was able to do it? In any case thank you all

15. Simon. Whoops! So I did.

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