For Genius 136, Puck tells us that “Eight solutions include one or more thematic elements that are absent from their clues. Before submitting your completed entry you must make a single numerical adjustment in the grid, the effect of which will be to create two intersecting and mutually exclusive alternatives suggested by an appropriate well-known saying.”
In fact, I think what was meant was that the thematic elements were absent ‘from the wordplay in their clues’, as they turned out to be included in the definitions.
I was fortunate to hit the wavelength quite quickly on this one – 1A was a ‘sparkling wine’ which seemed to have an anagram of the letters SENT, to fit an 8-letter slot – i.e. presumably four thematic letters missing – and SPUMANTE seemed to fit the bill…so PUMA seems to be a thematic word. Then 9A – ‘Blair’ as a choreographer…not too many Blairs in my cultural references – Tony, Eric (George Orwell), Linda (the Exorcist) and of course the ‘theatrical’ LIONEL BLAIR – who I remember more as an 80’s quiz show panellist, but was also a bit of a choreographer in his time. So, LION is probably another – there must be a (big) cat theme going on here.
And so it continued – PUSS in Boots; Curtis STIGERs (great material and clue to fit the cat theme!); and ATOMic KITTEN – two thematic elements in one clue, as warned in the preamble. To complete the list: liFELINE; annOUNCE and stacCATo.
But, as ever, there needs to be a denouément…a ‘numerical’ adjustment in a puzzle containing only letters(?). After some searching for a written out number – ONE? TWO? SIX? – I eventually realised that we need to turn to our old friends the Romans…changing D (500) for M (1000) at the first letter of DOG SHOW/DICE PLAY gives us MOG SHOW and MICE PLAY.
And the overall theme is that old saying: ‘when the CAT’s away, the MICE will PLAY’. The cats are ‘away’, or absent, from their clues’ wordplay. And the mutually exclusive alternatives are ‘MOG SHOW’ – the cat showing up – and ‘MICE PLAY’ – which they only do when the cat doesn’t show up.
There were a couple of thematic references in the clues – to mice as ‘players here’ in 25A, and cats as ‘absentees’ in 28A – although I have to admit I only spotted those when parsing these clues more closely for the blog. Also, the Roman numerals reference for EXCEL/XL at 26D may have subconsciously helped in the thought process for the numeric substitution.
All in all, I felt this was at the ‘easier’ end of the scale for a Genius puzzle, but I am not complaining as it was my turn to blog it! And it was certainly fun along the way – thanks Puck.
Looking back nearly a month on, I think my last one in was FLASHERS at 8D – which was a nicely diverting surface reading, and also contains another CAT reference, as the lash can be the ‘cat o’nine tails’… I hadn’t come across BIMBASHI before, and I was confused for a while by the MOOSE being a small Scottish animal – put on your best Scottish accent and say: ‘there’s a moose loose aboot this hoose’…
| Across | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Clue No | Solution (wthout thematic material) | Entry | Definition (with occasional embellishments) | Clue / Logic/Parsing |
| 1A | SNTE | S(PUMA)NTE | Sparkling wine | Sparkling wine sent round (8) / anag (i.e. round) of SENT |
| 9A | EL | (LION)EL | Blair, as choreographer | Blair as choreographer of the Middle Way of New Labour, originally (6) / E (middle letter of ‘nEw’) + L (first letter, originally, of Labour |
| 10A | ASSORTED | divers (as in diverse, not scuba divers!) | Dora and Tess trained divers (8) / anag (i.e. trained) of DORA and TESS |
|
| 11A | BOOTS | See 2D | See 2 (5) / See 2D |
|
| 12A | LI | LI(FELINE) | vital means of communication | Left with one vital means of communication (8) / L (left) + I (one) |
| 13A | USANCE | time allowed for paying bills | US Secretary of State once trimmed time allowed for paying bills (6) / US + ANCE (former Secretary of State – Cyrus VANCE? – trimmed |
|
| 14A | ASP | Slider | Slider part of door fastening in the Queen Vic? (3) / (H)ASP would be pronounced ‘ASP by a Cockney, maybe at the Queen Vic in Eastenders |
|
| 16A | DOG SHOW | (M)OG SHOW | Where one might take the lead | Where one might take the lead in section “Who waggled tail first?” (3,4) / DOG (tail, follow) + S (section) + HOW (anag, I,e, waggled, of WHO) |
| 19A | SS | S(TIGER)S | See 22A | See 22 (7) / See 22A |
| 20A | LEI | (Romanian) money | Money that is left for retirement (3) / IE (that is) + L (left) – all ‘retired’ to make LEI |
|
| 22,19A | CURTIS | Jazz musician | Jazz musician, short one with three sons (6,7) / CURT (short) + I (one) + SSS (three sons) |
|
| 25A | MAGNETIC | charming | Charming the backside off potential players here, including a broken-hearted chap (8) / A + GNET (broken hearted GENT), included in MIC (mice – potential ‘players’ in this puzzle – losing theiir ‘backside’, or last letter) |
|
| 27A | PRIES | Snoops in purse, say? (5) / homophone – PRIES (snoops) sounds like PRIZE (purse) |
||
| 28A | STACO | STAC(CAT)O | in a detached fashion (musically) | Absentees returning to love in a detached fashion (8) / STAC (cats, ‘absentees’ in this puzzle, returning) + O (zero, love) |
| 29,24A | AIC | A(TOM)IC | Group | Group of spies from the East (6,6) / CIA – spies, reversed, or seen ‘from the East’) |
| 30A | ENABLING | Allowing | Allowing a girl to have jewellery (8) / ENA (girl) + BLING (jewellery) |
|
| Down | ||||
| Clue No | Solution (wthout thematic material) | Entry | Definition (with occasional embellishments) | Clue / Logic/Parsing |
| 2,11D | IN | (PUSS) IN | Show (pantomime) | Show current Boston game (4,2,5) / I (current, physics) + N BOOTS (anag, i.e. game, of BOSTON) |
| 3D | MOOSE | small Scottish animal (Scottish pronounciation of ‘mouse’) | Way of working with very large English or small Scottish animal (5) / MO (modus operandi, way of working) + OS (outsize, very large) + E (English) |
|
| 4D | NITWIT | Wally | Wally returned home to wife, initially having sex (6) / NI (in, at home, returned) + TW (first letters of To Wife) + IT (slang, sexual intercourse) |
|
| 5D | ENDLESS | two defns: de-tailed; infinitely boring | Detailed infinitely boring carry-on to a greater extent, presumably (7) / if you ‘end’ less often) then, logically, you ‘carry on’ more (often), or to a greater extent |
|
| 6D | BIMBASHI | Turkish officer | Setter’s going to party held by bisexual Turkish officer (8) / B_I (bisexual) around (holding) I’M (the setter is) + BASH (party) |
|
| 7D | ANN | ANN(OUNCE) | report | A news report (8) / A + NN (new, plural) |
| 8D | FLASHERS | (Ford) Escort’s means of indicating | Escort’s means of indicating they’re fine whip users? (8) / F (fine) + LASHERS (whip users) |
|
| 14D | AWL | One bored with (i.e. a tool used to bore holes) | One bored with lawbreaking (3) / AWL = anag (i.e. breaking) of LAW |
|
| 15D | PSI | (Greek) letter | Letter from broadband provider turns up (3) / PSI = ISP (Internet Service Provider) turning up |
|
| 16D | DICE PLAY | (M)ICE PLAY | gambling | Writer in extremely dodgy place, desperately gambling (4,4) / I (the writer) in anag (i.e. desperately) of DY (extreme letters of DodgY) + PLACE |
| 17D | GARRISON | Barracks | Barracks teacher shown up during organ playing (8) / GAR_ON (anag, i.e. playing) of ORGAN, around RIS (Sir, or teacher, shown ‘up’) |
|
| 18D | HEIRSHIP | right of succession | Male Irish priest, one slipping further down in right of succession (8) / HE (male) + IRSHI (Irish, with I, or one, slipping down) + P (priest) |
|
| 21D | EN MASSE | all grouped together | Bottom’s fluid introductions, lacking a point and direction, all grouped together (2,5) / EN(E)MA – injection of fluid into the bottom, lacking E (East, a compass point) + SSE (direction, South South East) |
|
| 23D | IGUANA | arboreal animal | Antiguan anteater, partly arboreal animal (6) / hidden word in ‘AntIGUAN Anteater’ |
|
| 24D | KITTEN | See 29A | See 29 (6) / See 29A |
|
| 26D | EXCEL | be outstanding | Be outstanding, able to fill very big boots and score twice, reportedly (5) / two homophones: if you can fill large boots your feet might be XL (extra large); two ‘score’ = forty, or XL in Roman numerals |
|
Hi mc_rapper67
You are either a very late bird or, like me, live in the USA!
Thanks for the blog, and thanks to Puck for a great puzzle, which I really enjoyed.
For a while I thought 16A was MOGSHOW [which it coincidentally turned out to be in the end, after the letter change]. I had only got 6 of the 8 cat clues by then and had **GSHOW. I obviously knew DOGSHOW was more likely, but tried to convince myself of the former before getting 16D.
My LOI was Atomic Kitten, after which I kicked myself as it was staring me in the face, particularly as I knew that the solution had to have two missing cats.
I actually took Puck’s well-known saying as “While the Cat’s a way”. And ‘how’ is ‘a way’ to do something. Leading to MOGSHOW.
Apart from the 9 cats [one clue gave 2], there are a number of other animals lurking. We have ASS [twice], IGUANA, DOG, CUR, ASP, MOOSE and finely MOG and MICE [after the letter change]. I don’t think that would be a coincidence.
By the way your lovely animated solution loses the highlighting on Feline.
Gordon @1 – as another fifteensquared blogger, I can tell you that WordPress (the software behind the site) allows publication dates and times to be set in advance. So I doubt that our blogger was anywhere near his computer.
I had great fun doing this puzzle, ATOMIC KITTEN had me scratching my head for a while, wondering how kitten could mean group – duh!
I must have subconsciously solved 16d as MICE PLAY as I had no trouble spotting the numerical adjustment.
Thanks to s’r and b’r.
kenamc @2 – thanks for the explanation. I should have thought of that possibility.
I meant to add that my COTM was 28A, shortly followed by 22A/19A; the latter because of its surface reading, the former for its the lovely use of the theme twice.
Hi Gordon & kenmac – thanks for the feedback – and yes, I was comfortably tucked up in bed when the scheduler published this blog!
And good point, Gordon, on the preponderance of animals amongst the entries…a veritable menagerie…
“this was at the ‘easier’ end of the scale for a Genius puzzle”
Perhaps so, but about right for us! Took a while for the penny to drop – I think this happened with PUSS IN BOOTS – which then revealed how a couple of tentative entries (eg LIONEL) worked.
We then finished it in fits and starts over the next 3 or 4 days, which is good going for us 🙂
Clever construction, and good fun
Has anyone seen this week’s Genius yet? It doesn’t seem to be showing up for me but I may just be being stupid (particularly likely as a broken espresso machine means I haven’t had any caffeine this morning).
It didn’t take too long for me to see the theme, so was able to complete the puzzle fairly quickly. However, after repeatedly examining the diagram I was completely unable to see how the final instruction worked, so had no solution to submit. (Kicking myself now. 🙁 )
Still, I must compliment Puck on a fun puzzle.
Thanks to setter and blogger, and also to Gordon for pointing out the extra anima!s. It was a Puck so there had to be something I wouldn’t see.
Hi James, I can’t find it either. It’s comforting that I’m not alone, particularly as I’m going to be blogging it (hopefully)…
James, matt, et al – as of this evening (UK time) there seems to be a note at the top of the Grauniad Crossword page with some temporary links, including Genius 137. Hopefully that clears it up?…
Hi all
I found a way to get access to the crossword through me struggling to submit my entry for 136. Every time I clicked on the link on the crossword page I got Error 404, I still do and cannot understand why. However when I tried the Archive crossword search and used the lower option of the two, I selected Genius and 136 and it brought up the link. I was able to access 137 [along with Quiptic 137 for some reason] in the same way.
Hope this helps.