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Archive for January 25th, 2007

Independent 6326 by Scorpion - Very, very tough

Posted by nmsindy on 25th January 2007

nmsindy.

Scorpion is, I find, the hardest of the Indy setters and this puzzle was no exception.    There were some novel approaches and some areas I am not entirely sure of all the reasoning.   These are mentioned below.

Solving time (slowest of year so far, I think)    77 mins

* = anagram

ACROSS

1    SECOND      Very clever - a particle of a minute.

4   PISCATOR    i.e. an angler.    I got the idea straightaway from “rod” and “bank” but getting the right word took a while longer.

11 H(arr)Y FORD (reversed) + OIL   i.e. HYDROFOIL

12  MANGOES, I think.     It’s fruit all right.    My thought on the wordplay is that chestnut refers to hackneyed jokes starting “A man goes” i.e. “opening of old chestnut”.

13  f(A) c(U) + SPICE = season

22 THE SWAN  (AS NEWT + Here)*       “The Swan” as a typical pub name is my guess.

24  IAN BOTHAM      Have still not quite adjusted to seeing living people in the crossword, but this is an excellent &lit.     (IcONBAT)* i.e. caught (c) out + HAM = joint.  As for the surface reading, I thought that was what the Indy set itself out, on foundation, NOT to be !

25 T (ARK) A    The otter from Henry Williamson’s book, I think i.e. a fable.    TA = appreciated i.e, thanks.    ARK = haven

26  THE LASS (rev) Y  i.e. THESSALY.    You needed to know that the French for “tea” is “the” (there should be an accent on the e but this is ignored in crosswords) and the Spanish for “and” is “y”.

27  FRIEND   FIN interleaved with RED.      Phew!

DOWN

1  SK IR(M)ISH      I’ve learnt today that the postcode for Stockport is SK

2  COLON    A doubt     Definition would seem to fit “Waste disposal component”.    The “spotted” might refer to the dots in the sign for a colon (:)  but I do not see where “manual” comes in.

5  INDIANA (polis)

6  CROSSWORD SETTER     Delayed here by writing SOLVER first,  but agree SETTER is more accurate  - “his work”

9  PHYSIO   “fizzy”

15  ABERRANCE   (CANBERRA)* E   “fans” indicates the anagram.      Nice play on the meanings of “slip” (a fielder in cricket)

19  AUTUMN   Hidden reversal -  Hidden indicator a bit fuzzy, but no complaints when I found any answer in this puzzle.

20 CH (leade)R IS T(horns)  crown = first letter.      Impressive, that.

23 Shane WA (R) NE     Best clue of all.

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Independent npower juice Environmental Crossword/Eimi

Posted by Colin Blackburn on 25th January 2007

Colin Blackburn.

Solving time : 10 minutes or so.

The obvious theme of this puzzle made a few of the answers very easy to fill in. This sponsored puzzle is printed on a green background just to highlight its greenness. The four long across answers, the obvious ones, were all interlinked theme words. Elsewhere the theme was echoed in other clue definitions and surface readings.

The cluing was consistently good though one or two definitions were a little strained by the thematic considerations. An excellent bonus puzzle providing light relief from the main Scorpion puzzle.

Across
8 GREENHOUSE GASES — (SO HUGE EAGERNESS)*
9 RELEASED — RE(LEAS)ED
10 THESIS — THE+SIS
11 CLIMATE CHANGE — (CHEMICAL AGENT)* — excellent anagram.
13 LODGING — double def. — nice (briefly) misleading surface.
15 CHIMNEY — cryptic def.
18 GLOBAL WARMING — cryptic def.
22 TSK TSK — T(a)SK T(a)SK — even with -S- T-K this was the last answer to go in.
23 NINETIES — (EINSTEIN)*
24 CARBON FOOTPRINT — double def.
Down
1 GREEN — double def.
2 REVEAL — A in LEVER<
3 CHESSMAN — cryptic def.
4 PUNDITS — PUN(DI)TS — DI = Detective Inspector, a rank in the CID.
5 HECTIC — HE+CT+IC
6 WAVE FARM — W(AVE+F)ARM
7 BERING SEA — (GREEN BIAS)*
12 BOYLES LAW — (ALLOWS BYE)* — this answer wouldn’t have been out of place in today’s Times Concise puzzle.
14 GO BY TUBE — GO BY + (BUTE)*
16 HUMANITY — HUM+AN(IT)Y — IT is object here.
17 RAINBOW — R(A1+NB)OW
19 LIKENS — “LICHENS” — though lichens are technically symbiotic compounds of fungi and algae rather than just fungi.
20 NATURE — double def.
21 MEANS — double def.

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Guardian 23983/Araucaria – Notes from the Underground

Posted by ilancaron on 25th January 2007

ilancaron.

A puzzle about the tube from Araucaria that probably could be done on the tube. Not all the lines showed up but at least my favorite did (the District, which is what I took to school every morning: Earl’s Court to Ravenscourt Park).

The theme was pretty easy to spot once CIRCLE fell because of repetition of “line” in so many clues. But I have a couple of questions about wordplay – see below.

Across

1 J(UBILE)E – it’s a tube “line” and it’s JE containing (blue, I)*. Where JE is supposed to be the French “translation” of “my” (hardly). Maybe there’s another way to read this? If I’m right then “translation” does double duty – literally and as the anagrind. Perhaps “I” serves double-duty: once as part of the fodder and then in “translation” as the container?
5 [di]STRICT – “I had” becomes “I’d” which “otherwise” (anagrammed) is removed from the DISTRICT “line”.
9 H(ILLS)IDE – a kind of “inclination”.
10 CIRCLE – double definition: and the first tube “line” I solved. At first I thought this was a rather weak cryptic definition… then the penny dropped.
12 MET,ROPO,LITAN – poor* followed by Latin*. My second tube “line” and convinced me I had the theme.
15 IN,I(TIA,TIO)N – The first IN is “into”, the second one is “home”, while “houses” indicates containment of two of the few Spanish words I know.
20 JACK HORNER – From the nursery rhyme: he sat in the corner and among other things removed a plum with his finger. Our musical experts will tell us if someone who plays the horn will answer to HORNER. Actually Chambers has HORNER as archaic ‘horn player’. 
22 RIDING HABITS – “those who are up” on horses RIDING have strange HABITS no doubt if they live in “Yorkshire” which has three ridings
26 ALL,E,GE[t] – definition is “say it was”, and “get” docked yields GE.
27 BA(K,ER)LOO – Another tube “line” and BALOO is Hindi for “bear”. I was pretty sure of the answer but had to check Chambers for BALOO.
28 A,NY[l]ON,E – This time “line” isn’t on the tube – just a line abbreviated to “l” –and removed from nylon (“material”). Definition is: “never mind who”.

Down

1 JOHN BULL – Definition is “English type”. Wordplay refers to Bakerloo (27A) but not sure how it works. Thanks to loonapick: End of Bakerloo is loo which is a JOHN and BULL is “blunder” in the sense of a BULL in a china shop.
3 LIST,ERIA – Another kind of “inclination” followed by rev(Aire). LISTERIA is a type of bacteria identified by Dr. Lister himself (he of antiseptics)
4 EIDER=”Ida” – at least if you’re non-rhotic. Ref “Princess Ida” by G&S.
7 IN(CITE,ME)N,T – “Local” pub or INN and “model” T.
8 TWEE,NAGERS – TWEE (“pretty”) followed by angers*. Def is “precocious kids” who are engaged in, what Chambers most accurately indicates, “exasperating their parents”.
11 U,PLOOK – where plonk (for “wine”) has had N (“name”) replaced by O (“nothing”).
13 VICTORIA,NA – Another tube “line”.
14 PICC=”pick”,A,DILLY – And another “line”.
18 NORTHE,RN – Throne* followed by RN (Royal Navy still has “ships”) and it’s a tube “line”. “Ships of the line” is a nice nautical redherring.
23 BRAND – double definition: a BRAND is “hot” when used to make a mark and it identifies something’s “type”. BenIngton points out that the online and offline clues are different: “Hot type of play?” and “Hot Ibsenian play” where the “play” in question is Ibsen’s BRAND.
24, 25 B(LUE M)OON – BOON (“present”) contains mule*. I get these kind of clues once in a BLUE MOON.

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