Guardian 24,349 (Sat 29 Mar)/Paul - Que? Serah, Serah?
Posted by rightback on 5th April 2008
Solving time: 10:30
This puzzle contained several long phrases spanning multiple clues which can make things difficult, but some of the longer ones in this were very straightforward so it was a quickish solve, apart from a couple at the end (7dn/20ac).
Music (15/28/23): Rome Wasn’t Built In A Day by Morcheeba.
* = anagram, “X” = sounds like ‘X’.
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | AROMATISE; (MOIST AREA)* |
| 10 | A,Z + URE |
| 12 | B(L)INDS POT |
| 17 | TI(B)ER |
| 20 | MA[d] + KER[mit] - I spent too long looking for a god’s name here, rather than a generic word. This and 7dn held me up for a while at the end. |
| 21 | PIC + AS (= ’since’) + SO (= ‘then’) |
| 22 | MA(W[ea]K + I)SH |
| 24/26 | CASTLES + IN (S)PAIN |
| 29/13 | THERE’S NO TWO WAYS ABOUT IT |
| Down | |
|---|---|
| 1 | LAS(T,T)HING - I actually ‘back-solved’ this from 25/27. |
| 2 | DOMINO (hidden) - very well-worded hidden clue. |
| 3/19/ 8/5 | LAUGHTER IS THE BEST MEDICINE (cryptic definition) - not a phrase I knew well enough to produce until I had several crossing letters. |
| 4 | TIT + BIT |
| 7 | HUMPBACK (double definition) - my last entry. A humpback is both a species of salmon and a type of whale, both of which would fit the clue (”An underwater bridge?”). |
| 13 | A + C(T)UP |
| 15/28 /23 | ROME WAS NOT BUILT IN A DAY; (OARSMEN TWO)* + “wordplay in the answer” - the anagram is ‘built’, hence ‘(?)’, inside ‘Twenty-four hours’ in the clue. I have to confess to not even thinking about the wordplay when I wrote this in. |
| 16 | SERA (= ‘will be’ in French & Spanish) + H - the Spanish must be known to everyone from the famous song Que sera sera, whatever will be will be, we’re going to Wembley (appropriately for this weekend’s FA Cup semifinals), but this seems a curious choice of name instead of ‘Sarah’. Serah seems to be a character in the Hebrew bible, but that’s about all. Are there are Serahs out there? [Edit (see comments): The answer is actually SARAH. 'Sarà' means 'will be' in Italian.] |
| 19 | THOUSAND; (SOUTH)* + AND |
| 22/6 | MINUTE + HAND - embarrassingly I wrote in ’second hand’ at first. |
| 24 | CUBE - 19dn is 1000 (a cube number), 21ac is Picasso (a cubist). |
| 25/27 | LATENESS; (LAST SEEN)* |
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