Paul’s back, just a week after his last appearance.
We have some well-constructed, witty clues (especially the definitions in 18ac SEISMOGRAPH, 22ac FISHMONGER and 19dn AGREED, which make for really good surfaces), one or two expressions I’ve managed thus far without knowing or using, along with some of Paul’s schoolboy humour. One bit of parsing (23dn) was beyond me, so the usual thanks in advance for your help.
Thanks to Paul for the puzzle.
Definitions are underlined in the clues.
Across
1 Disappearance of Ganymede, say, short time before dawn (7)
MOONSET
MO (short time) + ONSET (dawn)
5 Lighter article from France entered into poetry competition by Penny (3-4)
SUN-LAMP
UN (article from France) in SLAM (poetry competition) + P (penny)
9 Colour I observed in ring given a twirl (5)
LILAC
I in a reversal (given a twirl) of CALL (ring)
10 Black then beat blue fluid for drink (6,3)
BUBBLE TEA
B (black) + an anagram (fluid) of BEAT BLUE
11 Wow, the snuff taker has snuffed it! (10)
RIPSNORTER
RIP (requiescat in pace – rest in peace, i.e. has snuffed it) + SNORTER (snuff taker)
12 Musical symbol split, briefly (4)
CLEF
CLEF[t] (split, briefly)
14 Anything but a high-flier for the guillotine, did you say? (11)
HEDGEHOPPER
‘Head chopper’ (guillotine), did you say? – one of Paul’s less outrageous sound-alikes: I rather liked it
18 First of musicians in parish goes crazy, shaking recorder (11)
SEISMOGRAPH
M[usicians] in an anagram (crazy) of PARISH GOES – a neat definition and amusing surface
21 Turning left, notices a superstore (4)
ASDA
A reversal (turning left) of ADS (notices) + A
22 Obscene gesture keeps quiet doctor in the gutter? (10)
FISHMONGER
FINGER (obscene gesture) round SH (quiet) MO (doctor) – an ingenious definition, one who guts fish
25 Bother, it having impeded vehicle ā search for diversion? (9)
GALLIVANT
GALL (bother, as a verb) + IT in VAN (vehicle) – lovely word
Correction: IT round VAN – thanks beaulieu @19
27 Red, pace ahead of blue (7)
TROTSKY
TROT (horse’s pace) + SKY (blue)
28 Case on driveway packed into car, end of holiday celebration in March (4,3)
LADY DAY
D[rivewa]Y in LADA (car) + [holida]Y – March 25th, the Feast of the Annunciation
Down
1 Beer swilling if not noble (6)
MILORD
MILD (beer) round (swilling) OR (if not)
2 Plants kiss where kiss planted, love coming first (6)
OXLIPS
O (love) + X (kiss) + LIPS (where kiss planted)
3 Diabolical demon chose the other place? (6,4)
SECOND HOME
An anagram (diabolical) of DEMON CHOSE
4 Italian flower again chewed up? (5)
TIBER
A reversal (up, in a down clue) of RE-BIT (again chewed)
5 A grub seen wriggling in biology classes (9)
SUBGENERA
An anagram (wriggling) of A GRUB SEEN
6 Empty pan? You fill vessel, finally (4)
NULL
Last letters of paN yoU filL vesseL
7 Resident of nest, fly off graceful animal (8)
ANTELOPE
ANT (resident of nest) + ELOPE (fly off)
8, 26 Villains waiting to board train, perhaps, in ā70s attire (8,5)
PLATFORM HEELS
HEELS (villains) on the PLATFORM – waiting to board train perhaps
13 Big jobs for a reporter journalist sniffed at (4-6)
POOH-POOHED
POOH + POOH (big jobs) + ED (journalist)
Edit: sounds like (for a reporter) POO POO (big jobs) – thanks, Jack Of Few Trades @11
15 Big noise as good egg splits log (9)
DIGNITARY
G (good) + NIT (egg) in DIARY (log)
16 Slow mover races off before caught (8)
ESCARGOT
An anagram (off) of RACES + GOT (caught)
17 Lentils and duck in red or white dish that’s hot (8)
VINDALOO
DAL (lentils) + O (duck) in VINO (red or white)
19 You’re on peak of Annapurna, asking for a lot (6)
AGREED
A[nnapurna] + GREED (asking for a lot) – again, I liked the definition
20 Worthless wood fills crack (6)
TRASHY
ASH (wood) in TRY (crack)
23 Accommodation in which weed and grass picked up? (5)
HOTEL
Over to you – I suspect it must be to do with some of the plentiful slang for drugs
Edit:Please see first three comments – thanks to Andrew, KVa and Crispy
24 Beer bringing hiccup from below (4)
PILS
A reversal (from below, in a down clue) of SLIP (hiccup)
23d is “hoe” (to weed) + “tell” (to grass)
HOTEL
hoe (to weed) and tell (grass) —soundalike
HOTEL – āPicked upā Hoe (weed) and Tell (grass)
Many thanks, all – blog amended!
This must have been tamer than usual for Paul as I woke up in a sweat at 3am and managed to solve all but 3 before managing to get back to sleep.
Quickly rattled through the remaining clues this morning.
Liked ESCARGOT and TROTSKY.
Thanks Paul and Eileen
Quite a tough challenge, mainly because I am rarely on this setterās wavelength.
New for me: SLAM = poetry competition (for 5ac); LADY DAY, RIPSNORTER.
Favourites: FISHMONGER, ESCARGOT, DIGNITARY, HEDGE-HOPPER, LILAC.
I could not parse 1d.
All solved except 11a. āWowā is a strange definition for RIPSNORTER but I should have been able to achieve the solution through parsing.
Thanks Paul and Eileen
Several things I had never heard of, including a poetry SLAM and BUBBLE TEA. I didn’t parse FISHMONGER and don’t like it much. HEELS for villains is also rather weak – I toyed with SHOES first.
We had “garden” as a verb for HOE yesterday.
Favourite SEISMOGRAPH.
Must be the heat dulling the brain, but what does a SUN-LAMP have to do with lighter?
I would add SUBGENERA to the favourites already mentioned. I agree with William that “Lighter” is a bit loose for SUN LAMP. It’s a shame that Penny Tanner isn’t famous enough to make “Tanner” the definition.
Last one in was “pooh-poohed” and I thought “There’s the schoolboy humour we know and love/hate”. I had it as a homophone (“for reporter”) of “poo poo” however.
Very witty, clever definitions and one of those where half the clues left me thinking “no idea…I’ll come back to that” before moving to “is it possibly..?” followed by “Well that’s obvious now”.
Many thanks Paul and Eileen
I failed on the intersecting MILORD and RIPSNORTER but I don’t feel too bad about that, given that neither has a very obvious definition. I did like the wordplay in the latter (which I don’t think needs separating; it’s just “RIP, snorter” as a unit). I guess I also like the wordplay in the former, but goodness does the term “mild” for beer still exist? I haven’t heard it for donkey’s years!
It took me an age to think of the finger for the FISHMONGER and I confess to Checking my SHMO when I was running out of steam with it. Happily that unlocked the rather good AGREED and DIGNITARY, which at least saved some blushes by leaving me at only two unfinished.
Personally I rather liked PLATFORM HEELS and HOTEL (tho indeed yesterday’s hoe helped). But I’m another who doesn’t quite see that a sun-lamp is a lighter; that’s not quite its purpose – although that didn’t impede me.
Some surfaces could have been a bit smoother, but overall good fun and a good workout. Thanks both!
AP @12
After a round of golf, two of my playing partners always drink mild at the nineteenth. I stick to bitter, though.
I enjoyed this very much, especially the wonderful RIPSNORTER, POOH-POOHED, GALLIVANT and HEDGEHOPPER. I remember serving MILD (in halves usually) to elderly gents in the 80s, but wonder if itās still available in pubs these days?
Ah, my question answered!
Jack Of Few Trades @11 – you’re right, of course: it is a homophone. I’d overlooked the reporter. I’ll amend the blog.
AP @12 – re RIPSNORTER (a new word for me): I didn’t make a very good job of that parsing – I was trying too hard to make the explanation clear. I agree that RIP SNORTER is a unit.
I think, with others, that 5ac is just a rather loose / weak clue – but there was nothing else for the definition.
AP@12ā¦exactly my experience at the very end today, MILORD and RIPSNORTER taking an age to solve. That last one almost sounds like a word Roald Dahl might have used in his books. Good to see some of Paulās groanworthy schoolboy humour and not quite Spoonerisms back in the same puzzle. I thought FISHMONGER for a Gutter a great misdirection, took me a while to see that too. Enjoyed the fun and games greatly this morningā¦
ā¦and on the subject of Mild, years ago when I was a student in Norwich there used to be an old boy supping pint after pint of this in my local pub in the Earlham Road. His excuse was, ābut it do feed yerā¦ā Some said that his daily diet was as many as fourteen pints some eveningsā¦
Not one of Paul’s best, but some neat clues as noted by Eileen.
Small error in blog parsing of GALLIVANT – it’s VAN in IT, not vice versa.
muffin@8 – surprised you’ve not come across BUBBLE TEA. Here in W Berkshire there are almost as many bubble tea shops as vape shops, “Turkish” barbers and other somewhat dubious businesses. It seems the stuff is basically tapioca pudding diluted with tea, which sounds unpleasant to me.
AP@12, mild is still fairly easy to find if you know where to look, though not as popular as it once was.
Thanks Eileen and Paul.
beaulieu @19
Sounds awful! Not reached East Lancs yet.
ronald @18
I did my teaching practice at Earlham School, next door to the university. The science department all decamped to the pub at lunchtime to play darts – would be frowned on now!
Loi was vindaloo, and I love a good hot vindaloo! Forgot that dahl could be dal until all crossers were in. Good puzzle, ta PnE.
I enjoyed this more than most offerings from Paul – less cross-linking and fewer clunky clues. Like several others, I failed on the intersecting MILORD and RIPSNORTER. Thanks, Eileen for explaining MILORD, but I guess I’m being thick about RIPSNORTER. I know the word and can understand RIP + SNORTER (like it!). But ‘wow’ as a definition? Is anyone else able to help?
HEDGEHOPPER indeed! I hope no-one is going to complain about that sort-of homophone, as some are prone to do: it made me laugh, anyway.
Beaulieu@19 : thanks for the explanation of what bubble tea is – I’ve seen it on sale around here recently. Now I know to give it a shuddering miss.
The parsing of HOTEL completely escaped me-thanks to commenters 1-3 for that. Clear enough when you see it, a brick wall when you don’t.
Mild was the first sort of beer I drank… Somewhat underage, my friend and I nervously sloped into the Shoulder of Mutton, and trying not to flap, asked for the only beer we could see a pump for, Shipstone’s mild ale. We got quite a taste for it. Both the pub and the brewery are long gone now. Sic transit, etc…
Thanks Paul and Eileen!
I fondly remember Rip Snorter, the ugliest pig in the world, from The Dandy, way back in the fifties.
I am beginning to think Roz is right re the similar level of difficulty of the Guardian crosswords recently. This was a mild Paul compared to some of his previous offerings and it is the 3rd time this week that I managed to finish in less than 45 minutes.
Median @22 – online Collins has : slang,
a person or thing noted for intensity or excellence – as the definition of Ripsnorter – so it sort of means Wow ?
Thanks to Eileen for the excellent blog.
Another where MILORD and RIPSNORTER were last to fall. I parsed wow as a noun rather than as an exclamation, as in her show was a real wow/striking success, for example. I thought HEDGEHOPPER, SEISMOGRAPH, FISHMONGER and GALLIVANT were excellent and I parsed POOH-POOHED as JOFT @11.
I first tried a pint of mild in Kings Lynn when I was 17 and I never tried it again.
Ta Paul & Eileen.
Hi Median @22
As I said @16, RIPSNORTER was new to me (I don’t remember the pig, Blaise @24!) but I found plenty of explanations online for something / someone extraordinary or marvellous, including this https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/ripsnorter
Collins has ‘slang, a person or thing noted for intensity or excellence’.
Thanks, SimoninBxL @25 and Eileen @27, for pointing me to sources explaining RIPSNORTER. That’s fine.
The fewer question marks in a Paul puzzle the simpler it will be. And that was the case today. Ticks for oxlips and fishmonger.
Briefly had the equally valid MOTEL at 23d, until disabused by the crosser. SEISMOGRAPH rather unfortunate given today’s news from Venezuela, where I used to live, but not anyone’s fault of course.
I also entered RIPSNORTER and MILORD last.
I liked FISHMONGER, TROTSKY, ESCARGOT and (the unfortunately topical) SEISMOGRAPH.
Thanks, Paul and Eileen.
Redrodney @14. As I remember from my West Midlands days, men drank pints of mild. Bitter there was considered a womanās drink and usually served to them in half pints. Straight glasses of course! Mitchell & Butlers and Banksās produced excellent beers of both types.
Managed to complete a Paul in a couple of hours! Which I assume means it was a gentle one as I usually struggle with his obscurities. Quite a lot I found easy (for a change), but other bits not so much. Wasnāt sure HEDGEHOPPER really worked as a sound-alike a bit too loose for my liking. Liked SEISMOGRAPH best. Thanks Paul for being a bit gentler than usual, and to Eileen and the commenters for clearing up some parsing questions I had.
Lots to enjoy here: I especially liked FISHMONGER. Found head chopper/HEDGEHOPPER a bit of a stretch.
No problem for me with “lighter” at 5a: sun lamps emit light (UV and visible).
I’ve always found Paul irritating but struggle through without much pleasure. I know he has his fans but I find his vague definitions and overwrought wordplay annoying. Of course, I don’t have to do the crossword – should I check who the setter is before buying the paper?
As an alternative to 5ac, how about “Article from France entered into poetry completion by Penny for a Tanner”?
Miche@34: your explanation of lighter for sunlamp makes sense. Thanks for the explanation. Like others, I did not know ripsnorter, but guessed snorter after I had all the crossers (and my husband guessed rip). I was puzzled by the “reporter journalist” rather than just “journalist” in 23d. Thanks for Jack Of Few Trades @11 and Eileen for explaining this. I guessed the hedgehopper, but the homophone does not work for me; I pronounce it as hedge-hopper. I failed to parse 9A as I did not see that twirl is a reversal indicator. Thanks, PAul and Eileen
Maybe it is too obvious, but it seems to me that the missing link in 11A RIPSNORTER that no-one has mentioned is e.g. Chambers:
wow n (sl) anything thrillingly good, successful or according to one’s wishes
Always tricky, always clever, always cheeky.
Always happy to see Paul is setter for the day.
Big thanks to Paul for the challenge and the giggles, and to Eileen for the ā as always ā clear and helpful blog.
As one who routinely struggles with Paul, I found this a mixture of gentler-than-usual and bafflingly unparsable. FISHMONGER was clever, HEDGEHOPPER a groaner, and TROTSKY a favourite.
It might be time though to give “flower” a holiday – I feel like it’s come up often enough lately to have lost its effectiveness at misdirection. Unless some setter uses it in other pronunciation, of course, just to mis-misdirect.
FISHMONGER. I like the bit in George Mikes’ “How to be an Alien” (from the days when the UK generally liked and welcomed immigrants): “A fishmonger is the man who mongs fish; the ironmonger and the warmonger do the same with iron and war. They just mong them.”
Also whoremongers, costermongers and (rarely) leathermongers and peacemongers. I may have missed a few. An odd collection of things to mong. Does it mean to sell, to make or both? Why not goldmongers or tinmongers, equally ancient trades?
A real RIPSNORTER of a puzzle today, and no mistake. FISHMONGER and TROTSKY were good, and VINDALOO was also a treat. Thanks Paul for your charming wordplay.
Jacob @40 ā yes, āflowerā is a bit of a clichĆ©. But at least this time the āItalian flowerā wasnāt the Po.
A relatively straightforward offering from Paul for a pleasant change.
Not so easy for me but I got there in the end but I couldn’t parse HOTEL and MILORD. I liked the RIP SNORTER, the pun-y HEDGEHOPPER, the FISHMONGER gutter, the good anagram for SECOND HOME, and AGREED you’re on. DTS @41, from Google AI: The term [monger] has a history stretching back over 1,000 years, tracing back to the Old English word mangere and the Latin mango (meaning dealer or trader). Over time, early traveling peddlers and “hustlers” gave the term a negative reputation, which explains why it often implies deceptive or discreditable behavior in modern language
Thanks Paul and Eileen.
[ Happy Birthday Cellomaniac , it is said that old 78s produce the best sound , may the wolf stay away . ]
Nothing to add really just wanted to say that Paul is my favourite. At 13d he seems to have found a new level of disgusting though even for him with ‘Sniffing at big jobs’. You have to laugh š.
Thanks for the blog , I saw Ganymede unaided in January , you need perfect conditions and have to wait until next February now . FISHMONGER and SEISMOGRAPH very good , Henri Lebesgue would be surprised that NULL meant empty .
Regression to the mean continues apace .
I knew Lady Day was some sort of Anglican holiday, but had no idea what it commemorated or what month it came in.
Lots I couldn’t parse, so thanks, Eileen and commenters.
Don’t remember platform HEELS. Shoes was what came to mind, but I googled the heels and there they were.
Thanks, Paul and Eileen.
Not one of Paulās more fiendish offerings but huge fun as ever. I really donāt see any objections to the use of lighter in 5a. A lamp provides light; therefore itās a lighter.
Favourites were HEDGEHOPPER, SEISMOGRAPH, FISHMONGER and VINDALOO.
Thanks Paul and Eileen
I remember the platform SOLES – and at 5ft 3in, I appreciated the extra height, but also remember it was very easy to twist your ankle wearing them š
I’m not sure that simply “wow” for RIPSNORTER is fair.
Other than that, enjoyed this though some parsing I had to cross-reference with this blog.
Thanks setter and blogger.
Nice to see a mention of Billie Holiday, under the name given her by her inseparable confrere Lester Young – LADY DAY.
[Tx to those who commented about mild ale. A follow-up recourse to AI tells me that in pubs, it’s largely limited to the Midlands and lower-northern England these days. Which seems a pity. As a Westcountry boy, I certainly remember it being something my dad was well aware of, yet there’s a paucity of real ale in the Southwest in general these days, or at least so it seems to me.
An interesting point was made about men’s versus women’s drinks. On the face of it, one would think that mild would have been the drink of the women, and bitter that of men. My guess is the society judged that women were only supposed to have half a pint in total. And so perhaps they preferred the slightly stronger option, while men needed something slightly weaker
LADY DAY is one of the four traditional quarter days on which a yearly rent is paid, in four instalments. It is 25th March and the others are Midsummer (24th June), Michaelmas (29th September) and Christmas Day.
for their multi-pint sessions.]
Prospector@32 My experience in the W Mids since the 60s is that men generally were the only drinkers of mild, but by no means eschewed bitter. Certainly the workers at Ansell’s Brewery where I worked didn’t.
It might depend on where you were.
Very clever, too clever for me in places, so have to register this as a dnf. Nho poetry slam so had a problem with SUNLAMP as the definition is weak. Also failed to parse HOTEL.
Loved RIPSNORTER, SEISMOGRAPH and POOH-POOHED.
Lady Day is one of the quarter days on which agricultural rents were (and sometimes still are) due, the others being Midsummer, Michaelmas and Christmas. Also the tax year ending on April 6th is the old date of Lady Day before the calendar changed by 11 days in 1752.
Thanks Paul, and Eileen and bloggers for helping parsing.
GALLIVANT the last one in for me. Every element of the clue a bit of a stretch.
SUBGENERA on the other hand was charming.
In haste, just to let everyone know, in case youāre wondering, that I got this completed at lunchtime. Took two sessions, so a good difficulty level for me. A few generous anagrams gave me a leg up. Lots of fun — Paul at his best
Favourites 11a RIPSNORTER (loi), 12a CLEF (musical clue), 14a HEDGEHOPPER (funny), 18a SEISMOGRAPH (funny and misdirecting āshaking recorderā definition), 22a FISHMONGER (āgutterā, which I suspected fairly quickly), 28a LADY DAY (good old āLadaā), 2d OXLIPS (poetic clue), 3d SECOND HOME (misdirecting definition), 19d AGREED (āYouāre onā)
Sorry, no time to read the comments right now. Maybe more later…
Thanks Paul and Eileen!
[I looked him up, Roz @48; lots to do with integrals — Archimedes, Newton, Leibniz, Riemann — but nil on null. Que?]
Grant@62 , modern integration theory is based on Lebesgue . In what is called Measure theory a Lebesgue null set has zero measure but is rarely empty . I have no idea what is on the internet and as you can probably guess , I do not care . Just try Lebesgue Null Set .
The classic single volume text is by Alan J Weir , CUP , ISBN 0 – 521 – 09751 – 7
Eileen@27. It took me a while to find confirmation that my memories of Rip Snorter were not childhood imaginings about what I remembered as the ugliest pig in the world (although I suspect he was in fact a warthog…). I know my dad, from Northumberland, often referrred to something that he really liked a lot as a real ripsnorter. But I can’t remember him ever saying “Wow!”
Blaise @64 – thanks for your research!
That’s nothing like anything I remember seeing in the Dandy (but I didn’t get the Annual, so that’s perhaps not surprising).
I’m just here to amend the above description of BUBBLE TEA. More properly known as boba tea, it consists of tapioca pearls (aka boba) in an iced-tea-based beverage, usually with a fruity or other sweet flavoring added. Boba tea shops usually have dozens of flavors available. You drink it with an extra-wide straw; the little boba balls thus pop through, and add a little texture to your tea. They’re chewy, but don’t taste like much. The Web tells me it’s Taiwanese in origin (I had assumed it was Japanese, because that would track).
Boba tea was a big fad here about 20 years ago; there were boba shops everywhere, and then all of a sudden there weren’t. But at least here in Chicago, you can still find it in places like Chinatown and Argyle (our Little Saigon).
I’m not a big fan, but it is NOT watered-down tapioca pudding.
In Blackpool in the 60s we had mixed drinks – brown (ale) and mild, light (ale) and bitter where you got a half of draught and a bottle, and mild and bitter which was half and half draught.
Thank you, mrpenney @66. That has done nothing, however, to reconcile me to the idea.
Meanwhile, does anyone else remember ‘HEDGEHOPPERs Anonymous’, a band whose members were affiliated with the RAF, and who had a hit with ‘Good News Week’, a ‘protest song’ (ergo ‘edgy’) some time around the mid-1960s? I can still remember the lyrics, but I shall not trouble this forum with the details.
Balfour @68
Yes – good song.
AP@55&others: when I had a holiday job on the Isle of Wight in 1968 I could get an (underage) pint of mild for 1s. 10d. It’s funny how you remember details like that.
[AP @70
When I went up to uni in 1970 the cheap bitter – I think it was called “Starbright” – was still 1s 10d a pint. That didn’t last long, though.
P.S. a search hasn’t found Starbright beer – I’ve probably misremembered.]
Balfour @68 Yes I do, but no thanks for reminding me.
Hector @70 In 1963 M&B mild was 1/8d. Their Brew XI bitter was 1/10.
I was struggling with the last few, just as I did with last week’s Paul. Then it was SNOOZEFEST, which I never got; today it was ‘Wow’. I went out to cool down in the park and on my return tried RIP and found that SNORTER immediately followed. One of several wow moments in a tremendous puzzle from Paul, though I do wish people would stop saying “schoolboy humour”. It’s just humour!
I’ve enjoyed reading the comments almost as much as solving the puzzle. Someone “doesn’t say HEDGEHOPPER like that”, but that is the point. It’s meant to be groan-worthy! Someone else hasn’t seen mild for 40 years, another remembers it as a women’s drink in half pint glasses. Tell that to the steel workers in Sheffield and coal miners in South Wales back in the day! (I’ve drunk more than 20 different milds so far this year, from almost as many different brewers.)
I can remember Good News Week and someone singing it in the showers after PE in my first year at secondary school, so probably 1966. Bubble tea isn’t dilute tapioca pudding, it’s fruity tea with tapioca pearls in it? So that’s all right then. And Henri Lebesque is now turning in his grave.
Thanks to everyone for the entertainment. š
Zoot @73 and others. My experience in the Midlands in the seventies was that mild was popular but some liked to mix it with bitter. This drink was known there as “half ‘n’ half”. If you only wanted half a pint you asked for “half ‘n’ half ‘n’ half”, to the utter bewilderment of visitors from elsewhere!
Neill@97 Also known as a Mickey Mouse.
muffin@71
The beer you’re thinking of was probably Watney’s Starlight, a keg (carbonised) beer of 2.9% ABV. According to some it would have been lawful in the USA during Prohibition and according to others it was like making love on a canoe. It was part of the Watney’s Red Revolution which led to my drinking an awful lot of bottled Guinness.
Neill97#75
My Uncle Fred, who, like the actress Jodie Whittaker, was a Shat lugoil biter was partial to a “half o’ twos”, his term for mild and bitter.
On our annual floating pub crawl on the Broads in the 60s we used to avoid Bullards pubs because the bitter was undrinkable. I put it down to the fact that the locals drank mild.
[ Roz@46, thanks for the birthday wishes. My ageist turntable only plays 33ās and 45ās, so Iām the only functioning 78 in the house. Do I sound better? At least the wolf trap on my cello keeps the wolf (F# on the G-string) at bay. ]