DT 30936

84 comments on “DT 30936”

1. I’m sure others will enjoy today’s guzzle but I’m afraid I didn’t get on with it at all. I needed far too much help for it to be enjoyable so it is a DNF for me. I found some of the parsing unfathomable so I will need the hints to sort things out. Two examples are 14a and 27a.

   Thank you, setter or the guzzle but I could not do it justice. Maybe I overdid the gardening yesterday and my brain is still asleep. Thank you, Falcon for the hints, which I will now peruse in search of explanations.

   Neither could I make sense of the Quickie pun.

   Oh well, tomorrow is another day.

   1. The Quickie pun bemused me too until I twigged that it was an American reference.

      1. I’ve never heard of him. 🤔
         However, I rarely watch live TV.

         1. Jerry Seinfeld. One of the greats of New York style observational comedy. Popular in the uk in the 90s.

   2. Agree. Today was a discouraging slog. Mondays used to be challenging but doable, and I’m thinking of taking a break from puzzles for a while…

2. 4*/2*. For me, this was a disappointment after last week’s splendid selection of back-pagers. It’s probably a wavelength issue, but I found this very tough and not at all appropriate for a Monday. Also, some of the surface readings left a lot to be desired.

   Thanks anyway to the setter and to Falcon.

   1. You couldn’t have said it better. Just about summed up my feelings today too.

   2. I say hear, hear and join you and BL.

3. Nice to have a slightly more challenging but very enjoyable puzzle on a Monday. **/**** Thanks setter and Falcon.

4. The trend to have slightly harder Monday puzzles continues – thanks to our setter and Falcon.
   My ticks today went to 9a, 6d and 16d.
   There is an anagram (indicated by sporting) in 5d.

   1. Thanks, Gazza, for bringing the omission of the wordplay in the hint to my attention. Now corrected. I had solved the clue through the wordplay but neglected to include it in the hint (I will blame it on working overtime).

      1. If this is a Monday offering we can only be fearful of how difficult things may become by Friday. I did finish but needed Falcon to explain some of the answers. There were no laughs but blame that on my poor sense of humour today.

5. Well I found this a tricky little number and had to work slowly through it. 6 left to go and off to make some asparagus soup. 40 minutes later the last 6 slotted in nicely. However I’m not a clever clogs and will now read the hints as I couldn’t parse several of them although my digital version tells me they are correct. Thanks to the setter and Falcon – I would have thought Telegraph Towers could send you the guzzle earlier to save the stress.

6. Not for me I’m sorry to say, hope it appeals more to others.

   Thanks anyway to our setter for his efforts and also to Falcon for the review – hope tomorrow’s events go smoothly.

7. Apart from 1a, which went straight in, the rest was a bit of a slog. Clearly a problem for me getting into the thought process of the compiler. A dnf as I needed a couple of hints to keep me going and I’m going to check a few parsings that passed me by. Cotd is 1a. Thanks to compiler and Falcon.

8. Certainly a bit more chewy than usual for a Monday, making for a welcome and very satisfying solve. A pleasure to be required to think more carefully about almost every clue.

   Honours to 1a, 1d, 6d & 17a.

   Many thanks to the setter for the excellent puzzle, and to Falcon too, of course.

9. Not overly difficult, but I was perhaps lacking in motivation today to appreciate it fully.
   Too much excitement yesterday watching Chelsea qualify for the Champions league – Terence, where are you??

   Thanks to the setter and to Falcon.

10. Like others, I found this guzzle a bbit tricky and the clues went in very slowly. I’m glad I finished but dound it a slog. However, I liked the cryptic double meanings at 1 and 27a and the Lego clue at 17a. Thanks to the compiler, another step up the Monday puzzle diff ladder. Thanks also to Falcon for the hints which I needed to parse some of the clues.

11. I’m another who found this a tricky little blighter. Can’t say I enjoyed it much but there are bound to be folks who did.

    The ones I did like were 1a, 15d, 16d and 18d.

    Thanks to the setter for providing the challenge and to Falcon.

12. Well, this took me by surprise.

    I got off to a great start oop north but quickly ground to a halt when I went sarf.

    I managed to crawl over the finish line having taken a right old shooing. So, I’m not sure what to think.

    ‘Sporting’ is a new anagram indicator but what isn’t these days!

    My podium is 17a, 26a and 16d.

    MT to Mr Lancaster (?) and Falcs.

    4*/3*

    1. No double pun today so almost certainly not our esteemed editor as he wrote this last Monday:

       I’ll out myself here as the “new” Monday setter; you’ll be able to tell which are mine by the double puns, in a tribute to Allan Scott.

       1. Thank you for that, you Manitoban mountie, you.

          I hope Mondays aren’t as tough as this one as I do like a gentle start to the week.

          Maybe AP should shift to Mondays?

       2. The other setters who have been appearing on Monday are X-Type and Twmbarlwm. I am leaning toward the latter.

          1. Mr Tumble has come out with some beauts recently.

             So, hoo nose.

    2. Very tricky for me and I floundered in the South so DNF. Difficulty parsing some of the clues even with the answer.

13. Not much to add to what everyone else has written – definitely a Monday Toughie. I hope that it is not an indication of how the rest of the week is going to play out.

    Smiles (a grade less than candidates for favourite) for 17a, 1d, and 22d.

    Thanks to whomsoever and Falcon.

14. Started well, got stuck, then the remainder fell into place. Thanks to Falcon for confirming a couple of parsings. Didn’t have to 4d today and that got a tick, as did 16a once I banished all thoughts of James Bond drinks being involved! Also liked 20d in the Baltic.

    Thanks to then setter and Flacon.

15. This was certainly a step up in difficulty for the start of the week, with my last two entries, 14a and 16d, taking an age to tease out. It was 16d that emerged as my favourite upon completion. A challenge most assuredly, but one I mostly enjoyed.

    My thanks to our Monday setter and Senf.

    1. Not me! Falcon.

16. This was tricky, but then recent Mondays have been so I have successfully reset my brain to not expect it to be easy. I battled through and although the parsing of some beat me I definitely enjoyed the tussle and many of the clues were very clever. 1d was my favourite with 26a in second place. The lurkers were well hidden.

    Many thanks to the setter and to Falcon for the hints.

17. I thought this was really rather good.

    Thanks to today’s setter and Falcon.

    1. So did I Jonners. 16d my pick from many ticks.
       Thanks to the setter & to Falcon

    2. Me too! Definitely the chewiest Monday puzzle we’ve seen for a long time but very enjoyable.
       Podium places to 1a, 11a and 26a for the smile it brought.

18. Quite a grind and got there in the end, but I can’t say I enjoyed myself very much, especially in the south. Having finished I can appreciate the clever constructions, so obviously just having a thick-headed day!

19. What happened to my comment yesterday please. It would be polite to let me know,

    1. You made two identical comments, although one had a very mixed up version of your email address. It would appear that the Sunday comment got removed instead of the one on the wrong (Saturday) post

       1. Thank you CS

20. I miss the old Robyn Mondays 😄
    I found I needed far too much help with this one too make it enjoyable, though when I saw the answers they did make sense with the clues, so, it just wasn’t on my wavelength, that’s down to me not the setter.
    Thanks to Falcon and whomever.
    ****/**

21. I reckon you’ve missed the bit about ‘wrapping one’ in 11a Falcon, your hint just gives ‘editoral’

    1. So I did. Now corrected. Thank you for bringing the faux pas to my attention.

       1. Do I win five pounds? 😀

          1. Would you settle for a percentage of my royalties from the blog? : )

             1. Careful, TC. 10% of nothing is nothing. Don’t be tempted! 🤣

                1. Amen to that Steve, cold hard cash or nowt, ne’er get hooked in by an offer like that, dodgy dealing abound….

22. What a slog that was. Not much fun to be had at all. Only served to highlight the brilliance of yesterday’s crossword. Needed the hints to parse a couple – thanks Falcon. Not for me today ****/*

23. This was a more difficult Monday puzzle this week and included a few tricky clues to suss out. A couple I could not parse even with the answer being what it had to be. A Monday toughie almost.

    2.5*/3.5 for me

    Favourites 1a, 9a, 26a, 4d, 7d & 16d — with winner 26a with a laugh
    Also got chuckles from 26a, 4d, 7d & 22d

    Thanks to setter & Falcon

24. Great fun. Loved 1a’s surface, 17a’s smooth and 10d’s smartly done. Best thanks to setter and Falcon.

25. Good afternoon

    In common with many of you, I’ve noticed that the level of trickery has been raised over the last few Mondays. I don’t object to that; not at all. It teaches you not to take Mondays for granted, I suppose!

    I got off to a very slow start. Very slow! I genuinely didn’t think I’d twig the last two to fall, namely 17a and 15d. I kicked myself when I tumbled 1a and 10d! 10d is my joint COTD along with 16d.

    I’m away on holliers tomorrow, and I don’t know if I’ll be able to get a Telegraph. I’m not pratting about trying to do online crozzies on my phone, so that being the case, I’ll see you in a couple of weeks, God willing.

26. Very difficult but fair – 7d as my CotD for its succinctness. Thank you compiler and the much needed Falcon. If anyone has missed Chris Lancaster’s latest telegraph Puzzles blog it is very moving

    1. Sounds a must, Shrimp. Where can one find it?

       1. It was in the weekly newsletter yesterday. I can’t see a way to link to it so here is the extract:
          I’d best start with a confession. Until very recently, I much preferred solving crosswords (and indeed most other types of puzzle) on paper, rather than online or in an app. Call me a Luddite, but it’s undoubtedly just something born of habit. Plus, there’s something rather nice about the tactile nature of filling in those little squares with a pencil or pen. As a result, over the past few years I’ve felt a bit of a cheat, advocating solving digitally rather than in print. However, over the past year or so, that’s all changed.

          Just under 18 months ago, I was diagnosed with motor neurone disease. In case you don’t know, this is completely untreatable and always terminal (normally within three years or so), in which one loses the ability to move one’s muscles. As a result, I am now wheelchair-bound, spend perhaps 15 hours a day on a ventilator, take around half of my nutrition through a feeding tube (MND affects swallowing, as well as everything else), and my failing voice doesn’t allow me to have much more than a short conversation.

          Most tellingly as far as my lifelong love of puzzles is concerned, I can no longer use a pen or pencil. Well, I can, but the resultant scrawl is something that even I can’t read myself. My wife would tell you that my handwriting has always been borderline illegible, but I defy GCHQ or any codebreaker to decipher my scribblings (which are normally worsened by dropping my writing implement every few seconds).

          My inability to write has had one positive and (at least to me) somewhat surprising effect. Even though I am a convert through necessity rather than choice, I can now say, hand on heart, that I greatly prefer solving digitally to doing so on paper. The reason? Well, there are numerous advantages, I’ve discovered.

          For starters, if you get something wrong, then it’s much easier to undo or overtype letters in an online crossword grid, than it is to rub out what you’ve written in pencil and start again. And, if you are solving in pen, rubbing out is of course not an option.

          It isn’t just that, though. Judicious use of the “Skip filled squares” option makes things much easier. Plus, it’s just a quick swipe to open a dictionary app to check a spelling or definition, rather than relying on a large and very heavy copy of Chambers or Collins. This is something my wife particularly appreciates, after decades of me insisting on taking a small library of reference books on our family holidays. Oh, and if you’re stuck, you can cheat quite legally by revealing an obdurate letter or even an entire answer (but not on any of our prize puzzles, of course).

          Most importantly of all, there’s access to not just that day’s puzzles, but to tens of thousands of them. So, if I crack a day’s Cryptic Crossword in just a few minutes, I can easily find another. Unfortunately my solving times have grown astronomically (cognitive decline is often a feature of MND), but I can dream.

          Are there things that I miss? Well, yes. I did like being able to write the letters of an anagram in a circle, thus making it easier to unjumble them. While there are anagram-solving apps, it would be nice to have the ability to do this using a graphic rather like our Panagram puzzles, in which one could enter the letters of the anagram, and then jumble them randomly until one spots something likely-looking.

          This aside, I’m a convert. Which is my way of saying that, after a lifetime of solving on paper, if I can see the advantages of doing so digitally, then anyone can. I’m not entirely sure what I’ll do when I completely lose the ability to type or tap a screen, but perhaps I’ll be able to grow to love solving using voice recognition. Who knows, maybe that will be even better.

          1. Thank you for posting this. My very best wishes Mr Lancaster and to your family.

             I hope he can continue to get some pleasure from puzzles for a good while yet.

             My mother lived with multiple sclerosis for many years but i I have always felt that of all the cruel illnesses out there, MND is the most cruel. Chris’s blog seems to confirm that.

          2. Thank you for posting this. My very best wishes to Mr Lancaster and to his family.

             I hope he can continue to get some pleasure from puzzles for a good while yet.

             My mother lived with multiple sclerosis for many years but i I have always felt that of all the cruel illnesses out there, MND is the most cruel. Chris’s blog seems to highlight that.

          3. Thank you from me for posting this very sad and moving update from Chris Lancaster. I had no idea he was so ill. I hope he reads this column and is a little comforted by knowing that we are all thinking of him and his family.

          4. Thank you so much for posting this, Crazy River.

             What a Trojan, Mr L is! He and his wife have been dealt a brutal blow but he is dealing with it as good as one can. They should put his attitude in a bottle and sell it.

             He’s put a very good case forward for going digital but it’s going to take me a while to jump over the fence to the not-so dark side. Day Zee told me that, when it comes to the crossy, she’s never going electronic.

             1. Despite what Chris said, nether will I but, then, poor Mr. Lancaster has no choice.

          5. Condolences Chris and much admiration for your positive approach to such a debilitating condition

          6. Very sad news!

             Looking forward to your next Samuel puzzle … using voice recognition, perhaps?

             Best wishes to you and your family!

          7. My sympathy and best wishes to Chris and his family. This is truly a devastating disease which hollows out the sufferers slowly and inevitably while leaving the loved ones to bear the strain of coping and keeping supportive. My best friend in North Yorkshire developed it five years ago starting with his arms which is the cruelest way..

          8. I have a friend in a similar situation. Not only tragic for him but for the whole family. I can only echo all the sentiments already expressed.

          9. Thank you for posting. Desperately sad. Best wishes to CL & family

          10. Thank you very much for posting this Madflower. It is indeed deeply sad and most moving.
              My heart goes out to Chris Lancaster and his family. I have great admiration for his courage. Just for one thing, as someone who always solves their crosswords on paper, I can imagine how tricky it was to begin with for Chris to start working online instead. I think I’d find it nigh impossible to make the switch!
              One of my cousins was afflicted by MND. It is a very cruel disease. He was an avid rose gardener.
              Like others, I hope Chris will be able to enjoy the puzzles for a long while yet. My thoughts and very best wishes are with him and his family.

       2. You need to subscribe to the puzzles newsletter, J.

    2. It is, indeed, Shrimp. My best wishes to Chris and his family.

       1. Seconded.

       2. Thirded … very sad for Chris and family.

    3. Thanks for posting this.

       So sorry to hear this news.

       My thoughts are with the Chris Lancaster and his family.

       1. A couple of my friends have suffered from this terrible condition one only lasted a couple of years the other is still batting on 14 years after diagnosis. He’s in a similar state to Chris these days but can still speak and is regularly interviewd in the newspapers and on television pushing for assisted dying. My heart goes out to Chris and all those suffering from this awful thing.

27. Oh dear. I am one degree under. We were thinking about some lunch when DD2 came over with the dogs. We are always so pleased to see her in her busy life and as usual opened a bubbly bottle and 2 hours and some nibbles later George is fast asleep but I was determined to guzzle. A bit of a slog if I am honest, no fault of the setter. I had to keep referring to the hints which is against my religion. I shall now go and join my husband, in a manner of speaking, the weather is not conducive to anything else. Many thanks to Messrs Setter & Falcon. 1a, 11a, 25a. I was so pleased this morning to complete yesterdays toughie 😊

    1. Enjoy Daisy. There is nothing quite as delicious as a satisfying, short afternoon nap.

28. I had time today , so brain was in gear and I found this an enjoyable but slightly chewy solve. Needed the BRB to help with the first part of 27a – couldn’t think of the synonym , and my new trusty AI companion ChatGPT to get the old police officer 22d . Of course the parsing of that then became obvious. Thanks to setter and Falcon.

29. Quite difficult for me today but got there in the end.
    Thanks to the setter and to Falcon.

30. Got to go for 1d today, there is a cracking one in Leeds with great little independent shops and cafés.
    I got a good start on the northern across clues, got bogged down a bit in the south but picked up the pace when checkers came.
    Many thanks to Setter and Falcon.
    I hope Chuck and Camilla enjoy the visit and do their bit to stop Falcon living in the 51st State

31. A puzzle of two halves for me today. Enjoyed getting 1a, 1d & 10d quite early on but struggled in places with the lower half. Struggled with the Quickie Pun and checked on Google. I decided on Cherry Seinfeld a character in the Thundermans! Many thanks to the setter and Falcon.

32. Well I enjoyed this one, just right for a Monday,
    1.5*/3.5*. Favourites 15a conker, 22d copper and 16d gamp.
    Ps also liked the quickie pun

    Thanks to setter and Falcon

33. Just couldn’t engage with the mindset today. Perhaps just getting older or too much wine last night?

    1. You’ve changed your alias so this required moderation. Both aliases will work from now on.

34. I’m pleased I wasn’t the only one who found this unnessecerily difficult for a Monday. I hadn’t heard of the fabric but at least it was an anagram. Favourite was 20d. Thanks to the setter anyway and Falcon.

35. Enjoyably challenging and learnt a couple of news words, 17a being one of them. Thank you to setter and Falcon.

36. I have never enjoyed Mondays’ cruciverbal offerings and today was certainly no exception. IMHO apart from anything else there are several iffy clues such as 16d and 21d (so convoluted). It was certainly a DNF for me.

    1. Not quite accurate to say I have never enjoyed Mondays’ offerings – memories of the Roger Squires days.

37. Busy all yesterday, so I did this puzzle a day late. A swift start gave false confidence, and I really had to work for the final few. My favourite couple were being deprived of computers in 4d and the cross draw in 27a. Thank you to Twmbarlwm for the entertainment and Falcon for explaining a couple of the parsings.

    And thank you to Chris Lancaster for that moving update on Sunday; best wishes to Chris and family.

38. Gave up yesterday and came back to it today.
    Definitely a Toughie for me.
    I wouldn’t have solved 20d in a month of Sundays, and after getting the answer from the blog, I’m not convinced that “Baltic” isn’t too general as an indicator of the answer.
    Thanks to Falcon and the Setter.

39. My very best wishes to Mr Lancaster and to his family.

    For the puzzle, 3*/3* ….
    liked 1A ” I rang The Lancet about cure for cold (7,7)”

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