Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 3348 (Hints)
Hints and tips by Senf
OK, let me try this again! A very good Sunday morning from Winnipeg where approximately five hours after this blog is published the Winter Solstice will occur marking the start of astronomical winter and the beginning of increasing daylight hours for six months.
On Thursday, we experienced blizzard conditions, with winds gusting to over 55mph and temperatures in the minus 20s before the mythical ‘feels like’ was taken into consideration, resulting from an Atmospheric River that originated somewhere over the Pacific Ocean reinforced by an Alberta Clipper once it had crossed the Rockies and ‘running into’ a Polar Vortex over Saskatchewan and Manitoba.
For me, and I stress for me,© Dada quite friendly, with four long ‘uns, six anagrams (one partial), two lurkers (one reversed), and no homophones in a symmetric 32 clues; with 16 hints ‘sprinkled’ throughout the grid you should/might be able to get some of the checkers to enable the solving of the unhinted clues. I hope you have your Crimson Tomes at hand!
If it is some time since you read, or if you have never read the instructions in RED below the hints then please consider doing so before commenting today as my electronic blue pencil is at the ready and the Naughty Step is OPEN!
Candidates for favourite – 10a, 21a/23a, 29a, 30a, 3d, 19d, and 22d.
As is usual for the weekend prize crosswords, a number of the what I very subjectively perceive to be the more difficult clues have been selected and hints provided for them.
Most of the terms used in these hints are explained in the Glossary and examples are available by clicking on the entry under “See also”. Where the hint describes a construct as “usual” this means that more help can be found in The Usual Suspects, which gives a number of the elements commonly used in the wordplay. Another useful page is Wolves in Sheep’s Clothing, which features words with meanings that are not always immediately obvious.
A full review of this puzzle will be published after the closing date for submissions.
Some hints follow:
Across
1a All That Jazz passes for musical song (8,4)
As a phrase what all that jazz can be a synonym for (passes for).
10a Storm ruined a fleece (7)
A synonym of ruined (of a fabric?), A from the clue, and a two letter verbal synonym of fleece.
12a Extremely merry (5)
A double definition – the first is being used as an adverb.
16a What might ignite conflict in town near Coventry? (7)
A synonym of conflict and something that might ignite (in an old fashioned device for illumination).
17a Coach shower in winless season? (7)
A term for a (meteorological) shower inserted into one of the four seasons with win deleted (less).
21a Bread or perhaps … (7)
A type of bread (loaf) or a descriptive term for the answer to 23a – the ellipses more meaningful than usual?
29a Brainless I figure, while having come first (7)
I from the clue and guess a figure (a number between eight and ten) placed after a two letter synonym of while (having come first).
30a One’s played money game with love, but no heart (5,7)
The lowest denomination item of money in the UK, a five letter classic, four-player partnership card game, and (with) LovE with the interior letters deleted (but no heart).
Down
1d Plaintiff seeing races fixed, copper brought in (7)
An anagram (seeing . . . fixed) of RACES containing (brought in) the chemical symbol for copper.
3d Count tucked into white fish (7)
A synonym of count (as in accumulate?) inserted (tucked) into a type of ‘white’ libation.
5d Old actress’s short dress (4)
The last name of an old (Swedish-American) actress with the last letter removed (short).
7d Tempting to eat without German stews (5-8)
An anagram (stews – yes, it’s in the list of 1,400+, well stew is) of WITHOUT GERMAN.
14d Bovine animal thus in dump (5)
A two letter synonym of thus inserted into (in) a verbal synonym of dump.
19d Argument is situated in extremes of debate (7)
IS from the clue and a synonym of situated inserted into (in) the outer letters (extremes) of DebatE.
22d Stain on morsel in cooking pot (7)
A three letter synonym of stain placed before (on) a synonym of morsel – you might recognise the answer as something else but the French got there first!
27d Hand is crushed by feet (4)
IS from the clue contained (crushed) by the abbreviated form of feet.
Quick Crossword Pun:
EAR + ELEPHANT = IRRELEVANT – Hmm!
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Some of the more astute of you may remember this particular piece being used before, but it’s the first day of Winter so here goes. The First Movement, Allegro non molto, of Winter the fourth concerto of The Four Seasons composed by Antonio Vivaldi, in the early 18th Century, played by Cynthia Freivogel and Voices of Music:
Dada being kind to us today with only a small amount of head scratching needed. I did like the 21a/23a combination and the argument in 19d. My COTD is the count at 3d.
Thank you, Dada for the fun. Thank you, Colonel for the hints.
Lots to do today so I better get on!
A puzzle of two halves for me. The west went in relatively smoothly but a couple of areas in the east including a stupid unparsed error in 21a held me up considerably. 22d surely will have its detractors, but gets my cotd closely followed by the German stew in 7d. Thanks to Dada and Senf.
A fairly straightforward guzzle, which i whisked through untol I reached the SEcorner which held me up for a short while. I liked the cryptic definition at 1a, the long abagram at 7d and rhe geographical clues at 8a and21a but my COTD was 22d ( very clever, I myself am a fan of22a so that helped. Thanks to Dada and to Senf for the hints
2*/3*. Good fun apart from having to guess a vague boy in 21d.
1a was my favourite, which I parsed slightly differently from the freezing Senf. I took it as a synonym for All That Jazz followed by a synonym for “passes”.
Thanks to Dada and to Senf.
I hadn’t read the hints, but I parsed it the same as you.
Me too
And me
Great puzzle at the gentler end but with lots of satisfying clues. I took a long time with some of the 4 letter clues. 1a my favourite and I parsed like Rabbit Dave. I couldn’t pars 17a so thank you Senf. Also enjoyed 22a (as it is a word I only came across in the last year) and 3d for the clever surface. Thank you Dada too.
Very enjoyable with just a few in the south east causing holds ups, I had to check 22d after as I was not sure about it, my favourite was 3d.
Many thanks to Dad and to Senf for the hints.
I didn’t find it quite as straightforward as others, but I always enjoy Dada productions with their requirement for lateral thinking
A restful Sunday amble through this puzzle, but very enjoyable. I also parsed 1a the same as RD. The West filled quickly whilst the East took a little longer.
Podium places for me are 1a, 16a, 7d, 8d and 22a, but COTD goes to 30a.
Thank you Dada and Senf for the hints.
Nice friendly Dada – although 22d had us foxed. Never heard of it as a cooking pot.
Thanks senf for the hints.
Both me and pommers have been poorly all week – flu is rife here. Still don’t have the energy to put the tree up or decorate it. Might be without this year.
If you have some of the thing you know as 22d, have a look at the label
Hope your recovery continues expeditiously, Sue x
Slowly but surely thank you Terence
We miss you !
This was a tad tougher than the usual Sunday fare offered up by Radio that was an enjoyable challenge.
My LOI was 1a which I couldn’t get, despite having all the checkers. I’m surprised I haven’t seen ‘with love but no heart’ as a construction before as it’s a goodie and very useful for words ending with those letters.
People will either love 22d or hate it (couldn’t resist)
My podium is 30a, 3d and 7d (excellent anagram).
MT to the aforementioned and the Manitoban mountie.
3*/4*
Well, that’s one cooking pot I wouldn’t use on principle – wretched stuff….
Fairly benign Sunday fare from Dada today with all four long ones getting ticks here along with 3d which was my cotd.
Thanks to Dada and to Senf for the hints and the seasonal offering from Vivaldi.
Apparently it is delicious with bananas ….
Wow, that’s a lot of potassium.
A fairly gentle puzzle from Dada today (he’s rather trickier in today’s Toughie) – thanks to him and to Senf for the hints.
I liked 16a, 17a, 30a and 3d.
I thought his toughie was excellent.
I had more ticks on that puzzle than this.
Of course, when the entire BD universe says a guzzle is a breeze, then I struggle. I needed a couple of pointers from the lad Senf, to enable me to reboot and complete this one.
This household is overwhelmed with influenza. H and The Youngster a-coughing and a-spulttering. I have avoided it so far but will, inevitably, succumb in time for Christmas. I cannot hide in my study as the builders are continuing to use it as a storage area for baths, sinks, and huge boxes of unknown items. They promise to finish by Wednesday; we shall see…
Thanks to Da-doo-ron-ron and, wearing several coats and red scarves, The Man From Manitoba
Thanks to Dada and Senf for the hints. We found this very easy for a Sunday. Our COTD 30a and LOI 29a. 25a was a bit risqué for the Telegraph!
I think for 25a it depends on which synonym for rump you think of first……😂
Hi G&V
When a clue says three quarters, it means omitting either the last letter or maybe the first (or two lettters if it’s an eight letter word)
Also, the DT will never use this word.
Great fun, with 25A raising a smile and the winless season being very clever. I also learned something about cooking pots.
Thoroughly enjoyable pre-Christmas lighter fare from Mr D this morning!
Enjoyed many of the clever clues but 25A was my LOL favourite – even made Mrs H chuckle! 😜
Thanks to Dada for the challenge and, as ever, to Senf for another excellent blog ‘n hints 👍👍👍
Merry Christmas to all!🎄🎁
Cheers!
I didn’t find this Dada puzzle the easiest puzzle this week. Must be the time of year with so much going on.
However, puzzle seemed quirky to me in spots and definite personal thesaurus at play.
Favourites 1a, 16a, 3d, 8d & 22d
Thanks to Dada & Senf
The three-syllable word in 25a is one of those that is the result of adding one letter to a one-syllable word.
Can anyone think of any others?
I asked this a few years ago and Jose, I think, gave an answer that I didn’t have but I can’t remember it.
I have two answers but there could be more.
Ore to Oreo !!
That’s a fine effort.
I should have said words in the dictionary but that works.
Tom, it is in the dictionary. On the Collins website, it appears in the Collins English Dictionary as well as the two accompanying US dictionaries, both as a trademark and as the derogatory slang term derived from the trademark.
Thanks for that, F. I had no idea that trademarks appear in dictionaries and the derogatory term is a new one on me.
Every day is a school day and all that caper,
Imposter was ahead of me.
Good fun this with plenty to enjoy on a grey Shropshire afternoon. It was occasionally testing, but overall a comfortable solve, with 30a my favourite.
Cheers to Dada and Senf.
2* / 4* Certainly not straightforward, especially the SE, but loads of top clues and humour.
For my favourites I’ll go for 30a, the brainless 29a and my last one in a 21d
Thanks setter and Senf
Oh dear I am short of time again. Thoroughly enjoyed the challenge though I do have to admit, dear Mustard Man, that I have not read your hints. I did it all by my own! I couldn’t quite parse 10a but I’m sure it is right. We have had 21a several times recently have we not? Anyway, I now have an hour in which I am determined to get my head down. Partying tonight – yeay! Many thanks to Mr Setter and Mr Hinter.
Short on time today. Very enjoyable. Never heard of 22d in this context. Also don’t recall the words in one clue being used as part of the definition of the other when an ellipsis is used. Thanks to Senf and dada
I hope it is ok to post this here but I know many of you have been thinking of Chris.
In the process of donating to Chris Lancaster’s MND fund I came across this update on Facebook and thought you might want to see it.
Lots of my friends have been in touch over the past 10 days to see how I am; rather than reply individually, I thought I’d update here. I was ambulanced to hospital last Sunday in lots of pain, with what they thought might be a bowel obstruction. It turned out that I had a perforated appendix.
Normally they would remove the appendix, which would completely resolve the problem, but I was deemed unfit for surgery due to MND-related respiratory failure; they said there was no chance I would come round after an anaesthetic. This means that I’ve had five days of antibiotics via IV, and on Saturday night was sent home with a syringe-driver to provide a constant dose of morphine and other end-of-life drugs.
At this point, it’s a case of waiting to see what happens. The doctors have remained constant in saying that this is a “terminal event” (their words); it just remains to be seen how long it takes the infection from the appendix to get me. It may be days or weeks, but they say that it will happen.
Thanks to everyone for their best wishes. It’s been a rather awful 10 days for me and my family, and I keep telling myself that doctors aren’t always right with their prognoses.
Thank you for posting this, MissTFide. Poor Chris. My heart goes out to him and his family and he will be in my thoughts and prayers.
Oh dear, that is truly awful news. We can pray and hope but it does not sound good.
How absolutely awful for Chris Lancaster. Hopefully he knows we are all thinking of him and his family.
Just awful. Thank you for letting us know.
Will hold him in the light and hope there can be relief in this most awful of situations.
This is truly very sad news.
My thoughts are with Chris and his family.
Thank you for posting, MissTFide
That is utterly awful. I can’t imagine what Chris and his family are enduring and can only offer up my hopes and best wishes that he be as comfortable as possible in the circumstances.
Truly awful news. I feel so sorry for Chris and his family. Sending positive thoughts to the maelstrom of negativity that has unfortunately beset them all.
Another brilliant puzzle from Dada, which was nice and friendly. I took a couple of wrong forks, quickly corrected with Senf’s so helpful hints. Thanks to you both.
Yes indeed thoughts and prayers for Chris. Courage mon brave.
This was a welcolme diversion from the Christmas hassle. 21a unparsed bung-in as was situated in 19d.
Thank you Dada and Senf.
Didn’t find this one quite the gentle breeze others clearly did. If I ever knew 22d was a cooking pot then I’d forgotten it (despite the pic on the label of the jar of the spread I’m quite partial to on a toasted bagel) & 25a also took longer than it ought to have. An enjoyable puzzle. Liked all 4 peripheral long ‘uns so perm 3 from 4 for podium spots.
Thanks as ever to D&S