Wednesday 3 February 2010

No 9756, Wednesday 03 Feb 10, Gridman

Some neatly conjured up clues toda by Gridman to round off this round and it's going to be Manna from tomorrow if I have got my maths right.
ACROSS
1 - Not a welcome visitor (8) - INTRUDER [E]
5 - Result of rocket firing? (6) - {UP}{SHOT}
10 - Wide and flat pedals moved around the far end of machinery (7) - SPLA{Y}ED*
11 - Attempt to cut short one tube with constriction (7) - VENTUR(-e){I}

12 - Conjure up statement of account with one thousand replacing one hundred (6) - INVO(-ic+k)KE
13 - Small para suitable for nothing but writing on the wall (8) - {GRAF}{FIT}{O}
15 - Measure to vilify heartlessly is a sin (4) - {EN}{V(ilif)Y}
16 - Absolutely agreeable (5,5) - QUITE RIGHT [DD]
18 - Undecided about article with receiver (2,3,5) - {ON} {THE} {FENCE}
20 - Pain from store with core leader gone (4) - (-c)ACHE
23 - Footloose boy doesn’t begin to work with what may be used for cooking (5,3) - {OLIVE(-r)} {(-t)OIL} Nice clue
24 - Charm close listener (6) - {END}{EAR}
26 - Stop! Amber changes! Proceed! (7) - {EMBAR*}{GO} Another nice one
27 - Fighting? Just played around the venerable person (upper class) (7) - JU{JI}TS*{U} Ji in India is like saying Sir in english. Gandhiji etc
28 - Want the French stylus (6) - {NEED}{LE} I still have the stainless steel needles of the old gramophone player of my grand-uncle and I use them as nails to hang small paintings on the wall, as India is yet to market steel nails like the ones you get abroad!!
29 - Poor leader of women strained (8) - {W}{RETCHED}
DOWN
1 - What separating lovers may tell each other while looking ahead? (3,4,2,4,2) - ITS TIME TO MOVE ON [CD]
2 - City et al batting for an old cricketer (3,4) - {TEL A*} {VIV}
3 - Separate world leaders over there endlessly kittle heartlessly (6) - {UN}{YO(-n)}{K(-ittl)E}
4 - Man has daughters in extremely easy circumstances (4) - E(-as){DD}Y
6 - Garment from a shop in a foreign land (8) - PINAFORE [T] Neatly fitted in

7 - Giving a roof above your head? (7) - HOUSING [CD]
8 - How one feels while skating on ice? (4,2,3,6) - THIN ON THE GROUND [CD] The only place I know of, where ice-skating can be done in India is in Simla, have had a go at it in 1960 when I was there as a kid.

9 - Have more goods than one can possibly sell (9) - OVERSTOCK [CD]
14 - Doubter is becoming a journalist (9) - SUBEDITOR*
17 - Rarer elf turns out to be a person recommended (8) - REFERRAL*
19 - It saves you from a pinprick (7) - THIMBLE [CD]
21 - Animal fraud heard (7) - CHEETAH (~cheater)

22 - Kind of printer with a fluid stream (3-3) - INK-JET [DD]
25 - Thus a door gives you an opening (4) - AJAR [CD]

22 comments:

  1. Good morning

    Some nice clues today, like 23A, 27A, 1D, 6D and 8D.

    13A GRAFFITO - Here Gridman has made use of the opportunity to remind us it is the singular form of GRAFFITI. I have come across many people writing like 'Graffiti is....' whereas 'Graffiti are...' is the correct expression.

    27A JUJITSU - With the help of the crossings, I filled this in. Only after reading the blog, the word JI dawned on me. Poor me !


    Richard

    ReplyDelete
  2. Actually from surface reading point of view the answer to 8D does not gel. Let's have Shuchi's and Chaturvasi's opinion on that, because if I were skating on ice I would be feeling more bothered about retaining my balance!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Colonel

    28A: While on STYLUS, our family too had a gramophone about 60 years ago and I have preserved most of my father's collection of 78 rpm vinyl records. Sadly, almost all of them have been overused and not worth listening to.

    For those in and around Bangalore who may be interested in possessing a gramophone as a decorative piece - and to operate as well - in the living room, they are available at Seethaphone Company on Avenue Road.

    I had bought one from there a couple of years ago. It has a brass horn on top and gives a nice look to the hall ambience.


    Richard

    ReplyDelete
  4. Re that long Dn clue: You might be on firm ground.
    I am not an expert on sport but please visit
    http://www.londonskaters.com/article-naomi-grigg-skate-years-3.html
    and using ctrl+F put thin in the Search box and see.
    Don't know if this helps!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Never skated. Don't have the faintest idea how a skater would feel. Maybe because the skates are thinner than one's feet one may feel thin on the ground

    ReplyDelete
  6. Today was one of those 'tip of the tongue' days. Struggled with INTRUDER and QUITE RIGHT

    ReplyDelete
  7. The 'thin on the ground' in the link that you have indicated uses it in the context of something being rare, like in the link provided, she means that 'female ice hockey players that actually skate are thin (read 'rare') on the ground.
    I was talking about the surface reading of the clue.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Having done ice as well as roller-skating I can tell you that at the learning stage a skater feels only the pain on his backside as, invariably, one lands on it after losing balance

    ReplyDelete
  9. I have memories of listening to music from the gramophone (a word that is often misspelt with even subeditors nodding over it - when questioned they will compare themselves with Homer) in my maternal grandparents' home in CBE way back in the Fifties: that was an MS song from Meera which still rings in my slowly tintinabulating ears.
    My paternal grandfather's home in its lumber room had a gramophone and scores of discs but thse were used by elder cousins of mine during a time I know not.
    My own children, alas, are part of a nucelus family with no memories of close living.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Richard
    You saw it as 'tintinnabulating', didn't you?

    ReplyDelete
  11. What do you say to crafty women using those discs for painting?

    ReplyDelete
  12. I would ask them: Are you doing it for record's sake?

    Richard

    ReplyDelete
  13. Col,
    The ice skating shoes have thin metal blades at the bottom which glide/cut through the ice and is the only contact with ground while skating. Hence, the contact area wit ice/ground is very less/thin...tht may be wat Gridman had in mind when he clued "thin on the ground"..

    ReplyDelete
  14. The craft is called 'wealth from waste'.(I forgive the insinuation in 'crafty'!lol!) What fun it is to weild words! I too have vivid memories of a grand wooden gramophoen with shelves in my maternal grandmother's house and sooooo many discs- from M.S. songs in Meera, MKT songs, Shakunthalai songs, and 3 sound tracks of movies, Mahalingam's 'Sri valli', 'Naam iruvar'and MGR's 'Maduari veeran'. They had books with dialogues without the help of which we cousins got them by heart! When elders were not around our bigger cousins used to adjust the speed in a way to make Durairaj in Shakunthalai song drawl in a wail and make Bhanumathi in Madurai veeran screech in a catty wrath! What fun we had!

    ReplyDelete
  15. I wonder why the records had speeds like 78,45 and 33 1/3 RPM? Why not nice round figures like 20, 40 and 80?

    ReplyDelete
  16. Read about the gramophone record at GRAMOPHONE RECORD fascinating

    ReplyDelete
  17. Sir,
    8D - How one feels while skating on ice? (4,2,3,6) - THIN ON THE GROUND [CD]
    Skating on ice is made known my REGELATION phenomenon.For more details visit at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regelation

    ReplyDelete
  18. 23 - Footloose boy doesn’t begin to work with what may be used for cooking (5,3) - {OLIVE(-r)} {(-t)OIL}

    Didn't think too well of this clue. "without beginning to work" can mean (-t)OIL, "work doesn't begin" can also mean (-t)OIL, but "doesn't begin to work" does not grammatically mean (-t)OIL.

    The surface isn't very meaningful, either.

    ReplyDelete
  19. 8D: When an idiom is clued, the clue must lead to its idiomatic meaning. e.g. A clue for GOOD SPORT should have a definition that conveys "One who loses gracefully". "Cricket, for example" may be a subsidiary indication but not the whole clue.

    8D doesn't do that, unless one argues that skating rinks don't have many people in them. That's not true of Salt Lake City (UT) at least, where I spent a season when people flocked from all over the world for ice-skating.

    In the link that CVasi Sir has provided, there is only a tongue-in-cheek personal remark [female ice hockey skaters that actually skate, as opposed to 'flirt whilst on skates' can be quite thin on the ground]. It doesn't validate the clue, rather weakens it. Female ice-hockey skaters that actually skate are few, but who flirt whilst on skates are many - which makes the entire class of ice-skaters NOT thin on the ground.

    In a CD, there is no need for the surface (i.e. literal) meaning to gel with the answer - in fact the surface meaning should throw us off-track from the answer. 8D's surface is fine, yet not a very good CD as it doesn't give a firm definition of 'existing only in small numbers/amounts'.

    I hope this has made sense!

    ReplyDelete
  20. Have a look at the CD examples on this page: Cryptic definitions. These illustrate the point above.

    ReplyDelete

deepakgita@gmail.com