Sunday, October 4, 2009 (ST 4343)

This puzzle was originally published in The Sunday London Times on August 23, 2009

Introduction

I found it to be a relatively easy puzzle today for The Sunday London Times. I was able to solve all but a couple of clues without aids of any kind. There does seem to be a grammatical error in one of the clues as well as an incorrect solution for one of the clues in the solution grid. As both of these errors seem to have also appeared in The Sunday London Times, I guess we can look at it as the Citizen merely recreating the "true British experience" for us on this side of the pond.

Today's Glossary

Some possibly unfamiliar abbreviations, people, places, words and expressions used in today's puzzle

sledging - cricket offensive remarks made by a fielder to a batsman in order to break their concentration (sounds like what North Americans would call ''trash talking")

TA - abbrev Territorial Army: in the UK: a fully trained volunteer force intended to provide back-up to the regular army in cases of emergency

Links to Solutions

A review of today's puzzle can be found at Times for the Times [ST 4343].

Commentary on Today's Puzzle

19a Being 16 volunteers returned to nurse (6)

I understood enough of the wordplay to obtain the solution, but some of the wordplay still eludes me. "Volunteers" is TA (Territorial Army) which is reversed (returned) and "to nurse" is TEND, giving ATTEND. I presume "16" is a cross reference to clue 16a, and that the intent is to indicate "Being at a cello performance". But how one gets that from "Being listen" or "Being try to hear some cellist ensemble" beats me.

17d Happens to give off water vapour (9)

I was glad to see that the British bloggers picked up on the grammatical error in the clue; it should be "happen", rather than "happens".

18d One makes good support, with metal right at the bottom (8)

My solution was RESTORER, and there is clear agreement on the British blogs that this is the correct solution (regardless of what the solution grid states). A RESTORER is "one who makes good" (i.e., repairs); "support" is REST, metal is ORE (there is an extensive discussion on this point on Times for the Times), and "right" is R, which is placed "at the bottom", (i.e., end) of a down entry. The solution grid indicates that the solution is LECTURER; however, there seems to be no way for that solution to be correct.

Signing off for this week - Falcon