Satyen Nabar's Sun Spl analysed
Sunday 31 October 2021
The Sunday Crossword No 3174, Sunday 31 Oct 2021
Saturday 30 October 2021
No 13390, Saturday 30 Oct 2021, Spinner
ACROSS
DOWN
Reference List
Friday 29 October 2021
No 13389, Friday 29 Oct 2021, KrisKross
Thursday 28 October 2021
No 13388, Thursday 28 Oct 2021, Bruno
Wednesday 27 October 2021
No 13387, Wednesday 27 Oct 2021, Karaoke
Tuesday 26 October 2021
No 13386, Tuesday 26 Oct 2021, Avtaar
Monday 25 October 2021
No 13385, Monday 25 Oct 2021, Vulcan
ELEMI Dickens is always UPSET and DISTRESSED when people misspell and mispronounce her first name as Emily. TONIGHT, she is at a SHINDIG, thrown by Alex Johnson, one of her batchmates from the Chicago Art School, where they are studying OP-ART. Not one known to GALLIVANT, she is wishing she could simply DISSOLVE from the scene but Alex is a dear friend and it would break his heart to vanish. She wishes that she had EAR PLUGs to shield herself from the noisy band and even more to shut out the inane THIGH-SLAPPERs from the emcee. She finds a bar-stool and sits holding a glass of TANGERINE juice and is covertly playing an ERASER challenge game on her phone.
So, she is surprised when a young man EMANATEs from the crowd, walks up to her and says, “Hi, Ms. Elemi Dickens, I’m Chris EARNER” and offers his hand. She is uncertain if this was a SIGN asking her to join in dance or simply a pick-up line and she hesitantly shakes the hand. Chris INTUITs that she is feeling totally out-of-place and says “shall we take a walk in the garden?”. She normally declines such proposals, but her interest is kindled by his ADDRESSing her by her proper first name. She thinks that ATTESTs a thoroughness of mind, something that is also evident from the starched PANTS he is wearing and a T-shirt that says “Save the WHITE SEA beluga-WWF”. They take a stroll in the garden and within a short PERIOD, Elemi is seen holding hands with this new acquaintance. The loud music, the noisy shouts from those partying hard and in fact the whole world around her seems to GRIND TO A HALT. ‘This is not my Prince Charming with all his REGALIA’, says an ASTRINGENT rational voice from within her. But the emotional voice quells that objection saying ‘look, he has UNWRAPped me from the shell I have been hiding in’.
A final MEMO to the dear reader: you are free to choose the ending of your choice:
1. ED & CE have a lasting relation
2. ED & CE have a brief relation and then they go their separate ways
3. ED & CE never meet each other
Note: The ending you choose will DICTATE your character respectively as
A. A romantic optimist
B. A level headed realist
C. A hopeless pessimist
Sunday 24 October 2021
The Sunday Crossword No 3173, Sunday 24 Oct 2021
The Hindu Cryptic on Sunday #59, Sunday 24 Oct 2021, Afterdark
The Hindu Cryptic on Sunday can be accessed at the link given below. You need to register and sign in using an email ID and password, subscription may or may not be required.
Saturday 23 October 2021
No 13384, Saturday 23 Oct 2021, Hypatia
ACROSS
1 Opinions of student lacking principles(5) IDEAS {IDEA4 Buy from both sides to exchange(5) BANDY {B{AND}Y}
11 Artist’s photo behind ocean(7) PICASSO {PIC}{ASS}{O}
12 Meticulously reboot computer starting this month(7) OCTOBER {REBOOT+C
13 Condition of one on a horse(5) RIDER (DD)
14 Discover profile’s public(6,3) FIGURE OUT {FIGURE}{OUT}
15 Captures black diamonds opening bids(10) ADBUCTIONS {A{B}{D}UCTIONS}
17 Requests time away from assignments(4) ASKS {
19 Partner of footballer, say with Engineer’s salary(4) WAGE {WAG}{E}
21 Heard Spooner collect support for old music ensemble(6,4) STRING BAND {(-b+ST)RING (+B-st)AND}
25 Litigant’s proposal restricting international dispute(9) PLAINTIFF {PLA{I}N}{TIFF}
27 Works for Bush(5) PLANT (DD)
28 Minor, 6, introduced to pilot(7) TRIVIAL {TRI{VI}AL}
29 Fearful swine flu frequently around vacation(7) LEISURE {
30 In France, it is guarding royal insignia(5) CREST {C{R}'EST}
31 Bury dad lost by 11, perhaps(5) INTER {
DOWN
2 Firm contract to recruit detectives(7) DECIDED {DE{CID}ED}3 Separate summary(8) ABSTRACT (DD)
5 Flower season’s finally back(6) ASTERN {ASTER}{
6 Suspect friend returned promissory notes(7) DUBIOUS {BUD<=}{IOUS}
7 Like drinking gin up in ancient city(6) SPARTA {A{TRAP}S<=}
8 Study to pass quickly without constant struggle(8) CONFLICT {CON}{FLI{C}T}
9 Carol reducing size in hope!(4) SONG {(-l+S)ONG} Reducing Size= Large (L) replaced by Small (S)
10 Free big rat isn’t underground(6) GRATIS (T)
16 Handy tool?(4,4) NAIL FILE (CD)
18 African counterpart, essentially paying erratically over time(8) EGYPTIAN {
19 Animal twisting foot with one twig oddly(6) WAPITI {PAW<=}{I}{T
20 Hot garlic sauce ultimately kept in ice(7) GLACIER {GARLIC*} around {
22 Generally, a student’s first real uniform gets crumpled(2,1,4) AS A RULE {A}{S
23 Proper rag picked up for chores(6) DUTIES {~ DUE TEASE}
24 Rock singers without resistance to change(6) GNEISS {SINGE
26 Covid: Lesser cases while away(4) IDLE (T)
Reference List
TalePiece
By Dr RKE
This is to warn you of a certain type of person like Mr.Sharma. By the time you finish reading this you will FIGURE OUT why I say so. AS A RULE, you will find this type of person sitting on the stone bench, adjacent to the petunia PLANT, in the park in your housing society, never mind that it is OCTOBER and the sky is overcast. He has a NAIL FILE in hand but no one has ever seen him use it on his nails. He is ostensibly there watching his grandson, a RIDER of a baby scooty. But his real motive is to ensnare one person every day into a conversation. It all starts quite TRIVIALly as he ASKS you, “you are in Flat 805 in H block, right?”. Please be warned that even if you reside in the said flat, it would be better to mumble something to the contrary and not pause. If you make the mistake of saying, “yes, Uncle”, be prepared to collect the WAGEs of your sin. You might as well forget all IDEAS of completing the shopping, picking up the Amazon delivery from the watchman and dropping your daughter for her STRING BAND practice. He has the DUBIOUS distinction of not letting anyone go away when he has DECIDED to perform this seeming act of ABDUCTION.
The difference between you and him is you have DUTIES and no LEISURE and he vice versa- and therein lies the CONFLICT. In an IDLE act of thoughtlessness, if you sit by him on the bench, within the next 10 minutes he will extract all the info about you, maybe even about your Aadhaar card (on which your name is misspelt). He would say, “O, Gopalan is your father, I know him back from the days when he was an AGM in State Bank.” There is no use telling him, “No, my father has retired from ISRO”. It is best to maintain an ABSTRACT silence because either way he is going to BANDY about how he bulldozed his way to a loan (for a SONG of an interest rate) from Gopalan of State Bank 20 years ago and how he got the gift of a clock GRATIS from him. Probably poor Mr.Gopalan just wanted to tear himself away from this motor mouth. INTER alia, he will launch into how he had a run-in with the promoter of the building society. If you want to escape, the only strategy is to maintain a GNEISS like rock-silence or the cold countenance of a GLACIER atop a Himalayan CREST, making him wonder if you have a sound hearing. You can also draw some modern art like PICASSO on the sand with your toes. Results not guaranteed, but what is the harm in trying?
My advice is let your favourite SONG play in your head, loud enough to drown out this monumental bore. And while at it, just pray for Mr.Sharma’s daughter-in-law to come along, because she is the only one known to be capable of freezing a charging Mr.Sharma on his tracks.