Saturday 23 October 2021

No 13384, Saturday 23 Oct 2021, Hypatia

 ACROSS

1 Opinions of student lacking principles(5) IDEAS {IDEAlS}
4 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+Computer*}
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 {tASKS}
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 Litigants 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 {fEaRfUl SwInE fLu<=}
30 In France, it is guarding royal insignia(5) CREST {C{R}'EST}
31 Bury dad lost by 11, perhaps(5) INTER {paINTER}

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}{seasoN}
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 {countErpart}{PAYING*} around {T}
19 Animal twisting foot with one twig oddly(6) WAPITI {PAW<=}{I}{TwIg}
20 Hot garlic sauce ultimately kept in ice(7) GLACIER {GARLIC*} around {saucE}
22 Generally, a student’s first real uniform gets crumpled(2,1,4) AS A RULE {A}{Student}{REAL+U*}
23 Proper rag picked up for chores(6) DUTIES {~ DUE TEASE}
24 Rock singers without resistance to change(6) GNEISS {SINGErS*}


26 Covid: Lesser cases while away(4) IDLE (T)


Reference List

Student=L, Ocean=O, Black=B, Diamonds=D, Time=T, Partner of footballer=WAG, Engineer=E, International=I, 6=VI, In France, it= C'est Royal=R
Detectives=CID, Promissory notes=IOUs, Constant=C, Time=T, One=I, Uniform=U, Resistance=R

Colour/Font Scheme

DefinitionSolutionComponent lettersEmbedded linksTheme word Reference list wordAnagram IndicatorC/C indicatorReversal IndicatorHidden word IndicatorLetter Pick indicatorDeletion IndicatorHomophone IndicatorMovement IndicatorPositional IndicatorSubstitution, IndicatorOpposite indicatorLink/Connector, Extraneous

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.

45 comments:

  1. Replies

    1. BTW Shankersen, this is the A-VM from yesterday.

      Delete
    2. 24 hours behind schedule! (like the GT Express of a bygone era)
      I am also reminded of PGW who completes an incident 2/3 paragraphs later. One has to turn a few pages back to get the connection.
      I remember one-
      End of a chapter-"He pushed the vase" and the beginning of another -"The vase broke"!

      Delete
  2. Wonderful Talepiece Dr.RKE!! A touch of Wodehouse in there!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. When I read your sentence on conflict between Leisure and Duties, I remembered a similar construct from PGWs Ring for Jeeves which goes like “It was a confusion of ideas between him and one of the lions he was hunting in Kenya that had caused AB Spottsworth to make the obituary column. He thought the lion was dead, and the lion thought it wasn’t.”

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    2. One good turn deserves another! Thank you Dr.RKE and CPC for the tail piece to the Tale Piece. Fits in properly.
      So very much happy to read the long essay (needed unlike Mr.Sharma) to accommodate most of the words.
      Thank you Ramesh for the Blogger's role.

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    3. today's tale Dr is in command as well as advise .i.e given medicine too.

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  3. 31A- how is 11, perhaps- painter?

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  4. Wow Doctor(RKE),it is amazing you weave such wonderful tales each morning just like that from the 'puzzling' words. Delightful.

    ReplyDelete
  5. DR's tale piece also reminded me of the opening sentence in one of Agatha Christie's mysteries (Taken at the Flood):"In every club there is a club bore."

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  6. Dr.RKE, excellent piece of writing. I specially liked the LEISURE,DUTIES conflict and trying to draw Picasso in the sand, rather unsuccessfully. Sure, some avoiadble pitfalls as a senior citizen to me-).Made an entertaining reading

    ReplyDelete
  7. Just saw the solutions for IXL Round 5.
    The answer for clue 15DN is ALL AT ONCE. But it was marked in red as error and the funny answer was ARL AT ONCE!!!
    4AC :Green light winking at Earl's carriage (8) The answer is CLARENCE which is purportedly derived from CL[-E]ARANCE. There is a mistake in the clue's annotation, I think.
    Any comments?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Wink also means disregard or overlook.

      Delete
    2. And if someone can explain this pls.

      Nero originally without fiddle? On the contrary, with it! (4)

      I was lost for def.

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    3. Tony is fashionable but it? Which is generally used for SA?

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    4. One of the very few I answered was gone-all at once!!
      Alla(H)(NOT)*CE- Where did the R come from?

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    5. Prasad, CLEARANCE has two As. There seems to be an error in this count.
      In regard to Nero, I too lost it because my answer was TUNE and the answer is TO[N]Y

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    6. Yes, they seem to have halted the process as the solution part disappeared now. I already complained about it.

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    7. Oops. Totally missed that.

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    8. The answer is corrected now. They will have to rerun the ranking list and revised list will be in place soon.

      Delete
    9. It shouldn't effect the leaderboard. Does it?

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    10. System should be conounting that as error too. There are some top guns who are also in the error list. I am sure once it is rerun, they will move over in the list.

      Delete
    11. Hi there is an error in the annotation of the clue for Clarence. The setter's intention was Clearance - E. Because of the inadvertent error, everybody has been awarded full points for Clarence and Ergon.

      with it (inf)= following current trends in popular taste (BRB)

      Delete
    12. "With it" is generic fashionable in "popular".
      Tony is fashionable "wealthy and stylish", "NAM" informal.

      Still not convinced but will rest the case.

      Delete
    13. Despite the error in Clarence, I thought this was a high class puzzle. Each clue had something to offer and the solver had to be on the top to get them.

      Delete
    14. +1 It was a tough one go Crack, got all of them right though.

      Delete
  8. Made mistakes in 27A and 23D.. 27A I deduced as PLAYS ( meaning it is a work for the Bush theater in London where plays are staged) .. this gave me DUSTER for 23D which I took for a DD.. defensible interpretations but wrong nonetheless

    ReplyDelete
  9. Sowmyaji, nice grid today though spoonerisms flew over the head for me - I had posted yesterday but as it was late, I want to mention today also that your reference to Sanjay was brought to his attention and he penned his thoughts
    Sanjay Subrahmanyan musing on Hypatia's grid from 21st Oct THC

    ReplyDelete
  10. Yes,that was interesting. His writing and the comments thereon.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Thank u for a nice grid. I missed BANDY.
    In 27ac - how does works for give u PLANT?
    Kindly explain.
    Also why is WAG Footballer's partner?

    ReplyDelete
  12. Works/ factory/ plant are synonyms (manufacturing plant)
    WAG- fairly common term in football parlance for Wife & Girl Friends (now used in Cricket as well)

    ReplyDelete
  13. The advantage of your tale is that we can improve Vocabulary . Thanks Dr RKE

    ReplyDelete
  14. Super crossword from Hypatia. Had to really dig deep.

    ReplyDelete

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