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| Rangoli by Gowri |
ACROSS
1 Driver's blog about catching cold during flu (4,4) GOLF CLUB {GOL{F{C}LU}B*}
5 Drink it after holding back tears (6) SPIRIT {IT}<=>{RIPS<=}
9 After fifty, eccentricity besieged mum (7) SILENCE {SI{L}{E}NCE} E/Eccentricity? See comments
10 Composed clever engineering question as opener (7) EQUABLE {ABLE}<=>{En...g}{QU}
11 Central India's gangster on American chopper (5) AXIAL {I}{AL}<=>{AX}
12 Spooner announcing a change in America for traitors (8) SERPENTS (~ per cents to serpents)
13 Slight cushion after #6 and #8 get out (6) INSULT INSULaTe
14 Arm temporary accommodation with air-conditioning and opulence, essentially (8) TENTACLE {TENT}{AC}{opuLEnce}
18 With others (14 other real odd ones out!) (2,6) ET CETERA {tEnTaClE+oThEr+ReAl}
27 Log 13 (3-4) PUT DOWN [DD]
28 Old toilet sucks - no joke! (4-3) LONG-AGO {LO{N}{GAG}O}
29 Sometimes proctologist revolts while undressing body (6) CORPSE [T<=]
30 Merlin sang songs featuring civets (8) LINSANGS [T]
DOWN
2 Post restructuring, sell oil or candies? (7) LOLLIES*
3 "100 + 50? ...??" (High society, in short, is not very bright) (9) CANDLELIT {C}{AND}{L}{ELITe}
4 Tune a system component that is not in a good state (6) UNEASY [T]
6 Trim, quiet, and single engineer (5) PRUNE {P}{RUN}{E}
7 Dreadful boor / jerk like Marvin? (7) ROBOTIC {BOOR}*{TIC}
8 - 5 - h = 20? (4) TREE {8-5=3=ThREE}
10 One who makes money disappear - nerd, by and large (6) EARNER [T]
15 Harassments from relative described by "metallic noises" (9) TAUNTINGS {T{AUNT}INGS}
16 Post-eclipse revelations: bad omens conveying rise in disharmony (9) EMERSIONS {EM{RISE*}ONS*}
19 Well, supporting ChatGPT without training limits, period! (7) CHAPTER {ER}<=>{CHAtgPT}
21 Forget artificial neural networks, basically (7) UNLEARN {NEURAL}*{Ne...s}
Reference List
Cold = C, Eccentricity = E, Fifty = L, Gangster = AL(Capone), Second-rate = B, No = N, 100 = C, 50 = L, Quiet = P, Engineer = E, Irrational = PI, About = C
9a maths term. Eccentricity of an ellipse is denoted by e. Relevant in the context of chandrayaan.
ReplyDelete8D. How to fit the20 with a question mark ?.
ReplyDelete20? refers to the solution of 20A
DeleteConvention of numerical for clue ref assumes the rest of clue is in words/literal.
DeleteA better hint could have been 20A.
Just a thought.
Deepak sir, to my petty mind, i found the clue too cryptic.-)
ReplyDelete...mmm. High level!
ReplyDeleteRefers to Prasad @ 8.33
DeleteNovelty
DeleteI hope all of you have registered for the IXL by now
ReplyDeleteHaving problem with getting picture to right size (kb wise) Will do t somehow.
DeleteColonel sir @ IXL 2023 reg
DeleteRegistered today 🙂
Same here.
Delete3d "+" = and, may be added in ref list.
ReplyDeleteA little bit more difficult and obscure than a normal Gussalufz puzzle. Not a complaint but we are expected to step up and be ready.
ReplyDeleteSILENCE prevailed.
ReplyDeleteVladimir was found in the GOLF CLUB.
Low in SPIRIT.
UNEASY.
He had been INSULTED.
Couldn't bear the TAUNTINGS.
No dinner in that CANDLELIT Restaurant.
Did it herald the end of a CHAPTER?
What happened next?
quite a few words today!
DeleteCol.sir. small clarification on 6D - In ref. list, Engineer - E. But the clue stated as single engineer. i.e in ER we considered 'E'. But the ref. list Engineer denoted as E in place of RE.
ReplyDelete6D - Single= Run (cricket) . Engineer= E
Deletenoted sir........I have taken in different way. Thanks for the clarification.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
Deleteun for 1- French indication should be there.
DeleteAlso Col. has put (run)
Yes sathia. you are right. to accommodate 'UN' between RE you need a containment indicator. Today's CW mostly tricky in all areas
Delete@ Gowri - Beautiful Rangoli. Have a nice weekend.
ReplyDeleteGowri, beautiful rangoli. Is it hand drawn and painted?
ReplyDeleteOn zooming I find it is filled with colours and craft items. Super work.
DeleteThanks for the blog, Col., and many thanks to all the solvers.
ReplyDeleteThis crossword has a couple of ninas and a theme. A tag line that might lead you to these is: "25 25."
I'll post my notes with the details in about 45 minutes. Hopefully someone will spot the theme/ninas before that.
I see Vikram Betaal
ReplyDeleteIndeed, those are the ninas and theme, well spotted! There are a few solution words that are connected to the theme...
DeleteHere are my notes for this crossword:
ReplyDeleteNotes
This puzzle's theme is the epic set of mythical stories, Vikram and Betaal. VIKRAM can be seen as a nina running across the middle row, and BETAAL can be seen as a nina running down the middle column.
The following entries are related to the theme:
5A. SPIRIT.
8D. TREE.
9A. SILENCE.
25A. TALES. Doubly thematic, being located at #25, as Vikram and Betaal has 25 tales (the preamble, "25 25," can be decoded as "25 Tales").
28A. LONG-AGO.
29A. CORPSE.
26D. EPIC.
Merlin, referenced in 30A, was also a mythical figure with magical powers, associated with a king.
This puzzle is a pangram.
While trying to get a pangram and trying to fit the theme, a few obscure entries made their way into this crossword. I've tried to set easy clues for these. Hope it all works out!
Personal notes
I'm wrapping this up in the first week of August 2023. Summer travels took me to Paris (saw the Bastille Day fireworks, from so close to the Eiffel Tower that some ashes landed next to my champagne glass!) and Boston (ran around Charles river yet again). Already can't wait for the next trip (probably India in January 2024).
My crossword next month will be my 50th for The Hindu. I'm in the middle of composing it right now. For variety, and to appease a few solvers who have been grumbling about my crosswords being too tough, I'm aiming to set an easy one. I know the Col. prefers that setters do not deliberately try to set easier offerings, but this will be just a one off. Regularly scheduled indeterminate hardness will return after that :-)
ReplyDeleteThank you. Welcome back to India and wish you a good trip and stay. Looking forwrd to your landmark 50 th puzzle.
DeleteLONG AGO Vikram was asked to bring a possessed CORPSE from a TREE without uttering a sound by a fake Swamy. As he carried the corpse possessed by the SPIRIT of Betaal, Betaal would use all his TAUNTINGS to break Vikram's SILENCE. Failing to do so, he'd tell him riddled TALES that required Vikram to answer if he knew the answer or die. His EQUABLE answers would break his silence at the end of each CHAPTER of this EPIC.
ReplyDeletenice to read Pilla. Good one
DeleteVikram makes Rao to tell a good story!
ReplyDeleteIt was quite a challenging puzzle, though possible to get 100% after staring at the grid for a long time.
ReplyDelete"Besieged" for containment indicator was interesting in 8A, though it was unclear which of the 2 components of wordplay were to be taken as container vs. contained. Eccentricity = E in the same clue also made it tricky. Was "described" as containment indicator in 15A fair? (cc: Prasad and others, what do you think?)
There was an interesting irregular deletion-type clue in 13A, whose solution was later required as a definition for 27A. The wordplay fodder for 18A required substituting the solution of 14A and then deleting letters at a certain frequency, which is a favorite technique of Gussalufz's.
Wordplay of "date" and "month" was fun in 20A. BAZOOKA by "recycling" KAZOO in 22A was fair even though it appeared at first to be like an indirect anagram. I enjoyed "relations" as the definition for TALES in 25A, as well as the toilet humor in some of the clues.
Whereas Hypatia prefers pop-culture, Gussalufz seems to favour avant-garde themes such as the musical EVITA used in 1D, "Marvin" the paranoid android referred to in 7D and PI as "irrational" in 26D. However, Barbie and an indecent KEN could be spotted in 17D, decidedly from the lowbrow end of the spectrum. Apart from that, I enjoyed spotting some technology themes like ChatGPT and artificial neural networks.
In 3D, "100+50" as CANDL was quite nice, as was single = RUN in 6D. I most enjoyed the math problem in 8D which I had been trying to solve over several hours, and was ultimately my LTF.
I had spotted the pangram which made it possible to solve 10A towards the end. I appreciated the relatively easy clues for 22D A SALTI and 30A LINSANGS, which would have been quite hard to solve without visible fodder.
For those interested in preparing for IXL, Gussalufz was one of the setters last year. He has made his grids available on his website. https://viresh-ratnakar.github.io/#crosswords
I am currently hooked onto this fancy puzzle with special effects: https://gussalufz.blogspot.com/2020/07/als-trick.html
Thanks, Economizer!
Delete