Monday, January 24, 2011 (DT 26377)

Daily Telegraph Puzzle Number DT 26377
Publication Date in The Daily Telegraph Thursday, October 21, 2010
Setter Unknown
Link to Full Review Big Dave's Crossword Blog [DT 26377]
Big Dave's Review Written By Big Dave
Big Dave's Rating
Difficulty - **	Enjoyment - ***
Falcon's Performance ┌────┬────┬────┬────┐ ████████████████████ └────┴────┴────┴────┘

Introduction

My performance today correlates well with Big Dave's difficulty rating for the puzzle. There were a few British references in the puzzle. However, for the most part they didn't seriously impede me as I had either seen them before or was able to guess them.

Today's Glossary

Selected abbreviations, people, places, words and expressions appearing in today's puzzle

Appearing in Clues:

squash¹ - noun 2 British a concentrated liquid made from fruit juice and sugar, which is diluted to make a drink: orange squash

Appearing in Solutions:

annexe - [American Heritage Dictionary] noun Chiefly British variant of annex

d - abbreviation British penny or pence (of pre-decimal currency): £20 10s 6d [from Latin denarius 'penny']

ice - noun 2 chiefly British an ice cream, ice lolly (also iced lolly, noun British a piece of flavoured ice or ice cream on a stick), or portion of water ice (noun a dessert consisting of frozen fruit juice or flavoured water and sugar)

kip³ - informal British

• noun 1 a sleep or nap: I might have a little kip; he was trying to get some kip
• verb sleep: he can kip on her sofa

Leicester² - noun 1 (also Red Leicester) a kind of mild, firm orange cheese originally made in Leicestershire

prep¹ - noun informal British (in an independent school) schoolwork that is set to be done outside normal school hours [Note: an independent school is one that has traditionally been known in Britain as a public school, but would be called a private school in North America]

River Ouse - any of several rivers in the United Kingdom. According to Big Dave, the 'best-known' of them is the one in Yokshire:

• the River Ouse, a river in North Yorkshire, England
• the River Great Ouse, a river in the east of England that, at 143 miles (230 km) long, is the fourth-longest river in the United Kingdom
• the River Little Ouse, a river in the east of England, and a tributary of the River Great Ouse which, for much of its length, defines the boundary between Norfolk and Suffolk
• the River Ouse, a river in the counties of West and East Sussex in England

sheila - noun Australian /NZ informal a girl or woman

whip - verb 4 British informal steal (something): the escaper had whipped his overcoat

Commentary on Today's Puzzle

This commentary should be read in conjunction with the review at Big Dave's Crossword Blog, to which a link is provided in the table above.

26a   Very good! Very good! Not as good! (2-2)

In the surface reading we can envision an observer commenting upon the performance of someone who, in attempting a series of athletic maneuvers, performs the first couple quite well and then flubs the third. The definition is "not as good" for which the solution is SO-SO. The wordplay is SO (very good) repeated.

We have seen "very good" being used as a synonym for 'so' as recently as last Thursday, where the clue was:

• [DT 26375] 7d   Assistant in kitchen, very good American, leading one astray (4-4)

Here so is used as:

• conjunction 4 [2^nd entry] introducing a question following on from what was said previously: so what did he do about it?

In such a situation, one might also say 'Very good, what did he do about it' which might express the idea that what has been said so far is fine, and encourages the speaker to provide further information. It might even, depending on the tone of voice, convey the message that the speaker should quickly get to the point.

9d   That youngster, a thief with a camera maybe? (14)

Whip is British slang meaning 'to steal', so a whipper would be a "thief". A camera might be called a snapper (something used to snap photos). When one puts these together, the result is whippersnapper, a "youngster".

15d   Early form of transport, a.k.a. 'Feroan'? (4,5)

I could find no evidence that such a word as 'Feroan' actually exists, so it may be a construction of the setter's imagination. However, if one were to deconstruct it, one would obtain IRON (Fe, the chemical symbol for the element iron) + HORSE (roan).

16d   Drinks squashes (8)

The surface reading of this clue, which no doubt seems bizarre to most North Americans, would make sense to a Brit who would think of squashes as drinks made by adding water to a mixture of concentrated fruit juice and sugar.

17d   Copper runs to workers for fruit (8)

In the cryptic reading, the setter likely intended "runs" to refer to a cricket term. However, the clue works equally well if one is into baseball rather than cricket.

19d   He is involved with penniless boy and girl (6)

This is the clue where I needed to seek help from my electronic aids. A search for candidate solutions matching the checking letters produced only a single plausible result, SHEILA. Once I had that, the wordplay was pretty straightforward to decipher - an anagram (involved) of HE IS + LA(d) {penniless (with a 'D') LAD (boy)} where 'd' is the abbreviation for penny in the old (pre-decimal) British currency system.

Signing off for today - Falcon