Tuesday, December 22, 2009 (DT 26024)

This puzzle was originally published Thursday, September 3, 2009 in The Daily Telegraph

Introduction

I think I found this puzzle to be a bit more difficult than Libellule rates it. Perhaps I was just distracted by the unfinished Christmas shopping still hanging over my head.

Today's Glossary

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

cover note - noun Brit. a temporary certificate showing that a person has a current insurance policy

grafter - noun Brit. colloq 1 a hard worker

gutted - adjective Brit. informal bitterly disappointed or upset

Loadsamoney - an obnoxious character, created by British comedian Harry Enfield, who constantly boasts about how much money he earns

loadsamoney - British, informal, humourous, satirical A colourful variation of the phrase "loads of money", referring to the free flowing of money, to large amounts spent or earned, or to the perceived acquisitiveness and materialism engendered in society by a booming economy.

ramrod - (Chambers, British dictionary) noun 2 someone who is strict, stern and inflexible, both physically and morally [Note: the term would appear to have a bit broader sense in Britain than in North America, where it would generally refer specifically to a strict boss: ramrod - (American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, North American dictionary) 3. A harshly demanding overseer; a disciplinarian]

RE - Royal Engineers (surely this British Army corps has made a sufficient number of appearances in recent puzzles that a reference is not required)

sub - (probably) Brit. verb 3 to lend (especially a small amount of money) • Can you sub me a quid till tomorrow?

Today's Links

Libellule's review of today's puzzle may be found at Big Dave's Telegraph Crossword Blog [DT 26024].

Commentary on Today's Puzzle

8a Labourers needed to put beams on top of garage (8)

The solution:

GRAFTERS (labourers) /needed\ RAFTERS (beams) following (put ... on) G (top of garage; i.e., first letter of garage)

Note that for ease of explanation, I have reordered the clue a bit so that it reads "Labourers needed beams put on top of garage" simply to eliminate the split indicator "to put ... on".

This clue incorporates several frequently-seen cryptic crossword constructions:

• Needed as a linking word - we often see the word needed used to link the wordplay and the definition. The rationale seems to be that the solution to the wordplay needs to be a word matching the definition.
• top of ... indicating first letter of ... - other similar constructions commonly encountered are head of ..., first of ..., etc.
• on as a positional indicator - Here, due to this being an across clue, on is used to indicate following (i.e., Y on X indicates Y appended to X or XY) . Yesterday, we saw that in a down clue, on has the opposite meaning, where Y on X indicates Y on top of X or YX). Sometimes, on is also used as a container indicator, where XZ on Y would mean XYZ (equivalent to XZ worn by Y).

22a Annual arts awards having backing of the stars (6)

This clue proves just how dense I am today. Even after reading Libellule's review, I struggled with the wordplay. The solution is hidden backwards in the clue ("annuaL ARTS Awards"). The hidden word indicator is having and the reversal indicator is, of course, backing.

12d Close friends have it (3)

At first, I thought close friends might have one's ear (which impeded progress significantly on 14a).

18d Status diminished by reserve (5-2)

A reserve (backup) could be a stand-in or a stand-by. Status is standing, so "status diminished" could be "standin", or possibly just "stand". In my experience, truncation-type clues such as this often involve stripping only a single letter from the end of a word, so stand-in seems to be the most probable solution. However, there still remains the word by to account for. To my mind, it may be merely padding to aid the surface reading, although Libellule views it as part of the truncation indicator (i.e., diminished by).

Signing off for today - Falcon