Listener 4272 - Bun Fight By Kea

[TheBear69]

Thanks for a good challenge, Kea. It was a nice challenge to determine the answers that had extra letters and not easy to get the two items from the extra letters.

I am a bit concerned about what I feel is ambiguity in the instruction. Are we supposed to write beneath the grid:

a) The word (obtained from the unused extra letters) that describes the goings-on

or

b) The goings-on itself.

The GOINGS-ON: label would suggest b) but I fear it's a) to prove we got that word...

[Scorpius]

An enjoyable puzzle from Kea, as always. I felt that it was a slight pity that the grid displayed an ambiguity in the thematic movement, requiring that preamble qualification about the number of non-words, but these things are sometimes unavoidable, given many other constraints.
As for the 'goings-on', although technically the preamble sentence is ambiguous, if the requirement was the 'goings-on', rather than the word that describes the 'goings-on', there could be several valid ways of identifying things, which would very unsatisfactory. The reasonable doubts expressed above could have been dispelled had the box below the grid contained 'Descriptive word', or some such label.

[sunny-dave]

Got there eventually - stalled by 31d and not helped by a completely feasible answer to another 'dropped letter' clue, which gave the correct grid entry, but the wrong dropped letters.

Nice puzzle and a good workout.

[contendo]

Tilbee, the number of permutations is increased due to the fact that some of the dropped letters are related to unchecked cells, so there may be 3 or 4 possible dropped letters for a particular clue. Haven't seriously got down to looking for the thematic items yet, too busy trying to get the Christmas tree lights to work.

[sunny-dave]

"too busy trying to get the Christmas tree lights to work" - ye gods, mine are in the attic for another 9 days yet ...

[perseverer]

Kea seems to delight in puzzles where things have to move about in the grid. Agree with Scorpius that it is a pity that there is not a unique "correct" movement without the 19 non-word qualification. 31d was also my last solve, requiring working back, like tilbee. I don't think there is any doubt about what to write at the bottom. I wonder how many people were familiar with both spelled out thematic items?
Anyway, thanks to Kea.

[IainGrace]

Finished. Same issues with 31 dn and the 18/19 problem. We construed the item to be written below the grid as referable neither to "word" nor "goings on" but to "word that might describe the goings on".

[Mesnilpat]

I think I have got some letters wrong somewhere. 31dn still eludes me and the only word I can see for the 'goings on' seems to be in the past tense? Surely that's not right.

[youngoffender]

So I have 19 non-word entries, but it seems to me that there is no unique solution - for the second 'thing', I could put a letter in either of the first two cells and get the same result. Maybe I'm being dense - I'll come back to it later.

[youngoffender]

... and of course I had missed a crucial word in the preamble. Now resolved, I think.

[Mesnilpat]

I've now solved 31dn, moved things about, got 19 non-words but I'm still not convinced by the word I have for the 'goings-on' even though it's no longer past tense.

[fallster]

I'm where you are, Mesnilpat. I guess it'll have to do but doesn't feel like a great description of the goings-on to me.

[Scorpius]

There's only one word that can be formed from the unused dropped letters, so there's no doubt about it. Interestingly a closely related noun in Chambers has a very appropriate definition.

[jim360]

I hope I'm right that we should put the goings-on at the bottom, rather than the word from unused letters. After all, that word only describes the goings-on but isn't the goings-on itself -- and also, there is am ambiguity at 31d that is only resolved by knowing what that word is, so getting the right answer there shows that you have it correctly. Fingers crossed that I'm right.

[Mesnilpat]

I can't find any way to make the word better, I've looked o see if I've missed any extra letters, two more would make the word much more appropriate in my opinion. I am going to write the word rather than the goings on jim360, but I agree that this could be open to interpretation. I shall have to wait for the solution to see if this is yet another fall at the last hurdle for me.

[EAChaplin]

As the grid entries for some clues are not defined in the clue itself, we can only get the correct letters via the two extras we remove. There is a choice in clue 31 but only one pair leads to a possible word as Scorpio pointed out. If we are not to use that word where do we get the "goings on" from and is it a unique solution.

[EAChaplin]

I do Beg your pardon Scorpius - I must have been thinking about my Horoscope:-)

[emcee]

These were my exact thoughts, EAChaplin, and thus there is no ambiguity.

[Cagey]

Enjoyed that, and no sore neck this week. The fact you have the correct letter in 31d means you have found the correct word from the left over letters or guessed correctly. It offers no constraint on which of the possible solutions to the going-ons you choose. I sat on the fence and stuck both down. Did anyone else think that within the same 19 non-words there are several possible sets of pairing solutions?

[tenflags]

yes cagey I have been stuck at this point for a while... a few ideas on how to interpret the pre-amble still have not given me a unique solution and have a radio-button issue if I try to meet one nuance of instruction..
I also don't like the goings-on part .. I think I know which way to jump but think it a tad unfair when things could be made clearer in the preamble without taking anything away from the puzzle.

[Alan7777]

I found this hard going but very enjoyable in the end. I think that the movement of letters has only one 'logical' solution and I'm not sure why there is a need to say that 19 clues become non-words. I hope I make the right decision re what to write under the grid. Merry Christmas to all.