Listener 4238 Typtoing In Grammar's Footsteps

[Ruthrobin]

This has be tremendous fun. Many thank Jaques, I too is typtoing in grammar's footstep's. (Actually finding the message about what solver's mus't do symmetrically helped enormous - smile!)

[contendo]

Thanks Ruthrobin and Scorpius. I've followed Scorpius's technique and actually got it to work. The only problem is knowing what size to reduce it to. My old records show crosswords with sides of 83 mms. Is that still the usual size?

[olichant]

What fun. My guess as to the possible theme was absolutely wrong, but no change there. A quick trip to the library next week will be needed just to check one point. I confess that the solecism that has been mentioned is new to me. Thank's to the setter.

[PureListener]

In my two years of submitting Times Crossword Club entries, I have never reduced the grid size (word document, firefox, 100% print scaling). I know that my entries are larger than the printed entries but I assumed JEG substituted a dummy piece of Times paper cut to the correct size with my name or number on it before throwing it in the bag. My method must be OK, since I won my first Listener prize a two weeks ago (4233) using a Times Crossword Club entry, and I hadn't won anything in the previous 18 years. The Brewer's Dictionary prize is a fantastic read, by the way, but no doubt most of you know that already.

[magichour]

Have a feeling I am missing something in the endgame of this (I, too, have confusion over the symmetry.) In a preamble and set of clues with so many deliberate errors, how are we to tell which instructions are meant to be followed as stated? Hope this doesn't give anything away.

[jim360]

The errors are only in the style, not the substance - so you can trust the instructions in the preamble, and the wordplay too for that matter is genuine.

[olichant]

Contendo - this week's grid had sides of 89mm.

[contendo]

Thanks Olichant. Then I suppose you have to leave a standard length at the bottom for name & address. How much?

[olichant]

My cut-out grid (with about 1mm spare on each side) is 134mm x 110mm - to include prize details and name/address panel, but not the title.

[youngoffender]

I was in the sticks without my Chambers over the weekend, so had to make do with the online OED (a great resource from my county library). Some definitions were elusive here, and combined with the jumbled down entries I found this quite a slog, but I got the grid filled eventually. Getting home to check my brand new Brewer, the result of my lucky Listener win a few weeks ago, the symmetry of the endgame was confirmed.

[sunny-dave]

Very enjoyable - some of the wordplay is pretty cute I think and the theme/quote was a new one for me.

Thanks to Jaques

[Philoctetes]

I was held up here in the NE corner, chiefly because I had three incorrect answers that I could justify at a push. It reminded me of a "puzzle" set in a bridge book some years back, where every clue had two possible answers, and getting the set that was not "correct" depended on how egotistical the solver was.

[Whenland]

This took us longer than most others to crack, but we've finally caught up, thanks in part to discovering a very usable on-line version of the relevant reference work. And we dont believe its a good idea to casually split infinitive's either ....

[LankyLanky]

Finally caught up after a great early spring away in the Highlands (the recent rain is welcome there). Thanks Jaques, any puzzle with 38 across as an entry is okay by me. I remember a few years ago my wife and I were stumped by one last clue, I think on the Jumbo which we did together with a time target of 30 mins. I said "It can only be 'bumboy'" and then roared with laughter. My wife was very indulgent of a) my puerility and b) laughing at my own joke. Talking of laughing at ones own jokes, on re-reading Fallaci's 'Interview with History' I'm reminded how Willy Brandt, one of my heroes, did the same. He ends the interview with Fallaci with the well known Baltic joke (setting is two isolated fishers who meet up for a drinking session in complete silence). When the first bottle of akvavit has almost been consumed, the visitor mutters : "Skol." The host replies : "Are we here for a drinking session or to talk rubbish ?"

[naomirod]

Any chance of the vaguest hint as to what I'm after in this completed grid.
[email protected] has no hair left to pull out

[IainGrace]

Catching up further post hols. Completed this. Good fun and we learned something new. As per previous posts, totally defeated by 4237 - solved about 40% of clues and that was it - but all will be revealed in due course.