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Listener No 4390: Castaways By External

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AHearer | 19:15 Fri 18th Mar 2016 | Crosswords
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That was good fun. I have to admit that I used the extra words to deduce the first six relevant entries, and only then sat down to work out what the husband and wife had been up to. I suppose it might have been possible to get the last two modifications without fully understanding the theme, but that would have reduced the enjoyment. Many thanks, eXternal.
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11D was a bit of a 'well, it must be that' type of clue, perhaps, but in their comments UU and Scorpius have gone straight over our heads
This I suppose is the problem of self-imposed censorship -- only those people in the know can work out what's being talked about, and the rest maybe have to second-guess what's going on. I reckon the query Scorpius was making has to be about the "...specifics, taking off glasses" part of the clue. Glossing over a discussion about whether something simpler would have been better anyway, I think it's borderline unfair perhaps -- only just saw it as I was writing this -- but not excessively so, as at least the questionable element of the wordplay is in the right order. Still, if you were going to insist on that sort of clue I'd have suggested "... taking off broken glasses". And then suggested another clue entirely.

If even that's giving away too much, so be it.
Hmmm - I thought the original was fair enough, given that the object in question was merely interrupted rather than actually shattered ... ?
Jim360 has identified the cause of my quibble - and suggested a good alternative treatment. (In using 'solecism' I was aiming for 'a breach of [crossword] etiquette'.) But even as I wrote my post I did think that 'taking off' might be seen as perfectly legit.

Don Manley (in his 'Chambers Crossword Manual') quotes Azed's reservations - about an anagram - that 'the departing letters should be in the same order as they are in the word or phrases to be anagrammed, although they do not need to be contiguous'. This is more generous than I'd have expected - in an anagram - but if applied to 11dn it exonerates eXternal completely. Collapse of stout party!
As others have said, good fun and educational. Thought 29 across was a poor clue.
I liked it.
Enjoyable. 29ac raised a chuckle.

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