Listener 4243 Pipes By Samuel

[dr b]

Quite a doozy this week but very enjoyable. Not necessary, of course, but I made copious use of the LEN, MID and VLOOKUP functions in Excel to count string lengths, pick out the Nth letter of the clue, and turn numbers into letters and vice versa. Thanks Samuel, or can we call you Sam? or Sammy? or Sammy baby?

[jim360]

Are any of the across clues in the wrong order, or am I missing something?

[contendo]

I think so, Jim. See my comment on the crossword club website.

[dr b]

Everything is OK with the clue order, in my opinion.

[Monkmonk]

There is nothing wrong with the puzzle. I agree that MID, VLOOKUP, MOD, INDEX and LEN are all very handy here.

[Grubb]

Well, I enjoyed that! A good workout and a fun conclusion. Leaving the weekend free to keep shuffling last week's cards.

[jim360]

Still a long way to go but I think I've seen what happens to answer my earlier question.

[AHearer]

Yes, that was great fun. I knocked off last night with the top left and bottom right quarters filled in, the theme identified, and a pretty clear idea of what the final instruction was. Notionally carrying out the instruction gave me enough hooks to fill in the rest this morning. Many thanks, Samuel.

[starwalker]

I guessed the theme with just a couple of grid entries and a few more down answers, which Wiki confirmed. I can hardly believe it. Now all I have to do is solve the rest of the clues and get the across message.

[starwalker]

Forgot to say - congratulations to Jim on his latest win.

[Jogler]

We haven't started yet and I am avoiding looking at anything you have written! However, wanted to pop on and congratulate Jim :) At the same time, I am reminded that my daughter asked me to pick the collective brains. She teaches (secondary school maths) and regularly runs clubs. The cipher club is always very popular with the 11-13 age group and she is thinking of starting them off on cryptic crosswords. Has anyone created any with children in mind, or do you have any recommendations? If you think it inappropriate to post answers on this thread then I would be grateful for any comments on [email protected]. Many thanks.

[Cloverjo]

I am intrigued. What has jim won?

[AndrewG-S]

I really enjoyed this one prefect listener level of challenge for me. I particularly liked the way that it was possible to progress by using all of the various gimmicks in differing ways. Great to see an alternative way of getting letters from clues too. Thanks Samuel.

[IainGrace]

Not sure where one draws the line between a good difficult challenge and one that is complicated for complication's sake, but this rather looks like the latter for us. No idea what LEN etc are. Will probably give this one a miss, as we did last week (although that was more to do with the fact that it didn't interest us as a crossword concept). Good luck, and on to next week.

[Ruthrobin]

Jim has won a copy of Brewers - well-deserved for all the effort he has put into mastering the Listener verbal crosswords and numericals too, and entertaining us for so long on University Challenge as well as becoming a setter (for the EV series) all within about a year!
Many thanks, Samuel for a great challenge and the usual impeccable setting. Of course everything is OK - the editors and setter wouldn't let a flawed crossword past!

[jim360]

Thanks all for the congratulations! Makes up for my troubles with this one...

[Cloverjo]

Well done, jim. It was nice to put a face to the name on UC.

[AHearer]

Oh dear, I've slipped up somewhere. In trying to transcribe my solution to a clean copy I realise I have not completely obeyed the final instruction.

[AHearer]

...but it was soon fixed.

[fallster]

Enjoyed this one a lot, and the theme brought back some fond memories. Still wondering whether one of the theme words is not so well known, or whether I have it wrong.

[jim360]

It all suddenly fell into place once I realised what was going on. A bit of a slog at the end (counting letters by hand is thoroughly exhausting) but well worth the effort as everything came together. Lots of novel ideas in this one. Actually not fond of the theme music but never mind.