Millipedes, four-letter capital cities beginning with L, and carburettors caused problems last month. On 18 January (Cryptic No 26,160, 14 down) Picaroon had 'Philosopher espied larks about to get insects (10)' for MILLIPEDES [MILL + ESPIED (anag)]. What a howler, they cried. Everyone should know that all members of the Insecta have six legs and one or two pairs of wings.
Zoologically speaking, that is right, but again we are dealing with a word that has both a specialised and a general meaning. Chambers, in fact, gives as its first definition 'a word loosely used for a small invertebrate creature, esp. one with a body divided into sections, and only as its second 'a member of the Insecta'.
So OK on that one, but not so good on the other two. The Saturday prize Cryptic for 25 January (No 26,166 by Otterden) required you to fit the names 12 capital cities (not defined in the clues) around the edge of the grid. I failed to spot that there were two possible answers that fitted the first part of 8 down (L*M*), namely Lima and Lomé. Please be assured that the capitals of either Peru or Togo were accepted as correct. Then, worse, in the Quick for 31 January (No 13,644, 5 down) the original clue had vaporised fuel being ignited in the carburettor of a petrol engine. This would have been very dangerous indeed and, on the website now, it is just petrol and air that is mixed in that part of the engine.
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Late in life Araucaria (John Graham) took to setting bespoke puzzles for people who wanted some event or anniversary celebrated in a personalised way. This became so popular that he set up a website through which people could place orders, giving half his fee to his local church at Somersham in Cambridgeshire. In the end he became somewhat overwhelmed by the volume of orders he was getting, though he much enjoyed the process of being able to give pleasure to others. It must have been one of the rarer examples of a nonagenarian setting up a highly successful e-business from scratch with no previous e-commerce experience! That website has been continued by Araucaria's 'webmaster', Hamish Symington, and a team of setters led by three Guardian regulars. It is open for business at http://customcrypticcrosswords.com. A part of the fees charged is donated to Brookfield Care Home in Somersham, where John was wonderfully cared for in his final weeks.
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It is clear that many would-be Genius puzzle solvers have been having difficulty getting the puzzle onto their screens and/or in submitting their solutions. You may have been getting messages like 'puzzle not available' or 'application blocked by security settings'. The problem seems to lie with the latest upgraded version(s) of the Java plug-in that you may deliberately have chosen to accept, or which may have upgraded automatically without your knowing. In order to protect your computer from contamination by malicious outsiders, the latest Java versions have upped the level of their security settings, which consequently reject stuff from sites it does not recognise as safe. You need, via your program control panel, to open Java and add http://www.theguardian.com to the 'exceptions' list in the Java security settings box.
A solver, Brian R., has kindly sent me a list of links to three documents that could help you fix your Java plug-in, if you are computer-minded:
http://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/technotes/guides/jweb/manifest.html
http://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/technotes/guides/security/
http://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/technotes/guides/security/
Alternatively, please ask the User Help desk for advice on what to do, telling them what kind of computer you are using, with what operating system and with what browser(s). Or you could even go back to an earlier version of Java, accepting its slightly higher risk of infection!
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If it has not yet come to your attention, you may like to know that the Guardian's tablet edition for the iPad now also gives you the daily Cryptic and Quick puzzles, plus the Observer's Speedy and Everyman on Sunday. On Android, you can get the weekday puzzles, but not as yet the Saturday and Sunday ones. More details are to be had at: http://www.theguardian.com/mobile/ipad-edition-faqs.
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The January Genius (No 127 by Tramp) produced no fewer than 51 correct entries on the first day, the first in being from 'psc' in Australia at 02:31, followed by 'm1fe' at 02:51. Due to a major change in the Guardian's Google mail system, combined with a hard drive failure on my personal computer, I am unable to give you further details of the January Genius but I hope that normal service can be resumed next month.
Congratulations to Gordon Roy of Connecticut, USA, who is the winner of the January Genius puzzle.
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