EV 997 by SOL

[DocHH]

Hello all EVers,
Hopefuly I haven't duplicated anythig! I found todays offering quite awkward, lots of cold solving and trying to make a sensible phrase of the extra letters, until a leap of faith lead me to try a possible form of entry, which worked and lead to resolving the extra letter phrase!
Time for a pre-prandial whisky!

[dr b]

Hola doc;

I found this on the harder side, but I made a bigger mess of it than necessary by sloppily putting a wrong extra letter in the margin. So, the critical 3rd word was starting with the wrong letter, leading to needless confusion for an embarrassingly long period of time. Oh well.

Slogging my way through a stack of grading (figuratively, anyway - actually typing comments to email back to students after they emailed me their papers). Makes it mard to get into the Christmas spirit!

[dr b]

"mard"? hard, even.

[kayakamina]

I agree that this was a very difficult EV and almost of Listener level.

The phrase for the instruction was so awkward that I solved the method of entry first and then worked backwards.

[devadolly]

Good Afternoon All. I'm afraid I am at a total loss with Mr Sol, I have racked my mind and got absolutely no-where so, could I please have some hob-nailed hints to kick start the grey matter.
From the comments at the end of this weeks EV, am I correct in assuming that as there is no paper on Xmas Day we all have to join the online Xword club to get the EV? Definately not fair, can't they squeeze it in Saturday's DT?

[DocHH]

Hello Devadolly,
Firstly have been in for you op yet, and was it successful?

I had one about 4 years ago and prior to it I was quite apprehensive, (blood pressure sky high, due to "white coat syndrome"), it was my second operation, the first was for scraping of adenoids about 57 years previously! Both had a suitably successful outcome! The former required post-op therapy of liberal eating of ice cream, the latter quite a lot of physiotherapy, of which the hydrotherapy was most enjoyable!

Regretably, for this EV you need to solve quite a few of the clues, and have a reasonable number of the letters of the phrase that tells you how to modify many of the grid entries. You will have noticed that some clues have entry indicators that are the same length as the lights available. That should get you started populating the grid. Then start entering coinciding across and down letters.
I'll lurk over the next few days, just come back for more hints. I'm recording tomorrow, so it will probably be about this time of day before I can help again!

[devadolly]

Thank you Doc HH. Yes have been butchered very successfully, said 'nasty little B........* turned out to be the size of a kiwi fruit instead of a pea! Very neat wound only about two inches long and now fully healed thanks to the wonderful Hypercal cream. Have told everyone that the slit throat was Himself in a rage! Strangely they don't believe me.......I wonder why? Have to say felt so much better almost immediately. Now am on massive doses of calcium to try and address the osteoporosis and have appointments to see a plethora of consultants.
Am I to presume that the lights with the correct no of letters as the clue go straight into the grid? Surely that would be too helpful?

[DocHH]

Devadolly, pleased all went well with the op. Absolutely, the clues with the same number of letters as lights available go in unchanged! You might get a little help from the first sentence of my Original Post, after the greeting as to how the rest go in! The spelling mistakes were intentional.

[AndrewG-S]

Belated hello to all. DD good to hear the op went OK and that you are on the mend. This was not a great favorite of mine, I guessed the grid entry method after about 5 clues and from then on it was a bit of a slog to complete and find the instruction, which came right at the end. In particular found the top left corner tricky. I did think that 1d was a great clue once I got it!

[devadolly]

Thank you for your kind words Doc & A G-S.
Have now done a few more of the clues, it is a bit like pulling teeth and as I have a deadline at 5pm, a beef beastie coming back tomorrow and a load of orders to put up + turkey-time next week, I rather think I will be nodding over the EV whilst staggering up the wooden hill!
Have looked closely at your post Doc and attempted the obvious but doesn't seem to work out. Back to the drawing board.

[novalis]

Hi everybody!

Due to an unexpected - but very welcome visitor - on Sunday and other commitments since I've been delayed in tackling this. Once it became apparent what needed doing things went a lot quicker.

I received my Chambers 2011 as a Speccie prize yesterday. Circling "dictionary" is certainly worthwhile as a £40 dictionary is better than a £20 cheque!!