Terry & Trevor
As a knowing “troll” I’ll finish my contributions to this thread with the following. I apologise to all who’ve suffered the tedium of the nonsense which I have unwittingly instigated here. I know you must be as bored with it as I am.
Thanks, Terry, for assuming on my behalf that I disapprove of Mikey4444’s original comment about Sun readers. I would say that some of my best friends are Sun readers, but it wouldn’t be true, because due to a patently repugnant personality, I don’t have any friends. Your assumption is correct, but although I abhor his opinion, he is entitled to it. I hope I would never have the temerity to set myself up as his judge and jury on line.
I didn’t “downgrade” your definition of “Pantheon”, I quoted (from the OED) the one I had in mind. Oh, dear! How you both hated my use of that word. I must make a note of that for future reference. I’d hate to upset anyone further.
You are clearly not illiterate and I didn’t use that term to describe you. You do both seem very angry about something, though, but I’m probably way out of order in thinking so.
Trevor; thanks for posting the link to Wikipedia’s page about “Flaming”. I do not know how to post links myself, only how to cut and paste. I found that parts of it gave an uncannily accurate description of what has been happening on this thread, and also on the thread in which a contributor called “K” was involved in a similar set of exchanges. How Kafka would have loved that irony.
My objection has never been to having my opinions opposed. I’ve been married for 30 years and I have 4 children, so I’m quite used to it. I have, however, been unpleasantly surprised by the aggressive, sneering, sarcastic and contemptuous tone of some of the ripostes. I am not “dumb”, “dumber”, “stupid” or “arrogant”. I am, in reality, a harmless drudge too old and tired to summon up the energy for a “hissyfit”.
In giving the Voltaire attribution, I had you both specifically in mind. You have every right to hold your views. We have freedom of speech, in this country, thank God. Therefore I have to accept you as the self-appointed scourges of pomposity and wordiness and eradicators of any whiff of snobbery that you suspect. These are causes in which you clearly passionately believe. So, much to your well expressed regret, K and Ruth obviously had to go. I wonder if their real names were Winston & Julia?
Gentle readers! The hugely over-inflated bubble of my self esteem has now been well and truly pricked by Terry and Trevor. As I am, in this instance, the prickee, I’ll leave it up to anybody who’s remained awake long enough to read this far, to decide who were the…., sorry I must have dropped off there myself!
The opinion that I was originally trying to express, remains a view to which I adhere. Araucaria solvers should expect clues which are not always strictly Ximenean and that those who don’t like his type of crossword should avoid them, especially beginners, for whom they could eventually prove off-putting. Heaven forbid that those who are struggling with Araucaria would have tried to get started on cryptics with Bunthorne. Personally I hate Quixote’s clues, but If I do his crosswords, I have to accept the way he sets them and admit defeat if I can’t solve a clue. Fortunately, I’m so bwilliant that this never happens.