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I'm a he... :)
Again, for strange unknown reasons I've long (at least 9 years, going back to when he debuted in the Grauniad's "Meet the setter" series) had an affinity for Paul's puzzles and solved them more quickly than others. There was a spell of a few months this year when I fell off the wavelength and failed on a number of his creations, but it's recently swung back the other way.

Normally when I see the name Paul on a Saturday I don't bother to start because without checking buttons I feel I haven't a clue. Today I persisted and after nearly two hours and a lot of help from Crossword Solver and Google I am once again hit in the mouth to have completed this. Can't help feeling there are better ways to spend my time though...

Apart from it being a greeting, I'm damned if I can parse 20d!

Hi Lucertola,

I'm not really familiar enough with different setters but I know that Paul has a lot of fans and I can understand why, there's often a wry humour to his clues, the so-called "Pauline" ones. Two hours was about my solving time too and, like you, I needed a lot of Google and word-search programs.

Hi Lucertola,

I puzzled over that as well - the best I can come up with is if you reverse the "he" you get a synonym of the first word and how to get it from "he" to "eh".

Good morning folks

I´m having trouble with 21a

Drink: large bottles small, in a cut back (5,4)
Is it an anagram of 13a?

Also 24a Bird with you in country did you say? (5)
I have ??A??

Please help

Struggled at first, fell asleep for about 5 hours, then made steady progress! Got 9d from the wordplay alone, but 8d was new to me and LOI even though I correctly guessed the meaning of issue. 20/26 was good and although 21a is a brand it made for a good anagram. I don’t think this is one of Paul’s best.
Brendan, I agree with your parsing of 20d btw, but not very satisfying. Still can’t quite parse 21a.

Hi Hywel,
You are correct in your assumption regarding 21a and 13a. And 24a involves a homophone of ‘you’ followed by the answer (which is a bird)

21a: four letter synonym for large containing s and a+synonym for cut backwards.

Thanks Mathi!