Sorry for the tardiness.  I was out-of-town and then I, er, forgot
that I hadn't finished the tabulation.  Anyhow, here are the latest
PCWC results (#66).  

Congratulations to Gareth Williams, who not only won, but romped over 
the rest of the field, in spite of getting a goose-egg from one judge
(who misread the clue, I think).

Gareth pre-declined the honor of hosting the next PCWC, so it slips
down to Jake Bergmann, who placed third.  For those of you who have
never moderated PCWC, it's the easiest of the competitions to handle.
I spent less than two hours total working on it (aside from the
sleepless nights choosing a word).

Thanks to all the judges, who really spent the time on this contest.

Look for PCWC #67, coming soon!

-- MM



Comments about the word:

Usually, when someone gives a highly nonspecific clue for something,
it's a hint that it's something close to them -- for example, someone
who clues "team" for YANKEES is likely to be from New York, if not
actually from the Bronx.  But in this contest we have two different
entries with nonspecific definitions for L(os) A(ngeles), both from
people who used British spellings!

Mostly "...LA UNCH...", L(A)UNCH or LA+UN+CH, but my favourite
was the "LAU... ...NCH" clue.

I don't know if it was the word or the time of year, or that 
cup of horrible instant coffee I've just finished, but
I wasn't stunned by any of these clues. 

Pretty good all round though hidden words are a bit too popular. 
One or two had pieces of novelty or thought-provoking phrases - 
which is just what you need!

Quite a few hidden-word (including my clue) and "a in lunch 
inclusion" forms, as I might supposed should be expected.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

1st place (score 79.75%) - clue 16
From Gareth Williams <gw@fmode.demon.co.uk>

    Found Dracula unchanged at heart.

Votes (normalized): 0 60 67 67 67 75 78 86 88 92 98 100 100 100 100 100

Not crazy about the straight definition.  It's legal
but takes something away from the quality of the clue.

Excellent, and a novel (compared with the other clues) choice of defn.

Very nice surface and misleading definition.

Excellent use of "found" as a definition!  About as
clever as a hidden word clue can be.  Needs the 
enumeration, and lose the period.

Good hidden-word clue with a straightforward surface - runner-up

Very, very nice.  You can't reform a Transylvanian.

A cryptic clue has two elements: a literal definition and a cryptic
definition.  I can see the cryptic definition, but not the literal
definition.
You mention "launch, establish" but I do not see it.  Perhaps an
oversight?

Compact, nice surface reading, but perhaps too easy to spot.

Excellent!  

Another hidden word - good though

Very good clue in all aspects:  "found" cleverly used in
different verb senses, surface and definition; "launch" is
at the very heart of the hiding phrase.  The explanation 
isn't so hot, but I'm not rating *that*.

I loved this clue.  Winner by a tooth.

Nice use of 'found'. 

-------------------------------------------------------------------

2nd place (score 73.11%) - clue 10
From Kevin Wald <wald@math.uchicago.edu>

    Begin, once naked, to get into hula dancing (6)

Votes (normalized): 22 25 25 30 67 86 89 90 90 100 100 100 100 100

Nice clue, with nice use of indicators. Co-winner

Strip "once" to get NC, then insert that into a shuffled "hula"?
<gag> I don't think so.
20

Not sure about "once naked"

I'm not crazy about "naked" as an indicator to remove
the first and last letter of a word, especially when
combined with a partial anagram/container.  Too much.

Second place.

I'm too old and fat to go in for naked hula dancing.

I'm not sure about NC = once naked, but the amusing surface
reading makes this one the winner!

Quite good, if a bit complex.  The surface makes it
sound as though the naked person remains so for an
extended period of time whilst wondering whether hula
dancing is really her/his thing.

Great clue, my favorite.  Love the surface.

A nice surface reading, with a humorous twist (and a lot of truth, I 
dare say). "Naked" as an indicator to remove the ends may not be 
everyone's cup of tea, but I think it's fair enough in this clue.

Good.  The surface is a little awkward but I like the originality
of "once naked" - a neat touch.  Still, I get the feeling that
there is a great, as opposed to a merely good, clue lurking in
here someplace.  

Unusual operator = 'naked' but seeing it explained then nice clue

Great clue!  Concrete surface well-integrated with its
cryptic elements.  My only (minor) qualm is with the cryptic 
use of "naked", which requires a bit of the imagination on
the part of the solver.

Indicators are too obvious.

Yes, although I think this pushes 'naked' a bit - 
I am more used to seeing it used where 'robe' or similar 
letters are removed. "Begin, once slimmer... "  ? 

-------------------------------------------------------------------

3rd place (score 71.53%) - clue 8
From JBergman@domaincorp.com (Jake Bergmann)

    Begin with hollow laurel branch (6)

Votes (normalized): 33 44 50 50 60 60 67 75 78 80 86 90 100 100 100

Good device.  Saved from being unfair, I think, by 
symmetry.

Very good! Like the "hollow" mechanism 

Can "hollow" mean "with middle *half* removed?" I think so, but
I suspect others will disagree.

I like this clue.  I think "hollow" works fairly well
as an indicator, especially as it seems to imply a
symetrically balanced operation, which it indeed is.

Unusual cryptic construction, but well signed. The best.

Good clue.  But the surface reads funny.  Why would I begin with
a hollow laurel branch?  What am I doing?  Perhaps, "Begin
construction with ..."

An uninspired clue, with little surface sense.

Hmmm! A different approach, certainly creative.  I think I like
it a lot.  I'm reading "begin with" as the definition so as to
avoid leaving "with" as a superfluous word; I can disregard the
cluer's explanation, can't I?  I assume the surface is the
beginning of a recipe for casting Druidic spells?

Pretty good, but 'hollow' usually means the same number of 
letters missing out of each side

An okay clue; "hollow" at least corresponds to a symmetrical
set of letters equal to what's left after hollowing, and
"laurel branch" is not some completely arbitrary phrase.
The surface leaves me wondering, "Begin what?".

And end with a mediocre clue.

Nice but I don't like the link word - 
'start from' would be more to my taste

-------------------------------------------------------------------

4th place (score 67.86%) - clue 14
From Philip Rose <phil.rose@zetnet.co.uk>

    Premiere in La Scala uncheered (6)

Votes (normalized): 40 44 45 50 50 55 56 64 67 83 86 88 90 100 100

Again, I am not crazy about the noun use of launch in
this way.

Good clue, good surface

Premiere in La Scala uncheered (6)

Simple, but hidden words usually are.

The word "La" is present only for the surface reading.  This is always
a bad idea stylistically, but particularly so in a contained-word clue.

Not sure about the use of "uncheered" as good English.  Thank
you for teaching me about "La Scala".

A nice try, but a premiere would be at, rather than in, La Scala.  
The clue clearly refers to bygone times, when discriminating 
audiences were prepared to indicate their displeasure far more 14)
readily than is the case today

Very good - the "la" portion of "la scala" is superfluous to the 
cryptic and thus a little inelegant but, other than that small
nit, quite nice.

Best clue - pithy, makes sense, everything relevant

Pretty good clue all-around, even if "uncheered" is 
probably not something I'd encounter in everyday speech or
writing.  Definition and cryptic are of a pleasantly
unified "theme".  A pedant might sneer that "La" is 
extraneous to the cryptic part, as only the "Scala" part
contributes to the hidden word.  But I'm not one of those.

This clue is uncheered by me, too.

Nice and straightforward. It grates on my UK ears
a little because we would say _at_ La Scala, _in_ Milan.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

5th place (score 67.11%) - clue 7
From Pete Mitchell <pwm@mv.mv.com>

    Take off and eat clothing article (6)

Votes (normalized): 0 30 33 40 40 50 67 78 83 86 100 100 100 100 100

The cryptic is clever but the surface makes no sense
at all.

Solid construction and surface. Lacks pizazz.

Good construction, and very funny surface; "clothing article"
is a slightly awkward way of saying "article of clothing", however.

First place.  Enough said.

Good average clue, good average score.

Nice misdirection of "eat", which could be taken as a
container signal.  The surface is perfect.  First place.

Huh?  Clothing article?  I don't think so.

I liked this one a lot.  I wonder if the setter had in mind someone 
eating his hat, or something more exciting, like edible underwear.

And, after that, he swallows his socks?  The surface conjures
up some decidedly strange images.

Nice word to cause to put inside = 'clothing', otherwise does launch 
mean 'take off' or 'take-off'?

Decent definion, although, in the surface, it seems a little
thematically disjoint from the cryptic half.  Cryptically
very good, especially the user of "clothing" as the 
container.

Good wordplay.

Neat, although it took me 2 passes to read the 'and' correctly

-------------------------------------------------------------------

6th place (score 62.70%) - clue 11
From bshatzer@orednet.org (Bill Shatzer)

    Chuck is the one in the French teacher's heart (6)

Votes (normalized): 24 25 25 25 44 56 65 67 67 80 86 86 92 100 100

Actually I think it goes better without the 'the'.  
But "chaqu'un a son gout" as they say in the French :)
Co-winner.

(If it were legal French at all,) shouldn't "the one" be "l'un" ?

I think "the one" in French is actually "l'un", not "la un",
but that's a minor quibble.

A couple of minor flaws:
"the one in the French" should be "the one in French"
"teacher's heart" is C; "teachers' hearts" would be CH
Chuck is the one in the French teacher's heart (6)

Nice use of "chuck" at the beginning of the sentence
(thus justifying its capitalization).  Don't like "the
one in the French" as "LA UN", though.  Wouldn't it
really be "L'UN"?

Defective!  The clue says "the one in the French", so we must translate
the phrase "the one" into French.  LA can be "the", but only before a
feminine word starting with a consonant; UN can be "one", but only if
it's one of something masculine.  "The one" is L'UN (m) or L'UNE (f).
Hence the clue tell is that Chuck is LUNCH, or possibly LUNECH.
It's quite a pity -- it probably has the best surface of all.

Although "chuck" and "launch" can be regarded as synonyms of
"throw", they are distinct types of throwing and cannot be
regarded as synonyms of each other. Also "the one" in French
is "L'UN (m)" or "L'UNE (f)" - "LA (f) UN (m)" is not correct.

Excellent surface and buried definition.  I like the
translation of consecutive words, though I suspect
some will be bothered.

Good clue.

Almost a very good clue.  Surface reading is good, but I prefer "in 
French" to "in the French" and I don't think it detracts from the
surface.  Also, "heart" is (for me) an indication of the central 11)
letters of a word, so teacher's should rather be teachers'.

Liked this best until I saw 'La un' - would prefer 'La une' ie 
both feminine

Nice definition, going incognito as a proper noun.  Good
surface, cryptic; I'm ever-so-slightly uncomfortable with
the "ch" part, as my natural inclination is to regard it as
"the heart of teacher" which would be "c" or "ach".

I don't like 'in the French'

I disagree with the setter, I think it is much better
without 'the'

-------------------------------------------------------------------

7th place (score 60.20%) - clue 3

    African leader in midday meal send-off (6)

Votes (normalized): 20 30 44 44 50 50 57 60 67 67 71 75 75 75 84 93

I don't think too much of the straight definition but
but it's OK.

Nice components, solid clue, surface meaning good, albeit a tad clunky
(did anybody else read cannibalistic into this one?)

ok, but a bit obvious.

Very easy.  Perhaps a less obvious clue than "midday
meal" for LUNCH would help.

Good basic clue, but the surface lacked something.

Near-first place.  Not very exciting.

Surface does not work for me.  Leader in a midday meal send-off?

The surface reading doesn't quite gel, and the clue is too obvious.

OK but obvious and somewhat unexciting.

Good straightforward clue

Hmm.  Is that African leader supposed to be a guest at the 
midday meal, or an ingredient?  "In" isn't the best synonym
for "at", in other words, if I'm to take this clue seriously
("send-off", to me, hints that said leader is the the guest
of honor) instead of humorously.

Clue doesn't stand out among the l(a)unches.

Satisfactory.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

8th place (score 58.45%) - clue 13

    Tesla, uncharacteristically, covered a new release (6)

Votes (normalized): 0 30 33 40 44 50 50 65 67 71 74 79 86 88 100

This of course relies on one knowing that TESLA is a
mildly famous band.  But the downfall is using launch
as a noun in an improper fashion ("Here's the latest
launch from Tesla"  ??)

What does the surface mean?

This is a nice clue with a decent and topical surface
(though I'll be stunned if there aren't at least a few
voters who don't know "who or what a Tesla is").  :-)

I was about to wonder what the surface reading had to with 
the physicist Tesla, but then recalled that Tesla were a
group of musicians (heavy metal?) - runner-up

The surface is not very vivid.

Surface, huh?

Is Tesla supposed to be someone I've heard of?

Why is a semi-obscure scientist covering a new release,
uncharacteristically or otherwise?  

Liked operator = 'covered' but who are 'Telsa'?

Another average container which will, I'm sure, be hurt by 
a reference to a musical entity less than 20 years old.

Is Tesla a well-known pop group? 
I assume it is and give the benefit of the score

-------------------------------------------------------------------

9th place (score 58.25%) - clue 17

    Take off from Los Angeles with a French companion (6)

Votes (normalized): 10 22 25 30 33 40 67 70 71 75 78 86 86 88 93

Mine. Abstain.

Good solid clue with reasonable surface.

Companion to CH is a bit of a stretch

Never heard of "CH" = "companion of honor".  Not in my
dictionary either.

Nice, but C.H. seems somewhat obscure to me.

Lovely clue with a good set of charades. Runner-up because every
one was a cliche - Los Angeles (LA) a French (UN) Companion (CH)

The fine surface puts this right up there with the leaders.
"CH" will be considered obscure by many (myself included),
but I'll take your word for it.

I would not have known that companion was CH.  Perhaps a bit too
cryptic?

Also makes for a good surface reading, but again maybe too obvious.

CH  =  Companion (of honor)?  Not in any reference I checked.  
Perhaps this is a Briticism beyond the ken of us colonials?
But this obscure reference makes the clue unsolvable IMHO and
thus, no cigar!

Liked this but again should it be 'take off' of 'take -off'?

Nice clue all-around, even if I'm not particularly familiar
with the "CH" part.

I don't really like foreign-language article clues.  Sorry.

Straightforward

-------------------------------------------------------------------

10th place (score 55.79%) - clue 6

    L.A. Gear stock doesn't move in initial offering (6)

Votes (normalized): 0 29 33 33 40 40 56 57 60 63 67 70 75 86 90 95

Using symbols is too esoteric, but an interesting 
try nevertheless.  A for effort.

Good surface (both smooth and consistent), good components.

A very clever idea. I would have been utterly unable to solve this
clue, however, not being that familiar with the stock market.

A bit too reliant on specialist knowledge.

Clever theme.  Unfortunately, the "Gear stock" part
feels obscurely superfluous since "L.A." already clues
to "LA".  Even knowing the answer, I couldn't figure 
out how it fit in until I read your explanation.

Ingenious, but most of us don't have stock ticker symbols memorized.
Also, a word should not appear in its own clue, even when the clue
is just part of a charade; I don't think the punctuation change is
enough to save the "L.A." part of the clue from this.

I don't play whichever stock-market you refer to, indeed I
don't play any, so the clue is perfect for the WSJ or FT, but not
here I'm afraid.

I don't accept the equivalence of "didn't move" and
"doesn't move" and besides, both parts of the charade
need the word "stock" to be decoded -- so is this more
like a punny double definition, with the first five
words translating en masse to "LA unch." ??

Is there a need for the word "gear" in this clue?  Could just write
"Los Angeles stock doesn't ..."

I would have liked this clue a lot more if I was familiar with the 
abbreviations for listings on the US stock market, or the "unch" 
abbreviation.  The idea was quite novel.

Decent cryptic and nice surface, flawed by the use of insider 
jargon.  Us common folk are unlikely to know the ticker tape 
symbol for LA Gear stock with the result that the "gear stock" 
portion ends up appearing to be superfluous padding.  "Unch" is
not a standard abbreviation either, but is probably fair.

Great if you're a stock-ticker, if not then unintelligible

How disappointing.  The Wall Street-esque surface is really 
nice, but despite it, I don't want to be responsible for 
having to know ticker abbreviations and company listings
in order to solve a clue.  Thus, in my book, "gear" is 
essentially extraneous and "doesn't move" is overly obscure.

My clue is, as usual, middling.

LA gear = LA is unsatisfactory; unch is way too obscure.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

11th place (score 52.93%) - clue 9

    City church hosts organisation's publicity event (6)

Votes (normalized): 21 30 33 38 50 55 56 56 58 60 60 60 60 71 86

'City' is kind of rough for LA isn't it?  I guess launch
is a noun in this context, but it grates on the ear.

Stolid. Don't like having to assume that "organisation" = UN
nor do I like "publicity event" = launch

Okay charade.

Why this city?  Why this organization?

The cryptic "organisation" => "UN" is a bit vague. Might
have got somewhere with "world organ...n".

Good clue, but the use of "city" for LA and "host organization" for
UN is too vague.

I'm not mad about UN = organisation.

Points off for misspelling "organization". And, I'm not wild
about clueing "LA" and "UN" with just "city" and "organization" -
they are just too broad.  "California city" or "international
organization" would be fairer.  Still, not bad.

Too unspecific:  "city" is too vague for "LA", and 
"organization" (sorry; just had to Americanize the spelling!) 
is too vague for "UN".  A couple of adjectives would have 
really boosted the score of this clue, in my opinion.  
Not overly long, and a good surface.

Good, but not striking.

Like it, but to make the apostrophe-s work as 'is', 
'hosting' would make the grammar more logical

-------------------------------------------------------------------

12th place (score 44.67%) - clue 4

    Louisiana: one Latino church fire (6)

Votes (normalized): 14 17 20 20 25 30 33 44 50 56 57 57 60 70 75 86

Bumpy surface.  

Is "fire" a good definition for LAUNCH? Quite good otherwise.

Charade elements are sound, but the surface doesn't
fire me up.  :-)

Unhappy about "one latino" => "UN": as far as I know latino
is not a language. Also is the surface an allusion to recent
firing of black churches in the USA?

The colon in the surface is wrong.  It says that
Louisiana IS a church fire.

I suppose that this would be a newspaper caption.

Is one Latino really "un".  French, perhaps (which would 
tie in better with Louisiana.  The surface reading isn't that great.

Wouldn't "one Latino" be "uno"?  Surface doesn't make much sense,
either.

Better to use 'Louisiana is' rather than just 'Louisiana:'

And now, for news from the South?  Not-bad surface, but I
cannot fathom why it's a Latino (*uno*) rather then a French
church --- especially since the French theme would go so
much better with Louisiana anyway.  An ugly technical flaw
in an otherwise commendable clue; particularly nice in 
disguising the verb-form definition as a noun in the surface.

I thought there were fairly few Latinos in Louisiana.  Now, 
had you said Los Angeles, that would have been closer.  
(And, some people would have claimed, inflammatory.)

A little choppy; from the UK I struggle with 'Latino'

-------------------------------------------------------------------

13th place (score 42.24%) - clue 15

    West-coast city leads international union after 
    Public Health Centre's unveiling (6)

Votes (normalized): 7 14 20 22 25 29 30 33 33 50 60 60 67 70 75 80

It's alright, I guess, but too complicated for such
a mild payoff.

Again, way too long and cumbersome.

With "after" there, this seems to clue CHLAUN.

Why is "Public Health Centre" "CH"?  Not an abbreviation 
I am familiar with, nor is it in my dictionary.

Defective!  This says that LA leads UN *after* CH, making CHLAUN.
I do like the sneaky "publiC Health centre" for CH.

Why does "Public...Centre" => CH? Also "after" is the wrong 
link word to use: it infers LA+(CH+UN) or even CH+(LA+UN)

Even if everything else about this clue were perfect,
it could not survive the use of "after" to mean "before".

Surface is confusing to me.  What is the city leading?  I like the
construction of "public health centre" being CH.

The link word "after" is misleading here, and detracts from what is 
otherwise a reasonable (if somewhat long) clue.

I didn't get this 'un at all on the first or even the fifth
reading - I just couldn't figure out why "public health centre's"
was supposed to equal "CH" and was prepared to give this 'un
a big fat zero.  Then, the "aha" hit!  Next time give the
explanation as "CH  =  the centre of publi[C H]ealth" or some such
for the benefit of those of us who are _really_ slow.  :-)

Nice try but too long

A rather lengthy clue, but one which takes care of the 
vagueness issues I had with clue 9.  I'm not all that
happy with "after" as a linkage indicator, as it implies 
that "laun" should follow "ch" rather than vice-versa, and
with equivalent, less-"ordered" words like "with" which
wouldn't damage the surface available.

Like all government writing, this clue is too long

Too cumbersome

-------------------------------------------------------------------

14th place (score 37.67%) - clue 12

    Shove argon into meal (6)

Votes (normalized): 0 0 0 20 22 30 33 33 40 40 43 57 63 67 67 88

Bland.

Neat and tidy.

Short and sweet. (Nowadays, the symbol for argon is Ar, but it used
to be A.) How do you shove a gas like argon, though?

Argon = Ar

The verb "shove" seems miscast in the surface.

Defective!  Argon's symbol is Ar, so this makes LARUNCH.

Good basic clue, but a bit thin in the surface.

As a chemist I balk at the use of A for argon.  The chemical
symbol for argon is Ar.  That notwithstanding, what does the surface
mean?  Is this some kind of preservation process?

I don't like the surface reading.

"Some argon with your petite fours, madame?  And, perhaps
some barium on your salad?"  The surface seems a tad
strange.

Why would you shove argon into meal?

Decent enough clue, solid defintion and cryptic.  Surface-
wise, I find it hard to envision "shoving" Argon --- a gas ---
into anything.

And add some xenon to your snack, while you're at it.

No surface sense

-------------------------------------------------------------------

15th place (score 37.09%) - clue 2

    Throw out a third of salami, unsold cheese (6)

Votes (normalized): 0 0 10 13 14 17 30 33 43 50 56 58 64 67 69 70

Unfair.  Should point to the appropriate letters
more directly.

Creative, although the mechanism doesn't quite reach that "A-ha!" level
of satisfaction.

Cute idea.  I'd like it better if the clue used the same
third in each case.  As it is, there are 27 possible
combinations to sift through.

"A third of" is supposed to tell us to take 1/3 of each of three words
individually and not even the same 1/3 of each one?  I don't buy it.

Didn't like the construct of the cryptic. I would rather it
be the same third of each word or processing thirds not what
was effectively random thirds

The arbitrariness of (middle third, first third,
first third) knocks this one out.

Surface makes no sense.  Have to clue the reader as to which
third to remove.  e.g., first third of cheese, middle of salami etc.

A sound, but not too inspired, clue

Novel approach and points for creativity in the cryptic.  Alas,
nowhere does the clue indicate we're to use the MIDDLE third
from "salami" but the FIRST thirds of "unsold" and "cheese".
Thus the cryptic solution is somewhat arbitrary - a fatal flaw
IMHO.

Novel, but which third of each word?

At once too easy and too hard:  "a third" is a pretty dead
giveaway as to what you're up to cryptically, yet it's not
a contiguous third of the phrase, nor even the *same* third
of each word (i.e. I might have looked more fondly on "latest
unsold cheese").  As a definition, "throw out" seems slightly
less "directed at a goal" than "launch".

Enough with the sandwich clues

Nice idea but we are _keeping_ a third of each
and SAUNCH would be a more logical result anyway

-------------------------------------------------------------------

16th place (score 37.02%) - clue 1

    Venzuela unchallenged within its Open (6)

Votes (normalized): 10 11 11 14 25 30 35 36 38 40 40 50 57 62 67 67

Indicator points in the wrong direction

Not 100% on "Open"=LAUNCH - I know, it's v. close, but
it's simply not a definition I "like". YMMV. Surface is also dodgy.

surely should be "open within Venezuela unchallenged"?

The indicator seems backwards to me, as if the clue were 
going to be found *within* "its Open".  Also, you misspelled
Venezuela.

Misspelled!  Also, "within" is awkward both as the container indicator
(it doesn't suggest looking within the words preceding it) and in the
surface.

Uninspiring golf allusion marred by the typing mistake

"its" is a wasted word; I could accept "it's" as
a link to the definition part.  Worse, "within"
can't point to what precedes.

Check spelling of  Venezuela!  Also "within" is misplaced.
Should be "within Venezuela unchallenged"

I can't agree that the surface makes any sense (individuals, not
countries, take part in an Open).  The word "its" is a weakness; it 
should be "it's", which would make the surface reading gibberish.

Points off for misspelling "Venezuela" in the clue. 

Nice hidden word clue, but what does it mean?

Good enough surface; "its" would appear to be rather
unnecessary to the cryptic (and I don't go for its being
used as the contraction of "it is", since it's not got the
requisite apostrophe).

The spelling mistake ain't bad, but a container has to be
really good (see #16) to win.

The 'its' doesn't fit.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

17th place (score 3.35%) - clue 5

    The urine is all gone from my belly and so its left good for 
    a float on the bay (6)

Votes (normalized): 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 25 29

Ha ha. You didn't actually expect to score any points
with this mess did you?

My pet hate - the rambling clue ... it's like having a conversation
my mother (bless 'er ;-): by the time you get to the end, you wonder
how on earth you got there, and can't remember what it was that you
started talking about in the first place.

Long, long, long. 

Uhhhhh...........no.

Misspelled!  And way too complicated and indirect, and has no
indication in the cryptic that the L precedes AUNCH, *and*
there's no surface reading.

The double indirection of "urine" to "pee" to "P" is a mite
unfair. Also the definition is very obscure and the whole
clue rather long-winded

Very convoluted surface and cannot use so many indirect
cryptic clues.  Pee for P cannot be used, for example, without
adding, "perhaps" or "we hear" or something indicating a
homophone.  Otherwise, solver should use PEE.

Apart from minor unsoundness (e.g. its instead of it's), a very 
unwieldy charade, with little surface meaning.  It also defines the 
wrong part of speech.  A launch may be good for a float on the bay,
but it doesn't make "good for a float on the bay" a definition of 5)
launch.

I'm speechless!  

Probably the most imaginative but just a little too convoluted!

Clues in which I have no idea of how they're cryptically
constructed --- even when I know the word being clued! ---
are either spectacularly brilliant or utterly miserable.
This clue is one of the latter.  The urine-pee-p is way too
indirect.  The length of the clue is way too long, padded 
with a bunch of words which are largely extraneous and are
there for the sole benefit of the image-laden but rather
unappealing, vulgar surface.  Where the cryptic direction for
"substitute" ("l" for "p") is eludes me.  Finally, "it's" is 
missing its apostrophe, as the contraction of "it is" calls
for (hey, I didn't make that rule; but it *is* a rule).

On a different day, I may have been more generous, but this 
clue strikes me as just too plain impossible.

Amusing but way too complex - perhaps something based on 
'left with unquiet belly' [unquiet = no 'P' ] might be easier?

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BONUS CLUE:

    Advance into Angola unchallenged (6)

Excellent - I particlarly like the way that this clue *reads* so well;
it's almost poetic.
The alliteration is good, and it has a distinct rhythm/meter
Besides all that, it is a good solid cryptic clue - I would have
nominated this as the winner if it had been eligible.

"into" is not really a hidden word indicator - it indicates moving
one word into the other as in AN(SUB)G - ANG for Angola - IVR? and
SUB for Advance

This is a great clue, too bad we could not score it.  I think that it
is the best of the "run-on" type clues.  Well done.

Better than some of the regular clues.

"into" is not, IMHO, a good hidden word indicator.  "Advance
in" or "advance from" would be better.  

See where you're coming from, but does launch mean advance? 
Also, 'into' usually means  put into (another word) 

Don't much like the definition or the indicator, but the
surface is good.

I do not  think of advance as launch 
and 'in' would have worked where 'into' doesn't for me

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Matthew Merzbacher                              matthew@mills.edu
Director, Graduate Program in Interdisciplinary Computer Science
Assistant Professor of Computer Science         (510) 430-2201
Mills College, Oakland CA  94613                 Yo Ho Ho!