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Gosh. Glad we have visitors this week 8-) I managed a few on Sunday but it soon became obvious to me that it would be beyond my means. Thanks to all for the interesting read though - I will keep the paper and enjoy following the solution in reflection in two weeks.

drx e-mail me and I will send you my thoughts/justification mary3305@btinternet.com

Essira - have you read through all the posts in the thread? There's only one instruction of the kind you describe and we've discussed it exhaustively.

I'm bound to say also that if anything is to be done to the grid as a preliminary to highlighting, the convention is that the setter points the solver towards it, e.g. 'Having followed the trail, solvers should follow an instruction in the grid to reveal the ultimate goal ...'

But I don't know what you intend by your hint, so I'm not saying I disbelieve your discovery.

Thanks for your kind offer Essira, but I think this site encourages a certain transparency, unlike the other one we keep mentioning - ''when in Rome...''

Highlighting LIFT doesn't mean you have to physically cut it in the grid. Just highlighting it would be like X marks the spot (where to dig).

Removing LIFT shows HARE and SEARCH AREA in the same spot. Around the left hand side of HARE is a jumble of CERAMIC or possibly just CERAMIST in order. If the other letters (STYENAETS) anagram to something thematic as well, that might be it?

After aging several months in the last 115 posts I have concluded that LIFT/HARE is probably right. But which to highlight? "The ultimate goal" is surely HARE, and I shall cut round the 3 lower edges of LIFT to indicate that. Whether it's right or not will be known in 15 days.

Adding to heisenberg's suggestion, if LIFT is raised, then the letters completely surrounding HA RE read CERAMIC - with the last two letters first - followed anticlockwise by STEANE (an earthenware container). And STY - a dirty place! So you have a hare in a ceramic container and in a dirty place, I.e. buried in soil! And of course the HA RE is in a searcHA Rea. Will that do folks?

It's been good to see a few fresh faces in the discussion, and good that this forum is approachable. It also confirms a guess that there are many read-only members who we don't normally see.

Dr X, I have to say that I agree 100%. The purpose of a crossword puzzle is surely to provide a little exercise of the grey matter without requiring solvers to spend a long time deciphering what is written in a preamble. This has been a recurring topic in the last year or so, there should at least be a lack of ambiguity. The idea that a puzzle should confuse so many people for so long does give weight to the kind of argument that S. Pugh gave earlier.

My perception is that Listener setters are relying more and more on ambiguity in the preamble as a device. Which, when I think about it, is just plain lazy. An expert setter would need little or no preamble...

Thank you, Meursault, for your welcoming words to new faces. You're right, I've been 'read-only' for some months, but have derived a great deal of pleasure and light bulb moments, too.

I feel I should apologise for being too specific in my other post (no. 32). Overexcited...but having stayed with you all for a week, I'm still not certain of endgame.

Luckily, my hair is already white.

Could someone please tell me who the 'other site' is? It sounds much more opaque than this one, but am curious.

Mama72 - I think this forum blocks posts with embedded web URLs, but I'll have a go: it's www.theanswerbank.co.uk/Quizzes-and-Puzzles/Crosswords/ and then, for this puzzle, put Listener 4422 in the search box. Which Poat would probably call the search area.

Speaking of whom ... Meursault has said it all, but I'd just like to add that the solver on AB who called the endgame 'fair, valid and unequivocal' needs tuition in the basics of logic. The word LIFT cannot be the 'ultimate goal': not only is it not a HARE, it's also not a noun.

As for the solver who called Poat 'ingenious', perhaps he/she was referring to CERAMIC, STEANE, STY and KIT WILLIAMS. Red herrings were of course a feature of the thematic book, but to me the appropriate description is 'exhibitionist', at the expense of the solver.