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Good evening, Rusty!
It is still damp here......although not raining quite as heavily now.
I am glad your car is now okay...and your tooth soon will be!
Is your dentist near a shopping area/ arcade then, as you are planning to visit charity shops and the fish shop whilst there?
I have never had an Arbroath smokie... I do love haddock, but have never had it smoked.
We had sausages and onions, new potatoes, cauliflower and broccoli for dinner!
Very good!
I didn't get around to starting today's crossword until mid afternoon.
I am finding it difficult?
I have quite a number of clues to which I cannot find answers......
I think I have successfully answered and parsed the others, though.

Hello, Elle!
My dentist's premises are above a bank, in a street full of shops.
I like a smokie now and again.
They are popular, but they have bones in them.
The late Queen Mother had a bone from a smokie stuck in her throat and had it removed at a local hospital.
Your dinner sounds very tasty!
I did not find the puzzle difficult today.
I liked 11a!

Hi, Rusty!
Oh yes, I remember now about the Queen Mother having a bone stuck in her throat!
I like fish, but I always have it boned.
I think this is partially because I am a "lazy" eater in that I do not like to "work "for my meal!
But it is safer, too, to have the fish professionally boned .
Funnily enough, our dentist too is "upstairs"!
But we have to go up an outside staircase to access the surgeries.
It is perhaps just I who found the puzzle difficult then.....
I have counted up, and I still have seven clues remaining, about which I have no ideas at all.
Yes, 11a was quite amusing, I thought.
I have "dottier" = crazier", presumably because there are more dotted letters in "Fijii" than there are in "Pitcairn"?
However, I had thought that it was protocol for the "definition" to be placed at the beginning or the ending of the clue?
Whereas "crazier" comes in the middle!
So have I got this right?

Hello, Elle!
I prefer boned fish too, but smokies are worth the effort!
I have a choice at my dentist.
I can go up an internal staircase or enter from the car park to rear and that is on level ground, no stairs.
The wee dots in Fiji are called tittles.
I have no idea if you are right about where definitions should be.
To me, the setter provides you with a clue and you hopefully should be able to reach an answer to the puzzle from that.
No more, no less.
The less "conventions" the better, Elle, it is only a puzzle for a bit of entertainment, is how I see it.

Hi, Rusty!
Our dentists does not even have a car park!
We have to drive around until we can somehow, somewhere, find a space in which to leave the car.
I've never heard of "tittles"... you are very well-informed...... to me they have always just been dots!
Now, I am thinking that crosswords seem to be surrounded by "conventions", Rusty?
When I was having a problem with the authenticity of that clue the other day...I cannot remember it now ....... I subsequently learned that it was considered to be a "reverse anagram"!
Now how was I to know that?
And people refer to charade clues (I can understand that one!) and various other technicalities!
I cannot even remember them all to list them, but there do appear to be a number of "rules"
Certainly the bit about the definition appearing at either end of the beginning of the clue is one of these "rules"!
I am feeling I need to be au fait with these guidelines, or else I shall be unable to solve all the clues?
Anyway, I am now down to five left in today's puzzle!
So a tad advanced on earlier!

Hello, Elle!
I meant to say, I watched an Andre Rieu concert that I had recorded this afternoon.
It was very good. Some great music about.
Carmen Monarcha was the soprano.
I don't use the dentist's car park, but park further away.
Elle, I have been doing The Times cryptic puzzle for many years and I have not learned any "rules" or "conventions", except two that the Times insist on.
"No more than five anagrams" and "no name of a living person".
The vast majority of the time I finish the puzzle without knowing what different clues are called, and I am not interested in finding out.
Could you be taking this rules business a bit too seriously?
To me it just a bit of fun and passes away some time in an interesting challenge.
No more, no less.

Hi, Rusty!
I watched "Eggheads", but other than that I have been reading.
I am re-reading some of my books that I have not read for a very long time.
At some point, I must do some "browsing" and buy some more books!
Yes, I know you have been doing the Times crosswords for a long time now, and you really are extremely good at solving the clues...... not only in the Times puzzles, but also random ones posted up on the Forum.
I wish I could reach that standard....I am afraid that I lag a long way behind!
The trouble is , now that I know that all these different forms of clues exist and have been allotted names / titles etc., I feel it obligatory for me to learn how the various types of clues operate?
It is a parallel feeling to learning English grammar...or a Latin declension...
Am I making any sense?
I feel it is something I should "master"?
A challenge maybe?

Hello, Elle!
I know the feeling about buying books.
I have quite a surplus in my Amazon account and should perhaps start browsing....whilst evading the clutches of Prime!
You must choose to do what makes you happy, Elle.
Unfortunately, I can not help you.
I don't know the terminology of clues, and have no wish to find out.
Why not go and look on YouTube?
There are lots of videos about solving puzzles there.
Or maybe crossword puzzle help books on Amazon?
Maybe worth having a look?

Update, Elle!
Have a look at this book on Amazon.
"The Times, How to Crack Cryptic Crosswords", by Tim Moorey.
This book appears to be the sort of thing that would help you, I think?
Tim Moorey sets for several newspapers including Sunday Times and Telegraph.

Rusty, just a quick text to thank you for being the early morning Spam monitor. I think it's your reports that mean the rubbish is moved, deleted, fairly quickly.