A jolly romp of a puzzle this Wednesday, which I solved in 16 minutes with the top left corner last to be completed. Four straightforward anagrams and a barely hidden word gave me an easy start, and oddly enough, 1d and 1a were my last to be put in. Your feedback is welcomed on 19a.
Definitions underlined in bold, (ABC)* indicating anagram of ABC, anagrinds in italics, [deleted letters in square brackets].
| Across | |
| 1 | Golf club‘s tip wet (7) |
| NIBLICK – NIB = tip, LICK = wet, as a verb. Even as a golfer, I had to dredge my memory for this name for an old type of golf club which was used for getting the ball out of a hole or bad spot. | |
| 5 | A writer, some soldiers, and so on (7) |
| SASSOON – S.A.S. = some soldiers, and SO ON. | |
| 9 | A small amount of cremating bungled (9) |
| CENTIGRAM – (CREMATING)*. Ten milligrams, as you would expect. | |
| 10 | Style of note female swapped with Charlie (5) |
| ECLAT – E FLAT being a musical note, replace F by C. | |
| 11 | Large creature to return carrying? Cry audibly (8,5) |
| HUMPBACK WHALE – to HUMP BACK = to return carrying, WHALE sounds like WAIL. | |
| 13 | Kill American, then relax close to balcony — that’s cold (3,5) |
| ICE LOLLY – ICE = U.S. slang for kill, LOLL to relax, Y the end of balcony. | |
| 15 | Turns down occasionally yummy Asian food (3,3) |
| DIM SUM -DIMS = turns down, e.g. a light; y U M M y. | |
| 17 | China object to a pet exercising (6) |
| TEAPOT – (TO A PET)*. | |
| 19 | Crawling on this is a result of poor judgement? (3,5) |
| ALL FOURS – I’ve underlined the whole of this clue, because I think it must be a cryptic definition of some sort, but neither I nor Mrs P can see why crawling on all fours can be this. How else can you crawl, but on all fours? Explanations below, please. | |
| 22 | Novel liquid’s cool and blue (9,4) |
| WATERSHIP DOWN – WATER’S (liquid’s) HIP (cool) DOWN (blue). | |
| 25 | Dog ignoring bone initially getting good score on course (5) |
| EAGLE – a BEAGLE dog loses its initial B from bone. A score of 2 under par on one hole, like hen’s teeth in my case. | |
| 26 | Shopkeeper, say, and master criminal (9) |
| TRADESMAN – (AND MASTER)*. | |
| 27 | Affair of cat eating a box of ingredients (7) |
| LIAISON – LION (cat) has A I[ngredient]S inserted. | |
| 28 | Spooner’s dratted pig is shamefaced (7) |
| HANGDOG – Rev. Spooner would have said DANG HOG. Well, his American cousin might have said DANG, I doubt he would have done so. | |
| Down | |
| 1 | Arrest New York basketball player for speaking (4) |
| NICK – I know very little about basketball, but I did know the New York team is called the KNICKS, which sounds like nicks. Something to do with knickerbockers and Dutch settlers, I believe. | |
| 2 | Article on short page supporting Bob’s first Wailer? (7) |
| BANSHEE – B (Bob) AN (article) SHEE[T] = short page. | |
| 3 | When in France, me and a lady picked up a turn of phrase (5) |
| IDIOM – MOI (me in French) DI (a lady) “picked up” i.e. reversed. | |
| 4 | Fork out to cover party game (8) |
| KORFBALL – (FORK)* then BALL = party. It’s a kind of netball / basketball for mixed teams. | |
| 5 | Fool to be awful when entertaining His Majesty (6) |
| SHMUCK – SUCK = be awful, with HM inserted. From Yiddish, I see, literally meaning penis. So use with care. | |
| 6 | Not straight with southern part of London over smell (9) |
| SKEWWHIFF -S (southern) KEW (part of London) WHIFF (smell). I wrote it in and it looked odd with two Ws together, but it is so spelt; is there another word in English with two Ws consecutively? | |
| 7 | City uncovered more lists (7) |
| ORLEANS – OR = more “uncovered”, [M]OR[E]; LEANS = lists. Pleasant city near Paris. | |
| 8 | Lowest part of engine thermostat (10) |
| NETHERMOST – here it is, hidden as above. | |
| 12 | A&E, say, with request to lab perhaps that’s unnecessary? (5,5) |
| FIFTH WHEEL – musically, from A to E is a fifth interval; W (with) HEEL instruction given to your labrador retriever. | |
| 14 | Old and stern? Not so much, and not smelly! (9) |
| ODOURLESS – O (old) DOUR (stern) LESS (not so much). | |
| 16 | Upset friends a little, being careless (8) |
| SLAPDASH – PALS reversed (upset) then DASH = a little. | |
| 18 | Island worker on one other island briefly (7) |
| ANTIGUA – ANT (worker) I (one) GUA[M] = other island briefly. | |
| 20 | Mundane novel is anonymous (7) |
| UNNAMED – (MUNDANE)*. | |
| 21 | Outlaw seen outside shack somewhere in Asia (6) |
| BHUTAN – BAN (outlaw) with HUT inserted. I’ve been to a lot of countries but not Bhutan, and it’s not high on my bucket list at this point. They have a nice dragon on their flag, though. | |
| 23 | Poem about old theatre (5) |
| ODEON – ODE (poem) ON (about). | |
| 24 | Make out small drink containing eggs (4) |
| SNOG – S for small, NOG as in egg nog. When I practised snogging in my youth (happy memories) I’d never have called it “making out”, I suspect this is an Americanism. | |
34.33 My third quickest ever. I thought “and master criminal” was a lovely anagram. I initially chucked in ODOURFREE without noticing that it’s not a word and clashed with EAGLE. Some mistakes only happen online. This held up LIAISON and LOI FIFTH WHEEL made no sense to me so thanks for the explanation.
Got FIFTH WHEEL as it was the only thing that fitted. Didn’t understand the A&E musical bit. Have heard of a third wheel, though, the same as a gooseberry. Surprised so many are moaning they’ve never heard of KORFBALL. Was very popular in the 90s, maybe still is. Otherwise all okay, for a 32 minutes completion time.
I know that if you want to strike up a conversation with a stranger in New York you’re supposed to say ‘how about them Knicks, eh?’ So I got 1 down easily enough, even though I couldn’t have said offhand whether the Knicks play baseball or basketball.
It’s not a particularly inspired clue, I admit, but I don’t get all this moaning about Americanisms. It seems a bit petty, especially on a day when there were no less than TWO golfing words! Bah!!
Enjoyable 26 minutes. I thought NETHERMOST was particularly well-hidden.
I finished the Big Boy Puzzle!! O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!
A 22:10 miracle. Off to buy a lottery ticket.
Templar
Beaten at the fifth- decided on ninth! No idea at the musical term or the straight bit so was up against it. Shame as I had enjoyed the rest of it.
Gave up, knew I wasn’t going to get 1d or 4d. Should have got 1ac but didn’t get that either. Couldn’t make sensor of ALL FOURS even though it was easily biffable and never heard of FIFTH WHEEL although it was also easy enough to guess. Do we really need DANG, SCHMUCK and (sounds like) KNICK in this crossword? Hope tomorrow’s better.
There’s an expression in French – la cinquième roue du carosse (coach) – which helped with 12d. Guessed KORFBALL and was not happy with ALL FOURS. 80 seems very low for the Snitch. I came in at 24’31”.
I too am still confused by “all fours” I originally put ” fly paper” which struck me as more logical, but getting 20 down put me in my place.
1st try of my big boy trousers, and quite surprised how far I got.
47 mins. Penultimate was SHMUCK but the HM meant no agonising over spelling. Last FIFTH WHEEL but no idea why except maybe akin to stabilisers on a bike being unnecessary when you get your balance but they’d be third and fourth wheels!?