27946 Thursday, 8 April 2021 Mr and Mrs Igitur and their flamboyant son Gaudy Amos

Author   ZabadakPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
I made rather heavy weather of this, slowed by an entry I put in but was very dubious about and an entry I injudiciously biffed. When you have a dubious entry, it tends to make you distrust the crossing letters which is nearly as bad as not having any, or at least that’s how it works for me. I also couldn’t see what was going on in 1ac, and there’s a maliciously placed comma that messes up the wordplay. I think I may have followed the setter’s artful map of garden paths too enthusiastically: others may see through such deceptions rather more easily and do relatively better than my 27.34.
I don’t think the vocab and GK needed is particularly obscure anywhere, but then I rarely do. I’m mildly impressed by the setter sneaking in two meanings of the same word in the wordplay.
Today’s smile came from the nail clue. I like daft definitions.
Clues are in italics, their definitions underlined, and their solutions in THIS STYLE.
Across

1 What shows one’s composed and performed for, new documentation following? (9)

SANGFROID Ah yes, the Englishman with his usual bloody cold. Not helped by thinking it was two words. The wordplay goes performed: SANG, for, new: FRO (it’s an anagram) and documentation: ID
6 Brief moment absorbing work matter (5)
TOPIC Brief moment TIC(k), work OP, the latter “absorbed” by the former.
9 Cheap booze from pub enthralling first of alcoholics (7)
BARGAIN Too long trying to think of cheap booze. Instead, booze from pub is BAR GIN, insert (first of) A(lcoholics)
10 Wise figure showing a lot of courage in the end retreating (7)
MINERVA Nerve is courage, so a lot of it is NERV. Place it in AIM for end reversed (retreating). Minerva is the Roman goddess of wisdom and strategic warfare, justice, law, victory, and the sponsor of arts, trade, and strategy. Impressive multitasking.
11 What’s needed for walking dog in meadow: quiet (5)
LEASH Not an insertion, which the “in” suggests. Just LEA for meadow and SH for quiet.
12 Doctors, in sum, given to single marker of death (9)
TOMBSTONE Doctors in one of their many abbreviations are MBS. Place in sum: TOT and add ONE for single.
14 Bridge that’s not finished well (3)
SPA From SPAN unfinished
15 Wine quantity not uniform? Bad business (11)
AMONTILLADO SO that’s quantity: AMOUNT but with no U(niform), bad: ILL and business: ADO
17 Proceed to accept unhappy end? (5,4,2)
CRACK DOWN ON Proceed is CRACK ON and unhappy accepted thereby is DOWN
19 Element of bondage session male eschewed (3)
TIE Probably the simplest possible element of bondage. Session: TIME with the M(ale) eschewed (posh for discarded)
20 Support car marque as an original design (9)
ARCHETYPE I couldn’t justify prototype, but it didn’t stop me chewing up the minutes by putting it in. But it’s simply support: ARCH by that most evocative of car marques the E TYPE
22 Chief is behind gathering wood (5)
BEECH  Chambers does justify CH as an abbreviation for chief. Put it behind BEE for gathering, as in The Great British Sewing Bee, shortly to resume on the BBC
24 Back to chop tree, clearing area, for instance (7)
EXAMPLE Back instructs you to reverse AXE for chop, then the tree you want ia MAPLE minus it’s a(rea)
26 Indian city featured in obscure plan (7)
DIAGRAM The Indian city is the one with the photo opportunity in white marble, AGRA. Insert into DIM for obscure.
27 Gaudy description of nails? (5)
TACKY One of those where the question mark indicates a whimsical Uxbridge English Dictionary description. Nails could be tacky. Well, they could.
28 Clumsy: presumably good for hitches ? (3,6)
ALL THUMBS Uma Thurman only needed one extraordinary thumb for hitching rides in Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, but you get the idea.

Down

1 Forecaster is upset over Times letters initially (5)
SIBYL Not a hitherto unrecognised talent of Mrs Fawlty: the Sibyls were legendary prophetesses of antiquity. IS is upset to produce SI, times (as in multiply) gives BY, which I spotted for once, and get the L from the initial of Letters.
2 Blessed state of vehicle caught in squally rain (7)
NIRVANA The vehicle is a VAN, and “squally” invites you to anagram RAIN to place outside it.
3 Loud thing cat may do? Here’s a reminder (9)
FLASHBACK Depends on you seeing that a cat is a form of whip, which might LASH BACK. Loud provides the initial F.
4 Subjects observed in this may be swift to grouse? (11)
ORNITHOLOGY I was uneasy about this for so long. So both swift and grouse are birds, their alternative meanings providing an amusing surface reading. For me, it jars a bit with their positions in an ornithology, which would be alphabetically reversed? Aasvogel to Zebra Finch, anyone?
5 Mother cracked up (3)
DAM Just MAD for cracked, crazy “up”
6 Regulates day in November? On the contrary (5)
TUNES So you’re looking to reverse the syntax and put N(ovember) (NATO) in a day. Pick TUESday.
7 Chopped up half of garden pole to make frame for plants (7)
PERGOLA Half of garden GAR, add POLE and then anagram (chop up) them both.
8 Tea for each individual companion (9)
CHAPERONE Tea CHA, each PER, and individual ONE.
13 Hollywood star who could move into elite domain (7,4)
MATINEE IDOL It’s an anagram slightly sneakily indicated. It could move into ELITE DOMAIN. Well, it could.
14 Ecstatic about ace stuff in ceremony (9)
SACRAMENT Held up by the P of my prototype. Ecstatic Is SENT, ace is A and stuff is CRAM. Insert parts B and C into A
16 Pine? 22 picked up in Californian city (4,5)
LONG BEACH 22 is BEECH as you may already know. Pine is LONG, and BEACH the other tree’s homophone (picked up).
18 Shrewd account about one of old (7)
ARCHAIC Another ARCH, this time clued by shrewd. Ad AC(count) with I (one) inserted.
19 Ran miles to embrace that chap? That’s the idea (7)
THEOREM Ran is TORE, M from M(iles) and an embrace HE for that chap.
21 Pointless trial attorney has abandoned before end of day (5)
EMPTY I think this is trial ATTEMPT with the ATT(ourney) abandoned, plus the end of daY
23 Organic material from our group supporting the sound of activity (5)
HUMUS What habebit nos post molestam senectutem. Our group is US, and the sound of activity HUM.
25 Time zone reduced after upset (3)
ERA I believe this is AREA for zone reversed, but without its final letter.

55 comments on “27946 Thursday, 8 April 2021 Mr and Mrs Igitur and their flamboyant son Gaudy Amos”

  1. After a fine start, I stalled out on this one for the better part of 10 minutes or so, not really able to proceed anywhere. I knew we needed ORNITH… but I thought we were looking for a kind of bird zoo, an aviary if you will, some synonym starting with ORNITH… Chambers suggests ORNITHOGAEA, for example.

    But after being stuck for so long I just gave the study a try and everything started opening up in the upper-right and lower-left. Happy to have gotten home in the end.

    Thanks for parsing EMPTY. I didn’t know the abbreviation of ‘attorney’.

  2. I was in dim mode, not seeing ‘cat’, not seeing the Uxbridgism in TACKY (I thought, well, nails are tacky until the polish dries), not seeing how EMPT worked even when I thought of TEMPT. DNK CRACK ON, E TYPE. LOI TIE once I got the T from POI THEOREM. TIE because it wasn’t TOE or TEE. I still don’t see how a tie is an element of bondage; tying, yes, but. I finally thought of THEOREM once I had the E,R,M; but then took ‘that chap’ to be THEO. Surprised I finished at all.
    1. Re TACKY, the great British scriptwriter, Barry Cryer, once defined irony on a radio programme as like steely, only different!

      Edited at 2021-04-08 04:02 am (UTC)

  3. I had a lot of fun with this. Thank you, Z, for your blog, especially for SANGFROID, PERGOLA, BEECH and EMPTY.
    I spent too long trying to justify CLAMP DOWN ON.
    I first came across AMONTILLADO about 50 years ago in a Daily Telegraph crossword when it was clued as
    “Wine waiter’s lament”.
    TACKY and FLASHBACK were my favourites today
  4. I was doing fine with this until I had completed all but the SW corner, and then I got myself well and truly stuck. All I had in place was SPA, CRACKDOWN and ERA and then I stared at the blanks for a good 10 minutes before writing in my next word, EXAMPLE. Every subsequent answer was also a mighty struggle. I got there in the end, only 6 minutes off an hour.
  5. This was hard, especially in the SW corner, with EMPTY my LOI unable to see how all the attorney stuff worked. Each of the last few clues was a slow challenge. I also had a word I couldn’t really justify, FLASHCARD, for a time. Living in California made LONG BEACH a write-in even before I had the other BEECH, which was then obvious. But I carelessly put SYBIL so two pink squares.
    1. Snap on all accounts even though I did pause briefly writing in SYBIL (still looks right)
  6. I was on the wavelength for this one. It helped that uncharacteristically I managed to avoid the tempting biffs others have mentioned — prototypes and headstones — though having of course considered both. It’s interesting that Zabadak mentions having crossing letters that you distrust. Recently I’ve taken to trying them briefly against their crossing answers but if I don’t get the crossing answers I take them out again. Otherwise I forget they are dubious then later come unstuck by taking them as gospel. I surprise myself by being able to hone my technique after many years of solving!
  7. 26 minutes with LOI EMPTY, unparsed. I’m still somewhat unconvinced. Wasn’t it established before all time that an attorney has to be the DA? COD to ALL THUMBS. A mainly straightforward puzzle.Thank you Z and setter.
    1. I am mortified that you remain somewhat unconvinced by ‘Empty’ – he is the main character in my novel. What are the chances?
      1. I’m sure that by the end of the book his character is full to overflowing. Or is he dead by then?
  8. …In which the Zephyr breathes the loudest song
    (but the E-type has the longer bonnet)

    30 mins to get to LOI, Minerva, so just the right degree of difficulty.
    I liked it, mostly the Arch E-type.
    Thanks setter and Z.

  9. Thanks Z. I enjoyed the latecomer to the graduation ball. There’s also the Mortarboard-Fitts and their brainy daughter Wilma. No problem with the crossword except that the confidently typed BINOCULARS were the wrong focal length.
  10. Just like others, SW slow as fixated on PROTOTYPE, HEADSTONE, FLASHCARD.

    I used to hitchhike a lot, all over England, France, Spain, Italy — always felt that women seemed to get more lifts, no correlation with THUMBS.

    24′ 32″, thanks z and setter.

  11. Like others, I found this quite tricky, taking just under the hour. Stuck in the SW. LOI EMPTY. Unparsed so thanks Z for that one. Took ages to see ARCHETYPE mainly because I believe the “marque” is Jaguar and “E-type” is the model. Also so many adding and taking away clues drive me nuts; Brief, lot of, not finished, not uniform, male eschewed, clearing area, and that’s just the across clues!

    I liked AMONTILLADO, ALL THUMBS and TACKY. Thanks Z and setter.

    1. I thought that too, about marque and model, but the dictionary when I later checked was more lenient.
      1. Apologies, late reply. Seems OK then but I still think that the word “marque”, which derives from the French, where it definitely means “make” of car, should apply only to the manufacturer or its main brands. Not the models therein. Francois.
        1. Yes, that’s how I use those words, too, Rose d’. Of course the one thing we’ve learnt by coming here day after day is that even the best dictionaries will allow usages that curl your toes.
  12. Would have been 31:20 but for a typo in 19d.

    Apart from that, took forever to work out what was going on with TUNES — I had thought of MINERVA for the crosser but wasn’t sure how that worked either.

    Doesn’t help either biffing FLASHCARD based on the first four checkers, then puzzling for a word that is C_A_D (CRACK)!

    A domani!

  13. 21.45. FOI sibyl, LOI eta having belatedly realised I’d somehow managed to put in examply rather than example at 24 ac.

    Good mix of clues today with a couple of classical allusions, homophones and sundry others. I liked this puzzle a lot . Interesting to see arch bisecting across and down. Don’t see that kind of coincidence too often.

    Two contenders for my COD torn between flashback and ornithology.

    Thanks setter and blogger.

    1. Just realised I got eta wrong. Missed era. Convoluted reasoning on my part, thought of eta as a time with ate as a reversed meaning of reduced. Ah well, can’t win them all.
  14. Never really felt on the wavelength, which doesn’t mean I didn’t find enjoyment in this puzzle. Glad that I thought of FLASHCARD and immediately erased the last four letters as “not explained by the clue so probably wrong”. As Pootle says, we can all learn, even if it takes us a lifetime. And just to prove that some lessons don’t stick, I followed the somewhat dubious reasoning in the previous comment, and put in ETA, despite it a) not really working with that clue b) not really being a proper word, when you think about it, as I didn’t. Ah well, tomorrow…
  15. 12:03 A bit slow getting started but then it was plain sailing. LOI the lovely TACKY. I rather liked SANGFROID too.
  16. A few biffs today, one of which unfortunately was CLAMP DOWN ON, only changed when I couldn’t get FLASH?A?P to resolve into anything sensible. Also spent a while trying to find an actual actor for 13d. Otherwise on the wavelength today.
  17. 13:45, finishing in the SW where I also thought Jaguar would be the marque and assumed the attorney must be a DA.
    It’s interesting that puzzles of average difficulty (based on time) like this always feel tricky. I understand why this is (I can exceed my average by 15 minutes but I can’t beat it by that much) but it’s still counter-intuitive, to me at least.
  18. Many thanks to setter and blogger.
    Re 27 ac. I’d just assumed nails were like tacks (e.g. carpet tacks)?
    Apologies if someone has already made this comment which I missed.
  19. Many thanks to setter and blogger.
    Apologies if this comment has already been made (I did check) but I had just assumed 27 ac. was a comparison of nails to (say, carpet) tacks?
    Ça marche?
    1. You’re right, of course, but the adjective tacky means a lot of things: a bit sticky, or sleazy, or in bad taste but not really “like a tack/nail”. That’s why the setter put in a question mark: the connection is humorous rather than technically correct. Martinp1 gave another good example with irony: a bit like iron (my adaptation). It could mean that, but it doesn’t.
  20. 29m today and another slowed down by an unconvincing ‘prototype’ and searching for a non existent Hollywood star — Tomadie Neil anyone? Thought not. But I did enjoy this one and definitely felt on the wavelength. Thank you, setter and of course, Z, for your always entertaining blog.
  21. Another who loved it, great puzzle. No obscurities (my GK and CK – crossword knowledge – covered everything). Great cryptic definitions in answers and clues. And very tricky, I was way over the snitch, but enjoyed every minute of it. No missteps, nothing unparsed, but very slow.
    Thanks setter and blogger.
  22. DAM and TUNES got me off to a reasonable start, then TOPIC and CHAPERON revealed the wise goddess to me. The rest of the NE followed with pleasing rapidity and I moved on in a clockwise direction. I was diverted by the SPA back into the NW where more answers tripped into the finger ends, with only FLASHCARD causing a bit of delay when I returned to the SW. I eventually spotted CRACK DOWN ON and had a FLASHBACK. Spent a while trying to extract the DA from 21d, my LOI, but saw EMPTY from the crossers and bunged it in. 22:46. Thanks setter and Z.
  23. Semi-biffed PROTOTYPE and, exactly as articulated above, began to doubt all the crossers. Only on forcing myself to rethink (and delete) did the bottom left corner open up. Good stuff. I particularly enjoyed ORNITHOLOGY, not a sentence I ever thoughts I’d type.
  24. Fell into the same dead-end biff-traps noted by others — PROTOTYPE, HEADSTONE and FLASHCARD. Too many interruptions this morning to record a time but must have been heading towards an hour before I’d fully retraced my steps and read the clues properly.
  25. in 2 sessions. Yes, much biffing-in-the-marsh, most of which sent me nowhere.
    ARCHAIC was the hardest for me, as I had the clue upside down. And I needed it to get my LOI TACKY
  26. LOI FLASHBACK, which I couldn’t parse as I saw the ‘loud’ part of the wordplay to mean ‘flash’, as in flashy clothes. How then might a cat act ‘back’? I even thought of the cat as a whip, a queen, a catamaran etc without seeing what Z has kindly explained. Doh!
    30’58”
    1. Had the F checker, so what does a cat do? Eat birds… F eat heron, with heron’s “feather on” the killing ground. Except of course featheron isn’t a word. Was one of my last in.
  27. Had to put this one down with 8 clues outstanding — annoyingly 2 in each corner.
    Came back after a 30 minute nap and it all fell into place.
    Funny how that happens sometimes — others have remarked upon it recently.
    I wonder what Astro Nowt has to say about “Ornithology” being an answer?
    1. I was wondering about Astro Nowt myself. Seems he’s too disgusted to even post!
  28. Another flashcarder here, and not helped by mis-spelling Sacrament with an ‘e’ in the key ‘a’ crossing location. I liked the puzzle, only thinking that the otherwise smooth and clever cluing was roiled by the “in” at 11a and the marque/model lack-of-distinction (I don’t care what the dictionary says) at 20a. Thanks, Z

    Edited at 2021-04-08 02:27 pm (UTC)

  29. ….Madelin Dote, I avoided further pitfalls and finished this enjoyable puzzle without dramas.

    Any other Granada ITV viewers will be only too familiar with the little girl who waves her plastic spade at the workers in the annoying United Utilities advert, and says “Let’s crack on !” I was therefore really annoyed to make 17A my LOI.

    FOI TOPIC
    LOI CRACK DOWN ON
    COD FLASHBACK
    TIME 10:04

  30. Including CRACK DOWN ON, LOI, as it took me a while to accept (not to see) CRACK ON for “proceed.” Also took E TYPE on faith. (And now I’ll look it up.)
    Gave my mental jaws some exercise, but tasty enough.
    I hitchhiked all the way across the USA a few times in my early 20s, and made record time. I thought of myself, in fact, as the male Sissy Hankshaw (from the above-mentioned Tom Robbins novel), though my thumbs are normal size.

    Edited at 2021-04-08 04:06 pm (UTC)

    1. It’s BEECH not BEACH. Have you read the blog?

      Edited at 2021-04-08 05:52 pm (UTC)

  32. Didn’t like some of this one, had problems in the SW corner too. Don’t see that a FLASHBACK is same as a reminder, tried hard but failed to justify FLASHCARD which is. Though a sacrament was a Thing not a ceremony. Not convinced about EMPTY, I can see empty gesture = pointless gesture but couldn’t parse it, ATT for attorney is a new one on me. 1a and 8d were good, the rest mundane.
  33. 20.10. I found this hard to get started but managed to get through ok in the end. The right level of challenge for me to engage without frustrating.
  34. Thanks to blogger for sorting out 21d and for a well written blog
    It’s always appreciated even if I rarely comment
    Enjoyed the crossword too
  35. 54 minutes, so not too easy, but a delightful puzzle which I enjoyed very much. No obscurities — what presented a challenge was the cleverness and wit of the clues, a refreshing change from many recent puzzles. SANGFROID was my LOI — I saw the ID early on but couldn’t see a whole word ending with that until SANGFROID just presented itself without any help on my part, as it seemed. I was sure 20 ac would be starting with AUTO????? until ARCHAIC scotched that, and for 3dn I had FLASHCARD, but couldn’t see how C…D could fit into 17ac, and so corrected it.
    COD to ORNITHOLOGY, among other excellent clues.

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