13.10, though I thought it was going to be quicker. After the chastening challenge of the first Competition grid yesterday this felt like a generous helping of light relief, and in the early stages I checked to see it had the requisite number of squares for Bigger Brother.
There are some clearly flagged anagrams, and I believe the one bit of TLS knowledge required should be within the reach of most solvers. I didn’t spot any unusual vocabulary, but as always I defer to those who do.
Definitions underlined in italics, with omitted letters enclosed on [square brackets] and everything else explained in immaculate prose.
| Across | |
| 1 | Challenged wicked madcap (9) |
| DAREDEVIL – Challenged is DARED, and wicked EVIL. | |
| 6 | Sober report’s conclusion mentioned arrests (5) |
| STAID – Conclusion of report is T, SAID for mentioned takes it in (arrests). | |
| 9 | Duck out? A black mark (7) |
| ABSTAIN – A plus B[lack] plus STAIN for mark. | |
| 10 | Inspiring object keeps spirit attacking in combat (7) |
| LUNGING – An object that inspires is a LUNG (it breathes in). Get it to keep GIN, a spirit. | |
| 11 | Family giving away new child (3) |
| KID – Family in this case is KIND, remove the N[ew] | |
| 12 | Chop Algeria into bits making group of islands (11) |
| ARCHIPELAGO – An anagram (into bits) of CHOP ALGERIA. You’ll not often get a plainer anagram clue. | |
| 14 | What widow used to wear on back of smart clothes (6) |
| TWEEDS – WEED is apparently archaic for clothing, not connected to unwanted plants. Widows WEEDS might still be in use, and refers to clothes worn when mourning: see any picture of Victoria after Albert died. Put the last letter of smarT at the front. | |
| 15 | Joint parliament welcomes old retired soldier (8) |
| DOVETAIL – Neither an anatomical or recreational joint, but carpentry. Parliament, the Irish one, gives DÁIL, which welcomes an O[ld] VET[eran] or retired soldier in. Don’t try the usual crossword “retire” by reversing something. | |
| 17 | Licentious closing time never forgotten (8) |
| IMMORTAL – Licentious is IMMORAL which is (en)closing T[ime]. | |
| 19 | One scorching vocalist (6) |
| SINGER – Two definitions, the first perhaps a little whimsical and pronounced with a softer G. | |
| 22 | Teacher at her best using bad language (11) |
| MISSPEAKING – MISS, your teacher, is PEAKING, reaching her best. | |
| 23 | One punches everyone in the ear (3) |
| AWL – Aural wordplay (in the ear) of everyone or ALL. | |
| 25 | Pass on nasty flu, one hard to control (7) |
| HANDFUL – Pass on is HAND, and an anagram (nasty) of FLU gives you the FUL. | |
| 27 | This writer’s work is getting harder (7) |
| SETTING – Setting in the concrete sense. The – um – setter, this writer, is referring to their own work. | |
| 28 | Brave, but not to start with, like Jim in novel? (5) |
| LUCKY – Brave is PLUCKY, remove the first letter. The reference is to the Kingsley Amis novel Lucky Jim. | |
| 29 | Editor is never, not ever, to change puzzle (9) |
| DISORIENT – An anagram (to change) with the fodder constructed from EDITOR IS NEVER without EVER | |
| Down | |
| 1 | Took glasses, finally spotted where taxi might be (5) |
| DRANK – The last letter of spotteD plus the RANK where a taxi might be found, if you’re lucky. | |
| 2 | Lodge retains for all to see what’s not been taken (7) |
| RESIDUE – Lodge is RESIDE, into which the U, cinema certification for suitable for all, is inserted. | |
| 3 | Prod grandad struggling to move on-screen (4,3,4) |
| DRAG AND DROP – An anagram (struggling) of PROD GRANDAD. | |
| 4 | Tourist destination is jolly pleasant without Rodney on vacation (6) |
| VENICE – Jolly pleasant is VERY NICE. Take out the R[odne]Y, the name emptied of its interior letters. | |
| 5 | Sweet to sprawl with one soft drink (8) |
| LOLLIPOP – Sprawl translates to LOLL, add I (one) POP for soft drink. | |
| 6 | In this state because divorced from church? (3) |
| SIN – I’ll rather generously call this an &lit: because is SINCE, remove the CE derived from the Church of England. | |
| 7 | From thieves he stole a large cake — I tucked in (3,4) |
| ALI BABA – He of the 40 thieves. A L[arge] BABA (a rum baba is a sort of cake that was a permanent fixture on the Wimpy menu). Tuck in the I. | |
| 8 | One may be given a lead to follow arrest (3,6) |
| DOG COLLAR – Follow is DOG, and arrest gives COLLAR. | |
| 13 | Deviously vet earnings for western luminary (7,4) |
| EVENING STAR – Venus appears in the western sky after sunset as a bright star. Here, its alternative name is produced from an anagram (deviously) of VET EARNINGS. | |
| 14 | Celebrating success of president hosting current prince (9) |
| TRIUMPHAL – The president is, of course, TRUMP, holding I for (electrical) current and accompanied by prince HAL, later Henry V. We bloggers have been asked not to make political comments, which leaves you free to make up your own. | |
| 16 | Chap was out front nursing a cold, severely restricted (8) |
| MANACLED – Chap is MAN, was out front gives LED, insert A C[old]. | |
| 18 | Two family members in charge of craft (7) |
| MASONIC – With a capital C, The Craft can refer to Freemasonry. Here our derived adjective is constructed from MA and SON, two family members, plus the abbreviated I[n] C[harge]. | |
| 20 | Managed in holiday cottage? It’s very hard (7) |
| GRANITE – In the days before Airbnb, a GITE was (probably still is) a French cottage rented out to holidaymakers. Insert RAN for managed. | |
| 21 | Wife is top American beauty? (6) |
| MISSUS – A top American beauty would be MISS US. | |
| 24 | Insult snubbing leader is not serious (5) |
| LIGHT – I’ll go for SLIGHT for insult, and knock off the leading S. | |
| 26 | Whimsical female you once upset (3) |
| FEY – Just F[emale] with YE, the old form of you, reversed or upset. | |
Very slow to start, apart from ARCHIPELAGO I didn’t see anything else for a few minutes. Battled my way through though and managed to finish all correct with only one unparsed, VENICE, thanks Z. MISSPEAKING took some time to fathom along with my last two in; TWEEDS and LUNGING. I knew ‘tweeds’ for clothes but not the widow link. KID took a lot longer than it should but couldn’t think of ‘kind’. NHO FEY but the wordplay was clear. Liked the misdirection of DRAG AND DROP which had me thinking about everything except computer screens. I see Trump has reared his not so pretty head again in TRIUMPHAL, Guy will not be pleased. A good Thursday puzzle which nearly saw me throw in the towel but I persevered.
Thanks Z and setter.
22:01
Not a tricky Thursday. I should have been faster, but at 3d I bunged in DROP AND DRAG–I wasn’t familiar with the correct term, but a moment’s thought should have sufficed–which delayed ABSTAIN & MISSPEAKING. I thought of MISSUS early on, but for some reason (dimness suggests itself) it took me a long time to see how it worked; my LOI.
I’m quite familiar with the correct term, but I did the same thing with DROP AND DRAG, and, as I was falling asleep, I didn’t even correct it to get those two answers until this morning!
I liked Sin, one of those clues which got written in, then got richer and much better as the parsing revealed the subtlety. No serious problems, though Lollipop and Lunging took a while to see.
Yes, definitely not Tricky Tuesday – probably moved to Wednesday for now. Still, I was slow – could not remember widow’s weeds and Lucky Jim as quickly as I should have. I was a little puzzled by dog collar – where does a clergyman appear in the clue? – only to realize that we are talking about an actual dog. Dovetail was my LOI, as I tried dail in several places, including reversals, before I figured out how to use it.
I wouldn’t necessarily take Ian’s invitation too seriously – I have deleted irrelevant political comments in the past, so let’s stay on-topic here.
Time: 21:53
I thought of Lord Jim first, but didn’t spend too much time before getting Lucky.
19:51 – only the WEEDS were new to me. Given the stated lightness I was hoping for sub-15, but ho hum. Spent too long looking for a drink at LOLLIPOP and considering LANCING for LUNGING. Didn’t really know DAIL but guessed it was Irish Parliament – ‘ai’ is quite common in Irish, it seems. On the evening star, suffice it to quote this old puzzle:
“It’s a curious fact that “Hesperus” is the Greek name of the evening star and “Phosphorus” is the Greek name of the morning star. As a matter of fact, the heavenly body people used these names for is just one thing—the planet Venus. Suppose Caroline does not know that fact. Given this, when she sincerely asserts “Hesperus is not Phosphorus,” what is she believing? Despite the fact that the morning star and evening star are both Venus, to many it seems incorrect to say that Caroline is believing the contradictory claims that Venus is not Venus, Hesperus is not Hesperus, or Phosphorus is not Phosphorus. Caroline is not irrational, so none of those things seems to capture what she is thinking.”
The answer is probably somewhere in “Naming and Necessity” by Saul Kripke.
31 minutes missing my target by 1. If only I hadn’t distracted myself momentarily confused by KIND (family) also containing KIN, the more usual word for ‘family’ in wordplay.
For some reason those answers giving me the most trouble started with D: DRAG/DROP, DAREDEVIL, DOVETAIL and DISORIENT (but not Donald). A really nice, even puzzle I thought, with a good mix of clues. 24.51, thank you Z.
From Subterranean Homesick Blues:
Look out KID, don’t matter what you did
Walk on your tiptoes, don’t try No-Doz
Better stay away from those that carry around a fire hose
Keep a clean nose, watch the plain clothes
You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows
No-Doz?!
According to the official web site, bobdylan.com, these are the correct lyrics.
I dare say. I just wondered what they meant..
No-Doz (sc. no doze) is an OTC caffeine pill. https://www.nodoz.com
Ha, a drug, should have guessed. Thanks, Kevin..
Back in the 1960’s the Toronto Maple Leaf ice hockey team had a high-scoring forward, Frank Mahovlich, who had a deceptively slow, measured approach to the game in contrast to his more energetic teammates. Often when Frank was skating especially deliberately and circumspectly cries of “Frank, take some No-Doz!” would ring out from the crowd.
Also a song by Calexico.
Phew, normal service has been resumed after yesterday’s horror show! What a pleasure.
27 mins and another with LOI DOVETAIL. Lots to like including a good spattering of meaty anagrams as our blogger mentions, especially ARCHIPELAGO.
Thanks Z and friendly setter.
Reassuringly straightforward today. Liked the dog’s collar, and prodding granddad..
47:14, clean solve.
So much better than yesterday. Especially the vocab, all reasonably common, certainly no NHOs.
DAREDEVIL held me up at the end, and once it went in the NW cleaned up fast.
I rather liked the self-referential SETTING and DISORIENT
32 mins. Yesterday I made the error of not checking an anagram. Today I repeated it and misspelled ARCHIPELAGO which held me up with ALI BABA .
24 minutes with LOI LUNGING. Fingers were crossed for TWEEDS but I had no alternative. Bring back the RUM BABA, although I could never make up my mind when to eat the glacé cherry. COD to MISSUS, with visions of Andy Capp’s wife Flo winning America’s most beautiful woman in her curlers. Nice puzzle. Thank you Z and setter.
14:28. LOI TWEEDS with a shrug not knowing what widows wear nor WEDS for clothes. I liked the prodded grandad and the surface for DISORIENT. Thank-you Z and setter.
17 minutes. I didn’t parse some as carefully as I should have, eg SIN but I was so glad to have some respite between yesterday and probably tomorrow that I was happy just to put in answers that appeared to be correct. I had seen variations on MISS US before but it still managed to trick me and, like Kevin, it was my LOI.
A nice confidence boost after yesterday. 24:46 but like the blogger felt it could have been quicker. Many answers got an “of course” after toiling with them for far too long.
AWL I must have put this word in a crossword more times than I have actually seen one in real life.
NHO GITE but glad the checking letters and literal were kind.
FEY I thought was referring to Tina Fey who had a bit of fame on these shores for her Sarah Palin impressions. I was going to have a moan about double duty before I remembered that meaning of fey.
COD: DISORIENT not sure if it was a sly dig from the setter.
Oh why did I enter ‘fly’, today?
When it should have been ‘fey’.
18:53. A feel good treat. I liked SETTING and MISS US. And I liked all of the three-letter words, so AWL is my COD (nice surface) and FEY is my WOD
Just over half an hour, with nearly half of that on the frustrating TWEEDS. I considered TRENDY, TRENDS and even a mombled TIERDY (‘on back’ = er, contained by tidy (‘smart clothes’), albeit that doesn’t work with the ‘of’ in the clue), but eventually I convinced myself that widow’s weeds were a thing and went for it.
– Didn’t know which novel LUCKY Jim was from
– Had to trust that a gite is a holiday cottage to get GRANITE
– Spent a long time thinking 21d started with ‘Wis’, until the S from DISORIENT pushed me towards MISSUS
Thanks Zabadak and setter.
FOI Sin
LOI Tweeds
COD Dovetail
9:28
Confidence restored after yesterday’s drubbing. There is probably a sweet spot somewhere between the two.
21:54. Another who felt it should have been quicker so maybe it was deceptive, the enjoyment masking some tricksy stuff.
Took ages to work out DISORIENT despite spotting the method early.
Great fun, thanks Zabadak and setter.
A Monday Thursday, 12 minutes, equal PB,nothing biffed, nothing to hold me up here. NW corner went in last.
Like others found this much more forgiving than yesterday, allowing a reasonable holiday 25′ or so time. Enjoyed MISSUS albeit it was a gimme, WEEDS linked to widows came from somewhere. Didn’t see the parsing for sin, focusing on because=as. Thanks Z and setter
41 mins which is not bad for me and a big relief to be able to complete a puzzle after a run of DNFs.
Held up by putting in willful at 25a which seemed to me a perfectly good answer until it was clear it wasn’t.
Properly speaking, an archipelago is not a collection of islands, but the sea that surrounds it.
That depends on how proper you wish to be. The OED says: “Any sea, or sheet of water, in which there are numerous islands; and transferred, a group of islands.” Which is good enough for me .. in fact I would go further. The normal usage in modern English is in fact to the islands, not the sea.
There must be several other instances of the secondary (almost opposite) meaning being the more common. Of course, can’t think of any, but will endeavour to come up with some during this evening’s RCM concert!
I agree.
But if we’re sticking to normal English usage, a good deal of what we quote from the dictionaries in justifying clues would be invalid.
Alternatively, if the definition to this clue had been ‘sea of islands’, everyone would be saying ‘I never knew that, but it must be correct because it’s in the dictionary’. The dictionary-trawlers would love it, but most of us would be cursing the setter because it’s not normal usage.
My point being, when do we rely on the dictionary and when do we not?
A bit of light relief after the preceding battles! From DRANK to MISSUS in 12:56. An enjoyable puzzle. Thanks setter and Z.
20 mins – all went in fairly steadily once I got a toehold in the NE, though MISSUS took a disproportionate amount of time
My thanks to Zabadak and setter.
Not-tricky Thursday,fortunately.
15a LOI Dovetail. I wasn’t thinking of those joints. And the Dail isn’t the first parliament I think of, I went for Diet and Owls first, and I was trying to reverse stuff.
23a POI “All I live by is by the awl” from Shakespeare. Cobbler in is it Julius Ceasar?
18d Masonic, DNK its connection to Craft.
21d Doh! Missed Miss US. Biffed.
Much of this was like a Quick Cryptic and at one point I thought I was going to be under 20 minutes, something that is increasingly rare. However, it started to become a bit harder: LUNGING came slowly, and I’m sure I’ve seen something very similar to MISSUS before, but it stopped me for a while. Then DISORIENT, which struck me as a bit dodgy in that one has to remove ever from never to get N, before anagramming, so that it becomes a sort of indirect clue, or what Azed calls a clue to a clue. I think it’s conventional (for some reason) that single letters can be worked out before anagramming, but surely not this sort of thing? 26 minutes.
17:34 WOE
No problems with most of this before slowing up towards the end. Was half expecting the Unlucky sign, which I duly got: not for TWEEDS however, but for the perfectly sensible COXEDAIL right beside it. At least, it seemed sensible at the time. Ah well – thanks Z and setter.
Thoroughly enjoyable and very gettable. Makes a change from recent experience of struggling through one block after another. Dog collar caused the same pause as some other commentators and Tweeds came easily enough but with only a slight suspicion of memory of widows weeds.
10:48. Moderate.
I knew the term for clothes (‘let me see thee in thy woman’s weeds’) but I’m not sure I’ve come across the connection to widowhood before.
I thought briefly that ‘whimsical female’ was a slightly reductive way if describing Tina Fey. A brilliant comedian and writer: 30 Rock is a classic.
Hear hear for Tina Fey, winner of the Mark Twain Award and others! Love her to death. And I knew she was a Philly girl before she told me (she reminded me of someone special…)
Ah good, I can still do these.
SIN was LOI and I was only alerted to it after trying to submit but getting an incomplete message.
13:16
A quick one by my standards finishing in a speedy 22.44, although at one time I thought it may be even quicker. I got bogged down a little at the end with the MISSUS and SETTING crossers, but a good ninety seconds or so were frustratingly spent on my LOI DOVETAIL.
50 mins … LOI was DOVETAIL after staring at it for something like 15 minutes, and once it went in I clicked that button so hard my laptop bounced, so happy was I to be rid of that clue. Now I can finally go back and parse it. COD was probably MISSUS.
16.31
Felt a bit slow as I was held up at the end on the crossing DOVETAIL (wanted a reversed aged) LOLLIPOP (wanted lie) and LUNGING (had the -GING). But as others have said a blessed relief after yesterday’s horror show.
DOVETAIL was smooth; SIN was clever and VENICE was amusing.
Thanks Zabadak and setter.
I thought this was the QC, but a hard one. Persevered, and with a few biffs got home in 41:00 to find that this was the 15×15! Chuffed to have managed it!
Welcome aboard! You won’t look back, although Friday can be a difficult day ..
9 minutes, a pleasant relief after yesterday’s struggle.
25:54. I flew through the first half, and the last few on the RHS caught me out… LOI was DOVETAIL. thanks for something easier than yesterday’s!
22.58 Pretty gentle but not as easy as the SNITCH suggested. I liked SETTING. LOI DOVETAIL. Thanks Zabadak.
19:38
A pleasant return to a solvable crossword. SIN and DISORIENT were my two favourite clues. MISSUS was my LOI.
Thanks Z and setter
Solvability confirmed by my 19:05. Got stuck on DISORIENT (I wanted it to be a noun) and LOI DOVETAIL, where I had the wrong sort of joint, and was trying reversals, AND misread “soldier” as “sailor”!
Many thanks Z.
MISSPEAKING surely doesn’t mean ‘bad language’ except in the very loosest sense? A misspeak usually contains correct use of language, but conveys the wrong meaning.
15’50”. Narrowly avoided LANCING.
Nice puzzle. Like Z, I checked I wasn’t doing the Quickie, but things slowed down about half-way through, with some obscure definitions, such as MISSPEAKING, LOI. Liked SIN, VENICE and DISORIENT. DOVETAIL also took longer than it should have. A relief after yesterday, though…
5:12 and all parsed as I went through. Back on the wavelength after yesterday. Perhaps tomorrow will be a stinker?
I m finally in the running! All present and correct apart from LUNGING which just wouldn’t come ( so a lookup, just to finish in my fastest time for quite a while). Had all the requisite GK (including widows WEEDS, DRAG AND DROP and LUCKY Jim). 19a a bit QC, but otherwise fun and do-able. COD SETTING.