My fastest solving time ever – 4 mins 58 secs.
This was a very easy Friday effort, as evidenced by the time it took me to solve it. There were no difficult words, or oblique references, and, although I entered two or three answers without being absolutely certain of the wordplay at the time, my hunches appeared to be sound.
This will be a fairly short blog entry, as I don’t think many of the clues require a lot of explanation.
Across | |
---|---|
8 | CO(P)Y |
9 | MATCH POINT – (t into champ)* – excellent & lit. clue |
10 | AT BOTTOM – where the Titanic certainly is |
13 | ALCHEMISTS – scientists who tried to transform base metals into precious ones, therefore “scientifically unsound” |
18 | SACRAMENT-O – state capital of California |
22 | POLK-ADO-T – referring to James K Polk, 11th President of the US |
24 | MANUSCRIPT – (print camus)* |
27 | MAGI-S(T)ERIALLY |
Down | |
1 | AM-ON-TILL-ADO – a medium sherry often served as an aperitif |
3 | SOMETIMES – as in that “was some Times article today!” |
4 | IS-TH(M)US |
6 | IRON HORSE – “club” in a clue always has me thinking of IRON, WOOD or C, so this was easy enough |
7 | NUN – homophone of NONE |
12 | IMPETUOSITY – (me pity is out)* |
14 | HAMSTRUNG – HAMS-(grunt)* |
15 | SCARLATTI – (cast trial)* – Alessandro Scarlatti (1660-1725), composer of operas and cantatas |
19 | CAPSIZE – one’s cap size may indicate the size of one’s head, and conceited people are considered “big heads” |
21 | LOCUS – “place” as opposed to LOCUM (“doctor temporarily”), the change of case referring to the change from the accusative to the nominative case, if my O-grade Latin of many moons ago serves me correctly. |
23 | AVAIL – homophone of A VEIL, which a nun would indeed take. |
Despite the obvious wordplay, I spent far too long on the 2 unchecked letters of 17A (not mentioned above), which nudged me just over 20 mins all told.
Al
But had I been trying a “clean sweep” I’d have been much slower!
As I tend to do bits and pieces of X-words as a break from work for a minute or so at a time I don’t really time myself. This was quite a quick one even for me.
There are some “easies”:
1a Repeatedly fool people about one murder (13)
ASS ASS I NATION
11a Not the only one to succeed in firm he and I run (6)
CO HE I R
16a It’s right and proper to be so absorbed (4)
R APT
17a Still casting line in river (4)
CA L M
20a One form of accommodation eclipses second, less expensive type (6)
HO S TEL
26a A variable in algebra is put on this line (4)
A X IS
2d E.g. note providing authorisation (3-2)
SAY – SO
5d Hospital’s brought in a medic for a special operation (2,3)
A D H OC
25d Object in front of fire! (3)
AIM