Jumbo 799 – 7th February 2009

Author   7dpenguinPosted on Categories Jumbo Cryptic
The new Jumbo regime and the first one’s already late! I only found out that I was definitely doing this one last night (Sunday) so apologies to anyone who has been beside themselves with eager anticipation. Because I didn’t know I was blogging this I didn’t time myself but It was round about the 30 minute mark, about medium difficulty. We’ve been a bit spoilt recently with Jumbos. I thought this was another excellent one but not quite as entertaining as some in the recent past. I only noticed when writing this that the across clues are positively littered with insertion clues.

Across
1 DEPOSIT – TI(SOP)ED all reversed
5 REC(EP)TOR
9 SHUCKS – I didn’t know this but a shuck is the husk, pod or shell of a pea, hickory nut or ear of corn, or the shell of a clam or oyster. Aaah shucks!
14 SWA(MP)Y Everybody’s favourite eco-warrior
17 KIWI – “key wee”
18 GREATCOAT – (A COTTAGER)*
20 PILCHARD – DIP rev around L,CHAR
21 TAM-O-SHANTER – (HATTER MAN SO)* Silly hat beloved of the Scots of which Robert Burns wrote:

This truth fand honest Tam o’ Shanter,
As he frae Ayr ae night did canter:
(Auld Ayr, wham ne’er a town surpasses,
For honest men and bonie lasses).

For which he scored 2/10 for spelling and was asked to stay behind to see Miss
 
24 PO(O,L)TABLE This setter is a fan of insertions! I like “pub regular” for the definition
25 FO(RE NAM)E Told you so. Very devious clue – Napoleon is a forename and Hitler isn’t.
29 T(R)END,SETTER – very funny
33 FLIP ONES LID – double definition – another good spot from the setter
36 G(LASS)B,LOWER. Another insertion clue. I promise I won’t mention this again
39 SUP,POSER
41 TELEVISED – LEVI in (STEED)* In the Torah Levi is one of the Twelve Testaments of the Patriarch. Some of the others are Reuben, Simeon and Wrangler
44 BULLET TRAIN – I struggled to understand this, but its U (classy) +  L (line) + LETT (European) in BRAIN
45 ON THE SLY – ONLY around THES[-pian]
48 O,VE(N)G,LOVE – another one  to reverse engineer once you have the answer
50 RIG,A TON,I – small tubey pasta, usually ridged
52 SHINTO – (THIS NO)*
53 PIGGY IN THE MIDDLE – another head scratcher and there may be some complaints (not from me, I like things like this). The word CASSOWARY has SOW at its center, thus “piggy in the middle”
54 RA(GIN)G
56 [sigh]T,ANGEL,O – I think the meanings are as in the phrases “be a dear” and “be an angel”

Down
1 DON,J,ON – my new word of the day. It’s an earlier word for “keep”
2 POTTER – 2 defs one being Harry
3 SHORT LIST – you’ve got to admire the humour of clueing this as “CATALOGU? ” but is this enough? Again, I give it the thumbs up
4 THE CRUCIBLE – easy clue, only included because it’s one of the five literature facts I know.
6 C,HEM IN,DEFER – chemin de fer is a variant of the card game baccarat, one of the easiest games to learn and one of the easiest ways to lose money
7 PREHISTORIC – another tricky one. PRETORI[-a] around HIS then C
8 O(RANGE)MAN
10 HOWS THAT – excellent clue. HO(W)ST, HAT. Lift and separate – bowler is HAT and the definition is just “appeal”
11 COME OUT IN THE WASH – two defs, one a little whimsical
12 S,HYSTER[-ectomy]
15
 		 BESSEMER – MESS rev in BEER. Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm beer. The Bessemer process was the first inexpensive industrial process for the mass-production of steel from molten pig iron, named after its inventor, Henry Inexpensiveindustrialprocessforthemassproductionofsteelfrommoltenpigiron
19 PARENTAL (PATERNAL)* Not too keen on this one
22 SPITEFUL – (FLIES PUT)*
23 LOVE LIES BLEEDING – Amaranthus caudatus for the botanically inclined
27 BEST RIDE – excellence in four words “Get on the favourite?”
28 TALL – excellence in four words “Unlikely — to be short?” Unlikely here as in “tall story”
32 C(HAS,T)ITY
35 DI,SENT,ANGLE
36 GARBOLOGIST – LOG in (BAG I SORT)* Apparently you can take a course in GARBOLOGY at the University of Arizona. It must be true coz it’s in Wikipedia
37 SELF EVIDENT – (FIELD EVENTS)* one of those opportune anagrams that make you smile like MANCHESTER CITY and SYNTHETIC CREAM
40 PEACE PIPE – “PIECE” + PI(P)E. “Item on reservation” is a nice def
42 VULGARIAN – BULGARIAN with a change of leadership
43 H(EIGHT)EN – “…as chicken feed” to mean “put … in HEN” is genius
46 POODLE – not to keen on “Woofing toady?” as a clue. What does it mean?
47
 		 LIBERO – include in “more bilge” reversed. A libero is a sweeper at football. A sweeper is a defender with more of a free role (hence libero) than the full backs. It’s just nonsense, I bet Motty has never uttered the word “libero” in his life!

2 comments on “Jumbo 799 – 7th February 2009”

  1. I actually only got rund to solving this last Thursday, so it’s still fresh in my mind. Just over the half-hour for me, which gives it “average” status. I don’t mind the odd clue like 3D either – Ximenes might turn in his grave, but I don’t think there’s any ambiguity there, so it’s not unfair to the solver. It’s a bit like a famous clue which I first saw in the Telegraph about 25 years ago: GGSE? (9,4) = SCRAMBLED EGGS. Some love that sort of thing, purists hate it.
  2. The report’s lateness was my fault for not getting a new schedule out in good time. I struggled a bit with this, taking 41:30. Also slipped up on 46, hastily confusing woofing with wolfing, and putting FOODIE.

    I suspect Motty has uttered ‘libero’, sometime back in the 1970s when Franz Beckenbauer was playing this role – he seems to get quoted as the classic libero/sweeper.

    Edited at 2009-02-24 08:48 am (UTC)

Comments are closed.