11:42; all present and correct. Not as hard as the Orpheus I blogged a couple of weeks ago but still more than enough to keep the solver honest. Favourites were 23a and 8d.
A few that I found difficult to explain convincingly, so as ever, suggestions welcomed.
Thanks to Teazel
Definitions underlined in bold, deletions marked by strikethrough
| Across | |
| 1 | Demonstrate lack of leisure for entertainment (4,8) |
| SHOW BUSINESS – SHOW (‘Demonstrate’) BUSINESS (‘lack of leisure’) | |
| 9 | Lesson Mike has spoken (5) |
| MORAL – M (‘Mike’ in NATO alphabet) ORAL (‘spoken’)
Not too difficult to bung in, but to parse correctly you need to separate the ‘has’ and ‘spoken’ |
|
| 10 | Instruction single young woman may want? (7) |
| MANDATE – Wordplay as cryptic hint. A ‘single young woman may want’ a MAN DATE | |
| 11 | Saw how birthday cake was defective? (7) |
| NOTICED – Another wordplay as cryptic hint. One way a ‘birthday cake was defective’ would be if it was NOT ICED | |
| 12 | Estimated trade is bad (5) |
| RATED – Anagram (‘is bad’) of TRADE | |
| 13 | Drunken bachelor at bingo (6) |
| BLOTTO – B (‘Bachelor’) LOTTO (‘bingo’)
This looked familiar and surprise, surprise, it was an answer in the Orpheus from a couple of weeks ago. Given the number of words for ‘drunken’ at our setters’ disposal, this re-appearance within such a short space of time merits a comment |
|
| 14 | Sportsman foiled? (6) |
| FENCER – Cryptic definition; ‘foiled?’ in the sense of armed with a foil, a small sword used by a FENCER
Another one I liked, though some may feel it is not cryptic enough |
|
| 17 | Relax, conserving energy for corrective operation (5) |
| RESET – REST (‘Relax’) containing (‘conserving’) E (‘energy’) | |
| 19 | One enters pantry, becoming fatter (7) |
| LARDIER – I (‘One’) contained in (‘enters’) LARDER (‘pantry’)
I’d wondered if there was a difference between a larder and a pantry as they seem to be used interchangeably and are listed as synonymous in several thesauri. According to the OED, pantry originally came from the Anglo-French panetrie, meaning a “bread-room” and larder was originally used for a room in which “meat (? orig. bacon)” was stored, being derived from the Latin term for “lard” via Anglo-French |
|
| 21 | Insulting a form of transport I have joined (7) |
| ABUSIVE – A (‘a’) BUS (‘form of transport’) IVE (‘I have’) | |
| 22 | Exhaust beginning to drip with water (5) |
| DRAIN – D (‘beginning to drip’=first letter of ‘Drip’) RAIN (‘water’) | |
| 23 | Understanding nervousness is catching (12) |
| APPREHENSION – Triple definition
We’ve probably had something similar to this before, but I still liked it |
|
| Down | |
| 2 | Nelson’s hard speech left unfinished (7) |
| HORATIO – H (‘hard’) ORATIO |
|
| 3 | Tiger, eg, to attack when employees are out unofficially (7,6) |
| WILDCAT STRIKE – WILDCAT (‘Tiger, eg’) STRIKE (‘attack’) | |
| 4 | Ruined, like a messy bed (6) |
| UNMADE – Wordplay as cryptic hint. An UNMADE bed would be a ‘messy bed’
As a verb in the present tense, to unmake = to ruin. No, not a common sense or synonym but it’s in the accepted sources |
|
| 5 | Islands: nine birds here flying (5,8) |
| INNER HEBRIDES – Anagram (‘flying’) of NINE BIRDS HERE
Good surface. I had to mull over this for quite a while to work out the definition and then had to muck about with several options for the anagram fodder. I’m not sure that I’ve seen ‘flying’ as an anagram indicator often before, but it works for me. I could take a stab at the ‘nine birds’ but I’d need to look up the last few; anyway, there must be a few rum ones there that I don’t know about |
|
| 6 | Lift up old key (5) |
| EXALT –EX (‘old’) ALT (‘key’)
It took me a while to see ‘up’ as anything other than a reversal indicator. I keep getting (and will continue to keep getting) EXALT mixed up with “exult” |
|
| 7 | Fine mess finally at bank perhaps (7) |
| SLENDER – S (‘mess finally’=last letter of ‘mesS‘) LENDER (‘bank perhaps’) | |
| 8 | Answer by the people? (4) |
| AMEN – This would do as an all-in-one / &lit for me, with the whole clue as an admittedly not very cryptic definition and all of the clue contributing to the wordplay: A (‘Answer’) MEN (‘the people?’) with ‘by’ as a positional indicator | |
| 13 | Hairdresser’s spoken with a woman (7) |
| BARBARA – Homophone (‘spoken’) of BARBER and (‘with’) A (‘a’) | |
| 15 | Fashionable journey round a city (7) |
| CHICAGO – CHIC (‘Fashionable’) GO (‘journey’) containing (’round’) A (‘a’)
‘Journey’ as a verb for GO |
|
| 16 | Run away from church in warm coat (6) |
| FLEECE – FLEE (‘Run away from’) CE (‘church’) | |
| 18 | Heavy fall and small swelling (5) |
| SLUMP – S (‘small’) LUMP (‘swelling’) | |
| 20 | Place in society held by veteran knight (4) |
| RANK – Hidden (‘held by’) ‘veteRAN Knight’ | |
23:26
Was flying through this but then spent 10 minutes staring at the NE corner. Not impressed that FINE means SLENDER, struggled with MANDATE and finally LOI EXACT.
Just seen on the Snitch that today’s QC falls into the ‘Easier’ category. Any minor satisfaction I took in completing this has now evaporated. My confidence is at rock bottom and my frustration levels are through the roof. The harder I try, the worse I get.
Don’t be downhearted over Snitch ratings, Gary, as the people who get counted in them tend to be seasoned solvers who inevitably will be speedier than average. I never look at them and judge my performances good or bad against what I calculate to be my own average. You did well to complete today’s after a run of puzzles you found too difficult, so enjoy your success! FWIW, I didn’t think this was particularly easy and I would have missed my target today had I not extended it by 5 minutes a couple of weeks ago because I felt I had become too focused on speed.
Thanks Jackkt, much appreciated.