A few unusual words held me up here, especially the apt 3d.
Still, I very much liked this with a little present in the grid from Breadman adding to the enjoyment. I’ve hidden it behind the button below:
Eventually finished in 14:04 after a couple of typos added to the delay of getting the crossing 3d and 11a, my last two in.
Definitions underlined in bold, deletions indicated by strikethrough.
| Across | |
| 1 | Body of police that represents the Piccadilly Tube network? (4,4,4) |
| THIN BLUE LINE – cryptic hint: the Picadilly Tube line is shown as a THIN (dark) BLUE LINE on the well-known London tube map. | |
| 8 | Piece of information nowadays withdrawn by corporation (5) |
| DATUM – AD (‘nowadays withdrawn’=’nowadays’ reversed) TUM (‘corporation’)
AD for “anno domini”. I’ve yet to see CE for ‘nowadays’ in crossword land, but I’m sure it’s on its way. Talking of crossword land, is TUM ever used in this sense in the real world? |
|
| 9 | Huge chaps in semi relocating (7) |
| IMMENSE – MEN (‘chaps’) contained in (‘in’) anagram (‘relocating’) of SEMI | |
| 10 | Manage rugby session finally (3) |
| RUN – RU (‘rugby’=short for “rugby union”) N (‘session finally’=last letter of ‘sessioN‘) | |
| 11 | Left darkness extremely quickly (9) |
| OVERNIGHT – OVER (‘Left’) NIGHT (‘darkness’)
As an adverb, as in “Following the release of “Gone with the Wind”, Vivien Leigh became a sensation overnight”. Reverse the last two words, and the sentence would still make sense with OVERNIGHT as an adjective. |
|
| 13 | Style of hair right in bubbly character (5) |
| FRIZZ – R (‘right’) contained in (‘in’) FIZZ (‘bubbly character’) | |
| 14 | Distrust that Parisian railway (5) |
| QUERY – QUE (‘that Parisian’=the word ‘that’ in French) RY (‘railway’) | |
| 16 | Docker, English, travelled with animal doctors westwards (9) |
| STEVEDORE – E (‘English’) RODE (‘travelled’) VETS (‘animal doctors’) all reversed (‘westwards’ in an across clue)
What would be called a “longshoreman” in the US. The OED tells me the word comes from the Spanish estivador, agent-noun from estivar to stow a cargo. Of interest the US can claim ownership, as the first recorded quotation (as “stowadores”) is from the Massachusetts Spy in 1788 and then as “stevedore” in the first edition of Webster in 1828. |
|
| 17 | Odd bits of speech dry (3) |
| SEC – Odd-numbered (‘Odd’) letters of ‘SpEeCh’)
After seeing SEC many times in crosswords over the years, I finally got around to looking up whether it was the adjective or the noun (related to dry wine) being referred to. Collins, Chambers and the ODE only list the adjectival sense. |
|
| 19 | Boffin‘s breakfast food? Loaf (7) |
| EGGHEAD – EGG (‘breakfast food?’) HEAD (‘Loaf’)
‘Loaf’ as Cockney rhyming slang for HEAD = loaf of bread |
|
| 21 | Sort of crossing unoccupied zone with female support (5) |
| ZEBRA – ZE (‘unoccupied zone’=first and last letters of ‘ZonE‘) with BRA (‘female support’) | |
| 22 | Football team‘s notoriety Len broadcast (6,6) |
| LEYTON ORIENT – Anagram (‘broadcast’) of NOTORIETY LEN | |
| Down | |
| 1 | Royal family‘s impromptu do retainer conceals (5) |
| TUDOR – Hidden (‘conceals’) in ‘imprompTU DO Retainer’) | |
| 2 | Fashionable figures the writer’s detailed (9) |
| INTENSIVE – IN (‘Fashionable’) TENS (‘figures’) IVE (‘the writer’s’)
‘The writer’s’ = the writer has = I have = I’ve. |
|
| 3 | Confusion of woody grass unknown element topped (13) |
| BAMBOOZLEMENT – BAMBOO (‘woody grass’) Z (‘unknown’) Very appropriate as I was, well, bamboozled by this one, being unable to shift “bemusement” when I had the crossing B and M. |
|
| 4 | Academic institutions (former) applicable to male or female (6) |
| UNISEX – UNIS (‘Academic institutions’) EX (‘(former)’) | |
| 5 | Kitchen device imbecile partner ruined initially (5,8) |
| LEMON SQUEEZER – LEMON (‘imbecile’) SQUEEZE (‘partner’) R (‘ruined initially’=first letter of ‘Ruined’)
Guilty on multiple occasions. Great surface and I liked SQUEEZE for ‘partner’; I can only hazard a guess as to whether this is ‘applicable to male or female’. A LEMON to me is more a “dud” than an ‘imbecile’, but close enough and my COD. |
|
| 6 | Relative‘s Indian side dish (3) |
| NAN – Double definition | |
| 7 | Knowledge test for elite classes (6) |
| GENTRY – GEN (‘knowledge’) TRY (‘test’)
The Scottish equivalent is “kentry”. |
|
| 12 | Possible to find out good arrangement of sublease (9) |
| GUESSABLE – G (‘good’) and anagram (‘arrangement of’) SUBLEASE
As some otherwise unsolvable answers are in a crossword puzzle. I think ‘Possible to work out’ would have been closer to the mark, but maybe I’m stuck on how GUESSABLE applies specifically to coming up with a crossword answer. |
|
| 13 | Agitated American son seized by FBI agent (6) |
| FUSSED – US (‘American’) S (‘son’) contained in (‘seized by’) FED (‘FBI agent’) | |
| 15 | Country road below zero in winter month (6) |
| JORDAN – RD (‘road’) under (‘below’) O (‘zero’) contained in (‘in’) JAN (‘winter month’=abbreviation for January)
No, nothing to do with the John Dever song as I first thought. |
|
| 18 | Plan church sculpture? (5) |
| CHART – CH (‘church’) ART (‘sculpture?’)
The question mark as ‘sculpture’ is an example of ART. |
|
| 20 | My half of horse (3) |
| GEE – Half of GEE-GEE (‘horse’)
‘My’ as an exclamation. My first thought was: is there a horse breed called a “cor-cor”? |
|
8:22. I noticed the unusual letters – including a surfeit of Zs – and also that it wasn’t a pangram! Still I didn’t twig that they were in the middle. I rather liked the anagram for LEYTON ORIENT – not a tricky one for me as I lived in east London for a few years, but for some reason I still tried to put LUTON in initially 😂 Otherwise nothing much stood out for me today.
The trouble with 1a is that Breadman couldn’t put line in the clue as it was part of the answer, but it did make it rather clunky . We rewatched The Thin Blue Line recently – not quite as good as Blackadders II – IV, but it still had some real laugh-out-loud moments.
I’ve been wondering if perhaps we shouldn’t start reusing words like corporation, tiddly and such-like. They’re a lot gentler than some modern slang!
FOI Tudor LOI Overnight – wasn’t overly keen on that one
Thanks Breadman and BR
Nice to see some new posters today 😊
5D Imbecile – Lemon? Hands up anyone who refers to their partner as a “squeeze”
COD Thin Blue Line
My friend started dating a woman and she introduced herself to me as “Mark’s new squeeze”.
Admittedly she is Canadian, this was back in 2004 and they are now married with two boys!
Thin blue line came to mind straightaway but couldn’t remember what colour Piccadilly line is so just hoped it is blue!
COD Choice between Bamboozlement and Zebra.
Thanks Breadman and BR.
Manually timed finish of 35mins. Held up by the parsing of Datum. The ‘T’ was critical in solving 2D. The Z of zebra gave me Lemon Squeezer and a whole lot of checkers. From which I happily solved many clues quickly.
LOI Gentry
Thanks Breadman and Vinyl
Ps Leyton Orient was once the retirement club for many a West Ham player
A late start for me, which I could use as an excuse for struggling with this one. But no, I’ll admit to finding it tough to get started.
Once I got going it was fine until I reached 16a. What the …?!
Unfortunately I had one error: INTENTIVE rather than INTENSIVE.
Needed Pumpa’s help on 16a. Even he struggled with this one. In the end I had to complete the help he gave me with a random letter trawl, until I found a combination that looked as if though it might be the answer. Which it was.
33:10
My verdict: 🫤
Pumpa’s verdict: 🎃
LEYTON ORIENT was easy for me as a great childhood memory was watching (my team) Leicester City beat them 5 – 1 on Boxing Day 1962😀. Oh and the rest of the crossword was OK
11:22
Only STEVEDORE needed digging from the memory. The rest seemed pretty straightforward. LOI GENTRY.
Two sittings or me today.
Held up by trying to find a homophone instead of an anagram for my LOI that football team and then trying to shoehorn in those missing letters from the pangram.
But looking for those missing letters did help me with JORDAN and FRIZZ.
Thanks for a great puzzle Breadman and to BR for the blog.
Good fun today whiling away lunchtime at my favourite Italian Deli in Market Harborough. Needed a checker to decide between 1a blue thin/thin blue. I guess the original thin red will turn up soon. Took a while to get into Breadman’s style but all the better for having to tune in. Surprised no-one yet objecting to the clue at 21a. So wanted 3d to be bewilderment… but it wouldn’t do, even at a stretch. Took me too long to see the hidden at 1d. Happy to have more like this.
FOI 4d Unisex
LOI 7d Gentry – and that was really so easy – I think I was by then in overthinking mode
COD 5d Lemon Squeezer
You’ve definitely made me want to return to the cafe in MH! And I’ve given up moaning about the support clue 🙄
Very enjoyable.
As a public servant, I’d get sacked if I were to suggest that a UNISEX facility were only usable by males or females. Clearly gender fluidity and non-binariness have not yet reached Crosswordland. I think I might emigrate there.
Thanks Bletchers & Breadman!
15 minutes.
Thought I’d done really well until I came here and saw that I hadn’t achieved anything special. Still too many hold ups on simple clues. Disappointing.
Thanks for the blog.
Oh dear
Having failed today’s QC earlier I was chuffed to finish this one in 14:35, which seems to be within shouting distance of a few of you who are actually good at this crossword stuff. No doubt I will resume normal service tomorrow, but this was a nice start to the evening.
Speaking of “corporation”, I spent much of a walk with my wife last week trying to shoehorn it into a cryptic clue. She finally asked rather pointedly what I was so distracted by, and I don’t think that my attempt to explain was very successful in mollifying her.
Bloated corporation has eastern perfume (9)