After last week’s gentle offering from Oink I was expecting something a bit more difficult and so this proved to be.
Having five anagrams helped, as did the absence of a full clue as a cryptic def, but even so, a not exactly speedy time of 15:15 (yes, 13:13 would have been more appropriate, if not much quicker) was the penalty for being generally sluggish and for being very slow to spot the reverse hidden at 20d, my LOI.
Thanks to Mara
Definitions underlined in bold, deletions and letters in wordplay not appearing in the answer marked by strikethrough.
| Across | |
| 1 | Food, something in freezer on right (4) |
| RICE – ICE (‘something in freezer’) following in an across clue (‘on’) R (‘right’) | |
| 3 | Piano, scratched on the outside, thrown on rubbish tip (8) |
| SCRAPPED – SCRAPED (‘scratched’) containing (‘on the outside’) P (‘Piano’) | |
| 9 | Greek character accompanied by slim South American (7) |
| CHILEAN – CHI (‘Greek character’) and LEAN (‘slim’) | |
| 10 | Coloured paint unsuitable (5) |
| INAPT – Anagram (‘Coloured’) of PAINT
I don’t remember seeing ‘coloured’ as an anagram indicator before, but it seems fair enough in the sense of “embellished”. |
|
| 11 | Ever a grown-up? (2,3) |
| AT ALL – A (‘a’) TALL (‘grown-up?’)
I wondered about TALL for ‘grown-up?’. I suppose something which grows upwards, more or less vertically, may be TALL, but there is a hyphen here which suggests the “adult” sense of ‘grown-up?’ instead. The question mark is working hard here. For the answer, not the best example but “Have you been to Rome ever? / Have you been to Rome at all?” |
|
| 12 | Consumer embraces beginning of song festival (6) |
| EASTER – EATER (‘Consumer’) contains (’embraces’) S |
|
| 14 | Succeed as paparazzo — see? (3,3,7) |
| GET THE PICTURE – Double definition, the first a cryptic hint
For the first def, to ‘Succeed as paparazzo’ you need to GET THE PICTURE of your famous subject. For the second def, GET THE PICTURE as an informal term for ‘see?’ as in “to understand”. |
|
| 17 | Two articles written by chap in country (6) |
| GUYANA – AN and A (‘Two articles’) placed next to (‘written by’) GUY (‘chap’)
In mainly American use, GUY(S) can also mean men and women. |
|
| 19 | Blade losing its edge, say (5) |
| UTTER – |
|
| 22 | Popular place for contribution (5) |
| INPUT – IN (‘Popular’) PUT (‘place’) | |
| 23 | Perfume in smell, might you say? (7) |
| INCENSE – IN (‘in’) then aural wordplay (‘might you say?’) of SENSE (‘smell’) | |
| 24 | Lovely dog’s activity? (8) |
| FETCHING – Double definition, the second cryptic | |
| 25 | Brood in ferment at regular intervals (4) |
| FRET – F |
|
| Down | |
| 1 | Boost has excited archer, eg (8) |
| RECHARGE – Anagram (‘excited’) of ARCHER EG | |
| 2 | Tea bags in tea cups etc (5) |
| CHINA – CHA (‘Tea’) contains (‘bags’) IN (‘in)
A natural surface for what seemed such a simple clue but undoubtedly as intended, I took a while to separate ‘Tea’ and ‘bags’ to get the correct part of speech for ‘bags’. My COD. |
|
| 4 | New topic on mental thought (13) |
| CONTEMPLATION – Anagram (‘New’) of TOPIC ON MENTAL
My first reaction on reading this was: “‘Mental thought’? Shurely shome mistake!”. No. |
|
| 5 | Overturned sheet on which is a pseudonym (5) |
| ALIAS – LIAS a reversal (‘overturned’) of SAIL (‘sheet’) following in a down clue (‘on which is’) A (‘a’)
One of Mara’s appears in the next clue. A sail is a sheet of sorts, but in a nautical sense a sheet isn’t a sail. As a landlubber, I’d better leave it there. |
|
| 6 | Paul ate off table (7) |
| PLATEAU – Anagram (‘off’) of PAUL ATE | |
| 7 | Go out as part of crowd at event (4) |
| DATE – Hidden in (‘part of’) ‘ |
|
| 8 | The law reforms in plentiful supply (6) |
| WEALTH – Anagram (‘reforms’) of THE LAW
As in “there was a wealth / plentiful supply of information”. |
|
| 13 | Loose as it were, most ready to drop (8) |
| WEARIEST – Anagram (‘Loose’) of AS IT WERE
Not the sense of ‘drop’ suggested by the surface reading. |
|
| 15 | Bit of a daffy instrument! (7) |
| TRUMPET – Double definition, the first referring to the familiar trumpet-shaped flowers of a ‘daffy’ or daffodil, known as the TRUMPET. Yes, ‘daffy’ as an abbreviation for “daffodil” is in Chambers.
Not that I knew this, but the trumpet of a daffodil is not comprised of petals but is a separate structure. More here if you’re interested. |
|
| 16 | Critical moment, sound of teeth on Corn Flakes? (6) |
| CRUNCH – Definition with cryptic hint
As used in expressions such as “when it comes to the crunch” or “crunch time”. |
|
| 18 | Letter a prickly thing? (5) |
| AITCH – A (‘a’) ITCH (‘prickly thing?’)
As for AT ALL above, the question mark (just about) makes ITCH acceptable for ‘prickly thing?’. |
|
| 20 | Performer in gutter, one tanked up (5) |
| TENOR – Reverse hidden (‘in… up’) in ‘ I made a real mess of this, just not identifying the correct def or seeing the reverse hidden and it was my LOI by a few minutes. |
|
| 21 | Head scratched in difficult argument (4) |
| TIFF – |
|
10.22 WOE. The top half was very quick. The bottom was slower, not helped by THORN. I got the pink square for GOT THE PICTURE. CHINA was nice, TRUMPET was biffed and WEARIEST was LOI. I managed to learn a sheet bend in the cubs without realising that a sheet is a rope. Thanks BR and Mara.
My solve was steady today starting nicely with the 1s RICE and RECHARGE. I biffed SCRAPPED with the C and P in play and also needed another P checker to solve TRUMPET. LOsI were WEARIEST and ALIAS. Thanks BR. 7:41
Forgot to say that FETCHING is my cocker’s favourite activity so it gets my COD.
14:55. I thought AT ALL would start with AS and UTTER was short for Putter. Also just took CHINA for a kind of tea plus crockery missing the clever ” tea bags in”. FETCHING was great.
Fetching is a great word for “lovely”. And funnily enough came across it in the Bill Bryson I was reading earlier – think it was as he was driving through Illinois
13:16 for me, with GUYANA the last one in as I trawled through 3-letter synonyms for “chap”. Liked FETCHING and CHILEAN most today, I think.
Thanks to Mara and BR.
Weeeeellll, I “finished” but with two unparsed in 11:54 (other than a fat-fingered pink square). Same experience of top half vs. bottom half, and TENOR and TRUMPET, as many others here. Liked the neat CHINA clue.
Thanks Mara and Bletch. Loved the info on the daffy coronas. I still have some blooming. What a crazy spring we’ve had.
Nice to be back to solving in the morning after a few days so busy that not only couldn’t I get to it in the morning, but when I did get to it I could hardly think. Oh my stats haha!
Our Irish Setter doesn’t do ‘fetching’. Neither did any of his three predecessors….. but an amusing clue. Struggled to see 11a At All and 17a Guyana, and 7d seems not quite right. Hey ho, it’s a crossword!
In common with many others, it was all very straightforward until the SW corner kicked me into the SCC with 23:33. Oh well, disappointment is probably good for the soul, or something.
Thank you for the blog!
14:08. Started strongly but found the lower half much harder. I spent far too long working out how to spell INCENSE…
It took me about a minute and a half to get started! So I was quite pleased to finish, all parsed, in 11:34 – it could have been much worse 😅
I think I’ve seen a similar clue to FETCHING before, but I really like it.
FOI Easter LOI Fetching COD China by a long chalk
Thanks Mara and BR
6:44 for me despite being on my phone. Slightly suprised by the comments. I think I was on wavelength today getting FETCHING and GUYANA almost immediately which seems to have caused others a little more bother. Only CRUNCH caused me more than a momentary head scratch not helped by spelling INCENSE with an S. I think because I had the word sense in my head from the clue.
COD: CHINA
An ok 15 mins.
Failed on 15 x 15 by five.
Still struggling.
is there any letter other than aitch which appears in the dictionary spelled out as a headword?
En and Em, but only really if the printing terms En-dash and Em-dash aren’t hyphenated.
I can only think of one other in common use. And I’m not counting I or A, nor homonyns like Oh, Why and Queue.
Chambers has gee with six definitions, of which the first is “the seventh letter of the alphabet” and jay with two definitions, the second being “the tenth letter of the alphabet”. Also kay, el and probably others.
8.31. This setter’s loose definitions always aggravate me in any of the many places his puzzles appear.