This one took me 16:29, a little over my average time, and at that time I was tenth of ten on the leader board. So I’m guessing that this is a pretty middle-of-the-road puzzle that I just wasn’t quite in sync with.
For some reason, I feel differently about the need for an extra space in one of the definitions in 1 across and 20 across. Changing “stepson” to “steps on” for “crushes” made me smile, but changing “drawback” to “draw back” doesn’t quite work for me.
I started with TALC, ended with STEPSON and my COD goes to BOARDING PASS because I would never have spotted that SONGBIRD in there. Also because I got it quite quickly, which rarely happens for me with longer anagrams.
Definitions underlined, synonyms in round brackets, wordplay in square brackets and deletions in strikethrough. Anagram indicators italicised in the clue, anagram fodder indicated like (this)*.
| Across | |
| 1 | Shrink disadvantage (8) |
| DRAWBACK – A double definition, the first in the sense of shrinking away from something, although I think I would normally have that as “draw back”. | |
| 5 | Fine material captured by digital camera (4) |
| TALC – Hidden in [captured by] |
|
| 9 | Saucy Hispanic moves? (5) |
| SALSA – the salsa is a Spanish dance, and also a condiment often served with Mexican food.
I initially had this down as a double definition, but ‘saucy’ the adjective doesn’t work for ‘salsa’, which is a noun and means ‘sauce’, not ‘saucy’. So I think it’s just a hint, and that the question mark is being asked to do a real job of work. |
|
| 10 | Litres spread on black hair (7) |
| BRISTLE – (LITRES)* on B for black. | |
| 11 | Something done with a casket when emptied (3) |
| ACT – A (from the clue) + the first and last letters of C |
|
| 12 | Danger! Use plastic garment (9) |
| DUNGAREES – (DANGER USE)*
Not a word in common use where I live, where ‘overalls’ is the normal usage. |
|
| 13 | Year in quality NI county (6) |
| TYRONE – YR (year) inside [in] TONE (quality).
I surprised myself by dragging this county name up from the depths. |
|
| 15 | Only street on which cashpoint has nothing (2,4) |
| AT MOST – ATM (cashpoint) and ST for street, containing O (nothing). | |
| 17 | Tape, pen or other means of recording ideas (9) |
| NOTEPAPER – (TAPE PEN OR)*
I don’t recall seeing ‘other’ used as an anagram indicator before. |
|
| 19 | Processed meat cut in health resort (3) |
| SPA – SPA |
|
| 20 | Crushes relative by marriage (7) |
| STEPSON – A double definition, the first of which requires you to add a space to produce “steps on”. | |
| 21 | Adjust radio: eventually signal established then, first of all (5) |
| RESET – first letters of R You won’t get a clearer indicator that you need the first letters than “first of all”. |
|
| 22 | Dish without starter — still to come? (4) |
| LATE – “Washing the dishes” includes the plates, so I think “plate” for “dish” is fair. |
|
| 23 | Sound of someone eating may blow up! (8) |
| DYNAMITE – Aural wordplay [sound of] for “diner” (someone eating) + “might” (may).
To avoid “may” doing double duty, we need the verb form of “dynamite”. |
|
| Down | |
| 1 | Ascend where rocky, time for upper air? (7) |
| DESCANT – (ASCEND)* + T for time.
I only knew this word in association with a recorder that I played for a little while in primary school, until it became obvious that I had zero musical talent. It turns out that it is also “an independent treble melody usually sung or played above a basic melody.” (Oxford Languages via Mr Google), so “upper air” is a perfect definition. |
|
| 2 | Issue frequently engulfing Lima (5) |
| ALLOT – A LOT (frequently, as in ‘this happens a lot’) including L (Lima in the phonetic alphabet). | |
| 3 | Requirement for flight as a songbird remarkably maintains power (8,4) |
| BOARDING PASS – (AS A SONGBIRD)* including P for Power. | |
| 4 | Young camper, an islander (5) |
| CUBAN – CUB (young camper, think of the Cub Scouts), + AN (from the clue). | |
| 6 | Poorly rated, company style (3,4) |
| ART DECO – (RATED)* + CO (company). | |
| 7 | Teams on ship sail around we hear (5) |
| CREWS – Another homophone, this time indicated by “we hear”. Sounds like CRUISE (sail around). | |
| 8 | Ground dreariest, as a battlefield (8,4) |
| DISASTER AREA – (DREARIEST AS A)* | |
| 14 | Shelter respecting nurse (7) |
| RETREAT – RE (regarding, respecting, as in the subject line of every email reply ever), + TREAT (nurse, the verb). | |
| 16 | Rolled oats make fast hot snack (7) |
| TOASTIE – (OATS)* + TIE (make fast).
We didn’t have to lift and separate “hot snack”. Didn’t stop me trying. |
|
| 17 | Sniffy agency interested in space and light primarily (5) |
| NASAL – NASA (agency interested in space) + first letter [primarily] of L |
|
| 18 | Money girl? (5) |
| PENNY – Another double definition | |
| 19 | Last of pizzas, American hot one — take-away choice? (5) |
| SUSHI – [last of] |
|
Another poor showing from me and a second successive multi-clue DNF in 47 minutes. This time I failed to solve STEPSON, PENNY and DYNAMITE, all of which were connected.
Whilst I made reasonable headway in the NE corner, I found the rest of the grid rather too challenging. The result being that I soon dropped off the back of the peloton and never made it to the finish line. I will now read everyone else’s comments above and see if I’m the only occupant of the (dreaded) broom wagon.
Many thanks to Doofers and Mara.
Did you do tomorrow’s QC?
A Very Poor Day! I was well into the SCC, struggled with DRAWBACK and was breezeblocked by 1d, so stopped for a bit. Of course, when I came back, there it was 😅 I didn’t get on very well with the biggie either – not a day to remember.
I remembered FATLAD (or possibly FATDAD) for the NI county. SALSA made me laugh, and obviously PENNY was a gimme 😉
A bit under 25 minutes
FOI Lace LOI Descant COD Boarding pass
Thanks Mara and Doofers
Another disastrous day. 45 minutes of pure hell and felt no sense of satisfaction or achievement on finishing.
I’m wasting my time if I think I will ever be able to do this in a time that doesn’t leave me feeling humiliated.
My brain just isn’t capable of doing this. I’m sure all the boffins found this a breeze.
I am truly useless at this. What joy is there in being so bad? Totally fed up.
Only got DISASTER AREA once I had all the checkers. Like a few above, I assumed the answer had to be an actual battle field and I wasted a bit of time trying to unravel what obviously had to be an anagram of “dreariest as a” and getting nowhere.
I don’t think that “disaster area” and “battlefield” mean the same thing at all, not even remotely, unless you can make a case for some battles being a “disaster” depending on which side you are on.
I completely agree. A disaster in this sense is a natural one or, if man-made like an explosion or fire, not intentional. Clueing this more accurately wouldn’t have adversely affected the surface of the clue imho.
Well, I enjoyed this and thanks to Doofers and Mara.
But a TOASTIE is not a snack. The fact that Mara thinks that two whole slices of bread plus some amount of fat- and protein-laden filling is something to consume BETWEEN meals, rather than as part of one, and no-one has contested this notion above, presumably explains why almost everybody is fat these days.