Times 23,652 – 20ac looking at some of this!

Author   dhoggPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
A fairly challenging puzzle today, I thought. Some of the clues seemed to take longer than I’d have expected if I’d been on form and there are a couple I’m unsure about.

Solving time – in two spells, total of about 16 minutes.

ACROSS

1 FLY(PAP)ER

9 A-C.I.D.-RAIN (homophone of REIGN)

10 CASINO (hidden backwards in “prisON IS A Convict” – don’t like this one, as there is no definition as such. I’d imagine that prisoners would claim to be better off anywhere, and most casinogoers don’t leave the casino better off.

11 VERMICELLI – (l crime evil)*

13 D(ice)(INNER-LAD)Y

16 BERN-IN-1 – Italian scuptor, and BERN (or Berne) is the capital of Switzerland

17 UPRAISE – (Piraeus)*

20 SQUARE EYES – double cryptic definition

22 (t)EDDY – referring to Theodore (Teddy) Roosevelt and Mary Baker Eddy, the founder of the Christian Science Church

23 TWEE-T TWEE-T

25 1-MO-GEN – daughter of King Cymbeline in Shakespeare’s “Cymbeline”

DOWN

2 LEAD-FREE – as in with no lead (initial)

3 PRIM-ADO-NNA(<=Ann)

4 P((wa)R-OVID-ENCE

5 RAT-RUN-(gras)S – only worked out the wordplay as I was writing this blog

7 PAELLA – (<=AL(e)-LEAP)

8 ANTITYPE – (in a petty)*

14 (s)EX-POSITION – excellent if a little risque

15 LEAVE ALONE – (a-level a one)* – the anagram isn’t jumbled enough for my liking here

16 BESOTTED – (detest O.B.)*

19 BY HEART – Spoonerism of Hi Bart (from the anarchic animated series “The Simpsons” – for those of you who may have been living on Mars recently, Homer Simpson is Bart’s dad)

21 USED-UP – USE-(<=pud) – I like “milk” for use, but not keen on the rest of this clue

14 comments on “Times 23,652 – 20ac looking at some of this!”

  1. not as hard as the usual Friday fare — but I wonder about 23A — must be TWEET-TWEET (“repeated calls from the branch” which works both as birdsong and as telephone rings) but I don’t understand the def: “pretty indignant in the end”. I’m missing what?

    14D is a lovely clue!

    1. had one of those “the moment I posted the question, I understood the answer” things.

      Def is “calls from the branch” and wordplay is T(WEE)T with “indiganT in the end” being T which is repeated with WEE for “pretty” inside. But isn’t “repeated” doing double duty then?

  2. 8:43, so not a stinker but there was some good stuff here, esp. the cheeky “(s)ex position” in 14D.
  3. Good puzzle, though re 11 across lire are gone now, replaced by the euro (minor niggle, just). Is 7 down PAELLA, and, if so, why?
  4. It’s AL(E)+ LEAP all reversed (or overturned since it’s a down clue). Def is Dish (not Enflish).
  5. Thanks for PAELLA (both of you) – in CASINO I read it as better i.e. gambler off here i.e. to the casino
  6. yeah that’s what i meant 🙂 — i think i’d better stop writing about this clue.

    –ilan

  7. Is this really a double cryptic definition? Isn’t the wordplay old-fashioned = square and views = eyes, followed by a nice definition?
  8. I thought this was a delight (particularly EXPOSITION :-), though I wasn’t particularly fast at 10:13, making heavy weather of RAT-RUNS and FLYPAPER.
  9. Perhaps too late to bother but:
    5 d: I think the explanation is wrong. It should be
    RAT RUN(verge)S where Run = manage which separates Rat = grass and the last letter of vergeS (as per “at last”).
    No?
  10. A good Friday offering with only half a dozen “easies” left out of the blog:

    12a Good, clear powerful network (4)
    G RID. As in National Grid.

    26a Teacher’s timetable with reminder about head of department going round (8)
    E D UC ATOR. That is backwards ROTA with D inside CUE.

    27a Showily presented hawk in extremely small case (8)
    TIN SELL Y

    6d Bird from small island we heard (4)
    KIWI. SL Key We.

    18d Genuine support for team of stars (8)
    SIDE REAL. Appropriate as REAL MADRID are probably the best footer side in Europe at present. This probably works for 2007 AND 2017!

    24d Cheers and cheers for so long (2-2)
    TA-TA

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