Across
1 SAND FLEA – the definition is ‘small crustacean’; AND + FL[y] in SEA (the tide).
9 REASONER – RE + A + SON + ER.
10 IRIS – ‘flag’ is a word used by someone to refer to ‘any of various plants that have long swordlike leaves, esp the iris Iris pseudacorus’ (Collins); hidden.
11 CHAMBER MUSIC – ‘notes’; AM + BERMU[da, AKA District Attorney] in CHIC.
13 BORNEO – BORNE + O.
14 CONVINCE – CON + VI(N)CE.
15 FRAILTY – I + LT in FRAY.
16 PRO+TEST.
20 CAPUCHIN – ‘monk’ (topical for me, as I’ve just read Chesterton’s St Francis of Assisi; this as well as the Internet suggests that Capuchins are an order of friars rather than monks); UP reversed + CH in CAIN.
22 MORSEL – M[anaagement] + ROLES* (anagram).
23 ARISTOPHANES – R in A THESPIAN SO*.
25 TO-DO – double definition.
26 HUNT DOWN – HUN + (D[esperadoes] in TOWN).
27 TREADING – not ‘speeding’ as I originally thought; T + READING.
Down
2 AU REVOIR – ‘so long’ (farewell, auf Wiedersehen, good night…); (I + OVER) reversed in A + UR (an ancient Babylonian city invested by crossword setters many years ago, from which they still make the occasional sortie).
3 DISCONTINUES – DISC + ON (being played) + IN in TUES[day].
4 LAYABOUT – do I detect a whiff of Guardian here? It’s a double definition where the first one would be spelt ‘lay about’.
5 ARABICA – I still remember a Cantonese learning tape where the Chinese guy kept referring you to the page with arABic numeral so-and-so. Perhaps he was a coffee fan. It’s CA (about) after A + RAB[b]I (ie a teacher requiring a single B).
6 BARREN – RE in BARN.
7 ONUS – hidden.
8 CROCKETT – ‘American congressman once’ – this fellow (full name Day-VEE DAY-vee Crockett), who killed a bear when he was three, served in the House of Representatives, was a friend of the Indians if not the Mexicans, died at the Alamo (had someone tampered with his car?) and was responsible for the mother and father of earworms, popped up in the Prize puzzle of 7 June, not to mention the discussion that followed over the weekend just passed. It’s ROCKET (reprimand) in CT (court).
12 UNINTERESTED – UNI + NT + ‘E+RESTED.
15 FACEACHE – never heard of this abusive epithet for an ugly person, itself rather ugly, which also comes hyphenated. A+CAFE* + CHE[f].
17 RUMINATE – MARTINU* + [unremarkabl]E. Bohuslav Martinů was a Czech composer with a little “o” over his last letter which my software won’t support. It will now! Thanks to Andy.
18 SHERIDAN – Sheridan was the Irish playwright responsible for The Rivals (which introduced the world to Mrs Malaprop) and The School for Scandal. SHE (Crosswordland’s best-selling novel, even if ET remains its longest-running film) + ID (name) inside RAN (published).
21 HOODOO – ‘bad luck’; [Robin] Hood + OO (loves).
24 IONA – ‘place in the Hebrides’; if the crossword compliler wants to tell us that he (or she) possesses something – without saying what exactly – then (s)he might say “I own a…”
Edited at 2014-06-16 06:58 am (UTC)
Having brought up the subject of Davy Crockett here only yesterday I smiled at 8dn. The original song-sheet I have in my possession confirms that what Day-vee kilt when he was only three was a “b’ar” which is refreshingly pedantic with its use of apostrophe considering the generally appalling colloquial grammar of the 20 verse lyric. One line that I’ve always enjoyed is “An’ knows he’s right ’cause he ain’ often wrong”.
The blogger’s point about CAPUCHIN is well made though the setter may take some comfort from Chamber’s including this in its definition of “monk”: “other than a friar, but loosely often applied to a friar also”. To avoid all this it might have been fun to have gone for a somewhat surreal surface reading by substituting “Monkey”!
Edited at 2014-06-16 04:24 am (UTC)
Can still remember reading the lyric “kilt him a b’ar” when I was about five years old. Might as well have been written in Icelandic.
… and that one wrong letter was the A in SHERIDAN (where I carelessly had an ‘o’). This was one of the ones that went in unparsed (others being CHAMBER MUSIC and SAND FLEA). Should have taken longer to parse it, but, like McT (not often I write that!) that would have meant going over the 30mins.
Davy Crockett, eh? The understudy for the Mr Spock joke, left ear, right ear and wild front ear.
The friar vs monk situation is hard to get too het up about.. there is a a Carmelite order near me, like the Capuchins one of the four mendicant orders, and indeed they live in a Friary (called “The Friars,” just to be clear!).. but the OED says: “Sometimes loosely applied to members of the monastic or of the military orders” so it seems to be acceptable, loosely speaking.
I remembered the comic character Faceache from my boyhood; wikipedia tells me he appeared in Jet and then, after a takeover, in Buster, though I have no memory of either of those publications (mind you, it appears that the latter absorbed no fewer than 12 other comics in its 40 year lifetime, which shows how many there were competing for my pocket money back in the day).
Edited at 2014-06-16 08:32 am (UTC)
Edited at 2014-06-16 11:58 am (UTC)
Enjoyable puzzle with some tricky wordplays but much put in from definition and checkers and worked out afterwards.
FOI BORNEO, LOI SHERIDAN (the name=ID took some time for the penny to drop). FACEACHE is an ugly word, also an ugly thing to say of an unattractive woman. I winced as I entered it. For shame.
CHAMBER MUSIC only “appeared” when several crossers were in place, when the parsing was relatively straightforward, but I’d have never got to this one without the crossers. SAND FLEA was remembered from a previous crossword, and the tired PROTEST has had many outings, some, I seem to think, quite recently.
DISCONTINUES put me in mind of DISCONSOLATE – a long-ago and fondly remembered Times clue, circa 1971, about a “late night gramophone player”.
Shouldn’t 4d have had a question mark after the clue?
45 minutes…
Didn’t parse CHAMBER MUSIC. Frankly, if parsing a clue is harder than getting the answer, I think something’s gone wrogn. But otherwise a fair and fun puzzle.
Today’s ‘Patient of the Day’ Award goes to a gentleman of about 50 who walked in, accompanied by the colleague who had driven him here. He calmly informed the receptionist that he had a piece of rebar through his shoulder (which was true), and wondered if someone could remove it (which we did).
Given that we’re cutting our armed forces back by 20%, I think we should ensure that the remaining 12 soldiers are all ex-builders.
I never really found the setter’s wavelength, but looking back afterwards, I can see this was a very fine crossword.
(New word of the day – for me, that is: “rebar”. Thanks, Dr Thud.)
Your software doesn’t need to support it, as when you post on LJ the text gets converted to HTML, which does. The HTML entity name for ů is uring. You need a & in front and a ; at the end. Google HTML entities for other examples. This particular one can be found here.
Edited at 2014-06-16 11:40 pm (UTC)