Solving time: 75 minutes
I found this rather hard, but I suspect most of the usual gang will not find it that difficult. I wasn’t sharp at solving it, and the lack of chestnuts and anagrams threw me off, as I usually get a foothold that way. For many of the clues, the way I thought the clue worked turned out to be wrong, and I had to reset my mind and go back to square one.
Music: Mozart, Violin Concertos, Grumiaux/Davis/LSO/
Across | |
---|---|
1 | BEST SELLER, BEST + sounds like CELLAR. I admit, I wasted a lot of time trying to work in ‘bodega’ somehow. |
6 | TWIT, double definition. An interesting word. The Old English ‘witan’ means ‘to blame’, and the ‘at’ suffix is an intensifier, giving ‘atwitan’. Substantial weakening was needed to produce the fool and teasing |
9 | AUTHORSHIP, AU + THOR’S + HIP. Glad to hear that the Norse gods are still relevant. |
10 | IOWA, I.O.W + A, the Isle of Wight, that is. |
12 | BUMPER-TO-BUMPER, double definition, the first jocular. |
14 | ORANGE, O RANGE, so very close. |
15 | MINSTREL, MI(N,S)TRE + L[ouche]. I wasted a lot of time looking for specific composer who might fit. |
17 | SEDATIVE, anagram of DEVIATES, one of the few starter clues. |
19 | IN CASE, INCAS + E[vent]. |
22 | OVER MY DEAD BODY, double definition. I knew it was going to be something like this, but I couldn’t bring it to mind until I had a fair number of checkers. |
24 | PHEW, P + HEW. |
25 | ANTICLIMAX, anagram of IN TAX CLAIM. |
26 | RUTH, double definition. I wanted to put in ‘Acts’ for the longest time, but could not justify it. That’s because it was the wrong answer! |
27 | REPRESENTS, E.R. backwards + PRESENTS. |
Down | |
1 | BRAG, B(R)AG. I was thinking ‘rack’ or ‘board’ for a long time. |
2 | SATSUMA, SAT + SU + MA. If you thought ‘Parked’ = ‘P’, you were wrong. |
3 | STOPPAGE TIME, anagram of POST + PAGE + anagram of ITEM. I thought until the very end that I was looking for the name of a famous drama. |
4 | LUSTRE, LUST + R.E., that is to say Religious Education. |
5 | EPISODIC, EPI(SOD, I[nvasion])C. ‘Epic’ is not exactly ‘classic’, but close enough. |
7 | WHOPPER, W[ith] + HOPPER, an obvious one that I missed rather badly. |
8 | TEA TROLLEY, T(EAT ROLL)EY, with YET upside-down. |
11 | NUTS AND BOLTS, a sort of cryptic definition, with an allusion to the expression ‘get down to brass tacks’, in which ‘brass tacks’ do not have quite the same metaphorical meaning as ‘nuts and bolts’. |
13 | GOBSTOPPER, double definition, one jocular. This candy is known as a ‘jawbreaker’ in the US and Canada. |
16 | EVIDENCE, EVI(D[isput]E)NCE. Very clever, the cryptic took a while to figure out after putting in the obvious answer. |
18 | DEEPEST, DEE, PEST. This should be a write-in for most solvers. |
20 | ABDOMEN, anagram of BAD + OMEN. |
21 | RAPIER, RA(PI)ER, that is REAR upside down. |
23 | AXIS, A + SIX upside down, our cricket clue. |
I’d parse 12ac as BUMPER (massive), TOPER (drinker) inc BUM (behind).
We keep ours in a purple draw-string bag which once held a bottle of Crown whisky. I was amused some time ago to see that The Simpsons use an identical bag for their Scrabble tiles – not sure if I should read anything into that!
Edited at 2014-06-23 03:08 am (UTC)
On the shady lady front, those of a certain UK vintage may remember the journalist and broadcaster Dee Wells, and as for the other one, the most famous I can think of is Su Pollard. Hi-di-hi!
Edited at 2014-06-23 06:38 am (UTC)
When we had a LibDem council here, Su Lawton was one of the councillors – another was surprisingly coincidentally Manny Doku !
Count me as another who was considering an unparsed “Acts” for 26ac until the checker from 13dn put me right. I didn’t have a problem with “Su” or “Dee” as I had come across both names before.
RAPIER I put in twice after all the checkers were in, once discarded for lack of parsing. Wondered if this was an escapee frdm the ST given the preponderance of bottoms (I read BUMPER etc the same way as mctext) and the abbreviated women. SuBo, anyone?
Can’t see a bag in this scrabble game on the official Mattel site, but there may be a reason.
The Quickie, as already noted, had GOBSTOPPER on Friday last, where the clue was “Gag for a sweet”. Times going out of its way to be helpful? Dumbing up of the Quickie? Dumbing down of the Slowie?
Excellent start to the week.
Edited at 2014-06-23 09:43 am (UTC)
No problem with the names. After all, those of a certain age will remember Pans People on TotP, with a double dose of Dee, ie Dee Dee Wilde, although her given name was Patricia.
Yes, I remember Dee Dee Wilde and Pan’s People. Brings misty-eyed, wistful smile to the faces of gentlemen of a certain age. PHEW
Italian ultras on scooters like stabbing visiting football fans in the buttocks.
45 mins, nice puzzle, many thanks all.
dnp BUMPER TO BUMPER, dnk the ‘tease’ bit of TWIT.
TTTS = thanks to the setter? (Sotira)
I hope it’s that and not the onset of Tourette’s combined with bad typing. KNTCKERS!
Yes, Janie. I feel a bit of a crawler writing it out in full too often.
The only WP I couldn’t unravel was for evidence so thanks for that one Vinyl.
Edited at 2014-06-23 12:18 pm (UTC)
COD (and LOI) for me was AUTHORSHIP. RUTH was a guess, my knowledge of the bible being almost non existent. I also wasted a few minutes by having NATO for 23d, until I actually parsed the clue and realized that O TAN wouldn’t answer.
Easy but pleasant puzzle – Ji.
Edited at 2014-06-23 05:18 pm (UTC)
BUM and REAR in a puzzle – now the Halpernian challenge comes, can one get BUM, REAR, ASS and ARSE in a crossword?
FOI – gobstopper; LOI – episodic
Martin Hill