A twenty minute stroll, but a few tricky ones to parse once the answers were plucked from the likely-box; 17a, 18a, 3d, 15d for example. A pleasant if not demanding puzzle for a Wednesday, I don’t expect to see orange on the SNITCH.
The definition / meaning of 6a may be new to some, as may be the geography of the far end of Wales, but the wordplay is clear enough. I think I like 18a best, for its neat but misleading surface.
The definition / meaning of 6a may be new to some, as may be the geography of the far end of Wales, but the wordplay is clear enough. I think I like 18a best, for its neat but misleading surface.
Across | |
1 | Soldier wearing suitable American equipment (9) |
APPARATUS – PARA = soldier, has APT around it, then US. | |
6 | Unskilled work from son of afflicted man? (5) |
MCJOB – JOB was afflicted, needing patience, so McJob could be his son… a bit odd but different I suppose. | |
9 | Trick cyclist performs in bin (7) |
WHEELIE – Double definition. | |
10 | How unmarried couples used to live, swallowing extremely unusual hormone (7) |
INSULIN – Couples used to live IN SIN, they swallow U L being the first and last letters of UnusuaL. | |
11 | Squirrel away almost months in terrible weather (5) |
STORM – STORE loses its E, adds M for months. | |
12 | Take fish with rod, it’s plain (9) |
PIKESTAFF – PIKE = fish, STAFF = rod. A pikestaff was carried by a pilgrim, so plainly showed his situation, the word was corrupted from PACKSTAFF it seems. | |
13 | Provided with backing, cease being addict (5) |
FIEND – IF is reversed then END = cease. Fiend in the sense of ‘he’s a golfing fiend / addict’. | |
14 | Academy dancers after training were very nervous (3,6) |
RAN SCARED – RA = Royal Academy, (DANCERS)*. | |
17 | Provincial shopping centre in the way now made to move (5-4) |
SMALL-TOWN – MALL = shopping centre, inside ST = the way, then (NOW)* = now made to move. | |
18 | Less threatening, to be deprived of all love (5) |
MINUS – OMINOUS = threatening, loses both its O’s. | |
19 | Conspirator hanged: rope splits in two, we hear (3,6) |
GUY FAWKES – Sounds like GUY (= rope) FORKS = splits in two. | |
22 | Discharge returned bill first, producing capital (5) |
ACCRA – AC = bill, account, then ARC reversed. Capital of Ghana. I wanted to get in ABUJA at first just because I knew it had replaced Lagos. | |
24 | Part of opera, some number about sailor from foreign land (7) |
ARABIAN – ARIA = part of opera, N = some number, insert our AB sailor, an Arabian is from a foreign land, if you’re not currently in Arabia I suppose, a bit of a weak definition. | |
25 | Giant in forest wore odd pants (7) |
REDWOOD – No Ents or Sibelius trees, simply the Giant Redwood tree as in California. (WORE ODD)*. | |
26 | Detective, modest and attractive (5) |
DISHY – DI = detective, SHY = modest. | |
27 | Proverbs about heroin that are employed by the chippy (9) |
SAWHORSES – SAWS are proverbs, around HORSE slang for heroin. |
Down | |
1 | Formerly a hated symbol broken in half (2,3) |
AS WAS – A, half of SWASTIKA. Neat. | |
2 | Remarkable events in empty patch with flower springing up (9) |
PHENOMENA – P H = patch ’emptied’, then ANEMONE reversed. Maybe I will now remember not to spell Anemone Anenome. | |
3 | Look right up across unnamed newspaper, for example (4,5) |
ROLE MODEL – LO = look, R, reversed, = ROL, around LE MO(N)DE = newspaper losing its N for name. | |
4 | The turf an object of derision for Cambridge college? (3,5,2,5) |
THE SPORT OF KINGS – Cryptic definition. I can see the Kings bit but not sure why SPORT equals derision, unless it’s ‘having sport at the expense of’ meaning deriding? | |
5 | Scarcities known to be artificial are unacceptable (5,2,4,4) |
STICK IN ONES CRAW – (SCARCITIES KNOWN)*. | |
6 | Doctors succeeded saving European national leader (5) |
MOSES – MOS are doctors, S = succeeded, insert an E for European. | |
7 | No new sort of calendar girl (5) |
JULIA – the JULIAN calendar loses its N. | |
8 | Carelessly, behind sofa husband dropped proof of honesty (4,5) |
BONA FIDES – (BE IND SOFA)*, the H for husband dropped from the anagram fodder. | |
13 | Port that protects marine resource? (9) |
FISHGUARD – Slightly witty cryptic definition, although having been through Fishguard many times going to and from Rosslare, there’s nothing very amusing there, it’s dull and at the far end of Wales. | |
15 | In mock game, have decided to be inconsistent (4-3-2) |
COME-AND-GO – COD = mock, GO a game, insert MEAN = have decided, in the sense of ‘I mean to go to Tesco’. | |
16 | Meet rhyme for first clue? (3,6) |
RUN ACROSS – Seems to me this is supposed to be a rhyme for ONE ACROSS but if that’s all there is to it, not a great challenge. | |
20 | I agree about returning thanks for poet (5) |
YEATS – TA reversed inside YES I agree. | |
21 | A college year provides friendship (5) |
AMITY – A, MIT (Mass. Inst. of Tech.), Y for year. | |
23 | Chain of human descent not complete (5) |
ANDES – Today’s hidden word in HUM(AN DES)CENT. |
I got 12ac from the phrase ‘plain as a pikestaff’.
Edited at 2018-09-12 05:06 am (UTC)
Apart from that, enjoyed 6a MCJOB and 18a MINUS, and was done in 31 minutes, so it’s a shame I didn’t get them all right…
Edited at 2018-09-12 06:15 am (UTC)
I just did a search of TftT for MCJOB and the only hit was in a Sunday Times puzzle dated 22nd December 2007, only a month after I started blogging here. Andy was on duty for that day, but in my contribution I noted that MCJOB has been in the OED since 1986. If that was its last appearance I’m not surpised I had forgotten it!
Edited at 2018-09-12 05:34 am (UTC)
Nice to have ROLE MODEL in on the morning after the excellent Alastair Cook’s final Test, with its utterly improbable, couldn’t-make-it-up endings.
Fine, entertaining blog – thanks Pip. Haven’t worked out the title relevance yet, mind. Dum Spiro was Nixon’s running mate, wasn’t he? Something of a McCandidate, as I remember.
FOI APPARATUS
COD REDWOOD
MCJOB reminds me of the time I went to a restaurant called McBenny’s in Malta. It looked exactly like McDonald’s with branding including the golden arches logo though the food was nicer. I wonder if it’s still there or if McDonald’s ever got it closed.
Update – Just in. Wanderers have avoided both administration and points deduction. I hope this isn’t too far off the subject!
Edited at 2018-09-12 03:50 pm (UTC)
I liked Ominous but COD goes to Wheelie.
Edited at 2018-09-12 09:54 am (UTC)
Fishguard is a nice little seaside town, just down the road from my daughter’s cottage in Rosebush so quite familiar. Pembroke is a lovely part of Wales, once you finally get there.
Re pikestaff, I regard the pilgrim derivation as highly suspicious. So far as I can see it derives from Brewer’s dictionary and is likely a folk etymology .. lots of people used packstaffs or pikestaffs, and a much simpler idea is just that they tend to be big – especially the military kind – and obvious. Unfortunately the OED is silent on the matter.
Enjoyed McJob, as always..
Edited at 2018-09-12 09:02 am (UTC)
There is a Beckett play called COME AND GO, no hyphens. I won’t spoil it for you, so don’t be tempted to look it up, but maybe today’s definition is where the title comes from. And, while we’re on high culture, anyone put YATES in?
Thanks pip and setter.
OK perhaps not Beachy Head. But you know what I mean. An enjoyable 19m.
“By a bicycle factory as they sounded the siren
And returned into the dance hall she knew he was the one
Though he wasn’t tall or handsome she laughed when he told her
“I’m the Sheriff of Nottingham and this is Little John”
Anon didn’t reply. Listen to Jeff Stelling’s Saturday afternoon football score show on Sky and you’ll be hard pushed to find anybody who rhymes one and won. Tringmardo makes the same point above.
So when you say that ‘won’ rhymes with ‘bun’, should that be ‘wan’ or ‘woon’?
I have your problem the other way round with my three children all brought up just North of London. I’m generally OK with North Londonese. But my daughter went to a very posh independent school which conducts its business with the most contorted vowel sounds, last heard from the Queen’s mouth circa 1954. I often have to ask her to repeat something.
London: ONE rhymes BUN Yorkshire: ONE rhymes JOHN
London: WON rhymes BUN Yorkshire: WON rhymes BUN
London: PUB rhymes JUG Yorkshire: PUB rhymes JUG
And let me, like jerry, put in a good word for Fishguard — and indeed more generally for Pembrokeshire: the area has some beautiful coastal scenery, good walking, good beaches, some pretty villages and sites of historical interest.
Thanks to the blogger and setter.
ARC as a discharge was new to me, but fortunately the clue was kind and I had the checking letters.
P&P was my also first thought for ‘sport’ (that rhymes… for me, at least).
The surface for 9a was great, and as a confessed ‘one rhymes with run’ vowel mangler, I liked 16d.
Thanks to setter and blogger.
[*Wikipedia tells me that there is a J. Michael Yates, poet.]
Edited at 2018-09-12 02:15 pm (UTC)
*wails and gnashes teeth*
Can someone help me understand the chippy sawhorse connection?
Another use of chippy was used in a most excellent exchange of views about throwing bugs on a fire by Lady Colin Campbell when she tarred Tony Hadley (ex Spandau Ballet crooner) with the withering put down ‘chippy oik’. Nothing to do with carpentry that time.
Edited at 2018-09-13 07:24 pm (UTC)
It is somehow different from solving on paper.
Anyway I nearly finished this. Defeated by Moses and McJob.
I thought Sojob might be the right word and never thought of Moses. David
Working.
Did this just now with egg and chips (hoorah).
30 mins for all but M-job and failed.
Mostly I liked: Guy Fawkes and Wheelie (ha).
Tomorrow is another day.
Thanks setter and Pip
One way round this would be to modify the clue a little:
Conspirator hanged: rope splits in two some hear.
42 minutes, held up too long by said ‘homophone’.