A fairly typical Monday specimen, I thought. I just snuck under 20 minutes, having entered a typo, which had to be dealt with.
How did you do?
| ACROSS | |
| 1 | A fairy to quarrel endlessly? It could be the sherry! (8) |
| APERITIF – A PERI TIF |
|
| 5 | Trainee protecting the female child looking innocent (6) |
| CHERUB -HER in CUB | |
| 9 | Big bird to be unsteady, mostly (3) |
| ROC – ROC |
|
| 10 | Men go in lift possibly to get what restaurant offers? (5,6) |
| FILET MIGNON – anagram* of MEN GO IN LIFT; essentially, what fillet steak is known as in the US, I am told; in France, it typically refers to pork tenderloin | |
| 12 | Star full of power, or police officer without staff (10) |
| SUPERWOMAN – SUPER (superintendent) WO MAN (staff – vb.) | |
| 13 | Monkey: one pursuing bird (4) |
| TITI – TIT I; sometimes (as here) a monkey, sometimes a plant | |
| 15 | Narrow thoroughfares or wide streams? (6) |
| BROADS – B roads will be familiar to British drivers: the Broads are shallow navigable lakes, linked by rivers, in East Anglia. Pretty wide streams, then | |
| 16 | Neighbour needs a dairy product (7) |
| ABUTTER – A BUTTER | |
| 18 | Half of them were not well and sent message (7) |
| EMAILED – |
|
| 20 | Tommy, for one, given food with little hesitation (6) |
| TUCKER – TUCK ER; a reference to the English nursery rhyme ‘Little Tommy Tucker’: Little Tommy Tucker / Sings for his supper. / What shall we give him? / White bread and butter. | |
| 23 | Hotel‘s documents read out (4) |
| RITZ – sounds like ‘writs’ | |
| 24 | Craftspeople needing skill if joining top decorators (10) |
| ARTIFICERS – ART (skill) IF (if) ICERS (those who ice or frost cakes) | |
| 26 | Like sale article at ground level? (7,4) |
| KNOCKED DOWN – a sale article is indubitably knocked down (in theory, anyway), while something at ground level may have been knocked down; hence the question mark and hence the non-ascription of double definition status. But I wouldn’t go to war over it… | |
| 27 | Song is heard in this Scottish town (3) |
| AYR – sounds like ‘air’ (as in ‘Londonderry Air’ – altogether now, ‘O Danny boy!’) | |
| 28 | Granny joins group going round French city (6) |
| NANTES – NAN SET reversed; Britanny’s largest city, or not, as you prefer | |
| 29 | Creative impulse of a female, calm American (8) |
| AFFLATUS -A F FLAT US; basically, divine inspiration. Not a word you can easily use without getting funny looks and feeling you ought to apologise | |
| DOWN | |
| 1 | This clue is not a hard thing to bear (6) |
| ACROSS – A CROSS; this clue is of course A DOWN! | |
| 2 | Finally the son has lark — one getting away (7) |
| ESCAPER – |
|
| 3 | Doing well, friend lacking airs and graces (10) |
| INFORMALLY – IN FORM (doing well) ALLY (friend) | |
| 4 | I will start to cheer on team, looking embarrassed and foolish? (3-10) |
| ILL-CONSIDERED – I’LL C |
|
| 6 | Greeting that comes from above (4) |
| HAIL – double definition | |
| 7 | Went berserk in rave outside port (3,4) |
| RAN RIOT – RIO in RANT | |
| 8 | I attempt to follow gang in criminal activity (8) |
| BANDITRY – BAND (gang) I TRY (attempt) | |
| 11 | Criticise act to sell multiple raffle tickets? (4,1,5,3) |
| TEAR A STRIP OFF – if you tear off a strip of raffle tickets, you might be able to sell a bunch more efficiently, so long as you count them carefully, which you could do before tearing them off, I think | |
| 14 | Religious rite in river is working (10) |
| FUNCTIONAL – UNCTION in the River FAL (in Cornwall); the only other Cornish river that pops up from time to time is the Tamar, but there are two separate Allens, so perhaps that (they?) is ready for an appearance | |
| 17 | Puts up with relations in furry attire (8) |
| BEARSKIN – BEARS KIN | |
| 19 | Instrument old character used to accompany Jolson? (7) |
| ALTHORN – AL [Jolson] THORN (þ – a letter in Old English representing the unvoiced ‘th’ sound, as in ‘this’); ‘a valved brass musical instrument belonging to the saxhorn or flügelhorn families’ | |
| 21 | Smart English member meeting one from a colony? (7) |
| ELEGANT – E LEG ANT | |
| 22 | Little old gentleman is a god (6) |
| OSIRIS – O (abbreviation of old) SIR IS | |
| 25 | Island‘s broadcaster picked up (4) |
| SKYE – sounds like SKY (the oft-plugged company in the same stable as The Times) | |
Same problems as others. Had to reveal LOI SUPERWOMAN and still not sure it makes sense to me. A few new words in TITI, ALTHORN and AFFLATUS (can’t wait to drop that one into conversation 😂) but otherwise fairly plain sailing. Thanks all.
13.15 but a few dramas along the way. I’m sure I won’t be the only one to put in hiya at 6 dn but fortunately filet mignonette saved my embarrassment. Remembered afflatus from somewhere and finally gave up thinking of supernovas to recognise superwoman.
Good Monday workout, now for another. Off to torture my body in the gym.
Apparently I am the only one to think of hiya at 6 dn- oh the horror…
I did think quite hard about HIGH, but not quite enough to enter it.
I thought it was hiya! But had to change it when it didn’t fit.
It would have been a natural greeting in my original area. NW.
Finished this morning ahead if my tee time but before the blog came up. 40′ though not sure why it took so long.
Maybe time spent prior to the eventual biff of SUPERWOMAN, having tried to make something out of supernova. Like others I don’t think the clue works. Also spent time on the TUCKER/FUNCTIONAL nexus, mainly trying to add “for one” into the mix rather than realising it was an example indicator. Thanks Ulaca and setter
I started with 1d, ACROSS and finished with TITI, having spent quite a while on an alphabet trawl, but not coming up with a viable alternative. EIRE held up KNOCKED DOWN and SUIPERWOMAN took an age to cobble together. ALTHORN and AFFLATUS had to be assembled from the instructions. Liked APERITIF. 18:47. Thanks setter and U.
Like some others I failed by putting SUPERNOMAN as my LOI but I was surprised that AFFLATUS was a word so not too disappointed.
I took a while to get going and then collected all the mistakes everyone else made and put them in one puzzle. So I had air for AYR like Koppite, Ran amok like Bazzock (until ABUTTER sorted that out), and finished with a flourish with Supernoman like Bletchleyreject. Not only does it fit the cryptic but is clearly an excellent word for a powerful star. I consider myself in good company.
Thanks for sorting me out Ulaca.
16.20 if I hadn’t plumped for ‘supernoman’. I know it’s not a word – but it could have been – and ‘star’ to define ‘superwoman’ does not impress me favourably.
Well, I put in Supernovan as an adjective describing a star full of power (although, admittedly, van = staff doesn’t make sense).
I also needed aids for Althorn.
So, a DDNF (double did not finish) – not the easiest Monday puzzle.
31 minutes. Enjoyable Monday crossword, a bit harder than usual I thought.
Now for supper. I’m thinking an aperitif, a filet mignon, some broad beans with butter, and finally some afflatus.
A pleasant Monday stroll, all done in 15 minutes. Was pleased to see an ESCAPER and not the awful ESCAPEE – though this is not as awful as STANDEE, which was common for a time in warnings in London buses not to get too close to the driver. I ummed and aahed for a while between TITI and KIWI for 13ac before plumping for the first as it seemed better suited to the clueing.
FOI – APERITIF
LOI – RITZ
COD – ACROSS.
Thanks to ulaca and other contributors.
I definitely considered putting in SUPERNOMAN, before ‘without’ alerted me to the possibility of it being a word I’d heard of. Likewise the half-forgotten AFFLATUS held me up a while. We had Sky as a broadcaster quite recently, so that went straight in, unlike LOI -I-I, where I seriously considered whether a Kiw was a monkey before going for the only bird I could think of as -I- to get the unlikely TITI. Mostly on the simple side, except for the above-mentioned. Liked ACROSS that wasn’t and 22D – OSIRIS.
16’58”. Same as everyone above on SUPERWOMAN. For me, there was confusion added by the fact that the word contains an anagram of POWER. But what’s a SUMAN? NANTES definitely historic capital of Brittany. Here is Jonathan Sumption in the first part of his history of the 100 years war: “Eastern Brittany, roughly corresponding to the modern departments of Ille-et-Vilaine and Loire-Atlantique was a fertile and densely populated plain given over mainly to vineyards and to cattle-farming and possessing in Nantes and Rennes the only two truly important towns of Brittany. This was Gallo-Brittany, speaking French and belonging to France as recognizably as the neighbouring provinces of Maine, Anjou and Poitou, which it physically resembled. West of this region lay the massif of lower Brittany, ‘Bretagne Bretonnante’ demonstrably different and overwhelmingly Breton-speaking.”
DNF
Another absurd (in retrospect) SUPERNOMAN. Main problem was typing in ESCAPEE which meant half a dozen unsuccessful alphatrawls to try and solve BROADS. Also wanted HIYA
Nice puzzle. Thanks all
Yep, nearly fell into the Hiya trap, but retracted the pen as HAIL dawned on me. Not saved by the FILET MIGNON – another anagram for a (unknown to me) foreign phrase. Bah.