Solving Time: About 25 minutes, but the last five spent on 20dn. This is one of the four “Vintage Olympic cryptic puzzles” printed on the Crossword Club website today, and my second blog of the day. In the absence of any other volunteers Andy (Linxit) has kindly agreed to blog two of the other three and Tony Sever has even more kindly agreed to blog the stinker from 1948.
This is the most recent of the four and almost certainly the easiest, though I haven’t done much more than glance at the others yet. If it were printed as a daily cryptic now, I don’t think it would have caused any undue comment at all. A fine, straightforward solve with only 20dn giving me any trouble, though I don’t think it’s in any way an unfair clue. The set of four are each from the opening day of their respective Olympics; but I can’t see anything unusual, such as a nina, in the two I have tackled so far
cd = cryptic definition, dd = double definition, rev = reversed, anagrams are *(–).
ODO means the Oxford Dictionaries Online
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | hemlock – border = HEM + LOCK, which the ODO defines as “a short section of a canal or river with gates and sluices at each end.” Hemlock is an unusually poisonous plant. Just 0.1g can be fatal |
| 5 | peckish – kiss = PECK + I + SH |
| 9 |
consensus – O + N |
| 10 |
error – |
| 11 |
lurid – game = R |
| 12 | insolvent – very = V in INSOLENT |
| 14 | spring-cleaning – without mistakes = CLEAN in SPRINGING. Even in 2000 “housewives” had a faintly old-fashioned feel |
| 17 | as the case may be – a dd, the second one relating to an airport luggage carousel, I think |
| 21 | headdress – man = HE + ADDRESS = skill. The latter is in ODO, though it marks it “dated.” Couldn’t find it in the current Chambers |
| 23 |
haste – H |
| 24 | lifer – a cd, and a clever one too, I thought |
| 25 | driftwood – *(DID FOR TWO) |
| 26 |
rockery – |
| 27 | Hackney – a dd, Hackney being both a horse-drawn cab and a London borough, much of it transformed by the recent London Olympics |
| Down | |
| 1 | hackle – gain access to = HACK + LE. A hackle is a cock’s neck feather, worn in in a (usually military) cap as decoration. This I knew, but god knows where from |
| 2 | mantrap – a word repeated = MANTRA + P = quietly |
| 3 | overdrive – cricketing terms = OVER + DRIVE. This word appeared not so long ago, and led to an erudite discussion. Broadly an overdrive is a high gear where the objective is fuel economy, and not maximum speed. I leave the Wiki entry for those who want more.. it’s quite interesting in fact |
| 4 | kissing gate – *(EG ITS ASKING). A common device in these parts, which does indeed limit access, barring not only farm animals but also anyone sufficiently obese. Which seems counterproductive, rather |
| 5 | pas – hidden |
| 6 | creel – C + R + EEL |
| 7 | Israeli – IS + RA + ELI, the latter of which seems to have been appearing regularly in crosswords pretty much since he died |
| 8 | heritage – *(EIGHT ARE). Neat clue |
| 13 | silversmith – “Treasure Island” mutineer = (Long John) SILVER + (Winston) SMITH, main character of Orwell’s novel 1984 |
| 15 | apathetic – A PATH + CITE rev. |
| 16 |
bachelor – *(BE |
| 18 | traffic – *(CRAFT IF) |
| 19 | bassoon – BA’S SOON |
| 20 | heyday – a cd. One’s heyday is when one is in one’s prime. Took me a while to see this, the wordplay is not too helpful |
| 22 | dirge – note = G in DIRE |
| 25 | dry – DRY = hardliner as opposed, of course, to the wets. Not a familiar usage to me but it’s in Chambers. And dry as in drained dry. |
My hesitations were all in things you’ve flagged – 1 across (I always think of a lock as a thing which connects two sections of canal, but as the smallest normal lock is about 70 feet long, I guess it has to be counted as a section in its own right); that meaning of address; and “dry”, which I imagine was regarded as more familiar usage twelve years ago when the wet / dry Tory cabinet was a much more recent political memory.
P.S. Jerry, if I may point out a typo in the interests of completeness, you’ve left the TO in, and not removed the S
ucceeded, from the anagram at 16 down.The current (2011) edition of Chambers includes “adroitness” among its definitions of “address”, which is close enough to “skill” for me.