I’m running late, as I had to attend a memorial for a friend this evening, so I’ll keep it brief. This puzzle should not have been hard, but I was left with four unsolved at 15 minutes, and I struggled mightily with those. They were not actually that hard, but I just couldn’t call the appropriate words to mind.
Time: 28:34
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | Grab a customer blocking counter (6) |
| ABACUS – Hidden in [gr]AB A CUS[tomer]. | |
| 5 | Constituent briefly a fan of substantial backing (8) |
| INTEGRAL – INT[o] + LARGE backwards. | |
| 9 | Hapless MP edits last of Trotsky’s letters arranged in wrong order (8) |
| MISTYPED – Anagram of MP EDITS + [Trotsk]Y | |
| 10 | Soldiers entertained by American writer’s language (6) |
| ARABIC – A(R.A.)BIC. | |
| 11 | Bones chanced upon west of a Turkish city (10) |
| METATARSUS – MET + A + TARSUS. Metatarsus seems like it should be singular, but it is a group of bones in the foot. | |
| 13 | Partner’s celebration starting late (4) |
| EAST – [f]EAST. A bridge partner, that is. | |
| 14 | Reportedly think cat does this (4) |
| MEWS – Sounds like MUSE. | |
| 15 | Adult on his travels? Very strange (10) |
| OUTLANDISH – Anagram of ADULT ON HIS. | |
| 18 | Seals experience narrow escape (5,5) |
| CLOSE SHAVE – CLOSES + HAVE. | |
| 20 | Nobleman just about to lose case (4) |
| EARL – [n]EARL[y]. | |
| 21 | A country once mostly forming large land area (4) |
| ASIA – A + SIA[m]. | |
| 23 | Miriam late up? It’s of no consequence (10) |
| IMMATERIAL – Anagram of MIRIAM LATE. Up is a novel anagram indicator, at least to me. | |
| 25 | Line shared by neo-Marxists and anti-Semites? (6) |
| HYPHEN – Cryptic hint, a fairly common device for punctuation marks. | |
| 26 | Tryst with Eva turning into farce (8) |
| TRAVESTY – Anagram of TRYST + EVA. | |
| 28 | Increasingly sentimental tears regularly shed on boat (8) |
| TENDERER – TENDER + [t]E[a]R[s]. | |
| 29 | Lead on clubs to eliminate onset of racism in full (6) |
| ENTICE – ENTI(-r,+C)E. | |
| Down | |
|---|---|
| 2 | Newly-wed thriving in prison (9) |
| BRIDEWELL – BRIDE WELL – think 18th century London prisons. How many can you name? | |
| 3 | Arm of TUC upset group ignored by leader of Conservatives (7) |
| CUTLASS – TUC upside-down + [c]LASS. | |
| 4 | Idiot’s backward step (3) |
| SAP – PAS upside-down. | |
| 5 | River pilot going out of business (5) |
| INDUS – INDUS[try]. A bit of a chestnut. | |
| 6 | Upfront dad with gender dysphoria? (11) |
| TRANSPARENT – TRANS PARENT. | |
| 7 | Enterprising Indian chief (2-5) |
| GO-AHEAD – GOA HEAD. | |
| 8 | Sign of one in thrall to warmonger (5) |
| ARIES – AR(I)ES. | |
| 12 | Somehow dreading son’s mess (1,4,6) |
| A DOGS DINNER – Anagram of DREADING SON. A dog’s breakfast in the US. | |
| 16 | Drink consumed after article pushed back (3) |
| TEA – ATE with the A moved to the end. | |
| 17 | Jeering exhausted amateurs in south polar region (9) |
| SARCASTIC – S + ARC(A[mateur]S)TIC. | |
| 19 | Stoned, as one’s avocado might be (7) |
| SMASHED – Cryptic hint. | |
| 20 | Try leaving hospital refuge sober (7) |
| EARNEST – [h]EAR + NEST. | |
| 22 | Design of steps announced (5) |
| STYLE – Sounds like STILE. Style and design as verbs. | |
| 24 | Mum’s game over, start to relax (5) |
| MATER – MATE! + R[elax]. | |
| 27 | Demands of Treasury barely fell (3) |
| AXE – [t]AXE[s]. | |
32 minutes. A nicely judged puzzle. I think you’re just as likely to hear “dog’s breakfast” in the UK as “dog’s dinner”. I liked the clue to MATER.
And I don’t think you’re likely to hear either in the US.
17 down’ s clue is incorrect. It is the north polar region which is the arctic not the South. The South polar region is the antarctic
Not incorrect. South is cluing S , and polar region is cluing ARCTIC.
31:14
No idea why this took me so long; just general mental sluggishness, I suppose. I think BRIDEWELL may have become a common noun by the 18th century; anyway, I can think of Newgate and the Marshalsea.
V, I think you’ve got your + and – backwards in ENTICE.
When I first moved into this flat, my nearest police station was New Bridewell, historically a prison, which always helps me remember the name. As with so many things in Bristol it’s been knocked down and redeveloped into student accommodation, which seem to be the fate of almost every dingy bit of cheap 1970 architecture here.
The prison was the City Bridewell which closed in 1878. The New Bridewell was a police station and a probation officer where I volunteered in the 1980s. On the other side of the road was a Crown Court which had holding cells which linked by tunnels with the other Crown Courts where St Nicholas market now is. The cells frequently flooded as the river Frome runs underground through the centre. I actually think that the current student building is a good design though it’s sad that there is so much quality student accommodation but so much homelessness and rough sleeping for Bristolians.
I like “The Clink” too .. it’s near Southwark Cathedral and became a general word for prison. The oldest one in the country, so they say. Though I doubt that.
And The Clink.
A DNF with a silly typo at GO AHEAD. Good Monday puzzle with the gender dysphoric Dad my LOI and favourite.
17’56”, no issues eventually. Liked BRIDEWELL, SARCASTIC and METATARSUS.
Thanks vinyl and setter.
24 minutes with LOI CUTLASS. I think I’ve been more of a DOG’s DINNER than BREAKFAST person in my life, but I can say either. Playing football for the first half of that life has taught me that METATARSUS is plural. COD to Incompetent, Irrelevant and IMMATERIAL. Enjoyable start to the week. Thank you V and setter,
13:09. I agree a bit tricky in places, but nothing held me up unduly. I liked the TRANS PARENT best. Thanks Vinyl and setter.
25:22 which is good for me and under my 30:00 target. Delayed a bit in the SW by the HYPHEN/STYLE/TENDERER combo but got there in the end. Thanks Vinyl and setter.
Just under 20 minutes.
– Hesitated slightly over METATARSUS as I wasn’t 100% sure that Tarsus is in Turkey
– Relied on the wordplay for the otherwise likely-sounding BRIDEWELL
– Wouldn’t immediately equate EARNEST with sober, but I’m sure there’s overlap somewhere
Thanks vinyl and setter.
FOI Abacus
LOI Smashed
COD Transparent
18.54, so apparently Tricky For a Monday, with the NE corner holding me up most, a decent collection of properly good clues, especially (indeed) TRANS PARENT. I also liked the substitution device for ENTICE, something which I think we’re seeing more frequently – Saturday’s Jumbo had several.
I’ve never personally SMASHED an avocado, but I quite like guacamole when someone else has prepared it.
21 mins. Held up in the SW at the end. Monday fun.
Didn’t parse EARNEST but pleased to spot HYPHEN, those always fool me.
Another TRANSPARENT fan here. Thanks to vinyl and setter.
23.33 with the SW corner the most trouble until I got smashed- a phrase appropriate for this time of year.
Merry Xmas to one and all.
22 minutes and a very pleasant solve with the NE corner last to fall, ARIES being my LOI. Good start to the day and the week. Much thanks to setter and blogger.
Held up at the end with HYPHEN/STYLE. I didn’t see what was going on at HYPHEN although once I got it, STYLE was obvious, but until then I was not thinking of STILE for steps. I’m not sure I knew about BRIDEWELL although the wordplay handed it to you. Typical Monday fare.
Yep. That SW corner has clearly proven tricky for some others, too. It doesn’t help that I have never smashed an avocado in my life so that definitely meant absolutely nothing to me. STYLE, I should have seen far quicker – no excuses. But HYPHEN … There it was, right in front of me, but I could not spot it.
ABACUS, MISTYPED, OUTLANDISH and CLOSE SHAVE were my podium and timing, a fraction over 20 minutes.
Thanks setter and blogger
20:31
Decent puzzle, mostly straightforward but a longish delay over STYLE, HYPHEN and SMASHED.
COD TRANSPARENT.
Thanks to Vinyl and the setter
17:44 but was doing it on my phone, off and on, whilst on dad duties. I felt I could have been quicker on the laptop but then maybe clogs were turning in my head between each visit.
Didn’t parse INDUS but I guess there’s a first time for every chestnut.
Liked TRANSPARENT and GO AHEAD so must be in dad joke mood today.
Thanks blogger and setter.
Liked this one, only a little bit Mondayish, I thought.
13ac a poor clue, “Partner” seems insufficient as a definition.
Since you ask, Vinyl, I’m OK with c18 London prisons: Newgate, Bridewell, Marshalsea, The Clink, Fleet prison, the King’s Bench, Clerkenwell .. and there were others I believe, given the population at the time London must have been quite a lawless place!
Johnny-come-latelies like Wormwood Scrubs, Pentonville & Holloway (all Victorian) don’t count, of course..
All done and parsed but it took me 35′ or so. Like others I enjoyed the dysphoric dad but not so much the HYPHEN. My daughter in law smashed my last avocado for breakfast yesterday which freed up the sticky SW corner. INDUS wasn’t a chestnut for me..
Thanks Vinyl and setter
I thought the famous Bridewell was in Dublin – I remember visiting (not as an inmate), didn’t realise there were Bridewells all over the place.
Left the end of METATARS** until the checker arrived, to add US, didn’t know it was a plural but had to be.
SOBER = EARNEST raised an eyebrow. Otherwise all flowed in and done in 20 minutes. MATER was neat, and TRANS PARENT got a silent groan.
I don’t think Metatarsus is right
The bone is metatarsal and the plural is metatarsi
Collins: ‘the skeleton of the human foot between the toes and the tarsus, consisting of five long bones’.
I took an irritatingly long amount of time on this. Even had to use aids on STYLE, looking up S _ _ _ _ words for design. And then to make it worse I realised that I’d seen it before. Wasn’t sure about INTEGRAL = constituent, and certainly wasn’t sure, to the extent of disliking it, of EAST = partner. INDUS no chestnut for me, although if the above is anything to go by I’ve come across it before. 52 minutes.
Took a while to get started. SAP went in first, but then I drew a blank until EARL. Proceeded clockwise from there finishing in the NE with the dysphoric Dad. Ha ha. After a slow start I seemed to finish at a trot. 21:48. Thanks setter and Vinyl.
I was surprised to find myself in the top 10% of solvers on the Leaderboard (15th but really 11th if we ignore the 4 idiots above Verlaine who need to get a life), since I found this only marginally trickier than an average Monday puzzle.
FOI ABACUS
LOI ARIES
COD OUTLANDISH
TIME 8:01
28m – inexcusably slow on the HYPHEN clue and in the SW in general, with STYLE and TENDERER proving particularly tricky – the latter involving staring far too long at the wrong end of the clue for the definition.
28:13. Nice one. LOI MEWS which totally threw me. I liked CLOSE SHAVE, TRANSPARENT (of course) and GO AHEAD.
Ideally – and for this we would have to discount dictionaries, all other reference works and widespread common usage – ideally the dog’s two different meals would have two different meanings:
Dog’s breakfast – a mess, just as it is
Dog’s dinner – a mess, dressed up to look nice (successfully, or possibly not)
Ah yes. If only I were in charge of the English language
If only anybody was .. it’s a dog’s breakfast
‘ Just couldn’t call the appropriate words to mind’ – tell me about it! In my case it was the AXE / ENTICE crossing which caused a DNF.
A nice Monday crossword, with Transparent giving me a good chuckle!
It took me 21 mins (in three sessions!) with c 5 of those spent on the SW corner. I kicked myself when I eventually worked out HYPHEN, a clever straightforward clue. As soon as I got TENDERER, SMASHED solved itself. Of several amusing clues, I particularly liked the Enterprising Indian chief. Thank you to setter and Vinyl(L).
I had (r)ALLY for a while at 13ac which almost works but turned out not to fit the checkers so had to rethink. Around 9 minutes in all so reasonably Mondayish for me. The dysphoric dad raised a smile.
2o minutes for this. TRANSPARENT went straight in as I’d watched Ricky Gervais doing his Bruce Jenner routine just before doing the crossword.
I seem to have one of the slowest times at 45 minutes – but I did have a couple of Christmas drinks at lunchtime. Held up by Earnest and Entice at the end.
My COD to Go Ahead.
34:52. Brain not working due to flu. at least that’s what I’m going to claim. LOI MEWS which took far too long.
18.19
Late entry. Like Zabadak the NE was entirely blank for a while. Excellently judged puzzle. Nice blog.
This was one of the hardest puzzles I’ve ever attempted, for some reason. How does TENDER work?
Tender – a small boat, such as a dinghy, towed or carried by a yacht or ship
I’m with you on this PJ, I found it hard to get the last half-a-dozen answers over the line
had a ? beside 24d, thinking is etam a game?…. doh .
COD transparent. thanks to setter and blogger
I’m with PJ too, as I struggled all the way through this. Certainly didn’t feel Mondayish to me. (Today actually is a Monday here in Oz, and Australia Day to boot – so all very quiet here). Didn’t get the dysphoric dad, nor the near thing, as I was stuck in my head with Navy Seals. For whatever reason I put in SKYPE at 22d too – so not my day, all told. Liked TRANSPARENT and MEWS.