Once again the Saturday puzzle was soothingly straightforward by comparison with the day before. Thanks, setter. How did you all do?
Note for newcomers: The Times offers prizes for Saturday Cryptic Crosswords. This blog is for last week’s puzzle, posted after the competition closes. So, please don’t comment here on this week’s Saturday Cryptic.
Definitions are in bold and underlined. With the luxury of a week to do the blog, I can expand on the wordplay, so:
-
- synonyms and the like appear in [square brackets]
- instructions to show how to get the answer appear thus
- anagram material is (THUS)*, with the anagram indicator in italics
- a ^ symbol indicates where text is to be inserted.
| Across | |
| 1 | Rude track on the radio (6) |
| COARSE – sounds (on the radio) like COURSE. | |
| 4 | Take away work from Kandinsky? (8) |
| ABSTRACT – two meanings. I didn’t remember Kandinsky. |
|
| 10 | Have young professional cut sandwiches (9) |
| REPRODUCE – RE^DUCE [cut] sandwiches PRO. | |
| 11 | Masked sidekick to plunder home (5) |
| ROBIN – ROB + IN. Batman’s “Boy Wonder“. |
|
| 12 | Small old man heated bath (3) |
| SPA – S + PA. Two easy ones in a row. | |
| 13 | Money book heroine swipes in valour (11) |
| DOUGHTINESS – DOUGH + T^ESS includes (swipes) IN. | |
| 14 | Intermediate male violinist wanting tips (6) |
| MIDDLE – M + FIDDLER (wanting tips). | |
| 16 | Love oldies broadcast after one (7) |
| IDOLISE – I + (OLDIES)*, broadcast. | |
| 19 | One leaving property on a hill (7) |
| LEGATOR – LEG [the on side, at cricket] + A + TOR. | |
| 20 | Therapist from outskirts of Portsmouth regularly seen by a sailor (6) |
| PHYSIO – PH [outskirts of PortsmoutH] + YSIO [bY a SaIlOr, regularly] | |
| 22 | Japanese food beginning to sell loads around Scottish town (4,7) |
| SOBA NOODLES – Sell + OODLES, around OBAN. I dimly remembered the answer, at best. |
|
| 25 | Trouble from ChatGPT, say, source of lies (3) |
| AIL – AI [ChatGPT, say] + L [source of Lies]. | |
| 26 | Resistance to be in silly sketch (5) |
| DRAFT – R in DAFT. | |
| 27 | Get notes from debtors having low level of interest (9) |
| INCURIOUS – INCUR [get] + IOUS. | |
| 28 | Soldier and third of regiment enthralled by dusky model (8) |
| PARADIGM – PARA [soldier] + G [third of reGiment] inside (enthralled by) DI^M. | |
| 29 | Idiot Yankee obstructed by second being devious (6) |
| TWISTY – TWI^T + Y obstructed by S. Twisty? A devious route, perhaps. |
|
| Down | |
| 1 | Take heart from sloppy act of affection (6) |
| CARESS – take middle letters (heart) from CARELESS | |
| 2 | Seeming enticing to change sides (9) |
| APPEARING – APPEALING [enticing] changing sides from L to R. | |
| 3 | Rose starts to trail over turf borders (5) |
| STOOD – S^OD [turf] borders TO [starts to Trail Over]. | |
| 5 | Space that man’s taken in airship above a secure stately home (8,6) |
| BLENHEIM PALACE – EN [typesetter’s space] + HE [man] taken in BLI^MP [airship] gives you BLENHEIM P. Put that above A + LACE [secure: lace your shoes, for example]. | |
| 6 | On railway, stray within dictator’s land (9) |
| TERRITORY – ERR within T^ITO, on RY. | |
| 7 | Walk better when unclothed (5) |
| AMBLE – GAMBLER, unclothed. | |
| 8 | Metal fastener mounted on top of Gatling gun (8) |
| TUNGSTEN – TUN [NUT, mounted] + G [top of Gatling] + STEN [gun]. The Gatling and Sten guns date from different eras. |
|
| 9 | Ensuring continued service from group if fortune fails (6-8) |
| FUTURE PROOFING – (GROUP IF FORTUNE)* fails. | |
| 15 | Set off from old housing somewhere in Berkshire (9) |
| DETONATED – D^ATED [old] housing ETON. | |
| 17 | They feign patriotism deposing leader in revolution (9) |
| IMITATORS – (pATRIOTISM)*, in revolution. | |
| 18 | Nearby upside-down pudding is sealed (6,2) |
| CLOSED UP – CLOSE [nearby] + DUP [PUD, upside-down]. | |
| 21 | Sort to ignore if posh (6) |
| CLASSY – CLASSIFY, to ignore IF. | |
| 23 | Former PM vacated beautiful carriage (5) |
| BLAIR – BL [vacated BeautifuL] + AIR [carriage]. | |
| 24 | Brief scrap with small beast (5) |
| SHREW – SHRED + W. | |
Thought had this one and nearly fully parsed, but for some reason could not see 3d STOOD. And there was not any Yoda speak unlike 10ac REPRODUCE.
Admired 27ac INCURIOUS for neatness, 7d AMBLE for simplicity and 15d DETONATED for unusual reference to Eton.
Thought 5d BLENHEIM PALACE complicated although did parse correctly, 8d TUNGSTEN a bit strained, and is W (presumably for wee) acceptable behaviour in 24d SHREW? Apparantly so.
Thank you setter and branch.
If have the time, will have a go at Tricky Thursday (or F-ing Friday) this week, just for the torture and some giggles.
W=with
OK. Thank you.
W for with is normal practice I presume.
I belatedly notice branch had ‘little’ as part of the meaning.
Yes, W=with is in Chambers, and the SOE. I can’t see it in the Collins app on my iPad.
W is in general use (w/), as is w/o for without.
17:51
Biffed a bunch, couldn’t parse TERRITORY, IMITATORS. DNK that Eton is in Berkshire, not that it mattered. I couldn’t remember who Kandinsky was, so had to wait for checkers. I liked TUNGSTEN.
40 minutes. SHREW and TWISTY delayed me at the very end. NHO SOBAN NOODLES.
soba. I never heard of ‘soba noodles’, either, of course; just ‘soba’, buckwheat noodles.
Am coming to really enjoy the weekend puzzles as recent Friday efforts have shaken my confidence to some extent.
I thought this one was excellent with FUTURE PROOFING particularly good. Thought TWISTY was a bit weak but no other complaints.
Pleasant stuff. Nho soba noodles but as so often, it didn’t matter; the clueing was clear.
I thought I had this sewn up, albeit with alphabet trawls for COARSE and CLASSY. The former took forever as my LOI, as I passed over O because of the pronunciation change with the missing R. However, I see now I mistook the definition for 24d as Brief and went for SCROW, (small crow) which I guessed from the legal word escrow, and which does mean a scroll, often legal. It’s archaic, but that’s never stopped setters yet!