This one hurt. It was a challenging puzzle that I nevertheless did quite well with, having everything in except for one clue in about 35 minutes. But I could not figure out 25 across for the life of me. Even after looking up the answer, it took me several minutes to make sense of what was going on.
Touché, setter!
| Across | |
| 1 | My family home collects different food to barbecue here? (3,2,5) |
| OUT OF DOORS – OURS (my family home) around anagram of FOOD TO
This meaning of OURS was quite foreign to me, so this one took much longer than it should have. |
|
| 6 | Hot green dresses are imitations (4) |
| ECHO – ECO (green) around (dresses) H (hot) | |
| 9 | Promotional material mentioned genuine East End butcher’s? (10) |
| PROPAGANDA – homophone of PROPER GANDER
Butcher’s is Cockney Rhyming Slang for ‘peek’. (butcher’s hook -> look) |
|
| 10 | A little bird doing no good (2,2) |
| AT IT – A TIT | |
| 12 | Love, difficult at a distance, gets in the way (12) |
| THOROUGHFARE – O (love) ROUGH (difficult) FAR (at a distance) in THE | |
| 15 | Charlie’s excitedly welcoming Penny round (9) |
| SPHERICAL – anagram of CHARLIE’S around P | |
| 17 | Member of party departing the Tabard Inn, where everybody’s drunk (5) |
| REEVE – hidden in WHERE EVERYBODY
A reference to The Canterbury Tales… of Chaucer… and Shakespeare. |
|
| 18 | Noisily change focal point of service (5) |
| ALTAR – homophone of ALTER | |
| 19 | Metrically, one’s very rigorous (9) |
| INTENSIVE – IN TENS (metrically) I’VE (one’s) | |
| 20 | Buffet cars inter alia currently serving rich gravy (7,5) |
| ROLLING STOCK – ROLLING (rich) STOCK (gravy)
Didn’t know ROLLING, slang for rich. |
|
| 24 | Current stable employee covers bet (4) |
| LAID – LAD (stable employee) around I (current) | |
| 25 | Queen Elizabeth Gates perhaps showing this sticker? (10) |
| BILLPOSTER – BILL (Gates perhaps) after (POST) ER (Queen Elizabeth) shows “Queen Elizabeth Gates perhaps”
Someone who sticks up bills. I didn’t know this word, and I still find the wordplay quite irritating. |
|
| 26 | Love interest of old city MD? (4) |
| EXEC – EX + EC
MD = Managing Director |
|
| 27 | Play I promise a short run in? (10) |
| IMPRESARIO – anagram (play) of I PROMISE around A + R (short run) | |
| Down | |
| 1 | My bad theatre job, enormous curtains (4) |
| OOPS – OS (enormous) around (curtains) OP (theatre job)
OP as in ‘operation’, in a surgical theater or a theater of war. |
|
| 2 | Worked beside well (4) |
| TOOK – TO (beside) OK (well) | |
| 3 | Silly exploit with plant that flavours water (7-5) |
| FEATHER-BRAIN – FEAT (exploit) HERB (plant that flavours) RAIN (water) | |
| 4 | Broadcasting / very happily? (2,3) |
| ON AIR – double definition-ish
A reference to the expression walking on air, inter alia. |
|
| 5 | Fish / a curious topping for ginger nut? (3,6) |
| RED MULLET – double definition-ish
Where a RED MULLET would be a bit of a curious look on the top of a redhead. |
|
| 7 | Result of a little home cooking? (7,3) |
| COTTAGE PIE – cryptic definition
Since COTTAGE = ‘little home’. At least this is how I read it. Is there something more here? |
|
| 8 | Confining serpent’s victim to pit below not awfully fair (2,3,5) |
| ON THE LEVEL – EVE (serpent’s victim) in HELL (pit) under anagram of NOT | |
| 11 | Station café’s offering things to give ox (7,5) |
| CHARING CROSS – CHA (café’s offering) + RING (thing to give ‘o’) + CROSS (thing to give ‘x’)
I can feel proud that I got this one as an American, completely from the wordplay of course. |
|
| 13 | Spring routine restricted by extremely elaborate footwear (10) |
| ESPADRILLE – SPA DRILL in E{laborat}E | |
| 14 | Children had remained with English housekeeper (10) |
| CHATELAINE – CH (children) ATE (had) LAIN (remained) E (English)
I look forward to watching Simon Anthony discuss the abbreviation CH for ‘children’ in his YouTube video tomorrow. I don’t dispute it (it’s in Chambers and Collins) but I have never once seen it in a cryptic crossword puzzle. |
|
| 16 | Covering between 100 and 1000 substantial cycles (9) |
| CLINGFILM – FILLING (substantial) with its letters rotated (cycles) between C (100) and M (1000) | |
| 21 | Chap out on roof newly illuminated from the ground? (5) |
| TILER – reversal of RE-LIT (newly illuminated?) | |
| 22 | Step out of a prison (4) |
| STIR – STAIR (step) – (out of) A | |
| 23 | Group One beginning to have change of heart (4) |
| TRIO – TIRO (one beginning) with its guts jumbled
I believe I’ve only seen TYRO, but I could be wrong. |
|
Completed and parsed with the occasional use of the dictionary/thesaurus, but that’s OK. I did think it was quite hard, but then took the attitude of not caring if I got it all or not, which vastly improved the experience. The short clues were quite oblique, I agree. CLINGFILM might be my favourite, for which I had earlier tried CLINGWRAP. I’m still a bit iffy about IMPRESARIO, even though I bunged it in. Thanks to the setter, and to the blogger and commenters. Coming very late to this (had a print-out tucked away), it’s nearly Christmas. Season’s greetings to all!