45:01. I found this hard, and if my suspicions are correct, most UK solvers will not agree with me: I had the distinct feeling that this puzzle required more UK-specific knowledge than most. (Which is quite all right, of course!) I enjoyed many of these clues — even more after I’d taken the time to parse them!
| Across | |
| 1 | What banks account for every individual (4) |
| EACH – EH (what) around (banks) AC (account) | |
| 3 | Further crimes DA laid on Irishman (3,3,4) |
| AID AND ABET – DA BET (laid) after (on) AIDAN (Irishman)
‘Further’ is a verb in the answer. |
|
| 9 | One newly risen, standard planet waning in the east (7) |
| PARVENU – PAR (standard) + VENUS (planet) without the last letter (waning in the east)
Shame on me for thinking Earth and Pluto were the only planets with five letters. |
|
| 11 | Fruit trees one foot, two feet or more? (7) |
| PAWPAWS – PAW (one foot) PAWS (two feet or more?)
I had wanted the answer to have something to do with metrical feet. And I thought “fruit trees…” would be PEAR or PLUM around I FT or something like that. The answer was much simpler than that! |
|
| 12 | Educate minors, running teaching programmes? (13) |
| DOCUMENTARIES – EDUCATE MINORS anagrammed (running) | |
| 14 | Writer returning only some of one’s Biros (5) |
| IBSEN – hidden reversed (returning only some of) ONE’S BIROS
Was held up for a bit by having written in ISBEN! |
|
| 15 | Spin gets Diane named for office (9) |
| DESIGNATE – anagram of (spin) GETS DIANE
We are looking for the adjective form of the word, as in “chairman designate”, etc. The part of speech here tripped me up for a long time! |
|
| 17 | Powerless factory mobilised human element (9) |
| LANTHANUM – PLANT (factory) – P (powerless) + anagram of (mobilised) HUMAN | |
| 19 | Large hunter chasing game lasts for one hour (5) |
| TIGER – TIG (chasing game) + last letters of (lasts for) ONE HOUR
Didn’t even come close to seeing the wordplay during my solve. |
|
| 21 | Shared understanding lumberjack’s work, receiving down payment (6,7) |
| FELLOW FEELING – FELLING (lumberjack’s work) around (receiving) LOW (down) FEE (payment) | |
| 24 | Issue chap had going behind wife’s back (7) |
| EMANATE – MAN (chap) ATE (had) after (going behind) last letter of (‘s back) WIFE | |
| 25 | After taking everything off, grand party game (7) |
| NETBALL – NET (after taking everything off) BALL (grand party)
I liked this clue very much. |
|
| 26 | Ship’s computer voided floppy in good time, twice each orbit? (4-6) |
| HALF-YEARLY – HAL (ship’s computer) + F{lopp}Y (voided) + EARLY (in good time)
Really liked this one as well. |
|
| 27 | That woman’s daughters drive together (4) |
| HERD – HER (that woman’s) D (daughters) | |
| Down | |
| 1 | Spring practice in bare feet, footwear for summer? (10) |
| ESPADRILLE – SPA (spring) DRILL (practice) in {f}EE{t} (bare)
Another great one, marred only by the fact that the answer was fairly easy to see with the right checker or two. |
|
| 2 | Coach service of use during strike [in] capital (7) |
| CARACAS – CAR (coach) ACAS (service of use during strike)
I don’t know much about ACAS, but you can read about it here. |
|
| 4 | Fertiliser put on south of island wiped out reptile species (9) |
| IGUANODON – GUANO (fertiliser) DON (put on) below (south of) I (island) | |
| 5 | Most influential Davos summit has finished early (5) |
| ALPHA – ALP (Davos summit) HA{s} (finished early) | |
| 6 | Having second decision-making structure in case of dissent, the Westminster way (7,6) |
| DOWNING STREET – OWNING (having) S (second) TREE (decision-making structure) in D{issen}T (case of)
Probably a write-in for everyone but me. |
|
| 7 | Smile, and date in the audience waves from the side (4,3) |
| BEAM SEA – BEAM (smile) + (and) homophone of (in the audience) SEE (date)
It means, ‘waves from the side’. |
|
| 8 | Facial hair you shouldn’t have? Say no more (4) |
| TASH – TA (you shouldn’t have) SH (say no more)
Liked this one too! |
|
| 10 | Man on top first, change lady under him liked initially (6,7) |
| EDMUND HILLARY – anagram of (change) LADY UNDER HIM L{iked} (initially)
The first man to climb Mount Everest. The surface reading here is… spicy? |
|
| 13 | Sleep with tatty blankets left dirty and damp (10) |
| BEDRAGGLED – BED (sleep with) RAGGED (tatty) around (blankets) L (left)
Did not know BEDRAGGLED had the connotation of wetness. Things are getting moist up in here. |
|
| 16 | Tie families forged across fence in the middle (9) |
| SEMIFINAL – FAMILIES anagrammed (forged) around (across) {fe}N{ce} (in the middle)
Took me too long to see this — forgot that ‘tie’ is a match. |
|
| 18 | Tasteless, absolutely not a sausage (4,3) |
| NAFF ALL – NAFF (tasteless) ALL (absolutely)
I think I’ve parsed this right. (ALL = ‘absolutely’ isn’t 100% convincing.) This was my last in and I really had no idea what was going on, until suddenly I remembered that NAFF was a British word I’d heard before, and I knew it had to be it. |
|
| 20 | Put a funny face on ghastly card (7) |
| GRIMACE – GRIM (ghastly) ACE (card) | |
| 22 | Music[’s] what gets punk going in old age (5) |
| OPERA – P{unk} (what gets … going) in O (old) ERA (age)
Liked this one. |
|
| 23 | Drug was introduced to hospital (4) |
| METH – MET (was introduced to) H (hospital) | |
DNF – speedy enough until I hit BEAM SEA and AID AND ABET and eventually gave up
Please will someone explain the Punk clue. Even reading Jeremy’s blog I’m afraid I am none the wiser. Great crossword though, and on the hard side for me.
The P “Gets punk going” (starts it), in the middle of O (old) and ERA (Age)
Much appreciated. Now you’ve told me, it seems obvious! Thanks.
Love pawpaws, known around these parts as papayas. Had 2 prolific trees in the back yard, but both of them fell over dead – I’ve got a brown thumb when it comes to gardening, but 5 and 10 year-old trees just separating from their roots and falling surprised me. BEAM SEA NHO, but they have phrases like head sea and lee shore, so it seemed reasonable. CAR-ACAS a had-to-be guess, liked HAL, knew NAFF as tasteless, know my periodic table – Lanthanides and Actinides written down the bottom cos there’s no room up the top where they should be. Didn’t find it as hard as many seem to have.
Oh, and thought Hilary had only one L.
In the US we use papaya for the large tropical fruit. There is a North American berry like thing called a pawpaw, which pretty much everyone knows due to a child’s song where some of the activity is “pickin’ up pawpaws put ’em in your pocket, way down yonder in the pawpaw patch”.
Careful, it can be an earworm.
Pawpaws arrive in my garden from time to time courtesy of passing birds, or possibly bats. I let them live as food for possums, hoping to get citrus before they do. (Can’t eat the fruit, due to their meat tenderising effect, ditto pineapple. ) Wet feet are deadly to pawpaw, that is consistent with sudden demise.
I enjoyed this puzzle, despite falling at the last hurdle – missed the anagram for Ed H, didn’t see first as part of the definition.
It was surely BEAM SEA, but I hadn’t heard of it, so that and AID AND ABET held me up for ages. Eventually I gave up and looked for B S in Chambers and there it was. Otherwise a very pleasant crossword, with many clues enjoyed, but I took 59 minutes over it.
Plugged away for just over an hour with liberal use of the check button but only one reveal for AID AND ABET. Needed help with some of the parsings but did manage most. Really enjoyed and particularly liked TASH, HALF-YEARLY, IGUANODON, ALPHA… the list goes on! No probs with ACAS. LANTHANUM was a NHO but sounded plausible. Only just understood the parsing of OPERA – brilliant! Many thanks jeremy and setter.
Blasted thru this in 15:37 but alas too quickly. Biffed Edmund Hillary once I had a few checkers without pausing to think about the clue and spelt it Edmond. This after spelling iguanodon correctly for the first time ever.
Great puzzle, thx Jeremy and setter
50 minutes.
Like Dvynys, I also entered Espadrills, but I’m not going to let that spoil my day. Very nice puzzle.
My COD – Aid and Abet
Tough but enjoyable. My legal knowledge assisted with aid and abet.
Great puzzle! 50 mins in pub (unaided!), interrupted by visit to bar for replenishment purposes. NHO element, haven’t heard the Lehrer patter song for a while! FOI IBSEN, LOI the excellent TASH.
Good puzzle but I landed in the fertiliser with IGUANADON. I Chuckled at NAFF ALL. My wife says I often do.
Thanks to Jeremy and the setter
I had all the GK, and was lucky to see where a couple of the longer answers with slightly cryptic definitions were going, so a pleasant start to the weekend.
LAY is the opposite of BET, but laypersons are perennially confused by it.
I grimace every time I see it.
Definitions of ‘lay’:
Chambers: To make (a bet), wager
Collins: To make (a bet) with (someone): I lay you five to one on Prince
ODE: stake (an amount of money) in a bet: she suspected he was pulling her leg, but she wouldn’t have laid money on it
Perhaps you should take it up with multiple lexicographers!
Those examples don’t demonstrate anything. The second example is simply me as a layer giving you a price of 5/1 for your bet as a bettor.
The second example is less obvious, but imagine the ‘book’ has two options-pulling her leg or not pulling her leg. She’s unsure (as a layer) of either so she won’t accept any bets on it.
I concede the latter has come to mean the opposite, and I did say it makes me grimace. But it doesn’t make it correct.
As for Chambers, I have nearly 50 years in the betting business and I’m kind of tempted to trust that rather than any definition in there.
Bettors ‘place’ bets, bookmakers ‘lay’ them.
Really didn’t think I’d crack this one – took ages to do the RH side and then struggled with lots of gaps on the left until suddenly a few fell into place. Once I worked out PARVENU I found EDMUND HILLARY (very good!) and it was plain sailing from there with LOI the clever HALF YEARLY. Very pleased with myself!
Thanks yet again to the setter and to all of you who write the blog and educate the rest of us 🙂
39:44. A super crossword. I was surprised to see the Snitch below 100, and I’m still surprised after reading the comments. But there you go; it certainly wasn’t a Friday stinker. I never parsed AID AND ABET, and luckily didn’t need to. The rest was wonderful. I loved getting the punk started in the OPERA, and the LOW FEE as a down payment. And ALPHA and NETBALL…
Finished this today, after starting it yesterday, but then having lots of travelling to do.
Lovely clue surfaces hiding deceptive clues. LOI was SEMIFINAL and I was convinced for ages it was an obscure word.
More of these please!
Only came to it today, as yesterday was house-moving my son for around 14 hours, including driving to London and back with a hire van full of furniture. I found it very accessible for a Friday, and couldn’t see much UK-centric material except NAFF OFF, though I concede ACAS might present a problem to non-UK solvers. LANTHANUM had to be – there really was no other way the letters could have been distributed. BEAM SEA was NHO but self-explanatory. I couldn’t parse TIGER – shame on me – got the TIG bit but missed the final letter indication. Bifd and post-parsed FELLOW FEELING. LOI NETBALL.
Worked through this yesterday on paper – very slowly but enjoyably. That was until I got to the SW where I had WASH (WAS introduced to H – hospital) for 23dn. I assumed that might be another term for drug, looked it up and found it is a slang term for meth. This meant I didn’t get my LOI 24ac.
Sunday night solve after week away. Happy with 26’32”. Made mistake with IGUAN-A-DON once before so was ready this time. ‘O’ Deliberately placed on a non-checker. “Now if you take a pawpaw or a prickly pear, and you prick a raw paw, the next time beware” – Jungle Book.
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