Hi everybody.
17a is my firm favourite today as I’m currently popping round daily to feed and cuddle a colleague’s two truly adorable animals. 9a and 4d sent me on a less happy train of thought, so I will turn my attention back to the here and now.
I took about 25% longer than average, which is unusual for me on a Monday. I’ll be interested to see how you found it.
Thanks Hurley!
Definitions are underlined in the clues below. In the explanations, quoted indicators are in italics and I’ve capitalised and emboldened letters which appear in the ANSWER. For clarity, I omit most link words and some juxtaposition indicators.
| Across | |
| 1a | One organising mother’s period in Dominica’s capital (10) |
| MASTERMIND — MA’S (mother’s) + TERM (period) + IN + Dominica’s first letter (capital) | |
| 8a | Covered area in Hull, say, associated with island firm (7) |
| PORTICO — PORT (Hull, say) next to (associated with) I (island) + CO (firm) | |
| 9a | Anxious future maybe (5) |
| TENSE — A double definition, the second grammatical | |
| 10a | Drops artist, trendy (4) |
| RAIN — RA (artist) + IN (trendy) | |
| 11a | Background‘s ripe edge, suspicious (8) |
| PEDIGREE — RIPE EDGE, anagrammed (suspicious) | |
| 13a | On radio, I’ll identify facial feature (6) |
| EYELID — EYEL, which in the answer sounds like (on radio) I’ll, plus ID (identify) | |
| 14a | Pressure leading favourite one controlled totally (6) |
| PUPPET — P (pressure) + UP (leading) + PET (favourite) | |
| 17a | After returning animal, I go, saying little (8) |
| TACITURN — On reversal (after returning), CAT (animal) + I + TURN (go) | |
| 19a | Restricted by most unexpected surprise (4) |
| STUN — The answer is contained in (restricted by) moST UNexpected | |
| 21a | Street urchin‘s advantage after Frenchman intervenes (5) |
| GAMIN — GAIN (advantage) with M inside (after Frenchman intervenes); M = Monsieur | |
| 22a | Closed? I’m disgusted — that is difficult question (7) |
| TOUGHIE — TO (closed? – of a door) + UGH (I’m disgusted) + IE (that is) | |
| 23a | Amusing exaggeration perhaps potentially accurate about Rhode Island? (10) |
| CARICATURE — An anagram of (potentially) ACCURATE around (about) RI (Rhode Island) | |
| Down | |
| 2d | Maybe KLM tune policy (7) |
| AIRLINE — AIR (tune) + LINE (policy) | |
| 3d | One of pair, wife, in the money? (4) |
| TWIN — W (wife) in TIN (the money?) | |
| 4d | Greek island‘s ways to get around, they say (6) |
| RHODES — ROADS (ways to get around), homophone (they say) | |
| 5d | Scheme in eg Turin I concocted (8) |
| INTRIGUE — EG TURIN I anagrammed (concocted) | |
| 6d | One giving party meeting refusal, resistance (5) |
| DONOR — DO (party) next to (meeting) NO (refusal) + R (resistance) | |
| 7d | Regret agent upset canteen (10) |
| REPENTANCE — REP (agent) + an anagram of (upset) CANTEEN | |
| 8d | Figure, recent, revised, put into sheet (10) |
| PERCENTAGE — An anagram of (… revised) RECENT put into PAGE (sheet) | |
| 12d | Crossword in The Times — one that might bug you? (8) |
| LISTENER — Two definitions: The Listener crossword, and one using a bugging device. I did not expect this to be a double definition and did not readily think of the right crossword even though I do them quite often. A bit of a d’oh moment when it came! |
|
| 15d | Baseball player‘s liquid container (7) |
| PITCHER — Another double definition | |
| 16d | Reviewer, regularly acerbic, based on time in charge (6) |
| CRITIC — Alternate letters of (regularly) aCeRbIc above (based on) T (time) + IC (in charge) | |
| 18d | Funny cries of mirth in cinema at the outset? (5) |
| COMIC — Initial letters of (… at the outset) Cries Of Mirth In Cinema | |
| 20d | Is obliged to Greek character on street (4) |
| MUST — MU (Greek character) on ST (street) | |
The main puzzle is easier – nuff said!
As the main puzzle blogger, I would have to say this is not the case – unless you happen to have a lot of rather obscure knowledge. The SCC would definitely not like today’s 15 x 15.
maybe I got lucky here and there – I just felt that the quickie was poorly pitched – thanks though!
I only solved a few clues in the 15×15 but I did know the specific hat involved in 29a.
My GK is quite random.
likewise 🙂
15:15 (Thomas Wolsey becomes Cardinal and Lord Chancellor)
Slowed down by getting used to a new pair of glasses, which currently give me double vision when reading.
LOI was Listener. I never attempt the Listener crossword, and took a long time to remember its existence. Is there an equivalent of an “and lit” where the clue successfully describes itself?
Thanks Kitty and Hurley
The Listener used to be a weekly published by the BBC. It included transcripts from radio and Television programmes so was interesting and I enjoyed it. It also had a fiendish crossword which was subsumed into The Times when the Listener folded as already mentioned.
38.57 WOE. Worst result for months! Most clues sent me off in the wrong direction. GAMIN took an age to come to mind followed by last one in LISTENER. I had initially rejected the Times crossword named after a defunct magazine as a solution because OBSERVER didn’t fit. To cap it all off the kebab in 6d gave me a pink square. It’s been a busy weekend. Thanks to Kitty and Hurley.
Another TOUGHIE that took ages – that and LISTENER were last in.
DNF on this one. I found it to be a QC of two halves. I did really well at first but came to a grinding halt.
Never heard of GAMIN. Personally I think that is too obscure to be in a QC.
I did enjoy this one to an extent, but eventually became a little discouraged and so gave up.
I despair! Why don’t I set a cut-off time? It would save me such a lot of anguish. 24 minutes for the first 22 clues, but then another 48 minutes for my last two (LISTENER and GAMIN). Total time = 72 minutes.
I have actually completed the LISTENER crossword a few times in the past, but only the mathematical ones. My rubbish crosswording ability, coupled with my inability even to understand the instructions, means that I never even look at that puzzle these days. No surprise, therefore, that I struggled to bring it to mind today. Once it came, it was only a matter of seconds before GAMIN appeared. M for Monsieur came soon enough, but GAIN for advantage stayed hidden and I had NHO GAMIN for street urchin.
Mrs Random started her attempt well after me and finished around 20 minutes before me. She said she could understand why I was having trouble with 21a, but that she didn’t know why I was having problems with 12d. She told me to get a grip and went off to do something useful in the garden.
Many thanks to Hurley and Kitty.
Same issues but in a different timescale. The GAMIN/LISTENER combo held me up a lot at the end – I should be (and am!) very happy with 15 minutes. It was a good workout. Don’t despair – it all keeps the little grey cells jumping about. Sorry to hear you missed out on the croissants!
I often feel like that when I’ve been stumped by the last two clues. I think you should focus on the positives today. Getting all but two in 24 mins was good going today.
Let’s hope tomorrow is a little more kind to you.
You did well. I was over an hour… 😬
Slogged through this TOUGHIE. Quite a few of the clues were stressful for this permanent resident of the SCC.
30 mins…
Of which 10 was spent pontificating over 12dn. I took a punt that “Listener” was indeed a crossword and luckily for me I was right. Overall though, I thought this was quite a work out for a Monday.
Much to my amusement, I misread 2dn at first, and thought it had something to do with KLF and their “justified ancients of mu mu”. Alas, it was not to be.
FOI – 1ac “Mastermind”
LOI – 12dn “Listener”
COD – 8dn “Percentage”
Thanks as usual!
Enjoyed this one and finished in 59 minutes. Nice mix of straightforward and difficult clues.
COD to TOUGHIE which slowly unravelled itself.
LOI was PUPPET which was nearly MUPPET which I would have felt like if I’d put that in.
Thanks Hurley and Kitty.
DNF today. Undone by LISTENER (doh). Found the rest fairly straightforward, although paused for some time over both TOUGHIE and PUPPET. I liked EYELID best but also enjoyed the surface for GAMIN. Often find Hurley tough – today no one exception. Thanks kitty.
18 minutes. LOI LISTENER.
Found it quite tough overall.
David
14:37. A bit of a plod today. Nothing the matter with the crossword – just my brain on go-slow. Or so I thought: having read through the comments, I see that perhaps it wasn’t just me after all!
Pleased to see the championships are back in action, but I don’t think I’ll be bothering them 😅
FOI Portico LOI Puppet
Thanks Hurley and Kitty
Yet another DNF, foiled by LISTENER (didn’t occur to me, I don’t buy the printed newspaper) and GAMIN (NHO, and little chance of getting it without the N from ‘listener’). To be honest I’m not convinced that having those two cross each other was entirely reasonable, though that might be sour grapes on my part having made decent progress otherwise.
Thank you for the blog!
Took my time over this lovely puzzle. First period while waiting at the Surgery and then finished late afternoon in Costa after picking up a new prescription! A few unparsed eg toughie and a couple parsed once I had a word to fit!
FOI 2d airline
LOI 21a gamin – dredged from somewhere as looking right but not properly parsed
COD 6d donor
Enjoyed this one a lot, a good challenge. Fell into several of the same traps as others (anagram of KLM TUNE, anyone?), and had very few after my first pass, but luckily those few were the down clues in the bottom half & I was able to work my way back up the grid. Just avoided the SCC: 18:49.
Thanks to Hurley & Kitty.
NHO GAMIN or LISTENER crossword (dimly aware of it as a BBC publication). Despite this, I was able to make good progress and finished in 23 mins. Happy to take this given the difficulties many others experienced. I have had a decent run with Hurley, although I agree this was on the tough side.
This set my up nicely for the Quintagram which took about 4 mins.
Thanks for the blog Kitty.
A busy day for me. Tried but failed to complete just now with the GAMIN/LISTENER combo stumping me too. Sometimes I’ll carry it over to the next day but on other times, as today, if I sense there is a word I have NHO then I give up ready for a new dawn tomorrow.
I enjoyed the rest of it and it wouldn’t be a challenge if I always completed.
Funnily enough I liked 9a TENSE, for its succinctness.
Enjoyed PERCENTAGE and MASTERMIND when the penny dropped.
Thanks Hurley and Kitty.