Times Quick Cryptic No 1332 by Tracy

Author   plusjeremyPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic

Introduction

I solved this puzzle in just under 10 minutes, and enjoyed every second of it thoroughly! If you’re looking to improve your solving skills, this puzzle is chock full of chestnuts and will undoubtedly reward close study.

I’ll intersperse my solutions with a play-by-play on my solve.

Solutions

Across

1 Fool sailors, when aboard (7)
JACKASS – JACKS (“sailors”), AS (“when”) inside (“aboard”)

I read ‘abroad’ and hence skipped this one the first go-around. Not solved.

5 Good to have evening dress (4)
GOWN – G (“good”) + OWN (“to have”)

Wrote in G from ‘good’, then thought maybe ‘evening’ would be EVE. Is GEVE a thing? Certainly not a dress! But GOWN makes sense, and so does OWN for ‘have’. Solved.

7 Somewhat unorthodox former prime minister (5)
NORTH – letters in (“somewhat”) UNORTHODOX (“unorthodox”)

‘Somewhat’ suggested a hidden word, but I don’t know my prime ministers well. DOXFO? OXFOR? Or does ‘former’ mean EX and I’m looking for EX??? meaning ‘somewhat unorthodox’? I’m sure this one was a sitter for UK solvers (and probably most US solvers as well), but I moved on. Not solved.

8 Bone china defaced? Certain to be returned (7)
HUMERUS – CHUM (“china”, Cockney Rhyming Slang for ‘friend’) without the first letter (“defaced”, as in, ‘with face removed’) + SURE (“certain”) reversed (“to be returned”)

I started this clue from the end: I was pretty confident ‘certain’ meant SURE, so I wrote ERUS into the grid and then thought about bones. HUMERUS came to mind almost immediately and then I saw the meaning of (C)HUM. Solved.

10 Allow the Parisian time (3)
LET – LE (“the Parisian”, that is, ‘the’ in French) + T (“time”)

I’d barely glanced at the clue and the enumeration when LET sprang to mind. I checked it against the wordplay and moved on. Solved.

11 Former Soviet official [given] order by young woman in automobile (9)
COMMISSAR – O.M. (“order”, Order of Merit) + (“by”) MISS (“young woman”), in (“in”) CAR (“automobile”)

‘Former’ again, and I’m wondering about EX. But ‘Former Soviet official’ is also a likely definition, so I look later in the clue and see “…in automobile”. Of course it could be VAN or CAB but it’s usually CAR, so I write C…R into the grid and go back to the wordplay. What am I supposed to be putting in CAR? I see ‘order’, which is often OM, so now I have COM…AR, and COMMISSAR comes to mind, and of course the MISS is the young woman. Solved.

13 Fast food item, food rejected by her, heading off (6)
BURGER – GRUB (“food”) reversed (“rejected”) + (“by”) HER (“her”) without the first letter (“heading off”)

“Her, heading off” almost certainly means the answer ends with ER, which also makes sense for a food item. Now I need a reversal of a four-letter word meaning ‘food’, and it just so happens on last Friday’s main puzzle we had GRUB = ‘food’, so it was fresh in my mind. I continued on my solving streak. Solved.

14 Bad hats confronting the old lady [making] a complaint (6)
ASTHMA – anagram of (“bad”) HATS (“hats”) + (“confronting”) MA (“the old lady”)

It’s very clear that this is going to be either MA + an anagram of HATS or the reverse. For the life of me, I can’t figure it out! The reason is I keep forgetting that ‘complaint’ is a UK term for ‘illness’. Finally I settle on my trick of writing out the letters in HATS backwards, and seeing them on the page helps me come up with ASTHMA (after considering nearly every other combination!). Solved.

17 Rebuked on island after fifty set free (9)
LIBERATED – BERATED (“rebuked”) next to (“on”) I (“island”) after (“after”) L (“fifty”, in Roman numerals)

“After fifty” is a dead giveaway that the first letter is L, so I write that into the grid. In retrospect I could have also banked on the answer ending with ED, etc, but I stopped there and moved on, not understanding how the clue was supposed to end with I. Not solved.

19 Whiskeys, right away? Certainly (3)
YES – RYES (“whiskeys”), R (“right”) removed (“away”)

I was drinking a glass of rye whiskey while solving the puzzle, so this one was a cinch! Solved.

20 Conspicuous foreigner in street (7)
SALIENT – ALIEN (“foreigner”) in (“in”) ST (“street”)

I didn’t think I’d get this one on the first pass. Synonyms for ‘conspicuous’ were on the tip of my tongue. But then I wrote in S…T and all of a sudden ALIEN and SALIENT came to mind at about the same time. Moral of the story? Write things down. That’s why writing was invented! Solved.

22 Petrol, [or] electricity, [in] essence (5)
JUICE – triple definition

What could this be, I wondered? Triple definitions can often be confusing when they’re not dead obvious. Not solved.

23 Lacking strength, reportedly, [for] seven days (4)
WEEK – WEAK (“lacking strength”) replaced by homophone (“reportedly”)

As soon as I saw the first words I thought WEAK. Then I just took my time to make sure which of WEAK/WEEK was the answer! I’m sure someone’s gonna slip up! Solved.

24 National / topic (7)
SUBJECT – double definition

I hazard a guess at SUBJECT from ‘topic’, and it seems sort of right for a monarchy to have ‘national’ (as a noun) = SUBJECT as well. I put it in with a question mark in the margin. Solved, I hope.

Down

1 Carol, beautiful girl heard cutting catchy tunes (6,5)
JINGLE BELLS – BELLE (“beautiful girl”) replaced by homophone (“heard”), in (“cutting”) JINGLES (“catchy tunes”)

My brain wasn’t working well. I had _ _ _ _ L _ / B _ L _ S, and from ‘carol’ I knew that the second word had to be BELLS, but for the life of me I couldn’t think of the first word. (D’oh!) I also couldn’t think of a word for ‘beautiful girl’ and honestly felt no great pressure to try to think overmuch about the clue since I’d undoubtedly get it on a later pass. Not solved.

2 Artist received by court upset museum administrator? (7)
CURATOR – RA (“artist”) in (“received by”) COURT (“court”) anagrammed (“upset”)

I had _ _ _ _ T _ R, and I knew from ‘artist’ that we’d probably see RA in the answer, but where? And ‘court upset’ made me think of reversal of a five-letter word for ‘court’, which I couldn’t think of. But once I saw ‘museum administrator’ it all just clicked into place, and then I realized the true significance of ‘upset’. Solved.

3 Result of bumpkin being caught by a belt? (1,5,3)
A THICK EAR – the answer is obtained by (“result of”) HICK (“bumpkin”) in (“being caught by”) A (“a”) + TEAR (“belt”, as in ‘to go fast’)

I had _ / _ _ _ C _ / E _ _ , and all I could think of is A BLACK EYE, with no idea how that could be right, except maybe LACKEY could pass for ‘bumpkin’. Put it in with a question mark. Solved incorrectly!

4 Beginning to scare me about revolutionary[‘s] plot (6)
SCHEME – first letter of (“beginning to”) SCARE (“scare”) + ME (“me”) outside (“about”) CHE (“revolutionary”, namely, Che Guevara)

I had _ _ H _ M _ , and just started following the wordplay. Put in S as the first letter from ‘beginning to scare’, then ME at the end from ‘me’, and CHE and SCHEME both popped to mind at about the same time. Solved.

5 Stone [in] part of Stonehenge, massive (3)
GEM – letters in (“part of”) STONEHENGE MASSIVE (“Stonehenge, massive”)

I had G _ M, so this was practically a write-in. Solved.

6 Has a job [in] factory (5)
WORKS – double definition

I had W _ R _ S, so again a write-in. Solved.

9 Develop film, [producing] computer program (11)
SPREADSHEET – SPREAD (“develop”, as in a rash) + FILM (“sheet”, as in like a filmy layer)

Even though I had S _ R _ A _ S _ _ _ T, the first words of the clue weren’t helping. (In retrospect, I see that the synonyms were quite tricky.) But once I glanced at ‘computer program’ the answer was clear. I didn’t bother with the wordplay until writing up the blog. Solved.

12 Crime committed with collusion — behind bars affair (6,3)
INSIDE JOB – INSIDE (“behind bars”) + JOB (“affair”)

From ‘crime’ and I _ S _ _ _ / _ _ B, the answer was clear immediately. I only considered the wordplay while writing up the blog. Solved.

15 Wary, he worried about one [getting] completely out of control (7)
HAYWIRE – WARY HE (“wary he”) anagrammed (“worried”) outside (“about”) I (“one”)

I had H _ Y _ _ _ E, and the anagram letters gave it to me. Solved.

16 Importance [of] data around university (6)
STATUS – STATS (“data”) outside (“around”) U (“university”)

I had _ _ _ T _ S, and all I could think was FACTUS, which didn’t seem right. Not solved.

18 Rubbish left in large one, ultimately (5)
BILGE – L (“left”) in (“in”) BIG (“large”) + ONE (“one”) reduced to last letter (“ultimately”)

I had _ _ L _ E, and then looked for a synonym for ‘large’ and came to BILGE, which certainly sounds like a synonym of ‘rubbish’ I’ve heard in movies or some such. Solved.

21 The Spanish king [will get] large deer (3)
ELK – EL (“the Spanish”) + K (“king”)

I had E _ K, so there wasn’t much to think about. Solved.

* * *

Then I went back to the clues I didn’t get:

1 Across – Fool sailors, when aboard (7)
Now I had _ _ C _ A _ S, and I finally read ‘aboard’ correctly and put ‘when’ = AS in to yield _ _ C _ ASS. ‘Sailors’ could be RN, TARS, or JACKS… wait, could the answer be JACKASS? How delightful! Solved.

1 Down – Carol, beautiful girl heard cutting catchy tunes (6,5)
I immediately looked to 1 Down and saw that it was JINGLE BELLS. Double d’oh! Didn’t check the wordplay until writing up the blog. Solved.

7 Across – Somewhat unorthodox former prime minister (5)
Now I had N _ R _ L because of my error in 3 Down. But I distrusted that L anyway, and I found NORTH in UNORTHODOX, so I put it in, and erased all unchecked letters of 3 Down. Solved.

17 Across – Rebuked on island after fifty set free (9)
I had L _ B _ _ _ _ _ D, and put in LIBERATED immediately from remembering the clue. Didn’t check the wordplay until writing the blog. Solved.

22 Across – Petrol, or electricity, in essence (5)
I had J _ I _ E, and put in JUICE immediately, without quite understanding the full wordplay. Solved.

16 Down – Importance of data around university (6)
I had _ T _ T _ S, and put in STATUS immediately. As I moved on to the next clue I remembered that STATS came from ‘data’. Solved.

3 Down – Result of bumpkin being caught by a belt? (1,5,3)
I had A / _ H _ C _ / E _ R. Could it be A THICK EAR? It sort of sounded right, and I was ready to stop the clock, but didn’t want to make a stupid mistake. So I checked the wordplay: HICK made sense for ‘bumpkin’, but what about ‘belt’ = TEAR? That sort of sounded right, too, like a car going fast. Solved.

73 comments on “Times Quick Cryptic No 1332 by Tracy”

  1. In my rush to come in under 10 minutes, in which I failed anyway, I didn’t proof read, and had a pink square in HATWIRE where I obviously hit the adjacent key to the Y, which I overwrote, also making 19a wrong. Drat! Nice puzzle but I messed it up. Bed time methinks. zzzzz. 10.01 With 1 wrong letter giving 2 errors. Thanks Tracy and Jeremy.
  2. I approached COMMISSAR from the other end: ‘Former Soviet official’, then saw the wordplay. ‘Former’ wasn’t really necessary, as there aren’t any soviet countries anymore; I wonder if the setter deliberately invited EX. COMPLAINT isn’t a UK term for ‘illness’, it’s a term for ‘illness’. I also thought of A BLACK EYE at first, but rejected it since the A wouldn’t be allowed; whereas THICK EAR requires an A. As Jeremy says, lots of chestnuts: when=AS, china=MATE/PAL/CHUM, order=OM, artist=RA, revolutionary=CHE, the Parisian/French=LE (we also have ‘the Spanish’=EL), … 5:43.
    1. Golly. Is it more common in the UK? I’ve never heard the word used that way.
      1. Got me; I don’t think I’ve ever heard the word used. I’ve certainly seen it often enough, and have no idea as to where.
        1. Everything you call a program is being run in some larger program. We’re no longer feeding algorithms on punch cards into computers directly.

          Yes, we now have the “document” model where something called a spreadsheet is an ‘instance’ in a larger program. But so is all software: just ‘projects’ in some sort of program development environment. You go to the file menu and select “New Project”. Every piece of software is made up of algorithms which are in themselves programs but we call the whole thing a program, too.

          Given that people use function calls and scripting languages to make spreadsheets do their magic, I don’t see a problem with calling a spreadsheet a program, and neither does every dictionary it seems. Shrug.

            1. My original reply was flagged as spam, so I did a shorter version. Then both posts appeared, so I deleted the older one, having no idea you were busily replying to it….
      1. A quick Google comes up with the following: “No, Jingle Bells is neither a Christmas carol nor a Christmas song. Jingle Bells, as we call it today, was written in 1857 and called “One Horse Open Sleigh”, with words by James Pierpont. It was written to be sung at US Thanksgiving time and is linked to the sleigh races held in Medford, Massachusetts.”
        1. Another quick Google search for “christmas carol” returns Jingle Bells as the top hit.

          Are you seriously trying to convince me that Jingle Bells is not even a Christmas song because of something you read online?!

          Many popular songs, incidentally, came from tunes that are no longer associated with their original meaning.

            1. Personally, no, but if I found it in nearly every caroling book I’d come across I’d be forced to conclude otherwise!
                1. Well I’m not. You wouldn’t expect to hear it at a Christmas carol service, nor is it specifically about Christmas. If you live in some parts of the USA, a one-horse open sleigh is fun to ride for about half the year.
    2. That Jingle Bells belongs to Thanksgiving is one of those things I’ve “always known”. But other seasons besides Christmas have their carols. Tradescant
  4. A Spreadsheet is not a computer program

    That’s like saying a database is a program

    The two things are entirely different

    I can see google has program listed as a definition of spreadsheet, but it just smells wrong

    Crossword setters shouldn’t encourage this dodgy stuff by taking advantage of it

    Edited at 2019-04-17 02:21 am (UTC)

    2. I completely agree no way is a spreadsheet a cp. in 40 years of working with computer programmes I have never heard a reference to spreadsheets.
  5. Because it’s like saying a database is a program

    There needs to be a distinction between the data and the application, otherwise confusion reigns

    1. A spreadsheet is data now? One enters data into a spreadsheet in order to have it operated on by the spreadsheet, in my reckoning. But then of course, everything is “data”.
      1. yes, everything is data, which is not very helpful, so we use different words to refer to different kinds of data, like “program”, “spreadsheet”, “file”, “comment” etc
  6. By the way, all this fuss about Jingle Bells and Christmas Carols is just pedantry gone wild…I can’t imagine the distinction ever being remotely useful

    1. Well, it would be useful if it kept people from singing “Jingle Bells” at my front door.
  7. On the subject of carols I’d mention that all the usual sources specify religious content usually celebrating the birth of Christ, with only Chambers in its printed edition widening the definition a little to ‘song of joy or praise’. I don’t think it’s possible to deny ‘Jingle Bells’ as being associated with Christmastide and therefore undoubtedely a ‘Christmas Song’ whatever its actual origins, but only in the same way as hundreds of other commercial songs such as Irving Berlin’s ‘White Christmas’.

    Edited at 2019-04-17 03:16 am (UTC)

    1. So Deck the Hall, I imagine, shouldn’t be considered a carol either? Just a Christmas song?

      Edited at 2019-04-17 03:42 am (UTC)

      1. I’m with Jackkt in this and would say that Deck the Halls is not a Carol. In my opinion Carols are religious songs. Everything else falls in the category of Christmas songs. You wouldn’t hear Deck the Halls or Jingle Bells in a Carol Service. The problem is that the secular world has adopted the word carol to mean something different from its original definition.
          1. The original definition, incidentally, was a song to accompany a dance in the round I believe.
  8. This may not be the best of places to come for people averse to pointless pedantry!
    1. Quite a lot of it about this morning, methinks! Was anybody stumped in their clue solving today by Jingle Bells being called a carol, or by a spreadsheet being referred to as a program?!
        1. 11.5% of my total solving time was spent over SPREADSHEET, and I’d already uttered an obscenity over JINGLE BELLS. Provided ones solveometer was set to “loose” I suppose both clues more or less work, but this is The Times not the Daily Mail.
      2. Yes, on both counts! We put them in with a grumble. In my defence, spouse has very definite views on carols/Yuletide songs and the differences thereof, as perhaps befits a former nun…
        Tim (not that Tim)
  9. Glad I treated myself to a bit of telly this morning before the crossword – I’ve have missed all the great stuff above if I’d posted at my usual time. The carol was OK but SPREADSHEET was last in even though I spent 30 minutes on excel between telly and crossword. Thought I was going to be in trouble with the bottom half but suddenly all done in just under 16m. Great puzzle, great blog, awesome discussion to follow. This is the best start to a day off ever (where romance hasn’t been involved).
  10. Back to the crossword…
    I was a few seconds under my 20 minute target with only SPREADSHEET to go, but it took me another 10 to see it, despite using one every day. I can see ‘sheet’ for ‘film’ but not ‘spread’ for ‘develop’. As usual for a Tracy, I seem to use the checkers more than usual.
    Brian

    Edited at 2019-04-17 07:00 am (UTC)

  11. As a beginner I really appreciated the clear solution finding pathways and thought processes
  12. My Golden Raspberry today goes to me, for sticking WEAK into 23a and then going back and rereading the clue 3 times to make sure I’d got it the right way round – and clearly misreading the clue each time.
    In spite of that I enjoyed the puzzle where there was a good mixture of the straightforward and more tricky. Finished with LOI 9d.
    Amazing blog Jeremy
  13. No real issues today although I very nearly slipped up on “week” versus “weak”. I also initially put in “ton” for 6 down as a hidden massive stone. With 3 down, I had not thought of “hick ” for bumpkin – a primarily American English word? I can see that that’s the correct parsing now, obviously, but my first thought was that you’d get “a thick ear” as a result of being belted for being a “thick” “bumpkin”…. Oh, dear…! Thanks, Jeremy, for your superb blog. I always appreciate how much effort you put into your explanations. Thanks, too, to Tracy for an enjoyable puzzle.
  14. 14.20 for quickest this week but found some thorny clues which eluded full parsing till Jeremy’s exemplary blog. I was another who equated bumpkins with thickness in a very unPC fashion!
  15. Three biffs, JACKASS, A THICK EAR and LIBERATED. I still couldn’t fully parse them after submitting so thank you Jeremy for the blog. I nearly fell for the WEAK option at 23a and I am wondering if it weren’t for the comma after reportedly whether the clue could be interpreted the other way. Like others, my LOI was 9d SPREADSHEET. 11 mins
  16. I have crawled my way to occasionally solving QCs completely, mostly nearly solving. Fully solved today in about 45 mins. However I biffed quite a few and was mystified about the parsing until reading the full explanations, many thanks! Frankyanne.
  17. I agree this would have been a good workout but I did feel that a number of clues pushed the boundaries of a quickie. I had to check that a Christmas song could be a carol, but it can be so I grudgingly accepted it 🙂 I’m not convinced that a spreadsheet is a computer program however. Never heard of hick. Jumping from China plate to mate to chum is definitely 15 by 15 stuff in my view. Thanks though
  18. ….Back Door Santa Claus by Clarence Carter.

    All that matters has been said, and the LOI took me over target. Will save the 15×15 until I’m in the right frame of mind later.

    FOI LET
    LOI SPREADSHEET (MER is “minor eyebrow raise”, so what is “major eyebrow rise ” please ?)
    COD INSIDE JOB
    TIME 5:13

    2. I think when Myrtilus first coined the acronym, mer was minor and MER was major, but I could be wrong.
  19. 22mins of enjoyment (mostly) followed by repeated alphabet trawls to get loi 9d, Spreadsheet – just couldn’t see the wood for the trees. I don’t think it’s a program either, for what it’s worth. Like others, I agonised over week/weak but picked the right one in the end. I thought the deceptive surface of 7ac was good, even by Tracy’s standard, so it gets my CoD vote. Another clear and very informative blog by Jeremy. Invariant
  20. 19 minutes and no eyebrows were raised, although I’m still recovering from the house red last night so maybe later.

    Biffed a few such as jackass and burger.
    Couldn’t parse juice.

    Cod yes or liberated.
    Thanks

  21. Good puzzle – plodded through whilst doing other stuff so no time but I’d rate as slightly harder than average. Great blog from Jeremy – this would be really good for a complete beginner but will sadly disappear into the mists of time as the weeks and months roll by. I wonder if there could be a kind of beginners corner on the site where that type of blog could be pinned to so that complete novices can benefit from such a thorough explanation of the solving process.
  22. DNF thanks to 1 across – in hindsight (wonderful thing!) not really one of the trickier clues, I just became convinced it ended TARS (sailors) and ended up biffing JOCTARS!! Well it just must mean aboard!
    Thanks as ever for puzzle & blog…
  23. A straightforward QC which I enjoyed. Biffed a couple and didn’t actually give a hoot about the finer points of some definitions since the answers were beyond argument. A late start and post from me so I won’t pick out lots of favourite clues but my LOI was ASTHMA. The best time for a while for me – 12.56. Many thanks to Tracy and to Jeremy for an unusually detailed blog that I will now digest at leisure. John M.

    Edited at 2019-04-17 03:40 pm (UTC)

  24. Usually enjoy Tracy, but there were just too many iffy clues here. Rhyming slang is specific, China can only be “mate”, chum would be fruit (fruit gum, “How you doing old fruit”). I have never seen Jack used in the plural for sailors! To me it is one of those words that only exists in the singular. Stats are data in the sense that everything is data, but I would describe them as metadata if anything. All that on top of 1d and 9d just makes it too much of a stretch, and the fact that they were all eminently biffable isn’t really an excuse.
    Pwliv
    1. 1a is not using JACK as plural for sailors. JACKS contain AS(when) so sailors are JACKS, as shown in the blog.

      Edited at 2019-04-17 05:21 pm (UTC)

    2. ‘China’ is CRS for ‘mate’, and therefore, as this is a cryptic crossword, ‘china’ is considered a cryptic way to clue any synonym of ‘friend’. ‘China’ = PAL in particular is very common.

      As you can see from my write up (or as John Dun writes), ‘sailors’ = JACKS, not JACK.

  25. I completed all but SPREADSHEET and ASTHMA in 14 minutes, but had to have a second sitting for those two!
    I had a bit of a biff-fest today and therefore greatly appreciated the highly detailed blog.Thanks for that, Jeremy! Also thoroughly enjoyed reading all the comments. (Jingle Bells shouldn’t be called a carol…but it always is!!)
    I have to admit that I couldn’t decide between WEAK and WEEK and still don’t see that the direction in the clue is clear enough to suggest one in preference to the other. MM

    FOI JINGLE BELLS (despite everything said!!)
    LOI ASTHMA
    COD INSIDE JOB

    1. I took my time wondering about this too, but for me it was the inclusion of the word ‘for’ that tipped the balance, so I read the clue as: Lacking strength, reportedly, for (a word meaning) seven days.

      Edited at 2019-04-17 06:52 pm (UTC)

        1. Thank you both. It seems a bit clearer now…. though I am sure I’ll fall into future traps like this one!
  26. Phew, struggled there taking me nearly four times as long as the main puzzle. Spent an age looking for a carol with bells at the end, as Jingle Bells is not a carol. When I finally put it in under duress, it handed me JACKASS. Spreadsheet is not a program either, but it had to be with the checkers.
  27. As an American national. We have no king or queen, and we are not subjects.
    (Excuse me if someone else has brought up this point; I did search the comments and did not see it broached.)
  28. Thanks for the detailed and very helpful blog. I thought I’d respond and note some of the things I found difficult as one who regularly struggles with the harder QCs.
    I found this another beast. I usually tick the clue number when I’ve done it and ring it where I have biffed and have no idea of the parsing. This one had nearly as many rings as ticks.

    1: NHO ‘jacks’ for sailors – ‘jack tar’ and ‘tar’ but not ‘jack’ on its own and certainly not as a plural.
    7: Despite being a UK resident, couldn’t dredge up ‘North’ – I even googled prime ministers and didn’t spot him
    8: Got this the same way as you – put ‘sure’ backwards and thought of ‘humerus’ – didn’t spot where the ‘hum’ came from, though. Had forgotten ‘china’ could be mate, etc
    11: Again, I thought of ‘car’ but where the letters go is the problem. And ‘young woman’ could be any random girls name.
    14: Could see an anagram of ‘hats’ but couldn’t see how to use the rest. ‘The old lady’ usually means ‘wife’ in my experience. ‘ma’ is mother.
    20: Got this one – I got S & T for street but in such cases, I always hesitate as to whether the letters would be at the ends or elsewhere in the answer
    22: I can usually manage double definitions, especially if they follow ‘Rotter’s Rule’ and have just the two words. I never seem to spot triples.
    1d: Struggled with this one, as others, I didn’t see Jingle Bells as a carol.
    2d: Worked out that it would be ‘RA’ and curator popped into my head.
    3d: Didn’t associate ‘hick’ with ‘bumpkin’ nor ‘tear’ with ‘belt’ – this was one I biffed and couldn’t parse at all

    The rest went in pretty well OK but struggled with ‘spreadsheet’ and ‘bilge’

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