Solving time: 6:29
An enjoyably gentle-to-medium-paced Pedro puzzle, which seemed to reveal its answers with pleasing regularity. I don’t think there were any particularly tricky clues here, no unusual answer words, apart from perhaps 5d if you’ve never come across it before.
What did you think?
Definitions are underlined in bold italics, {deletions and substitutions are in curly brackets} and [directions in square ones]. The little upward arrow ^ indicates an insertion point in containment clues.
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | Hard rock? Start to bop with a sailor (6) |
| BASALT – First letter [Start to] of B{op} with A SALT (sailor) | |
| 4 | April fools ultimately upset one going round and round (6) |
| SPIRAL – Anagram [upset] of APRIL and the last letter [ultimately] of {fool}S | |
| 8 | Energised of right before air journey? It’s the effect of adrenaline (5-2-6) |
| FIGHT-OR-FLIGHT – Anagram [Energised] of OF RIGHT before FLIGHT (air journey) | |
| 10 | Control remains with the French at first (5) |
| LEASH – ASH (remains) with LE (‘the’ in French) upfront [at first] | |
| 11 | Cover up how long performers have been together? (7) |
| BANDAGE – the gently cryptic “how long performers have been together?” might be a BAND AGE | |
| 13 | Preserve horse, keeping illness curtailed (9) |
| MARMALADE – MAR^E (horse) containing MALAD{y} (illness) without its final letter [curtailed] | |
| 17 | Lennon’s first and second wife penning joke in the past (4,3) |
| LONG AGO – First letter of L{ennon} and ON^O (second wife i.e. Yoko Ono) containing [penning] GAG (joke) | |
| 18 | Second deal overlooking a fashion worker (5) |
| MODEL – MO (Second i.e. short for moment) DE |
|
| 19 | Session rather showing the result of good fortune? (7,6) |
| SITTING PRETTY – SITTING (Session) PRETTY (rather)
PRETTY/rather as in “My word, Agnes! Your beetroot surprise really did taste PRETTY/rather good!“ |
|
| 21 | Advanced maths resolved inspiring problem (6) |
| ASTHMA – Anagram [resolved] of A (Advanced) and MATHS | |
| 22 | Strike or work on far side of partition (6) |
| WALLOP – OP (work) on the other side of WALL (partition)
OP is short for Opus. The word Opus comes from Latin and simply means “work.” In music, Opus (often abbreviated as Op.) refers to a work or composition by a composer. More commonly, it’s used to catalogue or number a composer’s works in the order they were published or composed. |
|
| Down | |
|---|---|
| 1 | Perplex pair of females wrapped in bundle (6) |
| BAFFLE – FF (pair of females) contained [wrapped] in BA^LE (bundle) | |
| 2 | Railway worker poorly aligns a great number, but not all (9) |
| SIGNALMAN – Anagram [poorly] of ALIGNS then MAN{y} (a great number) without its last letter [but not all] | |
| 3 | Fasten rear of chancel and church after visiting (5) |
| LATCH – Last letter [rear] of {chance}L, then CH (church) after AT (visiting)
AT seemed to me an odd substitution for ‘visiting’ but it does work e.g. “My mother and father enjoy travelling around the country. They were AT/visiting Blenheim Palace yesterday.“ |
|
| 5 | Italian dish not pale when stirred (7) |
| POLENTA – Anagram [when stirred] of NOT PALE POLENTA is boiled cornmeal or buckwheat, but is a staple of many southern European countries. Its consumption was traditionally associated with lower classes, as in times past, cornmeal mush was an essential food in their everyday nutrition. Must admit I’m not a fan. . Etymologically, POLENTA is derived from the Latin pollen for ‘fine flour’, which shares a root with pulvis, meaning ‘dust’. |
|
| 6 | Regretting throwing out popular floor covering (3) |
| RUG – RU |
|
| 7 | Subsequently suppressing hot sweat? (6) |
| LATHER – LAT^ER (Subsequently) containing [suppressing] H (hot) | |
| 9 | Somehow manages massage and hairdressing shop, succeeding finally (4,5) |
| RUBS ALONG – RUB (massage) SALON (hairdressing shop) then last letter [finally] of {succeedin}G | |
| 12 | Article located ground according to reports (9) |
| ANECDOTAL – AN (Article – indefinite) then anagram [ground] of LOCATED
The word ANECDOTE comes from Ancient Greek ἀνέκδοτον literally meaning “unpublished” or “not given out.” Procopius of Caesarea is credited with an early use of the word, as the title of his 6th century work Anekdota (Unpublished Memoirs), which contained private stories and court gossip about Emperor Justinian I. |
|
| 14 | Natural approach is seen in field of study (7) |
| REALISM – IS inserted [seen in] into REAL^M (field of study) | |
| 15 | Question invading in the style of American state (6) |
| ALASKA – ASK (Question) inserted [invading] into À L^A (in the style of) | |
| 16 | Bet accepted by youngster to go wrong (4,2) |
| PLAY UP – LAY (Bet) inserted into [accepted by] P^UP (youngster)
A LAY bet is a type of wager where you bet against a particular outcome e.g. your friend might say “I’ll bet you £10 that Arsenal beat Manchester City in the EFL cup final.” If you accept the bet, you are effectively backing Arsenal not to win i.e. you win the bet if Arsenal lose or draw the match. |
|
| 18 | West Side Story character beginning to master operatic song (5) |
| MARIA – First letter [beginning to] of M{aster}, then ARIA (operatic song)
TBH, I’d struggle to name any other West Side Story characters… |
|
| 20 | Drink, child (3) |
| TOT – Double definition | |
Yes, rather easy. I was annoyed I could not think of salt for sailor when I finally saw basalt. Realism also gave a little difficulty until I saw what was going on. As often, I biffed answers like marmalade and anecdotal from the crossing letters.
Time: 6:58
Enjoyable but I have no time to report as I was tired and nodded off before completing. I’ve learnt that POLENTA originated in Italy.
Not that I say it much but I think I’ve been saying POLENTA wrong – lucky it was an anagram. Four on the first pass of acrosses, so a slower start than Monday or Tuesday but the pace remained good from there to end up all green in 10.10 when WALLOP and then PLAY UP went in.
10 minutes. Good QC, no excuses, just slow to get SITTING PRETTY, RUBS ALONG and PLAY UP.
I don’t know what the dictionaries say, but a pedantic MER (sorry!) for ASTHMA as an ‘inspiring problem’. Asthma is mainly a problem in breathing out (expiring) rather than breathing in (inspiring) though I can see that Pedro is using ‘inspiring’ as a general term for “breathing” and of course no argument with asthma being a breathing problem.
What about Bennie, as in “Bennie and the Jets” as another ‘West Side Story character’ 😊.
Thanks to Pedro and Mike
As I recall the problems for the lungs in asthma is caused by inspiring dry air
19:23 over half of that in the SE unable to bring myself to wallop that pup.
Ta MAP
Like Jack I was tired and fell asleep, so no time. Think my sluggish brain made harder work of it than was necessary as now I’m awake it seems pretty straightforward and some nice clues.
I had a bit of a mare with this. 9:33. The main problem was I mistyped ANECDOTAE, so had an E in the middle of WALLOP, and therefore couldn’t solve it.
But I thought it was another good puzzle. For me, even aside from my silly error, I thought this was above average, and harder than yesterday.
I started brightly but ran into problems in the SW corner, severely hindered by mistyping a K for the last letter of SIGNALMAN. Well, they are close on the keyboard. Eventually spotted and corrected it, and ran through to a completion, but the clock showed 14:35 as I did so for a Slow Day. RUBS ALONG gave me the most pleasure when I finally parsed it, but overall not my finest effort.
Many thanks Mike for the blog.
Straightforward to finish sub 20m.
LOI PLAY UP. Never been a fan of polenta despite having had it served up in various flavours of culinary excellence. COD ALASKA. Not the baked variety.
Thanks Mike & Pedro
But baked Alaska is delicious, imo.
Slightly sluggish today for no apparent reason but an enjoyable solve nonetheless.
Started with BASALT and finished with ANECDOTAL in 8.50.
Thanks to Mike and Pedro
Started with BAFFLE and ended with PRETTY (having seen “sitting” straight away but missing the significance of “rather”).
COD to BANDAGE, I do like a cracker joke!
All done in 06:56 for a Very Good Day. Many thanks Pedro and Mike (I did enjoy the anecdotes about anecdotes).
6:02. Held up at the end not being able to see BANDAGE by having a lazy RUNS ALONG not thinking through the unlikelihood of there being such a things as a “massage and hairdressing” salon. Hmm. Maybe there’s a business idea there. I’ll get my coat. Thanks Pedro and Mike.
I didn’t find this easy at all, taking a long 28:05. Problems with FIGHT OR FLIGHT (not familiar with the expression), WALLOP, PLAY UP, LATCH. Not on the right wavelength at all.
Enjoyable puzzle. Pretty fast at first with inspired biffs like FIGHT OR FLIGHT and SIGNALMAN. 1a and 1d being easy helped.
On the other hand, it took me a while to solve SITTING PRETTY, ALASKA and LOsI PLAY UP and WALLOP.
Remembered Yoko, but biffed LONG AGO. I like it, along with BANDAGE and ANECDOTAL.
Thanks vm, Mike. Good knowing about Procopius. Also liked Agnes.
14:24
Held up by a rogue SIGNALLER, then couldn’t parse MODEL, which led to a LOI ANECDOTAL.
Officer Krupke comes to mind, his name also features in a song title.
COD SITTING PRETTY and BAND AGE
11:49 for the solve. Last couple of mins spent trying to understand WALLOP rather than biff it; couldn’t see the parsing because I thought the final P = side of Partition. Brain was definitely not quite firing on all cylinders as also struggle to parse ALASKA on first creation; and was generally held up by BANDAGE, RUBS-ALONG (looking at wrong end for definition) and MARMALADE which felt ironic due to bunging it in on Monday’s QC.
In LONG-AGO; rarely if ever seen a clue constructed like that. Lennon’s first gives you the L but then you also have to reuse him for his second wife.
Thanks to Mike and Pedro
I was way off Pedro’s wavelength and made heavy weather of this – quite a lot slower than my last Pedro QC and I certainly found it tougher than most of the contributors above. I finished, having just stepped into the SCC, but didn’t enjoy it.
Perhaps down to my mood and tiredness after a rush out for a very early appointment.
The blog looks interesting so I will explore that and see how my unparsed answers (ALASKA, LONG AGO and my LOI ANECDOTAL which I bifd) were put together.
Golly – more medium than gentle, I suggest. Real struggle to get going at all, many definitions far from obvious. For example if someone has cancer (or asthma) do they have a “problem”?* Many possibilities for “the result of good fortune”, SITTING PRETTY far from the first to come to mind. Many were doable once you have the crossers, it’s getting the first ones in that was difficult. Enough fuss; it was all doable in the end, thanks Pedro and Mike.
*Thanks BR for explanation! And John: BANDAGE was my LOI, too.
I was held up by LOI WALLOP, due to having biffed ANECDOTES at 12d. Eventually saw the error of my ways. FOI was LATCH. Generally slow on the uptake today, possibly due to a fuzzy head and sore throat. 10:15. Thanks Pedro and Mike.
My last two, SITTING PRETTY and ALASKA, took ages to come to mind, for some reason. Other than that, it was quite a biffing session, not bothering to parse LONG AGO, MARMALADE, FIGHT-OR-FLIGHT or BANDAGE. Somewhat easier than most Pedro’s, I would say. No unknowns.
I found this difficult although in hindsight I can’t put my finger on why. I eventually staggered over the line on 28 minutes with several biffed. I think this mirrors my experiences with previous Pedro puzzles.
FOI – 8ac FIGHT OR FLIGHT
LOI – 12dn ANECDOTAL
COD – 11ac BANDAGE
Thanks to Pedro and Mike
Quite a tricky puzzle in several places, eventually finishing a bit over my average at 16:33. Didn’t help myself by managing to miss the anagram indicator for ANECDOTAL.
Thank you for the blog!
I had already drifted into the SCC before I decided that a second sitting would be more beneficial than continuing to stare at my last three: Bandage, Anecdotal and Wallop. As usual, the short break worked wonders, and the previously unfathomable trio became obvious (I would love to really understand why this happens). Sadly, that still meant it was standing room only at pens down.
CoD to Rubs Along, which started life as an odd looking Runs Along that didn’t help with Bandage. Invariant
A medium paced solved starting with BASALT and ending with WALLOP in 7:09. The only clue I failed to parse was LATCH or more specifically the ‘AT’ part so thank you Mike for explaining it to me. My favourite clue was BASALT.