No pleasure in today's CW with so many CD/DD/E's, 14 by my count. Apprentice back from leave.
ACROSS
1 - False trade plate found in the Lake District (10) - PATTERDALE* Needed Google verification
6 - Yield we hear to a ranked tournament player (4) - CEDE(~seed)
9 - Miracle town has ways which lead to rumours (7) - {CANA}{RDS}
10 - Central area of America has widest parts around head of Missouri (7) - {M}{IDWEST*}
12 - What a batsman must do to capture public interest (4,1,3) - MAKE A HIT [CD]
13 - In a manner of speaking, I would visit the Isle of Man (5) - {I'D}{I}{O}{M} Is IOM recognised abvn for Isle of Man
15 - Condition under which a horse races (5) - RIDER [DD]
17 - Appear as concerned with donation (9) - {RE}{PRESENT}
19 - Divination, kind that is to include member (9) - {SORT}{I{LEG}E} Never heard of this had to google for it
21 - Has to OK a tall military cap (5) - {SHA*}{KO*} Tall is the AInd? Shako is the one worn by the Madras Sapper on the right in the image below.
23 - Pass gradually to take its own course (5) - SLIDE [E]
24 - Supplied with strings attached (8) - PROVIDED [DD]
27 - Looked forward to (7) - AWAITED [CD]
28 - State of North African chief (7) - EMIRATE [CD]
29 - Garden of paradise (4) - EDEN [E]
30 - Whatever happens, don't stare so much (10) - {REGARD}{LESS}
DOWN
1 - Father caught in an agreement (4) - {PA}{CT}
2 - A mug-like vessel for beer (7) - TANKARD [E]
3 - A weird lake in North America (5) - EERIE [CD] No indication for the extra 'E'
4 - Pay five hundred is the order (9) - {D}{IS}{CHARGE}
5 - Confine within bounds laid down (5) - LIMIT [DD]
7 - He alone keeps to the Christian faith (7) - EREMITE [CD]
8 - Reckoning I am in the eastern depot (10) - {E}{ST{I'M}ATION}
11 - Clubs used in golf to propel ball from tees (7) - DRIVERS [E]
14 - Evergreen creeper (5,5) - GRASS SNAKE [CD]
16 - Clothing is torn without intention (7) - {R{AIM}ENT}
18 - Strange things seen by only women in the scrap heap? (9) - {PHE{NO,MEN}A*}
20 - Confusion i.e. great in town (7) - REIGATE*
22 - In time Vera may be seen as mean (7) - {A{VERA}GE}
24 - A drape found for the parson (5) - PADRE*
25 - Dial one for an epic (5) - IL(I)AD*
26 - To muddle at a place where group of people have meals together (4) - MESS [DD]
ACROSS
1 - False trade plate found in the Lake District (10) - PATTERDALE* Needed Google verification
6 - Yield we hear to a ranked tournament player (4) - CEDE(~seed)
9 - Miracle town has ways which lead to rumours (7) - {CANA}{RDS}
10 - Central area of America has widest parts around head of Missouri (7) - {M}{IDWEST*}
12 - What a batsman must do to capture public interest (4,1,3) - MAKE A HIT [CD]
13 - In a manner of speaking, I would visit the Isle of Man (5) - {I'D}{I}{O}{M} Is IOM recognised abvn for Isle of Man
15 - Condition under which a horse races (5) - RIDER [DD]
17 - Appear as concerned with donation (9) - {RE}{PRESENT}
19 - Divination, kind that is to include member (9) - {SORT}{I{LEG}E} Never heard of this had to google for it
21 - Has to OK a tall military cap (5) - {SHA*}{KO*} Tall is the AInd? Shako is the one worn by the Madras Sapper on the right in the image below.
24 - Supplied with strings attached (8) - PROVIDED [DD]
27 - Looked forward to (7) - AWAITED [CD]
28 - State of North African chief (7) - EMIRATE [CD]
29 - Garden of paradise (4) - EDEN [E]
30 - Whatever happens, don't stare so much (10) - {REGARD}{LESS}
DOWN
1 - Father caught in an agreement (4) - {PA}{CT}
2 - A mug-like vessel for beer (7) - TANKARD [E]
4 - Pay five hundred is the order (9) - {D}{IS}{CHARGE}
5 - Confine within bounds laid down (5) - LIMIT [DD]
7 - He alone keeps to the Christian faith (7) - EREMITE [CD]
8 - Reckoning I am in the eastern depot (10) - {E}{ST{I'M}ATION}
11 - Clubs used in golf to propel ball from tees (7) - DRIVERS [E]
18 - Strange things seen by only women in the scrap heap? (9) - {PHE{NO,MEN}A*}
20 - Confusion i.e. great in town (7) - REIGATE*
22 - In time Vera may be seen as mean (7) - {A{VERA}GE}
24 - A drape found for the parson (5) - PADRE*
25 - Dial one for an epic (5) - IL(I)AD*
26 - To muddle at a place where group of people have meals together (4) - MESS [DD]
Missed on 1a, 19a and 7d. Found 21a, 3d lacking proper clueing.
ReplyDelete3d lacking proper clueing.
ReplyDelete---
This is putting it mildly.
'Weird' is EERIE.
I think the lake is ERIE.
This is neither a CD nor a homophone clue.
Nor is it a charade.
Nor is it a straightforward ("E") clue.
It is a badly written clue by a thoughtless writer.
Should be dismissed straightaway.
Abbr IOM is in Chambers!
ReplyDelete19d my cod, not for the cluing, but for the three continuous Ss in the grid, reminding of the sibilant snake.
ReplyDeleteYou mean 14d.
ReplyDeleteTypo Brahe.
ReplyDeleteOK
ReplyDeleteTake any word which has the same letter thrice consecutively and write a clue!
Kishore,
ReplyDeleteProbably you meant 14D GRASS SNAKE
Maybe a phrase or hyphenated word.
ReplyDeleteHaving no old pen like a stripped bird? (5-4)
ReplyDeleteQUILL-LESS
ReplyDeleteAn overkill here: 5 consecutively used letter
ReplyDeletePlum story calling pigs (3-3-1-1-1-2)
1 - False trade plate found in the Lake District (10) - PATTERDALE*
ReplyDeletePatterdale is a small village in the Lake District of Cumbria in Northwest England. It lies a little south of Ullswater and a few miles east of Helvellyn. Its only claim to fame is the Patterdale Terrier, a breed of working dog that originated here, which was later renamed as Welsh Terrier.
How we wish Manna stops giving these vague place names from foreign countries!
Chinese agarbathi wields rod, chasing JOHNNIAC Open Shop System (4-5)
ReplyDelete(J)(OSS)-(STICK
ReplyDeleteGood one, Kishore
CV sir,
ReplyDeleteHave you ever thought of an awesome clue for a word and decided to build the rest of the crossword around it?
Will the other setters visiting the blog feel free to answer the question please?
Thank you.
Plum story calling pigs (3-3-1-1-1-2)
ReplyDeletePig-Hoo-o-o-o-ey (from PGW's Blandings Castle and Elsewhere)
Thanks, Venkatesh. Of course, its close relative MOSS-STICK also qualifies for 3 letters in a row.
ReplyDeleteWords like Mirindaaaa...aaaaah ! may not count.
Satya
ReplyDeleteSpeaking for Gridman, I can answer your question.
From crossword 1 (I have crossed the 600 limit) I have never written a clue before putting a word/phrase in the grid.
That is, first the grid is seeded with words/phrases and then the clues are written.
I have read that some UK setters write clues for certain words/phrases and enter the latter as initial entries in their grids (esp. the one in the first ac. slot) It could be PATTERDALE, ha, ha, ha. But I have not done it.
This means that if any clues are good in my crossword, the word/phrase was tackled after it came up.
I like it this way.
You know, the pleasure that a crossword setter gets when he is able to write a decent clue for a squishy word is great! I look forward to it. I savour it!
Of course, what I think is a good clue and of which I am proud may fall flat to certain solvers and may even be rejected should I dare to submit it as part of a crossword to a UK paper (no, I won't even dream of it; I hold my fellow countrymen and women dear).
6 - Yield we hear to a ranked tournament player (4) - CEDE(~seed)
ReplyDeleteI am surprised that no one has commented on this clue. Going by the wording, one would guess yield (CEDE) we hear (Homonym) to give SEED (a ranked player). This is how Kishore interpreted this clue at the Orkut site.
As Manna has intended it the other way round, he should have placed the homonym indicator (we hear) at the end of the line. While we notice some improvement in NJ, there is a concomittant slide in MM.
I will not agree there is a slide in MM. His crosswords have always had this uneven quality: some clues 'super' as my three-year old granddaughter often says of some experiences that she has and some others 'duper' (which I use in the sense 'iffy'). To describe this phenomenon, I used to have a line from a Blake poem - which Kishore too mentioned recently. It is unlikely that he took a leaf from my book, for I always keep it closed, using a bookmark to know where I left off.
ReplyDeleteVenkatesh 09:41
ReplyDeleteIf I try to solve an MM crossword it may have some blanks, for I cannot bring myself to entering the intended answers as the clues in my opinion DO NOT lead to them. You think I could have entered EERIE? No way!
Angry utterance in ship leads to quarrel (5,6)
ReplyDeleteHi Kishore
ReplyDeleteI just logged in for 10 minutes yesterday night and someone had said something appreciating Kishore. So I presumed you had revealed yourself, somewhere in the earlier posts!
So in my 2257 post, please replace 'Kishore' by 'Interrobang'. Whoever goes by that synonym, kindly pardon my gaffe :)
Good Morning
ReplyDeleteManna made a mess for all the good so far he had done this week. Very poor clueing. Most of clues leads to dead end and bad surface reading. I have given up after a while as my search proved futile.
Mathu.
I agree with Venkatesh. I filled in 'seed'for 6A and struggled to get 8D because of it.I was so sure of seed.
ReplyDeleteI liked the clue for 18D-phenomena,particularly the 'no men' part.
reg.3D-weird sounding lake in NA.Would this be better or too direct? How about "Oriental lake is weird"?
ReplyDeleteI agree with CV. Manna has always oscillated between a maestro and a tyro in his clueing. I also suspect that TH Crossword setters borrow words from Crosswords appearing in British newspapers (based on how local the word is to their context - Patterdale is one example. There have been many in the recent past) Except NJ I haven't seen any setter in TH use local names
ReplyDeleteShyam 1029:
ReplyDeleteTo quote from a Hindi filmi dialogue:
Hota hai, hota hai.
Anyhow, thanks for giving me credit and presuming I had that much brains... IB must be having a chuckle at our expense.
Kishore's 1056 reminds me of another famous dialogue in a Hindi film:
ReplyDeleteHoga, hoga, hoga...
Remember? (You must be of a certain age!)
That was a movie in which Padmini bared a large part of her back.
The hero plays bagpipes sitting in a tree !
ReplyDeletePadmini? I thought it was Vyjaianthimala
ReplyDeleteIf I am not wrong it was Vaijyanthimala from Sangam.
ReplyDeleteOn many a day, when we also see CWs from old Times (appearing in Hindustan Times) and those in the Financial Times and the New Indian Express (which were published earlier in the UK), we do find clues lifted straight out from there or may be polished up a bit. I appeciate the solvers who are quick to spot these.
ReplyDeleteIt is ironic that a technical expert group (chaired by a former DG of CSIR) to do with patent law issues (& Intellectual Property Rights) allegedly copied from a paper on the subject funded by the drug industry in the UK. The report with alleged plagiarised content was released at the fag end of 2006.The Technical Expert Group withdrew tee Report, re-examined it and resubmitted the Report in April 2009.
As with drugs, the concepts of 'ever-greening' and 'incremental innovation' seem to apply to apply equally to clueing for CWs.
and sings in Hindi a song about two monkeys:
ReplyDeleteMeri monkey Ganga
Tere monkey Jamuna...
and yes it was V not P.
Muthaiah, our resident movie and history expert, has again got it right. It was, indeed, the Vijayanthimala-starrer 'Sangam'.
ReplyDeleteCV sir,
ReplyDeleteSorry for the delayed response.
Thank you for your reply. My question certainly got answered.
Perhaps, the Padmini whom (or rather whose 'back')CV had in mind was the famous South Indian acress of "Thillana Mohanambal" fame, and not Padmini Kolhapure, as some might have presumed.
ReplyDeleteIn two popular Hindi films (Mera Naam Joker and Jis Desh Mein Ganga Behti Hai), Padmini was paired against Raj Kapoor. Her forays into Bolywood include memorable films like Payal and Babubhai Mistry's Mahabharat.
i think i go with CV sir. It is Padmini in Rajkapoors' jis desh me ganga behti hai...only movie she can claim or anyone for that matter played a glamourous..
ReplyDeleteofcourse rajkapoor is known to make good bare films with heroines...remember zeenat, mandakini, dimple... i am not too old but i am old.
crossword turned movie forum today...effects of a Manna day
Mathu.
Mathu,
ReplyDeleteI liked the pun on the word - Manna Dey (born on May Day). Who can forget his ever green patriotic song 'Ai Mere Pyare Watan' from the film Kabuliwallah!
Bad day.
ReplyDeleteWidest around M, but MIDWEST begins with an M.
And then, of course, there's EERIE.
I do not know how "strange things" are equated to "phenomena," when the former is only a subset of the latter. Even when a phenomenon is used to describe an up and coming artist, say, it used to in the sense that one finds the talent extraordinary, not strange (or does one?).
Just so that no one accuses me of pointing out only the negatives, I think 14D is nice even though I didn't fill it up myself.
Mathu/Venkatesh,
ReplyDeleteI once met MD at the HAL airport. Both of us had flown in from CCU and were waiting for the cab. I spent a few minutes with him. He was such a nice, down to earth person and I cherish the time spent with him. Contrast with LM who I met (again at an airport) who had an entourage who were insulating her, MD was alone and approachable. He presently stays in Bangalore
Looks like I missed an interesting discussion on Hindi movies. What information I could have offered on Sangam, Raj Kapoor, Vyjie et al is all 'bared' here much before I logged in.
ReplyDeleteSure, no one can escape Kishore's scan when it comes to any slips - no pub please - in matters filmi or otherwise.
sorry, it should read, no pun please. No Freudian slip there !
ReplyDeleteAs Mathu so often voices my own thoughts... I'll echo them. :)
ReplyDeleteRepeat Mathu 10:29
Horrible CW today. I guess it was Mr. Hyde's turn today. Hope Dr. Jekyll is back on Monday.
@ Richard: Given the time of the night, maybe you did come from a pub!!! :) That was a very humourous slip there! haha
ReplyDelete