No 14770, Friday 17 Apr 2026, Karaoke

RULES FOR POSTING COMMENTS FOR FRIDAY ONLY

All those who are not regular commenters but who are rookie commenters or silent followers of the blog are requested to post answers with annotations in the comments section. In your own interest please avoid looking up the answers from the interactive version. Don't hesitate to post your annotations, in case you make a mistake in the annotation someone will correct it with the right annotation.

PLEASE NOTE, SOLUTIONS WITHOUT ATTEMPTING THE ANNOTATIONS WILL BE DELETED

Each commenter is requested to post only 5 answers thereby giving others also a chance to participate. Please provide all your answers in one comment.

Regular solvers/Veterans can post 1 answer each, but after 11 AM only.

ACROSS

1   Open house, bird-house (6)

4   Mosquitos vacated, no more suffering in public toilet (4,4)

9   A specialty hospital right across minister's original place of seclusion (6)

10 Throw away editor misbehaving with girlfriend (3,3,2)

12 Greed for wealth from medal by fool leaving nothing at the end of tourney (8)

13 Rest of money stolen from old women (6)

15 Frisk high priests near bridge (5,6)

18 Drinking heavily, both let off with model in lounge oddly (2,3,6)

21 Well-deserved employees always receive net excluding dividends primarily (6)

22 Song by crazy doctor on a lake (8)

24 Starter by pirate at sea with wife heartily (8)

25 Sage consumes basically edible mushroom (6)

26 Sondheim composed "The pursuit of pleasure" (8)

27 It makes you sleepy when fixed in taste occasionally (6)

DOWN

1   He'd treat a patient who is mentally unstable (8)

2   Fancy shopowner fired women. They are good-for-nothing (2-6)

3   He can add some input funnily (7,8)

5   Smooth sailing, maybe curtailed (4)

6   Clergy with hot tutoress pants in exercise (7,4,4)

7   Lots of love poems about first love! (6)

8   The Lion King, say, horribly famous acting for Oscar (6)

11 Bears witness to abstainer participating in destruction of asset (7)

14 Essentially Bharat's army at large weapon factory (7)

16 Gates scenery? (5,3)

17 Spooner says "Cut down rent. It's a punishment place" (8)

19 Cuts up hot angel (6)

20 Companion cooked around noon (6)

23 Searches for accommodation (4)

No 14769, Thursday 16 Apr 2026, Gussalufz

Solution to 18A has been deliberately left unsolved and is to be answered by a non-regular/novice commenter, with proper annotation. Those who have answered earlier in the week, please give others a chance.

Open for anyone to answer, if not solved by 1 PM.

HIJKLMNO Pronounced

ACROSS

1   Development environment that boss nearly destroyed to grasp a bit of programming (4,4) STOP BATH {THAT+BOSs}* over {Pr...g}

6   Surprise for woman expecting escort? (6) SHOWER [DD]

9   Setter going for a social media interaction with Victoria, perhaps (4) LAKE L(-i+a)AKE

10 Some elaborate trap to teach obscure grammatical term? (10) TETRAPTOTE [T]

11 Oh, let's go back for a campus gathering (6) HOSTEL {OH<=}{LETS<=} 

12 Gang, in memoir, was regularly retreating for sport (8) SWIMMING {GaNg+In+MeMoIr+WaS}<=

13 Writer got sharply panned (10) STYLOGRAPH*

15 Cocaine, son, right away! (4) SNOW {S}{NOW}

17 Collect fingerprint pattern after returning (4) POOL<= 

18 Old bird circling cloud or a kind of delivery service? (4-2-4) D?O?-T?-D?O? (Addendum DOOR-TO-DOOR {D{OORT}ODO}{OR} - See comments)

20 Set out quinoa around five following chef's first dish (3,2,3) COQ AU VIN {QUINOA}* over {V} after{Chef}

22 "Outcome of naughty pout?" "Keeping quiet" (6) UPSHOT {UP{SH}OT*}

24 Made dry Indian crispy chicken starters, gobbled up with daughter (10) DESICCATED {DESI}{Cr...y}{Ch...n}{ATE}{D}

26 Welcome husband's distress (4) HAIL {H}{AIL}

27 Disentangle gunk and snot after blowing noses (6) UNKNOT {gUNK+sNOT

28 Spooner's young boy, batter with poor judgement (3,5) BAD TASTE (tad baste to bad taste)

DOWN

2   Quite a fort! Wonderfully hosts a small party (3,3,3) TEA FOR TWO [T]

3   Fold coat, bottom to middle (5) PLEAT PL(+e)EAT(-e)

4   Essentially, can't I logically use this operation to convert, say, 1 to 10? (7) ANTILOG [T]

5   How to prune butts, becoming attractive (3) HOT {HOw}{To}

6   Unoriginal southern liberal (7) SLAVISH {S}{LAVISH}

7   Made improvements in newspaper column about model I.I.M.s, with editing (9) OPTIMISED {OP ED} over {T+IIMS}*

8   Scoffed at faceless men on ecstasy (5) EATEN {AT}{mEN}<=>{E}

12 Squabble over private resort area (3,4) SPA TOWN {SPAT}{OWN}

14 All muddled, old language includes old pronunciation of R as L (9) LALLATION {ALL}* {LATIN} over {O}

16 One studying mountains is ordinary for university doctor (9) OROLOGIST (-u+o)OROLOGIST

18 Voted crankily to accommodate company housing for pigeons (7) DOVECOT {DOVE{CO}T*}

19 Lacking advanced auxiliary supports, ramshackle hut collapsed noisily (7) THUDDED {aADDED}<=>{HUT*}

21 Main article chases CEO's replacement (5) OCEAN {AN}<=>{CEO}*

23 Uh, sound missing in a chainsaw's clattering? (5) SCHWA CHAinSaW*

25 Save up for boat (3) TUB<=

Reference List

Son = S, Old bird = DODO, Cloud = OORT, Quiet = SH, Daughter = D, Husband = H, Southern = S, Model = T, Ecstasy = E, Old = O, Ordinary = O, University = U, Advanced = A