Wednesday, 4 November 2009

No 9679, Wednesday, 04 Nov 09, Nita Jaggi

ACROSS
 1 - Each advertisement includes a country (4) - CHAD [T]
 9 - Accountant has information about a lot of regular notes in receipts (15) - {AC}{KNOWLEDG{M}E}{N}{T}{S}
10 - Group of three, train without a name in Ohio (4) - TR(-a)I(-n){O}
11 - Service cut short for the first class warrior tribe (5) - MAS(-s){AI}
12 - General trend is to change the diet (4) - TIDE*
13 - Make a mark on the street in the morning for a political leader (5) - {ST}{AM}{P}
14 - Main point of support in an animal (7) - FULCRUM [CD]
16 - Grain Roy distributes around college in an Asian marketplace (7) - {GR}{O{C}{E}RY*}
18 - Appliance regularly set for Vatican in the East (5) - {S}{T}{O}{V}{E}
22 - Told to get help on the security interest (4) - LIEN Anno pending (Addendum - LIEN(~lean) )
23 - Tip-off the colourful plant positioned below (5) - (-f)LOWER
24 - Officer goes to work in the farm building (4) - {CO}{OP}
25 - Malignant disease is the last point of sickness (8,7) - {TERMINAL} {ILLNESS}
26 - Toy track is round for the headless boy turning back (4) - {Y}{O}{YO(-b)}
DOWN
 2 - Where one resides only to put the clothes on line (7) - {HANG}{OUT}
 3 - Short flashback that takes one to the past! (4,6,4) - DOWN MEMORY LANE [CD]
 4 - Cause fear in the attacked races (5) - SCARE*
 5 - Annoy the brat at last without any difficulty (5) - {T}EASE
 6 - Productively rich silver on Rhode Island for a religious group acceptable in a gathering (14) - {AG}{RI}{CULT}{U}{RALLY}
 7 - Somehow inspect out the new infected wound (6) - SEPTIC(-n)*
 8 - Overheard few holding the volunteers and a princess in the large structure (7) - (~some)S{TA}{DI}UM
15 - Chicken is horrible to cook with no gas (7) - BROILER(-h)*
17 - Theatre in Channel Islands has a false name (6) - {CI}NEMA*
19 - Placement agencies help to fill in this empty space? (7) - VACANCY [CD]
20 - Enlarge the small cavity (5) - {S}WELL
21 - Indian leader is in to impersonate an outward expression (5) - PO{I}SE

No of Black squares - 91 (40%)
No of white squares - 134

GRID

12 comments:

  1. Incidentally 22D is the one answer i did not get.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Perhaps you meant 22 Across, Suresh?

    Richard

    ReplyDelete
  3. 9 Across - 'Acknowledgements' and 'Acknowledgements' both forms are accepted. But here since there was a clue of information, insertion of 'knowledge' is implied. So I relied on 'acknowledgements' and got stuck with the other clues around.

    A few long words today. Yet, those like Down Memory Lane and Terminal Illness were not hard to guess.

    For once, no scope for NJ-bashing today, I hope.

    Richard

    ReplyDelete
  4. Sorry, Col's anno on 9 across clears my doubt. I stand corrected.

    Richard

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  5. no scope for NJ-bashing today, I hope: You are too kind, richlas.

    For starters:

    "26A Toy track is round for the headless boy turning back (4)" - what does the surface mean?
    "12A- General trend is to change the diet (4) - TIDE*" - not right to stick "the" between the anagrind and fodder.

    OK, it's better than NJ's usual crosswords, but that's not saying much :P

    ReplyDelete
  6. Shuchi.
    I don't see your problem with 26A
    Toy= def
    track=y
    round=o
    headless boy turning back is yo
    The only superflous word is 'for'

    ReplyDelete
  7. Shuchi, thanks for that neat and 'clean' interview with Col on your blog. Keep up your good work.

    By chance, do you know my friend Divvy Kant Upadhyay from Agra, who is a medico currently doing internship at Manipal University?

    Col, this is for you. Whatever has happened to that bushy beard sported by you in that photograph?

    Richard

    ReplyDelete
  8. Hi Suresh, You're right about the parsing. The problem is with the surface of the clue. Does "Toy track is round for the headless boy turning back" make sense, if you forget for a moment that what you're reading is a cryptic clue?

    This one, for example, has a better surface - 24A Officer goes to work in the farm building (4).

    If we read through the previous compiler Sankalak's work and compare them with NJ's, the difference in surface construction is obvious. More on this subject here: surface reading, cryptic reading.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Yeah Shuchi, I get your point. I have been doing crosswords for a long time, but only recently after joining this blog I have started analysing them in this depth. Also I guess, I have more time nowadays.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Hi Richard,
    That beard was just a fad which I started immediately after retirement 'literally letting my hair down' as in the Army beards are not permitted. The fancy wore off after 6 or 7 months when the beard started getting unruly!!
    Was thinking of starting a goatee now!!
    Sures,
    If NJ bashing were to start of we would be able to go on and on till tomorrow's CW appears

    ReplyDelete

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