Friday, 15 September 2023

No 13971, Friday 15 Sep 2023, Crescent

    Artwork by Prasanna

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ACROSS
7   Grave always in excavated space (6) SEVERE {Spa{EVER}cE}
8   Armoured shell wheels rapidly (8) CARAPACE {CAR APACE}
9   Baseless story about compact contents (4) TALC {TALe}{C}
10 Fit section wasted for sugar (4,6) SOFT SAWDER {S+WASTED+FOR}*
11 Setter's suggestion for The Listener's a headache (8) MIGRAINE {~my grain)
12 Plate with metal closer to zinc runs in beds (6) CHROME {zinC}{H{R}OME}
14 Celebrity in higher office (4) HERO [T]
15 Move by truck to keep shaking? (5) WAGON {WAG ON}
16 Dances where the boys in blue must change for an earlier start (4) BOPS (-c+b)BOPS
18 Like a stick? Before working, gorge (6) CANYON {CANY}{ON}
20 Views over wings (8) OPINIONS {O}{PINIONS}
22 Holding me tight, ask me and set right (4,5) MAKE AMENDS {ME} in {ASK+ME+AND}* Typo in Enu it should be (4,6)
24 German physicist hard pressed by native Chinese (4) HAHN {HA{H}N}
25 Foundation doubling scale suffering severe blows (8) DEBACLES {BED<=}{SCALE*}
26 Appear in smoke (4,2) ROLL UP [DD]

DOWN
1   Vested interest primarily a terrible downer (8) SEDATIVE {VESTED+In...t+A}*
2   Passing through with dogs, men end in safety (10) PERCURSORY {PER}{CURS}{OR}{s...tY}
3   Black strip not new for one used to plane (3,3) JET SKI {JET}{SKInNever knew that Jet Ski is actually a Brand Name
4   The Reverend's fold bark for garbage collector (8) TRASHCAN (~crash tan to trashcan)
5   Hurl well aired clothes back to heap (4) SPEW {(~so)SEW} over  {heaP}
6   Pick and shovel at first leading riot (6) SCREAM {CREAM}<=>{Sh...l}
8   Price justification to support fine old clubs upset the dregs of Java? (6,7) COFFEE GROUNDS {FEE GROUNDS}<=>{F}{O}{C}<=
13 Winding lairBob the bunny's home perhaps (6,4) RABBIT HOLE*
15 Snake plant an adversary for fabulous knight (8) WINDMILL {WIND}{MILL}
17 Thing endlessly put away enthralls cold miser (8) PINCHGUT {THING+PUt}* over {C}
19 When keeping mum exhausted zombie staggers (6) AMAZES {A{MA}{Zo..iE}S}
21 Special condition nurses cover (6) INSURE {IN{S}URE}
23 Stretch from heel andash (4) ELAN [T]

Reference List
About = C, Section = S, Runs = R, Over = O, Hard = H, Interest = I, Men = OR, Black = JET, New = N, Fine = F, Old = O, Clubs = C, Cold = C, Special = S


58 comments:

  1. 7a severe - grave ever in s e from SpacE
    13d Rabbit hole from laie bob the anagram
    14a Hero - celebrity from higHER Office
    23d Elan - dash from heEL ANd

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I found 7A, 13D, 14A and 23D among the easier clues today.

      Delete
  2. 22A enu should be (4,6)? Given as (4,5), in print as well.

    ReplyDelete
  3. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  4. 9a
    Compact contents=talc
    Baseless story= tale-e,
    about=c (tal+c =talc)

    ReplyDelete
  5. 3d. Jet lag.
    15. Wag(on). Move and truck . Keep shaking.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Happy Engineers Day to all the Engineers here!

    ReplyDelete
  7. 19d AMAZES: staggers
    When: as, keeping mum: ma, exhausted zombie: ze
    A(MA)(ZE)S

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. 19D When keeping mum, exhausted zombie staggers (6)

      An incredible clue - not a word wasted. Each word word has a role to play in surface reading and cryptic reading. Charade components and selection indicators camouflaged in idioms and common parts of speech. Excellent setting.

      Delete
  8. 22A Holding me tight, ask me and set right (4,6)
    Ans: make amends
    Def: Set right
    Holding(containment ind) me
    Tight(anagrind) 'ask me and'*
    (make a(me)nds)

    ReplyDelete
  9. 17 dn pinchgut-miser
    p (in (c )hg ut. thing-t.* cold-c

    ReplyDelete
  10. 24Ac HAHN - {HA{H}N} ; Otto Hahn German physicist

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Otto Hahn is listed in reference sources as a chemist...I suppose physicists can claim he was one because of the connection of his work to radioactivity.

      Delete
  11. 8D COFFEE GROUNDS
    (FEE + GROUNDS) under (F O C) <--

    ReplyDelete
  12. 4dn : TRASHCAN Spoonerism of CRASHTAN
    Fold = Crash, Bark = Tan
    Definition : Garbage collector

    ReplyDelete
  13. 1d, downer = sedative
    (Vested + I + a)*
    terrible = anagrind

    ReplyDelete
  14. 11a MIGRAINE: headache
    Migraine~my( setter's) grain(suggestion)

    ReplyDelete
  15. 25a DEBACLES = Severe blows
    BED = Foundation, doubling DEB +
    ACLES anagram of Scale . Suffering anind

    ReplyDelete
  16. It us not dounding cane but like a cane- cane ( like lengthy)

    ReplyDelete
  17. +1
    I barely filled a third of the grid before opening the blog.

    ReplyDelete
  18. 8A- Carapace- armored she'll
    wheels= car?
    Rapidly= Apace

    ReplyDelete
  19. quite tough to get the annotations. Though I got the answers by crossings anno. parts found to be round about. like IXL grid.......Telescopic clues cracked easily.

    ReplyDelete
  20. 15d WINDMILL = An adversary for fabulous knight ( Don Quixote)
    WIND = Snake
    MILL = Plant

    ReplyDelete
  21. 26A Appear in smoke. - ROLL UP
    DD

    ReplyDelete
  22. One more by your leave

    21d INSURE = Cover
    INURE = Condition
    S = special
    IN+S+URE
    Nurses container ind.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. 21D Special condition nurses cover (6)

      Another brilliant clue - not a word wasted. Every word has a role in the surface reading and wordplay. A cryptic crossword connoisseur's delight.

      Delete
  23. Me too, one more please
    2d, passing through = Precursory
    With = pre
    Dogs = curs
    Men = or
    End in safety = y

    ReplyDelete
  24. 2d, passing through = Percursory
    With = per
    Dogs = curs
    Men = or
    End in safety = y

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. A percursory look at the clue have me the answer because of the dogs, but couldn't figure out the full anno. Got stuck on 'men end in safety'.

      Delete
  25. 3D-Jet ski- one used to plane; black-jet; strip-skin

    ReplyDelete
  26. This has come up here any times with the answer. OR- Other Ranks= Men/ Soldiers

    ReplyDelete
  27. 16A- Boys in blue= cops? Police?

    ReplyDelete
  28. Yes, that is what the dic. says. Did the English cops wear blue uniform? News to me.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. https://projectbritain.com/london/crime.htm#:~:text=The%20Metropolitan%20Police%20force%20patrol,the%20%22boys%20in%20blue%22.

      Delete
  29. "like a stick" = CANY is such a good piece of wordplay, one can forgive the surface grammar and enjoy the chuckles in this case.

    ReplyDelete
  30. I have a 7A 11A today, so I thought I will skip my grid analysis. But with Crescent and hard-difficulty Sudoku next to it, I enjoyed the paper enough to scribble my 20A.

    After getting 4-5 clues I spotted the letters J, K, V, W and thought the grid might be a pangram. But it was not meant to be - the letters Q and X are missing.

    The puzzle was a thoughtfully constructed one, with unusual definitions and part-of-speech changes to make charades harder to parse. For example, in 8A, "wheels" is a verb on the surface while it is a noun for CAR in the cryptic sense. In the same clue, "rapidly" is provided as the charade definition for APACE. Most people would think first of words like "quickly" or "fast" and APACE might be among the last synonyms they think of. So the setter has done a good job of thoughtfully constructing a challenging clue in this case.

    Another trick used effectively by the setter is to have multiple indicator-like words in the clue, making the solver guess which is the real indicator. For example, in 10A, I had identified "sugar" as the definition, but for the wordplay I misread and took "wasted" as anagrind, "fit section" as fodder, "for" as linkword and having got crossings for S and F in positions 1 and 3, I was thinking how "soft incite" could mean "sugar"! It turns out that the correct parse takes "fit" as "anagrind" and "s(ection) wasted for" as fodder for "soft sawder" as sugar (in the sense of "flattery"). Here, the definition was also quite cryptic, which added to the difficulty.

    Some other enjoyable cryptic definitions were: "compact contents" for TALC in 9A, "suggestion" as GRAIN for the HP in 11A, "downer" for SEDATIVE in 1D, "one used to plane" for JET SKI in 3D, "riot" as SCREAM in 6D, "justification" for GROUNDS in 8D, and "plant" for MILL in 15D.

    However, while it was a creative definition, "bed" and HOME (12A) are not listed as synonyms by Chambers. Similarly, "move by truck" for WAGON in 15A was interesting but "wagon" is not defined as a verb in Chambers. PINION (20A) is defined as a part of a bird's wing, not the wing itself. Having some experience in the matter, I can say that "roll up" (26A) is an action that one might do immediately before smoking - it doesn't refer to the act of lighting up itself. "Bark" and TAN (4D) are unlisted as synonyms - I recently got flak for similarly using CORAL and "wine" as colour synonyms in a Sunday Special on this blog.

    Special mention should be given for the setter's use of Homophone and spoonerism clues, of which we ought to see more in THC. The phrase "well aired clothes" as [fodder][HP indicator][containment indicator] was brilliant in 5D. 5D was also my COD for maximum setter skullduggery in camouflaging indicators as common words. 4D and 11A were also well-executed spoken-language clues.

    There were one or two grammatical nits to pick, but those are forgivable. The vast majority of the clues were inoffensive for repeated rereading.

    ReplyDelete
  31. Challenging grid but very satisfying to wrap up. LOI were SOFT SAWDER and SPEW. Did not get the anno for the latter till I saw the blog.
    Thanks Crescent and Col.

    ReplyDelete
  32. For those who enjoy a challenge - last night I solved The Guardian Cryptic by Fed. Mind-blowing puzzle with "every other" clue having an inventive device.

    Puzzle: https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/cryptic/29175

    Annotated solutions: https://www.fifteensquared.net/2023/09/14/guardian-29175-fed/

    ReplyDelete
  33. Thank you Col.sir. It was my delay. However, you have considered it. Thanks once again for posting my artwork. Happy Engineers day & week to all members in this blog.

    ReplyDelete
  34. Very fine artwork Prasanna. 👌

    ReplyDelete

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