Independent 6957 by Merlin
Posted by NealH on February 2nd, 2009
*=anag, []=dropped, <=reversed, hom=homophone
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | Groundhog Day: Ground + hog + ‘d + ay. |
| 8 | Off Off Broadway: Off (= start in expressions like “from the off”) + off (=away) + broad + way. |
| 10 | Nooky: Nook + y for yes, definition = “it”. |
| 11 | Rot or |
| 12 | Desai: Aides with the AI moved to the back. |
| 15 | Hi De Hi: Hom of Heidi, hi. |
| 16 | Deja Vu: Hidden, reversed in “helluva Jedi”. I’m not exactly sure that Deja Vu would be the theme for the Groundhog Day film, since it’s more of a vague sense of having been somewhere before rather than history repeating itself. |
| 17 | Alamo: A La Mo (state abbreviations). |
| 18 | Gibbon: A reference to Edward Gibbon. |
| 20 | Limpid: Lid around I MP. |
| 22 | Acids: As around CID. |
| 25 | Aesop: A pose<. |
| 27 | Disco: Didn’t really get this – “Tracing not very noisy club”. I imagine disco=club, but don’t follow the rest unless there’s some word like disco[ff]. |
| 28 | Full steam ahead: “Beats leading side as quickly as possible”. As quickly as possible is obviously the definition and “team ahead” is probably leading side but I’m not familiar with full meaning beat. |
| 29 | Punxsutawney: (way next sun up)*, but not the nicest of clues to have to do on the train with no reference books to confirm the spelling. |
| Down | |
| 1 | Groundhog day: Cryptic def (ground hog i.e. stop hog taking off). |
| 2 | Off-road: Of (a ford)*. |
| 3 | Nifty: I FT in NY. |
| 4 | Hobble: Hobbe[s] (Thomas) around l[ogic]. |
| 5 | Gloria: (a girl o)* + &lit. |
| 6 | Adder: double def. |
| 7 | Mantra[p] |
| 9 | Groundhog Day: a rather weak cryptic def, I thought. |
| 12 | Diana: (An aid)<. |
| 13 | Swam I |
| 14 | Idols: solid*. |
| 19 | Basque: Base around qu. |
| 21 | Pastern: P[anto] + a + stern. |
| 23 | Cortex: Cox around RTE (an Irish TV station). |
| 24 | Deja Vu: Jude* around AV (Authorised Version). I’m sure I’ve seen that before somewhere. |
| 26 | Pilau: Lip< + a + u. |
| 27 | Dram a |
February 2nd, 2009 at 11:49 am
A laugh aloud joy of a puzzle. It was deja vu all over again. Again.
February 2nd, 2009 at 12:04 pm
It was – and the fact that Groundhog Day has appeared so recently as a solution in an unthemed Paul puzzle, and that Puck’s effort on this same subject appeared Feb 2 last year, seemed to work for rather than against this nice piece.
February 2nd, 2009 at 12:18 pm
Neal
27a is DISCO[very]
28a to ‘full’ is to scour and beat (Chambers)
February 2nd, 2009 at 12:46 pm
Today’s Indy hasn’t arrived, presumably because of the snow and the on-line version doesn’t seem to be working, so I’ve missed this one.
February 2nd, 2009 at 2:04 pm
Not sure where the crosswords have got to on the Indy home page, but this link should still work
http://www.independent.co.uk/extras/puzzles/crosswords/cryptic/
February 2nd, 2009 at 2:09 pm
I think the message of this one for me is that how ever many times the theme comes up, I still can’t spell PUNXSUTAWNEY
I thought this was great fun, and not too hard – the second DEJA VU did make me laugh.
In an inspired bit of scheduling, The Cameo cinema in Edinburgh once did their Sunday double bill as “Groundhog Day” followed by “Groudhog Day”…
February 2nd, 2009 at 2:10 pm
Sorry, “Groundhog”, not “Groudhog”, obviously…
February 2nd, 2009 at 2:24 pm
I thought 9 down was GROUND HOG DAY rather than just a cryptic definition. Despite the repeated answers, I found it quite a hard puzzle.
February 2nd, 2009 at 11:34 pm
I also found it on the hard side. Have never heard of Punxsutawney, but perhaps that’s my fault.
5dn (A girl disc spelled out: GLORIA) is we are told an &lit. I can’t see how, as I thought an &lit. needed the whole clue to be a definition of the answer. This clue makes precious little sense to me, and I can’t see how it’s a definition of Gloria.
Sorry Merlin, I didn’t enjoy this. Obviously I’m missing something, since it was praised on the Crossword Centre Message Board.
February 3rd, 2009 at 6:16 am
Wil, 5D GLORIA or G.L.O.R.I.A. is about the most famous song by Patti Smith.
(Who said crosswords were stuck in the distant past? OK, that song is now over 30 years old.)
February 3rd, 2009 at 7:27 am
I’d heard of Groundhog Day (who hasn’t?) but didn’t know anything about it and certainly never heard of Punx…. so found this one a struggle. But got there in the end after googling ‘Groundhog Day’. ‘Cortex’ was brillant!