Independent 7195/Phi
Posted by John on November 6th, 2009
The usual very pleasant offering from Phi. One or two I’m not quite clear about, but that will be me not him I’m pretty sure.
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 7 | BI(R)D LIME |
| 9 | appaREL IS Hard |
| 10 | STE(E)P |
| 11 | DEMO{li}TION |
| 12 | PRIVATE PAT(1)ENT |
| 15 | LO(LL)OP |
| 16 | MOR{e} ALE |
| 18 | ALPES-MARITIMES — (seems impartial)* — there’s no acute accent in the online version, but perhaps there’s one in the paper |
| 20 | S(MOULD)ER |
| 22 | maIN DIAgonal |
| 24 | AN O(RA)K |
| 25 | R(EG 1 C)IDE — I suppose it’s ‘serious’ in the sense ‘major’ |
| Down | |
| 1 | MINSTREL — an unusual clue I think but good — ‘minster’ has its last two letters, which are ER (Queen), reversed, then {recita}l |
| 2 | {s}IDLE |
| 3 | SEND-UP — I’m not comfortable here: OK despatch = send, but how does pilot = up, except in the vague sense that a pilot is up in the air? |
| 4 | B RUM |
| 5 | GLITTERATI — litter in (1 tag)rev. |
| 6 | E-S(C)ORT — the Ford Escort |
| 8 | IMPETUOUS — (I am to use up)* — ‘supply’ is an adverb |
| 13 | VOL UP TU {v}ARY |
| 14 | TWO-TIMING — (owt)rev. Tim in g |
| 17 | EYE C AND Y |
| 18 | ALMOND — (old man)* |
| 19 | AU (R) OR A |
| 21 | DU(K)E |
| 23 | DOCK — 2 defs I think, ‘cut’ and ‘service provided by port’ |
November 6th, 2009 at 7:50 am
SEND-UP has the old question-mark alert, John.
If you were to despatch a pilot, would you perhaps send her up (into the sky)? That’s what m’colleague is nudging at here methinks, thereby achieving a good match-up twixt the SI and the (slighly cryptic) def.
Nice blog, nice puzzle.
November 6th, 2009 at 12:13 pm
Thanks for the post, John, and in particular for explaining the wordplay in TWO-TIMING. Is the definition meant to be “without scruple”? A good fun puzzle as usual for Friday, anyway.
November 6th, 2009 at 1:04 pm
John, if you mean the acute accent in département, I don’t think this applies, as the clue uses the English translation of it – department. Otherwise it would need two Es as well as an accent, which would’ve really wrecked the surface reading!
November 6th, 2009 at 2:13 pm
Re SEND-UP. Just to split a hair or two. The straight clue must be “take-off”, a noun and synomym of the hyphenated solution “send-up”, also a noun. “Despatch a pilot” is a verb phrase, whose synonym would be “send up” with no hyphen.
November 6th, 2009 at 2:37 pm
In a double definition clue there may well be different enumerations for each part, but by convention only one can be given. See perse/per se yesterday.
November 6th, 2009 at 2:52 pm
Very enjoyable puzzle from Phi with MINSTREL my last answer.
November 6th, 2009 at 11:05 pm
Thanks for tidying me up as usual on one or two points: yes of course Mick H, he couldn’t have used the French word for department as that would indeed have made the wordplay hopeless, and yes Roger P of course it’s simply ‘send up?’ for ‘despatch a pilot’.