Financial Times 13,636 / Jason
Posted by Agentzero on March 8th, 2011
Some pleasingly tricky clues here, in particular 7 down and 16 down. I didn’t otherwise find much to comment on, except I wonder how our nonnative English speakers fared with the somewhat obscure slang in 8 down and 23 down.
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | MAIN COURSE dd |
| 6 | ISIS I[sland] SIS[ter] (little female relative) |
| 9 | MICHAELMAS The names MICHAEL and SAM are “back-to-back” |
| 10 | LIDO LID (cap) O (ring) |
| 12 | WRITERS BLOCK *(BRISTOL WRECK) |
| 15 | CAMPANULA CAMP (effeminate) + A + ALUN (lad) reversed |
| 17 | TASTE S[on] in TATE (London art gallery) |
| 18 | ANGUS hidden in slANG USed |
| 19 | PRESCRIBE PRES[ent] CRIB (cot) E (close to “babe”) |
| 20 | PENCIL PUSHER PENCIL (wherein to find lead; why “lusty”?) P (quietly) USHER (guide) |
| 24 | PUBS B[ass] in SUP (drink), reversed |
| 25 | FLEA MARKET FL[og] (a couple beginning “flog”) + *(TEA MAKER) |
| 26 | REED RE (on the matter of) ED (education) |
| 27 | GRIM REAPER d&cd |
| Down | |
| 1 | MEMO reverse hidden in welcOME Mat |
| 2 | INCH A triple definition; an INCH is an island, and is also signified by IN CH (Switzerland). I think I would have preferred the misdirection of “Creep in Switzerland,” evoking a different sense of “creep” |
| 3 | CHAIRMANSHIP MAN (bloke) in *(IRISH CHAP) |
| 4 | UNLIT L[earner] in UNIT (one) |
| 5 | STAIRCASE I (one) in STAR (celeb) + CASE (bit of baggage) |
| 7 | SAILOR SUIT SAILOR (salt) SUIT (please) |
| 8 | SHOPKEEPER SHOP (grass) KEEPER (minder). “Shop” and “grass” are both slang words for “inform on someone to the police” |
| 11 | OBSTACLE RACE *(CLOSE CABARET) |
| 13 | SCRAP PAPER APP (iPhone gizmo) in SCRAPER (stripper) |
| 14 | IMAGINABLE IM (I am) + *(A BELGIAN) |
| 16 | UNPOPULAR U[niform] in UN (a, French) POPLAR (tree); the definition is simply “not in” |
| 21 | SWARM S[pecial] WARM (kind) |
| 22 | SKIP dd |
| 23 | STIR dd; both “stir” and “bird” are slang for “prison” |
March 8th, 2011 at 10:44 am
Agent0: Re the slang terms in 8 and 23d: I don’t think any of these would have posed a problem to solvers in India. Non-native speakers of English pick up these when reading crime novels or tackling UK/US crosswords regularly.
March 8th, 2011 at 1:16 pm
Many thanks Agentzero I found this very enjoyable.
Well done, Jason. More of the same please!
March 8th, 2011 at 3:35 pm
I thought this was a ripsnorter of a puzzle. Plenty of neat twists, and deft exploitation of ambiguous phrase (e.g. ‘Bass’, ‘one such’, ‘not in uniform’). And, of course, bonus style points for resurrecting Olly Reed; I imagine that he’d appreciate being pegged alongside Mr Reaper in the bottom row!
20A’s lustiness is a reference to the priapic phrase “here’s lead in your pencil”.
24A, 1D and 13D (although, I quail at attributing phone apps uniquely to Apple!) also raised a smile.
March 8th, 2011 at 4:20 pm
Indeed a very good runout from Jason, Smiffy, and you pick the tricks I myself enjoyed. How nice ‘on the matter of education’ is!!
March 8th, 2011 at 5:11 pm
Don’t recall doing a Jason before. Solved most without aids but needed it for Campanula and couldn’t get swarm.
Thanks for the blog
March 8th, 2011 at 5:49 pm
Excellent stuff. Just the thing to avoid having to go home on a Tuesday evening. Another grey hair for campanula.
March 8th, 2011 at 11:32 pm
Thanks Agentzero.
Nice puzzle from Jason,not too difficult but plenty of amusing clues.Some good anagrams and the cheeky 20 across,which I read the same way as smiffy.
27 across didn’t quite work for me but was easily gettable.
Second use of APP in as many days.