Everyman crossword No 3,417
Posted by Stella on April 8th, 2012
First of all, a Happy Easter to all, and a farewell, at least for the time being, as I find myself unable to live up to my compromises with 225, so have decided to renounce them.
Palm Sunday coincided with the mini-theme cited in three interlocking across clues in this enjoyable puzzle – and then there is one anachronic intruder 
| Across | |||
| 1. | Felt for shipmate at sea collared by journalist (10) | ||
| EMPATHISED | *SHIPMATE in ED | ||
| 6. | Chief stud (4) | ||
| BOSS | Double definition | ||
| 9. | A boost to self-esteem achieved on English horse that’s inferior (3,4) | ||
| EGO TRIP | GOT = “achieved” after E, + RIP = “horse that’s inferior”, a new definition for me, which I only found by googling, as it doesn’t appear in Chambers. | ||
| 10. | Anteater chained, maltreated (7) | ||
| ECHIDNA | *CHAINED |
||
| 12. | 14 or 25 (7,6) | ||
| POISSON D’AVRIL | The first of the three interlinked clues for today’s date. |
||
| 14. | 12 or 25 (5,4) | ||
| APRIL FOOL | The second, and my way in to the solution, reminding me of this, though the date given confuses me, since it’s three months before my birth, yet I distinctly remember watching the programme with my family. |
||
| 15. | Old article penned by that woman novelist (5) | ||
| HEYER | YE in HER, first name, Georgette. I didn’t know she also wrote detective stories. If I had, I might have read more of her works |
||
| 16. | Wooden old actor-manager close to Goldwyn (5) | ||
| TREEN | TREE+ (Goldwy)NI doubt that he and Goldwyn actually met |
||
| 18. | Wife is at home nursing prisoners of state (9) | ||
| WISCONSIN | W IS IN around CONS | ||
| 21. | Still together (2,3,4,4) | ||
| AT THE SAME TIME | Double definition | ||
| 23. | Nearing resort, hittable (2,5) | ||
| IN RANGE | *NEARING | ||
| 24. | Camping item perhaps missent abroad (4,3) | ||
| MESS TIN | *MISSENT |
||
| 25. | 12 or 14 (4) | ||
| GOWK | Fool number three | ||
| 26. | Scathing when gang housed in portable shelter (10) | ||
| ASTRINGENT | AS + RING in TENT | ||
| Down | |||
| 1. | Still the same (4) | ||
| EVEN | double definition, reminiscent of 21ac. | ||
| 2. | Get on with Miranda’s father? Mostly (7) | ||
| PROSPER | PROSPER(o), from The Tempest | ||
| 3. | Made for Hallowe’en, watch number later, outside, at onset of night-time (6,7) | ||
| TURNIP LANTERN | TURN = “watch” + IP(number?) + LATER around N, + N(ight-time)Either I’m missing something, or this is uncharacteristically sloppy for Everyman. I can’t see any actual indication for IP   |
||
| 4. | One meeting member regarding painting technique (7) | ||
| IMPASTO | 1 + MP + AS TO = “regarding” |
||
| 5. | Unknown number fired from outside, non-stop (7) | ||
| ETERNAL | E(x)TERNAL, without “x” | ||
| 7. | Neat hospital attendant (7) | ||
| ORDERLY | Double definition | ||
| 8. | A trap for the unwary consumer in shopping area in a rush? (5,5) | ||
| SMALL PRINT | MALL in SPRINT | ||
| 11. | Cartoonist having hour in the bar, soon worse for wear (5,8) | ||
| HEATH ROBINSON | H in *THE BAR SOON |
||
| 13. | No longer bothered over looking after people (4,6) | ||
| PAST CARING | PAST =”over” + CARING | ||
| 17. | Actor we cast – admit we were wrong (3,4) | ||
| EAT CROW | *ACTOR WEI’m more familiar with the expression “eat humble pie.” | ||
| 18. | Wife stands seeing small furry creatures (7) | ||
| WEASELS | W + EASELS
Do they really go “pop”? |
||
| 19. | Pilot going about a mile in vessel (7) | ||
| STEAMER | STEER around A M(ile) | ||
| 20. | Ghost commanding a form of respect (7) | ||
| SPECTRE | *RESPECT | ||
| 22. | Section without lights learner driver avoided (4) | ||
| UNIT | UN(l)IT | ||
April 8th, 2012 at 12:34 am
A turnip is a type of pocket watch Stella. Thanks for your blogs.
April 8th, 2012 at 3:44 am
Hi Stella,
Happy Easter to you. Thank you very much for your contributions to the Everyman blog which I really enjoyed. I hope you will be able to return at a future date.
I found this the trickiest Everyman puzzle for a while. Although I finished it, I needed Stella’s blog plus Sidey’s response number 1 to understand the wordplay for 3 down.
April 8th, 2012 at 4:15 am
Adios (until you resume blogging), Stella, and thanks for all your blogs. Thanks too, to Everyman.
Considering the date on which the puzzle was published, I suspected something like it. However, one of them got away: GOWK. I opted for GAWK (in preference to GAWP), which Collins defines as an awkward foolish person. Didn’t look any further to find the better nuanced answer.
April 8th, 2012 at 7:24 am
Thanks, Stella. I didn’t know “rip”, either.
Sorry we won’t be hearing from you again, at least in the role of blogger. Hope you’ll still join in the exchanges, though.
April 8th, 2012 at 8:58 am
Thanks Stella,
I agree with Nathan that this was indeed the trickiest Everyman for a while. I also found the numbered clues confusing when the three themed answers were essentially the same albeit relating to different countries. I had never heard of Poisson d’Avril or Hunt-the-Gowk but found them in the Wiki page ==> http: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/April_Fools'_Day
I particularly liked WISCONSIN, PROSPER and WEASELS.
Thanks Everyman and sorry to hear that you are leaving Stella. Thanks for your good work.
April 8th, 2012 at 9:04 am
I fail to see what is cryptic about clue 12 referring to 14 & 25, clue 14 referring to 12 & 25 and clue 25 referring to 12 & 14. If the answers had been circular, going round in circles or chasing ones tail then perhaps I would have thought it clever.
Anyway shouldn’t davril should be d’avril?
In Northumberland a gowk is (or was ) an apple core.
I thought this was a poor crossword.
Thanks for the blog Stella.
April 8th, 2012 at 9:38 am
Thanks, Stella.
A bit of a rarity, an Everyman puzzle with a theme, but I thought it was fun. I think the three clues ‘chasing their tails’ is hinted at by the fact that 14 is 1/4 or April 1st, then a bit of indulgence is needed.
Morning, Bamberger. Apostrophes are conventionally ignored in crosswords answers, so if the answer was SCRATCH ONE’S HEAD it would be enumerated as 6,4,4.
I too entered GAWK, which I think also works, so I hope this week’s lucky winners won’t be eliminated if their solution was also that. And thanks to sidey for the TURNIP explanation.
Stella, thank you for all your blogs – hope all is well with you and that this is an au revoir and not an adieu.
April 8th, 2012 at 10:58 am
Thanks all for your comments and good wishes, especially to Sidey for clearing up 3d for me.
April 8th, 2012 at 2:58 pm
So sorry you are having to retire from fifteensquared for a while. I hope that things work out for you as well as they possibly can.
April 8th, 2012 at 4:39 pm
Thanks for this and other blogs Stella
3ac: despite sidey@1 (watch=TURNIP) your parsing is better. watch=TURN + number=IP (as in Internet Protocol address, generally referred to as IP number)
April 8th, 2012 at 4:40 pm
3dn I meant
April 8th, 2012 at 6:47 pm
Thanks for the blog, Stella – lovely pictures, especially the poisson d’avril, something with which I was not familiar. I wondered quite what an April fish could be.
Thanks also for the reminder of the Panorama spoof which I watched in my teens! I read your link and was tickled by the comment …
“Spaghetti is not a widely-eaten food in the UK and is considered by many as an exotic delicacy.”
… how times have changed!
I thoroughly enjoyed the crossword. It was much more fun than usual.
April 8th, 2012 at 8:31 pm
Good, teasing crossword; more difficult than usual.
Thanks Stella for the blog and all your past contributions. I think in 3d it is supposed to be turnip=watch; Chambers gives: ‘a large old-fashioned watch (old sl.) Maybe it should have had an ‘old’ to indicate usage, but that could have also confused the Everyman audience, with old=o.
I didn’t know the expression ‘EAT CROW.’
April 8th, 2012 at 11:23 pm
Thanks all for your compliments.
I think Sidey@1 is probably right, though the only evidence I can find to support the explanation is that looking up “turnip watch” in Wiki sent me straight to “pocket watch” – only after reading the post
May 5th, 2012 at 6:38 am
Doing the crosssword as I do so many weeks later when it is syndicated down here, I was completely lost. Could not even begin to solve the three linked clues but hopefully that is a result of the time lapse, mind you who can say whether I would have got it otherwise. Found this one more difficult than recent ones! Having ssid that, this crossword is the highlight of my Saturdays.
May 6th, 2012 at 12:02 pm
Great to get some answers…. we, in New Zealand only had this printed for us on May 5th… Took a while for pennies to drop re the April Fool connections, but then Sweden celebrates April Fool on May 1st! Wiki had a clue about that regarding the ‘trick’of catching people with April 31st(!), though I forget the details right now. Cheers Ben