One doesn’t tend to expect a Nimrod to be easy, but this was perhaps tougher than usual.
Fortunately, the Nina on the top and bottom rows made itself evident fairly early on, and proved to be a big help. Even so, I didn’t manage this all myself, not least as there’s some pretty weekendy vocabulary in there. A few are yet to be explained so do fee free to help out.
*=anag, []=dropped, <=reversed, hom=homophone, cd=cryptic definition, dd=double definition.
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 9 | BEATITUDE – BEAT IT + DUE*. |
| 10 | BRUCE – CURB< + E[nglishman]. Bruce and Sheila are stereotypical Australian male and female names respectively. |
| 11 | U-SHAPED – (HEADS UP)*. |
| 12 | PRUDENT – PRUDE + N + T. |
| 13 | DEMOISELLE – (SEED + MOLLIE)*. I initially thought this must be something used in fly fishing, but it’s both a type of dragonfly and a fish. |
| 14 | YOUR – Y + OUR. |
| 16 | DILATE – (ETA + LID)<. |
| 18 | GYPSUM – GYP + SUM. |
| 22 | FETA – F + ATE<. |
| 23 | WEATHERMAN – (THERM in (A + A)) in WEN. One of those ones where the answer came fairly swiftly, but the wordplay took quite some working out. |
| 26 | MERMAID – (A DIMMER)*. The Mermaid Theatre is, I think, still in the City of London, next to Blackfriars Station. |
| 27 | E-TAILER – TAIL in EER. |
| 28 | SATIN – SAT IN. |
| 29 | EXTRADITE – not sure here: I can see IT (“just the ticket”) in DEXTER*, but that leaves an “A” unaccounted for. |
| Down | |
| 1 | ABOUNDED – ABOU[t e]NDED. |
| 2 | FATHOM – F + AT HOM[e]. |
| 3 | OIL PAINTS – (I SLAP IT ON)*. A very pleasing anagram! |
| 4 | OUTDOES – DO in [r]OUTES. I like “resistance is futile” for “remove the initial R” here. |
| 5 | LEG-PULL – dd. A wind-up or April fool’s prank, and a specific cricket shot to the “on” or “leg” side. |
| 6 | ABOUT – A BOUT. |
| 7 | NUMEROUS – (UM + ER) in NOUS. The “everyday” seems a little superfluous, so I wonder if it’s just there for the surface. |
| 8 | DEXTER – dd. This was a nice one. Colin Dexter is the author of the Morse books, while “dexter” as an adjective means “on the right-hand side”, thus the opposite of “sinister”, which originally meant “on the left side” or perhaps “left-handed”. |
| 15 | MYCENAEAN – (A + CAN + ENEMY)*. |
| 17 | LITERATI – LITER + something I can’t fathom. |
| 19 | MINOR KEY – I can’t explain this one yet. |
| 20 | PER DIEM – DEMIREP*. |
| 21 | STRETTO – TR in SET-TO. “Stretto” is “part of a fugue in which subject and answer are brought closely together”. |
| 22 | FAMISH – AM in FISH. |
| 24 | MOLLIE – M[ayor] + OLLIE. Chambers has MOLLIE as a variant of “mallemaroking”, which is a type of merry-making specific to the occupants of ice-bound ships, so this is fairly obscure vocabulary for a daily, if that’s what’s intended. |
| 25 | MAINS – [odoe]MA IN S[hort]. |
I thought ATI in 17 down meant ‘at one’ namely lunch time. Could be wrong.
Hi Simon
In 29ac, the clue is ‘… a 8 criminal …’ so the A is accounted for.
17dn is LITER (American’s quantity drunk) AT 1 (for lunch)
19dn is I’M reversed (writer’s heading for north) NORKEY – ORKNEY with the N moved forward (archipelago to promote first of novels)
I think 15dn is faulty. The clue reads *(A CAN) (anagrind cleverly) in *(ENEMY) (anagrind evil) but this does not give MYCENAEAN
PS the extra ‘a’ in 29 across sin in the clu. ‘A 8 criminal’.
Too many unknown words for me – – DEMOISELLE, MOLLIE. Never heard of ’em.
Gaufrid,
I think the word “infiltrate” implies that *(A CAN) “permeates” into *(ENEMY), rather than just appearing whole, perhaps?
IanN14
You are probably right, but it should also be ‘infiltrates’ so I am still less than happy with this clue.
I agree, Gaufrid.
Just playing Devil’s Advocate.
I also didn’t care for “cleverly” as an indicator…
Or “evil” for that matter.
For those seeking extra help, the apposite “SOON PARTED” is also there.
Another sublime test from Nimrod; favourite by far was NUMEROUS for its hint of colloquialism in “everyday sense” for NOUS.
Yes, that was clever. I thought of the possibility, looked, but did not spot it. Even after being told it was there by Anax above, it still took a while to find. Some v good clues, esp liked BEATITUDE, SATIN, ABOUNDED, FATHOM, NUMEROUS. Also as others have said, I found it hard.
Previous comments will confirm that this was too tough for me today, but I got about a third of it, so I live in hope.
A good holiday weekend to all the regulars (and indeed non-regulars) here.