Independent 7911/Dac

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 As we expect, a smooth efficient job from Dac.  Some of the clues are excellent and it is sad that these masterpieces which he produces week after week are here for a day and then almost completely forgotten.

There is one whose parsing defeats me, but I suspect that won’t be for long.  When I switch on after a night’s sleep I’m sure that I’ll find that someone has made things clear.

Across
1 CON DO — in North America a condominium (or condo) is a block of apartments where each apartment is separately owned; not quite the same thing as we have over here: it was explained to me once but I can’t now remember what was said
4 C(HIPS)HOPS
9 SHOWER GEL — a shower is someone who shows or demonstrates, a gel is a posh girl
10 whAT’S EAsily
11 INS{p}ECT — def cricket?
12 BE(V{isitor})ER A G E
14 REVELATION — (I’ve to learn)*
16 {D}A{n}G{e}R {w}A{s} — this word must be a nightmare for setters, it appears so often; Dac has of course done pretty well with it
19 DECK — 2 defs
20 S(P{olitical})IN DOCTOR — Doctor Who, &lit. I think, although I don’t really know the details of Doctor Who
22 SLIPOVER — def top, slip = cricketer, over = several balls
23 BE R(C)OW — the speaker is John Bercow
26 THIN K — to figure = to think
27 1 N COMMODE — inconvenience as a verb
28 PRES{s} ENTER
29 NOTED — (D Eton)rev.
 
Down
1 CASHIERED — (he is)* in cared
2 NO OKS
3 OVER(C)ALL
4 musiC — A GEnius — some say
5 I’LL BE BOUND — 2 defs
6 S(HAVE)R — have = give birth to as in “when did Mrs R have John?” (answer above)
7 ON S(LAUGH)T
8 S HARE
13 STAPLE DIET — (Listed pate)*
15 VICTIMISE — but I can’t quite see this: it’s (Tim) in Vicise, or (Tim is) in Vice, and since the definition is Bully, somehow we have to find another term for prison sentence; rhyming slang?
17 ARROWHEAD — (Hear a word)*
18 DOBERMAN — R{ottweiler} in (name bod)rev.
21 ROOK I.E. — but there are rookies who aren’t team members (as in golf), so should there not be a question mark?
22 SIT-UP — (put 1’s)rev.
24 CRO{p} FT
25 SCAR{f}

14 comments on “Independent 7911/Dac”

  2. The &lit in 20 is referring to a spin doctor’s job rather than anything to do with Doctor Who, which is just there to provide the Doctor.

  3. Thank you, John.

    I couldn’t finish this one – got stuck in the NE corner, where all the crossing letters seemed to be S, A or E, which wasn’t a fat lot of help; not knowing SHAVER as the definition of ‘a little boy’ didn’t help matters either. Otherwise the usual fine stuff from Dac.

  5. Yes, apparently it refers to a religious sister. That one held me up for a long time because I kept looking for something with sis around it.

  6. Thanks Dac for yet another really enjoyable crossword and John for the blog. Last in was 8dn for no good reason.

    sidey @1 re 15dn: Thanks for that – obvious now you have explained it, but I too got stuck with the idea that the boy was going to be Tim.

    4across@4 re 6dn: Sr for “sister” has the support of Chambers 2008.

    4dn: I would have liked a question mark on the end of this, which in my view would make it a complete “& lit”.

  7. Well, possibly. IMO it would still depend on whether or not you agree with Dac’s opinion (for that is surely what it is) about Cage.

    For pedantic folks, *political’s leader* really, at 20ac.

  8. Nothing too difficult here; thanks Dac and John. Held up a little on 3d thinking the ‘bridge player’ reference indicated N E W or S.

  9. I struggled a bit in the NW corner, this seemed quite fair but tougher to break into than usual, I too fell in the tim trap in victimise, despite working for a Vic, last was NOOKS as the wrong meaning of sanction got suck in my head…

    TY Dac & John, much appreciated.

  10. Sr is also an abrreviation for sister, as in hospital ward sister.
    I was a bit slow to get going, but things went in well until the last one at 8 dn: I don’t really see “share” as “helping” since they are surely different parts of speech?

  11. Re pennes’ comment at #10,I saw ‘share’ as ‘helping’ ie nouns as eg in a portion of dessert. I found this a little easier today than some here – not sure why. Excellent puzzle and blog – thanks, Dac, and John.

  12. pennes@10

    Well, ‘helping’ in this sense is a gerund – the usage of a verb (in its -ing form) as a noun – and ‘share’ can be a noun as well as a verb. So a helping (as in ‘a generous helping’ or ‘second helpings’) is roughly the equivalent of a share (as in ‘this is your share’).

    But don’t let’s get too tied up in grammatical niceties – they’re not too important in Crosswordland.

  14. On the contrary Allan_C, ‘grammatical niceties’ are precisely what’s important in ‘Crosswordland’! That’s the whole point for me, anyway, whether or not I get it right.

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