As it is the last Wednesday of the month, it is Dac’s day off, so I have crossed swords with Crosophile today.
Since I am not yet that familiar with Crosophile’s work, I made rather heavy weather of this puzzle today, but I got there in the end. This I did unaided except for the SI units at 6D and 18, both of which were new to me. The SE corner was slotted in last, with most of the solutions following in quick succession once one word had been fitted in. My favourite clue, for surface alone, was 1A.
*(…) indicates an anagram
| Across | ||||
| 1 | CHRYSALIS | *(HAS LYRICS); “blur” is anagram indicator | ||
| 6 | FETCH | F<etch> (“bit of” means first letter only) + ETCH (=eat out, e.g. metal); the definition is “go for” | ||
| 9 | OUTWEIGHS | OU (=Open University) + T<eaching> (“vanguard of” means first letter only) + WEIGHS (homophone – “reportedly” – of “ways” = methods) | ||
| 10 | RUN-IN | Double definition | ||
| 11 | STOVE | Hidden (“some of”) in “oaST OVEn”; & lit. | ||
| 12 | ROUNDNESS | *(SUNDO<w>NERS); “drunk” is anagram indicator; “with no drop of water (=W, i.e. first letter)” means the letter “w” is dropped from anagram; the definition is “corporation (=tummy, belly) quality” | ||
| 14 | ELM | <h>ELM (=direct, as a verb):; “lacking aspiration” means the aitch is dropped | ||
| 16 | OVERDRAWING | Double definition: OVERDRAWING means “going into red”, i.e. into debt, of a bank account AND “layer above artwork”, i.e. superimposed on existing work | ||
| 18 | CANDELABRUM | CANDELA (=CD extended version, i.e. full version of the SI unit of luminous intensity) + BRUM (=Birmingham) | ||
| 19 | SAT | Double definition | ||
| 20 | INFLUENZA | [FLUE (=chimney) in INN (=pub)] + Z A (=from one extreme to the other”, i.e. last and first letters of alphabet) | ||
| 22 | DRIFT | D (=director, as in MD) + RIFT (=break-up); the definition is “bank”, as in snowdrift | ||
| 25 | ASSET | <b>ASSET (=hound); “not needing lead” means first letter is dropped | ||
| 26 | SCULLIONS | [I (=one) + ON] in SCULLS (=rows) | ||
| 27 | AMOUR | AM (=the morning) + OUR (=for us) | ||
| 28 | ANDROGYNY | *(DAN OR) + homophone (“say”) of “Ginny”; “possibly” is anagram indicator; & lit.; the definition is “signs of both”, i.e. of Dan and Ginny, male and female | ||
| Down | ||||
| 1 | COOLS | O (=love) in COLS (=passes, i.e. between mountains) | ||
| 2 | RATIO | *(A TRIO); “involving” is anagram indicator; the definition is “e.g. sin”, where sin is an abbreviation for sine in trigonometry | ||
| 3 | STEVEDORE | [EVE (=a lady) + D (=diamonds)] in STORE (=hoard) | ||
| 4 | LEGERDEMAIN | LEG (=support) + *(REMAINED); “flaky” is anagram indicator; the card trick ‘find the lady’ would require legerdemain, sleight of hand | ||
| 5 | SIS | SIS (=relative, i.e. sister); “unaltered by upbringing” indicates a palindrome | ||
| 6 | FARAD | FAR (=some way (away)) + A (=one) + D (=old penny, as in lsd); a farad is an SI unit of electrical capacitance, hence the definition | ||
| 7 | TANNERIES | ANNE (=queen’s daughter, i.e. the Princess Royal) in TRIES (=attempts) | ||
| 8 | HINDSIGHT | HIND (=deer) + SIGHT (=glimpse) | ||
| 13 | UNDERVALUED | *(LUV RUDE AND + E); E (=energy); “cavorting” is anagram indicator | ||
| 14 | ENCHILADA | <t>ENCH (=fish in river; “with temperature (=T) dropping” means the letter “t” is dropped) + A (=one) + LAD (=boy) + A; an enchilada is a spicy Mexican tortilla wrap | ||
| 15 | MANIFESTO | MA (=old lady) + *(IS OFTEN); “changing” is anagram indicator | ||
| 17 | ARMADILLO | ARM (=limb) + [ILL (=poorly) in ADO (=flap)] | ||
| 21 | UTTER | Double definition (“total”, absolute AND “state”, speak) + Wordplay (<m>UTTER=to talk to oneself; “not the first sign” means first letter is dropped) | ||
| 23 | IVORY | OR (=soldiers, i.e. Other Ranks) in IVY (=evergreen) | ||
| 24 | TESTY | Whimsical definition: “test-y” means suffering from pressure, while a test is an exam | ||
| 26 | SEA | Hidden (“essentially”) in “a falSE Alarm” | ||
Thanks, RatkojaRiku.
I really enjoyed this one – we’re certainly never short of a themed puzzle in the Indy, but this shows that vanilla can be tasty too. I liked CHRYSALIS and my other favourite was ANDROGYNY, but it was all good.
SCULLIONS was one of those words that was lurking in my passive vocabulary and finally came out to play once I had some crossing letters. SCALLY is a mostly North-Western term for ‘rogue’, but I don’t know if the two are related.
Fine crossword, thank you to Crosophile.
Agreed. Very nice, I liked TANNERIES.
Vanilla it may be, but there is a nina – LIVE AND LET LIVE – although I can’t say if there’s a specific reason for it.
Many thanks to RatkojaRiku and Crosophile.
Many thanks, RR, and Crosophile. I enjoyed this too – seeing the Nina only when I’d the grid completed. About average in difficulty – my favourite clues were MANIFESTO and HINDSIGHT.
Also completed it without help, except using a dictionary to remind myself how to spell “candelabrum”, and even then I couldn’t see why it was that. I have heard of the candela (and the farad) but didn’t know CD was its abbreviation, and I see technically it’s cd. Case is important when using abbreviations for units. L is a lambert, but l is a litre, for example. (Anyway, that’s my excuse for not understanding the answer.)
Candelabrum was our last one in and we didn’t bother to parse it properly after getting the ‘brum’ bit. At least that is our excuse but maybe it’s the time of night here in Greece, the balmy (or should it be barmy?) atmosphere. Certainly nothing to do with ouzo, local wine and sundowners!
An enjoyable puzzle, better than yesterday’s offering which was cleverly constructed but a bit overconvoluted for our liking.
Thanks Crosophile – we didn’t know it was your puzzle until we accessed 225 and also to RR for making us realise that we needed to be more awake at the end!
Thanks also to MaleficOpus for spotting the Nina, even if we don’t understand why!
I seem to have struggled rather with Crosophile’s puzzles, but found this easier than his usual and rather good too, noting 2dn ratio and 4 dn legerdemain. I thought only a few clues betrayed the fact that it wasn’t a Dac puzzle as the clues were so neat and clear.
Thanks for all the kind comments and for the blog. The nina, if you can call it that, of ‘live and let live’ appealed to me simply because of the symmetry with which it could be entered with correct spacing. I must get round to doing some more ‘proper’ ninas…
Cheers Charybdis/Crosophile for a crossword I could do, thought for a while they’d all be write ins but there were a few to need the brain. Didn’t parse candelabrum as I thought CD expanded was C AND A and couldn’t see the EL bit, oh well. Ta RR for explaining that.
I didn’t spot the Nina either, which is par for the course for me – I don’t tend to look unless prompted to do so, or unless they follow the perimeter of the puzzle and thus “jump out” at me.
@Dormouse: I wondered about the lower case v upper case letters here too; thanks for clarifying that such details are all-important.