We don’t see a great deal of Math, and I make this only the third appearance since a welcome return to the Independent this year.
This seemed to be on the more tractable side for a Saturday, as we seem to be saying fairly regularly recently. It was fun though, with quite a few single-word definitions that were well-hidden and easy to miss at first glance.
There were a couple of references to Independent setters who will be very familiar to most readers, though it probably wouldn’t help anyone tackling their first Independent today.
Last one in was 7d, which I suspect will be the case for others too, though thankfully it was clued clearly.
| Across | ||
| 1 | ARCADIA | Help a hundred artists from the east to discover a Greek idyll (7) |
| (AID + A + C + RA), all reversed. | ||
| 5 | WINDOWS | Painful sounds caused by gas lights? (7) |
| OWS caused by WIND, quite an image, there. | ||
| 9 | CD-ROM | Medic, Dr O’Malley, keeps a collection of computer files (2-3) |
| Hidden in [medi]C DR O‘M[alley]. | ||
| 10 | PHILOLOGY | Crossword setter gets a couple of looks at extremely geeky study of words (9) |
| PHI + LO + LO + G[eek]Y. | ||
| 11 | UNMANNERED | It’s natural, like drones protecting a queen (10) |
| ER in UNMANNED. | ||
| 12 | JAVA | Joe Jonas’s first meeting with girl (4) |
| J[onas] + AVA. “Joe” being a slang term for coffee, and “Joe Jonas” apparently being famous for having brothers. | ||
| 14 | SNOW LEOPARD | An ounce of lard we stir with spoon (4,7) |
| Anagram of (LARD WE + SPOON). | ||
| 18 | PERCENTAGES | Displayed by returning exhibitors, e.g. at NEC: “Replacement parts” (11) |
| Well-hidden and reversed in [exhibitor]S EG AT NEC REP[lacement]. | ||
| 21 | ICON | Picture an honest admission by a swindler (4) |
| I CON. Made me chuckle when I spotted it. | ||
| 22 | DENOMINATE | Call me in on mishandled meeting about … (10) |
| Anagram of (ME ON IN) inserted into DATE. | ||
| 25 | PRINCIPLE | … original source of first of Patsy Cline (RIP) remixes (9) |
| Anagram of (P[atsy] + CLINE + RIP). | ||
| 26 | FLASH | Gaudy loud tie (5) |
| F + LASH. | ||
| 27 | ACROBAT | Killer whale flips to a certain degree, starting to twist like a gymnast (7) |
| ORCA< + BA + T[wist]. | ||
| 28 | ALL-TIME | Not yet surpassed by ace. It will come back to me (3-4) |
| A + IT‘LL< + ME. | ||
| Down | ||
| 1 | ACCRUE | Collect a team say (6) |
| Sounds like a “a crew”. | ||
| 2 | CHROME | Shiny plate given by Switzerland’s capital (6) |
| CH + ROME. | ||
| 3 | DIMINISHES | Shrinks denim? His is ripped (10) |
| Anagram of (DENIM HIS IS). | ||
| 4 | APPLE | Record company‘s assets, personnel, profits, losses and expenses to begin with (5) |
| Initial letters of A[ssets], P[ersonnel], P[rofits], L[osses] and E[xpenses]. Home to the Beatles, of course. | ||
| 5 | WHITE FLAG | Pasty? Get 17, then I’ll show sign of giving up (5,4) |
| WHITE + FLAG. | ||
| 6 | NEON | Once found alternatives to knock out gas (4) |
| Alternate letters in [o]N[c]E [f]O[u]N[d]. | ||
| 7 | OPOPANAX | Double the amount of work put on my colleague, by gum! (8) |
| OP + OP + ANAX. I had to look it up to be certain, but it is indeed several types of gum. | ||
| 8 | SKYWARDS | Up on charges is one of Murdoch’s outfits (8) |
| SKY + WARDS. | ||
| 13 | WORSHIPPING | Admiring our boatload from Newcastle (10) |
| WOR SHIPFUL. | ||
| 15 | ON-THE-SPOT | Where you might find head immediately (2-3-4) |
| I guess this is two definitions. I wasn’t sure that a head could be found on a spot, but I guess one does hear of blackheads and the like. | ||
| 16 | SPLIT PEA | ‘Tis 4 ingredients you need to mix for this sort of soup (5,3) |
| Anagram of (‘TIS + APPLE). | ||
| 17 | DROOPIER | More floppy disks, initially poor, I re-formatted (8) |
| Anagram of all of (D[isks] + POOR I RE). | ||
| 19 | SAFARI | Indian outfit accommodates Football Association for tour for the big game (6) |
| FA inserted into SARI. | ||
| 20 | TECHIE | The ice is broken by IT whizz! (6) |
| Anagram of (THE ICE). | ||
| 23 | OPERA | Work is held back by welfare policy (5) |
| Hidden and reversed in [welf]ARE PO[licy]. | ||
| 24 | SCAB | He won’t strike a beetle, lacking the guts (4) |
| SC[ar]AB. | ||
* = anagram; < = reversed; [] = removed; underlined = definition; Hover to expand abbreviations
Lots of computer programs strewn throughout the answers: WINDOWS, JAVA, SNOW LEOPARD, FLASH, ACROBAT, CHROME, APPLE, SAFARI, OPERA, as well as computer terms such as ICON, TECHIE, CD-ROM. Any others I missed?
Theme entirely unnoticed, but then I’m far from a Techie. Some very amusing clues here, particularly liked WINDOWS, UNMANNERED, ICON, WORSHIPFUL, so welcome back to Math and thanks to Simon Harding for blog.
Despite being a computer techie the theme didn’t occur to me. I did wonder about apple not being the i-shiny company and then thought no more about it. Thanks Simon and math.
As usual, the theme passed me by. 13d “worshipful” is canny!
I still don’t get WOR for Newcastle?
Chris M -“wor” geordie for “our”