Some relief from some of the festive difficulty
Apart from one down clue, which led to a bird I hadn’t heard of, this puzzle was full of write-ins, a welcome relief after some of the more difficult puzzles we’ve been offered over the last couple of weeks.
This puzzle was simple enough, partly becuase some of the clues were ones I had seen before, perhaps with slight adjustments.
Thanks, Falcon.
| Across | ||
| 1 | FIRE-RAISER | Arsonist not quite stable, one wearing rubber (4-6) |
| FIR(m) + 1 in ERASER | ||
| 7 | BACK | Second wager (4) |
| Double definition | ||
| 9 | BRAE | Bank of Scotland (4) |
| Scottish word for hill | ||
| 10 | PARI MUTUEL | System of betting in Lima, Peru – put off, losing plenty, initially (4-6) |
| *(lima peru (p)ut)
Parimutuel is similar to the Tote system of betting, where all the stakes are thrown into a pot, and the amount to be won determined from the value of the total pot. |
||
| 11 | SEXTON | Church caretaker attacked carrying cross (6) |
| SET ON “carrying” X | ||
| 12 | IN THEORY | Elected Conservative must ring her right away on paper (2,6) |
| IN TORY “ringing” HE(r) | ||
| 13 | DIMINISH | Shrink in car probing attractive person (8) |
| MINI “probing” DISH | ||
| 15 | COPE | Manage to catch leader of expedition (4) |
| COP + E(xpedition) | ||
| 17 | STAR | Leading performer, nearly bald (4) |
| STAR(k) | ||
| 19 | FOUL PLAY | Treacherous behaviour in crude piece of drama (4,4) |
| FOUL (“crude”) + PLAY | ||
| 22 | BLIGHTER | Beggar beginning to board barge (8) |
| B(oard) + LIGHTER | ||
| 23 | ASSERT | Sounds like a sure-fire winner in state (6) |
| Homophone of A CERT | ||
| 25 | BY ALL MEANS | Certainly, in every possible way (2,3,5) |
| Douible definition | ||
| 26 | TO-DO | Fuss unduly, entertaining daughter (2-2) |
| TOO “entertaining” D | ||
| 27 | BOAR | Swine in pub, drinking nothing (4) |
| BAR “drinking” 0 | ||
| 28 | SIDEWINDER | Team triumph, the German air-to-air missile (10) |
| SIDE + WIN + DER | ||
| Down | ||
| 2 | ISRAELI | Old PM blowing top coming from Tel Aviv, perhaps (7) |
| (d)ISRAELI | ||
| 3 | EVENT | Still ahead of time in competition (5) |
| EVEN “ahead of” T | ||
| 4 | APPENDIX | Supplement that may need to be removed? (8) |
| Double definition | ||
| 5 | STRAIGHTFORWARD | Plain sailing? Right on! (15) |
| Double definition | ||
| 6 | REMOTE | Distant meteor, rocky (6) |
| *(meteor) | ||
| 7 | BUTTERCUP | Book with complete chapter on winning flower (9) |
| B + UTTER (“complete”) + C(hapter) + UP (“winning”) | ||
| 8 | CLEAR UP | Solve first of conundrums humorist raised (5,2) |
| C(onundrums) + LEAR + UP | ||
| 14 | IRREGULAR | Unconventional Irish soldier? (9) |
| Ir. + REGULAR | ||
| 16 | CURASSOW | Bird from USA crows jostled (8) |
| *(usa crows)
A currasow is a New World game bird |
||
| 18 | TALLY-HO | Sporting call from friend in hot pants (5-2) |
| ALLY in *(hot) | ||
| 20 | ABRIDGE | Reduce the length of a card game (7) |
| A + BRIDGE | ||
| 21 | STUMPS | End of play is baffling (6) |
| Double definition
STUMPS is a cricket term for the end of the day’s play when the stumps are taken out of the ground |
||
| 24 | SATIN | Silky material modelled at home (5) |
| SAT + IN | ||
*anagram
Thanks loonapick and Falcon. My FOI was 4 ac where I confidently put in ABET. Eventually I realised this was not correct.
Apart from this hiccup reasonably straightforward.
Thanks Falcon and loonapick
One of those puzzles that didn’t actually take long … but didn’t feel like it was easy by any means. The left hand side went in easily enough but found some hurdles to jump in the right. Finished with CURASSOW (which was a new bird for me as well), COPE (short but not easy) and PARIMUTUEL (a term that I’m familiar with as a keen punter, but did not know that this was how it was spelt).