An easy offering from BRADMAN today, thanks to whom for a brisk workout.
FF: 8 DD:6
| Across | ||
| 1 | STARSHIP | Enterprise maybe with sailors in their natural environment (8) |
| TARS (sailors) in SHIP (natural environment , of sailors) | ||
| 6 | POPPET | Sweet child, writer of verse keeping very quiet (6) |
| [ POET (writer of verse) containing PP (very quiet) ] | ||
| 9 | TIN CAN | Sealed container of ancient civilisation found after short time (3,3) |
| INCAN (of ancient civilization) after T (time, short) | ||
| 10 | OBDURATE | Pig-headed old boy taking time to admit “game over” (8) |
| OB (old boy) [DATE (time) containing UR (game = RU, over = reversed)] | ||
| 11 | SHAM | Son (Noah’s son) is phoney (4) |
| S (son) HAM (noah’s son) | ||
| 12 | MARK ANTONY | Holy mother engaging philosopher about Roman politician (4,6) |
| MARY (holy mother) containing [ KANT (philosopher) ON (about) ] | ||
| 14 | EATERIES | Restaurants serving terrible teas across lake (8) |
| TEAS* containing ERIE (lake) | ||
| 16 | AVID | Keen biblical king abandoning his capital (4) |
| dAVID (biblical king, without starting letter) | ||
| 18 | ETUI | Small case in one American truck heading west (4) |
| Reverse of [I (one) UTE (american truck) ] | ||
| 19 | IMPOTENT | Trouble-maker, having taken old red wine, unable to act (8) |
| IMP (trouble-maker) O (old) TENT (red wine) | ||
| 21 | CONGREGATE | Get together in new gang? Coterie I’ll have no part in (10) |
| GANG COTERiE (without I) | ||
| 22 | AMBO | Pulpit used by William Booth (4) |
| hidden in “..williAM BOoth” | ||
| 24 | PASTRAMI | Beef in doughy food mostly had by foreign friend (8) |
| PASTRy (doughy food, mostly) AMI (friend, in french) | ||
| 26 | CUTTLE | Sea creature to sink, head disappearing (6) |
| sCUTTLE (sink, without starting character) | ||
| 27 | CEMENT | Stick carried by policemen – truncheon (6) |
| hidden in “..poliCEMEN – Truncheon..” | ||
| 28 | NUT-BROWN | Brunette in group of teachers meeting ex-PM (3-5) |
| NUT (group of teachers, national union of teachers) BROWN (ex-pm) | ||
| Down | ||
| 2 | THIGH | End of skirt raised to reveal it? (5) |
| T (end of skirR) HIGH (raised) | ||
| 3 | RACE MEETING | Wild tiger, menace where there are lots of horses (4,7) |
| TIGER MENACE* | ||
| 4 | HANDMAID | Man had new identity as female servant (8) |
| MAN HAD* followed by ID (identity) | ||
| 5 | PROCRASTINATION | Proverbial thief running in a strip cartoon (15) |
| IN A STRIP CARTOON* | ||
| 6 | PEDLAR | Seller of fruit securing heartless deal (6) |
| PEAR (fruit) containing DL (DeaL, heartless, without inner characters) | ||
| 7 | PER | A salesperson turned up (3) |
| REP (salesperson) reversed | ||
| 8 | EXTENSION | No longer facing stress, additional time being granted (9) |
| cryptic clue; to be read as EX TENSION (no longer facing stress) | ||
| 13 | TOASTMASTER | Most stare at silly person raising a glass (11) |
| MORE STARE AT* | ||
| 15 | ASTROLABE | Old instrument, a sort able to move around (9) |
| A SORT ABLE* | ||
| 17 | UPPERCUT | University place – Rod mostly seen therein as a hit (8) |
| [ U (university) PUT (place) ] containing PERCh (rod, mostly) | ||
| 20 | LEVANT | Do a bunk in vehicle during period of tenancy (6) |
| VAN (vehicle) in LET (period of tenancy) | ||
| 23 | BELOW | Half-hearted shout in the basement? (5) |
| BELlOW (shout, half-hearted) | ||
| 25 | TEE | Quaint little wife coming out to give support (3) |
| TwEE (quaint, without W – wife) | ||
*anagram
A UTE as an ‘American truck’ – I just about choked on my Vegemite sandwich! And from a setter named after another Australian icon. UTE is an Australian/NZ term for a truck, the equivalent of the American “pickup” – Wikipedia says they’re not exactly the same, but near enough. UTE appears every now and then in cryptics, and is usually clued as ‘Australian vehicle’ or similar.
AMBO is another word that has an Antipodean meaning. It’s used as an abbreviation for a paramedic, and The Oxford Australian Dictionary has it as “n. (Aust. colloq.) an ambulance officer”. You never know, it too may make an appearance in crossword land one day.
After recovering my composure, I enjoyed this with LEVANT as a new term to me, and PROCRASTINATION, of which I am a skilled practitioner, as my favourite.
Thank you to Bradman and Turbolegs
A very quick solve for me, too. Thanks Don and TL.
FOI ‘poppet’, LOI ‘levant’ – this meaning of which I didn’t know either.
I wonder if I am alone in wanting to query the adjective ‘ancient’ to describe the Incan civilisation? It flourished in the 15th and 16th centuries, the time of the Renaissance in Europe. Old, certainly, but ancient?
This meaning of levant was new to me so I’ve filed it away for future use
I wonder if the ‘Mr Mainwaring’ moment with the so-called American truck was to give people something different to say about the ETUI, which ‘only appears in crosswords’, ‘never head of that’ etc etc
Thanks to Mr M and Mr T
A quick solve but learnt some new things in the doing: Ham for Noah’s son, a boy and levant. Thought 5d was a super anagram. Shame about the Australian/American gaffe which surprised me.
Argh autocorrect got me again. Changed ‘ambo’ to ‘a boy’.
Learned a few more new things which is what I expect with a puzzle from the Don.
I now have a pulpit, a wine, an instrument and a way of ‘bunking off’ to store away for future use.
Thanks to Bradman for the lessons and to Turbolegs for the decryption.
Thanks Bradman and Turbolegs
Unusually straightforward by this setter with none of his usual obscurities. Some lovely anagrams with PROCRASTINATION clearly the best of them.
Finished in the SW corner with ASTROLABE (always find that I do have to look this one up), PASTRAMI (clever misdirection – was heading down a ‘beef wellington’ path for a while) and LEVANT (which I only got with a word finder when ‘decamp’ wouldn’t fit in – a completely new meaning of this word for me).