This preamble could well be just a repeat of what I, and others, have been saying for many months. A typical Everyman, smooth surfaces, clear wordplay and definitions, no obscurities, a pleasure to solve and blog.
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Across
1 Pull back, defended by bullets and drones (9)
SLUGGARDS – DRAG (pull) reversed (back) in (defended by) SLUGS (bullets)
6 Annoying person with love for sauce (5)
PESTO – PEST (annoying person) O (love)
9 Tree in a small enclosure (5)
ASPEN – A S (small) PEN (enclosure)
10 Most disobedient? Sure, until reformed (9)
UNRULIEST – an anagram (reformed) of SURE UNTIL
11 Fun? Worker perhaps worries about various kinds (4,3,8)
BEER AND SKITTLES – BEE (worker perhaps) plus RATTLES (worries) around (about) an anagram (various) of KINDS
12 Note and support thrust in message (8)
TELEGRAM – TE (note) LEG (support) RAM (thrust)
15 Hesitation in lead about to cause collision (4)
BUMP – UM (hesitation) in PB (lead) reversed (about)
16 Speaker’s beginning? Give up (4)
CEDE – sounds like (speaker’s) ‘seed’ (beginning)
17 Join knight in step showing restraint (8)
PATIENCE – TIE (join) N (knight) in PACE (step)
20 Elated, excited to hold pet for now (2,3,2,3,5)
ON TOP OF THE WORLD – an anagram (excited) of TO HOLD PET FOR NOW
23 Incidental topic in publication backing team (4,5)
SIDE ISSUE – SIDE (team) ISSUE (publication)
24 Belief expressed with energy in shelter (5)
TENET – E (energy) in TENT (shelter)
25 Party longing for respected figure (5)
DOYEN – DO (party) YEN (longing)
26 Cause of devastation in ancient city surrounded by endless wasteland (9)
DESTROYER – TROY (ancient city) in (surrounded by) DESER[t] (endless wasteland)
Down
1 Unworthy sailor first to board? Nervous about that (6)
SHABBY – SHY (nervous) around (about that) AB (sailor) B[oard] (first to board)
2 Church damaged and left in penury, damaged as never before (15)
UNPRECEDENTEDLY – CE (church) DENTED (damaged) L (left) in an anagram (damaged) of PENURY
3 Information on contents of boat in port (5)
GENOA – GEN (information) [b]OA[t] (contents of boat)
4 Ring with piece of advice about river excursion (5,4)
ROUND TRIP – ROUND (ring) plus TIP (piece of advice) around (about) R (river)
5 Say nothing about king in film about ogre (5)
SHREK – SH (say nothing) RE (about) K (king)
6 Friend with a piece of furniture that’s pleasing (9)
PALATABLE – PAL (friend) A TABLE (a piece of furniture)
7 Fashion designer in centre sat calmly working (6,9)
STELLA MCCARTNEY – an anagram (working) of CENTRE SAT CALMLY
8 Basket emptied into river? That’s stupid (6)
OBTUSE – B[aske]T (basket emptied) in (into) OUSE (river)
13 Politician put in effort, right away, to obtain freedom (9)
EXEMPTION – MP (politician) in (put in) EXE[r]TION (effort, right away)
14 Tangle with learner in game that’s unique (9)
MATCHLESS – MAT (tangle) plus L (learner) in CHESS (game)
18 Elegant plot, if speedy, having lost regular characters (6)
POISED – P[l]O[t] I[f] S[p]E[e]D[y] (plot, if speedy, having lost regular characters)
19 One working on paper painted it orange in part (6)
EDITOR – contained in (in part) ‘paintED IT ORange’
21 Combined force, not new (5)
FUSED – F (force) USED (not new)
22 Alien upset in struggle to become liquid (5)
WATER – ET (alien) reversed (upset) in WAR (struggle)
Thank you Gaufrid + Everyman
My favourites were UNPRECEDENTEDLY & TELEGRAM
I can’t really remember much about this one apart from my last entry SLUGGARDS which I thought was a bit of a strange word. I have never heard it used in everyday speech and probably never will. Oh what a sluggard I was for being slow to get SLUGGARDS.
Thanks to Gaufrid and Everyman.
NB. The spellchecker suggests I replace Gaufrid with frigid.
Thank you Everyman for a pleasant puzzle last Saturday, and Gaufrid for today’s blog.
The term “BEER AND SKITTLES” was new to me, and last in since I needed the crossers. ON TOP OF THE WORLD went in from the word pattern, what a long anagram for so many short words!
My favourite clues were those for SLUGGARDS and SIDE ISSUE.
Enjoyable as ever, with no major hold ups. Last in 13d.
Nice methodical solve, although the across clues only yielded two or three answers on the first read leading me to wonder if it was going to be rather harder than it turned out to be. Nice anagram of Stella McCartney.
Why does this site ask for an email address? It doesn’t seem to serve any purpose. I’m sure if any blogger or moderator wanted to say something to me they’d do so here. Puzzling.
Thanks Gaufrid and Everyman.
Got all but telegram. Still can’t understand “TE ” for note.
Barrie Perhaps they need the email address in case they have to block somebody as happened once before as I remember. I expect it’s a security issue.
Audrey, it’s Te as in the notes Do Re Mi…It should be spelled Ti but Chambers gives Te as an alternative spelling.
And the blocking notion can’t be the reason for the email address, I could say my email address was fredbloggs@anything.com and it would accept my comment as long as my basic arithmetic was up to snuff.
All rather curious.
We got that all out without any electronic help except checking that there was a fashion designer called Stella McCartney. (Out here in the colonies the latest sartorial nuances are not necessarily always top of our agenda.)
Last one in was cede. We hadn’t twigged that “Speaker’s” was a “sounds like” pointer.
Think my LOI was cede as well. Funny how sometimes the four letter ones can be problematic. Sluggards was a new word for me also, what an ugly word, bit of an ‘onomato’.
Perhaps the email address is an attempt at making sure the comments are legit despite fact you could id yourself wth a bogus email. Remember a while back when there was a furore over the setter’s style at the time, there were some rather vicious comments. Rather uncalled for.
Simple enough outing. Last in was TELEGRAM which when parsed brought a smile to my face.
I need a harder puzzle! 🙂
Re the email address question, somebody told us about the very useful Quinapalus website (https://www.quinapalus.com/cgi-bin/match) for help in sorting out potential answers. As I recall (though I might be wrong) that came as an email from whoever had posted the solutions for the day that our comment here had prompted his/her reply.