Sorry Knut – you have landed us again. Not that we’re complaining! You did however give us the run-around during the solve.
It’s Tuesday and the setter is Knut so we were on the look out for a theme. We missed the theme in Knut’s last puzzle and the one before that was another topical crossword based on Ken Dodd. It wasn’t until we had solved 10/13 after we had a number of crossing letters, that we realised the theme referred to the recent ‘whistle blowing’ from Christopher Wylie. Up to 87m users of 1A 2A may have been affected. Their 6A 11A fell. They fell again after Sheryl Sandberg (Chief Operating Officer for Facebook) actually owned up to the fact that the company knew about the malicious practices 2 years ago and didn’t do anything about it. 24/26/31 highlights the part that 10/13 played in Trump’s presidential campaign.
A very topical and well crafted puzzle – thanks Knut.
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | Confront some of those on the staff (4) | |
| FACE | F, A, C & E are notes on the (musical) staff | |
| 3 | As whistleblower, caution Zuck finally following expression of contempt (4) | |
| BOOK | K (last or ‘final’ letter of Zuck) after BOO (expression of contempt). The footballer is no doubt Hendrick Zuck but we needed Google to find him. The referee or ‘whistleblower’ presumably had no problem when he/she gave him a caution. | |
| 6/11 | Indicator watched by Wall Street and the soup kitchen? (5,5) | |
| STOCK PRICE | A play on the fact that if you were managing a soup kitchen you would be watching the PRICE of the STOCK (soup). | |
| 10/13 | Caught by digital camera, an iffy Trump lobbyist? (9,9) | |
| CAMBRIDGE ANALYTICA | C (caught) and an anagram of BY DIGITAL CAMERA AN – anagrind is ‘iffy’. This was the clue that opened up the theme for us. | |
| 11 | See 6 | |
| 12 | Shelter for naval ships getting shelled (3) | |
| LEE | ||
| 13 | See 10 | |
| 14 | Setback for Wenger as head of Gunners fails to extend contract (5) | |
| RENEW | A reversal or ‘setback’ of WEN |
|
| 15 | A little nephew I’d throw across the swimming pool (5) | |
| WIDTH | Hidden (‘a little’) in ‘nepheW ID THrow’ | |
| 17 | Ordered earliest time to be in repose (3,2,4) | |
| LIE AT REST | An anagram of EARLIEST – anagrind is ‘ordered’ and T (time) | |
| 20 | Shoot Nad nude, rolling around and around having nothing on (9) | |
| REDUNDANT | Hidden and reversed or ‘around and around’ in ‘shooT NAD NUDE Rolling’ | |
| 23 | Gag on tandoori chicken hot starters (5) | |
| RETCH | RE (on) and first letters or ‘starters’ of Tandoori Chicken Hot | |
| 24/26/31 | I’d teach doddery President about grubby tricks for budget problem solving (5,5,4,4,5) | |
| DIRTY DEEDS DONE DIRT CHEAP | An anagram of I’D TEACH DODDERY PRESIDENT – anagrind is ‘about’. The answer comes from THIS song by AC/DC which needed another Googe search. We were surprised that we didn’t recognise it – we guess that we were too busy being parents at the time it was released! | |
| 29 | Occasionally stroked David Mellor’s erogenous zone, allegedly (3) | |
| TOE | Alternate letters of sTrOkEd or ‘occasionally’. Another Google search to reveal THIS story from 1992. Scroll down to 4. | |
| 30 | Here in Versailles, her majesty is more frigid (5) | |
| ICIER | ICI (French for ‘here’) ER (Her Majesty) | |
| 31 | See 24 | |
| 32 | Midwife essentially is to assist to give birth (5) | |
| WHELP | W (middle or ‘essential’ letter of ‘midwife’) HELP (assist) | |
| 33 | Cougar getting stuck into the spumante? (4) | |
| PUMA | Hidden or ‘stuck’ in ‘sPUMAnte’ | |
| 34 | Support “Remain” (4) | |
| STAY | Double definition | |
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | Dash, following American spies (5) | |
| FACIA | F (following) A (American) CIA (spies) | |
| 2 | Ordered, new director (education) (9) | |
| COMMANDED | Well – a bit sneaky. COMMA (,) N (new) D (director) ED (education) | |
| 4 | Plod‘s wrinkly pecker? (3,4) | |
| OLD BILL | OLD (wrinkly) BILL (pecker – as in a bird’s beak) When requesting reductions because of our age, we always ask for 2 wrinklies please. | |
| 5 | Docking fee upset European nerd going round Alabama (7) | |
| KEELAGE | E (European) GEEK (nerd) around AL (Alabama), all reversed or ‘upset’ | |
| 6 | Pastures new for Republican big beast? (9) | |
| SUPERSTAR | An anagram of PASTURES – anagrind is ‘new’ R (Republican) | |
| 7 | One trapped between legs? It could make your eyes water! (5) | |
| ONION | I (one) inside or ‘trapped between’ ON ON (leg leg as used in cricket) | |
| 8 | Guard to look over Buddhist temple children (4,5) | |
| KEEP WATCH | A reversal (‘over’) of PEEK (look) + WAT (Buddhist temple) CH (children) | |
| 9 | Bess’s partner’s topless romp (4) | |
| ORGY | ||
| 15 | The big picture as seen from the space station? (5,4) | |
| WORLD VIEW | A play on the fact that if you were looking out of the space station window your VIEW may be of the WORLD | |
| 16 | Upsetting party, Powell (ex-Conservative) involved in dirty tricks campaign (9) | |
| HONEYTRAP | A reversal or ‘upsetting’ of PARTY and ENO |
|
| 18 | Fashionable new bar (3) | |
| INN | IN (fashionable) N (new) | |
| 19 | Gregarious Nix at last caught by film, right on time (9) | |
| EXTROVERT | X (last letter of nix or ‘at last’) inside or ‘caught’ by ET (film) R (right) OVER (on) T (time) | |
| 21 | Dead-beat loyalist political party did their sums (5,2) | |
| ADDED UP | An anagram of DEAD – anagrind is ‘beat’ + DUP (loyalist political party) | |
| 22 | Mo, 3, worked out maths formula (7) | |
| THEOREM | An anagram of MO THREE (3) – anagrind is ‘worked out’ | |
| 25 | Extolled unlimited pay increase (5) | |
| RAISE | ||
| 27 | Fire rifle (4) | |
| SACK | Double definition | |
| 28 | Vacate space for Australian company (5) | |
| EMPTY | EM (space) PTY (Australian company) | |
AC/DC and Cambridge Ananlytica in the same puzzle. What more could you want?
But there was more, much more.
Thanks B&J and thanks Knut.
Thanks B&J. I think 3a is actually referring to Mark Zuckerberg, founder and CEO of Facebook, and commonly known as Zuck.
Brilliant crossword – fitting in the very topical theme added to the cleverness
Thanks to Knut and B&J
Thanks Andrew@2. Neither of us are on Facebook and have never heard the CEO referred to as Zuck. Had Joyce (who wrote up the blog) Googled ‘Zuck’ instead of ‘Zuck footballer’ we may have realised our error! It makes much more sense now as well as adding to the theme.
A most enjoyable crossword where even I spotted the clever theme! I’ve now got some Indy puzzles to catch up on, as the Hebridean internet on Mull didn’t stretch to easy puzzle solving, with the rest of the family and grandchildren on social media at the same time. I see the online interface for the puzzle has been modified and is better in some ways, but now doesn’t allow you to see which are the connected clues in the clue sidepanel. I had to print out the puzzle to see which they were. The SW gave me a good start, and the NW was my final sortie, as I struggled with the parsing of 1a, having got as far as crotchets etc, but failing to see the obvious until I postulated FACE as the definition, which got me going with FACIA, and then the Cambridge lot made everything clear. Great stuff. Thanks Knut and B&J.
This was lots of fun to solve. I took far too long to unscramble 10a/13a, thinking that I was looking for a person. For me, as for B&J, this was the point where the penny dropped about the theme.
Like John @5 I ended up in the NW, and it took me some time to sort out 1a/1d.
Many thanks Knut and Bertandjoyce.
Failed on this one. Couldn’t get DIRTY DEEDS DONE DIRT CHEAP. It might well describe the antics of CAMBRIDGE ANALYTICA (which I also didn’t get) but in my defence, it isn’t (in our house at least) an idiomatic expression, and I was never into AC/DC.
So not my favourite Knut – all very contemporary and Indy-style, but a theme too far for this solver today.
Thanks all three.
10a/13a is brilliant. 3a is also a very clever themed clue. Thanks Knut
Thanks B&J for explaining the comma and KEEP WATCH.
I also liked WIDTH, just because i struggled to clue it in a recent puzzle and had considered the swimming pool.
And definitely 34
Always pleased to see Knut. As usual this was entertaining and topical, 10, 13 and 24, 26, 31 made me laugh. Thank you, Knut and Bertandjoyce.
Well, apart from putting ‘come’ instead of ‘done’ in 24/26/31 (we didn’t check the anagram fodder closely enough) we got it all without really spottig the theme although we liked the topical reference to 10/13. In fact we thought at first it was going to be a really difficult puzzle and surprised ourselves how quickly we solved it.
Our favourites were the non-thematic ONION and EMPTY – simple but brilliant.
Thanks, Knut and B&J
Thanks dear Bert&Joyce for the blog and to those who have commented. Just one minor point; in 19d, “Nix” refers to the indeed gregarious Alexander Nix, who was CEO of Cambridge Analytica at the time of the extraordinary Channel4 sting, and who has now been suspended and probably isn’t looking forward to being dragged back to Parliament to be grilled by Damian Colins’ committee.
Warmest regards to all, Rob/Knut
Thanks Knut – another one to add to the theme! Looking forward to the next one.
Yep, a typical Knut puzzle.
I’m not on Facebook (nor Twitter) and what I can say about that is that I feel just as happy as those who are. Perhaps, because of that the whole Cambridge Analytica thing is not really on my radar, despite being in the news day-in day-out. There are times that I find Knut’s themes somewhat too American but, having said that, it is quite something to write a set of clues like this.
Thanks B&J for the blog which I needed on a few occasions to understand what was going on. 1ac (FACE), for example, no musical connection made by me. REDUNDANT (20ac) and the long one came easily but I wasn’t fully sure about ‘around and around’ and the exact anagram fodder (which is silly because that one is actually quite clear).
It’s been a while since we had the comma trick (in 2d) but once the penny dropped nice to be reunited.
Unlike Dutch @8, I didn’t care very much for WIDTH (15ac). Yes, the imagery is, let’s say, eventful but I don’t think the definition ‘across the swimming pool’ does it for me. It’s the distance of the swimming pool and I can only qualify this here as a half-definition.
I wasn’t completely sure about RAISE (25d) as, to me, the answer sounded as a verb. However, the dictionaries (and my solving partner, too) tell us that it is an Americanism for ‘pay increase’. So, B&J, in the blog ‘pay’ should be underlined too.
Some unusually easy clues (18d, 27d, 30ac) but also some really good ones in this department like 34ac (STAY) and 7d (ONION).
32ac reads “Midwife essentially is to assist to give birth“. No problem to get the answer but the word “is” in this clue is surely incorrect? Or am I missing something?
Finally, Knut is one of only a few setters (known to me, that is) who uses the word ‘for’ to indicate just an addition. The only other ones in recent times are Quiptic setter Moley and Julius [ 🙂 ] and in the past- of all people – Araucaria! Knut uses it twice today (in 6d and 28d). I don’t need someone to give me a justification, I see how it works. I just don’t like it at all and I think my feelings are supported by the fact that the Pauls and Arachnes of this world won’t do it.
Oh, and on a night like this nice to see Mo being mentioned …….
Many thanks to B&J, and Knut for the entertainment.
Thanks Knut and BnJ
Sil @ 13: I disagree with you on 15A. The distance of the swimming pool is from one end to the other (aka along, in my view). The width however is from side to side, so across. So in my view Knut is completely correct. You may of course differ in your view, and I accept that.
Me @ 14
I haven’t quite got the new site workings sorted. In my last post [cue cornet] I had tried unsuccessfully to italicise ‘distance’ and ‘width’. I also forgot to add ‘hence length’ after ‘along’. Not my best effort.
Thanks Sil@13 about RAISE – will sort it out tomorrow.
As far as WIDTH is concerned, Joyce still remembers with horror being dragged across the swimming pool with a rope under her arms. It took place every week UNTIL she could swim a width on her own. It didn’t matter how, just get across. After doggy paddling across she gave up bothering to try to swim properly until much later in life. She now insists on swimming lengths!
Don’t worry Simon S@15 – neither was my doggy paddle!
Simon, what I actually meant – but didn’t say, unfortunately – is that ‘width’ can indeed mean (as you say) “The distance from side to side across a swimming-pool” [Chambers, def #3].
In that sense, Knut is of course correct.
My point is that just saying ‘across the swimming pool’ is not a sufficient definition for me. It’s in the category ‘I know what you mean but did you really tell me the full story?’.