Independent 9,850 by Alchemi

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You always get a nice transparent offering from Alchemi. Plenty of good clues here, though nothing I could see that was particularly frightening.

Definitions underlined, in maroon. Anagram indicators in italics.

Oh dear, as usual I haven’t really looked for a Nina, so hope that I’m not ignoring some clever device from Alchemi. The fact that the checking is Ximenean leads me to think that there is nothing to look for, but perhaps Alchemi doesn’t need the usual excuse. Perhaps some album by Sheryl Crow of which I’ve never heard.

Across
1 HIGH JUMPS Drug-addled President gets judge to replace translator at the beginning of serious events (4,5)
high [= drug-addled] Trump with the tr at the beginning replaced by j s{erious}
6 LACED Article in lower case editor spiked (5)
l(a)c ed
9 STALL Second unbelievable delay (5)
s tall
10 DANGEROUS It’s risky showing emotion during party with us (9)
d(anger)o us
11 SHERYL CROW Chelsea worry about dropping each player (6,4)
(Chels{ea} worry)*
12 PEAR Fruit and veg right (4)
pea r
14 ON A ROLL Where cheese may be put having continued success (2,1,4)
2 defs — you think of cheese as being put in, not on, a roll, but I suppose when you cut the roll open to make the cheese roll then on is OK
15 SHAFTED Treated unfairly back in Slough (7)
sh(aft)ed
17 SLAVERS Escorted by Nazis, former tennis champion drools (7)
S(Laver)S — I suppose there are some people who have never heard of Rod Laver
19 SOLVENT Financially sound star let off steam (7)
sol [= sun, a star] vent
20 REPS Exercises agents (4)
2 defs — the first one being repetitions, but it’s far down (in American (2)) in Collins
22 RESISTANCE Republican sees I can’t organise opposition (10)
R (sees I can’t)*
25 ASSEMBLED Put together when steam oddly leaked (9)
as s{t}e{a}m bled
26 EAGER Time to stop queen being keen (5)
E(age)R
27 TWEAK First of the feeble make slight change (5)
t{he} weak — make may or may not be included in the definition, depending on whether you read tweak as a verb or as a noun
28 CREATURES US caterer’s stuffed animals (9)
(US caterer)* — the anagram indicated by stuffed — I suppose in the sense ruined
Down
1 HOSES Pipes steeplechasers possibly hand out (5)
ho{r}ses — right hand, left hand, r hand, l hand
2 GUATEMALA Came across gold during a delay up country (9)
(a la(met au)g)rev.
3 JOLLY ROGER Flag is cheerful, I understand (5,5)
jolly roger [= I understand, used by radio signallers etc]
4 MEDICAL Test mostly cut to pieces during dinner? (7)
me(dic{e})al
5 SENIORS Spanish men surround Italy’s elders (7)
Sen(I)ors
6 LEEK Vegetable starter for lunch that’s scary (4)
l{unch} eek!
7 CHOSE Picked a hundred socks (5)
C hose
8 DISCREDIT Keeping secrets, policeman covers up last note to ruin someone’s reputation (9)
discreet with its last note [= e] replaced by DI — but I’m a bit uncomfortable with ‘last note’ = e: the last note in discredit is D; the last note in A.B.C.D.E.F.G is G; the last letter of note is e, but ‘last’  doesn’t mean ‘the last letter of’. So goodness knows what’s happening. If this problem can be resolved it’s rather a good clue. [As Hovis says, it’s the last letter of discreet not the last note of discredit. Getting mixed up stupidly. Apologies.]
13 WALL STREET Film with everyone stumped about plane? (4,6)
w all s(tree)t — [cricket] — plane tree
14 OBSERVANT Wild bears on TV following rules (9)
(bears on TV)*
16 TWEENAGER One of Shakespeare’s sisters put up with precious pre-adolescent (9)
twee (Regan)rev. — Regan in King Lear
18 SHELLAC Oil company gets bill for resin (7)
Shell ac
19 SWINDLE Only flatulence for old trick (7)
sole [= only] with wind replacing o
21 PASTE Having overtaken English, stick (5)
past E — I think the idea is that if you have overtaken English then you are past English; surely it can’t be that overtaken = past since it would be overtaken = passed
23 EARLS Peers in Court? (5)
2 defs; earls are peers in the aristocracy, and Earls Court (some, but not all, references on Google call it Earl’s Court)
24 AMOK Terse report from survivor is out of control (4)
A survivor if reporting tersely might say “am OK”

*anagram

13 comments on “Independent 9,850 by Alchemi”

  1. Don’t have a problem with 8d. E is the last note in DISCREET (not DISCREDIT) which is how I read it. This was my last to parse and took me quite a while.

  3. I’m afraid I wasn’t a very good Nina today (despite what our esteemed setter says!) as I couldn’t figure out DISCREDIT and WALL STREET for the life of me. Otherwise nothing too difficult, although I took a bit of a punt on SHERYL CROW, who I had only heard about in the context of a certain 8d’ed cyclist. I liked the idea of how Shakespeare would have dealt with a TWEENAGER.

    Thanks to Alchemi, both for the puzzle and for dropping in, and to John

  4. Thank you for blogging, John.  Good puzzle, which fell out steadily.  For no particular reason, I liked TWEENAGER today.

    I couldn’t parse DISCREDIT, so thank you for that.  “The last letter of note is e, but ‘last’ doesn’t mean ‘the last letter of.”  Oh, yes it does.  Just because some amiable old buffer wrote a book half a century ago that said it couldn’t mean that doesn’t mean that setters can’t use that device now.  Lots do, and it’s perfectly fair and understandable.  Folk will be saying that you can’t split an infinitive next.

    Thanks to the setter too.

  5. KD @4. Although I initially parsed the E as notE, I didn’t like it. Not for the reason John has but since DISCREET has 2 E’s and the clue then should really specify which. Since DI is covering dicreEt and T is not a note, this seems a better fit. Maybe Alchemi will come back and comment.

  6. Stupid discreet/discredit confusion on my part.  Blog amended.

    And in reply to K’s D above, I don’t agree with you. Alchemi is too good a setter to make this mistake — as Hovis says, what he is doing is fine. Your amiable old buffer of fifty years ago (not sure that he was all that amiable, if pictures of him are anything to go by; and what’s wrong with doing what he did some time ago? J.S. Bach is not now ignored just because he was writing music 300 years ago) actually laid down much of what is observed today, even though not everyone agrees with everything he said.  Anyway I wasn’t referring to him. In a far more recent publication by Don Manley this point is made. Just because lots of people do something this doesn’t mean that what they do is OK. Crossword convention isn’t like language.

  7. Very much enjoyed this one – like Kathryn’s Dad I thought the ‘E’ to be removed in 8d was the last letter of note.   Can’t see a problem with that.

    However, unlike Kathryn’s Dad, I hate the expression in 16d – earned a ‘yuck’ from me!

    1a made me smile – there can’t be many who haven’t been for the HIGH JUMP in the current administration.

    Many thanks to Alchemi and to John for the blog.

  9. Ho hum, Alchemi – did no-one ever tell you that it’s always the safer option to side with the fairer sex!

  10. Sorry, I don’t mean to make a big thing of this. It’s very unexciting and as a short, single word I admit it barely qualifies as one, but has anyone else spotted the unintended Nina?

  11. A bit late starting this today but we found it quite easy.  We parsed 8dn as Alchemi intended, but wondered how may solvers might have heard of 11ac, and were held up trying to remember if any of the weird sisters in the Scottish play actually have names – they don’t!

    Favourite was ON A ROLL

    WP@10: Do you mean ‘someone who can decipher the wordplay’ or possibly another word for ‘butt’?

    Thanks, Alchemi and John

  12. Allan C, I’ve heard of Sheryl Crow (and I actually have a few of her records).

    That said, I was a bit puzzled by the definition: ‘player’.

    True, she’s a singer-songwriter who plays the guitar but even so. Surely, Alchemi choice was a result of making the surface work. Just about.

  13. allan_c @11

    No, WP is referring to the fact that PARSER can be seen down the central column; as I’ve said and WP acknowledged, it was not deliberate.

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