Guardian Cryptic 27,595 by Tramp

by

Lots of fun, with plenty of tricky surfaces and definitions. Haven’t been able to spot a theme… Favourites 17 and 19/10. Thanks, Tramp.

Across
1 CONSTIPATION Difficulty going on after Ascot tip in racing (12)
ON after (Ascot tip in)*
8 UPSWING Economic recovery over? Drink round noon (7)
UP=”over” plus SWIG=”Drink” around Noon
9 VERTIGO Turning over channel to catch series — set off for film (7)
=Hitchcock film
reversal/”Turning over” of ITV=UK TV “channel”, around ER=TV “series”; plus GO=”set off”
11 THERESA In that place (South America) for May? (7)
=Theresa May, UK Prime Minister
THERE=”In that place” plus South America
12 SKILIFT Help on inclination of talent contracted by newspapers (3,4)
SKILL=”talent contracted”, plus i and FT=UK “newspapers”
13 RENTS Splits payments (5)
double definition
14 ORDINANCE Ruling men replace head of banking with director (9)
OR=”other ranks”=military men; plus FINANCE=”banking” with its head letter replaced by Director
16 EXCHANGES Swaps one-time lover and makes a connection (9)
EX=”one-time lover”; plus CHANGES=”makes a [e.g. train] connection”
19 ROMEO Ladies’ man, Tramp, in jumper (5)
ME=”Tramp” in ROO=kangaroo=”jumper”
21 TROUSER Something stirring by cheat’s right pocket (7)
=”pocket” as a verb, to take and keep something
ROUSER=”Something stirring”, by cheaT‘s right-most letter
23 OVIDUCT Old half of Victoria line starts to delay users getting Tube (7)
=tube through which an egg passes from an ovary
Old, plus half of VICToria around the starts to Delay and Users
24 NABBING Catching Boycott’s return, nearly got it (7)
reversal/”return” of BAN=”Boycott”, plus BINGO=”nearly got it”
25 AMENDER One improving in the morning, one coming last (7)
AM=”in the morning”, plus ENDER=”one coming last”
26 CROSS-DRESSER Annoyed one preparing for TV (5-7)
“TV”=Transvestite
CROSS=”Annoyed”, plus DRESSER=”one preparing”
Down
1 CISTERN Part of toilet cold on one’s rear (7)
Cold plus I=”one” plus STERN=”rear”
2 NAILERS Those fixing cars — Reliant’s part turned up (7)
“fixing” as in attaching with e.g. nails, rather than fixing=repairing
Hidden and reversed/”part turned up” in: carS RELIANt
3 TAGS ALONG Follows name and number over a line (4,5)
TAG=”name” plus SONG=”number” around A Line
4 PAVES Missing royal standards round five English flags (5)
“flags” as in paving stones
PARS=”standards” minus Royal; around both V=”five” in Roman numerals, and English
5 TORSION Screwing books up — possible complaint of typist working (7)
OT=Old Testament=”books” reversed/”up”; plus RSI=Repetitive Strain Injury=”possible complaint of typist” plus ON=”working”
6 OPINION Feeling that makes some cry? Pain regularly piercing (7)
ONION=”that makes some cry”, with regular letters from PaIn inside
7 BUSTER KEATON Early star with banker set out recklessly (6,6)
=star of silent films
(banker set out)*
10   See 19
15 DISLOCATE Developing Aldi: Tesco put out (9)
(Aldi Tesco)*
17 CROWBAR Jimmy Carr, with offshore banking, primarily fiddled (7)
(Carr w o b)*, using the first letters of with offshore and banking
18 AUSSIES Building issue when housing Victorians? (7)
=people who live in the Australian state of Victoria
(issue)*, with AS=”when” on the outside
19, 10 RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK Let’s take most of Harrison Ford’s fantastic film (7,2,3,4,3)
edit thanks to passerby: (Let’s take Harriso[n] Ford)* (Let’s take Harrison For)*
20 MAUNDER Rabbit‘s mother put to sleep (7)
=to talk aimlessly
MA=”mother”, plus UNDER=[having been] “put to sleep”
22 RIGID Stiff with or without female on top (5)
with Female on top, it would be F-RIGID, and still mean “Stiff”

48 comments on “Guardian Cryptic 27,595 by Tramp”

  2. I always like it when it’s Tramp’s name on the top of a puzzle, and this one was no exception. There was a very minor movie theme but I couldn’t see any further links between 9a VERTIGO. 7d BUSTER KEATON and 19/10d RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK. Did anyone else wonder whether ROUSER in TROUSER 21a should have maybe been “Someone stirring” rather than “Something stirring”?

    Favourites were my LOI, 12a SKI LIFT, 26a CROSS-DRESSER (lovely misdirection with the letters “TV”!), 1d CISTERN and 17d CROWBAR (the latter as you mentioned, manehi). I was stumped by who Jimmy Carr was until I got some crossers and then in a PDM saw “Jimmy” as a break and enter tool (the context in which I have seen it) rather than a first name.

    And sorry to be so parochial, but my COTD was definitely 18d AUSSIES!!!!

    Many thanks for a lovely puzzle, Tramp, and to you, manehi, for a prompt and thorough blog.

  3. Thank you Manehi, especially for elucidating the parsing of ORDINANCE at 14 – one of my many blind spots is the military sphere, which is a problem as so many martial abbreviations are beloved of setters. (But a very small price to pay for being of the generation that never had to do National Service or go to war and thus be familiar with such terms.) Good to see other setters moving in on Paul’s scatalogical territory too!

  6. I agree entirely with JinA @2 – except that I do know Jimmy Carr – and my top favourite was 19,10  [but [I knew she would like 18dn. 😉 ]

    Re 15dn: in his last puzzle, Tramp’s 1ac was ‘Strengthen Aldi: on Tesco struggles (11)’ – I think that’s quite impressive.

    Many thanks to both Tramp and Manehi.

  7. The RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK anagram reminds me that a magazine once ran a competition for readers to write a review of a film that was an anagram of the film’s title itself.

    For “Raiders of the Lost Ark” someone came up with “Ford, the Real Star, is OK”.

    My favourite, for its sheer simplicity, was “Hook” = “Oh, OK”.

    (The winner was “The Towering Inferno” = “Not Worth Fire Engine”).

    Thanks, Tramp and manehi.

  9. Thanks to Chris in France@7 for the laughs! Great puzzle as always by Tramp; AUSSIES is also stand-out clue for me. Many thanks to Tramp and manehi.

  10. I’m with Julie and Eileen

    Thanks to Tramp for a great crossword and to Manehi for the explanations

  11. Re 23ac – I see how the use of “line” gives a good surface meaning and misdirection but I cannot see how it works  otherwise.  I got the solution fairly easily with DU going into O VICT but how does “line” help in the wordplay?  Grateful for your help, Manehi – or any other commentator.  Lobed this crossword by the way – just the right mix of challenge and wit.  Thank you Tramp.

  13. Hovis @12: I see that now, but should it not then strictly be ‘lines’ – which would mean changing ‘starts’ to start; but ‘starts’ is needed to cover the two initials…. can’t win either way. Unless ‘Old half of Victoria’ is counted as plural, as being two component of the answer, but that is unconvincing. But, as often, I may be missing something

  14. Just the right strength. Thanks, Tramp.

    Jimmy aka jemmy, CROWBAR, nail bar, pinch bar, wrecking bar (is it regional?) – endless possibilities for setters!

    Thanks to manehi, too.

  15. quenbarrow@13. I was personally ok with O + VICT being two bits and hence plural. I am never quite sure which way the inclusion is supposed to work though. If you line a jacket say, the lining is on the inside not the outside.

  18. Thinks both. Am I the only one not to have heard of “jimmy” as a crowbar, being used to the English spelling of “jemmy”?

  19. To answer my own query (who does that?), line as a verb can mean cover on the inside (as line a jacket) but can also mean “to place all along the side of’. So, in this way, the inclusion can go either way.

  21. Thanks to Tramp and manehi. Much enjoyed this puzzle but needed help with parsing, especially with VERTIGO. I didn’t get the “changes trains” in EXCHANGES or the bing(o) in NABBING, and RSI in TORSION was new to me.

  22. There seems to be an extra s in the clue for 1d. Cold on one rear would be c i stern. The clue suggests c is stern.

  23. [Thanks to quenbarrow@ for adding the link to Jimmy Carr, whose face is familiar now that I see it. The extra information helped me to appreciate more fully the cleverness of the clue at 17d.]

  24. Thanks to Tramp and Manehi

    Just came on to get the parsing of PAVES (for which much thanks – this is the kind of Russian doll clue that can fox me) and to quibble about “line” in OVIDUCT but I’ve been beaten to it and, indeed, now have my concerns allayed by Hovis@15 et seq.  So it only remains to chorus approval for AUSSIES and admit that other (but shhh) favs were CISTERN and CONSTIPATION.

  25. Myrvin@22

    There is indeed an extra s in CISTERN, but this seems to be acceptable as an element which can either be included or excluded as setters require – it didn’t cause me any problem. No doubt there might be strict Ximenean objections but it gave me a chuckle.

  26. Myrvin@22. Although I tend to agree, if you read one’s as “one has”, it sort of works. I’m ok with it.

  27. Like Shirl @18, I can’t have jImmy as a crowbar,  Got to be jEmmy. Pity, cos it’s brilliant otherwise.

  28. Thank you Tramp and manehi.

    An enjoyable puzzle, but agree with the complaints about Jimmy, for me that means a potty – according to the COED it  is the American spelling for the CROWBAR.  Thanks to queenbarrow @4 for the link – if the tax haven had been in the Americas the clue might just have passed muster.

  29. Thanks to Tramp and manehi. As others have said an enjoyable puzzle which kept me occupied for a good while. I think I fell for every bit of misdirection in the puzzle. However, got there in the end, with crowbar and oviduct last ones. I actually liked crowbar (in spite of along being aware of jemmy) and cross dresser (which made me smile when the penny dropped). Thanks again to Tramp and manehi.

  30. I liked CROWBAR, though I’ve never heard of Jimmy Carr.  Liked it even more when quenbarrow supplied the story.

    Can D be used for Director?  A new one on me.

    I always love long complicated ingenious anagrams, so I enjoyed RAIDERS etc, though I couldn’t see the parsing till manehi helped me.

    I dunno about ban being boycott.  A ban comes from an authority, while a boycott is a response of the people to something they object to.  It’s named after Captain Boycott, a particularly cruel land agent in Ireland, who was treated to a total exclusion from any community activity — no one would sell him anything or work for him.

    Can “flags” mean “paves”?  Flag is a noun and pave is a verb.  Or does it mean “supplies with flags”{?

    15d DISLOCATE is a clever misdirection: I took “put out” as the anagrind and kept trying to find a word that meant “developing.”

    Thanks to Tramp and manehi, and to Julie and Eileen for saying what I agree with.

  31. I found Tramp’s wavelength more readily than usual today, helped by seeing RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK immediately, and once I had CONSTIPATION too the rest seemed a lot easier. Some intricate parsing challenges, but a fine crossword with plenty of entertainment.

    Thanks to Tramp and manehi

  32. Auriga @ 14: ‘wrecking bar’ is certainly familiar to me from my time as a builders merchant, and I don’t think it’s regional. however with my pedant hat on, crowber ansd wrecking bar aren’t synonymous. The former is about 5’ long, with a point at one end and a chisel at the other, while a wrecking bar is J-shaped with the equivalent of a nail-lifter at each end.

    Valentine @ 30: flag and pave can both be verbs: “I used natural stone to flag/pave my patio”. As a noun flag is an abbreviation for flagstone.

    Here endeth today’s construction trade lesson.

  34. Got there in the end but found it tough and needed the blog for some of the parsing. I found the top half easier than the bottom. Particular faves are SKI LIFT & (as many have said) CROWBAR.

    Thanks to Tramp and manehi.

  35. Belatedly (been out gadding), many thanks to both Hovis@12 and 15, Qenbarrow@13 and Auriga@14.  Am vigorously applying tea tray to bonce. Thanks again to all, to Manehi and to the glorious Tramp

  36. Many thanks for the blog and the comments. I wrote this puzzle way back in 2014 and there are a couple of things I don’t like, on reflection: one being the Boycott’s return.

    The DISLOCATE clue won a prize in Paul’s weekly clue-writing competition about ten years ago.

    Neil

  37. A splendid puzzle as usual from Tramp. All my ticks have been mentioned and AUSSIES is my cotd as it was only when I said to Mrs W “why are Aussies Victorians?” that the penny dropped. I came here with 9, 21, 24a and 5d unparsed so thanks to manehi and others for sorting those out, and to Tramp for the challenge and fun.

  38. A day of two halves. On the early commute in got about half and then totally froze. Might have been worry for my daughter on GCSE result day. She did really well and on the home commute the rest fell obediently and satisfyingly into place.

  39. AUSSIES was LOI and I didn’t understand it when I put it in. Now that I do I’m going to stand in the thick corner! I enjoyed most of this but the SW gave me trouble- and took longer than the rest of the puzzle put together. TROUSER,NABBING and CROWBAR caused much head scratching but I cracked it with the last one.JIMMY meant urination to me but I discovered,via the OED,that it is also the American version of JEMMY. Who knew?
    Thanks Tramp.

  40. Great fun, as always seems to be the case with Tramp.  Favorites included RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK, CONSTIPATION, and my co-CotDs, CROSS-DRESSER and AUSSIES, each of which provided a great PDM.  There were many other excellent clues, as mentioned by others above.  I like the Jimmy Carr clue much better now that I understand its relevance to a real news story.

    Speaking of “Jimmy”, I enjoyed the exchange of comments on the meanings of that word (as well as the various terms for pry bars of all shapes and sizes).  To that discussion, I will add these:  Where I grew up, in Massachusetts, Jimmies are the little tube-shaped candy sprinkles that are often used to top cupcakes and ice cream cones — but I don’t believe that term is used very much outside of the northeastern US.  And on the iconic American Country/trucker song “Six Days on the Road” by Dave Dudley, he sings about passing “a Jimmy and a White” (and everything in sight), which is a trucker slang reference to diesel trucks manufactured by, respectively, GMC (hence, “Jimmy”) and the White Motor Company (former maker of the Freightliner, which itself has been the subject of a number of country and blues songs).

    Many thanks to Tramp and manehi and the other commenters.

  41. There were five clues I couldn’t fully parse today, an unusual event for me attempting one of Tramp’s crosswords.  Two of those, CROWBAR and AUSSIES, are now favourites, along with the five longest answers.  CROWBAR is very clever – I already knew the news story concerning Jimmy Carr.  Like Shirl and others, though, I have never heard of jimmy meaning a jemmy.

    Thanks to Tramp and Manehi.

  42. Thanks to both. Enjoyed it thoroughly but had to get a couple of parsing for here.

    Down here we used to say “jimmy something open” when you were levering it in some way. Now whether that is a dialect shift from jemmy, I do not know, but using a jimmy was a not an unheard of expression here. And I did like the clue.

    Oddly I got stuck on AUSSIES until that clanging sound appeared. Many other good laughs too.

  43. Very late to the party but I wanted to say how much I enjoyed this, particularly the apposite anagram for RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK. I’d actually forgotten that JEMMY was the English version of JIMMY! Like others, was a bit dubious about “boycott” and “line” (thinking of coat lining).
    I shall henceforth think of Simon S as Bob the Builder.
    Thanks, Tramp and manehi.

  44. Curate’s egg for me. On balance too much snipping up of words into little bits and fiddly rearranging with tweezers. However, hugely popular it seems with all and sundry. Hey ho.

  45. We echo phitonelly@43 comments.

    RAIDERS OF THE LOST ASK was our favourite.

    Thanks to Tramp and manehi

  47. Re 19D/10D: is it acceptable to have the apostrophe-s at the end of Ford in the clue? It’s not part of the anagram, after all.

  48. viennesewaltz @47
    This is my third attempt at posting a comment in response to yours. The other two seem to have disappeared into a black hole.
    In the cryptic grammar I think apostrophe-s indicates ‘is’, so that ‘is fantastic’ can be read as ‘is an anagram’. The clue up to that point is the anagram fodder.
    I liked the clue. The brief definition ‘film’ is bolstered by the mention of the actor, which in this case is not a misdirection.

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