Quiptic 993 by Anto

by

Anto’s turn in the quiptic slot this week.

Across
1 TEFLON The financial ombudsman limits this material (6)
The first and last letters (limits) of ThE FinanciaL OmbudsmaN
4, 9 GENERAL KNOWLEDGE  Information provided by Chesterton, initially? (7,9)
A reference to the writer G K Chesterton, whose initials are often used to stand for ‘general knowledge’, although it’s not an abbreviation found in Oxford, Collins or Chambers
9   See 4
10 MUG UP Attack leading study … (3,2)
MUG (attack) UP (leading)
11 ONSET … concerning fixed charge … (5)
ON (concerning) SET (fixed)
12 BACKDATED … that’s obsolete after support is revised retrospectively (9)
DATED (obsolete) following (after) BACK (support)
13 TEATIME Talk about when to drive off in the late afternoon (7)
A homophone (talk about) of TEE TIME (when to drive off)
15 EUCLID Sign reversed by top Greek mathematician … (6)
A reversal (reversed) of CUE (sign) next to (by) LID (top)
17 PATENT … providing clear evidence of invention (6)
A cryptic-ish definition

Edit: See Geoff’s comment @ 7. To take the clue as a double definition is much more satisfactory.

Clear = PATENT. Evidence of invention = PATENT
19 FALL GUY Drop support for scapegoat (4,3)
FALL (drop) GUY (support)
22 NIHILISTS Is nothing sacred to them? (9)
A cryptic definition. A nihilist might be said to worship nothing
24 INFER Conclude there’s no escaping hell (5)
INFERNO (hell) minus NO (there’s no escaping)
26 HIT ON Proposition  discovered left out in hotel chain (3,2)
HILTON (hotel chain) minus L (left out)

Edit: BlueDot @ 10 points out that there is a second definition here. I had taken ‘discovered’ to be a link between wordplay and definition. But discovered also = HIT ON. BlueDot’s interpretation makes more sense than mine.
27 URINATION Dumping of waste into a ruin is wrong (9)
An anagram (is wrong) of INTO A RUIN
28 RACISTS Their colour discrimination makes rodents hold back like this (7)
Hard to identify a conventional definition here. The wordplay is RATS (rodents) containing (hold) a reversal (back) of SIC (like this)

Edit: Geoff @ 7 suggests we take ‘Their colour discrimination’ as an allusive definition
29 DEBRIS Bride’s gone berserk, making bits and pieces (6)
An anagram (gone berserk) of BRIDES
Down
1 TAKE OUT Date top Chinese, for example (4,3)
I think this is intended as a triple definition. Date = TAKE OUT. Top = TAKE OUT. Chinese, for example = TAKE OUT
2 FLOSS Classic location for the mill recommended by dentists (5)
A reference to the George Eliot novel The Mill on the Floss
3 OIL STRIKE Trio likes playing — it’s a source of energy (3,6)
An anagram (playing) of TRIO LIKES
4 GLENCOE Officer overwhelmed by joy in Highland valley (7)
NCO (officer) contained in (overwhelmed by) GLEE (joy)
5 NOMAD Rover is leading name of most Alsatian dogs (5)
The first letters (leading) of Name Of Most Alsatian Dogs
6 RIGHT-WING Acceptable building extension for conservative types? (5-4)
An acceptable building extension might be the RiIGHT WING
7 LIPIDS Elvis plied regularly with special kind of fats (6)
The even letters (regularly) of ELvIs PlIeD plus (with) S (special)
8 EDIBLE Editor bleeps second half out, making it suitable for consumption (6)
The first halves (second half out) of the words EDItor and BLEeps
14 APATHETIC Showing interest initially in distribution of cheap tat? Quite the opposite (9)
I (interest initially) contained in (in) an anagram (distribution of) of CHEAP TAT
16 CULTIVATE Encourage secretive group that is hiding tax (9)
CULT (secretive group) IE (that is) containing (hiding) VAT (tax)
18 TISSUES Papers have problems supporting this leader (7)
ISSUES (problems) below (supporting) T (first letter = leader of this)
19 FOSSIL Chapel is so fortunate to hold returned relic (6)
An answer hidden in reverse (to hold returned) in chapil IS SO Fortunate
20 Y-FRONTS Terribly frosty around November? They keep nuts warm (1-6)
An anagram (terribly) of FROSTY containing (around) N (November)
21 ANCHOR Without borders, fancy short stop at sea (6)
The middle letters (without borders) of fANCy sHORt
23 LINES Old school punishment excited silent majority (5)
An anagram (excited) of SILENT minus the last last letter (majority)
25 FLIER Chance taken by father holding position (5)
FR (father) containing (holding) LIE (position)

 

13 comments on “Quiptic 993 by Anto”

  2. Thanks Anto and nms

    In keeping with 4,9, this seemed to need quite a lot of general knowledge! (GK himself, HI(L)TON, EUCLID, and FLOSS for instance).

    I liked INFER and CULTIVATE. I had questioned the “top” in 1d, but I think you are right that it’s a triple.

    Is “charge” OK as a definition for ONSET? In the military sense “set on” seems more accurate.

  3. Thanks Anto and nms.

    For 6D, I took “Acceptable” (RIGHT) and “Building extension” (WING) as two separate parts of the charade, with the rest being the def.

  4. I agree with Shirl: this was an excellent quiptic with many clues that had me hugging myself with glee once I’d cracked them. My utter fave was Y-FRONTS (because it made me laugh out loud) and FLOSS, GLENCOE, NOMAD, RIGHT-WING and EDIBLE were also highly satisfying in their neatness. I have to confess, I much prefer these kind of cleverly worded clues to the ones where seemingly arbitrary letters are assembled to form the answer. I class myself as a sort of “experienced beginner” and am still puzzled by many of the acronyms used by the seasoned cruciverbalists who make up most of this blog (such as NINA: I’ve worked out what that is, but what do the letters stand for?) so there may well be a name for those patchwork type clues.
    Anyway, Anto that was enormous fun – thank you very much! And thanks also to Newmarketsausage for the explanations of RACISTS and ANCHOR.
    Now for today’s cryptic…

  5. Wellbeck @4

    “(such as NINA: I’ve worked out what that is, but what do the letters stand for?)”

    See the FAQ page.

  6. Thank you Gaufrid! I’ve just had a very pleasant tea-break browsing the general FS site, and also learning more about the bloggers.
    I came to FS in a roundabout way, my partner having found the daily blogs much more useful and informative than the Guardian’s own crossword section. So until you steered me to the FS homepage, I’d only ever checked out that day’s solutions-blog. I now know a NINA isn’t an acronym after all! (You wouldn’t believe how many attempts I made at decyphering it!)
    Although I’ve only been tangling with cryptics for a few years, the vast majority of my knowledge has been gleaned from reading these blogs. You guys are brilliant!

  7. I’m not sure that I see the problem with the definition part of 28a – is it not OK to have an allusion to the solution (“their colour discrimination”) as the definition?

    And I took 17a as a dd, rather than a cd, with patent meaning both “clear” and “evidence of invention”.

    Thanks to Anto and nms – the latter particularly for the parsing of 13a. I frequently miss both homophone indicators and golf references, so tgeir combination in this case was fatal!

  8. Thanks to Newmarketsausage and Anto – Geoff@7 – I agree with both of your first points – thanks for pointing them out.

  9. Thanks, Geoff. I’ve made a couple of edits to the blog.

    On 28a I wasn’t so much suggesting that the definition was wrong, more that it was unusual. Or at least that was the intention 🙂

  10. I took 26A to be a triple definition as well with HIT ON = discovered as well as proposition and the Hilton word play.

    I’ve been critical of the difficulty of Anto’s quiptics in the past – and I found the across clues to be a bit daunting – but the down clues fell into place quickly making this an excellent challenge without being too rough on us slower folk. Great job!

  12. Paulus @7 and newmarketsausage @9, my pleasure — literally, as I am chuffed to have made a comment that was seen as a positive contribution! (I am a beginner, for whom even Monday and Tuesday puzzles are a challenge.)

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