Very entertaining, put a smile on my face. Thanks Paul.
| Across | ||
| 1 | BLOTTO | Bowled, chance of a draw wasted (6) |
| B (bowled) LOTTO (chance of a draw, a lottery) – slang for drunk | ||
| 4 | JIGSAW | Cutter in dance is no longer tacking? (6) |
| JIG ((dance) then WAS (IS in past tense, no longer) reversed (tacking, alternating direction) | ||
| 9 | See 21 | |
| 10 | PEEPING TOM | Someone spying first of pins grasped by marker of territory? (7,3) |
| Pins (first letter of) inside (grasped by) PEEING TOM (marker of territory, a cat) | ||
| 11 | POUNCE | Spring, when one has cup upset (6) |
| anagram (upset) of ONE with CUP | ||
| 12 | See 23 | |
| 13 | STEAMSHIP | SIX (not 9) sides in vessel (9) |
| Six missing IX (9) then TEAMS (sides) HIP (in, fashionable) | ||
| 15 | TOGO | How one’s coffee may be ordered in African country (4) |
| TO GO (how one’s coffee may be ordered) | ||
| 16 | PUMA | For all to see in May for example, a wild animal (4) |
| U (for all to see, film classification) in PM (prime minister, May for example) then A | ||
| 17 | OVERSLEPT | Lover’s pet snakes failed to stir (9) |
| anagram (snakes) of LOVER’S PET | ||
| 21, 9 | GOODISON PARK | Skilful, I start crossing on football ground (8,4) |
| GOOD (skillful) then I SPARK (start) containing (crossing) ON | ||
| 22 | ASSIST | Help player, having missed header (6) |
| bASSIST (player) missing first letter (header) | ||
| 24 | BELL THE CAT | Having suffered main loss in difficult battle, Chelsea take on dangerous responsibility (4,3,3) |
| anagram (difficult) of BATTLE CHELsea missing (having suffered…loss) main (sea) | ||
| 25 | OATH | Curse at my gags (4) |
| AT inside (…gags) OH (my, an exclamation) | ||
| 26 | DOOBRY | Nothing coming in when delivery happened, track item without a name? (6) |
| O (nothing) inside (coming in) DOB (date of birth, when delivery happened) then RY (railway, track) | ||
| 27 | BREEZE | Comic’s ending in second place — that’s easy (6) |
| BEEZER (former children’s comic) with the letter R (ending) moved to second place | ||
| Down | ||
| 1 | See 19 | |
| 2 | OAKEN | Woody Allen movie, black melodrama, hero ultimately sent up (5) |
| last letters (ultimately) of alleN moviE blacK melodramA herO reversed (sent up) | ||
| 3 | TOPLESS | xposed? (7) |
| eXPOSED is an example of something being topless, and to be topless is to be exposed | ||
| 5 | IBIDEM | In the same book, I remain magnificent, initially (6) |
| I BIDE (remain) Magnificent (initial letter of) | ||
| 6 | SUGAR BOWL | Lumps in it perhaps, take up American dress on creature of the night (5,4) |
| US (American) reversed (take up) GARB (dress) then OWL (creature of the night) | ||
| 7 | WHO’S WHO | How novel twice has inspired second reference book (4,3) |
| anagram (novel) of WHO WHO (twice) contains (inspired) S (second) | ||
| 8 | DEATH IN VENICE | Bones to cover still, penning a fine book (5,2,6) |
| DICE (bones) contains (to cover) EVEN (still) containing (penning) A THIN (fine) | ||
| 14 | ARMADILLO | Animal appendage getting a bash, suffering cuts (9) |
| ARM (appendage) with A DO (bash, party) containing (…cuts) ILL (suffering) | ||
| 16 | PROCEED | Start low, catching French horn up (7) |
| DEEP (low) containing (catching) COR (French horn) all reversed (up) | ||
| 18 | REACTOR | Cleric guarding a nuclear structure (7) |
| RECTOR (cleric) contains (guarding) A | ||
| 19, 1 | PUSH THE BOAT OUT | Go to town, or go to sea? (4,3,4,3) |
| double definition | ||
| 20 | ESTHER | Stocked by libraries, the reference book (6) |
| found inside (stocked by) librariES THE Reference – book of The Bible | ||
| 23, 12 | STONE THE CROWS | Man alive seen to empty trash out before a murder (5,3,5) |
| anagram (out) of SEEN TO TrasH (empty, no middle letters) then CROWS ( a murder of crows, collective noun) | ||
definitions are underlined
I write these posts to help people get started with cryptic crosswords. If there is something here you do not understand ask a question; there are probably others wondering the same thing.
Didn’t get 24a or 26a and couldn’t parse 27a but nearly a first Prize finish.
The definition for 23,12 should be ‘Man Alive’ I think with SEEN TO TrasH as the anagram.
Oh and thanks Paul and PeeDee! Sorry my first ever post, excuse my manners.
Thanks PeeDee for the parsing of BREEZE – I’d forgotten the Beezer.
And thanks to Paul for an entertaining puzzle.
A probably unintentional feline mini-theme here (tom, cat, puma, pounce).
Agree with pavement (to whom, Welcome): the explanation of 23,12 is missing an ‘N’ and ‘alive’. FWIW Stone the Crows was a band I saw open for Zeppelin in 1971. Not terribly remarkable, except that they managed to be louder than the main act.
Thanks to Paul and PeeDee.
For me this was Paul at his best. It took us much longer than maybe it should have as I wrote 19/1d in the wrong way round and then had CALL THE BET which seemed much better than BELL THE CAT which I’d never heard of. Once these were sorted out things began to fall into place. I had loads of ticks with OATH being my favourite – concise clue, short answer, clever wordplay. This and Rosa in the FT kept us entertained on and off until Sunday evening. Thanks to Paul for a top class prize puzzle and to PeeDee for an exemplary and clear blog.
Thanks to Paul and PeeDee. I got BELL THE CAT but was defeated by DOOBRY AND did not parse BREEZE.
Thanks PeeDee. STONE THE CROWS is probably as passé an exclamation down here as “Man Alive!” up there: two-word utterances suffice now. 4A had me torn between ripsaw and jigsaw: could R.I.P justify ‘no longer’ or was ‘was’ reversed (via tacking) better. The jig /dance settled it, with a shrug. Last in was DOOBRY, the only thing feasible but never heard of. All pleasant enough.
A splendid wander through some colloquial English with Paul, although I found it hard to finish. I chuckled at the marker of territory, and spent a lot of time staring, baffled, at ‘xposed’ and was quite pleased with myself when I finally worked it out. My Chambers doesn’t give DOOBRY (which is how I imagined the spelling should be)- it has ‘doobrey’ or ‘doobrie’ both of which feel wrong to me. My LOI was BREEZE, because although I’d thought for a while that must be the answer, I really couldn’t convince myself and it was only at the very end that I remembered there had been a comic called the Beezer. Great stuff, Paul, and thanks for the blog, PeeDee.
I could have written your post, acd@6. I was another who missed the unfamiliar DOOBRY, and 27a BREEZE was an unparsed guess for me as well. I also didn’t know 21a GOODISON though I guessed it was a PARK so got 9d. So I was defeated by Paul on the day, but nonetheless found the attempt enjoyable. I loved 10a PEEPING TOM, 3d TOPLE$SS and 14d ARMADILLO (correct fodder this time; wasn’t it an anagram that didn’t work in a cryptic a while back? Sorry my memory’s going.). Agree with your post, WK@5, and yes you are right, 25a OATH was a neat little clue – “gags” being an interesting “inside” indicator. 23,12d STONE THE CROWS took me ages to see and I didn’t know it was the name of a rock band, Dr WhatsOn@4 [I didn’t ever see Led Zeppelin live (sad face) but did see Robert Plant live at Bluesfest last year and he was fantastic!] . Yes molonglo@7; I agree “stone the crows” it is not used much now but it reminds me of my dear Dad, who used to have some lovely Aussie colloquisms, although his version of that one was “Stone the BLOODY crows”.
I echo the welcome to pavement@1 and 2.
Thanks to Paul who won out on this occasion, and to PeeDee for clearing up the intention of the clues I didn’t get.
This kept me going all week. Pleased to finish it with LOI ‘Bell the cat’ a phrase I’d never heard of, also never come across ‘sea’ for ‘main’. Have been pondering all week how enjoyable this was compared to last week’s monster offerring. Paul seems to me to hide his answers in plain sight, you feel you should have seen it all along. Whilst last week it felt like Maskarade reached too often for obscurity, like looking for a needle in a haystack and then not recognising it as a needle. Unfair? By the way one small question, why the single L in skilful? 21,9 Thanks Paul as ever and Peedee for the blog
I really enjoyed tthe humour in this puzzle. My favourites were TOPLESS, OATH, STONE THE CROWS.
New for me was bones = dice, and also Goodison Park.
I was unable to parse BREEZE.
Thanks Paul and PeeDee.
Like others I got but failed to parse BEEZER. Despite regular acquaintance with its content in my dim & distant youth.
My LOI was DOOBRY only discovered by bashing through Chambers so maybe a bit of a cheat. As KeithS says Chambers gives variants spelling rather than the one used Let’s call it a draw.
Echoing comment earlier, this was a real palate cleanser after the (for me) unfinished feast of the Easter special.
Thanks Paul PeeDee and all the excellent contributors to the blog.
Thanks to Paul and PeeDee. Generally found this tough going, but nearly got there in the end. A DNF for me because I failed on 24 having never heard the expression before. However still very enjoyable and I liked stone the crows, Togo and steamship. Thanks again to Paul and PeeDee.
Huge fun as usual, for which thank you Paul. And thanks to PeeDee for explaining several parsing problems I had. As so often it took me all week (I only ever do Saturday’s puzzle anyway) but was still defeated by 16dn and 26, but, again as so often, I kicked myself when I saw the answers.
pavement @1 – many thanks for pointing out the slips and welcome! Such comments are always welcome as I can’t see the mistakes myself, I only see what I meant to write. Sometimes I write the wrong word entirely and cannot see it until someone points it out.
I decided I had finished on Sunday evening, but that included a wrong guess for 26, as I have never seen DOOBRY written out before – I had always rather assumed it was DEWBERRY. As to BELL THE CAT, the tale is of mice who decided to put a bell on a cat to warn them of his proximity, but could not decide who would take on the job of carrying it out – a dangerous responsibility. I think there was meant to be a feline theme. Thanks to all.
Thanks Paul and Peedee. Very enjoyable week although we were defeated by Bell the Cat having never heard the phrase. And Doobry although have vague memories of using it as a teenage as a substitute for an unknown. Never saw it written down! The W at the end of 4a. Distracted me for ages with a possible sew = tacking. Favourites like others Topless and Peeping Tom. And I liked Oaken and Sugar Bowl a lot. We couldn’t parse Goodison Park beyond Skilful = Good and the I but amused ourselves with SON and PARK (S.Korean footballers) playing (crossimg)!. However sadly neither played for Everton FC.
For 26ac, I had DOOSRA which is a delivery in cricket that does not come into the batsman but goes out towards off. Having said that I had no idea with the parsing except something along the lines of the name being Dora and OS being something to do with a track item on maps. Like others, this was the first time I have seen doobry written down.
Re DOOBRY – it seems to me that the idea of having an “official” spelling for a word like doobry is nonsense. Words like this are used only verbally, they are invented and don’t have a formal etymology on which to to base a spelling. One spelling is as good as another. For practical purposes dictionaries have to pick one to list the word under, but any spelling that conveys the sound and meaning of the word is a good one.
[Burnbake@10, just to say British English (and Australian) has it as SKILFUL, while I think American spell it with an extra “L”, SKILLFUL. I see PeeDee used the latter, Paul the former.]
Thanks to PeeDee and Paul
The spelling of the doodad/doodah/doohickey/idunnowhat/oojahmaflip/thingumabob/thingumajig/thingummy/whatchamacallit, word at 26a is supported here but I can find no reference for CHANCE OF A DRAW = LOTTO.
Very enjoyable crossword, loved 25a because sometimes I do.
Having lively words in the grid is a bit of a Paul trademark and I think he excelled himself here.
It was a coincidence that only the day before doing this puzzle I was reminiscing about the weekly Beezer I used to get as a boy. Rather difficult for foreigners, or even younger Brits to get, perhaps?
Enjoyed this, especially the typically Pauline near-smut in 10 ac. Though Paul is famous for getting close to the knuckle, he doesn’t overdo it – he rations the smutty clues so that they are more of a delight when one does turn up.
Have to check on my other computer where the completed puzzle is stored, as I don’t remember if I got DOOBRY at 26 ac, or bunged in some less plausible alternative.
Got the Beezer – the less appreciated sibling of Dandy and Beano – but only on the parsing; it didn’t help with solving (which was pretty much a biff).
Couldn’t fully parse 8 dn, so needed this blog.
Many thanks to Paul and PeeDee.
Paul back on form, I thought. As usual a lot of solve then parse, eg 8d that I guessed from the V, but I don’t mind if there is some wit involved. LOsI were 26 and 27. 26 because I’d never seen it written down and wouldn’t have spelt it this way and 27 because I only tried to fit in a comedian. When my son told me that it referred to the comic it rang a distant bell.
Thanks to Paul and PeeDee.
Yes, Paul on enjoyable form. Fave was 14a.
Like Neil (@18), I thought it had to be DOOSRA but couldn’t see why.
Ouch! I mean 14d!
Enjoyable, with some quite lateral answers leaping out, stone the crows being one. Over too quickly, and sadly hard copy recycled this arvo before realising comments were to come.
Got Death in Venedig, but without seeing the double inclusion to parse. Bell the cat enjoyed.
Thanks Paul
I was another with DOOSRA, as couldn’t think of anything that fit, even though it didn’t parse.
BELL THE CAT reminded me of the one where Jerry gets Tom to put a bell on himself.