I’m not sure if Cyclops is saying a not-too-fond ‘Farewell’ to TMay, or offering a Churchillian ‘Welcome’ to BoJo – or both – in this puzzle.
Quite a few aggressive gestures – TWO-FINGER SALUTE, F-OFF, V-SIGN, UP YOURS! – which I suspect are aimed more at the incoming POSH SCHEMER, with his TOP-HEAVY ‘No Deal’ PROGRAMME, and his DESUL-TORY STYLE, threatening to CUT-UP ROUGH on any AGREEMENT with the EU…
Maybe a little suggestion that the departing TMay should go and HAVE FUN, preferably in a NON-PROFIT way.
3D was wonderfully concise, evoking an image of a sad clown performing in a cut-price supermarket car-park! And 4D suggests that Trump’s SMART PHONE is getting depressed with his knee-jerky Tweeting habit. As for 18A – well, what can I say?!
All V-intage stuff, fun to solve and blog. Hope all is clear below…
| Across | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Clue No | Solution | Clue | Definition (with occasional embellishments) / Logic/parsing |
|
| 8A | PROGRAMME | Agenda for GOP’s main strike against Cyclops (9) | agenda / PRO (for) + G (first, or main, letter of Gop) + RAM (strike) + ME (Cyclops) |
|
| 9A | SKULL | Head’s row reported (5) | head / homophone, i.e. reported – the SKULL (head) sounds like to SCULL (row) |
|
| 10A | SCHEMER | Boris finally the revolutionary? “Yours truly, right one to make a plan” (7) | one to make a plan / S (final letter of boriS) + CHE (Guevara, revolutionary) + ME (yours truly, Cyclops again!) + R (right) |
|
| 11A | UP YOURS | Out of bed, one’s said to accompany 16 ac.? (2,5) | said to accompany 16A (two-finger salute!) / UP (out of bed) + YOURS (one’s) |
|
| 12A | STAPLE | Putin’s head covered by old hat – fix (6) | fix / STA_LE (old hat) around (covering) P (first letter, or head, of Putin) |
|
| 14A | ST GEORGE | Patriotic figure way before a royal son (2,6) | patriotic figure / ST (street, or way) + GEORGE (Prince George, a royal son) |
|
| 16A | TWO-FINGER SALUTE | Double-digit salary halved – Native Americans making dismissive gesture (3-6,6) | dismissive gesture / TWO (double) FINGER (digit) + SAL (SALary, halved) + UTE (Native American tribe) |
|
| 18A | POLISHED | Rubbed top of penis with processed oil drop (8) | rubbed / P (first letter, or top, of Penis) + OLI (anag, i.e. processed, of OIL) + SHED (drop) |
|
| 20A | ORCHID | Showy thing from church, wearing Dior creation (6) | showy thing / OR_ID (anag, i.e. creation, of DIOR) around (worn by) CH (church) |
|
| 23A | EXCLAIM | Late demand makes you cry (7) | cry / EX (late, former) + CLAIM (demand) |
|
| 24A | HAVE FUN | Perform sex with Joy – get much pleasure (4,3) | get much pleasure / HAVE (perform sex with) + FUN (joy) |
|
| 26A | V-SIGN | Churchill’s thing very sore at first before gin cocktail (1-4) | Churchill’s thing / V (very) + S (first letter of Sore) + IGN (anag, i.e. cocktail, of GIN) |
|
| 27A | NON-PROFIT | Unlikely NF portion is charitable? (3-6) | charitable? / anag, i.e. unlikely, of NF PORTION |
|
| Down | ||||
| Clue No | Solution | Clue | Definition (with occasional embellishments) / Logic/parsing |
|
| 1D | SPASMS | Jerks pass out when cut by short sergeant-major (6) | jerks / SPA_S (anag, i.e. out, of PASS) around (cut by) SM (abbreviation, i.e. short, for Sergeant Major) |
|
| 2D | POSH | Far-right Katie, abandoning family, turns into a celeb (4) | a celeb (Posh Spice?) / anag, i.e. turns into, of HOP( |
|
| 3D | GRIMALDI | Dire supermarket clown (8) | clown / GRIM (dire) + ALDI (supermarket) |
|
| 4D | SMART | & 22 Much depressed in the case of tweet-mad Trump? (5,5) | &lit-ish/CD? / The keys of a SMART PHONE are much/often (de)pressed by the tweet-mad Ronald T Dump… |
|
| 5D | DESULTORY | Duels wrecked politician’s rambling (9) | rambling / DESUL (anag, i.e. wrecked, of DUELS) + TORY (polititcian) |
|
| 6D | CUT UP ROUGH | Hack’s to act in bad-tempered fashion (3,2,5) | doule defn.? / to hack, can be to CUT (something) UP ROUGH(ly); and to act in a bad tempered fashion can be to CUT UP ROUGH (?) |
|
| 7D | GLASS EYE | Good girlie mag. for the non-working viewer (5,3) | non-working viewer / G (good) + LASS (girlie) + EYE (this mag-azine!) |
|
| 9D | STYLE | Approach an opportunity to get your leg over, it’s said (5) | approach / homophone, i.e. it is said – a STYLE is an approach to something, and sounds like STILE, something you might ‘get your leg over’, during a walk in the country… |
|
| 13D | APOPLECTIC | Poetical PC (Barking) on the rampage (10) | on the rampage / anag, i.e. barking, of POETICAL PC |
|
| 15D | AGREEMENT | Emerge – “ta” – with half of no bastard deal! (9) | deal / anag, i.e. bastard, of EMERGE + TA + N( |
|
| 16D | TOP-HEAVY | Descriptive of Dolly, prime screen villain? (3-5) | descriptive of Dolly (Parton) / a prime(-time) screen villain (HEAVY) might be a TOP HEAVY |
|
| 17D | AARDVARK | Early dictionary entry shows RADA’s crappy (very) craft (8) | early dictionary entry / AARD (anag, i.e. crappy, of RADA) + V (very, again!) + ARK (biblical craft) |
|
| 19D | STAIN | Liberal given the boot by dictator Mark (5) | mark / STA( |
|
| 21D | DENOTE | Balls up public school upbringing? That’s mean! (6) | mean / DE (ED Balls, former UK politician, up) + NOTE (Eton, public school, brought up) |
|
| 22D | PHONE | See 4dn (5) | see 4D / see 4D |
|
| 25D | F-OFF | It makes frock rock? Get away! (1-3) | get away! / to make ( |
|
I failed to parse 8ac, perhaps thrown by ‘GOP’ with which I wasn’t familiar. I have learnt it stands for Grand Old (ie Republican) Party. However, “for” = PRO at the beginning and “Cyclops” = ME at the end, together with the def was enough.
Re 11ac, I’m familiar with ‘one’ as a posh way of saying ‘I’, but ‘you’? Maybe just haven’t hung around enough posh people to hear it?
Your 13d hasn’t yet got me apoplectic, but for safety’s sake perhaps best amend it asap. 😉
“… perhaps best amend it asap.”
I don’t understand this.
Will at #3 – in my parsing of 13D, I had put ‘APOPLEPTIC’ instead of ‘APOPLECTIC’ – now corrected – which was causing lemming at #2 some ‘apoplexy’ (which I guess is better than the narcolepsy my blogs usually induce!?).
(The comment could be read to seem a little brusque/demanding, but he did put a smiley face after it, so I took it in the humorous way I think it was intended…i.e. implying that speed was of the essence, given that apoplexy can be a fit of infuriation to the point of bursting a blood vessel…)
Tony at #1 – re. 11A, I see where one is coming from(!) – I think I just took it in the sense that e.g. ‘minding your Ps and Qs’ is often used synonymously with ‘minding one’s Ps and Qs’…and didn’t think too deeply about it…
Ah, I didn’t see your entry before the edit. I took lemming’s comment to be lighthearted but couldn’t see what he was getting at. Thanks for the explanation.
Guardian 27,886 is an Eye-themed crossword.
mc_rapper@4, of course! What was I thinking? That a far more widespread use of ‘one’. Sometimes you can’t see the wood for the trees.
I think you mean, “Sometimes *one* can’t see the wood for the trees.” 😉
I had a few favourites this time. aardvark, glass eye, polished and stain…..but the last was so well structured.
Will@8, thanks for explaining my joke in case anyone didn’t get it.