A pleasant solve from Tyrus today.
1/10 took longer than it should have done to solve because we could not see where the ‘Q’ would go in 10ac. We hadn’t thought about IQ being defined as a 2-letter word.
Our LOI was 2d as we had no idea who the ‘wheeled king’ was and we needed very crossing letter to solve it.
An anagram of I WILL AVOID UN AID and Q (first letter of questions or ‘initially’ – anagrind is ‘annoyed’. The definition is a play on how Trump portrays every critic of himself.
A LOB (throw) reversed or ‘backed’ – a ‘lift and separate’ clue. The ‘ISH’ implies ‘sort of’
An anagram of SO I’M and R and D (first and last letters of respected or ‘extremely’) and A TITAN IN – anagrind is ‘working’
sADDLED (burdened) without first letter or ‘when leader’s away’
GEN (info) reversed or ‘about’ LETS (cancelled services, as in tennis) around C (college)
PR (image control) IS ON (working) and ER (Her Majesty)
LOO and HaCkS (alternate letters only or ‘regularly used’) reversed or ‘on return journey’
An anagram of IF CLEAN HOW PRES – anagram is ‘shabby’. The PRES is actually doing double duty as the definition describes how Trump referred to Prince Charles on Twitter.
MARGO (woman) reversed or ‘returning’ after STRIP (clear)
WHAT (I didn’t hear) and X (ten) in NET (clear)
E (Spain) LEG (on – as in cricket) IST (first)
W (wife) RETCH (gag)
An anagram of REAL (anagrind is ‘excited’) around or ‘welcoming’ EX (old) AND
OP (work) IT (reversed or ‘about’) MALe (gender) missing last letter or ‘mostly’
IN around XI (eleven) and O (first letter of o’clock or ‘at first’). IXION was a Greek mythological king who was expelled from Olympus by Zeus who ordered Hermes to bind Ixion to a burning solar wheel for all eternity.
EVER (always) inside or ‘opening’ BAGS (containers) around or ‘holding’ E (energy)
LATE (behind) round or ‘featuring’ alternate or ‘regular’ letters of aDvErT.
SH (say no more) A KO (stunning as in knock out)
O (love) DD (large size of bra or big boobs) SON (lad)
An anagram of DOG and A NURSE – anagrind is ‘exercising’
TAO (absolute principle) IS EACH (every single person) afterwards or ‘in support’
A play on the fact that a SIN KING may be one who is ‘pre-eminent in evil’
FOR (supporting) with REM (group) outside or ‘about’
A play on the fact that ‘no’ is HALF of nous (WIT). Tricky parsing but we solved it from the definition.
Hidden and reversed or ‘up’ in jungLE TARgetting
HOME (base) R (right). The Homer refers to the cartoon character Homer Simpson.
Thanks for parsing 20d. Very clever. Missed that one.
Was pleased to eventually parse REFORM. Stuck on the RE = “about” for too long.
Always nice to finish a Tyrus even though I didn’t parse 20d.
Thanks Tyrus and Bertandjoyce.
I failed rather dismally on this one, with four to go on running out of time. Included ‘stripogram’, which I should have got as I went out with one for a while, but she spelled it ‘stripagram’. Nevertheless, please with myself for getting ‘a low IQ individual’ and ‘Prince of Whales’. Whatever you may think about D.Trump, he is at least providing good crossword fodder. Thanks Tyrus and B&J.
Thanks for a great blog, B and J.
What a super puzzle! I had the same problem with 1/10, which was nearly last in. It had to be an anagram, surely, and having all the crossers seemed to make 10 INDIVIDUAL but what to do with IWLAOQ and no i? Such a laugh when the penny crashed down.
A while ago, Tyrus commented that Trump was the gift that goes on giving. How lucky we are that he goes on exploiting the gift.
I could give a long list of favourites but I’ll just pick out NEGLECTS, STRIPOGRAM, WHAT NEXT, DANGEROUS [after trying to find an anagram of HAIRY DOG A] and TAOISEACH, for reinforcing the mnemonic for the spelling which I got from my first Eccles solve [slightly different but equally good clue].
Huge thanks, Tyrus. It really made my day.
Thanks, B & J. Just a note: “A low IQ individual” is also a direct quotation from Trump, referring to Joe Biden!
The clue for 2 would have worked better and been more accurate with “sex” (the biological term — male or female) instead of “gender” (the grammatical term — masculine, feminine or neuter).
Terrific stuff from Tyrus – always a great blend of chewy wordplay and a few really good laughs!
Thanks to him and to B&J
Not sure about about comment#5
Collins dict has
Gender is the state of being male or female in relation to the social and cultural roles that are considered appropriate for men and women.
A challenge as one expects from Tyrus, but we got it all, although we failed to parse REFORM.
Further to NeilW’s comment @4 one might add ‘it takes one to know one’ 😉
Thanks, Tyrus and B&J.
Very nearly finished this without any external aids, but succumbed with three to go. Two unparsed, 18d and 20d. Didn’t know of 1a/10a or 21a, as I don’t even listen to anything he says.
I found this hard going, only getting two answers after about half an hour. Came back to it and it slowly fell out.
1/10 defeated me and I needed to cheat heavily to get it. Even when I had all but the Q, I couldn’t see it.
Lovely crossword but, indeed, not really easy.
I am surprised to see that so many solvers had problems to parse 18d (REFORM) – I actually thought this was one of the easier ones.
Anyway, I bunged in HALFWIT at 20d, moved on and forget about how to properly parse it.
The wheeled king was, just like for B&J, my LOI.
Many thanks to Bertandandjoyce & Tyrus.
Bertandjoyce, of course 🙂
Thanks to Bertandjoyce and others who commented.
Thanks also to our friend across the pond who is clearly an irony-free zone.