Independent 10,644/Vigo

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A pleasing puzzle from Vigo this morning in the ‘doesn’t have to be hard to be enjoyable’ category. Brava.

 

The only other thing to add before I hand over to you is that it’s a pangram. Why did Vigo make it a pangram? Because she can.

 

 

Abbreviations
cd cryptic definition
dd double definition
cad clue as definition
(xxxx)* anagram
anagrind = anagram indicator
[x] letter(s) removed

definitions are underlined

Across

1 Disperse liquid in small dish
SPLATTER
A charade of S and PLATTER.

5 Prisoner and scoundrel agree
CONCUR
A charade of CON and CUR.

9 Plant officer eats right before a mass
MARJORAM
A charade of R inserted into MAJOR, A and M.

10 Initially dismiss everything just as very unusual and weird sensation
DÉJÀ VU
The initial letters of the second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth and seventh words of the clue.

12 Distributed publicity material the French left during a fair day
LEAFLETED
A charade of LE for one of the words for ‘the’ in French, L inserted into A FETE and D for ‘day’.

13 Be quiet about thickness returning in spirit
SYLPH
An insertion of PLY reversed in SH! The reversal indicator is ‘returning’ and the insertion indicator is ‘about’.

14 Dock is important to auditor
QUAY
A homophone (‘to auditor’) of KEY.

16 Fantastic magazine distributed without energy
AMAZING
(MAGAZIN[E])*

19 Agreement rejected after mother left drop of mulled wine
MALMSEY
A charade of MA, L, M for the first letter of ‘mulled’ and YES reversed.

21 Work in the garden every other weekend
WEED
The odd letters of WeEkEnD.

24 Unusual degree in dance
RUMBA
A charade of RUM and BA.

25 Devote attention to four consumed by religious sect
CULTIVATE
A charade of CULT, IV for the Roman numeral ‘four’ and ATE.

27 Page with amusing predicament
PLIGHT
A charade of P and LIGHT.

28 Paper directed at recent union members
CONFETTI
A cd.

29 Desire broadcast to be live
RESIDE
(DESIRE)*

30 Always returning to accept press release that’s for Amnesty
REPRIEVE
An insertion (‘to accept’) of PR and IE for id est in EVER reversed.

Down

1 Try politician in North West town
SAMPLE
An insertion of MP in SALE.

2 Nymphs line a rave dancing?
LARVAE
A charade of L and (A RAVE)*

3 After time register one living under bridge?
TROLL
A charade of T and ROLL. Now most often used to describe an online nuisance posting inflammatory comments, it originally refers to a mythological creature from Scandinavian folklore. Vigo is referencing the Norwegian fairy tale, Three Billy Goats Gruff, where the troll living under the bridge is outwitted by the three animals.

4 Precisely perform first two parts of lyric by former partner
EXACTLY
A charade of EX, ACT and LY for the initial two letters of ‘lyric’.

6 Exaggerate deliveries going to art gallery
OVERSTATE
A charade of cricket OVERS and TATE.

7 Clergyman in church by a prairie
CHAPLAIN
A charade of CH, A and PLAIN.

8 Approximate time to produce fibre
ROUGHAGE
A charade of ROUGH and AGE.

11 Decide against boxing plan
IDEA
Hidden in decIDE Against.

15 Wound staunched without scars
UNSCATHED
(STAUNCHED)* To make ‘wound’ the anagrind you have to read it as the past tense of ‘wind’.

Edit: or, more likely, just consider ‘wound’ as meaning ‘to injure’.  Thanks to WordPlodder.

17 Rude sprite with tie to king
IMPROPER
A charade of IMP, ROPE and R for rex or ‘king’.

18 Slimy cop running in international competition
OLYMPICS
(SLIMY COP)*

20 Talk about being embraced by ox
YACK
An insertion of C for circa or ‘about’ in YAK.

21 Hail desirable reception
WELCOME
A triple definition.

22 Nerve to drop ball for a contest
BATTLE
Vigo is inviting you to remove the O (a ‘ball’) from BOTTLE and replace it with an A.

23 Remove frost around head of vital instrument
DEVICE
An insertion of V for the first letter of ‘vital’ in DE-ICE.

26 Popular judge rises to conclude
INFER
A charade of IN and REF reversed (‘rises’, because it’s a down clue).

Many thanks to Vigo for the start to the Indy week.

15 comments on “Independent 10,644/Vigo”

  1. There were quite a few here that gave me pause for thought, including being stuck on 1a for the first few minutes trying to make an anagram from ‘Disperse’. I never did understand the ‘one living under bridge?’ bit of 3d so thanks for the explanation. I wondered about LIGHT for ‘amusing’, but it is in you know where. MALMSEY is an interesting, not so common word.

    Six of one, but I parsed the anagram indicator ‘Wound’ in 15d as the imperative of the verb to wound, or injure.

    One of life’s little pleasures to spot the pangram at the end.

    Thanks to Vigo and Pierre

  2. After solving 26d, I thought it would be interesting to see if Chambers thesaurus now accepts imply and infer as synonyms. Strangely, under “imply” “infer” is listed and it then goes into some detail as to their different meanings. Go figure.

  5. Thanks for the blog, Pierre. I parsed 15dn as you did but it works either way. Whichever, I had a tick for it.

    Other favourites were WEED, CONFETTI, OLYMPICS. WELCOME and BATTLE.

    Many thanks to Vigo for a pleasant start to the week.

  6. I agree with WordPlodder though with a different conclusion to Pierre!  As WP says, six of one: I really do think both interpretations of ‘wound’ are as good as the other. Wound can certainly mean tangled or entwined, admittedly often associated with ‘around’ but it’s good enough for me.  I’m also with WP on liking MALMSEY.  (The clue, that is; I’m not accusing you of being a toper).  I might have said this before, but, these days, trolls prefer living in white houses to beneath bridges.

    An effortless pangram is always nice to see and my suspicions were aroused fairly early on when J, V, X, Y, P, F and M appeared.  In fact, wondered if a double might have been on its way at one point as several of those starting popping up.

    I smiled at the surface for OLYMPICS, BATTLE is simple but neat, I liked the anagram for AMAZING, DEJA VU was almost excellent – the initial letters cleverly clued but maybe a bit more could have been done with the link to the definition?  Nice to see a different NW town to Bury in SAMPLE.  The thesaurus says ‘idea’ and ‘plan’ are synonyms but, on reflection, I feel the first is less developed and definitive than the second.  An idea precedes a plan.  An idea is more vague than a plan.  I’m not objecting to the clue but was prompted to muse…

    Thanks Vigo and Pierre

  7. Eileen @5: I’ve taken rather a time to compose my post and yours appeared in the interim and, once again, we appear to share an opinion (ref wound).  I also enjoyed the clues you highlighted and only omitted WEED and CONFETTI because I’ve seen very similar before.  Any triple (or more) definition is to be admired, especially if the clue only consists of three words!

  9. A pleasant start to the working week – very enjoyable.  Plenty to like, such as MARJORAM, LARVAE and TROLL but our favourite was CONFETTI.  Thanks, Vigo and Pierre.

  10. This pangram was light but a lot of fun with plenty of good clues to choose from when selecting a favourite with BATTLE just nosing in front at the winning post.

    I shuddered when I got the answer to 12a and was horrified to find it listed as a verb in Chambers.  That’s progress, I suppose.

    Many thanks to Vigo and to Pierre.

  11. RD @10: I sympathise.  I recall once reading the phrase, “unfortunately there is such a word as canisterize” and I call it to mind on occasion when encountering such as 12a.

  12. Wouldn’t it be nice if 21a’s only had to be dealt with every other weekend!

    A couple in the SE that held me up for a while but otherwise the usual delightful selection from this setter – with a slight wince over 12a.

    RUMBA and CONFETTI raised the biggest smiles here.

    Thanks to Vigo for another most enjoyable puzzle and thanks to Pierre for the review.

     

     

  13. Thank you Vigo for a delightful crossword with plenty of smiles. I did have a few clues where I had no idea until I had some crossing letters then the penny dropped, but I thought the difficulty was just right and the surface readings were very good.

  15. Extremely late and probably nobody will read this, but if you do please could you explain how Homer hasn’t in fact nodded at 21ac: to me ‘every other weekend’ doesn’t mean ‘every other letter of the word weekend’, and it seems a mistake of the same type as ‘First week’ to give w, which Don Manley draws attention to in his Crossword Manual.

    I hope I’m wrong and am missing something, because for me that was the only blemish in a nice crossword.

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