Independent 10,685 by Gila

by

An enjoyable and mostly easy puzzle.

ACROSS
1 SEINFELD US sitcom character‘s life ends badly (8)
 

(Life ends)*
5 GRADES Grammar school receiving excellent 5th place in Ofsted’s rankings (6)
 

G{rammar} S{chool} around (rad(=a slang term for excellent) + 5th letter of Ofsted)
9/6 CRISTIANO RONALDO Footballer from Croatia is upset with London rents at first (9,7)
 

(Croatia is + London r[ents])
11 NYLON Material used for hose is now primarily plastic only (5)
 

N[ow] + only*
12 UNTIED Family member without a day free (6)
 

[A]untie + d{ay}
13 SEA LEVEL Aquatic creature almost always next to lake causes rising concern (3,5)
 

Seal + eve[r] + l{ake}
15 BEAUTY PARLOUR Do business? (6,7)
 

CD. Not entirely sure I follow the logic but I suppose various words involving do (hairdo, doing nails etc) refer to beauty treatments.
18 PANIC STATIONS Captain is not prepared to tackle the onset of such a state of commotion (5,8)
 

(Captain is not)* + s[uch]
22 EVENTUAL Final, incorrect net value (8)
 

(Net value)*
23 AT EASE A kid is chilled-out (2,4)
 

A + tease(=kid)
26 CAROB Cold mug filled with a chocolate-like substance (5)
 

C{old} + rob (in the sense of mugging someone) around a. Carob is a tree which is used to make a chocolate substitute.
27 EXUBERANT Former taxi firm worker possibly in high spirits (9)
 

Ex + Uber ant(=worker possibly, a type of ant)
28 ELEVEN French pupil joining new soccer team? (6)
 

Elève + n{ew}. A football team normally has 11 players but other sports (e.g. cricket) also have that number, so the question mark is required.
29 B LISTERS Bubbles for less important celebs (1-7)
 

DD (blisters)
DOWN
1 SUCCUMBS Stucco oddly breaks into pieces right away and gives under pressure (8)
 

Odd letters of stucco + c[r]umbs
2 IDIOT Innocent wedding vow contains one term of endearment (5)
 

I do around i + [endearmen]t
3 FITMENT Suitable space covered with banks of modernist furniture (7)
 

Fit(=suitable) + en(=space in printing) in m[odernis]t
4 LEAD Direct someone in a star role (4)
 

DD i.e. lead actor.
6 See 9 Across
 

7 DELIVEROO Online food company disliked returning glasses (9)
 

Reviled< + OO, which has the appearance of a pair of spectacles.
8 SINGLE Run on your own? (6)
 

DD. I think the question mark is to avoid definition by example, since "on your own" would only be one instance of being single (as opposed to "on my/his/her own").
10 OVERRATE Attach too much importance to the speed of deliveries? (8)
 

DD. The speed of deliveries in cricket would be the over rate.
14 SPACE AGE High-tech step taken by government advisory body (5-3)
 

Pace in Sage. Sage is the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies. Normally you wouldn't hear much about them, but for some reason they seem to have been in the news recently.
16 APPLE TREE Computer programme getting ordered regularly – it should bear fruit (5,4)
 

Applet (a small computer application) + even letters of ordered
17 ASBESTOS Fibres for protective coat and top stocked by fashion e-tailer (8)
 

Best in ASOS
19 NOTABLE Distinguished aristocrat interrupted by cheers (7)
 

Ta in noble
20 TOTTERS Small child having irregular rest risks falling down (7)
 

Tot + rest*
21 RESCUE When backing up, user initially neglected prompt to save (6)
 

[U]ser< + cue
24 APACE Military helicopter leaves hospital very quickly (5)
 

Apac[h]e
25 BULL Nonsense … it’s worth fifty! (4)
 

DD, referring to the bull's eye in darts

13 comments on “Independent 10,685 by Gila”

  1. I’d agree with our blogger’s overall assessment though I misled myself for a while with the initial U for UNTIED getting me to think ‘uncle’ for too long and also needing to reacquaint myself with the innocent meaning of idiot. I also failed to make any real sense of BEAUTY PARLOUR. And I needed help parsing GRADES – never heard of ‘rad’ = excellent. I see it’s an abbreviation of radical and is used these days, presumably, in similar way to wicked or sick.

    The RONALDO anagram and surface are good and I liked the relevant surface for PANIC STATIONS. FITMENTS took a long time to work out – I was sure I needed to know the name of a modernist furniture brand. DELIVEROO was clever. SPACE AGE must be a little passe for high tech? We’ve been in space for nearly 60 years now!

    Thanks Gila and NealH

  2. Although not very demanding, I thought this was a superb crossword. It must be difficult creating such natural surfaces whilst making it seem effortless. It’s particularly nice when double meanings are used in wordplay/definition. For example the ‘hose’ in 11a, the ‘mug’ in 26a and even the ‘glasses’ in 7d.

    I spent some time deciphering 2d. Rather than “the innocent meaning of idiot” that PostMark refers to, it was more “the idiot meaning for innocent” for me. In Chambers, this is the last nounal meaning for ‘innocent’. I also often fail to see “term” as “ending” (another clever use of a double meaning). Didn’t know ASOS in 17d, so had to google that.

    Thanks to Gilda and Neal.

  4. Even I had heard of the ‘Footballer’ at 9/6, so after initially thinking this was going to be the first of many unknowns, I managed to finish the puzzle without too much trouble. It did take me a while though to think of IDIOT for ‘Innocent’ and ASBESTOS held me up at the end, probably because ASOS did turn out to be the one unheard of. Had to come here to see how BEAUTY PARLOUR worked.

    Thanks to Gila and to NealH

  5. I also got hung up for a while on that family member being an uncle. I enjoyed the modern-ish usages: rad, asos, deliveroo, none of which would or did spring immediately to my mind. Helpful that 9/6 was one of the most famous footballers evvah! Thanks to Gila and to NealH.

  6. Loved today’s crossword. ASOS, DELIVEROO and UBER are bookmarked on my laptop so no problem with them. Slightly disappointed that I solved it quite quickly which is not the norm for me. Favourites were BEAUTY PARLOUR and B LISTERS. I love a bit of word play.
    Thanks to Gila and NealH

  7. I got off to a bad start with 1a & 5a, my first two answers in – we had a 20+ year old American sitcom, which I’d never heard of, followed by an ugly slang word, presumably American, for excellent. Fortunately things improved dramatically after that and it proved to be an enjoyable and mostly easy puzzle as Neal says, although I did think that 15a was rather dodgy.

    With lots to like, my top clues were BLISTERS, DELIVEROO and OVERRATE.

    Many thanks to Gila and to Neal.

  8. I had never heard ‘rad’ so unable to parse 5A. At 4D, I don’t see ‘lead’ = ‘direct’, as if you direct someone you tell them what to do, whilst if you lead them you’re actually taking them with you – I speak in such a pernickety fashion as a leader of walks. But much enjoyed anyway so thanks Gila and Neal.

  9. Similar experience to that of RD in that I’d never heard of the American sitcom and didn’t know that the dreadful slang word for excellent also exists in a short form.
    Fortunately, I did know the footballer – wonders never cease – but I spent quite a while trying to fit ‘uncle’ into 12a.

    Top two for me were EXUBERANT and BLISTERS.

    Thanks to Gila and to Neal for the review.

  10. Well, we’re usually the ones who’ve never heard of something (particularly if American) but we knew of SEINFELD and had encountered ‘rad’ before in a crossword so we had no problems today – we even knew of the footballer|
    Lots to like, particularly EXUBERANT and DELIVEROO.
    Thanks, Gila and NealH.

  13. I enjoyed this too, despite my ignorance of ASOS, DELIVEROO or SAGE. Perhaps a sign of a good crossword is that it can be finished by the secondary routes (important for a non-UK solver!)

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