Independent 11,232 by Eccles

by

It’s Eccles today! We’re in for a treat!

As expected – all good fun. A solver-friendly grid, plenty of lovely surfaces, some crafty cluing and only one new word (for us).

What more can we say?

picture of the completed grid

ACROSS
1. With arm on the counter, obtains fast food (7)
NUGGETS

A reversal (‘on the counter’) of GUN (arm) + GETS (obtains)

5. Players nearly dispossess left-winger (6)
CASTRO

CAST (players) ROb (dispossess) missing last letter or ‘almost’

8. Imaginary line originally ran halfway under Mont Blanc (5)
RHUMB

First or ‘original’ letters of Ran Halfway Under Mont Blanc – a new word for us

9. Agreement in romantic relationship beginning to disappear (8)
ALLIANCE

dALLIANCE (romantic relationship) missing first letter or ‘beginning to disappear’

11. Let European into type of party that’s celebrated in fancy dress (9)
HALLOWEEN

ALLOW (let) E (European) inside HEN (type of party)

12. Investigators meeting queen for drink (5)
CIDER

CID (investigators) ER (Queen)

13. Hard to stop lust, perhaps, showing a bit of leg (4)
SHIN

H (hard) inside or ‘stopping’ SIN (lust perhaps)

14. Check balance, then shower (8)
RESTRAIN

REST (balance) RAIN (shower)

18. Bloated and drunk, need grog (8)
ENGORGED

An anagram (‘drunk’) of NEED GROG

19. This drug doesn’t work, man (4)
DUDE

A play on the fact that a DUD E would be a drug that didn’t work

22. Main dictionary describes several languages (5)
INDIC

Hidden or ‘described’ in maIN DICtionary

24. The French take clothes off for someone to clean them (9)
LAUNDRESS

LA (French for ‘the’) UNDRESS (take clothes off)

25. Child’s pouch found in rubbish dump by Swede on vacation (8)
PAPPOOSE

PAP (rubbish) POO (dump) SwedE (first and last letters only or ‘on vacation’)

26. Girl‘s fair-trade candle regularly used (5)
IRENE

Every third (‘regular’) letter in faIr tRadE caNdlE. For some reason, we guessed the answer but took far longer than we should have to check that the ‘regular’ letters were correct.

27. Section of coursework not typically extremely difficult (6)
KNOTTY

Hidden (‘section of’) in courseworK NOT TYpically

28. Thought a lot about smut-free retrospective (5,2)
DWELT ON

NOT LEWD (smut free) reversed or ‘retrospective’

DOWN
1. Hot Señoritas dancing in Russian republic (5,7)
NORTH OSSETIA

An anagram (‘dancing’) of HOT SENORITAS

2. Demanding porridge with fish (9)
GRUELLING

GRUEL (porridge) LING (fish)

3. Went public with shocks, essentially all at the same time (2,4)
EN BLOC

Middle two (‘essential’) letters only in wENt puBLic with shOCks

4. Frightened and traumatised, one runs away (6)
SCARED

SCARrED (traumatised) with one ‘r’ (run) missing or ‘away’

5. Kitchen equipment of Buzz Aldrin? (8)
COLANDER

A play on the fact that Buzz Aldrin was one of the two astronauts who first landed on the moon making him a CO-LANDER

6. Lack of transportation in South London? (8)
SCARCITY

CAR (transport) inside S (south) CITY (London)

7. Hurried Federer finally hit an unreturnable serve (5)
RACED

R (last or ‘final’ letter of Federer) ACED (hit an unreturnable serve)

10. Creator of life is outspoken scientific genius, I conceded (12)
FRANKENSTEIN

FRANK (outspoken) EiNSTEIN (Scientific genius) missing or ‘conceding’ I

15. Deeply regrets going naked to cuddle inspirational figure for fun (9)
AMUSEMENT

lAMENTs (deeply regrets) missing first and last letter or ‘going naked’ around or ‘cuddling’ MUSE (inspirational figure)

16. Deluded elite marksman, one quietly replaced by another (8)
CRACKPOT

CRACK shOT (elite marksman) with SH (quietly) replaced by P (another abbreviation for quietly)

17. Record that crime is overwhelming Northern worker (4,4)
FELL PONY

LP (record) inside or ‘overwhelmed by’ FELONY (crime)

20. Went to capture ancient city, but beaten to a pulp (6)
PUREED

PEED (went) around or ‘capturing’ UR (ancient city)

21. Recommendation of American director with immoral habit (6)
ADVICE

A (American) D (director) VICE (immoral habit)

23. Knock back doctor in nursing academy (5)
DRAIN

DR (doctor) IN around or ‘nursing’ A (Academy)

 

18 comments on “Independent 11,232 by Eccles”

  1. Truly magnificent. A joy from start to finish with one of the finest clues ever in COLANDER. I struggled for quite a while to parse this entry but what bliss when the penny finally dropped.

    Many thanks to Eccles and to B&J.

  3. Very enjoyable. I couldn’t parse PAPPOOSE and had no idea what a RHUMB was. My favourite was the DUD E.

    After solving, I looked RHUMB up in Chambers and had exactly the same reaction as Hovis @2. I then went on to look up “loxodromic” at which stage things got even worse! Maybe Roz can help out, as long as her explanation contains words of at most two syllables.

    Almost certainly serendipitous, but I note SNCF and then RY across the middle row of unches.

    Thanks to Eccles and B&J

  4. Eccles lulls one into a false sense of security with easy and sometimes obvious clues at first then pounces halfway through with some real stumpers. Wonderful! Thanks Eccles and B&J.

  7. The mix perfectly described by Tatrasman @4. RHUMB was gettable but a new word to me. I didn’t know you could spell PAPPOOSE with 2 Ps so despite it being an obvious wordplay I was held up.

    I ran through kitchen equipment and didn’t have to go far before I got to COLANDER and groaned. Great clue.

    Thanks to Eccles and B&J

  8. What crypticsue said.

    Like Salad, I’ve never seen PAPPOOSE before – it looks very odd. (Just saying: I see it’s in both Collins and Chambers as an alternative, so no complaints.)

    Many thanks, Eccles and B&J.

  10. Indeed, copmus, DWELT ON deserves a big nod. Eccles must have been delighted with self to spot that reverse spelling. I know I would have been.

  11. I had all manner of kitchen equipment in mind for Buzz before the penny dropped very loudly – nicely done. I also had a big smile for DWELT ON and like others needed persuading of the unusual spelling of PAPPOOSE.

    Thanks to Eccles for the puzzle and to B&J for the review.

  12. I loved this, have always enjoyed this setter’s offerings, and this lived up to expectations.
    Dare I say I found 26a a tad weak but the rest outstanding.
    I’ll highlight SHIN, FRANKENSTEIN, COLANDER&PUREED as my special picks.
    Many thanks indeed Snape, along with B&J for the top-notch entertainment.

  13. For WordPlodder and others……

    Joyce here – Bert is out walking with the local U3A. I sat down with a cup of tea and decided to look up RHUMB. I hope this explanation in Wikipedia makes more sense than Chambers did when we were busy solving and blogging when we were short of time.

    In navigation, a rhumb line, rhumb, or loxodrome is an arc crossing all meridians of longitude at the same angle, that is, a path with constant bearing as measured relative to true north.

    Link to page
    HERE

    Britannica on-line has this as well:
    A RHUMB may be seen as the path of a ship sailing always oblique to the meridian and directed always to the same point of the compass.

  14. Tatrasman@4 How true. I find that with some setters I start slowly, but speed up towards the end, but it’s often the other way round with Eccles. So many good clues. I’d add CRACKPOT to the list that others have mentioned.

  15. Thanks both. I reversed a couple of consonants in NORTH OSSETIA but unlikely I shall be visiting soon. Unusual spelling or not, the dump equals ‘poo’ element of PAPPOOSE identifies it as today’s favourite

  16. We didn’t know the aternativel spelling PAPPOOSE so were held up in the SW corner till we resorted to a wordfinder after which the rest fell into place. We did know RHUMB, though. Favourites were AMUSEMENT and LAUNDRESS.
    Thanks, Eccles and B&J.

  17. Thanks Eccles for writing reliably crafty clues. I liked NUGGETS, ALLIANCE, LAUNDRESS, DWELT ON, FRANKENSTEIN, CRACKPOT, PUREED, and when I finally saw it, COLANDER. I guessed some and checked some but not much of either. Thanks B&J for the blog.

  18. A belated thanks Joyce @13. Believe it or not, it sort of makes sense, much more sense than the Chambers entry did anyway.

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