Financial Times 17,379 by JULIUS

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Julius is the setter of today's FT puzzle.

This was about as straightforward a puzzle as you're likely to find in a daily newspaper, except for some Monday Guardians.

After my first pass of clues, I was left with only five clues left to solve and these all slotted in easily thanks to the plethora of crossing letters the first pass had yielded.

I was disappointed to see that the first three across clues all had part-reversals, and that H was hot twice (4ac/22ac) and N was new twice (2dn/5dn). A little editing may have improved the puzzle generally as some of the clues were write-ins (HAIR OF THE DOG, HUE AND CRY, eg) where the enumeration and definition meant that these were obvious answers even without any other indication.

Before I get accused of being grumpy, there were also some very good clues (BANANA REPUBLIC (another that was a write in but at least it was clever), WHARFAGE (a difficult word to clue), KING COBRA (nice anagram) and INCENSE.

Thanks Julius

ACROSS
1 DOSAGE
“Flip” — mild oath when ingesting outsize quantity of medication? (6)

[flip] <=EGAD ("mild oath") when ingesting OS (outsize)
4 BACKACHE
Taxi reversed, ruining cake with hot filling — what a pain! (8)

<=CAB ("taxi", reversed) + *(cake) [anag:ruining] with H (hot) filling
9 AVIDLY
Retired prima donna cleaned out library with relish (6)

[retired] <=DIVA ("prima donna") + [cleaned out] L(ibrar)Y
10 CINNAMON
Celtic Inn amontillado infused with spice (8)

Hidden in [infused with] "CeltiC INN AMONtillado"
12 REPUGNANT
Disgusting little dog granny put in to soak (9)

PUG ("little dog") + NAN ("granny") put in RET ("to soak")
13 CHAIN
Make fast tea at home (5)

CHA ("tea") + IN ("at home")
14 BANANA REPUBLIC
Undemocratic land in which lots of hands get chopped off? (6,8)

Bunches of bananas are known as "hands".
17 BIRD OF PARADISE
Does it drop down from heaven? (4,2,8)

(Mildly) cryptic definition
21 SWEDE
Son married European national (5)

S (son) + WED ("married") + E (European)
22 HUE AND CRY
Brouhaha hot, racy nude stirred up? (3,3,3)

H (hot) + *(racy nude) [anag:stirred up]
24 HOT TODDY
Husband’s excessively weird yen for a winter warmer (3,5)

H (husband) + OTT (over the top, so "excessively") + ODD ("weird") + Y (yen)
25 SIGNAL
Notable section of design album (6)

Hidden in [section of] "deSIGN ALbum"
26 WHARFAGE
Aargh! Wife carelessly forgot island harbour fee (8)

*(aargh wfe) [anag:carelessly] where WFE is W(i)FE with I (island) forgotten
27 SHREWD
Smart, bad-tempered woman, Democrat (6)

SHREW ("bad-tempered woman") + D (Democrat)
DOWN
1 DIATRIBE
Harangue political clan following elevated financial help (8)

TRIBE ("political clan") following [elevated] <= AID ("financial help")
2 SKIDPAN
Dad supporting second child on new area which is slippery (7)

PA ("dad") supporting S (second) + KID ("child") on N (new)
3 GULAG
Camp joke about upper-class Liberal (5)

GAG ("joke") about U (upper-class) + L (Liberal)
5 ARISTOPHANES
A noble prince, he’s embracing a new Greek comic writer (12)

ARISTO ("a noble") + P (prince) + HE'S embracing A + N (new)
6 KING COBRA
One might be spitting mad after spraining back and groin (4,5)

*(back groin) [anag:spraining]
7 CAMPARI
Conservative politician Maria undressed to guzzle a bitter drink (7)

C (Conservative) + MP (Member of Parliament, so "politician") + (m)ARI(a) [undressed] to guzzle A
8 EL NINO
Linen needs changing, start to open source of warm water (2,4)

*(linen) [anag:needs changing] + [start to] O(pen)
11 HAIR OF THE DOG
Hangover cure sorely testing her good faith (4,2,3,3)

*(her good faith) [anag:sorely testing]
15 NODDED OFF
Having blanked the king, Ken Dodd — drunk rotten — fell asleep (6,3)

*(en dodd) [anag:drunk] + OFF ("rotten") where EN DODD is (k)EN DODD having blanked the K (king)
16 RECYCLED
Got on one’s bike again and went to the bottle bank (8)

If one gets on one's bike once cycles, so to do it again would be RE-cycling
18 ICED TEA
After extra time, December 1st, served up cold beverage (4,3)

<=(A.E.T. (after extra time, in sports results) + DEC 1 (December 1st)) [served up]
19 INCENSE
Charlie’s in for tons of highly concentrated combustible material (7)

INTENSE ("highly concentrated") with C (Charlie) in for (i.e.replacing) T (tons) becomes IN(t>C)ENSE
20 ESCHEW
Shun English school we set up (6)

E (English) + Sch. (school) + <=WE [set up]
23 NEIGH
Whinny from 7, 8? (5)

Hidden in [from] "seveN EIGHt"

19 comments on “Financial Times 17,379 by JULIUS”

  1. Alas, this fun puzzle was over all too quickly.
    A write-in and fully parsed with the exception of REPUGNANT; saw ‘pug’ and ‘Nan’ but couldn’t get ‘ret’ = ‘soak’ (only ‘wet’.
    I liked the surface for 14A, 8D, 15D, KING COBRA, the ‘seven eight’ trick (23d) and HOT TODDY.
    Was also amused that there were, in fact, two flipped oaths in 1a.
    Thanks to Julius and Loonapick.

  2. Thanks, Julius and loonapick!

    BIRD OF PARADISE
    I think loonapick has already considered ‘feathers’ for ‘down’. ‘Mildy cryptic’ it is, anyway.

  4. KVa – to be honest, I missed that – it just had to be BIRD OF PARADISE because of “heaven” and the enumeration, so maybe I should upgrade my comment to just “cryptic definition” without the “mildly” bit.

  5. Pretty straightforward, nothing obscure or controversial, and plenty of smiles. I was disappointed with AET for “after extra time”, but if, as I discovered, it has a sport link, I can’t complain. Never heard of “ret”, to soak, nor a skidpan, and was unaware that “aristocrat” was ever abbreviated.

    Thanks Julius & Loonapick.

  6. I solved this after Vlad in the Guardian, and was relived to find I did remember how to solve cryptic crosswords.

    Thank you loonapick and Julius.

  8. Like Shanne, I came to this after Vlad’s Guardian puzzle, which I said was his hardest for a while, so it was interesting to find another of my favourite setters offering up one of his easiest – so I was actually quite happy.

    Great fun, as crypticsue said. I had ticks for 1ac DOSAGE (good spot, Diane, @1) 4ac BACKACHE, 26ac WHARFAGE – a new word for me, 5dn ARISTOPHANES, 6dn KING COBRA, 15dn NODDED OFF and 23dn NEIGH.

    Best of all, with a brilliant surface, for me, was 24ac HOT TODDY: my late whisky-loving Scottish husband would make himself one of an evening throughout the winter months, claiming he was either treating a cold, recovering from a cold or taking precautions against catching a cold. (I, on the other hand used to enjoy CAMPARI as a pleasant summer drink – and I suppose we might sometimes need a HAIR OF THE DOG if we exceeded the recommended DOSAGE.)

    Many thanks to Julius, as always for an enjoyable puzzle and to loonapick for a fine blog.

  9. Liked BANANA REPUBLIC for the “hands” trick. A phrase used of late to describe goings-on in the UK & US.
    https://www.ft.com/content/07cfbb5e-fe92-4d61-818a-0492308b4f08
    “It’s all a bit banana republic,” said John Nicolson, SNP MP for Ochil and South Perthshire.”
    Liked BIRD OF PARADISE for the “down” trick and the manna/rain misdirection.
    ARISTOPHANES would have been a nice clue if “Greek comic writer” didn’t give the game away so easily.
    Another fun solve.
    Thanks J&l

  10. Very pleasant puzzle, with only BIRD OF PARADISE holding me up and even then I didn’t see the ‘down’ bit. Admittedly, a few bunged in half-parsed such as the AET part of ICED TEA and NEIGH. I liked the ghoulish surface of BANANA REPUBLIC and it was good to see RET for ‘soak’ again.

    I did this before Vlad which took me much longer, but both were enjoyable for different reasons.

    Thanks to Julius and loonapick

  11. loonapick@4 and WordPlodder@10
    BIRD OF PARADISE
    Without the ‘down’ bit, there doesn’t seem to be anything else to hint at ‘BIRD’.

  12. As far as I’m concerned, there’s wrong with an occasional easier puzzle when it’s as much fun as I found this one. There’s no small measure of skill involved in writing clues that are as accessible as this yet inventive and amusing, as well as being unimpeachable in their technical soundness. So hats off to Julius. It’s a yes from me.

    And I still have some mental energy left to take on Vlad…

    Thanks for the blog, Loonapick.

  14. Funny old game crosswordland. I thought BIRD OF PARADISE was one of the best CDs I’ve written. Onward!
    Best wishes to all, Rob/Julius

  15. Always pleased to see Julius, especially after a battering from Vlad. Favourites were BIRD OF PARADISE, NEIGH and BANANA REPUBLIC. Thank you, Rob and loonapick.

  16. Thanks Julius. I was expecting a more challenging crossword but I was still very pleased due to the plethora of well written, amusing surfaces. BACKACHE, REPUGNANT, SHREWD, KING COBRA, and NODDED OFF are a few of my favourites. Thanks loonapick for the blog.

  17. What I like about a Julius crossword is that I don’t need to use a word-wizard or a check or reveal button.
    Thanks, RJ.

  18. Most enjoyable despite the niggles about repetition, etc. We liked ARISTOPHANES and EL NIÑO.
    Thanks, Julius and loonapick

  19. Though you may all think it not challenging enough, this was a puzzle that I would highly enjoyable and would recommend to those vast number of newer or wannabe solvers who want to see how professionally written cryptic clues work. I greatly enjoyed this! Thanks Julius and Loonapick!

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