Financial Times 17,653 by PHSSTHPOK

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PHSSTHPOK kicks off the week…

Apologies for the lateness of this blog, I was up rather late watching the Superbowl (which I still do not quite understand).

A fun solve, though I cannot for the life of me parse 14d (not firing on all cylinders today!), though I hope the answer is correct!

(I’ve now added the parsing for 14d thanks to LarryS@1 and KVa@2!)

Thanks PHSSTHPOK

picture of the completed grid

ACROSS

1. Match what barman did (5,7)

MIXED DOUBLES

Double (cryptic) definition

9. Exploits fish in drink (9)

MILKSHAKE

MILKS (exploits) + HAKE (fish)

10. Clearing house finally pursues content (5)

GLADE

[hous]E (finally) pursues GLAD (content)

11. Quick-moving river swallowed doctor (6)

NIMBLE

NILE (river) swallowed MB (doctor)

12. Kick blocked by a referee wearing inadequate soccer kit? (8)

BAREFOOT

BOOT (kick) blocked by (A + REF (referee))

13. Operation to Norway needs tip of ice pick (6)

OPTION

(OP (operation) + TO + N (Norway)) needs I[ce] (tip of)

15. South side sheltered by jetty is less busy (8)

SLEEPIER

S (south) + LEE (side sheltered) by PIER (jetty)

18. Cut tree down inside type of fruit (8)

HONEYDEW

HONE (cut) + (YEW (tree), D (down) inside)

19. Picked up married woman’s skirts (6)

MISSES

“Mrs” = MISSES (married woman, “picked up”)

21. Entertainer’s trick all over the internet and TV (8)

COMEDIAN

CON (trick) all over MEDIA (internet and TV)

23. One ruminates like one politician to start with (6)

IMPALA

A LA (like), (I (one) + MP (politician)) to start with

26. Knight wrapped in security blanket, perhaps? (5)

LINEN

N (knight, chess) wrapped in LIEN (security)

27. Sticks to doctor if couple take overdose (9)

DRIFTWOOD

DR (ooctor) + IF + TWO (couple) take OD (overdose)

28. Bent leg almost splits cast (12)

PREDILECTION

LE[g] (almost) splits PREDICTION (cast)

DOWN

1. Token males accepted by social movement wanting love (7)

MEMENTO

MEN (males) accepted by ME TO[o] (social movement, wanting O (love))

2. Axes the French metro’s first transport system (5)

XYLEM

X Y (axes) + LE (the, French) + M[etro] (first)

3. Scattered toys ruled out (9)

DESULTORY

(TOYS RULED)* (*out)

4. Really odd characters take nil by mouth (4)

ORAL

R[e]A[l]L[y] (odd characters) take O (nil)

5. So arable ground produced beef (8)

BRESAOLA

(SO ARABLE)* (*ground)

6. A couple, less than expected, strokes bird of prey (5)

EAGLE

Double (cryptic) definition

Eagle being a golfing term

7. What’s in food starts to liquefy orthodontic implant in tooth disease … (8)

CALORIES

(L[iquefy] O[rthodontic] (starts)) in CARIES (tooth disease)

8. … following organic compound’s decay (6)

FESTER

F (following) + ESTER (organic compound)

14. Ground entrance for boyfriends’ flat (8)

TENEMENT

I can’t parse this one!

Thanks to LarryS@1 and KVa@2 for the following:

TENET (ground), entrance for MEN (boyfriends)

16. Get 1ac. in minute employed in puzzling (9)

ENIGMATIC

(GET I (one) AC IN M (minute))* (*employed)

17. Praised cabinet for lifting excise duty initially (8)

REWARDED

(DRAWER)< (cabinet, <for lifting) + E[xcise] D[uty] (initially)

18. Challenge attacking move without beginning to legitimise extremes (6)

HECKLE

[c]HECK (attacking move, without beginning) + L[egitimis]E (extremes)

20. Temp’s reputation not good (5-2)

STAND-IN

STANDIN[g] (reputation, not G (good))

22. Professor or benefactor (5)

DONOR

DON (professor) + OR

24. Emulsion of oil mixed in air mostly (5)

AIOLI

(OIL)* (*mixed) in AI[r] (mostly)

25. Injury below bittern’s head and beak (4)

BILL

ILL (injury) below B[ittern] (head)

15 comments on “Financial Times 17,653 by PHSSTHPOK”

LarryS

@1 - February 12, 2024 at 2:01 pm

For 14d, I have TENET (“ground”) containing (“entrance for”) MEN (“boyfriends”). This was my LOI and took a while.

KVa

@2 - February 12, 2024 at 2:02 pm

TENEMENT
MEN (boyfriends) in TENET (ground)?

KVa

@3 - February 12, 2024 at 2:02 pm

Larry S beat me to it!

Teacow

@4 - February 12, 2024 at 2:09 pm

Thankyou LarryS@1 and KVa@2… I’ve adjusted the blog to include your parsing!

LarryS

@5 - February 12, 2024 at 2:10 pm

To KVa@3, I would call it a draw. Cheers!

Martyn

@6 - February 12, 2024 at 3:09 pm

I found the top half easy, and finished it in no time. So saying, I was unable to parse CALORIES, not being able to find CARIES on the internet. The bottom half was a struggle in places and took quite a while to finish. I could not parse TENEMENT either in the end.

Favourites predictably came from the top half, indeed were the first three clues: MIXED DOUBLES, MILKSHAKE and GLADE

Teacow, you were not the only one watching the Superbowl that did not fully understand it. It is the only game many Americans watch in a year, and many people watch for the halftime show and the “clever” ads rather than the football.

Thanks PHSSTHPOK and Teacow

Sourdough

@7 - February 12, 2024 at 3:54 pm

I can’t say I enjoyed this a lot, though hard to say why, so probably just my mood today. I gave up with most of the SW corner unsolved, though I did get (and eventually parse) TENEMENT.
Thanks PHSSTHPOK and Teacow.

Sourdough

@8 - February 12, 2024 at 3:56 pm

Meant to say I can’t quite see REWARDED = PRAISED.

Tony Santucci

@9 - February 12, 2024 at 4:06 pm

Thanks PHSSTHPOK. This did not seem as difficult as I sometimes find this setter. I liked GLADE, NIMBLE, DRIFTWOOD, and CALORIES. I couldn’t quite parse ENIGMATIC; I guessed it from the definition but the surface reading made no sense to me. I did parse TENEMENT but was not impressed. Thanks Teacow for the blog. [I had the Superbowl on as background noise while I solved this crossword. I understand American football quite well but my interest has diminished over the years.]

JKTiffin

@10 - February 12, 2024 at 5:47 pm

Thanks to setter and blogger. It seems to take us a while to get onto some setters’ wavelength and we often struggle with this setter, but were able to finish today, albeit without parsing TENEMENT : we did not see TENET as “ground”. Favorites were MEMENTO for the surface and IMPALA for the use of “à la”.

Roz

@11 - February 12, 2024 at 6:00 pm

Thanks for the blog, pretty good but for once I was hoping for a theme.
The legendary Bagpuss is 50 today , Happy Birthday , I still remember watching the first ever episode.

AGN

@12 - February 12, 2024 at 8:23 pm

18d – Interesting: a check is a defensive move in most games, at least physical ones. But attacking in chess!

Moly

@13 - February 12, 2024 at 9:00 pm

I found this quite hard for Monday. That said 3/4 went in quickly, but the bottom left hand corner proved a headache. Milkshake was the other sticking point

Thank you for explaining Tenement and Memento

For reasons I find difficult to put my finger on, I didn’t much enjoy this one and found myself resorting to a Thesaurus far more than usual.

Anil Shrivastava

@14 - February 12, 2024 at 11:07 pm

I found this a lot of fun but very hard to parse and ended up making guesses. Put cavities instead of calories. Put on nubile instead of nimble, etc. But still really enjoyed the challenge. Thank you

Gaz

@15 - February 13, 2024 at 8:14 pm

I thought this was awful. Gave up after failing to complete the top half.

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