Financial Times 17,708 by BOBCAT

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BOBCAT kicks off the week…

I found this a bit more of a challenge than usual for a Monday. Some interesting clues though, and nice to see BOBCAT lurking down the middle.

Thanks BOBCAT!

picture of the completed grid

ACROSS
1. Airports finally backing firm’s provision for holding bays? (7)
STABLES

[airport]S (finally) backing STABLE (firm)

5. Slav picks up the bill for beverage (7)
POTABLE

POLE (Slav) picks up TAB (the bill)

9. Routine smell of elements in water (2-3)
HO-HUM

H O (elements in water) + HUM (smell)

10. Ban voters actively taking notice (9)
OBSERVANT

(BAN VOTERS)* (*actively)

11. A fractional element (half) of rotted manure is contaminated (9)
NUMERATOR

(ROT[ted] (half) MANURE)* (*contaminated)

12. Cake of soap pensioner exchanged for ice cream (5)
SCONE

SOAP (with OAP (pensioner) exchanged for CONE (ice cream))

13. One against worker independence at the outset (4)
ANTI

ANT (worker) + I[ndependence] (at the outset)

15. Dutiful old boy to suffer in Lent, after losing head (8)
OBEDIENT

OB (old boy) + (DIE (suffer) in [l]ENT (losing head))

18. 50% of audience inspired by my poetical distinction (8)
EMINENCE

[audi]ENCE (50% of) inspired by MINE (my, poetical)

19. Title of annual removed from cover (4)
EARL

[y]EARL[y] (annual, removed from cover)

22. Reptile that may be seen in summer (5)
ADDER

Double definition

24. Overbearing woman, British PM, losing face, ultimately getting chop (6-3)
BATTLE-AXE

B (British) + ATTLE[e] (PM, losing [fac]E (ultimately)) getting AXE (chop)

26. Student enters, making for lecture (7-2)
TALKING-TO

L (student) enters TAKING TO (making)

27. Foolish books on Amin? (5)
IDIOT

OT (books) on IDI (Amin)

28. I determine make-up of obsessive personality traits unknown to saint (7)
ANALYST

ANAL (of obsessive personality traits) + Y (unknown) to ST (saint)

29. Say ‘Goodness!’ to a boffin (7)
EGGHEAD

EG (say) + G (good) + HEAD (ness)

DOWN
1. Enigmatist’s special clue changed in the end (6)
SPHINX

SP (special) + HINT (clue, changed in the end – i.e. the T changes to an X)

2. Dealing with opponent by making him a demon? (2,7)
AD HOMINEM

(HIM A DEMON)* (*making)

3. Bird in two hands worth one in the bush (5)
LEMUR

EMU (bird) in L R (two hands)

4. Endless chore cryptically suggested by this one on the farm? (9)
SHORTHORN

short horn cryptically suggests HOR = [c]HOR[e] (endless)

5. Model’s more stylish without husband (5)
POSER

POS[h]ER (more stylish, without H (husband))

6. Spooner’s hard hat that’s controlling admittance? (9)
TURNSTILE

"stern tile" = TURNSTILE (hard hat, "Spooners")

7. Merrymaking in airline terminated in 1970s — not before time (5)
BEANO

BEA (airline terminated in 1970s) + NO

8. Plane possibly following directions for course (6)
ENTREE

TREE (plane, possibly) following E N (directions, East and North)

14. Urban centre is evidently where it’s at (5,4)
INNER CITY

where IT's at = INNER CITY

16. Conductor to choose arrangement of Credo, not Cherubini’s original (9)
ELECTRODE

ELECT (choose) + ([c]REDO (not C[herubini] (original)))* (*arrangement of)

17. Unsophisticated romantic’s first meeting with rogue is taken into account (9)
NARRATIVE

NAIVE (unsophisticated), (R[omantic] (first) meeting with RAT (rogue)) taken into

20. Incantation depriving siren of power (6)
MANTRA

MANTRA[p] (siren, deprived of P (power))

21. Joined Ted Heath out of bounds, cycled and cooked (6)
HEATED

[t]ED HEAT[h] (out of bounds), joined and cycled

23. Character of French lieutenant essentially bad (5)
DELTA

DE (of, French) + LT (lieutenant) + [b]A[d] (essentially)

24. Grocer primarily stocking vegetable produce (5)
BEGET

G[rocer] (primarily) stocking BEET (vegetable)

25. Telling tales such as ‘piloting jets without a wing’ (5)
LYING

[f]LYING (piloting jets, without a wing)

22 comments on “Financial Times 17,708 by BOBCAT”

  1. Something about this puzzle felt a little unconventional, still fun and fair, but not a fill-in. Good write-up on the blog.

  2. Just to expand slightly on 4d, CHORE minus both its end letters becomes HOR which in turn can be seen as HOR[n] thus fully explaining the SHORT HORN solution.

    Thanks Teacow and Bobcat.

  3. I feel clues like for SPHINX would be better if they gave some idea what the letter is changed to.

    Never heard of the defunct airline. And I’d forgotten that Brits call a smell a hum and a hat a tile. I wasn’t aware at first that POTABLE is also a noun.

    Why is “taking to” “making”?

  4. I don’t think I’ve ever seen ‘inspire’ used as an insertion indicator (normally a container?), but the first def in Chambers is ‘to infuse’, so that works for me.

    Thanks Teacow and Bobcat, who I completely missed in the middle of the grid.

  6. TALKING-TO (attn GDU)
    I think making for =TAKING TO
    in the sense of ‘escape to/rush towards’

    Agree with you GDU on SPHINX

  8. Re POTABLE / GDU@3: is potable a noun? I thought the definition was ‘for beverage’, an (admittedly rather clumsy) adjectival phrase.
    Thanks Bobcat for a fun puzzle and Teacow for the blog (especially for the parsing of EARL, which I just couldn’t see, though it seems obvious now.

  9. Sourdough@8
    POTABLE
    It’s a noun too. The underlined def in the blog seems correct to me.

    SM@7
    SPHINX
    That’s also right.

  12. FrankieG@11
    STABLES
    You are right. The ‘bays?’ should have triggered this thought. Didn’t.

  13. Especially liked 2d AD HOMINEM – the anagram making it &littish – Here’s a Guardian quote:
    Thatcher snatches win from Cameron in vote on century’s worst PM — “It is easy to demonise politicians and resort to ad hominem rather than policy attacks, but Thatcher encouraged the worst behaviour across all aspects of society and we are still reaping her poisoned harvest.”
    [That was seven years ago – we’ve had so many other worthy candidates since then]
    Thanks B&T

  14. We found the NW corner a bit tricky (didn’t know HO-HUM as an adjective, only as a sort of meaningless expression) but we had a nice PDM when we got SPHINX. Enigmatist, btw, is another pseudonym of FT setter Io.
    And thanks for the parsing of EGGHEAD – all we could think of was that it was a (very dodgy) homophone of ‘egad!’ which we don’t think is realle equivalent to ‘goodness’ even as an exclamation.
    But a satisfying solve, all the same. Thanks, Bobcat and Teacow.

  15. Thanks Bobcat. I found this on the difficult side and eventually revealed BEANO (knew neither the definition nor BEA as an airline) and SCONE (didn’t know OAP was a pensioner). All else fell into place but I didn’t fully parse some of my solutions. Favourites included ADDER, SPHINX, ENTREE, and MANTRA. I did spot the lurking BOBCAT. Thanks Teacow for the blog.

  16. British European Airways merged with British Overseas Airways Corporation in 1974 to form British Airways.

  18. Thanks for the blog, tough puzzle but worth the effort, I noticed the Scrabble letters in the middle but not the pangram.

  20. For North Americans, BOAC would be the British airline that we might remember, so I couldn’t see 7d BEANO (also not being familiar with beano as merrymaking).

    Clue of the day/week/month was 2d AD HOMINEM. Not only a superb surface, but a brilliant anagram that did perfect double duty as part of the definition. One for Eileen’s notebook?

    Thanks Bobcat and Teacow for the excellent puzzle and blog.

  21. [FrankieG@13, a tougher challenge might be to choose the best British Prime Minister of this century.]

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