Everyman 4,080 by Everyman

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A nice crossword from Everyman. The clues are neat, often imaginative, and not tortuous, as they have sometimes been. We are treated to all the usuals (in colour below), but this time we have two rhyming answers, although one pair is only an eye-rhyme. (Actually three: there is another pair which I missed at first and which it’s too late for me to colour. So as not to give anything away to the casual observer of this blog, I’ll just say that the two entries are each of three hyphenated words and have the same enumeration (if you still can’t see it I’ll mention it in the comments below).)

However, the surfaces (the ‘stories’ apparently created by the clue) are sometimes rather non-existent; some setters mind about this and make an effort to tell a story with their clues; others don’t seem to think it’s very important.

Definitions in crimson, underlined. Indicators (homophone, hidden, reversal, juxtaposition, etc) in italics. Anagrams indicated (like this)* or *(like this). Link-words in green.

 

picture of the completed grid

ACROSS
1 SAPS
Tree resins in health facilities sent back (4)
(spas)rev. — spas = health facilities
3 HOUSEFLIES
Common insects: audience hurries away (10)
house flies — house = audience (as in a theatre), flies = hurries away
9 UGLI
What’s in jug? Lichee fruit (4)
Hidden in jUG LIchi
10 SESAME SEED
Messed | around | with ease, I might be on a roll (6,4)
(Messed ease)*
11 MANDARIN DUCK
Bureaucrat to avoid waterfowl (8,4)
mandarin duck — mandarin = bureaucrat, duck = avoid (or perhaps ‘to avoid’: little words like to, a, the, are often ignored in crosswords — as Peter Biddlecombe, the Sunday Times Crossword Editor, wrote recently, “I’m happy to consider two possibilities when “a” precedes a noun — A + synonym or just synonym. I think hair-shirt deletion of strictly unnecessary A’s can lead to too much “telegramese” in surface readings”, and surely the same applies to ‘the’ and the infinitive ‘to’)
15 FURLONG
Pine marten perhaps leading in distance raced (7)
long with fur at the front (so ‘leading’ is a sort of reverse juxtaposition indicator) — long = pine, fur is an example of a marten (although we tend to think of a pine marten as the only kind of marten, there are in fact several types of marten) — a furlong is a distance in imperial measurements and is used to describe a distance in a horse race
16 ON-THE-GO
Ignoring some affront, he got busy (2-3-2)
Hidden in affrONT HE GOt
17 INMATES
Everyman initially nags deputies: they fill the cells (7)
I n[ags] mates — I = Everyman, mates = deputies (as in ‘first mate’) — inmates fill prison cells — the self-referential clue
19 BEAR OUT
Corroborate order for Paddington to go? (4,3)
Fancifully, one might order Paddington bear to go by saying ‘bear out!’
20 HORROR-STRUCK
Writhing, hurt, rocks or reels at first, filled with dread (6-6)
*(hurt rocks or r[eels])
23 TIE THE KNOT
According to Spooner, not one youngster or the other is to wed (3,3,4)
When Spoonerised, this is ‘neither tot’, not one youngster or the other
24 LIAR
In den, with stomach churning, peddler of falsehoods (4)
lair (= den) with its stomach (ai) churning, ie being reversed — In is not really a link-word because it doesn’t link two things, but it’s put there because it’s fairly harmless — after all, the answer is to be found ‘in den, with stomach churning’, and also it is there because it makes the clue make sense — so I’ve put it in green even though …
25 TAPESTRIES
Records rugby highlights in woven illustrations (10)
tapes tries — tapes = records, tries = rugby highlights
26 INCA
Empire invaded by Spanish finding home by Central America (4)
in CA — in = home, CA = Central America
DOWN
1 STUD MUFFIN
Miss embraced by | oiled nudist hunk (4,6)
muff in *(nudist) — muff = miss (as in drop a catch) — one term for a hunk is apparently a stud muffin, although I’d never heard of it — at my age one doesn’t think of such things
2 PALINDROME
Race car, for example – or kayak! (10)
CD — ‘race car’ and kayak’ are two examples of palindromes
4 OPENING
Job available in Gap (7)
2 defs
5 SO-AND-SO
Creep showing how to describe what’s average in two words? (2-3-2)
The two words are ‘so’ and ‘so’, giving so so, or so-so, which = average
6 FRENCH TOAST
Egg on this: santé! (6,5)
‘santé’ is a French word and it is also a toast (as in cheers, your health, etc)
7 IDEA
Notion, almost perfect (4)
idea[l]
8 SADE
Scandalous author – disturbing eroticist, principally? (4)
The Marquis de Sade, known colloquially as Sade, wrote various pieces of erotica and sadism (a word that comes from Sade) — the first letters clue
12 APOSTROPHES
Characters seen in Britain’s Got Talent and The Winter’s Tale? (11)
A sort of CD — an apostrophe is an example of a character. and an apostrophe appears in both of those titles
13 REVOLUTION
Rising gyration (10)
2 defs
14 SOUTH KOREA
Alternative adopted by | disruptive shakeout somewhere on the Yellow Sea (5,5)
or in *(shakeout) — or = alternative
18 STRIKER
Attacking footballer, one with brilliant match? (7)
When you strike a match, the light is brilliant — I’m not sure about the job done by ‘one with’
19 BARCODE
Read aloud Howl, poem: will it scan? (7)
Homophone of (bark ode) — bark = howl (?), ode = poem — one scans a barcode in a supermarket, say
21 STAT
Piece of info, ASAP! (4)
2 defs — a stat[istic] is a piece of info, and stat comes from ‘statim’, which is Latin for ‘immediately’
22 PEEP
Look furtively – in both directions? (4)
Peep is a palindrome, hence ‘in both directions’

26 comments on “Everyman 4,080 by Everyman”

  1. Thanks John and Everyman. I enjoyed this being slightly less challenging than some recent Everymans (Everymen?)
    I seem to remember a similar clue to 12D not so long ago but despite that it took a little while before spotting that I didn’t have to waste time trying to parse the text.

    21D STAT wasn’t familiar but a little googling showed that it’s used in medical circles where it apparently carries a much greater sense of urgency than and is thus not entirely synonymous with ASAP.

  2. Thanks indeed to you John.

    In 18D I think the ‘one with’ element refers to the one with the struck (brilliant) match, so the striker.

    Just a thought

  3. Thanks John .Happy New Year to you, and to Everyman on the first for this year.
    Agree about the surfaces and stories today, I found that odd, as Everyman’s surfaces often show great thought, with a good dollop of humour. Definitely less ”tortuous” and more accessible this week. Yes, spotted the the other pair.

    I also agree about the ”sort of CD” description for APOSTROPHES, (think I’ve seen this before), however IMO it’s more cryptic than PALINDROME which could be a quick/straight clue.

    “one with”, in the second def for STRIKER, I interpreted as indicating the noun, a person who’s lit a match. (As Jules42 said.)

    Being a bit picky about FRENCH TOAST. It’s not egg on toast but egg in toast.

    REVOLUTION was a neat double def, for the surface this time.

    I liked the positioning on the grid of PALINDROME above PEEP. Surely deliberate.

    STUD MUFFIN my pick.

  4. Many thanks to John and to Everyman. I really enjoyed this. Lots of good clues and a very informative blog. My favourites were TIE THE KNOT, PALINDROME, LIAR, FRENCH TOAST, and SOUTH KOREA. Happy New Year!

  5. Thanks to John for the thoughtful blog and to Everyman for the witty, fun puzzle. I noticed the second rhyming pair when I solved it but discounted the non-rhyming couple. I liked the Spooner, TIE THE KNOT, which worked for me this time. Other favourites included FRENCH TOAST, STUD MUFFIN, APOSTROPHES, BARCODE.
    Happy New Year to all.

  6. Thanks John for your illuminating blog. I don’t know if it’s implicit in your parsing of BARCODE, but the clue makes more sense when we recognise that “Howl” is the title of a poem by Allen Ginsberg.

  7. As this was the last Everyman of the year, just for fun here’s a list of all the people Everyman has introduced us to and all the places he’s taken us in 2024…

    PEOPLE
    Vermeer, Lionel Bart, Noel Coward, Stravinsky, Salinger, Isabella, Mandela, Andy Warhol, Domingo, Vermeer, Columbus, Alan Turing, (Arthur) Ashe, Shelley, Howard Carter, Salieri, Enya (2), Holmes, A.A. Milne, Mesmer, Lady Godiva, Stevie Wonder, Ronaldo, Orpheus, Hercules, Adonis, Raphael, Peter Pan, Chaplin, Othello, Mark Rothko, Wodehouse, Steinbeck, McEnroe, Sade

    GEOGRAPHIES
    Helsinki, Uzbekistan(i), Iberia, Nassau, Ankara, Granada, Bangladesh(i), Crimea, Siberia, Estonia, Denmark, Rotterdam, Eritrea, Sahara(n), Toronto, Asia (2), Bali, Acapulco, Pompeii, South Korea, Merseyside, Antibes, Bari, Cambodia(ns), St Lo, Tuscan(y)s, Oslo, La Rochelle, Salerno, Niagara, Uganda(n), Ontario, Madagascar, Suriname, Pompeii, Cape Town, Nairobi, Brighton, Asia, Biscay, Dakar, Marseilles, Estonia(n), Vienna, Dresden, Holland, West Africa, Nairobi, Rome, Bratislava, Tahiti, Iberia, Nicaragua(n), Casablanca, Ecuador, Oslo, Athens, Faeroes, South Korea

    Thanks to Everyman and all the Everyman bloggers for a fun year!

  8. Tough puzzle.

    Favourites: FRENCH TOAST, PALINDROME, APOSTROPHES.

    New for me: TRIES = rugby highlights; STUD MUFFIN.

    15ac it is sad to see marten clued as ‘fur’, considering that ‘The species has been afforded legal protection since 1988 and it is illegal to recklessly kill, injure or take a wild pine marten.’ (info from The Vincent Wildlife Trust). I understand the point that John made that there are many types of martens but I still think this clue is a sad one.

  11. Peter @10 – I solved that Spoonerism from the crossers and definition and then was doing other things sounding Spoonerisms in my head to work it out.

    I asked my daughter if she knew what a STUD MUFFIN is and she said when a friend is dating one you know to avoid them.for the next six months then be ready to pick up the pieces.

    Thank you to Everyman and John.

  12. Pleasant Sunday solve. I liked the anagram for HORROR STRUCK, the stomach-churning LIAR, the PALINDROMES, the French toast, and the APOSTROPHES that appeared.

    Thanks Everyman and John.

  13. Happy New Year! Agree with John about clues and surfaces, some nice ones featured here.

    Fun facts: SOUTH KOREA appeared in the same slot of an almost identical grid in #4,045 (hence twice on Jay’s list). A single APOSTROPHE featured in #4,060 with a very similar clue (already mentioned above), and LIAR in #4,059.

    Thank you, Everyman and John

  14. jayuu @13 – Since then we have had ‘Creating three of M*A*S*H’s characters’ (= ASTERISKING) on !7 November (#4074). This made last week’s device very easy to spot.

  17. Funnily enough at 32 I am young enough to think Stud Muffin is very oldfangled – something my parents would be saying as they backcombed their hair for a night out. Missed the wordplay though as I only know muff as the handwarmer or lady’s undercarriage.

    “Apostrophes” made me incandescently angry (positive).

    @4 I think “Egg on this” is a serving suggestion rather than a strict definition.

  18. So-so for average I’d actually interpreted as 50-50. I’m still learning about crosswords, but I’ve seen the letters I and O for numbers (and vice versa): is S for 5 acceptable too?

  19. No Sumit. I and O for numbers are close enough and have become established, but S for 5 I’ve never heard of. It’s just that ‘so-so’ means ‘mediocre’ or, as some people say, ‘average’.

  20. On the easy side today. Agree about some of the surfaces being random

    Got Stat but never heard of its asap meaning.

    Tapes tries was nice.

    Sumit if you are new to cryptics the other numbers you will need are Roman numerals, especially V X C D and M although G and K are also used for 1,000 or a grand.

  21. HI Barrie. I think stat is US, maybe military. What I call run- ons like ugli are usually the last ones I get. I liked houseflies and inmates. I still don’t get the Spoonerism. I had Auditioners for12D for a long time, even though crossworder’s instinct told me 23A had to have and or the.

  23. I often don’t get Spoonerisms as they frequently don’t work to my ear, but Neither Tot vs Tie the knot is one that I do follow. Just made for a clue with a crazy surface.

  25. I’m annoyed with myself for not getting the palindrome or apostrophe, clues, I must be losing my marbles!
    Thanks John and our favourite Everyman for this week’s blog and puzzle.

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