Financial Times 17,999 by SOLOMON

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A nice treat from SOLOMON to end the work week.

FF: 8 DD: 6

I wasn't too excited about one of the last across clues where part of the clue was quite similar to the answer itself with the change of just a single letter.

ACROSS
1 GIN
Drink gallons at home (3)

G ( gallon ) IN ( at home )
3 MALAPROPISM
Misapplication of the French article in play is embodied by matriarch (11)

[ LA ( the, french ) PROP ( article in play ) IS ] in MAM ( matriarch )
9 OFFENSIVE
Poor chicken’s decapitated by Solomon’s attack (9)

OFF ( poor ) hENS ( chicken's, without first letter ) IVE ( solomon's )
10 TRAIN
Spinning tapestries, say, in school (5)

[ reverse of ART ( tapestries, say ) ] IN
11 MARCHED
Did protest harm influential socialist democrat? (7)

MAR ( harm ) CHE ( influential socialist ) D ( democrat )
12 SPIDERS
Makers of silk dress fitted around Greek’s figure (7)

[ DRESS ]* around PI ( greek figure )
13 HAIRY
How might one describe a bear? ‘Dangerous’? (5)

double def
14 LOATHSOME
9 agitated moles circling rats? (9)

[ MOLES ]* around OATH ( rats?, an example of )
16 REICHSTAG
German seat and chairs get modified (9)

[ CHAIRS GET ]*
18 LUCKY
Jammy woman snaffles the last piece of flapjack (5)

LUCY ( woman ) containing K ( flapjacK, last letter )
19 WEBSITE
Fake news and sex filling insignificant pages online (7)

[ BS ( fake news ) IT ( sex ) ] in WEE ( insignificant )
21 CONTENT
At ease, in Tuscany, with camping equipment (7)

CON ( with, in tuscany i.e. in italian ) TENT ( camping equipment )
23 ROMEO
City close to archipelago that neighbours Quebec (5)

ROME ( city ) O ( archipelagO, last letter ); referring to nato phonetic alphabet, R after Q ( quebec )
24 BADMINTON
Wicked cast performing in stately home (9)

BAD ( wicked ) MINT ( cast ) ON ( performing )
25 DRILLING RIG
Platform for oil companies vigorously grilling the leaders of rich industrialised democracies (8,3)

[ GRILLING RID ( starting letters of "..Rich Industrialised Democracies" ) ]*
26 ARC
Part of regular circumference (3)

&lit; hidden in "..regulAR Circumference"
DOWN
1 GROOM
One promising to hold the bride’s train (5)

double def
2 NEFERTITI
Finite supply hampering old queen — with time she achieved great things (9)

[ FINITE ]* around { ER ( old queen ) T ( time ) }
3 MONTHLY
Madonna’s first on, and the endless legendary content’s belted out, eg Vogue (7)

M ( Madonna, first letter ) ON THe ( endless i.e. without last letter ) LY ( LegendarY, without inner letters )
4 LAIRD
One embraced by fat landowner in Scotland (5)

I ( one ) in LARD ( fat )
5 PRESS GANG
Force folk to become sailors? Or journalists? (5,4)

cryptic def; a group of journalists could be called a PRESS GANG
6 OSTRICH
East German aristocracy who won’t face up to reality (7)

OST ( east, in german ) RICH ( aristocracy )
7 IMAGE
Photograph in short periodical that is absorbing (5)

MAG ( periodical , short, magazine ) in IE ( that is )
8 MONASTERY
Where are the brothers who won’t speak to one another? (9)

cryptic def
13 HARD-WIRED
Inbred wrangler’s latest daughter’s wearing rawhide pants (4-5)

[ R ( wrangleR, last letter ) D ( daughter ) ] in [ RAWHIDE ]*
14 LITTER BIN
Piglets, perhaps, tip over part of pen and refuse to go in it (6,3)

LITTER ( piglets, perhaps ) BIN ( reverse of NIB, part of pen )
15 ORCHESTRA
Pit workers with lamps cycling the outer parts of Rhondda (9)

[T]ORCHES ( lamps, with the T moving to the end ) RA ( RhonddA, end letters )
17 HAIR OIL
French king goes through bad weather to get pomade (4,3)

ROI ( french for king ) in HAIL ( bad weather )
18 LANDING
Netting ling? (7)

cryptic def; LING split as L AND ING
20 BAMBI
Baby, there’s no getting away from it — I’m cute (5)

BAMBIno ( baby, without NO )
21 CIDER
Policemen finally locate bar and get a drink (5)

CID ( policemen ) ER ( final letters of "..locatE baR.." )
22 TONIC
During choir’s warm-up, do not upset one beginning to cough (5)

TON ( NOT, reversed ) I ( one ) C ( Cough, first letter ) ; i am on the right path but dont know what the exact meaning means

14 comments on “Financial Times 17,999 by SOLOMON”

  1. LANDING & BAMBI were the two I failed to parse. I wasn’t aware of the need to switch to Italian for the latter.

    Yes, I too was a bit surprised by 25a.

    An enjoyable diversion today, thank you Solomon.

  2. Fairly straightforward I thought today. Agree that 25a was a bit weak.

    Question for Turbolegs: what do you mean by FF: 8 and DD: 6?

  3. I plodded through this one, never feeling like I was truely one with Solomon. I thought it was OK, but nothing more.

  4. 22D – do as in doh, re, mi for the tonic scale?

    Thank you to Turbolegs and Solomon for an entertaining puzzle

  5. Doh (or do) is the tonic to a muso. For reference …
    Re supertonic
    Mi mediant
    Fa subdominant
    Soh dominant
    La submediant
    Te leading note
    Most have multiple spelling possibilities.

  6. Loads of fun as per. I agree one has to be on the wavelength with Solomon but, when one is, it is a very enjoyable ride. Some creative definitions and some cunningly hidden parses. Faves inc MALAPROPISM which feels quite CAD and almost &lit though I am not sure the lady actually misused French words; OFFENSIVE for the amusing surface; MARCHED and WEBSITE for the tight constructions; BADMINTON for misleading me with two false anagrinds and the unusual definition; GROOM for the neat trick of one very long and one very short def; LITTER BIN and ORCHESTRA for the lovely surfaces and TONIC for that very clever ‘do’. Doh! indeed.

    Thanks Solomon and Turbolegs

  7. MaxS @ 2

    I asked this a while ago. FF stands for Fun Factor and DD refers to difficulty (can’t remember the exact phrase)

  11. Thanks Solomon. Generally I’m in agreement with the ratings by Turbolegs but I thought this crossword was more difficult than a ‘6’, at least for me. I revealed LANDING and BAMBI & couldn’t parse TONIC. I did enjoy clues like GIN, SPIDERS, OSTRICH, and LITTER BIN. Thanks Turbolegs for the blog.

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