Eccles has set this week’s mid-week puzzle, as is his wont.
I found this to be a medium-difficulty puzzle through which I made steady progress.
I thought that the vocabulary used in the NW quadrant was somewhat abstruse, but then again, I was able to tease out all the solutions successfully, e.g. at 1D, 2, 15 …, and then verify them in Chambers. As is customary with Eccles, as a solver and blogger I am normally quite confident about my parsing of his clues.
My favourite clues today were 9 and 13, both for being cleverly disguised container-and-contents clues (“boring”, “nurses”, etc); and 19, for smoothness of surface
*(…) indicates an anagram; definitions are italicised; // separates definitions in multiple-definition clues
| Across | ||
| 01 | RUCKSACK | Fight fire in storage facility
RUCK (=fight, in prison slang) + SACK (=(to) fire, from job) |
| 05 | RENOWN | Nevadan city with new fame
RENO (=Nevadan city) + W (=with) + N (=new) |
| 08 | PERSECUTED | Essentially, hack journalist is oppressed
PER SE (=essentially) + CUT (=hack, chop) + ED. (=editor) |
| 09 | MANY | November is boring month for a lot of people
N (=November, in NATO alphabet) in MAY (=month, of year) |
| 10 | NO HARD FEELINGS | I forgive you fondling arse, he snarled
*(FONDLING ARSE HE); “snarled” is anagram indicator |
| 11 | ROUNDED | Start to reach over like zombie, not acting mature
R<each> (“start to” means first letter only) + O (=over, on cricket scorecard) + UNDE<a>D (=like Zombie; “not acting (=A)” means letter “a” is dropped) |
| 13 | IN TEARS | Crying, American buries nurses
A (=American) in INTERS (=buries) |
| 15 | OVERTOP | Patent work in Excel
OVERT (=patent, manifest) + OP (=work, i.e. opus); to overtop is to surpass, exceed, hence “excel” |
| 18 | STRANGE | Odd stone selection
ST (=stone, i.e. unit of weight) + RANGE (=selection, array) |
| 21 | INFRASTRUCTURE | Framework of rod mostly inserted into break next to hip
STRU<t> (=rod, member that resists pressure; “mostly” means last letter is dropped) in [IN (=hip, trendy) + FRACTURE (=break, in bone)] |
| 22 | TENT | Primarily, not appropriate to leave resident in temporary accommodation
TE<na>NT (=resident; “primarily (=first letters) not appropriate to leave” means letters “na” are dropped) |
| 23 | IMPEDIMENT | Money emptied in exotic bar
*(M (=money) + EMPTIED IN); “exotic” is anagram indicator; a bar is an obstacle, hindrance, hence “impediment” |
| 24 | STALIN | Despot in small Baltic city where characters are never seen more than once
S (=small, of sizes) + TAL<l>IN<n> (=Baltic city, i.e. capital of Estonia; “where characters are never seen more than once” means no double letters are used); the reference is to the despotic Soviet leader Josef Stalin (1878-1953) |
| 25 | STREAMER | Remaster works for online broadcaster
*(REMASTER); “works” is anagram indicator |
| Down | ||
| 01 | REPINER | Malcontent on long run
RE (=on, regarding) + PINE (=(to) long (for), yearn) + R (=on cricket scorecard); a malcontent is a discontented person, hence a “repiner” |
| 02 | CORFHOUSE | Where a Scot might cure my failing hearing, initially, on river
COR (=my! gosh!, as an exclamation) + F<ailing> H<earing> (“initially” means first letters only) + OUSE (=river, in UK); a corfhouse is a salmon-curing house in Scotland |
| 03 | SNEERED | Showed contempt, and guided leader from Tesla to become Nationalist
STEERED (=guided, led; “from Tesla (=T) to become Nationalist (=N)” means letter “t” is replaced by an “n”) |
| 04 | CHUFFED | Delighted, as Charlie removed from board
C (=Charlie, in NATO alphabet) + HUFFED (=removed from board, of pieces in draughts) |
| 05 | RED PLANET | Mars plot supporting Communist and Parisian
RED (=Communist) + PLAN (=plot, scheme) + ET (= “and Parisian”, i.e. the French word for and) |
| 06 | NOMINEE | In Aberdeen, I’m only uplifting candidate
Reversed (“uplifting”) and hidden (“in”) in “aberdEEN I’M ONly” |
| 07 | WINDSOR | Royal family weaves gold
WINDS (=weaves, twists) + OR (=gold, in heraldry) |
| 12 | EVOCATION | Arousal from online pursuit?
E- (=online, as in e-commerce) + VOCATION (=pursuit) |
| 14 | AD NAUSEAM | Gold collars with raised stitching, to a disgusting extent
[DNA (and=with; “raised” indicates vertical reversal) in AU (=gold, i.e. chemical formula)] + SEAM (=stitching, on garment) |
| 16 | VAINEST | Huge guards in Spain can be the most conceited
[IN + E (=Spain, in IVR)] in VAST (=huge) |
| 17 | REFUTAL | Denial about 5-a-side football game in which first to score is dismissed
RE (=about, regarding) + FUT<s>AL (=5-a-side football game; “first (=first letter) to score” is dismissed means letter “s” is dropped) |
| 18 | SURFEIT | Glut of fustier pants
*(FUSTIER); “pants”, i.e. rubbish, is the anagram indicator |
| 19 | RECLINE | Lie back in park with some cocaine?
REC (=park, i.e. recreation ground) + LINE (=some cocaine, i.e. a line of coke) |
| 20 | EVENTER | Equestrian’s stable theory regularly ignored
EVEN (=stable, level) + T<h>E<o>R<y> (“regularly” means alternate letters only are used) |
I always expect there to be at least a couple of clues in an Eccles puzzle that have me running for the dictionary but he went for it in spades today. All sorted eventually although I doubt I’ll remember where Scots cure things, the method of removing a piece from a draughts board or anything at all about five-a-side football!
Entries that made me smile were NO HARD FEELINGS and the cleverly constructed WINDSOR.
Thanks to Eccles for another excellent puzzle and to RR for the comprehensive review.
nho ‘futsal’ so REFUTAL went in partially parsed. Have huffed in draughts so that was no problem. Have eaten plenty of Scottish smoked fish but nho the curing house. Otherwise, everything else went in smoothly; a nice approachable puzzle. EVOCATION made me laugh and I was pleased that Tallin, for some reason, was the very first Baltic city to come to mind. NO HARD FEELINGS is a fun spot.
Thanks Eccles and RR
NHO repiner, corfhouse and futsal, but all were fairly clued. Great fun as ever with NO HARD FEELINGS the top of the pile.
Many thanks to Eccles and to RR.
Thanks Eccles. I started ticking clues but once I realised that I had ticked the first four across clues I stopped & concluded that all of them were good. I managed to come up with all the solutions but I checked Chambers to verify that RUCK could be a fight as well as the words CORFHOUSE, OVERTOP, and REFUTAL. Thanks RR for the blog.
Despot now has me mentally running through a list almost as long as fish, writer, poet or Scottish island.
A couple of out and out guesses with CORF and HUFF, but futsal is a big deal here so no trouble with that one.
Thanks Eccles and RR.
I found I got stymied by many clues down the left for this to be enjoyable. One of those days.
I know you are all in bed, but I’ll post anyway.
The nice thing about Eccles is that the obscure words are always clued very clearly. I have never heard of a CORFHOUSE, but the clue and the crossing letters left no doubt of any kind. Same with REPINER.
I really liked the clue for MANY, which has a nice surface, and EVOCATION for its slightly naughty suggestion of what many people use the Internet for more often than they admit to.