Firstly, thanks to Duncan and miserableoldhack for standing in for us recently. We now have a puzzle by Quince to blog.
We really expected a NINA given the grid but if there is one, we certainly cannot work out what it is.
There were some ‘inventive definitions’ as expected (TREE HUGGERS, SOMETHING TO REFLECT ON and UNION JOINER for example), but for some reason or other we didn’t like CHICKEN NUGGET.
Thanks Quince.
An anagram (‘slammed’) of BRIAN ENO HIT
Hidden (‘out of’) in waTER Naturally
IN (batting) DIG (like) E (English) NO USe (hopeless) missing last letter or ‘endless’
FACE (look forward to) LIFT (raise)
Hidden (‘some’) and reversed (‘lies about’) in feEL BIDEn
A play on the fact that a CHICKEN NUGGET has batter on it and a chicken is a young or ‘potential’ hen. As there isn’t really a definition, it’s not one of our favourite clues – or one of our favourite ways of eating chicken given the likely use of battery hens in the nuggets!
COY (withdrawn) + vOTEs missing first and last letters or ‘exposed’
TINKERS (toys) around or ‘winning’ H (hearts)
PIN (secure) A COLA (soft drink) D (initial letter or ‘start’ to down) + A
AS (like) around or ‘touring’ XI (team)
An anagram (‘built’) of ROME WASN’T around (not ‘in’ because of the ‘on the contrary’) A D (day)
FInANCE (fund) – missing or ‘scrapping’ the first n (new)
PERIL (risk) around or ‘cuddling’ WINK (flash) followed by E (European)
A reversal (‘up’) of DINEd (fed) missing the last letter or ‘for the most part’
T (time) inside or ‘cutting’ SAGa (long story) missing the last letter or ‘short’
LUNGING (moving forwards) around or ‘guarding’ O (love)
An anagram (‘garbled’) of I AM ON CALL HE
BULLETIN (news) around or ‘about’ a reversal (‘held up’) of ART (works)
TEN (X) ET (‘and’ in France) – in Spain (‘across the Pyrenees’) ‘and’ would be y
An anagram (‘supply’) of CRUDE OIL AT
An anagram (‘fluttered’) of TAYLOR and I D (middle letters or ‘hearts’ of swIft duDes)
A reversal (‘on retirement’) of OK (agreed) + ALAS (sadly)
A play on the fact that ‘h’ and ‘e’ are the ODD letters in ‘hues’
ARiSE (surface) with I (the setter) missing or ‘leaving’
Very much enjoyed this. One of those puzzles where I kept getting stuck and then inspiration hit and I managed to complete apart from parsing the ET bit of TENET. That was muy devious so hat’s off to B&J on that one.
My faves: HIBERNATION, CHICKEN NUGGET (thought it was a nice cryptic def with a misleading surface reading), THINKERS, STAG, TENET and ODDS.
TENET
Y taken across the Pyrenees? =ET (the ‘and’ in the clue is a linkword).
Probably, I am repeating what the bloggers said.
A tricky grid, ( all those unches ), and fewer clues than usual, but a very crafty feat of compiling.
Like Hovis@1 , I had to rely on quite a few flashes of inspiration rather than clever parsing.
Big thanks to B&J for enlightening me, where I had gaps.
Lovely stuff from setter and bloggers.
Si, muy sly indeed, Hovis @1, I totally forgot about Romeo y Julieta and other ands. Great fun, ta Q y B et J.
I found this one very difficult but so satisfying once I worked it out.
grantinfreo. Mustn’t mix up ‘si’ and ‘sí’ though 😉 Now, if I can just get the hang of remembering when I’m supposed to use ‘e’ for ‘and’ in Spanish. I’ve pretty much given up on estar/ser and para/por. You learn a rule and then along come the obligatory exceptions.
Tougher than usual for Quince but that maybe down to the grid shape. Managed to parse them all but TENET which was the last one in. Thankfully not much that fitted that letter pattern.
Not sure how I feel about CHICKEN NUGGET. I had all but one checking letter and once I saw it I didn’t have much doubt it was correct. Well done to anyone solving it cold. I think the purists would have liked a question mark.
Either way the rest more than made up for it.
Liked BULLET TRAIN most today.
Thanks B&J and Quince
Trickly and a bit out there, as can happen with more imaginative offerings. Slightly different views on the many oblique/cryptic defs; I liked tree huggers but wasn’t keen on union joiner, for example.
Like others I relied heavily on flashes of inspiration. I thought EDIBLE was excellent, and CHICKEN NUGGET tecnically very good now that I understand it (thank B&J), though I think it would work better – and maybe would have allowed me to parse it – if it were just “Battery hen?”. Just as for our bloggers, though, that one can’t be a fave because it simply makes me sad.
TENET was very clever and I’m mortified not to have parsed it, living as I do in that neck of the woods. I was distracted by the fact that RENE Descartes (of X and Y fame) was hidden in PYRENEES and fitted the N checker which I had. Funny how one sometimes finds it hard to switch tracks even when later checkers disprove an idea!
Thanks all
Hovis@6, e is used instead of y before words which start with an English “ee” sound, typically (always?) words with initial i, y and hi (h is always silent). That’s to avoid two consecutive “ee” sounds, an approach similar to the use of ‘an’ in English to avoid the disconsonance in “a apple”.
There aren’t exceptions to por/para and estar/ser really.. just incorrect or oversimplified “rules” in English books.(*) Not all cases come naturally to anglophones because we simply don’t mentalize things in the same way as hispanophones. Language is fascinating!
(*) I highly recommend A New Reference Grammar of Modern Spanish (6th Edition, Routledge, i.e. the one with the hideous purple cover). it’s the only properly decent grammar book for Spanish IMO. It requires a stiff drink though!
This was really challenging for me and, as others have said, very rewarding to finally complete.
The top third gave me a lot of trouble.
CHICKEN NUGGET, TRADESWOMAN and TENET were all super clues, I thought.