An excellent challenge from Wanderer, keeping in style with earlier offerings. I found the parsing for several clues annoyingly admirable. 🙂 Hunted for the nina without much success.
FF: 10 DD: 8
| Across | ||
| 1 | ENDOWS | Funds one extremely dangerous weapon’s first outing (6) |
| Â | Anagram of ONE DS (extremely DangerouS) W ( Weapon’s first) | |
| 4 | TASMANIA | Island in Fantasia? There’s no cooler island (8) |
| Â | MAN (island) in fanTASIA (there’s no cooler i.e. without FAN) | |
| 10 | TRUE NORTH | What homeward Santa aims for, bearing right first (4,5) |
| Â | NORTH (bearing) after TRUE (right) | |
| 11 | NACRE | Pearl’s mother and father can’t part over this? (5) |
| Â | hidden, reversed in “..fathER CAN‘t…” | |
| 12, 13 | CAST ASPERSIONS | Those playing the fool include somebody inspiring one to make slanderous comments (4,10) |
| Â | CAST (those playing) [ ASS (fool) including {PERSON (somebody) containing I (one) } ] | |
| 15 | REIGNED | Changing gender, I was in charge (7) |
| Â | GENDER I* | |
| 16 | ERRAND | Message from a bishop recalled at last? (6) |
| Â | [ A RR (bishop) reversed ] in END (last) | |
| 19 | SKATER | Cousins say fish recipe is needed (6) |
| Â | SKATE (fish) R (recipe) – robin cousins, figure skating champion, including olympics (1980) | |
| 21 | MINIMUM | Note a little hesitation at the very least? (7) |
| Â | MINIM (note) UM (a little hesitation) | |
| 23, 25 | CORRUGATED IRON | My wig involved No.1 rated material made wavy with rollers (10,4) |
| Â | COR (my) RUG (wig) with [NOI (No.1) RATED]* – another clue that had be puzzled for a bit, and my LOI. | |
| 27 | UNITE | Make one Italian into another one? (5) |
| Â | IT (italian) in UNE (french for 1) | |
| 28 | ILL GOTTEN | Knocked off, perhaps having supply gone till tomorrow initially (3-6) |
| Â | GONE TILL T* (Tomorrow, initially) | |
| 29 | FRONTAGE | Lead time for some building to appear (8) |
| Â | FRONT (lead) AGE (time) | |
| 30 | SPARSE | Scattered beams with minimal energy (6) |
| Â | SPARS (beams) E (energy) | |
| Down | ||
| 1 | ENTICERS | Temptations with runny centres? One’s been eaten (8) |
| Â | CENTRES* containing I (one) | |
| 2 | DRUMSTICK | Bit of chicken skin under this banger (9) |
| Â | cryptic clue | |
| 3, 14 | WIND INSTRUMENT | Left about half of dinner behind at home, to play guitar or sax? (4,10) |
| Â | WENT (left) about { [ DIN (half of DINner) after IN (at home) ] STRUM (play guitar) } | |
| 5 | ATHLETE | Two articles about rent in Wells, perhaps (7) |
| Â | A THE (two articles) about LET (rent) – alan wells, last british guy to win 100m at the olympics (1980) | |
| 6, 26 | MINESTRONE SOUP | Turnips someone baked for a starter (10,4) |
| Â | TURNIPS SOMEONE* | |
| 7 | NACHO | Some contain a chocolate chip (5) |
| Â | hidden in “…contaiN A CHOcolate…” | |
| 8 | AGEISM | Prejudice medics regularly displayed during annual get- together (6) |
| Â | EIS (mEdIcS regularly) in AGM (annual get-together) | |
| 9 | ERASED | Got rid of the Times editor (6) |
| Â | ERAS (times) ED (editor) | |
| 14 | Â | See 3 |
| Â | ||
| 17 | NUMERATOR | One reckoning to be topless as the one on top in something vulgar? (9) |
| Â | eNUMERATOR (one reckoning, without starting character) – completely deceived for a while before the light shone through, vulgar here refers to vulgar fractions | |
| 18 | EMINENCE | Celebrity rapper with no last name these days (8) |
| Â | EMINEm (rapper, without last character) N (name) CE (these days) | |
| 20 | READING | Starts to recognise eg a bell sound for lesson (7) |
| Â | REA (starting characters of “…Recognise Eg A…” DING (bell sound) | |
| 21 | MUESLI | Most use milk that’s fresh for this (6) |
| Â | USE MILk* | |
| 22 | SCRUFF | Untidy person getting clean, largely to meet females (6) |
| Â | SCRUb (clean, largely) FF (females) | |
| 24 | RHINO | Greek character taking home money (5) |
| Â | RHO (greek character) taking IN (home) | |
| 26 | Â | See 6 |
| Â | ||
*anagram
Couldn’t open the Indie this morning, so hopped over here to see what goes on of a Friday and enjoyed it. NUMERATOR was my favourite too, for its tongue-in-cheekiness and the ‘chicken skin’ element in DRUMSTICK was irritatingly tasty.
Thanks to Wanderer and Turbolegs.
Thanks Wanderer and Turbolegs
CORRUGATED IRON was LOI for me too. A good clue I thought.
Re 2dn DRUMSTICK
With ‘Bit of chicken’ as the definition, I read this clue as a charade:
skin (DRUM) and under this, banger (STICK). Is that what you meant?
Thanks Wanderer and Turbolegs
I think this was the toughest Wanderer I’ve tackled. That’s not a complaint, it’s a compliment. I thought it was tremendous.
What with Brendan’s tour de force in the graun today my brain needs a rest!
Thanks Turbolegs and Wanderer.
An enjoyable challenge.
I think that Linford Christie was actually the last Brit to win the Olympic 100m title – Barcelona 1992.
I had great admiration for Alan Wells but he probably only won in ’80 because the USA boycotted that year because – um – the Soviets had just invaded Afghanistan!
Thanks Wanderer and Turbolegs
The time doesn’t diminish the enjoyment factor of crosswords, thankfully … and this one was excellent. Â Thought that the simplicity and sheer cleverness of UNITE made it the clue of the day for me. Â MUESLI was a lovely &lit.
With DRUMSTICK, I had it as a double definition – the delicious part of the chicken / the more cryptic ‘banger’ (drumstick) of the ‘skin’ (drum).
Felt rather silly to have TASMANIA as my last one in.