Entertaining as always. Thank you Julius.
I suppose one could quibble over various technicalities in Julius’s puzzles but for me the entertainment value makes such quibbles irrelevant. I enjoy them very much as they are.
| Across | ||
| 1, 7 | SINGLE-USE PLASTIC | One way ticket put on credit card, our grandkids’ll pay for it! (6-3,7) |
| SINGLE (one way ticket) then USE PLASTIC (put on credit card) | ||
| 6 | COPRA | Leading artist – Constable perhaps – gets a source of oil (5) |
| COP (police constable perhaps) in front of (leading…is…) RA (Royal Academician, artist) | ||
| 9 | LOWERED | Threatened junior journalist (7) |
| LOWER (junior) ED (editor, journalist) | ||
| 10 | MANDALA | Universal symbol not unknown in Kipling’s work (7) |
| MANDALAy (work by Kipling) missing Y (an unknown) – religious symbol representing the universe | ||
| 11 | STORM | X-Men character ripped end off S&M clothing (5) |
| TORe (ripped, end letter off) inside (with…clothing) S & M – superhero from Marvel Comics, first appearing 1975 | ||
| 12 | REICHSTAG | Wealthy stock speculator hedging European parliament (9) |
| RICH (wealthy) STAG (speculator) contains (hedging) E (European) | ||
| 14 | AFT | Wife leaving a hint of perfume behind (3) |
| W (wife) missing from wAFT (a hint of perfume) | ||
| 15, 22 | YAH BOO SUCKS TO YOU | Oh Okay; Boy Scouts upset by universal insult (3,3,5,2,3) |
| anagram (upset) of OH OKAY BOY SCOUTS the U (universal) | ||
| 17 | EMPIRE STYLE | I met Presley dancing (after a fashion) (6,5) |
| anagram (dancing) of I MET PRESLEY | ||
| 19 | BOA | Scarf got pinched from Latin American city (3) |
| GOT missing from BOgotA (Latin American city) | ||
| 20 | AMERICANO | “Some cream, Erica?” “Nope; just black coffee.” (9) |
| found inside (some of) creAM ERICA NOpe | ||
| 22 | See 15 | |
| 24 | DRESSED | Blue releasing record in fancy packaging (7) |
| DepRESSED (blue) missing (releasing) EP (extended play, record) | ||
| 26 | EX-WORKS | Be employed in sex trade at the lowest price? (2-5) |
| WORK (be employed) in anagram (trade) of SEX | ||
| 27 | RADON | Managed to cook – bottled gas (5) |
| DO (to cook) inside (bottled by) RAN managed | ||
| 28 | MUSHY PEAS | Green favourite up north pushes May out (5,4) |
| anagram (out) of PUSHES MAY – I never realised this was a particularly northern dish until now | ||
| Down | ||
| 1 | SALES | Special beers a feature of Boxing Day? (5) |
| S (special) ALES (beers) | ||
| 2 | NEWPORT | Not a vintage Welsh town (7) |
| NEW PORT (so not a vintage port) | ||
| 3 | LORD MAYOR | Doctor run over visiting royal flipping dignitary (4,5) |
| MD (doctor) R (run) reversed (over) inside (visiting) anagram (flipping) of ROYAL | ||
| 4 | UNDER THE SEA | Some launder these articles when in U-boat (5,3,3) |
| found inside (some of) laUNDER THESE Articles | ||
| 5 | ELM | Victim of fungus regularly exhibited red lump (3) |
| every other letter (regularly exhibited) of rEd LuMp – victim of “Dutch Elm Disease”, a fungus spread by beetles | ||
| 6 | CINCH | A piece of cake for top military bod Henry (5) |
| C-IN-C (commander-in-chief, top military bod) then H (Henry) | ||
| 7 | See 1 across | |
| 8 | ANALGESIA | A northern Arab state is replacing King with son – that’s a relief! (9) |
| A N (northern) ALGErIA (Arab state) rih R (rex, king) replaced by S (son) | ||
| 13 | IVORY TOWERS | Ugly Soviet row about vacant ritzy housing for the out-of-touch elite? (5,6) |
| anagram (ugly) of SOVIT ROW contains (about) RitzY (vacant, no middle letters) | ||
| 14 | ALEXANDER | A FT column, a new article for those in the 12, and a great leader! (9) |
| A LEX (a daily column in the FT newspaper) A N (new) DER (and in German, for those in the Reichstag) | ||
| 16 | SWEPT AWAY | Thai temple pews turned up a year after having been taken by storm surge (5,4) |
| WAT (Thai temple) PEWS reversed (turned up) then A Y (year) | ||
| 18 | PREBEND | Church land ahead of the curve? (7) |
| just a guess: PRE (ahead of) BEND (the curve) – I can’t make sense of the definition | ||
| 19 | BAY TREE | Laurel, Hardy finally getting rebate sorted out (3,4) |
| anagram (sorted out) of hardY (finally) with REBATE | ||
| 21 | IBSEN | Dramatist nursed in retirement by Edith Nesbit (5) |
| found reversed (in retirement) inside (nursed by) edith NESBIt | ||
| 23 | URSUS | Twice America grasped the head of Russian Bear (5) |
| US US (America, twice) contains (grasped) Russian (head, first letter of) | ||
| 25 | DIM | Not very bright, I’m invested in obsolete currency (3) |
| I inside (is invested in) DM (Deutsche Mark, obsolete currency) | ||
definitions are underlined
I write these posts to help people get started with cryptic crosswords. If there is something here you do not understand ask a question; there are probably others wondering the same thing.
Your parsing for 3d misses one of the O’s. I parsed as MD (Doctor) + R (run) + O (over) in ROYAL all flipping.
Some typos. In 8d, I assume ‘rih’ was meant to be ‘with’ and in 13d SOVIET is missing the E.
Didn’t know the FT column but guessed it must be that.
According to my Collins, PREBEND can refer to the land associated with a stipend assigned to a cathedral or collegiate church.
Thanks to Julius and PeeDee.
Seems to be an “o” missing from 3D.
Royal is reversed with MDRO inside. Is “over” the “o” rather than an indicator of reversing?
There is a minor typo in your 13D description.
I admit I am slow at typing, particularly on mobiles.
Thanks for the corrections. I have to go out now but will fix it all when I get back.
This is the first time I’ve done a Julius puzzle and this was about the same level of difficulty as today’s Nutmeg and with a style that is more telegraphed (less subtle). Interestingly I found I appreciated it more when reading through the blog than I did when solving it. Thanks to PeeDee and Julius.
Another very enjoyable puzzle
Thanks to Julius and PeeDee
Thanks to Julius and PeeDee. I struggled with 15-22 until I finally got it with the help of Google and then other things fell into place. I was not sure of the A Lex for ALEXANDER or EX-WORKS.
Found this more difficult than Nutmeg today. FOI 20a, LOI DRESSED. COD BOA. Fortunately, had seen 15,22 in a past jumbo in the Times.
Agnes Bird would have been better, IMHO. Didn’t know of Lex in the FT.
Very enjoyable. Thank you, Julius and PeeDee. I particularly liked the mention of mushy peas, a favourite dish in the midlands too, not so much in the south I think.
Thanks Julius and PeeDee
Aha … you forgot to come back and fix it !! 😀
Did this on the plane trip back from northern Queensland last night – going from a gorgeous 27 degrees to an expected top temperature of 11 in Melbourne tomorrow 🙁
With compulsory no aids was able to finish in just under the hour but with a big question mark on my MINYANA at 10a, which I was able to check up on today to find that it was really MANDALA (neither the poem nor the symbol did I know). Found the rest of the puzzle most enjoyable with some other educated guess work required for the X-Men character, the odd saying at 15, 22, the architectural style and the EX-WORKS term (we refer to them as ex-factory outlets).
Finished in the SW corner with DRESSED, ALEXANDER (nice definition and an unknown FT column), PREBEND (in which I had written PREARCH initially) and RADON the last in.