I took a while to get going on this one, but it all came out nicely in the end, with Paul’s usual wit and some quirky clues. Thanks to him for the entertainment.
| Across | ||||||||
| 1. | BACKWATER | Remote location in loop, might you say? (9) Reversing “loop” gives us “pool”, so it’s “BACK WATER” |
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| 9. | QUEEN | Piece, central to, or on the far side of, banner (5) The word “banner” has ANNE in the middle and ER at the end: both queens |
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| 10. | DESPERADO | Time of special power, perhaps, in recollection of deviant criminal (9) ESP ERA (“time of special power”) in reverse of ODD |
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| 11. | EEK | Time has no beginning — whoops! (3) [W]EEK |
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| 12. | COWBOY BOOTS | Pair seen in Texas, perhaps — unqualified drug dealers? (6,5) COWBOY (unqualified, as in cowboy builders) + BOOTS (chemists, drug dealers) |
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| 14. | TANNERY | Aim to impress girl in skin-treatment establishment (7) ANNE “impressed by” TRY (aim). A shame we had a reference to ANNE so close to this in 9 |
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| 15. | APLENTY | To spare a net breaking, fold round it (7) A + NET* in PLY |
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| 16. | FROST UP | Fur tops taken off, freeze (5,2) (FUR TOPS)* |
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| 19,6. | STUFFED SHIRT | Pompous type, why the overweight appearance? (7,5) Havig a stuffed shirt might give you an overweight appearance |
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| 22. | REVERSE GEAR | Is one’s engagement a head-turner? (7,4) Cryptic definition: you might have to turn your head when reversing, i.e. after engaging reverse gear |
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| 23. | RUN | Be in charge of career (3) Double definition |
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| 24. | STAYSAILS | Canvas items. I say, with salts at sea (9) (I SAY SALTS)* |
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| 26. | GUILT | Shame only valuable on the surface, we hear? (5) Homophone of “gilt” (covered in gold, so only valuable on the surface – depending on what’s underneath, of course) |
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| 27. | EVERT | Turn out, on being missed by team (5) EVERTON (football team) less ON |
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| 28. | MONETISED | After conversion, 1 x 500 turned into currency (9) Anagram of ONE TIMES D |
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| Down | ||||||||
| 1. | BEQUEST | One’s left foot in bathtub, ask to remove right (7) Last letter or “foot” ot bathtuB + [R]EQUEST |
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| 2. | CHECK IN | Read aloud Prague’s hotel register? (5,2) Homophone of “Czech inn” |
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| 3. | WINDCHEATER | Cold in head spreading in January, perhaps — something needed to keep warm? (11) C in HEAD*, all in WINTER (January, perhaps). Windcheater was what we called anorak-type jackets when I were a lad, but I don’t think the word is used much nowadays |
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| 4. | TIDEWAY | Moisture beneath one in river channel (7) I + DEW in TAY |
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| 5. | ROSEOLA | Rash came up on legs and heads (7) ROSE (came up) + first letters of On Legs And |
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| 6. | SHE | Novel abandoned, unfinished (3) SHE[D] – novel by H Rider Haggard |
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| 7. | IDAHOAN | American English lacking in proposal, zilch in shorthand? (7) IDEA (proposal) less E + 0 in HAN[D] |
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| 8. | TROTSKY | Wrong coming up with blue for red (7) Reverse of TORT (a civil wrong) + SKY (blue) |
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| 13. | BOLT UPRIGHT | Place throw vertically over fitting, very straight (4,7) Reverse of PUT LOB (place throw) + RIGHT (fitting) |
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| 16. | FORESEE | Expect number and letter on the phone? (7) Homophone of “four C” |
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| 17. | OBVIATE | Do away with cracks above it (7) (ABOVE IT)* |
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| 18. | PREMIUM | Excellent injecting iodine in the months of pregnancy? (7) I in PRE-MUM (as a pregnant woman might be described) |
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| 19. | STETSON | Hat collections being worn, including first of trilbies (7) T[rilbies] in SETS ON (collections being worn) |
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| 20. | FORTIES | Time of life devoted to bonding? (7) FOR TIES |
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| 21. | DENOTED | Loading heavy weight up, something to sign, marked (7) Reverse of TON in DEED (legal document, something to sign) |
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| 25. | SIT | Appearing in dungarees, Italian model (3) Hidden in dungareeS ITalian |
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A good crossword with plenty of “the penny dropped” moments. I more or less did the four quarters one by one starting from the SE. I found three words that fit at least some of the crossers for 27a – Evict, Eject, or Evert.
Idahoan: It feels a bit unfair to me when you have all the crossers and an answer that fits the definition but have to solve the wordplay to be certain, but it’s a matter of opinion.
Far from quick, this, with some comical groans along the way, back loop, pre-mum and for ties among them, along with esp era. The gen ken for Boots came from buying stuff there on travels, but pretty well known I spose. Didn’t parse the queens in banner or 7d’s missing e plus zilch in shorthand; lazy…came here before revising. A bit of a workout but fun, thanks Paul and Andrew.
A very slow start for me this morning with 23a RUN being my only one in on first read through. However, after Mr pvb gave me 2d CHECK IN I was able to get going. I found it a tough but satisfying solve.
Favourite was 20d FORTIES.
Thanks to Paul for a good Friday workout and to Andrew for some helpful parsing.
Managed to fi!l all the spaces after very slow start but thank goodness for fifteen squared for much of the parsing. Baffled by DESPERADO, never spotted the queens, didn’t fathom out put lob and I could go on. So grateful to Andrew. Still plenty of smiles, with COWBOY BOOTS and CHECK IN among my favourites so thanks to Paul too, entertainment as always.
After getting ‘cowboy boots’ and ‘stetson’ I was looking for more of a theme, but I can’t see one.
Full of wit and imagination – you almost have to put the rule book away when solving a puzzle like this, and start again from scratch. It’s unarmed combat versus Paul and you are unlikely to come out unscathed.
I don’t think a month of Sundays would have helped me parse “queen” – the crossers and “piece” gave me the answer with no idea why. I loved “forties” “desperado”, “backwater” and the use of shorthand. “staysails” was new to me but what else could the anagram be – neatly clued.
Thanks Paul and Andrew for fathoming the unfathomable!
Thanks Paul and Andrew
No idea for the parsings of QUEEN, DESPERADO or IDAHOAN.
Favourites were COWBOY BOOTS and PREMIUM.
We had EVERT/EVERTON the other way round a couple of months ago
A curious one. Finished without parsing bequest , queen , desperado, obviate, stetson or idahoan! There are many ways to complete a crossword it seems!
Satisfying to have finished, and eventually parsed all but DESPERADO. First pass produced just the one entry so thought I was in for a slog. Not as bad in the end, surprised how long it took to spot some anagram indictaors, wily surfaces abounded. Also spent far too long trying to make TARPAULIN work at 24a before any crossers excluded it – I had TAR for salt(s) PAUL for ‘I’, that was enough to get me trying to wrestle the rest of the clue into submission!
On the Graun comments someone hinted at a theme, if there is I shall have to wait for further, more alert commenters.
Thanks Paul and Andrew
It’s interesting to see what different people regard as GK. Unlike grantinfreo@2, I thought of COWBOY BOOTS as “something everybody knows” (at least over here), but boots = chemists was completely new to me.
Thanks to Paul for defeating me yet again and to Andrew for explaining several that I solved but couldn’t parse.
I enjoyed this, had to puzzle out some clues, but for once I felt I was at least somewhat on Paul’s wavelength. Some of the parsing worked out post-answer notwithstanding. TILT staysails, bUT, as thezed says, what else could it be. My favs are similar to others – backwater (took me the longest time to parse and then I laughed), and premium. I spent a long time trying to work nine into an answer before the penny dropped, twas my LOI. Thanks to Paul for the fun and to Andrew for the blog.
There was a theme of a sort, and that was misdirection; for a large number of clues, however you thought they worked on first reading was wrong and you had to throw away what very readily became an idee fixe and try again.
That said, there were still a few that resisted parsing even after figuring out what they had to be. My own bit of craziness is that I consider those I don’t get to be DNF, which I try to avoid like the plague, hence a lot of staring at a finished grid (QUEEN took forever) but I think it makes me a better solver.
Thanks.
This repaid more than the bit of effort needed to eventually solve it. I found some of the parsing very difficult eg IDAHOAN and TIDEWAY and ended up entering 1a and 28a unparsed from the defs.
For originality, QUEEN gets my vote as clue of the day, closely followed by the REVERSE GEAR cryptic def. Paul at his best, or close to it.
Thanks to Paul and Andrew
NE last quadrant to fall, with the IDA of IDAHOAN unparsed. 13d likewise only half parsed… Like DrW @12 I feel I haven’t really finished the crossword if I don’t ‘get’ the clue.
Otherwise lots to like. I particularly enjoyed the pre-mum.
Thanks to Paul, and Andrew for clearing up the last bits of the puzzle for me.
Thanks both,
I eventually completed this without artificial aids. One of Paul’s good ones. I got 6d from the ‘shed’ in ‘finished’ in the clue, which I was grateful for at the time, but which some purists might object to. A good end to the week. From the relatively small number of comments at the time of writing, it could be a lot of people found this quite hard.
Ply is from plier, ok, and threeply etc, but can you substitute ply and fold?
Thanks to Paul and Andrew. Very tough going for me. Like others I got most of the solutions but with many left unparsed.
I bunged in EJECT unparsed for 27ac -I don’t think I knew EVERT! Should have got it though. The rest was pretty standard Paul and included a number of chestnuts- SHE,TROTSKY and some goodies-COWBOY BOOTS and BOLT UPRIGHT. Had to look up STAYSAILS but it had to be right.
Thanks Paul.
It’s been a while since I’ve tried a Paul – which is my bad luck (I don’t get much time for crosswords!) because this was a most entertaining solve in which there were several moments of head-scratching and penny-dropping. Given more time I might have parsed BEQUEST andf IDAHOAN, but I see it all now. I should have twigged Boots the drug-dealers, but I missed it. I had no problem with QUEEN, though.
Many thanks to Paul and Andrew.
One of those rare days when I was on Paul’s wavelength from the start. All quite enjoyable.
Thanks to Paul and Andree
Did this with friend in pub. Took us a while, but we got there in the end.
In my book 28a is an indirect anagram, but hey, it’s the guardian.
Too many wonderful clues to mention. Many thanks Paul and Andrew
I thought this was Paul at his best. I missed the PUT LOB parsing of 13 – I tried to convince myself that “bolt up” equated to “throw vertically” and that “place” was an instruction. I saw the two queens of 9 as ANNE and just R, but Andrew’s parse is much better.
Loved COWBOY BOOTS, IDAHOAN, WINDCHEATER and STAYSAILS. Not sure why Prague’s and not just Prague in 2.
Dutch@21, I didn’t mind the indirectness of 28, funnily enough, despite objecting to one in a prize a couple of weeks back. I must have been in a better mood.
Cracking puzzle. Thanks, Paul and Andrew.
I found this a slog and didn’t enjoy it. I find that when the clues don’t read with some meaning other than as a way of distracting from the solution that I set off in the wrong frame of mind and go downhill from there. That said almost everyone else (including MrsW) got more out of than me so I’ll put it down to me being grumpy. Thanks to Paul for the puzzle and even more to Andrew for the explanations.
Thanks Andrew for the parsing of QUEEN.
I had BACKWOODS (‘backwards’) for 1ac until TIDEWAY put me right.
Like it all, especially the ‘pre-mum’. Thanks Paul.
Also reverse gear turns your heading, so ‘head turner’?
I usually do not comment very often on Paul’s crosswords as they are, in my opinion, generally more or less flawless and still fresh after all those years.
As to today’s puzzle, however, I was in the WhiteKing camp (exactly for the reasons he gives @23).
Well, sometimes it is like that, on other occasions it isn’t.
But what really caught the eye was the thing Dutch referred to @21 and something I was surprised to see being overlooked by Andrew in his (excellent) blog:
the indirect anagram in 28ac, (1×500)* = (ONE TIMES D)*.
It really is one – a very obvious one, too.
That we had to wait until comment #21 is surely remarkable.
Perhaps, most solvers liked the Qaos-like mathematical trickery but for me it was against one of the basic rules of crossword setting. On top of that, the surface is meaningless too.
Dutch mentions that this is after all ‘The Guardian’ but it is very unlike Paul, I would say.
Guardian solvers accepting it without any problem is perhaps more characteristic.
In the past I often said: ‘We are all different, aren’t we?’.
I am happy to repeat that today.
Thank you Paul again and Andrew for explaining queen. Ridiculously couldn’t get ‘guilt’ despite going through the alphabet 3 times! My favourite too was probably ‘pre mum’
Found this very tough, hence the late comment, but after a slogging start decided it wasn’t going to beat me. I also stare at the grid until it cracks. Some of the answers and parsing were obscure, to say the least. But in the end a satisfying solve. Thanks to Paul and bloggers.
Newbie question. How do you know to reverse LOOP – I don’t see anything suggesting this in the clue? And secondly I understand everything about QUEEN except where does the Q come from? Thanks in advance.
Rachel: the BACKWATER clue is a type that’s sometimes called “reverse cryptic”, or something similar. The idea is that if you reverse LOOP then you get POOL, which is (made of) water, so LOOP is “BACK WATER”. I think it’s fair to say that most solvers wouldn’t get this from the wordplay: you need to get the answer first from the definition “Remote location”, and probably at least a few of the crossing letters, and then work backwards to interpret the wordplay.
Not sure you mean about “where does the Q come from?”- it’s just that there are two queens lurking in “banner”, as ANNE and ER (or maybe just R, as phitonelly says), and the definition is “piece”, as in chess.
Sil is right in the assumption he makes about other solvers. MONETISED didn’t trouble me (Paul clearly leads us through with “after conversion”, with “turned into” being the anagrind) and surfaces are never a main concern for me – particularly when the puzzle is as good as this!
I don’t know how he does it – managing to stay so fresh. Such a talent – we are so lucky!
Thoroughly enjoyable – ticked COWBOY BOOTS.
Many thanks, both and all.
I too had backwoods for 1ac. “Might you say” signals homophone to me and not reversing loop.