The puzzle can be found here.
Hello, fellow solvers, and happy weekend. Thanks to Wire for a very enjoyable puzzle, in which my favourite clue is probably that for CUTIE-PIE. I also enjoyed the definition of EAGER TO PLEASE, and its relation to the surface reading. Speaking of surfaces, it was the strength of many of these that made my shortlist of favourite clues not so short.
Definitions are underlined in the clues below. In the explanations, quoted indicators are in italics and I’ve capitalised and emboldened letters which appear in the ANSWER.
Across
1a Clumsy joke right away had Den worried (4-6)
CACK-HANDED
C[r]ACK (joke) without R (right away) plus an anagram of (… worried) HAD DEN
6a No chance of single female hosting confirmation in Rome (2,2)
AS IF
A (single) + F (female) containing (hosting) SI (confirmation in Rome: Italian for yes)
9a Unit at health centre finally has room (5)
THERM
Unit of heat. The last letters of (… finally) aT healtH centrE, all of which is next to (has) RM (room)
10a Signature works returned by country (not Norway) (9)
TRADEMARK
ART (works) reversed (returned) alongside (by) DE[n]MARK without (not) N (Norway)
12a Honour Geordie comedian after Tyneside comeback? (7)
ENNOBLE
NOBLE (Geordie comedian Ross Noble) after the reversal (comeback) of NE (Tyneside?)
13a Feature on short Venetian official as a shining example (3,4)
DOG STAR
STAR (feature) next to (on) DOGe (Venetian official) without its last letter (short …). There’s a dog star but no cat star? You can’t be Sirius!
14a Name of man in charge stocking small battery (5)
ISAAC
IC (in charge) containing (stocking) S (small) and AA (AA battery)
16a Dizzy maid regularly leaving treacle for butterfly (7)
ADMIRAL
An anagram of (dizzy) MAID followed by [t]R[e]A[c]L[e] with alternate letters deleted (regularly leaving …)
19a Urbanites keep going into river (7)
TOWNEES
OWN (keep) put inside (going into) TEES (river)
20a Take place in middle of row C with dog (5)
OCCUR
The middle letter of rOw, then C (from the clue) with CUR (dog)
22a Turnover across the car retailers building (7)
TERRACE
Contained in reverse in (turnover across) thE CAR RETailers. I can’t quite make the indication here work for me grammatically, although the intent is clear
24a Pieces of cloth left buried among islands by Turks (7)
CALICOS
L (left) inside (buried among) CAICOS (islands by Turks: the Turks and Caicos Islands)
26a Burst pipe blocked with old Argentinian meat (9)
PEPPERONI
An anagram of (burst) PIPE with the insertion of (blocked with) PERON (old Argentinian leader, Juan Perón, Mr Evita)
27a Calf and tibia discovered to be explanation of movements (5)
ALIBI
The words cALf and tIBIa with their outer letters removed (discovered)
28a Twister perhaps played … brandy’s two-thirds gone (4)
EDDY
Here, playED and branDY each have the first four letters of six removed (two thirds gone). Because the indicator applies separately to each piece of fodder, the ‘S jars a little
29a Fix hat before beginning to add fashion accessory (7,3)
FEATHER BOA
Make an anagram of (fix) HAT BEFORE then append the first letter of (beginning to) Add
Down
1d Lovely draw in competition: Italy against Spain (5-3)
CUTIE-PIE
TIE (draw) in CUP (competition), followed by I (Italy) next to (against) E (Spain)
2d Fresh director supports head of casting (5)
CLEAN
LEAN (David Lean, director) follows (supports, in a down answer) the first letter of (head of) Casting
3d Heave second wife onto robust beast (8,5)
HUMPBACK WHALE
A charade of HUMP (heave), BACK (second, endorse), W (wife), and HALE (robust). While hunting for pictures I found this account of a close encounter
4d Record includes dream about iconic structure (5,4)
NOTRE DAME
NOTE (record) contains (includes) DREAM, anagrammed (about)
5d Animal close to home territory (5)
ELAND
The final letter of (close to) homE + LAND (territory)
7d Clever-clever well-heeled Star Wars actor (5,4)
SMART ALEC
SMART (well-heeled) + ALEC (Alec Guinness, who played Obi-Wan Kenobi in Star Wars, which he described as “fairy tale rubbish”)
8d Don’t believe this cook to be ‘iding fish? (6)
FAKERY
FRY (cook) containing ([h]iding) – without the H – [h]AKE (fish). Hmm!
11d Easily agree best rental being good at accommodation (5,2,6)
EAGER TO PLEASE
An anagram of (easily) AGREE + TOP (best) + LEASE (rental)
15d Possibly fly east from land getting work in bar (9)
ARTHROPOD
E (east) taken from [e]ARTH (land), then OP (work) in ROD (bar)
17d Dreadful sitcom has one suffering (9)
MASOCHIST
An anagram of (dreadful) SITCOM HAS
18d Some acres Sid acquired for Dick? (8)
CRESSIDA
Some aCRES SID Acquired. The Metropolitan Police Commissioner
21d Fasten together basic material (6)
STAPLE
Two definitions
23d Wear down Queen with poem (5)
ERODE
ER (Queen) with ODE (poem)
25d Limits to clinical index reflecting height gain (5)
CLIMB
The outer letters of (limits to) ClinicaL plus BMI (body mass index)
I really enjoyed almost all of this but had a few minor concerns:
19a – I would never have dreamt that this could be spelt other than TOWNIES but TOWNEES is also given in Chambers.
28a – I don’t think the clue as worded tells the solver to take two-thirds of “played” as well as of “brandy”.
7d – surely “well-heeled” means “rich” not “smart”?
8d – very dodgy!
I loved 1d & 11d as well as the cat pictures in the review.
Many thanks to Wire and to Kitty.
Thanks Wire for a very enjoyable puzzle and Kitty for the entertaining blog – I loved the climbing cat! Being picky, as I tend to be, I don’t think ADMIRAL at 16A is actually a butterfly without the preceding red or white, or it seems there are black, orange and poplar varieties. Apparently it was originally called the red admirable, which it is. And like Kitty, TERRACE at 22A doesn’t quite work for me as isn’t actually a huilding, is it? Unless you count a row of adjoining houses as one building. I had never seen TOWNEES spelled like that before, it’s townies for me.
I’ve seen both spellings for TOWNIES/TOWNEES but I do watch Countdown.
Sir Alec will be turning in his grave after 7d. He’s “genuine class” if you like such anagrams.
As RD says, well-heeled means “rich”. Can “smart” mean “rich” as well?
Personally, I don’t mind 28a or 8d although I think the former could have better wording to avoid the ‘S.
Had to come here for the parsing of CALICOS. Geography is not my strong suit so I was looking at CI (Channel Islands) and COS and wondering what to do with the A.
Thanks to Kitty and Wire.
Enjoyed most of this but, not being a Star Wars fan, struggled a bit with 7d. The somewhat iffy definition didn’t help! Speaking of definitions, 22a was also less than convincing.
Don’t think that I’ve ever seen 19a in writing but my instinct would have been to write TOWNIES.
Favourite was probably 6a.
Thanks to Wire and to our excellent blogger – loved the butterfly you depicted at 16a (sadly not one that we’ll see in the UK) and was fascinated by the clip for 3d. One very lucky scientist!
We needed a wordfinder for ARTHROPOD but at least it helped us get EDDY, our LOI. Otherwise no real problems though we’d not encountered the plural form CALICOS before. Interesting how the same word sometimes occurs twice fairly close together – Kairos had PEPPERONI only a couple of weeks ago, although clued quite differently. DOG STAR, ISAAC and EAGER TO PLEASE were among our favourites.
Thanks, Wire and Kitty.