A gentle Monday offering from Vulcan.
This was just challenging enough for a Monday morning, with enough clever diversion in some of the clues to get the brain cells gently energised after the weekend. There were a few write-ins to get one started, and then the crossing letters provided the hints required for some of the slightly moire challenging clues, although there were no difficult words.
I have a slight quibble with PROOF, and the enumeration for GO OUT was wrong, but there wasn’t anything that would detract from the fun of solving the crossword.
Thanks Vulcan.
| Across | ||
| 1 | GALLOPING | Girl taking long strides, moving fast (9) |
| GAL (“girl”) + LOPING (“taking long strides”) | ||
| 6 | DRAWS | Pulls turf back (5) |
| <=SWARD (“turf”, back) | ||
| 9 | PROOF | Impervious academic eats nothing (5) |
| PROF. (“academic”) eats O (“nothing”)
Definition is a little loose for me, as one can say that sonething is fire-proof, but I don’t think you could say that it is fire-impervious? |
||
| 10 | STRAW POLL | Does it collect the views of suckers? (5,4) |
| Cryptic definition | ||
| 11 | SHEPHERDED | Guided by a crooked man (10) |
| Cryptic definition (shepherds traditionally carried crooks) | ||
| 12 | JEER | Mock judge always (4) |
| J (judge) + E’ER (“always”) | ||
| 14 | BOER WAR | Wore bra uncomfortably in fight (4,3) |
| *(wore bra) [anag;uncomfortably]
A bit of an understatement to call the Boer War a fight… |
||
| 15 | TERMITE | Oddly, their arachnid is an insect (7) |
| [oddly] T(h)E(i)R + MITE (“arachnid”) | ||
| 17 | WAFFLES | They make a dish with iron (7) |
| Cryptic defintion – one needs a waffle iron to make waffles. | ||
| 19 | HOARDER | Keeper who saves extravagantly (7) |
| Double definition, although there’s not much difference between the two. | ||
| 20 | ERGO | So hesitantly give dismissal (4) |
| If one hesitantly tells someone to go, it may come out as “ER, GO!” | ||
| 22 | FORTY WINKS | Scores of eye movements in sleep (5,5) |
| FORTY ((2) “scores”) WINKS (“eye movements”) | ||
| 25 | GOOSE-STEP | The way Nazis made progress? (5-4) |
| Cryptic definition | ||
| 26 | TASER | Tears flowing: that’s shocking (5) |
| *(tears) [anag:flowing] | ||
| 27 | DOTTY | Scatterbrained? In another case, I could be so described (5) |
| In another case (i.e. lower case) I becomes “i”, which could described as “dotty” as it has a dot on it. | ||
| 28 | RETARDANT | It delays trader, getting involved with worker, perhaps (9) |
| *(trader) [anag;getting involved] with ANT (“worker, perhaps”) | ||
| Down | ||
| 1 | GAPES | Stares stupidly at bunch of fruit, having no resistance (5) |
| G(r)APES (“bunch of fruit”, having no R (resistance)) | ||
| 2 | LOOSE-LEAF | Sort of folder seen in the autumn? (5-4) |
| Cryptic definition | ||
| 3 | OFF THE WALL | Unorthodox, like Humpty-Dumpty’s end? (3,3,4) |
| Humpty Dumpty met his demise by falling OFF THE WALL | ||
| 4 | INSURER | His services come at a premium (7) |
| Cryptic definition | ||
| 5 | GARMENT | Grant me renewed personal cover (7) |
| *(grant me) [anag;renewed] | ||
| 6 | DAWN | Bird new to this chorus (4) |
| DAW (“bird”) + N (new) | ||
| 7 | AWOKE | Came to wonder about fine (5) |
| AWE (“wonder”) about OK (“fine”) | ||
| 8 | SOLAR YEAR | Time of revolution that may come to royal ears (5,4) |
| *(royal ears) [anag;that may come to] | ||
| 13 | TREAD WATER | Make no progress, but hold one’s head up mainly (5,5) |
| If one were to hold one’s head above the water (the main = sea), one coukld be described as TREADIing WATER | ||
| 14 | BOW-LEGGED | Earnestly requested to bury bird with mild deformity (3-6) |
| BEGGED (“earnestly requested”) to bury OWL (“bird”) | ||
| 16 | INDONESIA | Republic one’s established inside another (9) |
| ONE”S established inside INDIA (“another” (republic)) | ||
| 18 | SPOTTER | Small wizard railway nerd? (7) |
| S (small) + (Harry) POTTER (“wizard”) | ||
| 19 | HOT SPOT | Popular nightclub, where trouble is anticipated (3,4) |
| HOT (“popular”) + SPOT (“nightclub”) | ||
| 21 | GO OUT | In painful condition, love to leave the house (5) |
| in GOUT (“painful condition”), O (“love”)
An error in the enumeration, which should be (2,3) |
||
| 23 | SPRAT | Jack, a lover of lean little fish (5) |
| Double definition, the first referring to the nursery rhyme character Jack Sprat. | ||
| 24 | DENY | Reject retreat, the last to stay (4) |
| DEN (“retreat”) + [the last to] (sta)Y | ||
*anagram
Just right for Monday. I thought proof was legit. Something water proof is impervious to water. Synonyms aren’t always interchangeable. You can fly into a rage but not into an anger. Couldn’t pass dotty. Thank you Loonapick for the concise blog.
A rare case of a clean solve for me, although I was held up by the enumeration of go out. Thanks Loonapick for parsing 27 (dotty). It seems a brilliant clue to me but I suppose it is an old chestnut?
Enjoyable puzzle to solve.
I was unable to parse DOTTY, and I agree about 21d needing to be enumerated as (2,3) – I solved it, but it took me a while to see that it was an error.
My favourite was LOOSE-LEAF.
Thanks, Vulcan and loonapick.
Yes michelle @3 – dotty a light-bulb moment for us after we’d put it in faux de mieux.
No complaints about the rather neat DOTTY, but GOOUT (which looks vaguely like something a Geordie might suffer from) is unfortunate early on a Monday morning…
Delayed (!) for a little while by putting DETERRENT in at 28a until I spotted (!) the small wizard at 18d and realised I had been lazy with not spelling out the anagram for RETARDANT properly. As with loonapick and others, I had a question mark against PROOF as the solution to 9a and the error at 21d GO OUT, and I also wondered if 25a GOOSE-STEP should have been pluralised. I liked 11a SHEPHERDED, 17a WAFFLES, 22a FORTY WINKS and 13d TREAD WATER.
Thanks to Vulcan and loonapick.
Does 17a seem very odd to anyone else? I feel like it should be ‘wafflers’ (ie, those who make waffles). How does the clue refer to waffles exactly?
Enjoyed this – some witty clues
Wasn’t so keen on DOTTY though: I think that the definition more accurately suggests DITZY – (which also happens to fit all the crossers) – while the word-play suggests DOTTED (one dot, rather than several) – but maybe that’s just me being a bit pedantic
Is Vulcan’s deviousness developing, or is it me being dim? Whichever, dotty was a did-not-parse. Otherwise not quite a write-in, but a stroll. 21d is just an error; stuff happens, don’t hang anyone. Thanks both.
I had all the mentioned quibbles re: WAFFLES, DOTTY and of course GO OUT (is there no PROOF-checking?). Talking of which, I was also questioning whether impervious was a good synonym, so like a good boy I looked it up and found in several dictionaries not only the impenetrable sense but also not being affected by. Proof has both senses, so it seems actually an unusually good synonym.
Yes, Mondayish but enjoyable. Thanks to V & l.
I enjoyed this; liked DOTTY very much and as has been mentioned was held up by GOOUT, but I entirely agree with grantinfreo, things can go wrong so we just have to get over it. And in any case it can lead to the lovely suggestion of NeilH of a painful Geordie toe complaint. Many thanks Vulcan and loonapick.
The enumeration has now been corrected on the website.
Good Monday fare – I failed to parse DOTTY, which was a good clue. I also liked STRAW POLL and GOOSE-STEP.
Thanks Vulcan and loonapick.
Particularly straightforward today so I hastily wrote in STAND STILL at 13d, although I suspected ‘mainly’ was significant. Could parse DOTTY but I liked it. 21d just had to be 3,2 so it didn’t hold me up. Thanks to Vulcan and loonapick,
Sorry, couldn’t …
Thanks both.
A bit late, but the enumeration for 21d has been corrected on the Graun website.
I’m in the minority regarding DOTTY – I didn’t parse it, but now I understand it, I think it’s a bit clumsy. But generally this was easy and pleasant enough.
Jake @7: Yes, I shared your misgivings over WAFFLES. It’s all sort of there but it doesn’t quite work, does it?
Also, not keen on the strained mainly in TREAD WATER clue. We are to some extent over-used to the main = sea ruse but to stretch it to mainly is a step too far IMHO.
Other than these minor quibbles and the glaring enumeration boo-boo, a smooth, rapid dash for a Monday.
Many thanks, both, nice week, all.
Thanks Vulcan and loonapick
A DNF for me, as I had EDGE at 20a (an edge might result in a dismissal at cricket; however it leaves the “so” unaccounted for). I didn’t parse DOTTY either.
Favourite OFF THE WALL.
I was confused by the special instruction, as my printout, like my paper, still had (5); the online version is (2,3), though.
Fine for a Monday. I even managed to parse DOTTY. However the numeration issue at 21d held me back for a while because I print the crossword and solve it at the breakfast table. At time of writing, the added correction is not present in that version, although it is visible on the website and in the PDF (the app, which is quite often out of sync, has the correction but not the note). In other words, clicking on Print does not print what you are looking at. All par for the course in Grauniad-land.
I really would like to see the editor’s job description.
KeithM@20 – Haha! This has come up several times. Perhaps he/she isn’t paid?
By the way, did anyone else spot the Spoonerism in a Private Eye cartoon in the latest issue? It was rather a good one: varifocals / fairy vocals.
This was really a one off for me. Finished in 15 minutes which is an all time record by a landslide!
I guess it must just have suited my way of thinking. Also did not parse DOTTY. Nice clue.
The editor had already changed the number count of 21d so no problems there.
Like BlueKraut @23, all solved and parsed in record time, although not quite in 15 minutes. I liked DOTTY, ERGO, and OFF THE WALL, among others. On the other hand, I thought that several of the cryptic definitions fell flat, but I see that they met with approval by other commenters, so I suppose it was just my sense of humour failing to function. Anyway, thanks to Vulcan and loonapick.
27a was definitely 3d
Twenty minutes became forty minutes after I put in DITSY instead of DOTTY.
Serves me right for guessing at clues I couldn’t parse but seemed to fit the definition.
Yes, DOTTY was a bit of a stretch, but impervious is the first definition of PROOF in Chambers, which makes it legit. Too many Rufusian cryptic clues for my liking, but that’s probably just me. The Metro cryptic from the bus was more challenging.
All was going very quickly until I hit 27a. Dotty, Ditsy, Ditsy all fitting but not parsing. Thought perhaps Vulcan was being a bit OTT so after much agonising went with Dotty.
Sadly spent so long on this clue that didn’t focus properly on 20a that I thought was Edge via a cricketing reference. Ergo I did not finish
Thanks to Vulcan and Loonapick
I agree with Jake @7 – waffles are made, they don’t do the making. But plenty to enjoy on a wet Monday lunchtime overall. Drofle@22 – I saw the fairy vocals cartoon too and loved it – was immediately mentally trying to clue it.
Thanks both,
Like loonapick, I thought Vulcan was getting a bit more subtle with a few engaging misdirections in this puzzle. 22, 7 and 14d were much to my taste. Re 17a, one waffle might not make a dish, but two or three would, especially if accompanied by maple syrup and ice cream.
A nice solve in two bites (breakfast and lunch). Favourite of today was BOW-LEGGED, for the image provoked by the surface. I also had a go at DITSY rather than DOTTY.
Thanks Vulcan and Loonapick for the blog, especially for explaining DOTTY.
I liked this puzzle, though I failed on 11A, perhaps because I had got it into my head that there was a nursery-rhyme theme (Humpty Dumpty at 3D, Marjery Daw at 6D, Jack Sprat at 23D, and a possible Mother Goose at 25A), so I failed to get the shepherd/crook combo, and was stuck on “the crooked man” living in a crooked house…. oh dear.
Thanks to Vulcan and loonapick.
re WAFFLES – there used to be a rather nice little café in Cambridge of that name, a favourite for Sunday breakfast; they did make their dishes with irons (well, I assume they did, I never looked into the kitchen!). It’s now buried under the unlovely Grafton Centre.
Troglodyte @33 – that’s brought back some memories – yes, they did use irons, and I remember the asparagus and curried egg waffles particularly, noted for their after-effects.
This one went in so quickly I didn’t even notice the enumeration error in 21d until after I’d entered the answer!
Troglodyte @ 33 & Alun @ 34
[Waffles moved from the Kite to Castle Hill for a few years, then the proprietors decided to move back to Canada 🙁
A sad loss.
]
Quite a good, if gentle, puzzle. Vulcan does seem to be getting better.I was held up in the SW corner because of the enumeration but once I realised the error, I decided on an unparsed DOTTY!
Thanks Vulcan.
Nice gentle Monday puzzle. Still not sure about 9A – PROOF is impervious, but that doesn’t mean impervious is proof…if you know what I mean!! We couldn’t parse DOTTY, but I love that – very clever!! Thanks Vulcan and Loonapick ??
Troglodyte@33: back in the 70’s we used to go to Waffles after a Friday night curry at the Curry Centre. The owner was American I think, and I’ll never forget the wonder that was the cherry and chantilly number. O tempora, o mores!
Overall there were too many “cryptic definitions” for my taste and too few of the torturous, twisted clues that raise my heartbeat when I finally get them but I guess Mondays can be like that. Failed to get DAWN or DOTTY but I really like the latter. Thanks Loonapick and Vulcan.
[poc @38
Perhaps we were in the Curry Centre together in the early 70s!]
Is a SPOT really a nightclub? Nite-spot in the East Midlands, 1970s perhaps, but otherwise to be avoided
I’m sure I’m just being more than usually thick, but I don’t understand how “chorus” can be used to define DAWN.
One minor observation: I’d call 19ac (HOARDER) a cd rather than a dd.
Also saw HOARDER as a cryptic def. I think WAFFLES doesn’t quite work. I was beaten at the end by hastily putting in DITSY – good clue. Slight issue with FORTY WINKS, as winks involve eyelids not eyes moving.
Proof as in ‘proof against’ is I think fine for ‘impervious’, which also takes ‘against’, but I must take issue with nitsuj@1 – interchangeability in some sentence without change of meaning is the sine qua non of synonymy in my book. ‘A rage’ is not the same as ‘rage’, which is why that example doesn’t work – but it would with ‘fit of anger’.
Ted @ 42
The definition is ‘this chorus’, so it’s DAW (bird) N(ew) to the DAWN CHORUS, ie a fledgling or similar. A stretch, but not an unfair one, I think.
Wiklipedia says “Spirits were tested by soaking a pellet of gunpowder in them. If the gunpowder could still burn, the spirits were rated above proof and taxed at a higher rate.” The way I heard it was that the excise man dusted his pants with gunpowder, than sat in a puddle of the spirit, and if it exploded when he held a match to it… This could explain why it wasn’t a popular job?
Oh, and I think 17 is OK. WAFFLES can make up a dish, and they’re made with a waffle-iron. QED
blaise @ 45
Reminiscent of the way to tell if spirits were going to give you a hangover.
Dip a finger in it. Light it.
If you felt no pain, the spirit was pure, as it was evaporating and burning above your skin.
If you felt pain, the spirit contained impurities which were burning *on* your skin.
It works, I’ve been there…
blaise @45
I think you are confusing “proof” with “ale-conner”. The ale-conner checked the pub’s beer by buying two (half?) pints of beer, pouring one on his wooden stool, sitting on it, and drinking the other. If, when he stood up, his leather trousers didn’t bring the stool up with him, the ale had been watered down.
“Proof” for spirits is easier. If you put water on a small pile of gunpowder and try to set light to it, it won’t burn. If you put pure alcohol on it, it will burn fercociously; there for there is a mixture of alcohol and water that will make a wet pile of gunpowder burn exactly the same as a dry one – this is “proof spirit”. As I recall (not necessarily correctly), it’s about 43% alcohol. If the gunpowder burned better, the spirit was “overproof”; if less well, it was “underproof”.
SimonS@46: yes, but that requires that you change horse midstream – from ‘make (up)’ to ‘(are) made’.
Late to the party, but didn’t much like this. Only just finished as goout/dotty stymied me this morning. I’m with the others who thought WAFFLES didn’t work and some fairly weak cryptic defs for me. Still like having a rufus-like start to the week though…
One thing that surprises me. I really liked DOTTY when I finally got it, but surely the obvious unparsed answer was ditsy (or ditzy). Amazed so many people had dotty unparsed. Lucky I guess… ?
Thanks to Vulcan and loonapick.
Thanks, Simon S @44. That makes sense to me.
I don’t think I was familiar with the phrase “dawn chorus”, but that appears to be a sign of my ignorance.
I don’t think I like this construction, but maybe that’s just me. Anyway, I understand it now. Including “this” as part of the definition definitely helps.
muffin@40: entirely possible. I was at Churchill. The Curry Centre was the closest Indian, and for a lad from the provinces, my first taste of Indian food and a formative experience.
Amazing, poc – Churchill for me too, and the Curry Centre for the same reason! My (future) wife was at New Hall – a convenient shortcut!
Do I know you? I was 1970-74 (I did a Cert. Ed.)
Muffin @48 et al… re “Proof” . In “The Art of Coarse Drinking”, Micheal Green advises as follows:
“In general, a good piece of advice when dubious about a local drink abroad is this:
When in Doubt, Light It
Pour some on a saucer and put a match to it. If it doesn’t actually explode, it cant really do much damage. If it burns with a slow and steady flame, drink with care and moderation. If it goes off bang, throw it away.”
Gah! Michael; and can’t. It would be useful if this site allowed post-editing…
Gonzo @ 49
OK, I’ll simplify it.
Waffles can make/be a dish.
Waffles are made with (a waffle-)iron.
Nice one today.Agree with those not happy about Waffles and Dotty. Perhaps ‘impervious’ in 9a refers to ‘foolproof’….?
All this talk of Waffles brings back memories. I wasn’t at Cambridge but I visited a friend there in the seventies who introduced me. I remember their prices were all in shillings long after decimalisation and that odd Japanese drink called calpis they served.
They moved to new premises on Castle Street and there were a number of science fiction conventions in nearby New Hall starting in the eighties but I think the place became an Indian restaurant not long after.
muffin@53: I was a postgrad in 71-72 (Computer Science Diploma) but stayed in Cambridge for a couple of years working at CUP before moving to Edinburgh for my PhD. Also met my wife at Churchill. I don’t recall anyone from Cert. Ed. but we may have had mutual friends. Small world (“I don’t think I’ve met a smaller” as Bertie Wooster says).
Thanks for that, poc. I read Natural Sciences before doing the Cert. Ed.