The puzzle may be found at https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/cryptic/28257.
A fairly quick solve, pleasant, but not too exciting, with some strange surfaces. A theme of headgear is plastered all over the place. Indeed, a google of nearly any answer plus hat gives some hits (some of which I have rejected, so come up with some justification if you find something you think I have missed. Odometer hat, anyone? After all, a propeller beanie is a real thing. And of course, these days you can certainly get hats with SNEEZE guards).
| ACROSS | ||
| 8 | NEW DELHI | Capital Henry put into Virgin store (3,5) |
| An envelope (‘put into’) of H (‘Henry’, electrical unit of inductance) in NEW (‘virgin’) plus DELI (‘store’). | ||
| 9 | ALIGN | Having no leader, abuse ally (5) |
| [m]ALIGN (‘abuse’) minus its first letter (‘having no leader’). | ||
| 10 | BRAY | Speak harshly of ‘underwear yen’ (4) |
| A charade of BRA (‘underwear’) plus Y (‘yen’, currency). | ||
| 11 | COLLEAGUES | Associates pass old measures (10) |
| A charade of COL (mountain ‘pass’) plus LEAGUES (‘old measures’). | ||
| 12 | SKOPJE | Capital generated from second football stand at outskirts of Jacksonville (6) |
| A charade of S (‘second’) plus KOP (UK ‘football stand’; short for Spion Kop, named for the resemblance of its steep rake to the hill in South Africa, site of the Battle of Spion Kop in 1900) plus JE (‘outskirts of JacksonvilllE‘), for the capital of North Macedonia. | ||
| 14 | ODOMETER | Instrument revealing Frodo met Erik, essentially (8) |
| A hidden answer (‘essentially’) in ‘FrODO MET ERik’. | ||
| 15 | ENTOMBS | Buries notes about retaining storage capacity (7) |
| An envelope (‘retaining’) of MB (megabyte, ‘storage capacity’) in ENTOS, an anagram (‘about’) of ‘notes’. | ||
| 17 | SKI-BOBS | Robert, engaged in sloppy kiss, goes downhill (3-4) |
| An envelope (‘engaged in’) of BOB (‘Robert’) in SKIS, an anagram (‘sloppy’) of ‘kiss’. | ||
| 20 | TRENCHER | Digger‘s board (8) |
| Double definition; for the second, a board or platter for serving food – as in trencherman, someone with a large appetite. | ||
| 22 | THRILL | It’s a pleasure to cultivate, taking little time (6) |
| An envelope (‘taking’) of HR (abbreviation for hour, ‘little time’) in TILL (‘cultivate’). | ||
| 23 | MATCHMAKER | Light manufacturer’s union organiser (10) |
| A charade of MATCH (‘light’) plus MAKER (‘manufacturer’), with a cryptic definition. | ||
| 24 | HOOD | Criminal hiding ring in trough (4) |
| An envelope (‘hiding … in’) of O (‘ring’) in HOD (‘trough’ for carrying bricks). | ||
| 25 | TIARA | It’s so long, to accommodate one’s top jewellery (5) |
| An envelope (‘to accommodate’) of I (‘one’) in TA-RA (a variant or careless pronunciation of TA-TA ‘so long’, goodbye). Note that ‘top’ belongs in the definition, as a tiara is worn on the head. | ||
| 26 | EXEMPLAR | Ideal version of Mexican pearl one’s able to ‘disappear’ (8) |
| An anagram (‘version of’) ‘Mex[ican] pearl’ minus (‘to disappear’)I CAN (‘one’s able’). The definition as a noun. | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | BEARSKIN | Pelt Chicago footballers with blood (8) |
| A charade of BEARS (‘Chicago footballers’) plus KIN (‘blood’). | ||
| 2 | EDGY | Tense BBC head entered in the out-of-date returns (4) |
| An envelope (‘entered in’) of DG ({Director General, ‘BBC head’) in EY, a reversal (‘returns’) of YE (‘the out-of-date’ although, as we all know, ‘the’ never really was YE). | ||
| 3 | CLOCHE | It’s a commonplace to replace one with ring plant protector (6) |
| CLICHE (‘commonplace’) with the I replaced by O (‘to replace one with ring’). | ||
| 4 | PILLBOX | Small defensive building taking pressure off fight (7) |
| A charade of P (‘pressure’) plus ILL (‘off’) plus BOX (‘fight’). | ||
| 5 | HAVELOCK | Ellis‘s fancy alcove in Hong Kong? (8) |
| An envelope (‘in’) of AVELOC, an anagram (‘fancy’) of ‘alcove’) in HK (‘Hong Kong’ IVR); Havelock Ellis was a physician and social reformer, perhaps best remembered for his writing on human sexuality. | ||
| 6 | SINGLES BAR | Ban on the very people who frequent this dating venue? (7,3) |
| Definition and literal interpretation. | ||
| 7 | SNEEZE | Outburst unfortunately seen by disheartened Zeke? (6) |
| A charade of SNEE, an anagram (‘unfortunately’) of ‘seen’ plus ZE (‘disheartened ZekE‘). | ||
| 13 | PHOENICIAN | 24 stirred in Inca prepared for a different civilisation (10) |
| A charade of PHOE, an anagram (‘stirred’) of HOPE (the answer to ’24’ down – as this is also a down light, the “down” is not mentioned) plus NICIAN, another anagram (‘prepared’) of ‘in Inca’. ‘Different’ because it is not Inca. | ||
| 16 | BOHEMIAN | Familiar form of address associated with virile male, inwardly independent, living an unconventional life (8) |
| An envelope (‘inwardly’) of I (‘independent’) in BO (‘familiar form of address’) plus (‘associated with’) HE-MAN (‘virile male’). | ||
| 18 | BALMORAL | Research place over upright castle (8) |
| A charade of BAL, a reversal (‘over’) of LAB (‘research place’) plus MORAL (‘upright’). | ||
| 19 | TREKKER | Pioneering South African TV series fan? (7) |
| Double definition (although I am more familiar with trekkie for the fan – but the question mark might cover that) | ||
| 21 | RIALTO | Capri altogether too much as a tourist attraction (6) |
| A hidden (too much’) answer in ‘CapRI ALTOgether’. | ||
| 22 | TURRET | Tower‘s shaky, utter rubbish top (6) |
| An anagram (‘shaky’) of ‘utter’ plus R (‘Rubbish top’). | ||
| 24 | HOPE | Name of woman parking in garden (4) |
| An envelope (‘in’) of P (‘parking’) in HOE (‘garden’, verb). | ||
This was worth doing for the wickedly misleading MATCHMAKER alone. I also liked BEARSKIN, partly because it gave a nod to American football for a change (though I still had to resort to google to confirm KOP as a ‘football stand’). There was also a prime EXEMPLAR of a tricky subtractive anagram. Is it just me, or have we been seeing more of those recently? Anyway, there were enough chewy clues to make it interesting, so thanks to Brummie. Thanks also to PeterO for the parsing of EDGY and for pointing out the theme, which I of course missed.
Liked NEW DELHI, PILLBOX, ENTOMBS, MATCHMAKER, EXEMPLAR, PHOENICIAN
Did not parse BOHEMIAN – why is BO a familiar form of address? Isn’t BO a name in itself? Also, did not understand the South African bit for 19D – and have just found it on google (Great Trek starting in 1836).
New for me today: SKI-BOBS, KOP (in 12A), CLOCHE, PILLBOX = a small, partly underground concrete fort used as an outpost; TRENCHER = old-fashioned term for mortar board.
Thanks, B+S
For me, this was an easier than normal Brummie, and quite enjoyable, except for one thing – TREKKER.
If there is no name for a thing, I think it is perfectly fine to make one up in the way English does and clue it with a question-mark. So (I’m guessing unnamed) fans of the movie Shrek might be Shrekkers or Shrekkies or whatever. But there is a name for fans of Star Trek, and that name is Trekkie, so Trekker just won’t do (imo).
A pleasant puzzle, all done, dusted and parsed as the (EDGY) last one went in . The NE quadrant went down in seconds, but the SE posed a few problems. Tried hard to link 24A with the first four letters of PHOENICIAN (which slowed things down) — until realizing that it should be 24D (deliberate setter subterfuge?). Well, it’s all in the game …. and no complaints ….
Pillbox had me thinking ‘hat’ via the Dylan song, and cloche (which I’ve yet to look up re plants) is a hat, but I didn’t take much notice. Kop, with its interesting derivation, was a total nho. The i can subtraction in 26ac was cute. Dnk the football team, but bears seemed likelier than deers! Agree with Dr Wh., definitely Trekkies not ers, so a bit of bending there from the Brumm, but not a hanging offence. An ennoyable potter, thanks B and P.
..enjoyable..
Thanks Brummie — that was enjoyable. MATCHMAKER is my clue of the day; COLLEAGUES and THRILL were other favourites. Could not parse EDGY, TREKKERS, or BOHEMIAN so thanks PeterO for the help.
to Dr. WhatsOn @3, I recall seeing a documentary where the fans themselves use ‘TREKKERS’ and Chambers has both, so I think it’s OK.
Thanks Brummie and PeterO.
I think SKOPJE is also a kind of baseball cap.
That was a good start to the day, and an early blog too! I completed the grid, but did not parse THRILL and EDGY. CLOCHE (for bringing on young plants, eg lettuces), BOHEMIAN and MATCHMAKER were very good. Hats? No, of course I didn’t… Many thanks to PeterO for explaining and Brummie for setting.
Disappointed that a ‘sneeze hat’ and a ‘thrill hat’ aren’t real things.
Theme eluded me as usual, as did TREKKER. CLOCHE felt a bit clunky in the surface reading. Otherwise, a smart Brummie solve in which my favourites were EXEMPLAR, MATCHMAKER and BRAY (because I still find underwear amusing in a Carry On sort of way)
A very enjoyable crossword, and for once I saw the theme! I think ‘trekkers’ are fans of the series who take it less seriously than ‘trekkies’, it’s certainly something I’ve heard of before. Like Michelle above, I can’t see how ‘bo’ is a popular form of address. Bo selecta? Surely not… Can anyone elucidate?
SKIBOBS (nho) was the tricky one for me (apart from EDGY). I had BOBSLED until BALMORAL made a compelling case that it was wrong, and I then constructed the unlikely word that turned out to be one. Also nho most of the hats, so missed that. Being neither a Pom nor a Yank, both the Bears and the Kop came easily. Must be a cosmopolitan… Ta to Brummie and PeterO.
A nice crossword, but what are ski bobs?
Conrad@12
Shortened slang version of ‘boy’. Much older than you might think.
The Coming of Bill by P. G. Wodehouse, 1920, published as Their Mutual Child in the US:
“You’re lookin’ kind o’ sick, bo,” was Steve’s comment. “I guess you was hittin’ it up with the gang last night in one of them lobster parlors.” Bailey objected to being addressed as “bo”.
Good reference, Penfold. Well done, bo.
A slight comedy of errors made mine a DNF, as I put in CLICHE instead of CLOCHE at 3d. Despite the fact I wrote beside that clue that I was more familiar with a cloche as a hat or a food cover, sadly, I also missed the theme. Now I can’t believe I didn’t see it – mainly because I didn’t look! I liked the clues that DinC@1, Michelle@2 and Beobacterin@10 mentioned. It took me ages to get EXEMPLAR as I had TREKKIE at 19d for the reason DrW-O and GiF mentioned above @3 and 5, notwithstanding what Skinny@8 and Conrad@12 have said subsequently.
Thanks to PeterO for teasing out a few things I didn’t understand, and hats off to Brummie for lots of enjoyable moments I spent solving this one. Unfortunately I missed the penultimate aha! moment that would have come if I had spotted all the headgear, and which probably would have made me amend my error had I made the connection.
[Loved the Dylan PILLBOX reference GiF@5 – great song!]
I don’t bother with themes – I am unconvinced the author has one half the time.
After I got HAVELOCK it did briefly occur to me that there might be a speedway theme, and no doubt you’ll find a second speedway rider if you look hard enough? The only theme that helped me was the “Friends” one a week or two ago, Monica,Chandler, Joey etc.. that was brilliant, but only saw the theme when I ‘d done most of them and got Rachel.
The rather unsatisfactory HOPE was my first tentative one in. Last one in was PILLBOX, to the strains of Dylan’s Leopardskin Pillbox Hat, as grantinfreo@4 mentions. I remember too always struggling when tour guides were describing an old fort as Phoenician, never quite sure whether they were pronouncing the word Venetian, another era altogether. Liked MATCHMAKER and COLLEAGUES. Thanks Brummie and Peter O. Oh, and wasn’t quite sure which of CLOCHE or CLICHE to insert earlier on, continuing the mini gardening theme started by the hoe in 24d…
RR @ 14 they are like kiddies bikes with stabilisers and you sit on them to go downhill.
Just remembered , one pass 1 I immediately thought of cloche (my dad used them for lettuce) but rejected it!
Annoyingly when I had all but the O to get, it came back! I’m doing these to offset the onset of dementia – perhaps Ineed to join Equity? My short term memory is dreadful.
Completely missed the theme again.
Had I not checked with cobro, it would have been a DNF for me because, unlike gif @5, I thought deers was a perfectly reasonable name for a football team :D.
Favourites were MATCHMAKER and THRILL.
Thanks Brummie and PeterO
…apropos that hoe…I shall never forget the episode of My Word (1957-?) on the radio (Denis Norden and Frank Muir) when one of them had to invent an unlikely story to explain the origin of “Oh, Death, where is thy Sting?”. A long rambling tale ending in a gardening accident, and the victim a certain woman called Eth. Thus the final line: “Hoed Eth, where is my string?”
I’ve always understood that many Star Trek fans take offence at the term “Trekkie” and prefer the term TREKKER. Google suggests that the Trekkie is in fact a more obsessive form of TREKKER. Who Knew?
[At one point, Vince Quince and his RIALTO Ballroom Detectives had the longest band name in the UK]
[Penfold @15 do you read or just memorise names :)]
Good setting to get in so many theme words, although was PHOENICIAN really a deliberate one?
As no one else has remarked, I really liked the clue for PILLBOX as I spent ages trying to think of the name for a fight lacking the ‘P’.
Thanks Brummie and PeterO.
[BTW, someone suggested on ‘The Increase in Comments’ thread that we should dispense with our thanks to setters and bloggers; I think it is always good to send our appreciation to the hard workers.]
Thanks PeterO, I didn’t know Bo as greeting (Bo in Bo selecta apparently indicates approval, Conrad@12) and missed the YE by Brummie’s cunning use of “out-of-date”, something to remember. Wikipedia entry on Trekkie has a discussion of that term vs Trekker, nothing conclusive but enough to show validity of the answer here. Brummie’s alter ego Cyclops has used variations on Entombs and Hood recently which helped me here, presumably coincidence though if the gridfills are computer generated? And for a while I was making the same silly error wrt 24A/D as rodshaw@4 despite knowing the convention. Liked BOHEMIAN, HAVELOCK and especially EXEMPLAR – DaveinNCarolina @1 without any quantitative evidence whatsoever I am inclined to agree with you and somehow feel Brummie/Cyclops in particular has taken to this sort of clue. Thanks Brummie.
Enjoyed this offering from Brummie for once, mainly because I was able to solve and parse (without aids) all except HOPE.
Still don’t know why it is name of woman and HOPE someone can tell me.
The hats went over my head.
Pedro @26: HOPE Hicks? – though I guess that’s coincidental.
Chapeau Brummie and PeterO
Thanks essexboy. So its just a woman’s name (like Anne) rather than a generic thing. OK
I have to take issue with tara being a careless pronunciation of tata: it’s Brummie, as in “tara a bit”! Brummie is the setter, after all…
Many thanks Penfold @15. I’m a big fan of Wodehouse too but I can’t recall ever seeing it!
Spotted the theme – no great achievement today and didn’t help much as I never heard of half the hats – and noticed that but for the absence of Q it would have been an acrostic double whammy
I have no problem with the TREKKER clue. The definition is South African pioneer – one who took part in the Great Trek. The ? at the end of the clue indicates the possible ambiguity of Star Trek fans.
My clue of the day was MATCHMAKER – very neatly misleading. Light industry, eh?
Thanks Brummie and Peter O. Needed help parsing one or two.
Conrad @30 Not one of his best. In Goodreads ranking of 106 Wodehouse novels, it came 97th. I should have said that was set in New York, so maybe ‘bo’ is/was an American expression?
[bodycheetah @23 Just memorise names, of course, so I can stagger through BOHEMIAN games. I noticed that Grant Baynham posted on the ‘increase in comments’ thread (and blogged today’s FT). He trumps us by being mentioned in a HMHB song, but Let’s Not get into that.]
No theme spotted (as per usual) and had to wait until later in the day to do this one (usually start around 7am) but not that difficult and done in the hour. But… I really found some of the surfaces unsatisfactory especially 24d where I’m afraid the reference to “woman” gave me a very different definition of “hoe” maybe one more suited to Paul’s alter ego. I’ll go and find the mind-bleach.
So not my fav but good fun nonetheless.
Thanks Brummie and Peter O!
I was so tempted by ‘deerskin’ as the pelt but I knew it wasn’t the Chicago Deers, it was the Chicago Bulls and that didn’t fit. Doh. And I follow the NFL, a bit. Mrs T ended up helping.
It’s nice to find there is a theme. I had no idea.
Good fun and not too hard. Favourites were MATCHMAKER which raised a titter, TRENCHER and the delightful TIARA. Never heard of HAVELOCK Ellis or SKI BOBS, and did not notice the theme hiding in plain sight. Many thanks to Brummie for the fun and PeterO for the early blog, pointing out the theme (doh) and reinforcing several parsings.
We had BALMORAL as a type of shoe in a recent Picaroon, and now it’s a hat too? I didn’t see the theme, of course, and this was ultimately a slowish solve as I got hung up on virile male=BUCK in 16d, and it took me a long time to talk myself into looking for alternatives. This would have been my clue of the day, but I really enjoyed the double cryptic definitions of ‘light manufacturer’ and ‘union organiser’. (I know the first part is really a charade, PeterO, but it also works my way!)
As JinA @17 said, hat’s off to Brummie!
Job – don’t think there’s an ‘F’ also?
I was also half expecting a pangram after finding that we had J K W X Y and Z, but it wasn’t to be.
Thanks Brummie and PeterO
No theme for me (of course!)
Before it meant a board, a TRENCHER was a slab of bread, usually stale, that acted as a plate. After the meal was finished the user would either eat the bread with gravy, or donate it to the poor.
Gladys, I spent the entire northeast corner awaiting the missing Q.
Glad to see a nod to my local team. (Bear down!)
The Trekkie/Trekker debate goes back a long way. Once “Trekkie” became common parlance in the mid-70s, the more extreme Trekkies took umbrage and declared themselves Trekkers, a less frivolous-sounding nickname.
But it was too late – “Trekkie” was in the lexicon, and still is. Trekker has faded away, certainly to the world out large. Do earnest people at conventions still call themselves Trekkers? Probably. But I’m not about to go and find out for sure.
What does “name of” add to 24? Does Trekker not relate to the South African pronounciation of tracker (pioneer)?
to Rose Allatt @42:-
Isn’t it just the Dutch/Afrikaans?
Wikipedia on the Grote Trek has:-
“Boers who took part in the Great Trek identified themselves as voortrekkers, meaning “pioneers” or “pathfinders ” (literally “fore-trekkers”) in Dutch and Afrikaans.
Only say that as accepting (what a setter may regard as) regional pronunciation in homophone-based clueing feels a tad too latitudinarian to me.
Apologies if that comes across as an otiose preemptive harrumph.
Was there a way of knowing it was CLOCHE rather than CLICHE?
Petert @44 – I think so, if you consider that “replace A with B” is an instruction to get rid of A and end up with B, then the clue is indicating that the answer contains an “i” and not an “o”.
me @46 … sorry … an “o” and not an “i” …
I spotted the solution to 20a straight away. I once dined on a ‘Yorkshire Trencher’ at Hawes in the Dales, an unforgettable beef stew with veg all contained in a dinner plate-sized Yorkshire pudding, the perfect end to a day in the hills. The reason I solved it so quickly? The pub serving this delicacy was called the Board. I hope it’s still going strong in these troubled times. Anybody know?
Well done for spotting all those hats!
13dn perplexed me for some time as I was trying to make an anagram of 24AC rather than 24DN.
Missed 5d HAVELOCK, having got hung up on nook for alcove and looked for a Hong Kong reference ending in nook. Of course if I had had sex on the brain, I should have gone from nook => nookie => H.E.
Favourite was 23a MATCHMAKER – brilliantly concise and doubly misleading.
Thanks, Brummie and PeterO for the Mad Hatter merriment.
Octopus @48
There was some discussion on this recently. Apparently if the clue referred to is in the same direction as the clue referring to it, “across” or “down” can be omitted.
Van Winkle @45 Thanks for that. I think I get it now
I really like hats because what’s left of my hair is really stupid, but I’d only really heard of a couple of these… Pillbox only because of Bob Dylan’s rather fabulous leopardskin version.
On me head, son…
[Sadoldsweat @47. Still open last time I was in Hawes (July), but I only put my head around the door and moved on, because beer is more my thing than pub food. I know it’s changed hands two or three times in recent years, so it may be struggling to keep up with the other three pubs in Hawes.]
Failed on Trekker. A fan of Star Trek is a Trekkie.
Thanks for the hints.
And yet …
Octapus @48 and muffin@50. What convention? The clue referred to 24. In a cryptic crossword, it isnt a massive leap of the imagination to consider BOTH the across and down clues to consider the solution.
Convention shouldn’t be there to spoon feed us the answers.
dantheman @56
As I very slightly implied, I didn’t entirely agree with the consensus.
Many thanks to both. Enjoyable and gettable although HAVELOCK threw me – it is a little town not too far from here. I had to google the name with Ellis, having never heard of him.
BO is in my eChambers as the third definition and labelled as US slang.
Thanks Hatter for the info. I’m sure the beer would have passed muster or I wouldn’t have been in there. It was at least twenty years ago so I don’t remember what was on tap but it’s good to hear the pub’s likely surviving thus far anyway.