This was last week’s Christmas Eve puzzle so not surprisingly another seasonal theme but not cloyingly so: some toboggans, crackers, a carol, a miracle, a portent and bit too much drinking. WHITE CHRISTMAS (11A) is clued quite well. A couple of new words (LOLLOP and DIABOLO)…
Across
| 1 | TOBOGGANS – (bags on got)* |
| 6 | VIR[a]GO – VIRGO’s a sign of the Zodiac and a virago is a shrew (not sure what the male equivalent is… any female readers here to let us know?) |
| 9 | POR(TEN)T |
| 10 | M(I+R)ACLE – Xmas-themed (“camel”, “king”, “amazing event” which is presumably the nativity). I do wonder about using “flea-bitten” as an anagrind. |
| 11 | WHITE CH(eck)+(is smart)* – WHITE is a “chess player” and WHITE CHRISTMAS is a “standard” tune indeed. Personally I like the irony of it being written by Irving Berlin in WWII. The wordplay is surprising and misleads quite nicely. |
| 13 | LOLL+OP – New word for me: LOLLOP means to “lounge”. According to Encarta, a Britishism to boot. Even though the clue “Hang work in lounge” reads as an insertion, it’s just a charade. |
| 14 | CRACKERS – Xmas-themed: partial double definition and cryptic definition: the kind of clue that depends on knowing (or working out – probably not very hard) the theme (or what day it was published) since it refers explicitly to “tomorrow” (Xmas day). |
| 23 | UNA+WAR+E – And our girl-friend UNA makes another guest appearance. |
| 24 | DIABOLO – Cryptic definition of a game with a top-like wooden thingy. Didn’t know this and had to wikitrawl. Hard clue to crack: no wordplay, so I struggled, even given D?A?O?O. |
| 25 | KE(R.R.)Y – Non-protestant Bishops are Right Reverends. Irish counties are shorter and pithier than their English cousins. |
Down
| 1 | TOPE – Hidden in “LighT OPEra”. I suppose Xmas-related assuming one does more than one’s fair share over the holidays. |
| 2 | BARTHOLOMEW F+AIR – Along with “Volpone” and “The Alchemist” a “play” by Ben Jonson — somehow I knew this. Also Bart was one of Jesus’s twelve. |
| 3 | GREAT+COAT – For some reason I always associate GREATCOATs with The Great War. |
| 5 | SOMBRE+R+O – Pretty sure I’ve seen a similarly themed clue in the past, but I think the surface works quite well here due to the surprising parsing: “dark” is SOMBRE and piece of ribbon” is R and “round” reads as around (containment) but it isn’t. |
| 6 | V+IR+US – Last clue for me: V[ide] for “see” escaped me for some time. |
| 8 | OPEN SESAME – Nice way to charade each word (“tournament” and kind of “seeds”.). |
| 12 | B(L+I+N.D. +DR)UNK – If you know your Beatles and Rocky Raccoon then this clue makes perfect sense. |
| 15 | CHIP+(a lot)*+A – I recognized CHIPOLATA as a sausage only once the wordplay fell into place. |
| 16 | HE+ATHENS – “Extremely” to indicate the two extreme letters of “HostilE” again. |
| 19 | TENDER – double meaning with different etymologies which is always a good thing. |
| 21 | I+TA(L)Y – Nice that ITALY is (almost) a Latin country. Three-letter rivers worth knowing: Exe, Cam, Dee, Ure and TAY… |
| 22 | G+OLD – Xmas-theme: one of the gifts from the 3 wise men (along with frankincense and myrrh). |