Good Monday puzzle from Peto.
I took longer than usual to complete this grid – possibly just me! Enjoyable nonetheless. Thank to Peto.
CREW (company) located near DRIVER (golf club) beyond S[lough] (west end of)
Double definition
O (old) + CUR (dog) eating C[hicken] (a piece of)
PAPER (essay) on SAND (French writer, George Sand)
BEG (to ask for) housing IN (all the rage) after SIEG (German victory)
I’m afraid I’ll have to be enlightened as to the meaning of the (or) – any ideas?
O (over) + [c]RATE (packing case, top missing)
P[ett]Y< (extremely, <over) + A (article) looking into (DILL)* (*analysis of)
“REID” (or “REED”) (English writer, “in recital”)
I’m not certain to which writer the setter refers, but presumably either Christopher Reid or Jeremy Reed, two award-winning English writers
18. Soldiers involved in exercises in Dover (4)
OR (soldiers) involved in PT (exercises)
Double definition
CO (Colombia) welcoming AIR (publicity)
M (months) + (THAT ANNA)* (*wasted)
(GREAT ART)* (*created) on M (Malta)
Double definition
HER[o] (priestess of Aphrodite, O (nothing) less)
SA (South Africa) facing LESSON (reprimand) over PE[eks] (a couple of) at [custome]R’s (bottom)
S[tonyhurst] (head of) + NOW (present) at BALL (clog)
(LAST)* (*repaired) underlying ROCK (crack)
ROW< (quarrel, <about) + SE (the home counties, South East England)
D[epartures] (first of) after REIN (bad weather (“rain”) “reported”) around SC (South Carolina)
VIN (French wine) + E.G. (say) + A[ffect] R[otund] (starts to)
REP (salesman) + ROB (to steal) + [m]ATE (pal, M (money) from)
POP[u]LAR (trendy, not U (posh))
PORT (left) with [J]E[r]R[y] (regularly)
(POOL PASS)* (*new) without R (resistance)
DI’S (girl’s) + TEND (to wait upon) + S (society)
CHIN (feature) + CHIN (feature)
MUT[t]< (dog, tailless, <lifted) + BRIL[l] (most of)
(Ignore the typo in the grid – apologies)
BEN (fellow) + MBS (doctors) after U[ncertainty] (at the outset)
CH (church) + SCOT (tax) earlier
BIT (piece) on T[he] E[aser] R[ising] (origins of)
MP (politician) taken in by [t]ALE (lie, needs no introduction)
A good puzzle, best of today’s crop, which was too good for me. I ended up not being able to get BESIEGING but there were others I couldn’t parse, eg SNOWBALL – I hadn’t heard of this as a ‘dance’ or that BALL could mean ‘clog’ – and I didn’t know which ‘English writer’ was being refer to in READ.
Overall, this was hard work; it was good there was so much liquid refreshment around to keep up the solver’s spirits.
Thanks to Peto and Teacow
Peto, re 11A my printed version ended with “German victory (or)”. It did not have a letter count. I can only guess that this was a misprint and (or) should have read (9).
Like WP re 1D, I cannot find any reference where “clog” means “ball”.
Thanks for your efforts with this blog. I live in Australia and get the crossword in my morning, yet you always manage to finish it before I go to bed.
Hello Peter @2. I’d never heard of it before, but looking it up today in Chambers, to ‘clog’ (transitive verb) is given as one sense of BALL.
Peter @ 2,
I think you must be right regarding 11a and the ‘or’ being 9 letters.
Found this pretty tough and needed lots of help with parsing. 1d and 19 were my undoing.
I liked CHIN-CHIN SANDPAPER best.
Thanks to Neo and Teacow for a most welcome blog.
Thanks for the blog, I also was puzzled by SNOWBALL for two reasons, but as seen above – to clog=to ball and Chambers does have a SNOWBALL dance.
Many neat clues, TETRAGRAM was my favourite.
A very satisfying solve — thanks Peto. This took awhile to finish and I took a quick peek at Teacow’s completed grid to get POP; I then got my LOI, POPLAR. All else came with varying degrees of head scratching — I too was mystified by (or) in 11a and I never noticed the missing enumeration. I particularly liked LILY PAD, TETRAGRAM (nice surface), RESCIND, and AMPLE (amusing surface). Thanks Teacow for the write-up — I never bothered to figure out the parsing to SALESPERSON and I missed the double definition aspect of BLEMISH.
As Tony@6 says, a very satisfying solve. And looking at the completed grid again we wonder if there’s a bit of a drinks theme, with SCREWDRIVER, SNOWBALL and MANHATTAN (cocktails) as well as SCOTCH, BITTER, PORT, PORTER and PUNCH – and even possibly POP.
Thanks, PETO and Teacow.
allan_c @7: CHIN CHIN — you’ve spotted a theme!
Excellent spot, allan_c@7! A layer of value I had missed.
Didn’t spot the theme either, but I’ve had a glass or two of 5d in my time passing for 22d!
Absolutely awful. Have added Peto to my list of setters I don’t bother with.
Clog = ball? FFS!
Thanks Pete and Teacow
Actually did this one near publication date, but it sank under a pile of others till I checked it off today. Notice that it spilled over to a second day and took about half as long again than normal to get it done – so a tough Monday puzzle. Still some lovely clues and some with a wicked twist to them along with some general knowledge – not sure how many would know the German ‘sieg’ meant victory.
BALL for ‘clog’ needed some chasing down and assume ROCK was referring to the slang word for crack cocaine. BRILL came to the rescue and saved the error with the original TUMBREL at 19d. Hadn’t heard of the POPLAR district of London until this year and this is the second occurrence in recent times. Didn’t twig to the ALCOHOLIC DRINKS theme, so good call out by allan@7.
Finished in the SW corner with that TUMBRIL, PORT and PROPOSALS.