Decent, lightly-themed Tuesday entertainment from Gaff, but…
I struggled. Well, a bit. I set off like a train with the obvious 1a/1d 25 device and expected to post early, but the top-right crossers – neither of which I’m still completely happy with – slowed me down at the death. There were other quibbles as well, but good fun and respect to Gaff from Currently Unfulfilled of Buxton.
| ACROSS | ||
| 1, 5 across, 3, 8 | MAKE HIM AN OFFER HE CANT REFUSE |
How 25 would negotiate fee-free arrangement with fat human chain-smoker (4,3,2,5,2,4,6)
|
| Anagram (‘arrangement’) of FEE FREE and FAT HUMAN CHAIN SMOKER, for famous quote from the film ‘The Godfather’ (answer to 25). | ||
| 9 | BRANCHLET |
Wager about farm land starting slight division (9)
|
| B.ET (‘wager’) surrounds RANCH (‘farm’) & start of L{and}. | ||
| 10 | CALIF |
Religious leader’s state (5)
|
| Double definition, 2nd = abbreviation (in Chambers) of California. | ||
| 11 | TETANISED |
Induced seizure: offensive plant to dead head (9)
|
| TET (Viet Nam war ‘offensive’) + ANISE (‘plant’) + 1st of D{ead}. | ||
| 12 | DRUGS |
Subject of traffic control measures? (5)
|
| Cryptic def. Drugs trafficking attracts control measures. H’m. | ||
| 13 | ROUE |
Playboy’s extremely roguish issue (4)
|
| 1st & last 2 letters of ‘ROguish issUE’. | ||
| 14 | TWO-TONE |
Maybe rose with fire engine siren sound (3-4)
|
| Double definition of 1) some roses, and 2) the old fire-engine nee-naw to the tune of the ‘Over the Rainbow’ middle 8. | ||
| 19 | RELOADS |
Gets another round in ready for more shots (7)
|
| Cryptic description of re-loading a gun, w mild, drink-based misdirection. | ||
| 20 | ROTA |
Schedule partial return of moratorium (4)
|
| Contained, reversed, in ‘morATORium’. | ||
| 24 | IGLOO |
Blocks arrangement to build white house (5)
|
| Cryptic def. | ||
| 25 | GODFATHER |
After start of game ref had to change sponsor (9)
|
| G (=1st of ‘G{ame}) + anagram (‘change’) of REF HAD TO. | ||
| 27 | BRAND |
Apple is one of a kind (5)
|
| Double def. | ||
| 28 | ONE-LINERS |
Jokes about electric ships (3-6)
|
| ON (‘about’) + E[lectric] + LINERS (‘ships’). | ||
| 29 | GREENER |
Less experienced in meagre energy use (7)
|
| Hidden in ‘meaGRE ENERgy’. | ||
| 30 | BLOUSON |
Contemptible person nearly wearing good French garment (7)
|
| ‘LOUSe’ (incomplete ‘contemptible person’) in B.ON (Fr. ‘good’). | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | MOBSTERS |
Mafia’s greatest includes black queens (8)
|
| MO.ST (‘greatest’) includes B[lack], then ERS (‘queens’). | ||
| 2 | KHARTOUM |
Capital place to bury cars, reportedly (8)
|
| Homophone of ‘CAR TOMB’. | ||
| 3 |
See 1 across
|
|
| 4 | MILES |
Distance is mainly easy, oddly (5)
|
| Alternate letters of ‘MaInLy EaSy’. | ||
| 5 | ANTEDATED |
Was older so wanted a Te Deum inside (9)
|
| Neatly hidden in ‘wANTED A TE Deum’. | ||
| 6 | OCCIDENT |
Mishap involving new leader in the west (8)
|
| ‘aCCIDENT’ (‘mishap’), 1st letter changed. | ||
| 7 | FILL UP |
Could make well over top mark (4,2)
|
| Double def. Maybe. 1) To ‘fill up’ (with tears) and then to ‘well over’ are the phases of beginning a little weep. 2) If you ‘fill up’ a vessel you might be said to ‘top its mark’. Neither hugely satisfactory and other ideas welcome. I have the distinct sense that I’m missing something bloomin’ obvious. | ||
| 8 |
See 1 across
|
|
| 15 | WRONGDOER |
Clue to redo criminal (9)
|
| Reverse anagram, i.e. ‘Wrong doer’ = clue for ‘redo’. | ||
| 16 | BEHOLDEN |
Obliged to keep insect outside before noon (8)
|
| HOLD (‘keep’) inside BE.E + N[oon]. | ||
| 17 | LOCH NESS |
Sound of Caledonian monster (4,4)
|
| Double definition, and sort of whole clue def. Again, not sure of this. ‘Sound’ is maritime and Nessie lives in fresh water. | ||
| 18 | GARRISON |
Signora runs around post (8)
|
| Anagram (‘around’) of ‘SIGNORA’ + R[uns] | ||
| 21 | BIN BAG |
Sack for not starting jabbing when ordered (3,3)
|
| Anagram (‘when ordered’) of ‘jABBING’ without 1st letter. | ||
| 22 | SLEAZE |
Corruption at No 10 leads to Sunak looking excited and zero endorsement (6)
|
| 1st letters (‘leads’) of last 6 words. The def seems a little tendentious to me. I mean, probably true, but tendentious. | ||
| 23 | CASINO |
Better place for chips? (6)
|
| Cryptic def. Where a punter collects his (gambling) chips. | ||
| 26 | DWEEB |
Noise level overwhelms small nerd (5)
|
| Decibel (D.B) surrounds WEE (‘small’). |
Had the same problem with FILL UP, and still not sure I’ve properly understood it. But thought 12ac was a double definition: Drugs being both “subject of traffic” and “control measures” (i.e. medication.)
I couldn’t parse my last in FILL UP either. I didn’t even think of ‘well over’ as a verb which does make more sense of the clue, but I still can’t really explain it. The ‘Sound’ inaccuracy passed me by and I also missed the DRUGS probable double def as pointed out by Vannucci @1.
A few other hard ones, eg the uncommon word TETANISED and the alternative CALIF spelling made this quite hard to complete. Good to see at least one theme-related name spanning two adjacent answers and there may be more.
Thanks to Gaff and Grant
Me too with FILL UP. Ended up thinking it was just a (weak) CD – If you fill something up it might well over the top mark – but I don’t think much of that parsing.
Thought SLEAZE was OK – no accusation, just that corruption at No 10 is often called ” sleaze’.
Thanks to Gaff and GB.
Oh, yes, and I’ve never seen the ‘calif’ abbreviation before.
Grant, I feel so much better after reading your blog, as I had a very similar experience. Got stuck on FILL UP and DRUGS, but got through the rest of it, with 1d my FOI, followed shortly by 25a, which then made 1a, etc., rather obvious.
Calif. is a normal abbreviation for California in the US, although CA and Cal. are a little more common. And the religious leader is much more often spelled caliph here, but calif is also acceptable.
My dictionary gives “a narrow inlet of the sea” (i.e., a “sound”) as the first definition of “loch”, but Loch Ness is definitely a lake (the second definition), so I agree that the use of “sound” in 17d is a bit of a stretch.
I particularly liked 5d, 24d, and especially 29a, since “meagre energy use” is “greener” than lots of energy use.
Thanks to Grant for a great blog and GAFF for a fun themed puzzle, even with the quibbles.
I agree with EDK that this was great fun despite the issues mentioned above (and which I pondered too). I’ve consistently enjoyed Gaff’s puzzles thus far and the theme was appealing today.
I particularly liked RELOADS which, for me, was sufficiently misleading for it to be my LOI. ROUE, BINBAG, BLOUSON, DWEEB, SLEAZE and KHARTOUM were other ticks.
Thanks to Gaff and Grant for a very helpful blog.
I had 7D as FOLD UP which I couldn’t parse properly, with mark = FOLD, and over that top = UP. Something about making a bed, of folding up with laughter… Good one to fold up the crossword on.
What about “Full up” as a possibility?
Gaff’s trademark sprinkling of superfluous words (e.g. 29a, 21d), dubious indicators (e.g. 13a, 9a) and sundry spruriosity (queens = ERS? Already veering into metaphysical realms, but the plural would logically be Elizabeths Reginae = ER.)
Nice ideas often spoiled by erratic clueing technique = the editor sitting on his hands.
Indeed, Oceanic! What a strange puzzle.
To Oceanic@9
I think properly that it would be ER + S. You have to split the word, which is of course legit. I’d thought of showing it that way but it felt a bit pernickety.
Slight deviation = “branchlet”?
Oh FFS.
I’m been a native English speaker for over 70 years and I’ve never heard the word.
Do some setters derive sadistic pleasure from including ridiculous clues like this?
A hodgepodge of oddities but I got there in the end — thanks Gaff. I liked RELOADS, GODFATHER, ONE-LINERS, MOBSTERS, and DWEEB. CALIF is an abbreviation and I thought the clue should have indicated that by the inclusion of “short” before “state” or “briefly” afterward. Thanks Grant for the blog — I couldn’t parse ANTEDATED (I hate missing the hidden ones because they should be the most obvious), WRONGDOER (very clever), and FILL UP.
Hermione @ 12
There are probably hundreds or thousands of words in English dictionaries that I’ve never heard, but they are all fair game for solvers as long as they are fairly clued.
Thanks Gaff and Grant.
Agree with EdK on almost everything. I too got hung up in NE corner and can’t quite figure out 7d.
KHARTOUM was my favorite!
This year is the 50th anniversary of the first GODFATHER movie, so how appropriate the theme is.
The bottom half filled in reasonably quickly but it took me a long time to get the big opening clue. After that again more progress but I missed Tetanised. Forgot that old chestnut Tet. I also had Fill up for 7D as I couldn’t see why it was Full up either. Both seemed equally unlikely to this solver. Favourite was Igloo as I went off in completely the wrong direction.
Me @ 14
‘…fair game for setters…’
Thanks Gaff and Grant
A bit of a struggle to get this one done and ended up in the NE corner like many of the folk here. There were a number of cd clues used throughout – 2 or 3 really good ones and the 7d / 12a which weren’t so good. Raised eyebrows too at the ‘sound’ at 17d.
Many other neat clues to make up for those though, especially the neatly hidden ANTEDATED.
TETANISED and BLOUSON were both new terms for me.
Maybe, Simon S, but we do have things like Azed and Mephisto specifically for the illumination and search of the darker corners of the dictionaries. I’m not saying that Gaff has transgressed here today, but sometimes we see in a daily words that haven’t seen the light of day since 1300.
In my puzzles usually. Let’s put TAGHAIRM in.
Offensive = Tet is an old chestnut which is now well past its use-by date and should be shunned by any conscientious setter.
Given your name, Westmoreland @20, you have good reason never to want to be reminded of the Tet offensive again, in a crossword or anywhere else!
Thanks Grant and Gaff. Can’t say I enjoyed this puzzle, as there were too many infelicities. To cite two: I’ve lived in California for decades and have never seen the abbreviation “Calif,” nor have I ever seen the religious leader spelled (or spelt) with a terminal F rather than PH; I can’t figure out why 22d needs “at No 10” except to provide a spurious air of topicality.
I parsed the DD in 14a differently: something that’s rose red and fire engine red would be TWO TONE, as is a siren sound.
Verbose@22: Calif. was a common abbreviation for California before the US Postal Service standardized on two-letter state abbreviations. (I am showing my age!)
EdK@23: Ah. Thanks.
Something I suspect was intentional, but which nobody else has mentioned, is that the score to the GODFATHER (25) is by Nino ROTA (20).