Monday and it’s Filbert again, never an easy task from a blogging point of view.
Not easy, can’t see any theme or Nina but I have been known to miss them. Over to you.
Visions of old Westerns here – don’t shoot me, I’m just the piano player, err sorry blogger. PITT the younger inside SOON – quickly
Definition refers to betting, mainly horse racing. P(enny) & LACED – tied in as in shoes say
An empty E(noug)H with CHOC(olate) inserted & AMBER – orange colour
ELL or the letter L, is the middle of K (L) M
VEER* crazily inside N&S as in the butterfly flutters in stomachs
BING – the Microsoft search engine as opposed the all conquering Google with LESS – lower inserted
TOOK A-BACK – surprised & the car maker SEAT
A sorted [FUSSY ROH ANNIE]*
MESS – confusion and MATE – a herbal tea, yes, really
Hidden in kayAK IM BOth
Most of (banana) SKI(n)
Capital of Papua New Guinea. MORES – customs inside PORT – wine & BY – passing through
Well an odd cocktail but yes OK. See 1D. S(on) & HANDY – good at fixing
B(ritish) & (m’) LUD – judge & a dancing GONE*
An empty I(rania)N & H(otel) & TIRE – flag reversed, raised in a down clue. Empty used again with the same meaning as 9a?
Ticked off meaning all correct but sort of meaning the opposite too
GO – turn reversed & AM in the morning. OGAM or OGHAM is an early English or Irish alphabet
Home of Cricket. Ground as def to deliberately mislead as a probable anagram indicator. R(ecipe) inside a nuts SOLD
Most of CRE(w) – squad & VICE – cramp, this is just a variant of clamp. I did check to see if this wasn’t a Grauniad style misprint ‘cos this has never happened in the Indy, honest guv.
The DEL(ete) key from a keyboard & EG – say & ATE – worried
Hidden reversed in cheESE A PLEBiean
In a scrum [(g)E(t)S BRUTAL]* it’s an architectural feature
K(ing) & NICKERED a noise made by horses
PRO – for & a redrawn MESSI* almost topical this one. [fixed, thanks Hovis]
YES – certainly & HI – welcome & a cut tax VA(t)
A cycled MA’S SEEN – mum’s spotted
COP – police office & YIN as opposed to YANG
A simple double defintion
reversed LIME tree, from a 1928 Novel Emil and the Detectives
Thanks, Filbert and flashling!
Very nicely written blog.
TICKED OFF
I thought the other meaning of ‘cross’ (x) was taken in the wordplay.
Instead of putting a cross, the opposite (tick) was marked.
In the sense of ‘is angry/cross’ is ‘ticked off’ an American usage (as in I am ticked off/I am cross)?
Wasn’t aware “ticked off” for ‘cross’ was an Americanism. Have always seen the OGHAM spelling in the past but Chambers gives OGAM as the main spelling. Minor error in blog for 17d – it is PRO + (MESSI)*
Nice one, Filbert. Lots of fine clueing here but ECHO CHAMBER stands out as my favourite.
I struggled to make sense of 11a – decided it must be the midway point of “literaLly km’s” but without being convinced. Your explanation makes more sense, thanks, flashling.
KVa, Hovis – Yes, the usual sources give TICKED OFF as US slang.
I made this harder for myself that I should with a tentatively placed DELETING instead of DELEGATE. And I did not know BALUSTER. And I spent too long trying to anagram ‘(for Messi)*’ which, given how close that fodder is to ‘pro (Messi)*’, led to confusion. As if it wasn’t tough enough already! That said, enjoyable as always and I am certainly woken up now. Favourites include ECHO CHAMBER, NERVES, SKI, TICKED OFF, LORDS and COPY IN were favourites.
Thanks Filbert and flashling
Jeen-yus but is Papua New Guineau in Asia or Oceania? Possibly Maritime South-East Asia. Immaculate clueing. I’ll have DELEGATE as my toppie because it took me a while to work out what removing was doing in the clue. Great blog and puzzle.
Agreed Sofamore @6. Pretty sure our neighbours to the north (PNG) consider themselves Pacific Islanders, not Asians.
The third hard Indy in a row and very satisfying to get this one out. I won’t complain if tomorrow’s is a bit gentler; a nice theme or Nina should help.
I have to admit I missed the reverse hidden in BEL PAESE and I took a long time to work out the correct anagram fodder for BALUSTER and to see what was going on with ELL; v. clever and my pick for the day.
Learnt a new way to spell OG[H]AM and agree with Sofamore @6 and GIS @7 about PORT MORESBY.
Thanks to Filbert and flashling
TICKED OFF
Probably, I didn’t clearly say what I wanted to say.
Cross is X.
Marked with this would have been ‘crossed’ or ‘put a cross’.
Marked with the opposite: Marked with the opposite of X : marked with TICK: TICKED OFF.
Does this parsing not work?
KVa @9 because of ‘American’ I had the clue as a double definition or with two layers of meaning, one of which you explain, the other being cross or angry, yet as Hovis@3 says there is no evidence that it is an American term and with Google it comes up as a UK term circa 1915. So, interesting.
The definition part was clear and I had no disagreement with that( Widdersbel @4 confirmed it was an American slang in response to my post & Hovis’s).
The second part: my parsing was at variance with what was explained by flashing.
Sofamore – Don’t know what source you found on Google but ticked off meaning annoyed is marked as US slang in the OED, Chambers and Collins, for which I presume they have evidence.
KVa – yes, I assumed that is what Filbert meant: marked with the opposite of a cross = ticked [off], meaning an item on a list is approved or dealt with. (Americans would say checked [off] for this meaning.)
Agree with Wordplodder @8, three-in-a-row has worn me down. Having said that, plenty of accessible titbits to give me a toe-hold before getting a little help.
Wasted some time trying to make PODIUM work instead of PLACED, but penny dropped soon enough.
Thanks F&F (not Fred & Flo)
Thanks both. I’m with others in feeling battle-hardened or battle-weary given the recent sequence of ‘challenges’. I struggled mainly with what was unknown to me, or perhaps forgotten, e.g. the ‘talking’ horse in KNICKERED. Still, I shall forgive myself for struggling with the obsolete variant OGAM and EMIL, obvious once the crossers were in, but ancient German children’s literature is not my strength
Thanks Filbert, that took awhile but it was ultimately satisfying. I hadn’t heard of OGAM, EMIL, STERNE, PORT MORESBY, or BALUSTER but I managed to figure them out from the wordplay. (I love when that happens.) I guessed BEL PAESE from the definition but missed the hidden reverse. (I hate when that happens.) I liked clues such as NERVES, ECHO CHAMBER, DELEGATE, PROMISES, COPY IN, and MOPED. I couldn’t begin to parse TOOK A BACK SEAT so thanks flashing for explaining.
I almost finished this but I had to wind the clock, and enjoyed being led up a number of garden paths ground not an anagram indicator, lower not being a cow, for being pro and not part of the anagram fodder.