Filbert on two consecutive days in the daily Independent. Not illegal, but certainly uncommon. A fine puzzle, which I enjoyed teasing out and finally completing.
Abbreviations
cd cryptic definition
dd double definition
cad clue as definition
(xxxx)* anagram
anagrind = anagram indicator
[x] letter(s) removed
definitions are underlined
Across
1 Water falling, cloud in sight?
CATARACT
A dd; the second is referring to the eye condition.
6 FBI suspect one of its agents hit
BIFFED
A charade of (FBI)* and FED. The anagrind is ‘suspect’. Great surface.
9 Facilities costing extra, landlord leaving note
DEAR JOHN LETTER
A charade of DEAR JOHN, which could be referring to an expensive loo, and LETTER. A phrase that I knew, but I’m guessing might not be familiar to all. It refers to a letter ending a romantic relationship, often addressed to a soldier away on service. The term was coined by American servicemen in World War II.
10 Unlikely to run like Usain Bolt, perhaps
FAST
A dd. The first definition is referring to dyes that are unlikely to run. Another excellent and concise surface.
12 The opposite article is on taxes
ANTITHESIS
A charade of AN, TITHES for the church ‘taxes’ and IS.
13 Couple in the back of huge car could be stars
GEMINI
A charade of GE for the final two letters of huGE and MINI.
14 Military staff protects old president, cycling this?
PUSH-BIKE
An insertion of USH B in PIKE. The insertion indicator is ‘protects’ and ‘cycling’ is the instruction to take the B from BUSH and move it to the end. An extended definition.
16 Need less depth in J R Ewing’s first novel
JANE EYRE
An insertion of NEE[D] in JAY and R followed by E for the initial letter of ‘Ewing’. J R Ewing is a character from Dallas and Jane Eyre is a novel by Charlotte Brontë. But you knew that already.
19 Nearly all bed covers left under the table
BLOTTO
An insertion of L in BOTTO[M]. The insertion indicator is ‘covers’.
21 The French enjoy the smell they make and down their wee
BON APPÉTIT
Harsh thing to say about our French friends. A charade of BO for body odour or ‘smell’, NAP in its fabric sense, and PETIT, whose Scots equivalent is ‘wee’. There is no real English equivalent to Bon appétit, Guten Appetit, Eet smakelijk, ¡Que aproveche! or Buon appetito, which probably says a lot about our relationship with food. But you will certainly hear ‘Enjoy!’ these days.
23 Corner immediately after turning right
NOOK
A charade of ON reversed and OK. ‘On/immediately after reading the letter, the soldier was distraught.’
24 Fine doctor cuts man loose after adapting carpenter’s tool
SMOOTHING PLANE
An insertion of THIN GP in (MAN LOOSE)* The insertion indicator is ‘cuts’ and the anagrind is ‘after adapting’.
26 Expected Tertius or Quintus, possibly but not Sextus
ODDS-ON
A bit of classics required here (which it took me ages to see). Tertius, Quintus and Sextus are Roman male forenames, indicating that they were the third, fifth or sixth child. Whimsically, the first two could be described as an ODD SON (since three and five are odd numbers) but the final one couldn’t, since six is an even number. Nobody calls their children those names any more except members of the upper class like Jacob Rees-Mogg, who came close when he named his sixth child Sixtus. There are probably a few unfortunates out there called Septimus or Octavius.
27 Nurse rapped for messing up last sheet
ENDPAPER
A charade of EN for Enrolled Nurse or just ‘nurse’ and (RAPPED)* The anagrind is ‘for messing up’.
Down
2 Mean hail storm
AVERAGE
A charade of AVE and RAGE. More Latin: AVE! means ‘Hail!’ in Latin. Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus tecum …
3 Musical in need of opening song
AIR
[H]AIR
4 Cupid got off lightly in the end, not knowing right from wrong
AMORALITY
A charade of AMOR, ALIT and Y for the final letter of ‘lightly’. AMOR and ‘Cupid’ are synonyms for the Roman god of love.
5 Trunk warmer, result of sun on back of Buick Super
TANK TOP
A charade of TAN, K for the last letter of ‘Buick’ and TOP. They only warm the ‘trunk’ because they are sleeveless.
6 Implacable attorney lodges complaint
BLEAT
Hidden in ImplacaBLE ATtorney.
7 That woman spreads thick toast for detective
FATHER BROWN
An insertion of HER in FAT BROWN gives you G K Chesterton’s fictional detective.
8 Teary having plucked flanks, choose wax remover
EARPICK
A charade of [T]EAR[Y] and PICK. Whatever happened to the advice never to put anything smaller than an elbow into your ear?
11 One crater formed, and no more dinosaurs
TRICERATOPS
A charade of (ONE CRATER)* and TOPS. The anagrind is ‘formed’.
15 Broke circumnavigators finally fixed boat and got on
SABOTAGED
A charade of S for the final letter of ‘circumnavigators’, (BOAT)* and AGED. ‘Broke’ and SABOTAGED are fairly distant synonyms, I would aver.
17 In a bar take drugs, possibly hard
AROUSED
An insertion of USE in A ROD. If you are blessed with a penis, then you may become ‘hard’ when AROUSED.
18 Ten bats with red or white splice
ENTWINE
A charade of (TEN)* and WINE. The anagrind is ‘bats’.
20 Defeat, on splits in armistice
TROUNCE
Slightly left-field cryptic grammar: Filbert is inviting you to split ‘on’ into O and N and insert those two letters randomly in TRUCE. The insertion indicator is ‘in’.
22 Spike attached to stone overhangs
PITON
A cd.
Edit: there is slightly more to it than this, and Hovis and Simon S explain why at comments 3 and 4.
25 Grazing the top half of foliage
LEA
LEA[VES]
Many thanks to Filbert for a puzzle to start our Indy crosswording week.
Thanks for the explanations of ODDS ON, (I had three and five as odd and six as even but no idea about ‘on’) and the tool. Speaking of tools, my toppie is AROUSED, whether it’s a blessing or not to have a penis. Maybe the ladies might disagree. Thanks Pierre and Filbert.
Surprising, indeed, to find two Filberts in a row but, as expected, the standard remains high. If ound this trickier than Saturday’s offering and needed a few checks plus Pierre’s blog to explain the parsing of PUSH BIKE (where I fell into the trap of president = IKE) and SMOOTHING PLANE which felt a bit tautologous as a phrase. I was nowhere near spotting the THIN GP. Favourites today inc CATARACT, BIFFED, FAST, GEMINI, DEAR JOHN LETTER, JANE EYRE, ODDS-ON, ENDPAPER and, of course, AROUSED. I’ve seen the split insertion used in TROUNCE before and think it works fine; could be vicious with more than a two letter insertion, though.
Thanks Filbert and Pierre
For PITON, I had the wordplay of PIT = ‘stone’ + ON = ‘overhangs’ with an extended definition. For 15d, I think ‘broke’ works within the surface of the clue.
Thanks Filbert and Pierre
My parsing of PITON was similar to that of Hovis: ON (attached to) with PIT (stone) on top of / overhanging it.
That seems to make use of all the words in the clue.
I suspected there might be something more to PITON. Thanks to Hovis and Simon S for explaining it.
Simon @4. That’s better than my effort.
Thanks Filbert and Pierre
Missed a couple of parsings so needed the blog. I liked Dear John Letter and learnt the origin above (thanks again); makes it even more saddening if one is away from home through no fault of ones own. The WW2 version of being told by text message
PITON
Hovis@6
Agree that Simon has a better parse. I had this 👇🏻 & was convinced my parsing was all right till I read Simon’s post:
stone=PIT
over=ON …ON hangs. 😊
Didn’t like a Greek singular TRICERATOPS being clued as “dinosaurs”. Wiktionary reckons the plural can be TRICERATOPS, or even TRICERATOPSES.
OPS (ὤψ) means face, plural OPES (ὦπες), so I’d go for TRICERATOPES. (But that’s just me. Feel free to ignore me – I should be used to it by now.)
Is PITON &lit?
Double joy.. altho agree with Postmark @2 re trickiness… that just meant more application of time to get everything in the end. Unsuccessful attempt to get an appropriate anagram from CUPID GOT + Y, but deep down I knew it must have some moral content. The smoothing plane is in daily use chez moi, n spotting the ‘thin GP’ confirmed.
All in all time well spent, even if quite a lot of water passed under the bridge.
Thanks (again) Filbert and (as always) Pierre
Brilliant!
Great start to the week and totally different to his last one (Olympic surfing?)
I reckon Filbert is well getting the hang of the this lark!
Thanks both. Persistence paid off for me, with CATARACT LOI as I was unaware of the first definition. I stood no chance of parsing SMOOTHING PLANE as I was not moving away from MO being the doctor, and similarly for a while within PUSH BIKE I could only see Ike as the President. To learn here that Jacob Rees-Mogg called one of his children Sixtus stands as another reason for him to be moved a safe distance away from the general public.
Little error in the blog at 11d the anagram fodder is one = I and CRATER.
Took me a long time to get to anywhere near finishing. Failed on 1a – nho of the 1st meaning of CATARACT. and also needed help on 19a as although I could just about make out what was going on I couldn’t bring to mind BOTTOM for bed.
I enjoyed that a lot today.
Thanks to Filbert and Pierre
Quite brilliant. The odd son made me smile. The outrageous wee-drinking French made me laugh out loud.
Like FrankieG, I wondered about Triceratops as a plural but it seems legit. And it needs to be “dinosaurs” in the clue to work with “and no more”, which I thought was v clever.
Thanks, Filbert & Pierre.
FrankieG@9
TRICERATOPS
I’ve seen you make similar comments about biceps & triceps. Can’t ignore. Just that these things are Greek & Latin …
Is PITON & lit?
Bluntly put no.
No spike in the wordplay.