GUY decided to make Friday a tough end to the weekend. 🙂
FF: 9 DD: 10
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | BARRACKS |
Building housing unit, except for shelves (8)
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BAR ( except ) RACKS ( shelves ) |
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| 6 | SNAPPY |
Fashionable son frequently changed underwear (6)
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S ( son ) NAPPY ( frequently changed underwear ) |
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| 9 | SITTER |
Dolly who models (6)
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double def |
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| 10 | XANTIPPE |
Angry wife wanting kiss opposed to Covid masks etc (8)
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X ( kiss ) ANTI ( opposed to ) PPE ( covid masks etc ) |
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| 11 | LEGO |
Something we stand on old bricks (4)
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LEG ( something we stand on ) O ( old ) |
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| 12 | SUCH AS IT IS |
Hit Cassius plotted which doesn’t come to much (4,2,2,2)
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[ HIT CASSIUS ]* |
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| 14 | CATACOMB |
Pet a bird’s crest, bones beneath there (8)
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CAT ( pet ) A COMB ( bird's crest ) |
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| 16 | CLOT |
Stop running, silly (4)
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double def |
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| 18 | MAXI |
Dress in the morning around eleven (4)
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MA ( reverse of AM , morning ) XI ( eleven, roman numerals ) |
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| 19 | RAILROAD |
Painter adjusted radio, catching end of cool American track (8)
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RA ( painter ) { [ RADIO ]* containing L ( cooL , last letter ) } |
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| 21 | GO STRAIGHT |
Try hand at poker to make an honest buck (2,8)
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GO ( try ) STRAIGHT ( hand at poker ) |
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| 22 | EXPO |
Show former partner where one used to go at night (4)
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EX ( former partner ) PO ( where one used to go at night ) |
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| 24 | FLAGRANT |
Shameless newspaper claims prisoner fled (8)
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FT ( newspaper ) containing [ LAG ( prisoner ) RAN ( fled ) ] |
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| 26 | NEARLY |
Close soon after end of season (6)
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N ( seasoN, end of ) EARLY ( soon ) |
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| 27 | WHAMMY |
Women tending to overdramatize bad news (6)
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W ( women ) HAMMY ( tending to overdramatize ) |
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| 28 | AMORETTI |
David regularly eats extra dry biscuits (8)
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AI ( dAvId, regularly ) containing [ MORE ( extra ) TT ( dry ) ] – i solved this from the parse but i cant find the word in chambers that means biscuits ( cupid, lover are what i found ) |
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| DOWN | ||
| 2 | ALICE |
Girl threatened with beheading, a consequence of nits (5)
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A LICE ( consequence of nits ) |
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| 3 | RATIONALIST |
Desert island included in some catalogue, I think logically (11)
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RAT ( desert ) IONA ( is and ) A LIST ( some catalogue ) |
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| 4 | CURASSOW |
Rogue donkey that hurts large fowl (8)
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CUR ( rogue ) ASS ( donkey ) OW ( that hurts ) |
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| 5 | SAXE COBURG GOTHA |
Royal house one leaves puzzling at a corgi’s huge box (4-6-5)
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[ AT A CORGiS HUGE BOX ( without I – one ) ]* ; i knew what the parse was but didnt know the solve itself |
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| 6 | SUNDAE |
Star on date with no time for pudding (6)
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SUN ( star ) DAtE ( without T – time ) |
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| 7 | ALI |
Parkinson’s famously had him (3)
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cryptic def |
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| 8 | PEPSI COLA |
Model pal copies, not the real thing? (5-4)
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[ PAL COPIES ]* |
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| 13 | INCARCERATE |
Jail for driving old banger around Spain (11)
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IN CAR ( driving ) [ CRATE ( old banger ) around E ( spain, Espana ) ] |
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| 15 | AYATOLLAH |
Religious leader always greeting cheers from below (9)
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AY ( always ) [ reverse of { HALLO ( greeting ) TA ( cheers ) } ] |
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| 17 | NINTENDO |
Gamer’s computer switched on ó mean to interrupt that (8)
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NO ( reverse of ON ) containing INTEND ( mean ) ; i don't know what the special character Ă“ in the clue is for |
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| 20 | CANARY |
Animal in cage? Rat or guinea-pig in mine (6)
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triple def; sing like a canary in the context of snitching and canaries were used in mines to detect carbon monoxide |
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| 23 | PILOT |
Person trained at altitude climbing towards rim of crater (5)
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reverse of TO ( towards ) LIP ( rim of crater ) |
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| 25 | GYM |
Hacker in Whitehall reported for training (3)
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sounds like JIM ( hacker in whitehall, jim hacker , yes minister ) |
28a AMORETTI — The biscuits are AMARETTI.
3d RATIONALIST — RAT = Desert, I = island, ON A LIST = included in some catalogue.
17d NINTENDO — online the “Ăł” is just a “—” (em-dash)
Lots to like here ALI, PEPSI COLA, WHAMMY, GYM, CURASSOW, XANT(H)IPPE (“blonde mare”). LOi LEGO held me up for quite a while.
Thanks G&T
Thanks for the blog , very good overall but a couple of minor slips. Frankie@1 has the biscuits correctly , the cupid version was in the Guardian very recently. I think NINTENDO just has a misprint in the paper, did not affect the answer.
ALI I think the clue has double meaning, the disease and the famous interview with Michael .
Yeah, online version for NINTENDO had “to” rather than “Ăł”
22a PO go at night?? – please enlighten me
No doddle but it all hung together
Thanks Guy and turbo
Michael @6. Po is short for chamber pot. People (mainly those with outside toilets) used to pee in them at night. Maybe some still do.
Never knew po was short for chamber pot. Thank you Hovis.
[Michael Flanders’ & Donald Swann’s “Ma’s out, Pa’s out, let’s talk rude: | Pee! PO! Belly! Bum! Drawers! | Dance in the garden in the nude! …”
(19??) – aka P** P* B**** B** D******, ‘a song comparing the use of profanity among the intelligentsia to playground swearing.’]
Lots to like in this. For 5d I first thought Windsor and then the correct answer was obvious.The Parkinson interview with Ali was memorable. 1971!
The biscuits are indeed AMARETTI ; the liqueur has the O .
Thanks to Guy and Turblegs
Would someone please explain to me how “sitter” means “Dolly” in 9A?
3D: doesn’t “rat on” mean tell tales or turn someone in? “Desert” means to leave someone…
22A: Don’t let me get started on “po” as an abbreviation of a one-syllable word! We Germans have words of many letters; we would never abbreviate a three-letter word to a two-letter word.
Okay, enough of a rave. Thanks to all who contributed today.
Further to my post @10 the Kaiser made a “joke”.on hearing of the dynasty’s new name during WWI.Maybe the title of Shakespeare’s play should be changed to the “Merry Wives of Saxe Coburg Gotha”
Frieda@12.
A sitter in many ball games is an easy shot , also know as a dolly
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SITTER
What SM says@14 +
In cricket, they refer to a simple catch as a SITTER/a dolly.
RATIONALIST
Collins gives this example for ‘rat=desert/abandon’
he ratted on the project at the last minute
Thank you both – SM and KVa – I am not into basketball or cricket or any other ball games apart from football.
Thanks to Guy and Turbolegs
3dn: I had this as RAT + I + ON + A + LIST, but essentially the same parsing as given by Frankie@2.
17dn: The Ăł in place of a dash has happened before. It is presumably a clash between different extended character sets.
Another one flummoxed for a while by Guy not knowing his biscuits
I also found this on the difficult end.
There was plenty to like, with my favourites SNAPPY (nice misdirection), CATACOMB, MAXI, LEGO, and who could pass up GYM Hacker.
The troubled biscuit was my LOI. I had issues with a few clues beyond that, and it seemed like the puzzle needed another run through by the editor
Thanks Guy and Turbolegs
I was a bit uncomfortable with the Parkinson’s reference but enjoyed the rest.
This may seem like sour grapes from someone who failed to finish (the misspelling of 28 ac didn’t help) but I do think that setters should look to update the popular culture references. Paul Eddington’s last outing was in 1988 and Michael Parkinson interviewed Mohammed Ali in 1971. What’s wrong with “Derry Girls” or Ariana Grande?
Very sorry about the biscuits, a result of flip-flopping between amoretto and amaretti and losing track.
Beak @21 fair enough, re cultural references, but look at today’s Guardian thread and see how many people don’t know Coldplay. The references are only there to serve a word game – cliched ones tend to do that better. I know nothing of Derry Girls, of Ariana Grande only by name, and I wasn’t even born in 1971. There’s Pepsi, Lego and Nintendo here too. And Ayatollahs are so current.
Martyn @19, which?
Thanks Guy , these things happen , own up and all forgotten . It did not spoil the solve .
To be honest I would have struggled to deduce that the theme was Coldplay from the answers in today’s Guardian crossword. Perhaps the old ones are the best!
Late to blog, but enjoyed all of the puzzle… just went with the parsing for the biscuits, which taste the same as the liqueur anyway… I find them both delicious together or apart.. I didn’t know how to spell Socrates’ wife either but the parsing didn’t let us down there either… Ali would understand the irony, I’m sure, it wasn’t like he hid it from the world… a great man.
Frieda@12 worth noting that “pot” is pronounced “po” in French, which may have been an attempt to make the whole affair a little more posh, certainly better than a “guzunder”, as in “goes under the bed” which you’ll find further north..
So thanks Guy for a decent end to the week, which has been bruising in parts, and turbolegs for a decent blog
Guy@22, I am afraid I deleted my notes when I replied so I am not able to answer. What I spotted were more details than serious defects, which is the reason I glossed over them.
Thanks again for the puzzle. If you read this, did you deliberately make this more difficult or did it just turn out that way?
This was hard for me for so many reasons that a new Yorker would never know half the references! But I did know Jim Hacker because it is over if the best TV shows ever made. My teenage son and I love it and found it one of the best explanations for why what happens in any bureaucracy anywhere in the modern world!