The puzzle is available to solve online or download here.
Hello. I hope this Twixtmas finds you in good health and good cheer. I think Bluth went quite gentle on us today, but kept the fun factor as high as ever. Thanks Bluth!
Definitions are underlined in the clues below. In the explanations, most quoted indicators are in italics, specified [deletions] are in square brackets, and I’ve capitalised and emboldened letters which appear in the ANSWER. For clarity, I omit most link words and some juxtaposition indicators.
| Across | |
| 1a | Aphrodisiac making old artist unsteady (7) |
| ERRATIC — ER[o]TIC (aphrodisiac) making O (old) RA (artist) | |
| 5a | Jump leads to start all Leyland cars – that follows (7) |
| SALCHOW — The first letters of (leads to) Start All Leyland Cars; HOW (that) follows. A jump in ice skating | |
| 9a | Fair provision of internet service provider and phone company used by aristocrat? (6,5) |
| TOFFEE APPLE — EE (internet service provider) and APPLE (phone company) used by TOFF (aristocrat?) | |
| 10a | Spoil drive back (3) |
| MAR — RAM (drive) back | |
| 11a | Leaned on print media journalist after you are caught (9) |
| PRESSURED — PRESS (print media) + ED (journalist) after UR (you are, caught) | |
| 14a | Loathed pitching the ad (5) |
| HATED — An anagram of (pitching) THE AD | |
| 15a | Meeting place with solemnity providing focus for mass (6,2,7) |
| CENTRE OF GRAVITY — CENTRE (meeting place) + OF (with) + GRAVITY (solemnity) | |
| 18a | Stable reliable sort in AA – perhaps owing to resolution (5,2,8) |
| TOWER OF STRENGTH — TOWER (AA perhaps – EDIT: the Automobile Association who may tow your vehicle – many thanks to Hovis in the first comment for this) + OF (owing to) + STRENGTH (resolution) | |
| 20a | Sidestep in rally round about 15 love (5) |
| AVOID — AID (rally round) surrounding (about) the centre of graVity (15a) and O (love) | |
| 22a | How’s your father, mother, uncle and aunt? (9) |
| RELATIONS — Mother, uncle and aunt are examples of relatives or RELATIONS; how’s your father is slang for, to take Chambers’ first definition, “amorous frolicking” | |
| 24a | Source of green energy set to be unlimited – wow! (3) |
| GEE — The first letter of (source of) Green + E (energy) + sEt without outer letters (to be unlimited) | |
| 25a | Source of green energy wired in but not initially working (4,7) |
| WIND TURBINE — An anagram of (… working) WIRED IN BUT and Not initially | |
| 28a | Indecisive writing journal – change article to be definite (7) |
| DITHERY — DI[a]RY (writing journal) in which we must swap the indefinite article for the definite one (change article to be definite) so A becomes THE | |
| 29a | Bill Nighy’s opening door (7) |
| POSTERN — POSTER (bill) + Nighy’s first letter (opening) | |
| Down | |
| 1d | Very busy wanting hospital to hold operation in abnormal place (7) |
| ECTOPIC — [h]ECTIC (very busy) without (wanting) H (hospital) containing (to hold) OP (operation) | |
| 2d | Prisoner ultimately given sentence – possibly raised in case of firearm (5) |
| RIFLE — The end letter of (… ultimately) prisoneR + LIFE (sentence – possibly) with IF (in case of) moved up (raised) | |
| 3d | At the end Alistair Darling introduces finance officer (9) |
| TREASURER — The last letter of (at the end) AlistaiR, which TREASURE (darling) precedes (introduces) | |
| 4d | Tea dance, 50% off (3) |
| CHA — CHA-cha (dance) with 50% off. | |
| This would have worked equally well with 2/3 off: I thought that the dance was really the 3-cha version, the 2-cha one being already an informal shortening, so was surprised to see the 2-cha as the lead entry in Chambers (although trusty Wiki agrees with me). | |
| And now I have this in my head: The one-L lama, he’s a priest. The two-L llama, he’s a beast. And I would bet a silk pajama: there isn’t any three-L lllama – Ogden Nash |
|
| 5d | Detectives turned up for drink (3) |
| SIP — PIS (PIs: detectives) reversed (turned up, in a down entry) | |
| 6d | Shelter beside church drain (5) |
| LEECH — LEE (shelter) beside CH (church) | |
| 7d | Actor on series gets hamper (9) |
| HAMSTRING — HAM (actor) on STRING (series) | |
| 8d | Cast Lloyd Bridges right after western knowing … (7) |
| WORLDLY — An anagram of (cast) LLOYD spans (bridges) R (right) after W (western) | |
| 12d | … direction spoken by pro will get support (4,3) |
| ROOT FOR — ROOT sounds like (… spoken) ROUTE (direction) and it is next to (by) FOR (pro) | |
| 13d | Despicable sort’s boring phone having numbered display (7) |
| DIGITAL — GIT (despicable sort)’s entering (boring) DIAL (phone) | |
| 16d | National park in N-Nottingham? (3,6) |
| NEW FOREST — NEW (N) + FOREST (Nottingham? – Nottingham Forest FC) | |
| 17d | Extremely deficient paper breaks up leaving holes (9) |
| APERTURES — Without the outermost/extreme letters (extremely deficient) pAPEr + R[up]TURES (breaks) with UP leaving | |
| 18d | Wanted to play with guitar at the top – plucked string? (7) |
| TWANGED — An anagram of (… to play …) WANTED with the first letter of (… at the top) Guitar. | |
| This reminded me of the notorious “Twangers” episode of a favourite children’s TV show Rainbow, the background of which is explained on its Wikipedia page | |
| 19d | Somebody once discovered Chase buzzer’s broken at the base (3-4) |
| HAS-BEEN — Without outer letters (discovered) cHASe + BEE (buzzer) + the last or bottom letter of (… at the base) brokeN | |
| 21d | Divine party with someone on vacation (5) |
| DOWSE — DO (party) + W (with) + SomeonE on removal of its inner letters (on vacation) | |
| 23d | Cow maybe dropping head like a sheep (5) |
| OVINE — bOVINE (cow maybe) skipping the first letter (dropping head) | |
| 26d | Vote of American in New York (3) |
| NAY — A (American) in NY (New York) | |
| 27d | Best pan on the counter (3) |
| TOP — POT (pan) reversed (on the counter) | |
I took the ‘tower’ in 18a to refer to the AA (Automobile Association) who may tow your vehicle.
Thanks Hovis! You are right of course: I’ve updated the blog with due credit. 🙂
Good to see one of my favourite comedians and setters on a Saturday morning. Got APPERTURES and ERRATIC from the definitions and crossing letters so thanks for the explanations. I also got RIFLE through an extremely convoluted parsing whilst your way is a bit more sensible.
Favourites: TOFFEE APPLE and DITHERY
APERTURES was the only one I didn’t manage to parse. An enjoyable puzzle.
And thanks for the added context around “How’s your father?”. I was doubting myself that the clue was too easy and I couldn’t see the second part.
Only ever heard the phrase in a Wurzel’s song before. I wonder if it was meant to be taken in that context?
Like Tim C, I failed to parse APERTURES and I’m not a fan of RIFLE which ends up as WP of definition which is not my favourite construction. Other than that I fully agree with our blogger’s assessment and had ticks for TOWER OF STRENGTH for the neat ‘AA’; AVOID and WIND TURBINE for the surfaces; POSTERN and WORLDLY for the Bluth trademark use of a person’s name; HAS BEEN for the cunningly hidden definition and TV culture reference and DOWSE for the neat Lego assembly. It does seem odd that the dance appears in the dictionary with both two and three CHA’s – wish they could make their minds up!
Thanks Bluth and Kitty
They call it the cha-cha on Strictly, so that’s good enough for me. I liked ERRATIC among many others.
What Kitty said – relatively gentle but good fun.
Many thanks to her and to Bluth.
Petert @7, Craig Revel Howard is a stickler for the correct cha-cha-cha. The reason it is called that is that the third and fourth beats of each bar are split into three so the rhythm of the dance is 1-2-cha-cha-cha.
I though RIFLE was a little clumsy but otherwise well up to Bluth’s high standard, so thanks to him and Kitty.
Thanks Kitty. And thanks all.
PostMark @6 re RIFLE. I don’t think it is WP of Definition. There is no intended linkword. My synonym for ‘if’ is ‘in case of’.
PostMark, you can possibly make a case for ‘if’ = ‘in case of’. Maybe, ‘in case of fire, break class’ = ‘if fire, break glass’.
Bluth, just beat me to it.
Bluth @11. I thought that might be your intention for RIFLE but I couldn’t (and still can’t) construct a sentence in which “if” can be replaced by “in case of”. Can you suggest something please?
The old brain got fixated on tennis so didn’t think to look at 15a for the parsing of 20a. Otherwise all good and nice to have a puzzle when g there’s a weird thing in the G second Saturday running.
WORLDLY is a word that always brings to mind the William Tell Overture. Well done anyone who can follow my train of thought there.
Thanks Bluth and Kitty.
Rabbit Dave – while it’s a slightly abstract example it is also one frequently used and easy to find in the wild. People describe certain logic problems using the phrase: “If X then Y”
I think “in case of X then Y” means the same thing.
I think the case for “if = in case of” is stronger than the case for “if = in case”
Bluth @11: thanks as always for dropping in. I came here for the parsing of RIFLE and ‘if’ is equated with ‘in case’ leaving ‘of’ as a bit of an orphan. If your intention was to avoid the WP of def construction, good on you.
Don’t ‘if’ and ‘in case of’ take different parts of speech? ‘If’ needs a phrase with a verb, ‘in case of’ just needs a noun, or equivalent phrase. ‘If X then Y’ just hides that behind algebraic shorthand. ‘If there is a fire then run’, ‘in case of fire then run’, where X = either ‘there is a fire’ or just ‘fire’.
I know that some solvers are not that fussed about the surface reading of clues.
60-odd years ago, my dad used to wrap my Christmas presents in pages from The Liverpool Echo. His excuse was, “I’ve spent money on yer present, not the frippery”.
Fair enough, but I like nice wrapping paper, nearly as much as I like the contents.
Bluth excels at the wrappings. Some lovingly-constructed clues, here.
A couple of sprouts in the bottom of the stocking…..”N-Nottingham”? for one; and RIFLE didn’t hit the mark, for me.
With ” fair provision” = TOFFEE APPLE (9 ac), all is forgiven.
Happy days, Bluth & Kitty
Thanks. I don’t have anything intelligent to add, but will amend the blog to match Bluth’s intended parsing of RIFLE.
Thanks Bluth. I found this on the gentle side but I still had problems parsing ERRATIC, RELATIONS, and APERTURES. My top picks were RIFLE, GEE, and DOWSE. I thought it a bit unfortunate that the definition ‘hamper’ and the answer HAMSTRING both had ‘ham’ in them when many other words (obstruct, thwart, frustrate, e.g.) would fit at the start of the clue. Thanks Kitty for the blog.
Lovely puzzle. APERTURES last in for me and had to stare at it for a minute before the parsing became clear. Crafty clue.
I enjoyed the variety of means by which the outer or inner parts of words were clued as part of the wordplay, a device used a lot in this puzzle.
Tony Santucci @20, I’m not sure any of your suggested other words help the surface, much:
Actor on series gets thwart.
Bluth @22: ‘Frustrate actor prior to series’ seems OK.
Tony @23 I prefer the added extra misdirection of the definition being a noun in the surface when it’s a verb that’s required.
Bluth @24: ‘Actor on series gets check’ might work.