Nick: I found this quite a toughy this week, giving my rating of 8/10 on the Azedian hardness scale.
I got tied up in the bottom half of the grid trying to correctly parse several clues, namely 28ac, 32ac, 33ac and 29dn.
26dn is an interesting clue.
| Across | |||
| 1. | Like a failing old tavern, stuck with rum nosh, rotten (12) | ||
| CUSTOM-SHRUNK | (STUCK RUM NOSH)* | ||
| 9. | Organized ladies diving into Scottish river, rarely drunk on malt (6) | ||
| SWIPEY | WI in SPEY | ||
| 12. | Draught of sole abandoned by tar? (4) | ||
| PLAN | PLAN(TAR) | ||
| 13. | Astringent I earmark for treatment (8) | ||
| KRAMERIA | (I EARMARK)* | ||
| 14. | Seconds ahead, being once past (4) | ||
| SENS | S+ENS | ||
| 15. | New column, curtailed with time, for laureate (8) | ||
| NOBELIST | N+OBELIS[k]+T | ||
| 16. | Oath from Jock: ‘It’s a wee bittie hard’ (5) | ||
| HAITH | HA’IT+H | ||
| 18. | Maine’s crack troops? They’re flat-topped (5) | ||
| MESAS | ME+SAS | ||
| 19. | Ebbing river abroad cracks stern badly, soaking back (9) | ||
| RESORBENT | (EBRO<) in (STERN*) | ||
| 21. | Reader having to admit old wife is computer whizz (9, 2 words) | ||
| POWER USER | OW in PERUSER I wouldn’t necessarily call a ‘power user’ a ‘computer whizz’ |
||
| 26. | Squelch round the highlands? It’s stag’s head, look, one’s after (5) | ||
| SLOAN | S+LO+AN | ||
| 27. | Cock, maybe, cross in appearance (5) | ||
| MIXEN | X in MIEN | ||
| 28. | Not accepted in Sicilian town, left describing stomach pains (8) | ||
| TORMINAL | T[a]ORMINA+L | ||
| 30. | Kindle, obsolete, leads to this in next decade (4) | ||
| TIND | leading letters: This In Next Decade | ||
| 31. | With a passage for food to join, took dinner? (8) | ||
| ENTERATE | ENTER+ATE | ||
| 32. | Intrinsically anxious, lacking cure (4, 2 words) | ||
| IN SE | INSE(cure) | ||
| 33. | At sea head, ay, do so to windward as before (6) | ||
| LAVEER | LAV+E’ER | ||
| 34. | ‘E’s caught by S. Liston’s cut, on going inside count – as invincibility progresses? (12) | ||
| RESISTLESSLY | (E’S+S. LIST[on]’S*) in RELY I don’t think I could have defined this word |
||
| Down | |||
| 1. | Holding power, truncheon accompanies work – here? (7) | ||
| COPSHOP | (P in COSH)+OP | ||
| 2. | Arrive gracefully, as young suitor about noon (6, 2 words) | ||
| SWAN IN | N in SWAIN | ||
| 3. | Restart mine worked out? One washes ore from deposits (11) | ||
| TIN-STREAMER | (RESTART MINE)* | ||
| 4. | Male on track having turned up for colourful birds (6) | ||
| MEROPS | M+(SPORE<) mistake here? SPOOR=TRACK, not SPORE, and I couldn’t find if ‘spore’ is an alternative spelling |
||
| 5. | Part of tack which a merchantman has on board (4) | ||
| HAME | hidden: whicH A MErchantman | ||
| 6. | Lift: Mary missing first in use (6) | ||
| UPRISE | PRI[mary] in USE | ||
| 7. | Pest lives in shade (8) | ||
| NUISANCE | IS in NUANCE | ||
| 8. | Odist a Sekt befuddled (5) | ||
| KEATS | (A SEKT)* | ||
| 10. | What’s said to guy inverting half of ring-bark? (5) | ||
| YABOO | (O[f]+O+BAY)< | ||
| 11. | Bert and Elsie I see irregularly used as names (11) | ||
| CELEBRITIES | (BERT ELSIE I C)* | ||
| 17. | A short book on Eton taken out when one pleases (8, 2 words) | ||
| À VOLONTÉ | A VOL+(ETON*) | ||
| 20. | Am avoiding dynamiter at large with a short fuse! (7) |
||
| TINDERY | (DYN[am]ITER)* | ||
| 22. | Right in centre of parade, on the rise – value doubled (at least) (6) | ||
| WORTHS | RT in (SHOW<) | ||
| 23. | Like water vessel number dipped in river (5) | ||
| URNAL | N in URAL | ||
| 24. | Confederate solicitor receiving cheers (6) | ||
| STATAL | TATA in SL | ||
| 25. | Membranous coverings displaying limitless allure? (6) | ||
| EXINES | [s]EXINES[s] | ||
| 26. | Herd youngster? This horn’d guy possibly (5) | ||
| STEER | composite anagram: HERD YOUNGSTER minus HORN’D GUY=(ESTER*) this clue also has 3 plain definitions (or maybe 4 if you include ‘horn’d guy’)! |
||
| 29. | Part of the eye mostly recalling smiling ones? (4) | ||
| IRIS | IRIS(h) See this song -> HERE |
||
| … | |||
Thanks Azed for the puzzle and Nick for the blog. Favourite clue 10dn for the use of “guy”.
This took me twice as long as any recent Azed had taken. I was doing all right and had only four left within a reasonable time, but got stuck at 9ac. I had -WI— and the construction was obvious, but my eye kept failing to spot swipey on repeated scans of page 1574 of Chambers.
21ac: The definition of power user in Chambers is near enough to “computer whizz” for me.
4dn: I too cannot find spore = track.
Some difficult stuff here. TAORMINA is even more obscure than Pluckley!
Spore is in the OED, which is no real excuse…
Still good fun though.
He’s used Spore for Track recently I think. Agree, very tough.
Re SPORE in Chambers, see entry for SPOOR, which doesn’t have the SPORE variant. So Azed’s mistake, if any, is not to mention OED as an authority.