If I say I only had 5 to go after the “first pass” (all clues attempted) that will make it seem it was a easy Eye crossword or else I was on fire. In fact I re-calibrated my “first pass” counter when late on in the solving I found I hadn’t attempted 19D. Mainly because I hadn’t noticed I’d crossed it with all it’s crossing letters. But also because I became engrossed in the solving of the rest of the grid and didn’t remember to tick off the clues. Undoubtedly this took longer than normal, even allowing for scribbling some blog notes on the way.
| Across | ||
|---|---|---|
| 8 | CLOCHE | Pisspoor Cheryl Cole dumps harp backing – not much on top (6) (CHERYL COLE – ERYL (= LYRE< harp backing))* AInd: pisspoor. I think the def. refers to the cloche hat being quite small – frankly I’ve seen smaller. |
| 9 | MANKY | Dirty, lousy male snot-rag dropping heroin (5) M[ale] [H]anky (snot rag) First answer solved |
| 10 | SUSPENDED | Pussy mad? Not unknown. Finished? – then put on ice (9) (PUSS[y])* AInd: mad, ENDED |
| 12 | UNHEARD-OF | Extraordinary hard-on, being involved with EU female (7-2) (HARD-ON EU)* AInd: involved with, F[emale] |
| 14 | ULCER | Conservative into “rule bending”, which is a pain (5) C[onservative] inside (RULE)* AInd: bending |
| 15/22 | VERBAL DIARRHOEA | Rejected party brief on our Tony Blair and shits’ gushing speechifying (6,9) LAB REV (party, out Tony Blair) reversed (TB was always the Rev of the parish of St Albion’s in the Eye), then shits. Yes I had to check the spelling in the dictionary |
| 16 | EDWARD | “Balls division” is the making of a royal? (6) ED (Balls) WARD (division). Shadow Chancellor a favourite of the Eye Crossy. |
| 20 | NOTES | Comments about ‘Tone’ getting first sign of Socialism? (5) (TONE)* AInd: about, S[ocialism] |
| 24 | GOALPOSTS | Glass top reels around hole which balls may enter (9) (GLASS TOP)* AInd: reels, around O (hole). I fiddled with the anagram fodder for far too long before getting it – footballs are not the first to come to mind when tackling the Eye crossword |
| 25 | KILNS | Mugs might well get fired by them – pathetic Nick Clegg’s first to go, embracing Left (5) (NICK’S – C)* AInd: to go, around L. Not sure how the S gets involved in the anagram fodder |
| 26 | RIPPLE | Wave and piss off having been shafted by papers (6) PP (papers) inside RILE (piss off). One of the last answers to fall |
| 27 | ANOREXIA | Aversion as a consumer when corrupt, pointless Nixon era is before one (8) (NIXON ERA – N (pointless))* AInd: corrupt, then A (one). |
| Down | ||
| 1 | LAUNCHER | Brenda, say, ceremoniously in charge of a champagne bottle? (8) CD? Thought of it on first read of clue but only put in when all crossing letters confirmed – but how does the wordplay work unless it is a relatively obvious (obvious enough to mislead me) Cryptic single def? |
| 2/11 | PLAY SAFE | Take no risk as PA, fly undone, exposes head (4,4) (AS PA FLY)* AInd: undone E[xposes] |
| 4 | BLUE MURDER | Coarse knocking off, which is screamed for all to hear (4,6) BLUE (Coarse) MURDER (knocking off). Annoyed I didn’t get this sooner |
| 5 | ACIDIC | Bitter Cyclops interrupts rock group in two places (6) I (Cyclops) twice inside AC-DC (rock group). Liked this wordplay |
| 6 | RENDERED | Given a transfer by the CIA, so gave up? (8) DD Topicality |
| 7 | CYMRU | As some would say, British land Conservatism yields many rather useless leaders (5) First letters. C[onservatism] Y[ields] M[any] R[ather] U[seless]. Wales is in Britain isn’t it? |
| 13 | ADAMS APPLE | Gulp, it moves a sad, pale PM to form new constitution (5,5) (A SAD PALE PM)* AInd: to form new constitution. Another where the obvious anagram fodder resisted solution till several letters were in place. |
| 15 | VINEGARY | Tart gets Jeremy mounting Barlow (8) Jeremy Vine, and Gary Barlow of Take That (not Ken B of Corporation Straße as I thought at first). Is Jeremy V as well known as Gary B? Discuss. Certainly not as well know in chez magnet as Tim V: (“Last night me and my girlfriend watched three DVDs back to back. Luckily I was the one facing the telly.”; “I entered the Olympic sun tanning – I got the bronze.” – and that’s just the one-liners he got in the Ed Fringe top ten this year) |
| 17 | APOPLEXY | Lap smeared with epoxy produces fit (8) (LAP EPOXY)* AInd: smeared … produces, |
| 18/3 | ODDS AND SODS | Chances grabbing beach outfit: divided tops, various articles (4,3,4) SANDS O[outfit] D[ivided] inside ODDS. Avoided “Odds and ends” by deducing wordplay before proceding |
| 19 | PASSING | Death of plonker with erection on grass (7) SAP (plonker) reversed, SING (grass – as in telling tales) |
| 21 | TRAPPY | Treacherous, having a big gob (6) Two odd defs. Last in. Sounds like a ‘tongue in cheek’ word for dangerous, besides the sideways mouth-related cryptic def. |
| 23 | AT SEA | Disorganised Cameron’s second seat lost (2,3) [c]A[meron] (SEAT)* AInd: lost |
| 25/7 | KERB-CRAWLING | Crew girl tainted with bank’s gutter activity ending with bang? (4-8) (CREW GIRL BANK)* AInd: tainted. Plus ‘tainted’ cryptic def. |
Hot weather:
I woke up one morning last week with a wicked hangover, listening to my neighbour mowing his bloody lawn.
My first reaction was to get up and give him a smack in the mouth. Then I thought, “Sod it, he’ll just have to mow around me.”
1 Down – the champagne bottle refers to one that you break over the bow of a ship when you launch it
26a/21d last in for me. I’d heard of trappy as in a trappy race meaning a horserace where anything could win. I’ve also come across “shut your trap” but never -what a big mouth -really trappy. For some reason I was looking for wave as in wave goodbye and then later breaker or roller rather than a wimpy little disturbance.