Well, this one was different! Some very liberal cluing of definitions in places and a lot of cds. Some of the surfaces seemed a little odd on first reading but with hindsight I think they are in keeping with the overall quirky nature of the puzzle. On another day I might have had more quibbles but the sun is shining, the birds are singing …..
Post Script: Whilst solving the puzzle I had question marks against quite a few clues but on further consideration during the preparation of this blog I have come to the conclusion that the majority were unfounded if one is prepared to give the setter a little latitude.
Across
1 POP THE QUESTION cd
10 Y-MOTH hidden in ‘mY MOTHer’
11,2 GOING DOWN ON ONE KNEE cd
12 AGE WELL EG (say) reversed in *(WE ALL) – faulty clue, no containment indicator or ‘back’ should have been omitted
13 NUTTERS *(ENTRUST) – poor anagram indicator, either ‘doctors’ should come before ‘entrust’ or it should be ‘doctored’
14 YONGE homophone of ‘young’ – Charlotte Mary Yonge
16,27,9 IS SHE IS OR IS SHE AIN’T MY BABY cd
19 BEET SUGAR A GUST (a blow) reversed in BEER (ale)
20,28,5 STATE OF THE UNION cd
22 AMNESIA cd
25 NO DOUBT *(BOUND TO)
29 YES AND NO ANSWER *(WAYNE SANDERSON)
Down
3 TE-HEE TEpEE with ‘p’ changed to H
4 ENGULFING *(LEG IN FUN) G (good)
6 SIGHTLESS *(THIS LEG) SS (ship)
7 IN ONE I (1) NONE (0)
8 NON-USER *(NEURONS)
15 EAST SHEEN *(SEE ATHENS)
17 STRONG TEA *(TARGETS ON)
18 STATUETTE U (uniform) E (echo) T (time) T (time again) in STATE (20)
19 BEATIFY BEA[u]TIFY
21 ESTHER THERES (yonder’s) with ES moved to the front
23 NOSES no ‘ses’ in ‘session’ gives ‘Sion’ (Jerusalem)
24 ALIEN A (one) LIEN (right)
26 DROSS hidden in ‘gournoD ROSSini’
Hi Gaufrid
Hmm: very quirky, as you say! I agree with your reservations re 12, 13ac and, I suspect, several of the others you originally had!
I’m puzzling over the need for ‘that’ in 21dn and ‘elusively’ in 29ac.
Can Y moth really be said to be ‘hidden’ in ‘my mother’?
Having said all that, I did enjoy it, in a bemused kind of way!
I didn’t do this but 16 etc. jumped out at me from the page. As a Louis Jordan fan, I know there’s no such song. Sloppy!
Yes, Tyro, that was one of my other reservations but I thought I must be wrong. I see now that I wasn’t and it really is ‘Is you is…’
Because of the way I catch up with puzzles, I’ve just done this one. It was fun and did crack fairly easily, though I was held up for a bit by the idiosyncratic substitution in the title, which with all the liberal will in the world can’t be justified, as far as I can see.
Thanks K. It was aimed at a certain person, with (deliberate) misquote.
Io.