Independent Prize Puzzle 8698 / eXternal – 30/08/14

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Our comment on the last puzzle by eXternal contained the following: “Good puzzle – a few head-scratching moments, a few smiles and a few new definitions – just the way to start the week.” All we need to do for this preamble is change start to end!

We tried spelling 12ac about three or four times and it was only when we had worked out the correct parsing that we knew it was correct!

Thanks eXternal!

Across
1   Sign of storm easing, dropping east after crossing over half of Kent
FORKED LIGHTNING LIGHTeNING (easing) without E (East) after FORD (crossing) around KE (half of Kent)
9   Takes in information about reserve funds
NEST EGG GETS (takes) in GEN (information) reversed or ‘about’
10   Rank boozer with nothing to gain
BARONET BAR (boozer) + O (nothing) + NET (gain)
11   Discharge liege stoning guards
EGEST Hidden within the clue liEGE SToning
12   Aviator’s landing spot on heath with dame right in the way
LINDBERGH H (landing spot) after or ‘on’ LING (heath) with DBE (dame) + R inside or ‘in the way’
13   State one’s disadvantages stopping success
WISCONSIN I’S (one’s) + CONS (disadvantages) inside or ‘stopping’ WIN (success)
15   Boot editor back, in confrontation
WADER ED (editor) reversed or ‘back’ inside WAR (confrontation)
16   Refute most of ideology
BELIE BELIEf   (ideology) with last letter missing or ‘most of’
18   He works out inverse equation group holding yours truly back
MUSCLEMAN SUM (equation) reversed or ‘inverse’ + CLAN (group) around or ‘holding’ ME (yours truly) reversed or ‘back’
20   Duck head, way to be let in by best bouncer
POGO STICK O (duck) + GO (head) + ST (way) inside or ‘let in’ PICK (best). Joyce remembers her cousin having one of these when she was younger and is surprised that she hasn’t seen one for years, despite them still being available. Has anyone else? We weren’t sure about GO being the same as HEAD but it was in Chambers Thesaurus so that’s fine by us!
23   Man withholding loot, ultimately
MISER MIStER (man) without or ‘withholding T (last letter of loot or ‘ultimately’). The whole clue is also the definition so it’s an &lit!
24   Point on slate to crack
DECRYPT PT (point) on DECRY (slate)
25   Father covering former university’s roof
PLATEAU PA (father) covering LATE (former) + U (university)
26   Turned around taxi in Queens and moved fast
ROLLER COASTERED ROLLED (turned) around COAST (taxi) inside ER ER (Queens). This was our LOI and we needed all the crossing letters before making a guess based on the definition!
Down
1   Amusing bendy pen bewilders Australian native
FUNNEL-WEB SPIDER FUN (amusing) + an anagram of PEN BEWILDERS (anagrind is ‘bendy’). We weren’t sure about FUN being a synonym of amusing but it’s in Chambers Thesaurus under adjective, which seemed obvious afterwards.
2   Cake-maker fills middle of kirsch slices
RASHERS ASHER (cake-maker as in Jane Asher) inside RS (middle of kiRSch). We wondered how many solvers would remember Jane Asher. Do people remember her because of her acting roles, her links to autism, her marriage to Gerald Scarfe, the fact that she split up with Paul McCartney after finding him in bed with someone else or her cakes? Maybe all of these!
3   Choose way to report conductor
ELECTRODE ELECT (choose) + RODE (sounds like ‘road’ or way)
4   Allowed on a lake
LEGAL LEG (on as used in cricket) + A + L (lake)
5   Initially bewildered in Indian state, grandmother’s to freak out
GO BANANAS B (initial letter of Bewildered) in GOA (Indian state) + NANA’s (grandmother’s)
6   Beat bachelor taking out women in fling
THROB B (bachelor) instead of or ‘taking out’ W (women) in THROw (fling)
7   Wino with tip-off about good wine being discounted
IGNORED wINO (with first letter removed or ‘tip-off’) about G (good) + RED (wine)
8   Experience delays? Choose Smart car, perhaps
GET THE RUNAROUND A play on the fact that a Smart car could perhaps be described as a ‘runaround’
14   Interdependent, as mob is with city criminal
SYMBIOTIC An anagram of AS MOB IS CITY (the anagrind is ‘criminal’) (Thanks PeterO)
15   Benign bore, excellent leader of train-spotters
WELL MEANT WELL (bore) + MEAN (excellent) + T (first letter or ‘leader’ of train-spotters)
17   Reasonable American serving in pub
LOGICAL GI (American serving) inside LOCAL (pub) (Thanks PeterO)
19   Wrongly pick up fleece – I’m rising above that
MISHEAR SHEAR (fleece) after I’M (reversed or ‘rising’)
21   Prude’s disheartened after the blue chat on-line
SKYPE PE (first and last letter of PrudE or ‘disheartened’) after SKY (the blue)
22   Larissa’s letter is manifest to have rent extracted to support king
KAPPA APPArent (manifest) with RENT missing or ‘extracted’ supporting or ‘after’ K (King). Larissa is in Greece but so are a lot of other places! Did external choose this city because of the alliteration or is there more to it? We couldn’t find anything with a google search but we may have missed something.

 

13 comments on “Independent Prize Puzzle 8698 / eXternal – 30/08/14”

  1. Like B&J, couldn’t figure out 12A; after EJECT didn’t bring congratulations I gave up, they persisted and got it. Some ingenious clueing, particularly liked 18A, 1D.

    Few minor points from the blog if I may.

    13A it is win (success) singular.
    18A “he works out” to be underlined
    20A he was going/heading south
    19D “wrongly pick up” to be underlined

    Thanks to eXternal and Bertandjoyce.

  2. Thanks gwep – you beat Joyce to it! Bert has only just got round to checking the blog!! He’s found a few more – it’s been a busy week.

    Could you explain your comment about 20A a bit more please? We’re not sure what needs changing.

  3. @2Bertandjoyce – sorry, didn’t mean anything needed changing there.

    I meant that “(to) head” is interchangeable with “(to) go” as in the expression eg “he was heading south” being being interchangeable with “he was going south”; so I was suggesting it was not so obscure as I thought the blog intimated (ie requiring a Thesaurus check).

  4. An enjoyable puzzle, IMHO, although I confess that several of the answers went in from definition and checkers as I couldn’t have been bothered to untangle the wordplay. LINDBERGH, NEST EGG, POGO STICK, DECRYPT and my LOI, ROLLERCOASTERED, all fell into that category.

  5. Whilst I enjoyed the solve the parsing of LINDBERGH has niggled at me all week – and I can see why I didn’t get it. Three elements that were not familiar to me: I knew that ling was heather, but I didn’t know that heath was too; I’ve never come across a DBE before; and the use of H as a landing spot isn’t one that I can remember coming across – although as I write this I’m beginning to doubt that, it doesn’t seem so obscure now. Still, three new bits of crossword lore from one clue is an impressive count.

  6. I found this quite straightforward except for 23 and 26 across so my thanks to B&J for the explanations and to eXternal for an excellent puzzle. 12A held me back for a while as I had tentatively pencilled in THROW, then convinced myself that there was an aviator called Longworth, and wasted several minutes trying to find him or her online. Eventually the penny dropped.

  7. It took me a long while to get into eXternal’s style – in part because I happened not to hit the more straightforward clues first. I remember Jane Asher as an actor (although I could not have named any of her roles, despite having seen Alfie recently), but I had to check that she also made cakes. I Ieft a couple of wordplays incomplete, to be checked here, so thanks for the blog. A couple of small points: in 14D, the angrist is ‘mob is’ plus ‘city’, and in 17D GI surely corresponds to ‘American serving’.

  8. Fascinating! I didn’t know that Jane Asher had found Paul in bed with her cakes!
    Thanks to B&J for a fine blog and to eXternal for a diverting puzzle (“rollercoasted” took me on an emotional journey!)

  9. Another waste of time for the general readership of the 2019 i , probably ok for experts in 2014 Independent days, do the i crossword editors ever try to do these puzzles Themselves? and think “this is the way to encourage the sales” I wonder what percentage of the i 2019 solvers finish a crossword like today’s. If the i management insist in regurgitating these very difficult crosswords, is it possible to have two cryptic crosswords one for the experts and one for us average bods, please.

  10. I agree with ‘The Tortoise VM’ seems to be a very small smug club that manage to complete these crosswords, all back-slapping one another and joining in with the obscure references, come on i, time to open the challenge to ordinary mortals.

  11. I would generally agree with these last two comments, but today I managed all but four answers and thought the crossword was not THAT difficult.

  13. Hi thanks for the help.We had to turn to you after a week of trying to decipher the clues. We maybe a bit dim but at lesat we dditn vige pu.

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