One doesn’t necessarily expect a stroll in the park with Nimrod, so I was very pleased to finish this one, albeit without fully understanding quite how everything worked.
Hopefully I’ve figured it all out, and I note there are some particularly nice surfaces in there, along with plenty of Nimrod’s signature inventive clueing. Good stuff.
| Across | ||
| 1/10 | PEANUT | Underground developer reeling in one of the bigger fish on record (6) |
| (TUNA + EP)<. Peanuts are also known as groundnuts, as they do indeed develop underground. And yes, we know they aren’t technically nuts. | ||
| 3 | HOTDOG STAND | Before bike throws them, show-offs have rolls here (3-3,5) |
| HOTDOGS + TAND[em]. | ||
| 9 | OF MANY WORDS | Preparing for Monday week’s brief? No (2,4,5) |
| (FOR MONDAY W)*. | ||
| 11 | BENEFACTRESSES | Patrons complain about new players (14) |
| (N in BEEF) + ACTRESSES. Last one in, I think. | ||
| 14/19A | LOT ONE | Starts to lose one’s temper the first to be knocked down! (3,3) |
| L[ose] O[ne’s] T[emper] + ONE. “Knocked down” as in sold at auction. If I’ve parsed it correctly, “the first” is doing double duty here. | ||
| 15 | SIDE EFFECTS | Repercussions after Italian agreed about things going wrong accepting borderline grades (4,7) |
| SI + ((E + F) in DEFECTS). | ||
| 17 | COMING OF AGE | Pottery brought in money in prison, reaching majority (6,2,3) |
| (MING in OOF) in CAGE. | ||
| 20 | BARGAINING CHIP | Pub getting canine in means to negotiate! (10,4) |
| BAR + GAINING + C + HIP. | ||
| 23/27 | ONE-TWO | How ten-over turnaround illustrates sporting move (3-3) |
| [h]OW TEN–O[ver]<. | ||
| 24 | STUDIO FLATS | Mutated adult is equipped with soft pads (6,5) |
| (ADULT IS + SOFT)*. | ||
| 26 | SQUEEZING BY | Just about managing Times after making press… (9,2) |
| SQUEEZING + BY. | ||
| Down | ||
| 1 | PROF | …for female academic (4) |
| PRO + F. | ||
| 2 | ARMREST | Upholstered part of chair, some charm restored (7) |
| [ch]ARM REST[ored]. | ||
| 3 | HANGERS-ON | Provoke charges rotating food stickers (7-2) |
| ANGERS in NOSH<. | ||
| 4 | TOWN AND GOWN | Say Oxford people generally have brown clothes with good blue robes (4,3,4) |
| (OWN in TAN) + (G in DOWN). | ||
| 5 | OAR | It’s not quite enough to get you into a row (3) |
| [int]O A R[ow] &lit. | ||
| 6 | SUSIE | Miss Dent has knowledge to wit (5) |
| SUS + IE. The lovely Susie Dent will be familiar to most readers, I’m sure. | ||
| 7 | AMNESIC | I keep forgetting bad acne is covering half of me (7) |
| M[e] in (ACNE IS)*. Great surface reading. | ||
| 8 | DATA SYSTEM | Channels of communication in which lawyer and my tastes differ (4,6) |
| DA + (MY TASTES)*. | ||
| 12 | THE RAIN KING | Literally, Henderson‘s reflection about important time (3,4,4) |
| ERA in THINKING. This book. | ||
| 13 | BLACK BOOKS | You wouldn’t want to be in these illicit reserves (5,5) |
| BLACK + BOOKS. | ||
| 16 | FRENCH FRY | Dawn on Stephen it’s a way to do the spuds (6-3) |
| Dawn FRENCH + Stephen FRY. | ||
| 18 | MARCEAU | Mime artist hurt very much in audition (7) |
| Homophone of “mar so”. Marcel, of course. | ||
| 19 | OXIDANT | Science facilitator‘s papers carried by two working animals (7) |
| ID in (OX + ANT). | ||
| 21 | AISLE | Division of the church in Renfrewshire town centre (5) |
| [p]AISLE[y]. | ||
| 22 | ASBO | Order contents of Pandora’s Box (4) |
| [pandor]A‘S BO[x]. | ||
| 25 | UZI | In another spell, 6 might have loaded this gun (3) |
| [s]UZI[e]. | ||
* = anagram; < = reversed; [] = removed; underlined = definition
Thanks Simon and Nimrod. Usual fine stuff from this setter. I needed aids to get 11a, and failed completely on 12d (“Henderson” bemused me here – in more ways than one!). Not sure I understand the CHIP part of 20a. Overall, though, a good range of clueing and nifty blogging.
Thanks Nimrod and Simon
Mike @1 re 20ac: HIP = IN = in fashion.
In 20 across, I took ‘canine’ to be CHIP, the name of a dog featured on the packaging of a breakfast cereal. If my brother is reading this, thanks for providing the information!
I had to do a search for 12dn, never heard of the book.
For 20ac, when I solved it, I wondered “chip” was a slang word for a tooth, but I can find no evidence for that. Simon’s parsing in the blog seems right.
Loved “Henderson”
Thanks PB@2. I see it now (c for canine was also new to me)!
Re LOT ONE, I think it’s temper=TONE, thus removing the need for the double duty of “the first”.
I am going to whisper this very very quietly, but I definitely seem to be on Nimrod’s wavelength these days. Solved all one session (and its not often one can say that) and I too loved ‘Henderson’.
Thanks to Nimrod for the fine challenge and Simon for the explanations
Querulous@7 re 14/19ac: Yes that makes sense. I like it.
Aha, yes. Works for me too. Thanks, Q.
Thanks to setter and blogger,
I enjoyed this one and for a Nimrod crossword it wasn’t too fiendish. Some lovely word play, including 3d, 11a (my LOI too) and the deceptively simple 4d. Thanks for explaining CHIP in 20, and TONE in 14/19a. BTW, almost a panagram but no J or V on a quick look through.
A pleasant way to pass a few hours on a weekend.
Thank you again.