Independent 8,911 by Eimi

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It wasn’t difficult to guess what we would be meeting today.

Eimi has managed to get some sort of reference to today’s events into about two thirds of the clues. One could carp at the Indy habit of having answers with bad checking; however, perhaps it is excusable when there is such a strong theme. The leader of the Labour Party is a boon to setters with his first name but it isn’t overdone here. A really enjoyable crossword.

Definitions underlined.

Across
1,11 DONE UP LIKE A KIPPER
Taken advantage of: made to wear purple and yellow (4,2,4,1,6)

2 defs: one of them metaphorical, the other referring to UKIP
11 AKIPPER
See 1 across
6,30 SIDE DISH
Vicious party leader’s sort of accompaniment – Greens, perhaps (4,4)

Sid [Vicious] Ed-ish — I think it’s this and nothing to do with International Students House
30 DISH
See 6 across
10 LUSTRUM
Five years of sexual desire and booze (7)

lust rum — a lustrum is a period of five years
12 LABOUR PAINS
What may be experienced towards end of term with the Eds, as Cameron sees them (6,5)

They’re what may be experienced towards the end of a term of pregnancy — Cameron sees Ed Miliband and Ed Balls as pains; perhaps
15,21 LEAP YEAR
A regular correction apparently included when listener is on line (4,4)

le(ap)y ear — ley line
21 YEAR
See 15 across
17 LIBERALISE
Make more enlightened sign about last of Conservative lies disseminated (10)

Lib({Conservativ}e)ra (lies)*
20 INTERVENED
Took action to somehow reinvent party leader (10)

(reinvent)* Ed
23 NATIONALIST
Politician putting race first (11)

At first I thought this was a very weak CD, but it isn’t and is rather a good clue: it’s [Grand] National 1st
28 OVERSEE
Supervise writing of poetry in Old English (7)

O(verse)E
29 TRIESTE
The French are in well-trodden Italian city (7)

tri(es)te — je suis, tu es, so the French ‘are’ is ‘es’
31 FAIRY STORY
Just Conservative concealing conclusions from party conferences in improbable account (5,5)

fair ({part}y {conference}s) Tory
Down
1 DULE
Fraudulently taking sides spelling misery for Sturgeon’s supporters (4)

{Frau}dule{ntly} — a Scottish word for woe or grief, and Nicola Sturgeon’s supporters are mainly the SNP
2 NASAL
Group of high-fliers, supported by Left, like Ed Miliband’s speech (5)

NASA l — Ed Miliband speaks in a nasal way
3 UNROBE
Green perhaps appearing in a French strip (6)

un(Rob)e — referring to Rob Green, the hapless England goalkeeper who no doubt had many good qualities but will always be remembered for that mistake
4 LIMOUSINE
One’s sprayed emulsion over expensive car (9)

(emulsion)* round [= over] 1
5 KNAPP
Old trade union leader or what 11 has, I hear (5)

Jimmy Knapp — “nap” — a kipper has a nap or a sleep
7 IMPASSIVE
Drip involved in likely election outcome not showing any emotion (9)

I’m not really sure here: it seems to be ass [= drip] in “One MP I have” or 1 MP I’ve — but this seems a bit odd and I’m sure someone will offer a more likely explanation [As I suspected, far better: it’s IV in impasse (I’d always thought that ass = drip was a bit loose and the less said about the rest of my parsing the better) — thanks djawhufc@1]
8 EBRO
River running through the Bronx (4)

Hidden in thE BROnx
9 SIMILAR
Like teacher concealing two notes (7)

si(mi la)r
13 PLAID
What might be worn by Scottish 23s or Welsh 23s shortly (5)

23 is NATIONALISTS; Scottish nationalists might wear plaid, also Plaid {Cymru}
14 FEARS
What politicians often play on: loud organs (5)

f ears
16 ATTENDEES
When the polls close observe leader of DUP standing up and they’re there (9)

at ten [the polls close at 2200 hrs] (see D{up})rev.
18 EVER AFTER
The first female tennis player from Australia from that time (4,5)

Eve Rafter — Adam and Eve, Pat Rafter
19 PROTEST
Sort of vote in favour of experiment (7)

pro test
22 PIPITS
Very good dark places in which to see birds (6)

pi pits — ‘in which to see’ is a link
24 OPERA
Perhaps Iris or Judith works in the Colosseum (5)

Iris is an opera by Mascagnani and Judith an opera by Serov — Eimi had to choose fairly obscure operas so as not to give it away
25 TESCO
Troubled retailer appearing in magistrates’ court (5)

Hidden in magistraTES’ COurt — Tesco has problems
27,26 VERY GOOD
OK, or excellent (4,4)

2 defs
26 GOOD
See 27 down
*anagram

15 comments on “Independent 8,911 by Eimi”

  1. Hi

    Thanks to Eimi and John

    Enjoyable I thought.

    Re 7 d

    It’s IV (drip in hospital) inside impasse ( the likely result of the election)

  2. Thanks, Eimi, and John for parsing LEAP YEAR. Delightful puzzle as always.

    Does anyone know whether the glitch that stopped the easy menu download of the Indy on Crossword Solver from working is at the software or the paper’s end, and whether anyone is working to fix it? It’s been quite a while and it’s getting very annoying.

  3. I thought this was very cleverly and amusingly done. Thanks very much to Eimi! And thanks to John from me too, because I couldn’t understand “leap year” either.

    I thought the wordplay for 6A “side dish” was excellent. 12A “labour pains” was wonderful! A nice chortle for each of these.

    22D “pipits” stopped me for a while. I have a mental block against associating the word “pi” with the alleged synonym “very good”, since I tend to think of religiosity as a bad thing in these extremist days. I shall have to unblock that, since setters seem to think differently.

    Goodness knows from what deep store I dragged up “lustrum”, but it did eventually surface. I completed the puzzle and then we walked straight to the polling station!

  4. There are a couple of uses of Ed so, depending on your view of the man, you might think that was one too many (or even two too many). Scottish dialogue is not my strong point, so dule was new to me, but I eventually saw the possibility of it being the middle letters of fraudulently. There’s something rather 1970s about Nigel Farage (maybe it’s the coat), so I quite liked the kipper-tie allusion.

  5. Just right for today; some tough ones though, which it took me a while to see. DONE UP LIKE A KIPPER, referencing the fact that UKIP followers are often called KIPPERS, is excellent; and there was some other subtle stuff for political junkies like me around the grid.

    Like Emrys, have just been to use the stubby pencil.

    And thank you to John for parsing UNROBE, because I couldn’t. Since his dislike of football is on the same level as my dislike of golf, then I think I should congratulate him and say: the boy done good.

    Thanks to Eimi (and IanSW3, Eimi is perhaps the man to answer your question if he drops in – he is the Indy crossword editor and might well know about these things).

    Afternoon nap coming on, so I can stay up all night.

  6. I thought this was slightly trickier than some of Eimi’s previous themed offerings, but very enjoyable nonetheless. I confess that I biffed LEAP YEAR and didn’t bother to try and parse it, and the previously unknown DULE was my LOI after I decided to trust the wordplay. I thought the clue for DONE UP LIKE A KIPPER was very good.

  7. Thanks Eimi for the Polling Day fun. We managed to parse them all but we did need to check a few definitions – DULE being one of them.

    For the first time we applied for postal votes because we thought we may not be here so it’s been a somewhat odd day with no stubby pencil.

    Thanks John

  8. Must admit dule was a guess as I’d never heard of it. Made me wonder why a less rare word wasn’t used, after all this isn’t Don setting. Thanks Eimi been too long. Cheers John that wasn’t as easy as I usually find the Ed.

  9. I found this quite tough. I did finish it, but only after looking at a map of Italy to get some ideas for 29ac. (Surely “es” is French for “art” as in “Thou art”.)

    I thought there might be a mistake in 24dn as English National Opera play at the London Coliseum not Colosseum, but I wonder if it just means opera as the plural of opus, the Latin for a work. (I was once confused reading a biography of the composer Webern by the references to Webern’s opera, when he didn’t write one, but I eventually realised it was referring to the works with opus numbers.)

  10. Thanks to John and all commenters. There were quite a few options for D?L? but I didn’t want the puzzle to be TOO easy – it is Thursday, after all. For some unknown reason I woke up at about 5:30 this morning, so I’m going to struggle to stay up for a potential Portillo moment. Clegg moment, perhaps? But I’m a bit of an amateur psephologist myself and find election night compelling.

    I tried to be fairly impartial, notwithstanding taking the proverbial out of the camp kippers.

    No difficult choices for me as I’m lucky enough to live in the constituency of by far the most impressive MP in the country.

    I’m afraid I can’t help with the technical problems. Most days I struggle to get the official online version to load.

  11. @9Dormouse it was “thou art” many, many years ago, but that usage has fallen into desuetude and “tu es” is “you (singular familiar) are”.

  12. A very nice crossword indeed. Many thanks to Eimi – especially for cheering up what has, for me, turned out to be a rather depressing morning (John Stuart Mill’s various views on Conservative voters being, yet again, confirmed in my view).
    I marked just one clue (NATIONALIST) as weak, so thanks to John for correcting my myopia.
    All in all – delightful.

  13. Eimi –
    Please do tell (you chose to whet appetites after all) who your outstanding MP is. It’s safe to do so now!

  14. Thanks, William. I’m pleased to say that it’s still Caroline Lucas. One silver lining, along with the demise of Nasty Nigel. He didn’t seem very happy. Perhaps he might say he’s been done up like a kipper.

  15. You’re absolutely right (on both counts) – and a lucky chap. You were one of the few who could not only do the right thing in your booth – but not be disappointed. The future’s green – and I like it! Let’s hope it’s sooner rather than later….. x

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