Posted by Colin Blackburn on 26th June 2007
A fairly easy Virgilius today with no obvious theme other than the inter-linking of a couple of the long entries. Though someone will now tell me that a knight’s move sequence reveals something important!
CD = cryptic def.
DD = double def.
* = anagram
< = reversal
| Across |
| 1 |
SOFT-BOIL — CD — soldiers (strips of toasted bread) go into soft-boiled eggs more easy than hard-boiled eggs. |
| 5 |
ARAMIS — A RAM + IS — sign = Aries = RAM. Aramis is one of the Musketeers. |
| 10 |
BORNEO — BORNE+O — this was the last but one to go in as I convinced myself that only a T would fit between the N and the O. |
| 13 |
RUSTICATE — (TACIT)< in RUSE — a student might have once been punished by being sent to the country, ie banished from college. |
| 14 |
DOUBLE-CROSSED — CD — nice wording using the switching of banks in the same way as the FERRYMAN clue yesterday. |
| 16 |
TRUE-LOVER’S KNOT — CD — a knot that involves a double-crossing but symbolises love rather than deceit. |
| 20 |
IGNORANCE — DD — ignorance of the law is no defence; ignorance is bliss. |
| 24 |
YASMIN — (N+I+M+SAY)< &lit — from the East determines the direction as if the grid was aligned to the compass, a convention rather than a fact as I solved the puzzle. |
| 25 |
BYPASSED — CD — the reference is to either a heart or town bypass, both will create a new arterial route. |
|
| Down |
| 2 |
FIFTH COLUMNISTS — DD — regulars on a (news)paper are columnists. |
| 3 |
BEAR CUB — BARBECU(e)* — lovely surface and nicely observed anagram |
| 4 |
INTERWEAVING — R IN (VINTAGE WINE)* — good anagram again. Shuttle refers to weaving, though this clue also ties in with 16ac if there is a theme at all. |
| 6 |
ROOKIES — IE in ROOKS &lit — my last entry, men = chess pieces, namely = ie is put in lately in the sequence ROOKS and the whole clue provides a definition of the answer. |
| 7 |
MANDARIN ORANGES — O in MANDARIN RANGES — the fact that a mandarin is a duck confused me for a short time here. I’m surprised there weren’t two ducks a l’orange. |
| 11 |
USER-FRIENDLY — FRIEND in (SURELY)* — a Quaker belongs to the Society of Friends. |
| 15 |
STAIRWAY — cheapeSTAIRWAYs |
| 17 |
LORELEI — expLORELEIpzig — two good hidden words in a row, both having very good surfaces. |
| 18 |
KATRINA — (AN ARK + IT)* — strangely tropical after yesterday’s floods though the reference is to the flooding in Louisiana caused by Hurricane Katrina. |
Posted in Independent | 6 Comments »
Posted by neildubya on 26th June 2007
Another FT, another new name for me. I really enjoyed this one - lots of excellent clues and just the right amount of difficulty.
| Across |
| 1 |
(PUT ONE’S HAND)* - nice anagram and a smooth-reading clue. |
| 9 |
THE,TA |
| 13 |
(THOSE AT)* |
| 18 |
initial letters of “State Promise Usual Rubbish” - and another good surface reading. |
| 20 |
SEEKING - “sea king”. I think this is right but I’m not 100% convinced. If it is right then would this count as an indirect homophone I wonder? |
| 23 |
R(ic)H,ONE - the “banks” gag is a bit of an old chestnut but I liked this clue, probably because the surface reading (”Extremely rich individual with banks in Switzerland“) is so convincing. |
| 26 |
AMEN,I,TIES |
| 27 |
(LOVES)* |
| 29 |
(A LIMITED ONE)* |
| |
| Down |
| 2 |
(TOY THE O E)* - EYE TOOTH. Nice bit of deception here. “Canine” and “old English” both make you think of dogs. |
| 4 |
D,RAG OUT |
| 6 |
(TO BE LAIRD)* - TIDAL BORE. I’d never heard this phrase before but the definition (”kind of swell”) led me to TIDAL which left E,R,O and B in the anagram fodder so it was either TIDAL ROBE (hmmm) or TIDAL BORE and I went for the latter. They’re actually quite interesting. |
| 7 |
BANG ON - a favourite phrase of mine in the “talk at length” sense so I was pleased to see it in a puzzle. |
| 14 |
EUPHEMISM - the clue itself being an example of one. |
| 16 |
(SAID)*,BLED |
| 17 |
EGGSHELL - I was expecting (eggspecting - ha ha) the clue to have a question mark since it is a pun on “layers” for hens. |
| 20 |
SIGN,SON |
| 22 |
K.O,PECK - of which there are 100 in a ruble (rouble?). |
Posted in FT | No Comments »
Posted by ilancaron on 26th June 2007
Felt a bit Araucarian today – surfaces sacrificed at the altar of clever wordplay. I had to look up SALOPETTE – which I think is contrived (derived from SALOP which I recognized as being Shrewsbury-related).
Across
| 1 |
MANIC,URE – today’s three-letter flower (river) is the URE. |
| 10 |
TASK FORCE – well-hidden in “conflicT ASK FOR CErtain”. |
| 11 |
PIMP(MOB,I)LE – they have these in England now? (in the US they are big flash Detroit monstrosities). |
| 12 |
NUMBER – two meanings: the second somewhat cryptic (using the familiar anaesthetizing cryptic cliché). |
| 15 |
STRETCH MARKS – don’t you get STRETCH MARKS after you’ve finished expecting? i.e. once you’ve delivered? As for wordplay, “time inside” must be STRETCH, as in prison – not sure how MARKS is produced unless it’s from “shop” as in grass…?? |
| 17 |
AS,S(EGA)I – a useful cryptic spear. Wordplay: AS=”while”, EGA=rev(age=”getting on”) in SI=rev(is). |
| 20 |
ACADEMIC – double meaning &lit and a little dig at our friends in academia. |
| 22 |
LA(Y)MA,N – our “priest” is Buddhist this time. |
| 23 |
SALOPETTES – had to look this up: turns out that SALOPETTES are ski-suits (shouldn’t the def have been plural “garments” then?) and SALOP refers to Shrewsbury so I suppose a dance troupe thence might be called the SALOPETTES… unless there’s something else topical that escapes me? |
| 24 |
HOO([re]D, WIN)K – took me a bit longer than it should since it was separated into two halves. |
| 26 |
TERM,IN,US – wordplay is cryptic def of “American expression?” – but… why the ungrammatical English in the (cryptic) def part? Is this a dig at the quality of American English? (I first learnt about “ain’t” on the playground of my primary school in South Kensington!). |
Down
| 1 |
PAR(AQUA)T – it’s a herbicide. |
| 3 |
BUM,PER – As in a BUMPER crop. |
| 5 |
I,MA=rev(am I),MATES – never encountered IMAMATES but I suppose makes sense as “Muslim territories”. |
| 6 |
DRY=”cutting”, BATTERY=example of ”crime” – and they need to be charged. Nice misleading surface. |
| 13 |
B(READ,BO)ARD – READ for “study”, BO for Body Odor (“unpleasant smell”) and the BARD of Avon and I suppose “cob” has a meaning of loaf of bread (unchecked). |
| 16 |
COM(PET)ED[y] – only clue that I felt was a little weak: defining “sitcom” as COMEDY seemed transparent, so much so that I kept looking for something else. |
| 18 |
ANALOG,UE – (along a)* and then “rUlEr”. |
| 19 |
ACE,TATE – it’s a “salt” and “sugar daddy” is a nice cryptic def for TATE (he of the sugar empire and the gallery). |
| 22 |
LUST,RE – LUST is our most basic “drive” (according to Freud at least). |
| 24 |
HAIR – two meanings (one cryptic). How many 4 letter musicals are there… Cats? Rent? |
Posted in Guardian | 8 Comments »