Posted by John on 14th October 2008
This little pig went to market,
This little pig stayed at home,
This little pig had roast beef,
This little pig had none,
And this little pig cried, Wee-wee-wee-wee-wee, I can’t find my way home
(The Famous Tommy Thumb’s Little Story Book (c. 1760))
Not the exact words that I remember, but the Oxford Dictionary of Quotations is probably more reliable than my own vague memory. One needs to have this verse at one’s 4acs as one solves this puzzle. Morph does well to fit in so many thematic answers.
| Across |
| 1 |
EDGE — ‘edge, and I suppose a reference to the current crisis, since 12 is MARKET |
| 4 |
FINGERTIP — (fringe)* tip |
| 9 |
UGLIER — rug lie with r(ight) moved to the back — excellent clue |
| 10 |
REDOUBLE — bridge term, re do(UB)le — UB doesn’t seem to be an abbreviation on its own, but in UB40 it is |
| 11 |
TOERAG — not sure about this: parents recite the rhyme to small children as they tweak the children’s toes, and a rag can go round toes, but it all seems a bit vague |
| 12 |
M(ARK)ET — ref. line 1 |
| 14 |
ALL THE SAME — 2 defs |
| 15 |
HEEL — 2 defs |
| 16 |
H(OM)E — ref. line 2 |
| 17 |
CRO(I(nsult))SS ANTS — ref. ‘Let them eat cake’ |
| 19 |
PIG OUT — but I don’t understand ‘like third or first’ |
| 21 |
WEE-WEE — ref. line 5, although in my version it should be ‘two-fifths of the way home’. No doubt Morph is using a different one |
| 22 |
ATTEND TO — at ten (dot)* — lovely clue |
| 24 |
INTROS — in (sort)rev. |
| 25 |
ROAST BEEF — t in (as before)*, ref. line 3 |
| 26 |
R(U)ED — although I don’t like this: ‘red’ doesn’t mean ‘debt’, even though ‘in the red’ means ‘in debt’; the COD comes closest to what is needed, giving ‘the red’ as ‘the situation of having spent more than is in one’s bank account’, but ‘the red’ isn’t simply ‘red’ |
| |
| Down |
| 2 |
DIGITAL COMPUTER — (product age limit)*, ref. the whole verse |
| 3 |
EPIC ENTRE(e) |
| 4 |
F(URN)ACE |
| 5 |
N(ER)O — nice &lit. |
| 6 |
END GAME — another nice clue, ref. chess |
| 7 |
TRUNK — 2 defs |
| 8 |
PULL THE OTHER ONE — ref. the whole verse; ‘get out of here’ doesn’t seem to be in the dictionaries, but one can imagine one being used to mean the other on EastEnders |
| 13 |
BA CON — ref. the whole verse |
| 15 |
HEEL — 2 defs |
| 17 |
CO(U)LD N(u)T — I think this is the explanation |
| 18 |
SHERIFF — (h (fire)rev.) in SF |
| 20 |
GRETA — great with at reversed; presumably if one is being familiar with Garbo one calls her Greta |
| 22 |
NONE — “nun” — ref. line 4 |
Posted in Independent | 18 Comments »
Posted by C G Rishikesh on 14th October 2008
Not too easy, not too hard. For this puzzle I took full thirty minutes and a little more. After some crossings were in, I got the long perimeter entries at 1ac and 26ac but I don’t see the annotation for these and another long anagram as well. I have not solved two; they are short lights and every other letter is available at each slot, yet I am not trying as I don’t care much for the particular words: these are unexciting ones that a compiler has to fit in after some other long entries.
I want to congratulate the compiler on the long entries at 26ac and 8dn: these don’t come from any crossword key or phrase dictionary. And anyone who has solved these has not cheated!
Across
1 CHURCH OF ENGLAND - anno pending. I did a lot of scribbling but in vain.
9 EXPENSE - Ex(pens)e - outgoing, n. = expenditure (Chambers)
10 CAT SCAN - cats,c,an - cat = a man, chap (slang) (Chambers)
11 SWAPO - swap,0 - short for South West Africa People’s Organization (an acronym that was in newspapers in the past)
12 MARTYRDOM - mod,ry.,tram (rev.) ‘resort’ is the anagrind.
13 ROADMETAL - (to Mardale)*
15 Not solved
16 SUPER - su(-p)per - actually ’super’ is short for ’superfine’; in India we have rava and other provisions of ’superfine’ variety; ’super’ itself is used only in the sense of ‘exceptionally good’. Ask even a non-English speaking person in a village, “How was the Rajini film?”, he would say “Super!”. Rajini himself is a ’superstar’.
18 INDECORUM - indeco(nicedo*), rum - when the ale is in, the wit is out.
20 STRIPCLUB - strip, club - longish def.
23 RAVEL - Two def. - but ‘ravel’ can also mean ‘disentangle’! See Chambers.
24 ANTARES -ant(are)s
25 NOUVEAU - Two def. - ‘nouveau’, as you know, is French for ‘new’ (”to Poussin”, a French painter in the Classical style). ref. to “art nouveau” - “A French school of art and architecture popular in the 1890s; characterized by stylized natural forms and sinuous outlines of such objects as leaves and vines and flowers” (WordWeb)
26 TENNIS COURT OATH - Anno pending.
Down
1 CREASE-RESISTANT - crease,resitant :: striker - not worker in sit-in but batsman in cricket as any schoolboy will tell us
2 UPPSALA - Up, PS, a la
3 CONFORMER - C(on,for,me)R :: one who complies with practices of the Established Church
4 OLEUM - hidden in coOL EU Ministers
5 ENCIRCLED - ‘circle’ (cleric*) in ‘end’
6 GET BY - two def.
7 ARCADIA - ar(cad)ia
8 DON’T MAKE ME LAUGH! - Again, scribbling has not yielded the anagram.
14 TRIPLE SEC - (let prices)* - Got the anagram but had to look up Chambers for confirmation.
15 INCORRUPT - i(NCO)rrupt - Is NCO for ‘bombardier’ a stretch? ‘Irrupt’ is a dictionary word meaning ‘to break in’
17 PURITAN - pu(Rita)n - ref. to the comedy Educating Rita
19 RIVIERA - (I arrive)*
21 Not solved
22 BANTU - ba(N)t,U
Posted in FT | 9 Comments »
Posted by Uncle Yap on 14th October 2008
dd = double definition
cd = cryptic definition
rev = reversed or reversal
ins = insertion
cha = charade
ha = hidden answer
*(fodder) = anagram
Today, I had to keep looking above the grid to remind myself that the compiler is Rover and not Rufus. The slick smooth style that we normally associate with Mr Squires is quite evident in most of the clues.
Across
1 REDCAP Simple cha from the red lining on their cap that military policemen wear
5 PLATTERS This is supposed to be a dd but how are platters chargers? (either horses or battery-devices) Never mind, I know either Eileen or Geoff will surely have a logical explanation for this.
9 ATROPINE *(operation minus o)
10 GENTLE Beautiful dd n a well-born person (); a trained falcon; hence a peregrine falcon (masc tercel-gentle; fem falcon-gentle); a soft maggot used as bait in angling.
11 CROSS-BENCHER punny clue
13 SHOE (A Mother Goose song for five toes)
This little pig went to market;
This little pig stayed at home;
This little pig had roast beef;
And this little pig had none;
This little pig said, “Wee, wee, wee!
I can’t find my way home.”
14 OPENINGS *(in sponge)
17 BRUSH-OFF Neat dd which I thought only Rufus knows how to craft
18 UGLY Huge lady minus head
20 BROUGHT ROUND This one didn’t do much for me
23 MURIEL Ins of U in *(miler)
24 NIGHTCAP An amusing dd
25 REHEARSE I really had to reassure myself that the compiler was not Rufus
26 RIDDLE dd
Down
2 EATS dd
3 CROTCHETS Allusion to crotchety being whimsical
4 PRISON Nice one, Rover; a clever dd with Hammersmith’s Wormwood Scrubs being the other one
5 PRESS CONFERENCE cd
6 ANGLESEY Angle (fish) + SEY (rev of yes), a Welsh island
7 TUNIC *(cut in)
8 ROLLED GOLD cd and of course you know King Midas with his touch of gold
12 CHARTREUSE *(the car user)
15 INUNDATED In (home) undated (at sometime or other)
16 POTHOLER Another one of those punny clues ala Rufus
19 MUGGER dd; broad-snouted Indian crocodile.
21 UNITE Cha of unit (some soldiers) E (European)
22 HAIL Another good dd hail3 (Chambers)
n (in ball games) a goal; a score.
vt to score (a goal); to put into the goal.
Posted in Guardian | 37 Comments »