A fun SOLOMON offering this Friday.
FF: 9 DD: 9
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | MIKE |
Name that one might drop? (4)
|
| cryptic def | ||
| 3 | CONGENITAL |
Inbred Italian with stunted body parts (10)
|
| CON ( with, spanish ) GENITALs ( body parts, stunted i.e. without last letter ) | ||
| 10 | DRAKE |
Rapper the face of December’s Playboy (5)
|
| D ( December, first letter ) RAKE ( playboy ) | ||
| 11 | ELBOW ROOM |
Make enough space by moving 14 Across below, having removed bed (5,4)
|
| [ BELOW bORedOM ( 14 across, witthout letters of BED ) ]* ; | ||
| 12 | MAKE HASTE |
Quickly cook hake with steam (4,5)
|
| [ HAKE STEAM ]* | ||
| 13 | OCEAN |
Loads of water from broken canoe (5)
|
| [ CANOE ]* | ||
| 14 | BOREDOM |
Tedium arising when old wine is drunk by retired group (7)
|
| [ O ( old ) RED ( wine ) ] in reverse of MOB ( group ) | ||
| 16 | IRKSOME |
Irritating leader leaves Scottish church with a few following (7)
|
| kIRK ( scottish church, without its first letter ) SOME ( few ) | ||
| 18 | HADRIAN |
Managing Director of Walls ate raspberry ice-cream after nachos for starters (7)
|
| HAD ( ate ) RIAN ( starting letters of “..Raspberry Ice-cream After Nachos..” ); figured the answer out but didnt know the significance until i googled it. Wiki | ||
| 20 | HOPEFUL |
Promising Spring, at first — England’s freezing by the middle of July (7)
|
| HOP ( spring ) EF ( first letters of “..England’s Freezing..” ) UL ( jULy, middle of ) | ||
| 22 | VIGIL |
Watch one of the Thunderbirds run away (5)
|
| VIrGIL ( one of the thunderbirds, without R – run ) | ||
| 24 | TOODLE-PIP |
Goodbye to one initially led astray by Dickensian character (6-3)
|
| TO O ( One, initially ) [ LED ]* PIP ( dickensian character ) | ||
| 27 | OVEREXERT |
Strain of old, exhausted explorer going through plain (9)
|
| [ EX ( old ) ER ( ExploreR, exhausted i.e. without inner letters ) ] in OVERT ( plain ) | ||
| 28 | CHINA |
Cups and saucers in a box nearby (5)
|
| CHIN ( box ) A | ||
| 29 | REMASTERED |
Band with Rough Trade cleared sample getting reproduced (10)
|
| REM ( band ) [ TRADE SE ( SamplE, cleared i.e. without inner letters ) ]* | ||
| 30 | OGRE |
One with a bad temper in back-to-front undergown (4)
|
| hidden, reversed in “..undERGOwn” | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | MADAM |
Female or male? The first one (5)
|
| M ( male ) ADAM ( first male ) | ||
| 2 | KNACKERED |
Worn-out, bent journalist drinks last half of beer (9)
|
| [ KNACK ( bent ) ED ( journalist ) ] containing ER ( beER, half of ) | ||
| 4 | OVERS |
Lots of deliveries made by ramblers starting late (5)
|
| rOVERS ( ramblers, without first letter ) | ||
| 5 | GIBBERISH |
Soldier scattered rubbish after scrubbing uniform filled with earth and garbage (9)
|
| GI ( soldier ) { [ RuBBISH ( without U – uniform ) ]* containing E ( earth ) } | ||
| 6 | NEW YORK |
City and Newcastle’s front three turning Roy Keane’s head (3,4)
|
| NEW ( NEWcastle, first three letters of ) YOR ( reverse of ROY ) K ( Keane, first letter ) | ||
| 7 | THOSE |
The articles? Tragedian’s cap and stockings (5)
|
| T ( Tragedian, first letter ) HOSE ( stockings ) | ||
| 8 | LEMON PEEL |
Last bits of balm (clove oil) tipped on ex- PM’s waxy skin (5,4)
|
| [ reverse of MEL ( last letters of “..balM ( clovE oiL ) ) ] ON PEEL ( ex-pm, robert peel of the uk ) | ||
| 9 | METHOD |
Organisation satisfied with building equipment (6)
|
| MET ( satisfied ) HOD ( building equipment ) | ||
| 14 | BEHAVIOUR |
Conduct the opening of Handel’s Messiah without soprano after Beethoven’s 1st and 8th (9)
|
| BE ( BeethovEn, 1st and 8th letters of ) H ( Handel, first letter ) sAVIOUR ( messiah, without S – soprano ) | ||
| 15 | MONOTREME |
Odd animal — male duck? No, shaved emu — in tree (9)
|
| M ( male ) O ( duck ) NO [ M ( eMu, shaved i.e. without end characters ) in TREE ] ; wiki | ||
| 17 | OFFSPRING |
The result of absent coil? (9)
|
| cryptic def; referring to the contraceptive device | ||
| 19 | ILLNESS |
Sell sailor’s cap in bad condition (7)
|
| [ SELL S ( Sailor, first letter ) IN ]* | ||
| 21 | PALACE |
Home housing the highest class? (6)
|
| &lit; PLACE ( home ) containing A ( highest class ) | ||
| 23 | GLEAM |
Flash Gordon’s lead male is bad (5)
|
| G ( Gordon, first letter ) [ MALE ]* | ||
| 25 | OUTRE |
Unusual characters within scout regiment (5)
|
| hidden in “..scOUT REgiment “ | ||
| 26 | PEACE |
Quiet musical composition on the radio (5)
|
| sounds like PIECE ( musical composition ) |
Thanks Solomon for a very enjoyable crossword with my favourites being IRKSOME, REMASTERED (great surface), BEHAVIOUR, and HADRIAN, the latter for the creative definition. (I highly recommend hiking the Hadrian’s Wall path.) I failed to parse CONGENITAL and CHINA. I was a bit surprised to see ‘bad’ as the anagram indicator in both ILLNESS and GLEAM. Thanks Turbolegs for the blog. (BTW, in your parsing of CONGENITAL I think you meant ‘Italian’ , not ‘Spanish’.)
OFFSPRING
It’s a cryptic def as the blog says (the whole clue).
Also, there’s some WP:
absent=OFF
coil=SPRING
17d I took the result of to be the definition and absent=off and coil=spring as KVA, with &lit on top. Perhaps issue with rather result of would also work. But I thought it was rather clever.
Got stuck in the SW but it’s all obvious when you know the parsing.
Liked ocean and lemon peel.
Thanks both. Happy Friday.
I found this middling difficultly. Does that make it a 5 on the Turbolegs DD scale? Some clues took time, but I got there and I thought I parsed it all, but thank KVa @2 for the detail I missed for OFFSPRING
I ticked MAKE HASTE, it being a nice surface and great anagram, MADAM was an interesting clue, and CHINA was a big tick too
I was surprised Solomon expected me to remember the names of all the Thunderbirds characters, a show I watched many years ago as a child. I am not even sure I could recall them when I was a kid and watched it regularly. And when was the last time someone actually said TOODLE PIP?
Thanks Solomon and Turbolegs
Thanks for the blog , a lot of very nice touches here . HADRIAN is very neat and led me astray since Walls is a major UK ice-cream brand , do not know if the name is international . REMASTERED also clever and includes the famous record label , digitally remastered is a synonym for ruined .
[ Tony@1 – just further South is the trail from St Bees to Robin Hood’s Bay , made famous by Wainwright and my favourite walk of all . I have moved seven pebbles from coast to coast . ]
[ Martyn@4 they were named after the Mercury7 astronauts but no Deke or Wally , our Sprog3 was mad on Thunderbirds when it was repeated . Virgil (Gus) Grissom sadly died in the Apollo 1 fire ]
Roz@6 I cannot help but be amazed at the things I learn in these discussions. Thank you for that information
Roz@5 – I think Walls is owned by Unilever, and it does not use Walls much outside UK. So saying, it sells the same ice cream product (such as Magnum) in many countries but through different company brands (e.g. Walls in UK, Streets in Australia and something like Good Humor in US). All from the top of my head, so happy to be proved wrong
Surely the Thunderbirds (1 to 6) were the vehicles, not the members of the Tracy family who piloted them.
I always enjoy a Solomon and this was no exception. Some fun surfaces and plenty of imagination in the cluing. Faves inc IRKSOME, HOPEFUL, KNACKERED, REMASTERED, MAKE HASTE, OFFSPRING and PALACE. I smiled at HADRIAn when the penny dropped though that is a very cheeky definition indeed. Like Tony Santucci, I was a little surprised at ‘bad’ appearing twice as an anagrind and also the repetition of ‘cap’ as an initial letter indicator in both THOSE and ILLNESS. But these things happen.
Thanks both
I can’t think why this should be but I can’t remember ever solving a Solomon puzzle before – but I shall certainly be back for more: I really enjoyed this one.
I can’t disagree with the slight reservations re the repetitions, expressed above but I find plenty more causes for irritation these days. I’m not sure I had actually registered these.
My list of favourites echoes that of PostMark @10, with the addition of the linked 11 and 14ac, TOODLE-PIP (the last time I heard it was probably as a child, from my much-loved great aunt) , GIBBERISH, NEW YORK and BEHAVIOUR (wonderful surface for the last of these – but they were all first-class).
Many thanks to Solomon for a highly enjoyable puzzle and Turbolegs for a fine blog.
I agree with PostMark and Eileen about the long list of good clues. I started off with Maeve for MADAM.
[Roz @ #5: The St. Bees to Robin Hood’s Bay trail is well known among hikers in the U.S. Some friends of mine did it a few years ago. There are at least sections of it I’d like to do one of these days.]
Martyn@8
As an angry investor, Unilever recently cut the cord with Magnum, and the shares allocated to us shareholders are not very sweet.
The Magnum Ice Cream Company, MICC.
Can you believe it? Somebody was taking the mick.
[Fond memories of the Coast-to-Coast from the summer of 1982. I imagine it must have changed a lot since those simple days. It’s noe very popular. Given most folk do it from West to East, the Yorkshire coast is apparently gently sinking under the weight of accumulated pebbles.]
Thanks as ever to Turbolegs for the blog and to all those who’ve taken the time to comment – it’s much appreciated.
Sorry about the indicator repetitions. The clue for ILLNESS was a last-minute change. It’s my fault – I should’ve checked for repetitions.
As for the Magnum – I’m sure someone once told me that the original idea for it came from Sir Roger Moore.
[ Thanks Martyn@8 , I thought it would be different brand names elsewhere . Tony@13 . It is worth doing the whole thing but I know time is limited for many people , I am lucky to have the time in summer . It is traditional to start with a swim in the Irish Sea and finish with a swim in the North Sea , brrrr . ]
I don’t have much to add but I enjoyed the puzzle. Lots of the clues went quickly from confusion to realisation. So, quite satisfying as my second grid of the day.
Thanks Solomon and Turbolegs.