One of those where the last one in was the first one read. This happens all too often.
Does Cyclops make the clue to 1 Across tougher than the rest? I doubt it.
It must be that the little grey cells need more warming up before – so I’d better do another crossword before attempting this one…
… but then what if I have the same trouble with that. Oh dear.
Pragmatically, the clue to 1A was clearly no harder than many of the others. It’s just the way solving goes, and this puzzle was about average – somewhere between 6 and 10 left to get after the first pass, including, as usual, the 5 shorter lights in the top left. Of those I suggest 2 down was the toughest – toughest just to read without thinking too much about the surface reading. Very off putting.
I thought the clues to 9D and 14D were outstanding for totally different reasons.
I had a bit of luck last weekend. I spotted a tenner on the pavement outside the newsagent.
After I picked it up I felt a little bit guilty. My gain is someone else’s loss.
And it was Easter I thought, “What would Jesus do?”…
| Across | ||
|---|---|---|
| 1 | SECURE | Tight arse hiding in view (6) CUR (arse) inside SEE (view) First one read and LOI (Last one in). |
| 4 | IMPLICIT | Understood there are no bounds to simplicity (8) [s]IMPLICIT[y] (simplicity, no bounds) First one in. Implicit is implicit in simplicity |
| 10 | UNINVITED | Being wed, concealing small bill is far from welcome (9) INV[oice] (bill, small) inside UNITED (being wed) Don’t conceal bills however small when you’re wed. That way you soon be not wed. |
| 11 | SAPID | Jerk I had – quite tasty (5) SAP (Jerk) I’D Not a word I use – too easily confused with vapid. |
| 12 | NOBEL PEACE PRIZE | Big shot with the Spanish treasure, keeping quiet (Trump wants it badly)(5,5,5) PEACE (quiet) inside (kept by) NOB (Big shot) EL (the, Spanish) and PRIZE (treasure) No <printable> comment. |
| 13 | CONDOM | Rubber party act by Frenchman? (6) CON (party) DO (act) M. (Frenchman, standard French abbreviation for Monsieur) Makes me imagine contortionists at the Cirque du Soleil <YouTube clip thereof> |
| 15 | LENIENT | Drug-taking Russian leader, ultimately bleeding-heart liberal! (7) E (drug) in LENIN (Russian leader), then [bleeding-hear]T. Putin must be taking loads of drugs to look that embalmed. |
| 18 | PANNIER | Container to check shag’s over (7) (REIN NAP)< (to check shag, over) NAP for shag as in shagpile. When I was a teenager I had a lovely pair of panniers on my bike. (They didn’t attract the girls though) |
| 20 | SCYTHE | One quarter Scottish, they casually make cuts (6) SC[ottish] (THEY)* AInd: casually. Is this clue one quarter ethnically offensive to the Scottish? |
| 21 | SHORT AND CURLIES | Bush method of taking down a dictator, not hard – “Sonofabitch is dishonest!” (5,3,7) SHORTHAND (dictation) – H[ard] (not hard), CUR (sonofabitch) LIES (is dishonest). Brilliant use of dictation as “method of taking down a dictator” |
| 25 | DUMBO | Dope mum has ball (5) DUMB (mum) O (a ball). No elephants were hurt in the making of this crossword. |
| 26 | WIND CHILL | Turn Conservative and rise – it’ll make you so much cooler! (4,5) WIND (turn) C[onservative] HILL (rise). No one thinks it’s cool to turn conservative these days. |
| 27 | SCHEDULE | Bloke had to enter cryptic clues programme (8) HE’D (Bloke had) in (CLUES)* AInd: cryptic. Self-defining setter. |
| 28 | PRAYER | Litany from Trump: “war ends!” – yeah, right! (6) [trum]P [wa]R AYE (yeah) R[ight]. This is what everyone else in the world besides Trump is doing. |
| Down | ||
| 1 | SPURN | Prick meets northern reject (5) SPUR (Prick) N[orthern] Is Spurn where they put the northern rejects? (Spurn Point) |
| 2 | CLIMB DOWN | Tip of septic member getting blue – withdraw! (5,4) [septi]C LIMB (member) DOWN (blue). I’m too squeamish to contemplate the surface reading of this clue. |
| 3 | REVEL | Party‘s left unceasingly arse over tip (5) L[eft] EVER (unceasingly) all reversed (arse over tip) Rare use of “Party” as a definition in an Eye crossword clue. |
| 5 | MEDICAL | Cops turn up during dinner getting physical? (7) CID< (cops, turn up) in MEAL (dinner). Avoid doughnuts for dinner? |
| 6 | LAST PENNY | All your remaining cash to endure ex-Tory minister? (4,5) LAST (to endure) PENNY (ex-Tory minister, ref. Penny Mordaunt, she of the sword) |
| 7 | CAPRI | Needing to get end away, a prick set out for island (5) (A PRIC[k])* AInd: set out. I don’t to be thought a prick, but I hope I set out for this island one day wiki Blue_Grotto_(Capri) |
| 8 | TED HEATH | Ex-PM, combination of Cruz and Bush? (3,5) TED [Cruz] and HEATH (bush, i.e. scrubby land, outback) Ref, Ted_Cruz. I find “Bush” = “Heath” a bit of a stretch, so this had me looking up if there was some other miscreant called Heath Bush that I didn’t know – but I couldn’t find anyone under that name. |
| 9 | STREAM | Smear fudge round testicles initially to produce flow (6) (SMEAR)* AInd: fudge, around T[esticles] !! Top clue for the appallingly rude surface meaning |
| 14 | DRIFTWOOD | Break by court, between two dates, which goes with the flow (9) RIFT (Break) WOO (court) inside D and D (two dates) !! And another top clue to follow. Very satisfying to parse the wordplay. |
| 16 | ETHNICITY | Ballsed up in the large community race (9) (IN THE)* AInd: Ballsed up, CITY (large community). What is “in” doing? It is not part of the wordplay and the clue would work without it. Edit: It is part of the wordplay of course. It is the anagram fodder. I don’t know what I was thinking when I wrote that |
| 17 | EPISODES | Experiences beginning of individuality in kinky speedos (8) (I[ndividuality] SPEEDOS)* AInd: kinky. Aren’t all speedos kinky? |
| 19 | RENEWAL | Kiss of life helps to get Irene waltzing (7) Hidden in IRENE WALtzing Flashbacks to Soames Forstyte in black & white |
| 20 | SECOND | Mo‘s back (6) Double Def. Here’s hoping |
| 22 | OOMPH | Balls and member hard – that’s vigour! (5) OO (Balls) MP (member) H[ard] One of Cyclops’s favourite grid words |
| 23 | RECUR | Come again on meeting bastard (5) RE (on) CUR (bastard) And another |
| 24 | SOLAR | Sun-originated, maybe also Republican (5) (ALSO)* AInd: maybe, R[epublican] Workmanlike clue. |
… so I turned it into wine.
Thanks for a great blog , very entertaining , as was the puzzle . SHORT AND CURLIES was brilliant , even had the fake capital for Bush hidden at the front .
ETHNICITY – you have answered your own query , IN is part of ETHNI as an anagram .
HEATH = bush , perhaps a bit of a stretch , Chambers93 does give cover , the bush can be treeless .
Thanks Roz. I seem to have had a blog-brain glitch when I got to Ethnicity
I often have the same issue with first clues, bm.
Yes the misdirection for SAC was very clever.
CUR seemed to occur several times, I didn’t see anything much behind that though.
Cheers one and all.
Thanks for the blog beermagnet and Cyclops. I’d say 21a is candidate for clue of the year. Last one in 18a, mainly because being a Cyclops puzzle I was thinking of a different type of shag. The penny dropped eventually as you confirmed. 11a new to me.
Thanks beermagnet and Cyclops. It took me ages to parse 18a. The only question mark I had was “why frenchman = m”. Seems obvious now (after being told).
I agree with everyone 21a was a real gem. Bravo, Cyclops!
My thanks to Cyclops and beermagnet.
My PE only showed up today, well late. I casually came here and found that my mag has to be a week late as the answers were already here.
Not too hard for a Cyclops but I totally missed 9d Stream which I biffed. Just didn’t see the anagram, wasn’t awake.
I did like 14d Driftwood when it swam into view, pretty late on.
This setter is obsessed with the word ‘cur’. His clues are the only context I ever see this word used. But on the bright side, that’s actually how I got 1A straight away. But yes usually, the first one always eludes me until towards the the end for some reason.