A tough head scratcher from SOLOMON.
FF: 9 DD: 9
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | DUSTY |
Oddly dour and filthy place needing a clean (5)
|
| DU ( DoUr, odd letters of ) STY ( filthy place ) | ||
| 4 | TECHNIQUE |
Procedure Committee’s leader enthralled by rendition of Queen hit (9)
|
| C ( Committee, first letter ) in [ QUEEN HIT ]* | ||
| 9 | FORMULA |
Generate means with supporting capital from Man U and City (7)
|
| FOR (?) M ( Man, capital ) U LA ( city ) – i am not able to satify myself with the marking of the def, and therefore the parsing ( verb vs noun ) | ||
| 10 | RAGTIME |
Music college’s period of charity fundraising? (7)
|
| cryptic def | ||
| 11 | UNSIGHTLY |
Repulsive, thin and ugly drunk devours seconds (9)
|
| S ( seconds ) in [ THIN UGLY ]* | ||
| 12 | TESLA |
When cycling, knock car (5)
|
| SLATE ( knock ) with the TE moving to the front | ||
| 13 | TUFTY |
Express disapproval about fellow close to Scooby — Shaggy? (5)
|
| [ TUT ( express disapproval ) around F ( fellow ) ] Y ( shaggY, last letter ) | ||
| 15 | RENEWABLE |
Green and blue uniform scrubbed after a Wren jogged about base (9)
|
| { [ A WREN ]* around E ( base ) } BLuE ( without U – uniform ) | ||
| 17 | MILKSHAKE |
Kind Arab ruler caught on mike getting something from McDonald’s? (9)
|
| M ( mike ) ILK ( kind ) SHAKE ( sounds like SHEIKH, arab ruler ) | ||
| 20 | STORM |
Row to one end of river through Swaffham on vacation (5)
|
| [ TO R ( either end of RiveR ] in SM ( SwaffhaM, on vacation i.e. without inner letters ) | ||
| 22 | DRIVE |
Who, say, Solomon’s hit with a golf club? (5)
|
| DR ( who, say ) I’VE ( solomon’s ) | ||
| 24 | OVERWHELM |
Snow under liquid, however, starts to loosen and melt (9)
|
| [ HOWEVER ]* LM ( starting letters of “..Loosen and Melt” ) | ||
| 26 | ARCADIA |
Lost garden gnome finally extracted from shopping centre and returned first-class (7)
|
| ARCADe ( shopping centre, without E – gnomE, last letter ) IA ( first-class = A1, reversed ) | ||
| 27 | STOMACH |
Someone virtuous and manly moving round belly (7)
|
| ST ( someone virtuous, saint ) OMACH ( manly = MACHO, with O – round, moving to the front ) | ||
| 28 | HONEYMOON |
Leave straight after the match (9)
|
| cryptic def | ||
| 29 | GAGES |
Sizes of plums reduced by 50pc (5)
|
| greenGAGES ( plums, without half the letters – reduced by 50% ) | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | DEFAULT |
Standard three consecutive notes you put in key (7)
|
| DEF ( three consecutive notes ) [ U ( you ) in ALT ( key ) ] | ||
| 2 | STRESSFUL |
Demanding character, most often seen in casinos, flusters, getting worried (9)
|
| [ FLUSTERS ]* containing S ( character most often seen in caSinoS ) | ||
| 3 | YOUNG |
Baby wildebeest rears up beneath you when its tail gets pulled (5)
|
| YOU NG ( wildebeest = GNu, without last letter, reversed ) | ||
| 4 | TRACTOR |
Rubbish farm vehicle reverses into another (7)
|
| reverse of ROT ( rubbish ) CART ( farm vehicle ) | ||
| 5 | CARRY-ON |
Fuss created when the tip of red crayon’s broken (5-2)
|
| [ R ( Red, tip of ) CRAYON ]* | ||
| 6 | NIGHT OWLS |
Covering low ground, headless horsemen who operate in darkness (5,4)
|
| kNIGHTS ( horsemen, without starting letter ) containing [ LOW ]* | ||
| 7 | QUIPS |
During panel show, you and I forgot to say jokes (5)
|
| [ U ( you ) in QI ( panel show, Quite Interesting ) ] PS ( ~ i forgot to say ) | ||
| 8 | ELEVATE |
Article in La Vanguardia on EE receiving tax boost (7)
|
| EL ( article in la vanguardia, spanish ) [ VAT ( tax ) in EE ] | ||
| 14 | YESTERDAY |
Prog rockers tense, ready to play song (9)
|
| YES ( prog rockers ) T ( tense ) [ READY ]* | ||
| 16 | BOOMERANG |
Septuagenarian angry when line is forgotten? It’ll come back (9)
|
| BOOMER ( septuagenerian ) ANGry ( without RY – line ) | ||
| 17 | MUD BATH |
Glam rock band on blow, heroin and mineral water? (3,4)
|
| MUD ( glam rock band ) BAT ( blow ) H ( heroin ) | ||
| 18 | AVOCADO |
Asda’s 50pc shareholder against online grocer delivering fruit (7)
|
| A ( AsdA, 50pc shareholder i.e. the 2 A’s out of 4 letters ) V ( against, versus ) OCADO ( online grocer ) | ||
| 19 | EMERSON |
Writer of English/French sea shanty that remains unfinished? (7)
|
| E ( english ) MER ( sea, french ) SONg ( shanty, without last letter ) | ||
| 21 | MEMPHIS |
Crossword setter meets politician to the north of his county seat (7)
|
| ME ( crossword setter ) MP ( politician ) HIS | ||
| 23 | INCAN |
Old American gangsters may end up here (5)
|
| cryptic def; read as IN CAN ( where gangsters may end up ) | ||
| 25 | WRONG |
Faulty Winchester unloaded on top of gunhouse (5)
|
| WR ( WinchesteR, unloaded i.e without inner letters ) ON G ( Gunhouse, first letter ) |
FORMULA
I think…
supporting=FOR
M+U+LA as mentioned in the blog.
That leaves us with “Generate means with”
The def could be “Generate means” or “Generate means with”
(means in the sense of averages). The part of speech mismatch
still seems to be there. So we are missing something.
Thanks Solomon for an excellent crossword. I found this fairly staightforward except for the parsing of RAGTIME and AVOCADO which I guessed from the definitions. I had many favourites including TECHNIQUE, TESLA, OVERWHELM, DEFAULT, TRACTOR, YESTERDAY, BOOMERANG, and INCAN. Thanks Turbolegs for the blog.
Further to KVa @1, I parsed 9a as ‘Generate means with’ as the def with FOR (‘supporting’) M (‘capital from Man’) U (‘U’) LA (‘City’) as wordplay with a FORMULA as a noun being an expression or rule used in mathematics to (among many other uses) calculate ‘means’ or averages. It sort of works as a noun if ‘This is used to’ is understood at the start of the clue and is part of the def; no, I’m not confident!
Otherwise an enjoyable puzzle. Fact I’ve learnt today: MEMPHIS is not the capital of Tennessee and is the ‘county seat’ of the never heard of Shelby County. Favourite bit was the misleading ‘Old American gangsters’.
Thanks to Solomon and Turbolegs
FORMULA
My LOI, unsurprisingly. Struggling to parse (in which I am evidently not alone) I toyed with ‘means’ as ‘a way of doing or making’, and then ‘a way of generating’, which makes ‘generate means’ another way of saying ‘a way in which one generates something’ – and then I decided to let someone else try and explain it . . . I think I had ‘a means to an end’ in my head, but my head was also starting to ache . . .
FORMULA – perhaps the clue has been messed with , sometimes happens . A wild guess – Generate means with THIS supporting ….
adapting the idea of Wordplodder @3 .
Thanks as ever to Turbolegs for the blog and to commenters – much appreciated.
Sorry about FORMULA, which clearly hasn’t worked if even KVa can’t parse it. The intent was for the definition to be just ‘means’ and the cryptic grammar to be ‘Generate [definition] with [wordplay]’, which I now agree is overly elaborate.
Thanks for the blog , very good puzzle with many neat and clever clues .