An enjoyable and challenging Prize puzzle from Fed this week…
…with a long, linked, ‘slogan’ at 14A/17A and a few cross-references in clues/definitions – almost Paul-esque?…
Unfortunately for me, 14A/17A took quite a while to click, only falling once I had enough crossers to combine with the enumeration and get it. Quite fitting, in that UNITED it stood, and I had to DIVIDE it with crossers to conquer it…
A few too many American references for me – the cruciverbally ubiquitous Trump assuming he had succeeded at 1A (apposite, given the events of the last few days!); Mar-a-Lago’s lavatory (where he hid all those classified documents) at 16D; Musk’s X at 10A; Kanye (West) – who he?! – at 14A/17A.
But apart from those – and the surface read of 1A was almost self-redeeming – it was quite an enjoyable solve. No obvious theme(ette) or Nina, to me at least, and my favourite was probably 20D WHIMSY, closely followed by the swearingly CONCUSSED prisoner at 11A.
My thanks to Fed, who seems pretty well established in this prize slot now, and I trust all is clear below…
[As is customary, I will be ‘spoiling a good walk’ tomorrow (Saturday) morning, so may not be particularly responsive to any comments/quibbles below – I am sure there will be enough ‘first responders’ to any cris-de-couer…and my thanks in advance to them!]
| Across | ||
|---|---|---|
| Clue No | Solution | Clue (definition underlined)
Logic/parsing |
| 1A | TRIUMPHED | Current President assumed he had succeeded (9)
TR_UMP (US president) around (assuming) I (electrical current, physics) + HED (he’d, contraction of he had) |
| 6A | SMUT | Soot – small amount oddly disappears (4)
S (small) + even letters (odd ones disappearing) of aMoUnT |
| 10A | TOKEN | Representation of crypto Musk finally invested in X (5)
T_EN (X, Roman numerals) around (invested in by) OK (final letters of ‘cryptO musK) |
| 11A | CONCUSSED | Stunned prisoner swore (9)
CON (convict, prisoner) + CUSSED (swore) |
| 12A | NODULES | Nintendo console installing game after turning knobs (7)
N_ES (Nintendo Entertainment System, console) around (installing) ODUL (ludo, game, after turning) |
| 13A | DOORMAT | One looked down on party leader abandoning make-up (7)
DO (party) + ( |
| 14A | UNITED WE STAND | & 17 Slogan – one used by Kanye and GAP before silly flawed deal’s conclusion (6,2,5,7,2,4)
UNITED (one) + WE_ST (Kanye West) + AND (with) + DIVIDE (gap) + D_WE_FAL (anag, i.e. silly, of FLAWED) + L (concluding letter of deaL) |
| 17A | DIVIDED WE FALL | See 14A (7,2,4))
see 14A |
| 21A | HECKLES | Spots French disappearing behind hospital barracks (7)
H (hospital) + ( |
| 22A | STEAMER | Ship’s pilot eats before noon (7)
STE_ER (pilot) around (eating) AM (ante meridiem, before noon) |
| 24A | MENOPAUSE | The change made on vacation without delay … (9)
ME (MadE, vacated of inner letters) + NO PAUSE (without delay) |
| 25A | TAMED | … change made on time – now under control (5)
T (time) + AMED (anag, i.e. change, of MADE) |
| 26A | YO-YO | Type of dieting you endlessly repeated (2-2)
YO( |
| 27A | BATTLE-CRY | Book new cattery to accommodate Lambert and Geronimo? (6-3)
B (book) + ATT_E_CRY (anag, i.e. new, of CATTERY) around (accommodating) L (lambert, unit of brightness) |
| Down | ||
| Clue No | Solution | Clue (definition underlined)
Logic/parsing |
| 1D | TITANIUM | Corporation covering it in a molten metal (8)
T_UM (corporation, belly) around (covering) ITANI (anag, i.e. molten, of IT IN A) |
| 2D | INKED | Find keen lads in prime locations getting tattooed (5)
prime numbered letters (2,3,5,7,11) of ‘fINd KeEn laDs’ |
| 3D | MANILA ENVELOPE | Bill might arrive in this capital before eleven, worried about work (6,8)
MANILA (capital of the Philippines) + ENVEL_E (anag. i.e. worried, of ELEVEN) around OP (opus, musical, work) |
| 4D | HACKSAW | Means to cut journalist on Maxim (7)
HACK (journalist) on SAW (maxim) |
| 5D | DENUDES | Dundee’s comic strips (7)
anag, i.e. comic, of DUNDEES |
| 7D | MASS MEDIA | Graduate, 22 aimed to work in TV, radio etc (4,5)
MA (Master of Arts, graduate) + SS (steamship, as per 22A – steamer) + MEDIA (anag, i.e. to work, of AIMED) |
| 8D | TO DATE | Thus far, ultimately not, old fruit (2,4)
T (ultimate letter of noT) + O (old) + DATE (fruit) |
| 9D | PUT ON A PEDESTAL | Fix up 8 panels illustrating hero-worship (3,2,1,8)
anag, i.e. fix, of UP + TO DATE (8D) + PANELS |
| 15D | INDECENCY | Good taste, home before 6? (9)
IN (home) before DECENCY (good taste) [6A being SMUT!] |
| 16D | FLORIDLY | State of Mar-a-Lago after detailing walls of lavatory in a rococo style (8)
FLORID( |
| 18D | DISTURB | Worry ad-libs occasionally dry up (7)
DIS (occasional letters of ‘aDlIbS’) + TURB (brut, dry, wine, up) |
| 19D | DISSENT | Object in stock, we hear (7)
homophone – DISSENT, object to, can sound like DESCENT, or one’s stock/lineage |
| 20D | WHIMSY | Question of motive consumes one writing fantasy (6)
WH_Y (question of motive) around (consuming) I (one) + MS (manuscript, writing) |
| 23D | MIMIC | Case of Maserati on motorway going over 100, makes Mirror (5)
MI (case, or outer letters, or MaseratI) + MI M1, UK motorway) + C (100, Roman numerals) |
I found this tough and didn’t parse them all
Liked: DISTURB, TITANIUM, HECKLES, MIMIC, MANILA ENVELOPE
Thanks Fed and mc_rapper67
14/17 Kanye West has a song “Stand United” and GAP had an advertising campaign of the same name which may explain the use of “used by” in the clue which is otherwise superfluous.
I missed the details of a couple of parsings but was happy to complete a Prize which is an unusual event for me. Favourite was 2D for its use of prime numbers; a piece of wordplay that was new to me and a very satisfying penny drop.
Thanks to Fed & mc_rapper67
Fun puzzle.
l don’t think I would have got INKED right away if we hadn’t had the prime trick relatively recently.
With STEAMER, spent way too long trying to work with the similar words navigate (a ship) and aviate (pilot). Maybe subjects of a future clue, who knows?
Liked MENOPAUSE, MANILA ENVELOPE, INDECENCY.
Got the long middle entries fairly early on when I got the W from 4d HACKSAW, which opened up the puzzle significantly. Who knew that the two phrases of 14/17 UWS,DWF contain the same number of letters? Remarkable
As with all Fed puzzles I loved pretty much all the surfaces in this one. Meaningful and funny. Hard to narrow my favourites. Let’s try 11a CONCUSSED (funny, concise), 13a DOORMAT (“One looked down on”), the pair of 24a MENOPAUSE and 25a TAMED (two “…change made on…”, with ellipses that really work), 2d INKED (with the rare “prime locations”), 5d DENUDES (“comic strips”), 16d FLORIDLY (remarkable surface)
1d TITANIUM provides today’s earworm
Thanks Fed for a fun puzzle, and mc_rapper67 for an excellent blog! A couple of tweaks:
1a TRIUMPHED, watch out for “current” double-duty. Just “President” (not “current”)
4d HACKSAW, SAW = “Maxim” (not “means to cut”)
I have found this week’s puzzles hard to finish. This was a much breezier affair as the setter and general knowledge suited me. If anything held me up it was the knowledge that The Dandy comic hails from Dundee and dandies fitted in place of denudes for a while, but it was only brief as I knew it didn’t parse. Lovely misdirection.
Like our blogger, the big clue took a while but I enjoyed chipping away at it. Good fun, great surfaces. I liked FLORIDLY, TITANIUM, NODULES and MANILA ENVELOPE among others. It was all good though.
Thanks Fed and mc_rapper67
Thanks for the blog , very good set of clues . INKED , I am always impressed by the prime trick . DENUDES is misleading , Dundee was (is?) the home of UK comics , Beano , Dandy etc . Not heard of NES but it had to be NODULES .
Geronimo is the traditional BATTLE-CRY when tombstoning .
My faves: TRIUMPHED, UNITED WS DW FALL, MASS MEDIA, P O A PEDESTAL, INKED and WHIMSY.
Thanks Fed and mc.
I liked INKED (I don’t recall seeing that technique before).
At first I had STEAMER as anagram of “eats” + “mer” before I saw the better parsing.
Last one was DISSENT which I still don’t like. Probably a bit picky but if object = DISSENT and stock = DESCENT then what is the “in” doing?
Thanks mc_rapper67, I found my way through this steadily and enjoyably enough. Never did come to terms with 2d though and don’t remember encountering the “prime trick before. I was also impressed with the very smooth surfaces.
I found this straightforward with no sticking points. I got the long 14a and 17a quite early and that unlocked the rest. No obscure answers to slow me up.
I couldn’t parse TOKEN, NODULES and DOORMAT.
Loved the passing reference to D C Thompson in Dundee’s comic strips.
No stand-out favourites among many excellent clues.
Thanks Fed and mc_rapper67
Enjoyed the puzzle. No mistakes. Got the big phrases in part directly from clues but assisted by crossers. 17a led to 14a. Failed to parse some of the clues mentioned above. Well done mc_rapper for getting them all. Meant to check prime numbers in 2d, but forgot. Had written ‘NES?’ next to 12a, so I got it really.
I missed the prime numbers trick, so INKED was unparsed; and like Roz@7 I had never heard of NES but it had to be NODULES. Didn’t parse DISSENT either, and don’t like ‘stock’ as a synonym for DESCENT. Other than that it was a very enjoyable solve, with WHIMSY and CONCUSSED favourites.
Thanks to Fed, and I hope our blogger enjoys his walk despite having to take a load of golf clubs with him.
Rather disappointed that the Bill arrived in a MANILA ENVELOPE rather than a squad car, but I enjoyed this in spite of the various things I learned for the first time. NES was an abbreviation I didn’t know, nor had I heard of the Lambert unit. I just sighed and applied my default “any word can be its first letter” rule. The prime numbers trick went straight over my head. Unfortunately the longest answers all became apparent long before I had the chance to untangle their parsing (something that tends to happen with Fed).
Liked HECKLES, MENOPAUSE, the appropriate surface for FLORIDLY, the definition for DOORMAT, INDECENCY, DENUDES. Thanks, Fed.
Gladys@14 , Lambert is pretty obscure and obsolete , still gets used , and definitely L .
The prime trick was overused for a while in the Guardian and FT , it is good to see it occasionally .
I always enjoy Fred’s puzzles and this was no exception. The crossers saved me from spending too long trying to work Wii into NODULES.