A fun challenge from SOLOMON!
FF: 9 DD: 7
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | EASY |
A portion of blancmange, a syllabub, and a piece of cake (4)
|
| hidden in “..blancmangE A SYllabub..” | ||
| 3 | PROPOUNDED |
In favour of strike the steward finally put forward (10)
|
| PRO ( in favour of ) POUND ( strike ) ED ( ‘..thE stewarD..” ) | ||
| 10 | RELIGIOUS |
Conscientious US soldier drills crude US oil with army engineers (9)
|
| RE ( army engineers ) { GI ( us soldier ) in [ US OIL ]* } | ||
| 11 | SPUDS |
Foam-smothered soft potatoes (5)
|
| SUDS ( foam ) containing P ( soft ) | ||
| 12 | ECHO |
Evocation of bygone days in Czechoslovakia (4)
|
| hidden in “..czECHOslovakia” | ||
| 13 | SUPERSTAR |
One really famous South American going around a pitch (9)
|
| S ( south ) [ US ( american ) containing PER ( a ) ] TAR ( pitch ) | ||
| 15 | PATIENT |
One boring open-and-shut case (7)
|
| I ( one ) in PATENT ( open and shut ) | ||
| 17 | NOWHERE |
In this time and in this place or not in any place (7)
|
| NOW ( in this time ) HERE ( in this place ) | ||
| 19 | ROE |
Cook unshelled heron eggs (3)
|
| [ hEROn ( unshelled i.e. without end characters ) ]* | ||
| 20 | SURNAME |
Higgs, for example, articulated the Large Hadron Collider objective (7)
|
| sounds like CERN ( french acronym for european council for nuclear research, where the lhc is ) AIM ( objective ) | ||
| 22 | DEBACLE |
Editor put about explosive cable, causing fiasco (7)
|
| DE ( reverse of editor, ED ) [ CABLE ]* | ||
| 24 | RISTRETTO |
Strong coffee, stirred endlessly, boiled two times over (9)
|
| [ STIRREd ( endlessly i.e. without last letter ) ] TT ( two times ) O ( over ) | ||
| 27 | BULL |
Cow’s tail removed for tripe (4)
|
| BULLy ( cow, without last letter ) | ||
| 29 | PANDA |
Animal from the remotest parts of Patagonia (5)
|
| cryptic def; remotest parts of PatogoniA are P AND A | ||
| 30 | EPICENTRE |
Most important part of long film course cut short (9)
|
| EPIC ( long film ) ENTREe ( course, cut short ) | ||
| 31 | ENCRYPTING |
Trying child’s first pen out? Is this what I’m doing? (10)
|
| [ TRYING C ( Child, first letter ) PEN ]* | ||
| 32 | GREY |
King George ‘the Old’ turns pale (4)
|
| GR ( king george ) EY ( reverse of YE, ‘the’ in olden times ) | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | EARL |
Posh bloke’s papa leaving something inside oyster? (4)
|
| pEARL ( something inside oyster, without P – papa ) | ||
| 2 | SOLICITOR |
Advocate spreading soil about with this object before worm’s discovered (9)
|
| [ SOIL ]* C ( about ) IT ( this object ) OR ( wORm, discovered i.e. without end letters ) | ||
| 4 | ROOMS |
Parts of a building fell over on top of someone (5)
|
| ROOM ( fell = MOOR, reversed ) S ( Someone, first letter ) | ||
| 5 | POSTPONED |
Put back letters called, but leave out H (9)
|
| POST ( letters ) PhONED ( called, without H ) | ||
| 6 | UNSCREW |
Loosen the middle of spinnaker taken in by us sailors (7)
|
| [ N ( spinNaker, middle of ) in US ] CREW ( sailors ) | ||
| 7 | DOUBT |
Question: do you bet on vacation? (5)
|
| DO U ( you ) BT ( BeT, on vacation i.e. without inner letters ) | ||
| 8 | DISORDERED |
Unkempt detective inspector’s given instructions (10)
|
| DI’S ( detective inspector’s ) ORDERED ( given instructions ) | ||
| 9 | IGNORE |
Refuse to look at topless foreign dances (6)
|
| [ fOREIGN ( topless i.e. without first letter ) ]* | ||
| 14 | APOSTROPHE |
A pale rope surrounding helipad that indicates ownership (10)
|
| A POST ( pale ) [ ROPE containing H ( Helipad ) ] | ||
| 16 | TREATMENT |
Leaders of the regiment upset soldiers before tense operation? (9)
|
| TR ( starting letters of “..The Regiment..” ) EAT ( upset ) MEN ( soldiers ) T ( tense ) | ||
| 18 | ESCALATOR |
Shoplifter damaged case left at the back of Costco close to Chester (9)
|
| [ CASE ]* L ( left ) AT O ( costcO, last letter ) R ( chesteR, last letter ) | ||
| 21 | ALREADY |
Suspect evacuated Leningrad a year before the time in question (7)
|
| [ LD ( LeningraD, evacuated i.e. without inner letters ) A YEAR ]* | ||
| 23 | BABIES |
BA Baracus’s head is cut by 12 bits of litter? (6)
|
| BA B ( Baracus, first letter ) [ IS containing E ( 12a is ECHO, phonetic alphabet for E ) ] | ||
| 25 | SONIC |
Lively hedgehog back at home among green leaves (5)
|
| reverse of [ IN ( home ) in COS ( green leaves ) ] | ||
| 26 | ONION |
Multilayered tearjerker being performed twice, overwhelming yours truly (5)
|
| [ ON ON ( performed, twice ) ] containing I ( yours truly ) | ||
| 28 | DENY |
Disown golden yellow trousers (4)
|
| hidden in “..golDEN Yellow..” |
Yet again Solomon delivers great surfaces and interesting constructions.
I confess I had a few ales before attempting this, which probably explains why I found it more difficult than our blogger’s 7 score. I thought ECHO, BULL, and SURNAME were clever, I also ticked PATENT.
I could not parse SUPERSTAR (so many times I forget that a = per), ROOMS (lucky guess given roofs are part of a building too), and APOSTROPHE (still not sure why post = pale – all I can think of is beyond the post/pale). I wonder what PB has to say about SOLICITOR, as the barrister is typically the advocate, not the solicitor.
Thanks to Solomon for a nice puzzle and Turbolegs for a great blog
Thanks for the blog , really good set of clues with many nice ideas , ONION is very neat .
Martyn@1 , a pale is simply a wooden stake in the ground used for fencing , I am guessing beyond the pale meant outside an enclosure of pales/posts .
We may have legal experts in later but in England solicitors can act in lower courts and I know there are Solicitor Advocates who can act in some higher courts and have had more training .
SURNAME has more layers , Professor Peter Higgs proposed the Higgs Boson which was the initial target for discovery at the LHC at Cern . Other aims were the particles of Super-Symmetry , oh dear .
I met Peter Higgs once when I was just a humble student dogsbody at conferences .
Why is post pale?
@Geoff Down Under – a Pale is a post in a fence.
Enjoyed this some lovely misleading definitions / surfaces
I found the top half went in more easily. I often find this – yet I remember being told that sometimes the bottom right hand corner was often easier because it was the bit setters did last.
Anyone else heard this?
Liked: SPUDS, ROOMS, ESCALATOR
Thanks Solomon and Turbolegs
Splendid as always. Lots of fun constructions and smooth surfaces. And a few mischievous definitions along the way – ESCALATOR in particular. I have not encountered ‘helipad’ for H before but guessed it might be a map symbol. Chambers normally has more abbreviations than any other dictionary but does not list that one. It’s incorporated into a lovely clue for APOSTROPHE.
Thanks both
I liked SPUDS, POSTPONED and SURNAME. For some reason, it took me an age to see the very straightforward DISORDERED.
Fiona @6: I think it’s a bit of a cruciverbal urban myth. True, if you start cluing words with the first across clue and work through in order, you will clue the last down clue last of all. (Doesn’t mean the last across clues are easy though – they will have come approximately half way through compiling.) But – and I can only speak for myself – the setter is also looking for a balance of clue types across the puzzle which might dictate what kind of clue is selected for that SE corner; relatively few clean reversals or homophones pop up when filling the grid with solutions so should one of those materialise in the SE, it might get clued earlier in the process; if there is a theme, that might dictate solutions with clues already under consideration for that corner and, similarly to that, one often has a few ‘seed’ solutions that might go into a grid early on and some of those might be in the SE. Finally, it’s by no means a given that the clues are written in one session and/or that they remain in place through the honing and editing process. That last down clue might be written right at the beginning of a new day when the brain is a-fizz with ideas.
A helipad has a very large H sign on the ground so definitely widely used .
Always nice to have an EASY start
I enjoyed this Solomon puzzle, as usual.
I have seen H for helipad before. It makes sense even if is non-standard.
In American crosswords, I think the SW corner is usually the easiest place to start, and the NW corner is usually where the most challenging clues appear, very broadly speaking.
Thanks Solomon for the excellent Friday fare. I had many favourites including RISTRETTO, PANDA, IGNORE, ESCALATOR, SONIC, and ONION. I thought some of the definitions were ‘creative’ which added to the fun. I couldn’t parse SURNAME but all else made sense to me. Regarding certain quadrants being easy or difficult I have found no pattern whatsoever in my solving. Thanks Turbolegs for the blog.
As Roz, the big H on a helipad was reason enough. I think it’s interesting that the heli- prefix probably came from a misunderstanding as helicopter essentially splits as helico (as in screw) and pter (as in wing, e.g. pterodactyl).
A good puzzle. PANDA brought a smile. I twitched slightly at GREY defined as “pale”; as far as I am concerned, grey can be pale, dark or anything in between. However, inevitably it’s there in Chambers…
DNF. Had ‘roofs’ instead of ‘rooms’! Oh well.
Looking in out of curiosity again as I am still away from home, but I need to say that I think Roz@2 has correctly answered the question posed by Martyn@1. Collins online gives us
solicitor in British English noun 1. (in Britain) a lawyer who advises clients on matters of law, draws up legal documents, prepares cases for barristers, etc, and who may represent clients in certain courts. Compare barrister
I think the “and who may represent …” covers it.
I cannot resist a tiny point about the parsing of 26dn. I think the definition for ON is “being performed”, not just “performed”.
“A fun challenge”? No way! 1ac was EASY but the rest left us struggling, only completing with extensive electronic help in the SW quadrant. Even then we couldn’t parse TREATMENT – ‘eat’ as ‘upset’ is too much of a stretch.
Sorry, Solomon, too much hard work to be enjoyable; but thanks, Turbolegs, for the explanations.
I enjoyed this one, although I did not find it straightforward. The top half went in relatively easily, but the bottom proved trickier.
And now for a humbling confession……
I put in the unparsed and inexplicable ROOFS as “part of a house”. 😂😂😂. I scratched my head wondering what else it could possibly be and couldn’t think of anything……
Perhaps the silliest mistake I’ve made in a crossword for a long long time.
Really enjoyed this! Especially PATIENT, SURNAME, APOSTROPHE, SONIC and clue of the day RISTRETTO. I always enjoy that helipad H’s are technically abbreviations despite being some of the least compact and most enormous pieces of writing on the planet.