Guardian Cryptic 28,190 by Anto

by

The puzzle may be found at https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/cryptic/28190.

For my money, the best Anto yet, by far. Bravo.

ACROSS
7 BOOM BOOM Report on economic success indicates it’s a joke! (4,4)
Now here’s an argument: which BOOM is the ‘report’, and which the ‘economic success’? One in a row…
9 TOUCHE You got me to put note around that hurt (6)
An envelope (‘to put … round’) of OUCH (‘that hurt’) in TE (or ti, ‘note’ of the sol fa). The answer, whether in fencing or otherwise, should rightly have an acute accent on the E.
10 SNOT Spoon out extreme bits found in nasal cavity (4)
Outer letters (‘extreme bits’) of ‘SpooN OuT‘. With a spoon?
11 BOX TICKING Routine bureaucratic approach with a potentially explosive package? (3,7)
Definition and literal interpretation.
12 BITE ME Serbians detest commerce? At heart, I don’t care (4,2)
Inner letters (‘at heart’) of ‘serBIans deTEst comMErce’.. Not an expression that I have come across before (at least with this meaning), but a little trawling comes up with it in Wictionary.
14 RE-ENTERS Again catalogues begrudgers rejecting society (2-6)
RESENTERS (‘begrudgers’) minus the first S (‘rejecting society’).
15 WHITMAN Poet and wife killer (7)
A charade of W (‘wife’) plus HIT MAN (‘killer’), for Long Island’s own poet.
17 SPRINGY Elastic band stuck in clock (7)
An envelope (‘stuck in’) of RING (‘band’) in SPY (‘clock’ in the sense of observe).
20 FOCACCIA Foreign office accountant caught spies forging Italian product (8)
A charade of FO (‘foreign office’) plus CA (chartered ‘accountant’) plus C (‘caught’) plus CIA (‘spies’).
22 PATOIS Nothing is shown by glib sort of language (6)
A charade of PAT (‘glib’) plus O (‘nothing’) plus ‘is’.
23 IFS AND BUTS Faust’s bind is desperate, with many reservations (3,3,4)
An anagram (‘is desperate’) of ‘Faust’s bind’.
24 TAPE Record overseas resident returning when vote is lost (4)
EXPAT (‘overseas resident’) minus the X (‘vote is lost’) and reversed (‘returning’).
25 LEGION Army prisoner restraint is missing lower end (6)
LEG IRON (‘prisoner restraint’ In college, there was someone who earned the nickname Leg Irons by his astonishing performances on the soccer field) minus the R (‘is missing loweR end’).
26 LION KING Putting together orchestral open­ing as interlude for musical (4,4)
An envelope (‘as interlude’) of O (‘Orchestral opening’) in LINKING (‘putting together’).
DOWN
1 YOUNGISH Not so old housing collapsed after year (8)
A charade of Y (‘year’) plus OUNGISH, an anagram (‘collapsed’) of ‘housing’.
2 SMUT Some men use these tips for titillation (4)
First letters (‘tips’) of ‘Some Men Use These’.
3 ZOMBIE Working stiff from Haiti (6)
Cryptic definition.
4 STRIKE-UP Start playing in attack when winning (6-2)
A charade of STRIKE (‘attack’) plus UP (‘winning’). I would not have hyphenated this.
5 BUCKET LIST Terrible tickle in chest — do this before you die! (6,4)
An envelope (‘in’) of CKETLI, an anagram (‘terrible’) of ‘tickle’ in BUST (‘chest’).
6 SHINER Eye damage from sun, perhaps (6)
Double definition.
8 MIXERS They like being with people and often lift spirits (6)
Double definition.
13 EUTHANASIA Auntie has a concoction that puts one to sleep (10)
An anagram (‘concoction’) of ‘auntei has a’. The ‘sleep’ is permanent.
16 ACCIDENT West’s leader becoming a calamity? (8)
OCCIDENT (‘west’) with the first letter changed to an A (‘leader becoming a’).
18 GRIPPING Complaining about president is exciting (8)
An envelope (‘about’) of P (‘president’) in GRIPING (‘complaining’).
19 CASUAL Being careless is responsible for United getting relegated (6)
CAUSAL (‘responsible for’) with the U moved one down (‘United getting relegated’).
21 OFFSET Compensation for travelling group (6)
A charade of OFF (‘travelling’. “We’re off to see the wizard”) plus SET (‘group’. Mathematicians, complain here that a group is an example of a set).
22 POST-OP Toilet break after surgery (4-2)
A charade of PO (‘toilet’) plus STOP (‘break’).
24 TAKE Trouser part of Greek attire is raised (4)
A hidden (‘part of’) reversed (‘is raised’, in a down light) answer in ‘GreEK ATtire’.

 

image of grid

73 comments on “Guardian Cryptic 28,190 by Anto”

  1. Thanks to Anto and PeterO.

    I really liked this puzzle from one of our more recent setters in the Cryptic slot. Ticks abounded: 7a BOOM BOOM, 9a TOUCHE, 11a TICKING BOX, 15a WHITMAN, 20a FOCACCIA, 6d SHINER and 8d MIXERS. I thought 3d ZOMBIE wasn’t particularly cryptic. I had a couple I couldn’t parse fully: 14a RE-ENTERS so obvious now!!!!), 22d POST-OP and 24d TAKE. I haven’t heard the use of PO for toilet (pot or potty maybe, but not PO) in the former clue, and while I suspect trouser is slang for “take in” as in fool, I still don’t fully get the latter clue.

    A good start to the working week (even though sometimes these days I have to look at the calendar to see what day it is).

  2. [P.S. I think BITE ME in that sense is a saying from the younger generation, PeterO. I think I must be getting a bit prudish as I age but I wasn’t fussed on 2d SMUT.]

  3. Hi JinA, trouser means take as in slip (a bribe, say, or something found) into one’s trousers.

  5. Thanks Anto for an extremely entertaining crossword. I knew when I got SMUT and SNOT I was in for a fun ride. BOX-TICKING, WHITMAN, and EUTHANASIA (great surface) were all superb. Thanks PeterO for the blog.

  6. A quick romp, with no real worries, though ‘causal’ as ‘resposible for’ felt more nudge than equivalence, and ‘walking stiff’ might have been a bit crypticer for 3d. Thanks Anto and PeterO.

  7. A joyless solve, but fortunately over quickly.                                                                       In fairness I should say that I got a laugh out of WHITMAN, and this almost made up for gauche clues such as 7A and 11A.

  8. This was a good puzzle, with a couple of quibbles:  I think most ACCIDENTs are not calamitous (16d), and MIXERS dilute rather than lift (8d).  I agree with grant@6 – I can’t think of a sentence where “causal” and “responsible for” are mutually substituable.   Nitpicking aside, a fun solve.

  9. I thought Monday puzzles were supposed to be at the easier end of the spectrum? Not so for this lockdown newbie. My grid was mostly non-intersecting for a long time and several times I thought of giving up, for a major dnf. The ghastly 10ac was first in, closely followed by assembling FOCACCIA. LION KING came after the N of GRIPPING suggested another -ING; I could not connect it to the clue. My favourite was BOOM BOOM for its humour. I also liked EUTHANASIA for its anagram and GRIPPING for its construction.  BITE ME was my last, a complete guess after the crossers suggested ME rather than BE as the second word. Never heard of or used it. On the whole, not a cake walk for me, but I enjoyed the humour and the clever clues once unlocked. Nothing new apart from apart from BITE ME.

    Thanks ANTO and PeterO.

    PS grantinfreo, Dr. What’sOn: I had CASUAL, not CAUSAL.

  10. Good puzzle. Minor quibble re LION KING: isn’t the musical titled “The Lion King”? Don’t like finding fault, especially in my first comment, but still…

  11. An early start and an early blog posting today.  Thanks PeterO.  I think this is Anto’s third outing and he/she has made a positive impact on me already.  I reacted to seeing the setter’s name with a smile of anticipation and it’s nice to have a Monday alternative.

    First ones in were 1,2 and 3 down and I realised this might be fun without being overly taxing and so it turned out.  A bit of a struggle in the SE corner when I reached it but crossers helped with those that didn’t fall at the first.  No real complaints: I agree with those who’ve suggested ZOMBIE could have been better but it did make me smile, as did WHITMAN which I may have seen clued this way before.  My ticks are similar to JinA’s – BOOM BOOM, of course, brought back memories of the incomparable Basil Brush.  I agree with Tony S@5 that EUTHANASIA had a superb surface, probably making it COTD, though POST-OP held out for a long time and is clever.

    grantinfreo @4: thank goodness for your postscript, without which I suspect JinA might have been mightily confused!  “So, why might one be starting off without one’s trousers?”, is my imagined response to your first elucidation. I’ve always associated the phrase with stealing money rather than other things.

    Dr WhatsOn @8: I was OK with mixers lifting in the sense of adding a quality that is missing in the – admittedly undiluted – spirit.

    rodshaw @7: I was tempted to take you to task for your ‘joyless’ – but, heck, it’s a beautiful morning here and each to their own…

    Thanks Anto for a pleasurable start to Monday.

     

  12. A satisfying Monday puzzle for us. The whole of 10a made me say eww! We had not heard of PO for toilet.

    Favourites were FOCACCIA, BOX TICKING and BITE ME.

    Thanks Anto and PeterO!

  13. A quick fun solve.  Favs were EUTHANASIA and WHITMAN.  Like you, PeterO, I would not have hyphenated STRIKE UP.

    I always find it fascinating re the differences in GK between us – BITE ME is familiar and I may have even used it once or possibly twice.  (However,  on the other hand,  no knowledge rethe Faerie Queen (from last week) other than title and author!)

    Welcome Pork Scotch@10 – I think your quibble is correct.

    Thanks to Anto and PeterO

     

  14. Like most others (but not all, I see) I thought this was a great puzzle, the only unsatisfying clue for me being ZOMBIE, which was just too obvious. Loved TAKE, BOOM BOOM, WHITMAN and others. Maybe a bit hard for a Monday. Many thanks to Anto and PeterO.

  16. I was looking forward to getting my hands on this crossword to keep my mind occupied in the boredom of post op hospital care and it delivered beautifully. I had to solve on my phone as my visiting husband couldn’t solve the problem of being me a printout to work off.
    NW went in smoothly and BOOMBOOM was my FOI which is always good for morale. Finally I got completely blocked in the NE and so I revealed 9a TOUCHE. I blame the drugs. After that the rest fell into place. Favourite was 5d BUCKET LIST which took a while as I was fixated on pidgin for 22a. Thanks PeterO for parsing of 14a RE-ENTERS and to Anto for a good puzzle.

  17. Hi from Freo, Hmmm in Oz. Yes, casual is right but you get there by relegating the u in causal.

    What a tragic story of the other Whitman, sadly all too familiar in the home of the brave…

  20. I thought this was great! Lovely surfaces, and I’m childish enough to enjoy the Paulish 2d.

  21. I found this quite difficult, and was thinking that I might not be able to complete it. NW corner was last in.

    New: PO = chamber pot, BITE ME = I don’t care, SPY = clock/see/notice

    Like: BOX TICKING.

  22. JulieinAustralia @1 and michelle @21: I think the most convincing derivation I’ve seen for ‘po’ is the French term pot de chambre.  Literally chamber pot and, of course, pronounced without the ‘t’.

  23. Ground to a halt about halfway through this but BOX-TICKING got me back on track again. Will confess to using the ‘check’ button to verify my spelling of FOCACCIA (got it wrong, changed my Cs around).

    BOOM BOOM made me smile, as did the deceptively simple WHITMAN. Enjoyed the pair of political commentaries in 16d and 18d. ZOMBIE was too easy to fill in – I think it would have been OK as a cryptic definition if it was just ‘stiff working’…

  24. PO is very dated (but perfectly legit). There’s a Flanders and Swan song (also dated) “Po, belly, bum, drawers”, these being the most risqué words a child of the 50s might know!

    Hope Anto is here to stay and thanks to PeterO.

  26. Wiki informs me it was “Pee, Po, Belly, Bum, Drawers”.

    Funnily enough, Boffo @ 23, ZOMBIE was my LOI.

  28. Enjoyed that a lot and while it was relatively quick, I had a pleasantly surprising number of answers where I worked forwards through the wordplay and realised I’d created a word that fitted the definition (rather than synonym then backwards parsing) which I find particularly satisfying. Lots of entertaining misdirection and cheeky clues and answers.

    Like Pork Scotch@10 and ngaiolaurenson@13 I wasn’t too keen on The Lion King missing its definite article but overall very little to gripe about in the puzzle.

    Thanks Anto and PeterO

  29. Thanks PeterO – I totally agree with the summary in your preamble – a far cry from Anto’s early Quiptics.

    Lots of clever clues in both construction and surface. All my favourites have been mentioned so I won’t list them all but I’ll highlight WHITMAN, which I haven’t seen before and FOCACCIA and EUTHANASIA for the surfaces.

    I don’t  think PO needs to mean ‘toilet’ for the clue to work: a toilet break for a  toddler would be a PO-STOP. 😉

    All the best to CanberraGirl!

    Many thanks to Anto for a fun puzzle.

  31. Quite entertaining in places, echoes of Basil Brush early on, but couldn’t see ZOMBIE for 3d in spite of all the crossers. With SNOT and SMUT amongst the first in, I wondered whether there was perhaps going to be an unsavoury theme.

  33. Mark@22 ‘pot de chambre‘ is also thought to be the origin of the term ‘po-faced’.

    PeterO, 21d: As you rightly say, a group in Mathematics is an example of a set. A set is simply a collection or ensemble of distinct elements, viewed as a whole. And it has to be unambiguous whether an element is in the set or not. (A group is a set that also has two special algebraic operations and an identity element.)

    So ‘ensemble’ or even ‘collection’ would have worked better than ‘group’ in 21d.

    grantinfreo: Thanks. Hope all is well in WA. I am in Qld and pleased not to be in Melbourne.

     

  34. Anto has progressed nicely in the last couple of years.

    Very enjoyable puzzle especially for a Monday

  35. Hmmm in Oz @33: Did not know that but it makes sense.

    On the SET front, PeterO rightly anticipated that it might raise questions (and I’m sure it’s been debated before but can’t recall a recent occasion).  If Anto had tried a mathematical surface, I think the criticism would have been fair.  But group and set are certainly synonyms for numbers of people (as, of course, is ensemble).  I have no problem with the surface or clue, therefore.

  36. Good fun, not too difficult, but needing some careful thought quite often. I agree with AC87 @28 about being able to construct answers quite often, then realise it fitted the definition. Thanks to the O twins: Anto and PeterO.

  37. What’s going on with Monday puzzles? Supposed to be a write in, aren’t they? I’ve got to do the Quiptic yet! Oh, well, I’ll vacuum tomorrow.
    A great offering from Anto, with some top drawer clues, all mentioned above. Not sure about POST OP, as PO for me has two ‘O’s, but besides that, excellent step up!
    Thanks PeterO for the excellent blog, and of course Anto, more like this one please!

  38. Well, that was a brief, if pleasant, journey. Does 3 even qualify as a cryptic, rather than straight, def? Just for once, nothing new to me today, though I’d assumed the poetic Whitman was Walt. I too knew Po from the F&S banger 🙂 Thanks to Alto and PeterO.

  39. Entertaining crossword; as others have said, a far cry from Anto’s beginnings in the Quiptic.

    BITE ME – where did that come from? It doesn’t seem to be in the main dictionaries or even crossword compiler, although it is in Wiktionary as PeterO pointed out.

    I didn’t see the ‘obvious’ ZOMBIE for a while. I was looking for RH or HTI for Haiti, doh!

    Thanks Anto and PeterO.

  41. Oh that was a lot of fun!  Weirdly, took me a while to get in the zone but then when I did, it all kind of happened.  Lovely start to the week! Thank you!

  42. Mark@35. Ta for your reply. Not complaining, just explaining why I think ensemble/collection would be an improvement over group.

  43. A pleasant diversion to accompany the TMS cricket commentary. SMUT and the emunctory SNOT and POST-OP made me wonder if this was really the Viz craptic crossword (which can be quite a tricky solve). Is BITE ME a new expression, familiarity with which requires one to be “down with the kids”? Never heard of it before. I liked BOOM BOOM, WHITMAN and especially CASUAL. I’m cruelly imagining David de Gea trying to take his mind off his poor form by doing this crossword and then reading the clue for 19D.

  44. BITE ME is pretty common in The Simpsons but that’s not much help if you spend your time reading rather than watching Homer

    Personally I’d like to see Anto every Monday. Not sure why but this took me longer than the prize with POST OP going in last as I’d got fixated on toilet = POOP and blinded myself to the actual solution

    Cheers all

  45. Nice puzzle, Anto, thanks for it.  And good blog, PeterO, you’re probably sweltering on Long Island about as much as we are up here in Connecticut.  And happy homecoming to you, CanberraGirl.

    BOOM BOOM and BITE ME were both new to me — I’m probably not alone.

    Same for BOX TICKING — I was trying to find some connection with mattresses.

    Funny how different we all are.  Several people got held up in the NW corner.  I filled most of that in right away, but couldn’t get anything in the NE corner except TOUCHE until I got to the computer and the check button.

  46. Yes, Anto is much better than he used to be. Lots of well-constructed clues, especially BOX TICKING. Valentine @45, you’re not alone in being unfamiliar with BOOM BOOM. I couldn’t see it even after having the fleeting thought that either reports or economic successes could be booms. However, I did know BITE ME despite not being a Simpsons watcher.

    Thanks to PeterO for parsing CASUAL.

  48. Boom boom afridi is a popular Pakistani cricketer. And moob is derogatory term for man breasts. So many possibilities 🙂

  50. Didn’t particularly like this, unlike most others, but at least Anto is not Vulcan. Had to check BITE ME really was an expression, and that does put me in the mainstream.

  51. Penfold @49. “The fearsome hollow boom of the older boys in the deep end.” (Nobody else knows what we’re on about.)

  52. Thanks Anto and PeterO

    BITE ME was my first solve, by following the instructions, but I looked at it and thought “that can’t possibly be right”!

  54. DaveinNCarolina @47 and Bodycheetah @48: I’m (clearly) no setter and could probably improve (shorten) this, given time, but what about:
    Hooker’s responsible for this sudden growth. Sound pole’s main constraint, holding back male swelling. (4,4,4,4)

  58. I didn’t care for this much mainly because of BITE ME which I ‘ve never heard of as meaning “I don’t care”. I couldn’t see the parsing for ACCIDENT but now I know it’s quite a good clue. I can’t say the same for ZOMBIE however. I did like BOOM BOOM and WHITMAN though.
    Thanks Anto.

  59. 2Scotcheggs @57: My last comment today, promise!  I thought for a moment you were referring to my post @56. ‘Twould have been a fair response!

  60. 2 Scotcheggs @51 I know that Bodycheetah @48 knows what we’re on about and Mark @53 is learning.

    Ray “Boom Boom” Mancini, former lightweight world boxing champion, is the eponymous subject of a Warren Zevon song.

  61. Was “boom boom” in use before Basil Brush, who first appeared in 1962 (wiki tells me)? I don’t remember it.

  62. Very much so Penfold @60 and a great reference to a fine album that I like to describe as song-based

  63. Thans to PeterO and to Anto. I thought this a nice gentle introduction to the week – a fairly steady solve but still requiring thought. This is how Monday puzzles should be.  Maybe I’m just in a lucky period though – I completed Saturday’s in one sitting too and I didn’t start until nearly midnight.  Float softly…..

  65. Have to admit I’m stunned by the multitude of comments on Bite Me – it was a common insult in many TV series in the 90s, so hardly one for the actual youth of today – there again I did watch a lot of Buffy the Vampire Slayer back then…

  66. And Penfold @60 Alan “boom boom” Minter is another contender…well, he was also undisputed world middle weight champion in 1980…not just a contender, then!

  67. I thoroughly enjoyed this puzzler. The change from early Anto puzzles is remarkable.

    I think that “Bite me” is an American usage. Google’s NGram viewer shows no examples in its British corpus. Surprising, actually: you’d think someone would have written something like “I didn’t think that the dog would bite me” at some point.

    I failed to parse ACCIDENT, but it makes perfect sense in hindsight. and PO for “toilet” is new to me.

     

  68. Minor quibble from a musician: the musical is THE Lion King….I really should try and get a (circle of) life

  69. The music master at school in the fifties was a Mr Chambers, often referred to as Micky Po. The same item was also known as a ‘guzunder” because it guzunder the bed.

  70. Finally got around to this and quite enjoyed it, possibly because I’m quite childish – childish enough to remember the joke about two elephants falling off a cliff, BOOM BOOM! PO STOP, SMUT and SNOT also elicited a chuckle, if you were in any doubt about said childishness.

     

    Surprised BITE ME has had such a reaction though, like Tan Coul I wonder if it’s a generational thing? It cuts both ways though – I’m frequently brought up short by references to poems that are assumed to be GK because they were regularly taught in schools but that haven’t been part of the syllabus for at least thirty years.

     

    Thanks Anto and PeterO for the parsing of the couple I hadn’t grasped, and I hope CanberraGirl arrived home safely.

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