A straightforward challenge today from BRADMAN. Thanks Don.
FF: 7 DD: 6
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | CHERUB | Innocent child – baby hugging mother, not half! (6) |
| CUB (baby) containing (hugging) motHER (not half i.e. without MOT) | ||
| 5 | GAMESOME | Playful tot heard pursuing wild animals? (8) |
| SOME (sounds like SUM, tot) after GAME (wild animals) | ||
| 9 | PROMOTER | Advocate for mum when husband’s run off (8) |
| PRO (for) MOThER (mum, without H – husband) | ||
| 10 | CANDLE | Decorative item and source of light in church? (6) |
| double def / cryptic def .. read as C AND LE = L (source of Light) in C AND E (CE, church) / Thanks to Muffyword@1 for pointing this out. | ||
| 11 | MARINE | Sea or river flooding American state (6) |
| R (river) in MAINE (american state) | ||
| 12 | LOW-LYING | Bird in act of deception near sea level? (3-5) |
| OWL (bird) in LYING (act of deception) | ||
| 14 | DAFT AS A BRUSH | Very crazy – and bristly with it? (4,2,1,5) |
| cryptic def | ||
| 18 | CHERRY TOMATO | Fruit that can be mushed into hot creamy rot (6,6) |
| [ HOT CREAMY ROT ]* | ||
| 22 | DECREPIT | Feeble technology given to salesperson at end of month (8) |
| DEC (month) REP (salesperson) IT (technology) | ||
| 25 | RHODES | Island adventurer making fortune from mines (6) |
| double def | ||
| 26 | RINGER | Some player in Germany who shouldn’t be in the team? (6) |
| hidden in “..playeR IN GERmany..” | ||
| 27 | PUBLICAN | Host of American politician about to be deposed? (8) |
| rePUBLICAN (american politician, without RE – about) | ||
| 28 | BREACHED | Broken food item guerrilla fighter’s eaten (8) |
| CHE (guerilla fighter) in BREAD (food item) | ||
| 29 | CREWED | Having company with set of principles carrying little weight (6) |
| CREED (set of principles) containing W (weight) | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 2 | HERBAL | Tea and silly blather, wasting time (6) |
| [BLAtHER (without T – time) ]* | ||
| 3 | REMAINDER | What could be left after an educational division? (9) |
| cryptic def | ||
| 4 | BUTTERFLY | Female taking in by bishop completely – a pretty little creature? (9) |
| F (female) in [ B (bishop) UTTERLY (completely) ] | ||
| 5 | GORILLA | Wild animal finds stream in Indian location (7) |
| RILL (stream) in GOA (indian location) | ||
| 6 | MACAW | Scotsman with a wife that may possibly imitate people? (5) |
| MAC (scotsman) A W (wife) | ||
| 7 | SUNNY | Cheerful lad’s sound (5) |
| sounds like SONNY (lad) | ||
| 8 | MILANESE | Italian city’s major road leading to minor roads east (8) |
| MI (major road) LANES (minor roads) E (east) | ||
| 13 | LAB | Learner given highest grades in workplace (3) |
| L (learner) A B (highest grades) | ||
| 15 | ANAEROBIC | Be in a car suffering without oxygen? Without oxygen! (9) |
| [BE IN A CAR]* outside O (oxygen) | ||
| 16 | RHODOLITE | Greek character toiled breaking stone (9) |
| RHO (greek character) [ TOILED ]* | ||
| 17 | CHEEKIER | After endless acclaim heartless murderer gets bolder (8) |
| CHEEr (acclaim, endless) KIllER (murderer, heartless – without central characters) | ||
| 19 | RYE | Grass is dry reportedly (3) |
| sounds like WRY (dry) | ||
| 20 | OCTOPOD | Mollusc’s head swallowed by old fish (7) |
| TOP (head) in [ O (old) COD (fish) ] | ||
| 21 | MENACE | Dennis maybe providing chaps with excellent service (6) |
| MEN (chaps) ACE (excellent service) | ||
| 23 | RAGGA | One form of music or another that’s doubly good (5) |
| RAGA (~form of music) with another G in (doubly good – G) | ||
| 24 | PERCH | Sit in upper chamber (5) |
| hidden in “..upPER CHamber” | ||
There is some wordplay in 10ac – neat clue.
Hi muffy@1,
Thanks for the tip. Indeed, a clever clue.
Regards,
TL
I think the “and” is from the clue – and + L(ight) in CE, but your way works too.
Very neat-and enjoyable.
Thanks Bradman and Turbolegs
A puzzle that took three 10 minute sessions to complete – and one where the breaks in between actually helped with the fresh pair of eyes for some of the clues.
A couple of the clues I initially thought were quite weak, especially CANDLE, until I saw the clever word play for it. Interesting to see the extractions of different parts of MOTHER in 1a and 9a. A couple of curious definitions – LAB / workplace and MARINE / sea.
Did like the RHODES double definition and the construction of CHEEKIER, RAGGA and that CANDLE.
Finished in the SW corner with BREACHED, RAGGA and OCTOPOD.
I too returned to this puzzle at intervals during which various pennies dropped. RAGGA stopped me from persisting with ‘brunched’ and MACAW likewise yielded CANDLE instead of ‘sconce’. DAFT AS A BRUSH, ANAEROBIC and MENACE were favourites.
Thanks to Bradman and Turbolegs.
Six Bradman solvers — and so early in the day — motivates me to carry on. Thanks!
Yes, reasonably straightforward, but enough to keep things ticking over, particularly in the lower half, with clues like BREACHED and CREWED. Earlier on, I liked BUTTERFLY, the cryptic def for REMAINDER and my pick of the day, CANDLE.
Funny to see my LOI OCTOPOD make an appearance elsewhere today (as ‘octopoda’, anyway) – in the Indy as part of a clue.
Thanks to Bradman and Turbolegs
Thanks to Bradman and Turbolegs. Enjoyable. I needed help parsing CANDLE, did not know DAFT AS A BRUSH, and took a while before getting the ki[ll]er in CHEEKIER.
We worked steadily through this and completed without any real problems. We did have to check the particular meaning of RINGER, and in the clue to 4dn we thought it should have been “Female taken [not ‘taking’] in by …”. We might have had trouble with OCTOPOD had we not, like WordPlodder, encountered octopoda in an Indy clue this morning.
A lot to like; our favourite was ANAEROBIC.
Thanks, Bradman and Turbolegs.
Leisurely worked on this throughout the day — favourites included MENACE, PROMOTER, and LOW-LYING. DAFT AS A BRUSH was new to me as was the use of RINGER. Thanks to both.
The FT is at it again with the pay wall this morning (Monday)
Goujeers @12 I hit the pay wall on my desktop but not on my phone — go figure. Keep trying — it’s a good Slormgorm crossword.
Got past the pay wall but no blog for Slormgorm? And a repeat crossword at the weekend… all very curious! Well, my completed version contained one slip, as I can see today, so hopefully, enlightenment will follow.