Another sound puzzle from Everyman, with – as should be the case – nothing to frighten the horses.
Abbreviations
cd cryptic definition
dd double definition
cad clue as definition
(xxxx)* anagram
anagrind = anagram indicator
[x] letter(s) removed
definitions are underlined
Across
1 Everyman would strain nerves around end of week
FRIDAY
An insertion of I’D for ‘Everyman would’ in FRAY. The insertion indicator is ‘around’.
4 A pair of clubs a nasty child hides in card game
BACCARAT
An insertion of A, CC and another A in BRAT. The insertion indicator is ‘hides’.
9 Arrogant and happy? Shame
UPPITY
A charade of UP and PITY.
10 Some groceries: linguine and wine
RIESLING
Hidden in groceRIES LINGuine.
12 Mishmash of antipasti chewed
PASTICHE
Hidden in antiPASTI CHEwed.
13 Cycling minibike, removing outer layer, revealing swimsuit
BIKINI
([M]INIBIK[E])* The instruction to take away the outside letters is ‘removing outer layer’; the anagrind is ‘cycling’.
15 How Valentine is sent? Hatefully? Nay, on my soul!
ANONYMOUSLY
(NAY ON MY SOUL)* with ‘hatefully’ as the interesting anagrind.
18 Appear insufficiently smart: university admitted against better judgment
UNDER DURESS
An insertion of U in UNDERDRESS. The insertion indicator is ‘admitted’.
21 Carve end off rowing boat, gaining point
SCULPT
A charade of SCUL[L] and PT.
22 Nasty niff in locations producing spurious medication
PLACEBOS
An insertion of BO for body odour or ‘nasty niff’ in PLACES. The insertion indicator is ‘in’.
24 Stated aim: very little weight gained
ENOUNCED
An insertion of OUNCE in END. The insertion indicator is ‘gained’.
25 With exercise unfinished, he washed his hands
PILATE
PILATE[S] Referencing Pontius Pilate, in Matthew 27:24 (KJV):
When Pilate saw that he could prevail nothing, but that rather a tumult was made, he took water, and washed his hands before the multitude, saying, I am innocent of the blood of this just person: see ye to it.
26 Also, audible breaths (bigger than average)
PLUS-SIZE
A charade of PLUS and a homophone (‘audible’) of SIGHS.
27 Announced 1¢ grant
ASSENT
A homophone (‘announced’) of A CENT.
Down
1 Hen told to produce eggs under pressure? It’s unfair
FOUL PLAY
A charade of FOUL (in the chicken sense), P and LAY.
Edit: I should have explained that FOUL is a homophone of FOWL for ‘hen’, and that the homophone indicator is ‘told’. Apologies for fouling that up.
2 The writer’s alternative online writing concealed: he’s not who he seems
IMPOSTOR
An insertion of POST (what you’re about to write) in I’M and OR. The insertion indicator is ‘concealed’.
3 Parson’s tiny aunt displayed anxiety
ANTS IN YOUR PANTS
(PARSONS TINY AUNT)* with ‘displayed’ as the anagrind. One of the trademark ‘paired’ answers, with 6dn.
5 Primarily, area Pacific islanders abide?
APIA
The first letters of the last four words of the clue and a cad. APIA is the capital of the South Pacific island of Samoa.
6 Chorus physician treated decide to call it a day
CASH IN YOUR CHIPS
(CHORUS PHYSICIAN)* with ‘treated’ as the anagrind. One of the trademark ‘paired’ answers, with 3dn.
7 Growin’ fruit
RAISIN
If growing can be shortened to growin’, then raising can be shortened to …
8 Oddly, thing drains a lot of water
TIGRIS
The odd letters of ThInG dRaInS.
11 Every so often, ask her to buy dust sheets
SHROUDS
The even letters of aSk HeR tO bUy DuSt.
14 Like beer? Rugby’s involved, usually
AS A RULE
A charade of AS and RU inserted into ALE. The insertion indicator is ‘involved’.
16 Barge I’ve renovated, going on too long
VERBIAGE
(BARGE IVE)*
17 Note: Dutch left East Indies (improved, in my view)
AS I SEE IT
(EAST I[N][D]IES)* The removal indicator is ‘left’ and the anagrind is ‘improved’. One of the synonyms for ‘improve’ in my thesaurus is ‘tweak’, so fair play.
19 Out-of-it Australian skins up
ASLEEP
A charade of A for ‘Australian’ and a reversal (‘up’) of PEELS.
20 Kudos: you finally decoded puzzle
SUDOKU
(KUDOS U)* Not as much fun as a cryptic crossword.
23 Car manufacturer is crooked, we’re told
BENZ
A homophone (‘we’re told’) of BENDS.
Many thanks to Everyman for the Sunday morning entertainment.
Thanks Pierre.
The ‘told’ in 1d is a homophone indicator for the ‘fowl’.
Some rather loose indicators imo – ‘given’ for inclusion, for instance – but that’s the style.
Very proud of myself for getting the whole thing AND being able to parse everything except 17. Thanks Everyman and Pierre.
17dn. In what context does D=Dutch?
Me too Alison @ 2
Managed to complete this for the first time and the only one I couldn’t parse was 18ac. Really happy. Thanks Everyman and Pierre.
@Jackkt @3 – is is ND – i.e. Nederland that is removed?
Jackkt you’re removing the initial letters of Note Dutch from East Indies was how I parsed 17d.
Loved the paired long anagrams.
Thanks to Everyman and Pierre.
Ignoring the t in Baccara(t) gives us a Spanish vocal duo, who in 1977 confirmed ‘Yes Sir, I Can Boogie’. We also have ‘Friday I’m In Love’ from The Cure and Brian Molko’s band Placebo. It’s a well known fact that 50% of people who go out intending to see the The Cure, actually see Placebo and enjoy it just as much.
Pretty straightforward but nevertheless entertaining. Getting FRIDAY straight off was a boost. Penfold @7 – Friday on My Mind (Easybeats). Most Poms I know think they were a one hit wonder, but in Oz they had a string of really good hits befoer they tried their luck in the Old Dart. ANONYMOUSLY was a surprising and satisfying anagram. Putting OVER SIZE at 26a held me up a bit, as did the A = Australian (which I have been caught out on before) – AUS, AUST, Oz, Aussie – yes, but never A, except as part of an acronym. A nice matching pair of IN YOURs – which broke the rule I advanced recently that, in such phrases, Pommy crossies always have ONES instead of YOUR. There has been recent discussion of this on 15^2. Thanks, Everyman and Pierre.
Thanks for comments re 17dn.
Skinny, I can’t find anything to suggest ND = Netherlands (NL is the international car registration) but even if it did ‘Netherlands’ doesn’t = ‘Dutch’ and it would leave ‘note’ unaccounted for in the clue.
Adrian’s parsing is I think the same as Pierre’s and that still leaves my original query unanswered.
Regards to all
Apologies. I omitted in 1ac the explanation of a need for the FOUL/FOWL homophone – blog now corrected. Thanks to Gonzo for the spot.
For 17dn, the wordplay is asking you to remove both N for ‘note’ and D for ‘Dutch’ from the fodder before making an anagram. Both abbreviations are in my Chambers (and both commonly come up in cryptics, because they are useful devices for setters).
Tim@8 Hello, How Are You? Greetings from Old Dart. Yes, a good shout. I’ve now discovered that the Easybeats rhythm guitarist was George Young, brother of Angus and Malcolm from AC/DC. Every day’s a school day.
Penfold @11. Please keep your comments relevant to the crossword that’s been blogged. If you want to have a conversation about guitarists with Tim, you can both use the General Discussion page which is accessible via the tab at the top of this page.
[At risk of getting the ‘sopranos’ message again… Penfold @11 – Yes, George Young and Harry Vanda were the production genii behind Acca Dacca – and quite influential in other ways as well – see this]
Whoops
Thanks for the blog Pierre. An enjoyable solve. Struggled with NW corner due to a mistype in my 2d solution whoops! There was something quite pleasin about 7d for me.
Blog seems to be missing 19d
Thanks for pointing out the missing 19d, Rebster. Now added. I am having a mare this morning with this blog.
Pierre @10. Thanks for quoting Chambers as the source for D = dutch, which I have now seen for myself although it’s only in the printed edition, not the free on-line version . I don’t think it can be on the list of single-letter abbreviations permitted in Times cryptics where I do most of my crossword-solving as I don’t recall seeing it before, nor is it in Collins or the Oxford dictionaries used as their primary sources of reference. One to remember for the Everyman!
And after all that kerfuffle, a well done to Alison and Fiona Anne for their completions – it’s a nice feeling, isn’t it?
A rare DNF Everyman for me. I didn’t clock PILATE at all and drifted off to do something else.
Not my favourite puzzle: some quite half-baked definitions, silly surface readings (although that’s nothing unusual for Everyman) and nothing I could point to as being a really good clue.
Collins online lists D as an American English abbreviation for Dutch.
Sorry Pierre, but another tiny correction, the aunt in 3d is missing U.
Thanks all
Thanks, DuncT. Corrected now. Bad things always come in threes, right?
I’d never had D for Dutch down as a particularly AmEng usage, so that entry in Collins online is interesting.
Pierre, I so appreciate getting Everyman explained to me every week that I pass over any very minor slips with no concerns. I usually finish it, but sometimes have no idea why some of the answers are what they are, so your explanations are great for me and are my usual Sunday morning starting point.
Without getting too far into irrelevancies, I appreciate too your brief notes about general discussion. This is particularly bad in the Guardian Monday cryptic. I often feel I’m an unwelcome gatecrasher to a private party. This is about the crossword under discussion and all the better for it!
On that subject, a relatively straightforward one. Let’s see what today brings.
I enjoyed this a lot more than the previous week’s Everyman – and PILATE made me grin (& also put the phrase “pilates of the Caribbean” into my mind. No idea why. )
Thanks to Pierre for help completing a couple of the parsings, to Everyman for the Sunday breakfast fun – and Penfold at 7, I like the way your mind works!
Thanks, Sara – I’m pleased you find the Everyman blogs helpful (Sil, Quirister and PeterO are also careful to give fullish explanations, with beginners in mind). On your second point, all I will say is that you are not the first person to express a feeling of being unwelcome on the Guardian blog. Many others I’ve spoken to also feel excluded, considering that it has turned into a private party where irrelevant discussion from self-aggrandising commenters now forms the bulk of the daily thread.
Gonzo @1; I can’t find ‘given’ in either the puzzle or the blog (?) Jacckt @17; as you have found, the free online version of Chambers is incomplete. WordWeb Pro has a complete online version but you may have to pay for it.
Generally good Sunday puzzle. I think medicationS might have been better for PLACEBOS.
Thanks Everyman and Pierre.
Me@20 and Pierre@21 – I wonder if the American usage could be linked to Pennsylvania Dutch, which is derived from “Deutsch” and originally referred to German speaking immigrants?
I liked 3d ANTS IN YOUR PANTS which was amusing. (The companion answer CASH IN YOUR CHIPS would seem to lend itself to a clue about having small change in your fast food.) On the “one’s/your” question, TassieTim @8, I think you’re right that in crosswords it nearly always is “one’s”, but it just goes to show that you/one can never be sure! At least this time the clues made it clear which it was – often you need the crossers.
I wasn’t keen on “hatefully” as an anagram indicator in 15a – how is that supposed to work?
Pierre @12 and Sara @22: I appreciate the point you make about relevance – and the sopranos discussion on Friday did get a bit out of hand – but surely the occasional off-topic comment loosely inspired by the puzzle is ok?
(And Pierre, why no fowl picture re 1d?)
Many thanks both.
For the obligatory Pierre bird link, Lord Jim, the answer has to be the bird, the whole bird and nothing but the bird. Rules is rules.
As to ‘off-topic’ rules, I really don’t want to clog this thread up with a long discussion about it, but Sara’s contribution summed it up. I, and I’m sure my fellow bloggers too, give our time freely to write these blogs to share our enjoyment of cryptics, but also to encourage new solvers to get beyond the ‘I could never solve a cryptic’ stage. Without newer solvers, we won’t have any cryptics to solve or blog. Fifteensquared is long established as a source of help and shared pleasure, but if it’s got to the stage where people are discouraged from contributing, or – like Anna did a few months ago – stop contributing, then that’s not a good outcome, in my opinion.
In the end, it depends how you define ‘occasional’ and ‘loosely inspired’. The Guardian thread is often clogged up with contributors who make multiple entries on stuff that is much more to do with relating their personal experiences or showing how knowledgeable they are than the crossword itself. In my opinion.
I found this a fun crossword and I very nearly finished is all on my own, and parsed everything, which was satisfying. (I have completely finished and parsed this week’s, which is I think a first for me, but that is for next week’s blog.) On the off topic discussion: I used to contribute to the Guardian comments when I was doing the online version via my laptop but now I do the crosswords on my phone I do not seem to have access to the comments thread. If this is a universal experience then it might account for some of the “in groupiness.” Also I think that discussions which reveal solutions are not meant to happen there? So what are they to takk about? Anyway, to come back to this crossword and blog, I much enjoyed it, with a groan for PILATE. Many thanks to Everyman and to Pierre!
Liked UPPITY
Did not parse AS I SEE IT, UNDER DURESS
Thanks Everyman and Pierre.
jackkt@17. D=Dutch. It’s in the Chambers Dictionary app on my phone, which was not free, but is comprehensive. You need to put your hand in your pocket and get the big dic on your phone.
Robi@25 I must have meant ‘gained’ in 24.
Copland Smith@31 Thank you for your advice. I have actually already put my hand in my pocket to buy the printed Chambers dictionary in several editions so I feel I have contributed enough to their coffers. All I need to remember is to consult it because their free online version is a poor substitute.
I was hesitant to write in BENZ, as I’ve only ever heard it pronounced like “bens” before. But that was a week ago, before Friday’s puzzle reminded me of the song where it’s required to rhyme with “amends”.
Got a LOL from 7d.
I was also convinced that Benz and bends were pronounced quite differently (as per Bigly@34) until I actually spoke the two, one after the other…and they came out practically identical.
Hmm, first Kiwi in?
Found this a satisfying if slightly easier solve.
Ticked 1,9,18 Across as fun clues.
The order of events of 4A had me thinking it clued ABACCRAT better than BACCARAT, but I sort of see how it works.
Daylight saving (and a big storm) in store for us this weekend.
Thanks Pierre and Everyman
Took me nearly as long to read the blog as it did to finish the crossword this week. Both equally enjoyable. Thanks Penfold @7 for making me laugh out loud.
Great. The first one I have finished for months. Guessed enounced but have never heard of the word.
Liked 1 d and 25 ac.
Like many others really enjoyed this -Nearly 100% —- first time in a long while – missed one
Got all but Pilate
Would never have got that one so I don’t mind
Loved plus size, baccarat, foul play
Uppity and sculpt
Never seen use of enounced before..and was surprised at spelling of impostor -am sure I’ve been spelling that wrong my whole life—that’s my learning this week
First time I’ve ever completed a puzzle on Saturday pm. And the first NZ Listener for 6 months arrived yesterday. It’s lovely weekend and lots of puzzles to do today and Sunday.
Really fun today, even if raced through it on the Waiheke ferry. Finished it just past Rangitoto.
Quickest Everyman ever! I did enjoy dust sheets = shrouds
We finished it after only one slip-up, and agree with previous comment that reading the blog has been almost as much fun as completing the cryptic! We only do the Saturday cryptic but now The Listener is back(yay!) we will have a lot more practice. So much to learn still. Thanks to all who give feedback, it all helps us newbies.
I too found this pretty straightforward. Pierre if you’re still there Samoa is a country not an island. Apia is on Upolu, the second largest island (Savai’i being larger but more sparsely populated.) Thanks to Everyman, Pierre & off track bloggers for brightening up the weekend.
Vanessa: I, like you, had not heard of “enounce” or impostor spelt that way. I wrote in imposter and then scribbled it out, making a frightful mess in an otherwise pristine crossword.
I imagine that nobody will see this with the possible exception of Pierre and Gaufrid. I was just idly flicking through some old Everyman blogs (I know, I’m sure I’ve got other things I should be doing) when I noticed that the number on this one seems to be wrong. I think it should be 3,854 rather than 3,584. Might it be worth amending for the record?