Sunday Toughie 48 (Hints)

Sunday Toughie No 48 by Zandio

Hints and Tips by Sloop John Bee

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Here we go with the first Christmas Sunday Toughie, This is online only today, which probably cuts the audience a bit. As Gazza said in his last blog, now would be a good time to emerge from the shadows and comment. there will always be someone to answer your queries even if postprandial naps and visits from Santa Claus may delay response at times.
I found this a quite gentle toughie but some of that may be because Chris Lancaster at Telegraph Towers was good enough to provide an advance copy of this and other Christmas puzzles. I was able to solve this at my leisure. I thank him and wish him a speedy recovery from a lurgy that is going around at the DT. Thanks also to Crypticsue for liaising the early delivery of puzzles to me and other bloggers.
We have an evenly balanced 14a and 14d clues and I have hinted at half. I can’t decide if any of the unhinted clues merits a hint so will offer a bonus hint to the first lurker to ask. (my own postprandial naps permitting.)
Many thanks to Zandio, proXimal and Robyn for improving my crossword skills with the excellent Sunday Toughie series. I wish them and all the other setters, bloggers, commenters and lurkers here a very merry Christmas and a prosperous New Year.

Here we go…

 

As it is a Prize puzzle I can only hint at a few and hope that will give you the checkers and inspiration to go further. I’ll be back just after the closing date with the full blog. Don’t forget to follow BD’s instructions in RED at the bottom of the hints!

I hope I don’t have to redact any comments but I am new at this and don’t want to rock the boat. If in doubt, I’ll rub it out! – I think that sentence is a bit redundant. You have all been so helpful in sorting out prior parsing failures, and I am sure I will need similar help again.

Most of the terms used in these hints are explained in the Glossary and examples are available by clicking on the entry under “See also” Where the hint describes a construct as “usual” this means that more help can be found in The Usual Suspects, which gives a number of the elements commonly used in the wordplay. Another useful page is Wolves in Sheep’s Clothing, which features words with meanings that are not always immediately obvious.

A full review of this puzzle will be published after the closing date for submissions. Some hints follow: Remember the site rules and play nicely.

 

Across

1a Moving text from model with no more energy (4-3-5)
Synonyms of model as in imitate, with as in including, a historical no more and e for energy (Ctrl-C Ctrl-V)

11a A fling, then Frenchman’s word is retracted in game of chance (7)
An ideal opportunity to re-gift those unwanted presents, fling a raffle ticket on an unwanted gift add the Frenchman’s word for word and reverse (retracted) the lot. Interestingly Zandio clued the same answer with a different clue in his Friday backpager, I think I prefer this one, any opinions from your good selves?

14a Warrior takes 31 days over suppressing sin and evil (9)
Synonyms of sin and evil go in a reversal (over) of an abbreviation of one of the months that contain 31 days.

16a Company with hotel invested in local I used as boozer (9)
I from the clue, an abbreviation of a company and or business and the letter that hotel indicates, are invested in an anagram of local.

21a One simply can’t resist house stuffing (7)
&lit A nice little all-in-one of someone who stuffs their house to the gills with rubbish that more sensible people recycle or re-gift perhaps.

23a Deception linked with manufactured pop (7)
I would have loved it if this had been 7d, A fib or deception links with a synonym of manufactured.
So would Daniel Peake!

26a Dr Foster maybe, carer, repeatedly tracks cases of medicine round hospital (7,5)
A medical carer and two (repeatedly) of the abbreviations for railway around the phonetic code letter that Hotel represents, followed by the case letters of medicine. Dr Foster is a definition by example (maybe) of the childish ditty we seek.

Down

1d Salad cream could be reimagined in ads this sweet (7)
This sweet is a compound anagram (reimagined) of Salad cream after ads has been removed.

3d Spirit character in Tempest that is out to embrace transformation (9)
A character in Shakespeare’s The Tempest loses the Latin for that is Id Est and embraces a transformation. Gabriel is an example of the spirit we seek.

7d Shooter that usually puts a smiley face on their target? (12)
This shooter will try and get a smile from targets by asking them to say Cheese!

15d Sharp metal ruler to be pulled out? (9)
The Legend of King Arthur suggests that he pulled this sharp metal implement from a stone or anvil to prove he was to be the rightful heir to the throne.

20d Integrated in Singapore, do Malaysians put up with it? (1,2,4)
An apple pie “integrated” with Ice Cream perhaps also a reverse lurker (put up with it – in a down clue)

22d Point both ways (5)
A palindrome to finish (both ways), “I “point” the hon. gentleman to the answer I gave earlier”? as may be heard at PMQ’s

 

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A rather pleasant Christmas Song.