Sunday Toughie No 77
by Zandio
Hints and Tips by Sloop John Bee
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It took a while to get going last night but when the Ladies of Nashville appeared twice and energy food three times, all in the acrosses – it gave me pause to think but it slowly unfolded. A famous 7d Wimbledon Men’s Champion gets a mention on finals day and in 16d I see a regular commenter who is a bit busy marking post-grad essays at the moment.
There are a couple of reverse lurkers with dodgy (to me) indicators, only one of which is hinted, and I have run out of hints before 20d so you will have to decide yourself on which came first but 9a-1a would be a suitable meal for Zandio. I am feeling quite peckish now, but I am not 20d, so would like to add bacon
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. Dont forget the Mine of useful information that Big Dave and his son Richard so meticulously prepared for us.
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 Fed up with toast, in absence of right energy food (4,6)
Start with a colourful synonym of fed up, then what you might say when raising a glass (without the r for right) and add e for energy
9a Common outlaws pinching energy food (5,5)
The common land of villages or small settlements, to outlaw or prohibit around e for energy again for some more food
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9a with 1a
13a Ladies of Nashville? (8)
How women of Nashville, Tennessee (or elsewhere in the US) refer to the place of relief we call the Ladies
18a Notes from ladies of Nashville? (7,5)
Notes on a stave…
21a Dull poem maybe written by a date (8)
A poem or other “piece” of art, a from the clue and any date of the seven we use each week, lead to something dull, prosaic or unpoetical
25a Underwater activity, dodging about in delta (4,6)
Dodging school, work or other toil, about in from the clue and the letter that delta suggests
27a Find baker’s processed energy food slicer (5,5)
An anagram (processed) and an abbreviation – ours has been repaired so many times but it still cleaves the loaf
Down
1d Feature in steamy mag I bought promoted this? (6)
An all-in-one reverse lurker (feature in…promoted), A magazine that is steamy (or seamy) enough to promote the having of more than one husband or wife at once
3d Intimate do coming up, if no cuddling time (12)
To do or trick, a reversal of if and a no that is not just a river in Egypt cuddling T for time
7d Remarkable, that guy’s rise in command (8)
A possessive belonging to that guy, a rise found on Dartmoor, Derbyshire and Glastonbury amongst others and an abbreviation for in command
11d Outrage in Portugal, in busting thousands showing gay colour? (8,4)
An outrage, both in’s from the clue, the IVR code for Portugal and two different abbreviations of thousand
Hi-fi buffs covet these turntables named after the symbol that homosexuals were obliged to wear in the outrageous Holocaust Death camps
16d Bully in bandage with a dirty look (8)
Has Zandio misgendered this bovine? I suppose the y allows him to be bull”ish”
17d One takes in a tot daily (8)
A double definition, one being someone who stands in loco-parentis for a tot, and a daily rival to the Telegraph
19d
23d Old American term for motorist’s abbreviated (4)
An old Central American is an abbreviated term for a motorist in a vehicle
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3d first word line 5
That’s All Folks!
A fairly gentle Toughie but very enjoyable. Thanks to Zandio and SJB. Congratulations to our regular commenter on getting the namecheck.
I’m not sure which of two potential candidates is the required answer for 13a.
My podium choices were three consecutive clues – 17d, 19d and 20d.
Bully in 16d is a verb.
As a verb it is fine thanks, I hope I have picked the right facilities in 13a I only saw one at the time last night
Your hint is correct for both but the Telegraph website said my first option was incorrect when I tried to submit the puzzle.
For one 13a possibility the BRB says ‘esp N Am’, for the other it says ‘chiefly N Am’ so I guess it’s a toss-up.
Before the checkers went in, I found three options – guess which one I took!
Another splendid Sunday puzzle with several amusing and entertaining clues.
Still struggling to parse 18a even with the hint. Had a different answer to the Ladies first appearance at 13a which fitted the checkers and I thought was more appropriate for Nashville.
Favourites include the clever 19d and also 20d which took me far too long to parse for my LOI.
Thanks to Zandio and SJB.
I too had 3 options 2 Were left after checkers, one is preferred in Senf Country, the last choice is preferred in the Southern States
Enjoyable Sunday puzzle although I had my doubts about 18a.
I’ll go along with DaveP and give top honours to 19&20d.
Thanks to Zandio and to SJB for the hints – lovely notes from the ‘Nashville ladies’.
I very rarely look at the Sunday Toughie, or indeed any Toughie, but have tried this to see what it’s like after the grinding experience of today’s Sunday Prize Puzzle! *To me* (and what am I doing on this page anyway!), the tensing in 16d seems odd, a word other than 13a exists for ‘ladies’ involving a clearer cross-Atlantic distinction, the indicator in 12a still grates even though what it means here has become familiar to me, 21a seems to involve a bit of a stretched synonym (although what else could the answer be), 23d seems another stretch (although, again, what else could the answer be once the checkers were in), and if 1d hadn’t been a lurker it would have been a lot harder. However, I liked this crossword and surprisingly finished it. I imagine I got lucky today.
Thanks to Zandio and SJB.
I probably should have looked at the comments above before I posted. There is more than one option that fits as you say – the website accepted the (‘esp N American’) word I selected, so I hope that’s an indication I picked the right one! Perhaps both that and the ‘chiefly N American’ word will be accepted? The word I was thinking of when I wrote the above makes more sense to me in terms of parsing as it is, I think, exclusively US (in the Oxford dictionary simply noted as ‘N American’), but it doesn’t fit with the checkers.
Difficulty is all relative here in toughie territory, sometimes they are Tuesday Toughie/Friday backpagers, then they can also stray into Elgar territory. This seemed easier than Dada (to me) please come again the water is usually fine here)
esp N American got the nod here and approved by the old websites check facility
Hello all, compiler here. Thanks for taking the time to solve, analyse and discuss. I’m in baking Venice and in a bit of a hurry so I hope this will make sense!
Apologies for the alternative answer. Alternative answers are particularly unfortunate on a prize crossword — but at least, thanks to your feedback, we now know about it. So Chris Lancaster, the Puzzles Editor, can allow for the alternative answer when choosing winners. It’s worse when you don’t find out until after the prize-winners have been chosen (supposing the chosen winners all give the ‘right’ answer). When I was a crossword editor, one reader even threatened to sue us over an alternative answer — though, in fact, if that person’s entry had been pulled from the bag, we would have realised that the alternative existed.
I asked Chris to make a late change to next Friday’s Quick when I belatedly noticed an alternative answer. They are hard for the setter and editor to spot, especially if the clue is a straight definition (as in the Quick) or a cryptic definition (as here). Grrrr!
Thanks again for solving, and have a good week.
Thanks for a great puzzle and for explaining the alternative answer thing,
I hope you have a good time in Venice, have a Sachertorte for me
I too opted for the alternative answer for 13a until the online site refused to accept my answer.
Apart from that I have no complaints at all, a most enjoyable puzzle.
Thanks to Zandio and SJB.
I enjoyed the puzzle today and the ‘alternative answer’ discussion too. Thanks SJB for making me chuckle with your 3d hint…. Enjoy your hols Zandio!
Didn’t find this as easy as everyone else. It took 3 times as long as Dada’s guzzle for the pennies to drop. I chose right with the Nashville ladies (both the checker determined possibilities occurred but opted for the entirely coincidental irrelevance of there’s a lot of John Nash architecture I think in the correct option) – it’s a term I use for the cludgie & in my experience over the pond the 3rd option is much more widely used. Like Jane wasn’t a fan of 18a other than it gave our reviewer the chance to play a bit of AK – may play a bit of Union Station later. 17d&21a my last 2 in & they significantly extended the solve time. Fav a toss up between 19&20d.
Thanks to Zandio & to SJB – loved the pic at 16d even though it had nowt to do with the context of bully & didn’t even register the answer name checked Steve
Thanks A
I could claim that as it is hints rather than a full blog I was just giving a nudge rather than a full blown parsing of the clue, but as Gazza said I probably hadn’t given bully as a verb enough consideration.
I couldn’t believe that the pic came up when I bunged the relevant parts into a Google images search but it jumped to the top of the list.
From what Zandio said I think any answer for the “cludgie” that fits the checkers will be marked correct
It seemed a bit easy to bung AK and Robert Plant in the 18a vid so I picked something a bit more “Nashville”
Wow. I have finished it ! Like others I had 3 answers for 13a but one had to go when I got 8d. Ive taken a stab at it. My last one in was 14d and I was looking for a secret agent until I saw the light! What a very clever clue – and my favourite. Thank you Zandio for stretching my mind and SJB for the hints.
Greetings from the Bay of Biscay. I enjoyed this puzzle sitting on the sun deck this morning en route to Bilbao, albeit briefly interrupted by a sighting of dolphins. Once again, a fine crossword from Zandio who must have been inspired by the Tour de France as there was so much energy food on offer. I had podiums for both directions: 6, 13 & 18 across and 14, 17 & 19 down. For me, there is an ambiguity in the answer to 13a, but it does not impact the checking letters (that was written offline, I see from other comments it is not just ‘for me’!).
Thanks to Zandio and also to SJB. We arrive in Spain tomorrow and will later be travelling on to Portugal so, as Captain Oates once said, I may be gone some time… :bye: