NTSPP 774 – Big Dave's Crossword Blog
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NTSPP 774

by crypticsue  

A Puzzle by Prolixic

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 Another Saturday lunchtime toughie from Prolixic

Across

1a  Drunken bisexual thug briefly boards coach (8)
BIBULOUS:  An abbreviated way of saying bisexual and a truncated thug inserted into (boards) a coach

5a  Seed money we rejected (6)
CASHEW:  Some money and a reversal (rejected) of WE (from the clue)

10a  New cardigan Roger knitted for this gardener (7)
ORGANIC: Our setter obviously intended that this should be an anagram (knitted) of N (new) CARDIGAN ROGER to give us

the word GARDENER and the type of gardening they do, the only problem being that there are not enough Es in the compound anagram fodder

11a  Royal Engineers maybe losing time in training (7)
REGIMEN: A large army unit (Royal Engineers maybe) without (losing) the abbreviation for Time

12a  Preservative extracted from barnacles (6,8)
SODIUM CHLORIDE: The chemical symbol for a  type of preservation can be extracted from barNACLes

14a  Sporty type's turn with internet user (10)
WINDSURFER:  A verb meaning to turn and a user of the internet

15a  Nearest clothing store (4)
NEXT: Double definition

17a  Great record I originally cut (4)
EPIC:  A type of record, I (from the clue) and the original letter of Cut

19a  I mimic rep's absurd quackery (10)
EMPIRICISM: An anagram (absurd) of I MIMIC REPS

21a  One creates interest with son in the story of Noah! (7,7)
SAVINGS ACCOUNT: The abbreviation for Son inserted into a way of describing the story of Noah’s Ark

24a  Obscure old desk accessory (7)
INKHORN: An adjective meaning obscure or an old desk accessory

25a  Level Pedro oddly skipped in Super Mario? (7)
PLUMBER: Level or true followed by the even (oddly skipped) letters of pEdRo

26a  Take action about Poles Penny arrested (6)
SUSSED: Take legal action goes about two of one of Poles, the result followed by the letter used for an old penny

27a  Dash dash dot (3-5)
FLY-SPECK:  Dash or go very fast, dash (a small spot)

Down

1d  Group from The Bahamas welcoming revolutionary soldiers (4)
BROS:  Insert some reversed (revolutionary) soldiers into the IVR Code for the Bahamas

2d  Sink in toilet's not working (3,4)
BOG DOWN: A slang term for a lavatory and a synonym for not working

3d  At heart mistakenly interpreted as most scrawny (8)
LANKIEST: An anagram (interpreted) of the inside (at heart) letters of mISTAKENLy

4d  Fearsome Glaswegian male vowing to be tough (14)
UNCOMPROMISING: A Scottish (as heard in Glasgow) adjective meaning fearsome, the abbreviation for Male and a synonym for promising

6d  Trouble in the past involving Greece (5)
AGGRO: An adverb meaning in the past into which is inserted (involving) the IVR Code  for Greece

7d  Dress code that has its ups and downs (7)
HEMLINE: A cryptic definition of something on a dress that changed length according to the fashion at the time

8d  Poet's year with period from June to August in Perth (10)
WINTERTIME: Thanks to Rabbit Dave, I now know that I should have looked at the BRB to find that the first part of this solution is a poetic word for a year which should be followed by a period.,  If a poet was writing about this  particular season from June to Australia, he  could be living in Perth, Australia

9d  Design of palace porch is one connected with Justin Welby? (14)
ARCHIEPISCOPAL: An anagram (design) 0f PALACE PORCH IS

13d  Initially rejected settlements to acquire old queen's possessions (10)
OWNERSHIPS: Some settlements without the first letter (initially rejected) to ‘acquire’ the regnal cipher of the late Queen

16d  Sanctimonious villains in canoes (8)
PIROGUES: An informal adjective meaning sanctimonious and some villains

18d  Calls on Bill to drop brash Ken Loach film (7)
INVOKES: Remove a synonym for brash from a bill and add the name of a Ken Loach film

20d  Mean priest holds pipe up (7)
IGNOBLE: A reversal (up) of a Biblical priest into which has been inserted a pipe for smoking cannabis

22d  Nary a soul has halo during divine office (2,3)
NO ONE:  A halo-shaped letter inserted into one of the hours of the divine office

23d  Journey back from poker tournament (4)
TREK: Hidden in reverse (back) in the last two words of the clue

 

 

18 comments on “NTSPP 774”

  1. Caffeine most definitely required but there was not enough for this brain mangler from Prolixic. After this, I would like to think that when I get to Dada’s offering (for tomorrow) this evening it will seem like a Monday back pager!

    Some e-help required, including checking as I entered an answer in the grid, to get across the finishing line.

    Smiles for 15a, 22a, 26a, 7d, and 8d, and a groan for 12a. Plus a couple of parsings elude me but I am sure that they will be explained perfectly in the review.

    Thanks Prolixic and thanks in advance to CS.

  2. Definitely e-help required and in the end some letters also revealed – and still help needed on some to parse the answer! Thank you Prolixic. We shall look forward to CS’s review tomorrow.

  3. I found that pretty tough going. A few letter reveals and some e-help needed.

    12a definitely the favourite, and smiles for 21a and 25a amongst others.

    Thanks Prolixic, and in advance to CS.

  4. Crikey that was tough. Good job the weather is so bad & there is sod all else to do other than scratch your bonce tacking puzzles & avoiding household chores. Got there eventually & without a letter reveal but needed a couple of hits of the check facility & one resultant correction en route plus Mr G on speed dial. A couple of the whys escape me too so look forward to the review. 1,14,21&25a plus 4,7,9&16d particular likes but my standout fav has to the ‘high’ priest at 20d.
    Thanks to Prolixic for the workout.

  5. I’m sorry to say that this was far too tough for me to be enjoyable with frequent checks needed using the BRB and Google. One of the meanings of the answer to 24a was new to me, and this seems to be an apposite adjective for several of the definitions needed to unravel the puzzle.

    Through sheer bloody-mindedness, after several sittings I managed to cross the finishing line with everything parsed, although I am not convinced by 7d being described as “dress code”.

    Thanks, I think, to Prolixic for the extreme brain mangling.

    1. Even in these enlightened(?) times there are probably, for example, some occupations where 7d is part of the dress code for that occupation.

  6. Found this too tough to be enjoyable but soldiered on and crossed the finish line with a huge sigh of relief although I still have a couple of bits of parsing to sort out. I do wish this particular setter would ‘lighten up a bit’ – dread to think what his sermons are like!
    Favoured clues here were 14a (wonder what he’s up to these days?) and 21a which really made me laugh.

    Thanks to Prolixic for his efforts, sorry I wasn’t more appreciative.

  8. Our Sunday morning walk has been very much delayed but we did want to get this one sorted. Eventually made it across the line with considerable Google help along the way.
    Thanks Prolixic.

  9. In the light of the above comments from those I regard as the heat and the good of the crossword world, I am feeling very pleased with myself, having finished this without help.

    I suspect that the solution will show that I have ( most) of the right letters, not necessarily in all the right spaces. :-)

    Don’t care, still feeling pleased.

  11. Glad I’m not the only one to find this tough and need e-help. And apropos 10ac glad I’m not the only setter to get the wrong number of letters in anagram fodder. Thanks, CS, for the explanations (and to Prolixic for the challenge).

  12. Many thanks for the review, Sue. This was very tough to solve and must have been even tougher to blog.

    Well done on spotting the error in 10a! It was my last to parse and I was so befuddled at that point that I skipped my usual anagram fodder check and trusted the setter.

    By the way, the BRB entry for “winter” reveals all about the “poet” reference in 8d.

    1. Thank you – I usually look in the dictionary before resorting to Google but this time I went straight to Google thinking I was looking for an actual poet!

  13. Many thanks for the review, CS, which did confirm that my answers were correct although, sadly, didn’t make me warm to the puzzle any more.

  14. Thanks for the review Sue. I thought there was something amiss at 10a & the fact that I used to bunk off physics & chem let me down again at 12a. Thanks to RD for the poet explanation too.

  15. This was quite a tricky puzzle from Prolixic as many commentators have already said. Quite a bit of head scratching was required to complete the grid, as well as requiring a ‘well-thumbed’ online dictionary. Despite having the answer, I couldn’t resolve the ‘Poet’s year’ reference, so thanks to RD for that. Both of the definitions in 24a were new to me, but the second one was ‘guessable’ and the first was in the dictionary.The 26a slang was also new to me, as were the ecclesiastical references and the ‘Fearsome’. 27d was another answer I needed to reference, but I chose the first ‘Dash’ as the definition rather than the ‘dot’. I’m not sure it matters…! Favourites to emerge were 21a, 27a and 2d.
    My thanks to both Prolixic and to CS.

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