Toughie No 3561 by Weatherman
Hints and tips by Whybird
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BD Rating – Difficulty **/*** – Enjoyment *****
Greetings from the Wirral. Well, the Slavonian Grebe decided it wasn’t going to hang around for a windy weekend, but the blow brought decent numbers of Leach’s Petrel and assorted other seabird goodies to the North Wirral coast. Quite how a bird no bigger than a blackbird survives out in the open ocean always amazes me.
Moving on from the wonders of the natural world, we have a wonder of the cruciverbal kind today. Weatherman has given us an absolute cracker, with lots of elegant surfaces and a lashings of deception and misdirection. I didn’t find it too hard, although I’ve added an extra half-star for the time it took to dig out some of the parsings. There’s a healthy dose of science today, too, which played into my stronger suit. There are so many wonderful surfaces, I’m spoilt for choice (3d, 6d, 8d, 22a in particular) but my prize goes to 1d, closely followed by 16a and 31a.
Thank you, Weatherman, for a wonderful puzzle.
Please leave a comment telling us how you fared and what you liked about the puzzle.
Across Clues
1 Fattest insect maybe seen by Victoria? (8)
PLUMPEST A four-letter term for what unwelcome insects could be an example of follows a fruit of which Victoria is a type
5 World leader, one after majestic hotel overlooking river (6)
GANDHI Remove the letter indicating “river” (overlooked) from a 5-letter synonym of “majestic” and follow that with “hotel” in the NATO phonetic alphabet and the letter that resembles the number one.
10 Suit providing returns in gamble (5)
BEFIT Insert a two-letter conjunction, reversed, (returns) into synonym of “gamble”
11 Magnificent stone worn by son of a bishop (9)
EPISCOPAL How you could (4,4) describe a great precious stone into which is inserted (worn by) the letter indicating “son”
12 Regularly lauding current plumber (5)
LUIGI The perhaps less-well known brother in a video game family is found by taking the odd-letters (regularly) of “lauding” followed by the letter used for (electric) “current” in physics
13 Point each way (4)
EAST The two-letter abbreviation for “each” followed by an abbreviation of a type of thoroughfare gives a major compass point. I spent too long trying to make this a palindrome!
14 Self-satisfied heartless dragon in children’s story (4)
SMUG Remove the middle letter from the name of the dragon in on of Tolkien’s books.
16 Makes digital artwork free after sniping (6-6)
FINGER-PAINTS An anagram (free) of “after sniping” gives a way of making art, brush-free, usually associated with small children. I put a lot of effort into “e” and “pic” before the well-disguised anagram and cryptic definition revealed themselves.
21 Airline guards record that man grabbing social worker’s animal (8,4)
ELEPHANT SEAL Take the male pronoun, insert (grabbing) the possessive form of one of the usual social insects, which is preceded(based on the order of the items in the clue) by one of the two-letter vinyl records and insert that combination into the national airline of Israel. I was convinced this would be a type of “bear” given the penultimate letter. Another wrong tree thoroughly barked up!
24 Bar not opening water (4)
LAKE Remove the initial letter (not opening) of a brand of chocolate
25 Lyra Belacqua nurses second son (4)
ABEL Adam and Eve’s second son is lurking in “Lyra Belacqua”
27 Better reveal sexual orientation before party (5)
OUTDO What those who are no longer in the closet concerning their sexuality are said to be, followed by the usual two-letter “party” to get “better” in the sense of “surpass”
29 Few can see this street cop’s corrupt (3-6)
TOP-SECRET An intelligence/information classification is an anagram (corrupt) of “street cop”
30 Arsenal drank heavily, on reflection (5)
DEPOT Reverse a synonym of “drank heavily” to get “Arsenal”, in the sense of storage facility.
31 Perhaps why you’re not taking a trip around Spain’s foremost clubs (6)
BATONS “Trip” here is a reference to drug use. A (2,3) statement of what you could be said to have if you lacked the means to induce such a trip, which is then revered (around) and followed by the initial letter (foremost) of “Spain”. My last one in, and for me, comfortably the hardest to parse.
32 Fear marines taking over unit (8)
ANGSTROM A five-letter synonym of “fear” is followed by the abbreviation of the UK’s military marines containing (taking) the letter indicating over, to give the name of a (very small) unit of measurement
Down Clues
1 Steadily work at fixing sink full of small stones (6)
PEBBLY A three letter synonym of “steadily work at” surrounds (fixing) a term meaning “sink” (often associated with tides)
2 Not just somewhere you might be taken for a ride if uninitiated (6)
UNFAIR Remove the first letter (uninitiated) of a place where you find roundabouts dodgems, ghost trains and the like
3 Cultural development site? (5,4)
PETRI DISH A cryptic definition of an item used to grow microorganisms
4 Dictator’s noticed emotive display (5)
SCENE A phononym (dictator’s) of “noticed” gets a pejorative term for (making an) emotional display
6 Leading hunt out of the Home Counties? (4)
ARCH Remove the two letters indication the geographic location (within the UK at least) of the Home Counties from a synonym of “hunt” (or look for)
7 Chemical weapon under a school brought to the surface (8)
DOPAMINE Reverse (“brought to the surface” in a down clue) “a” from the clue and a three-letter school associated with dolphins, and follow that with an explosive device to get a hormone associated with feelings of pleasure. I confess I hit on the answer to this based on the sense of “bring to the surface” as an industrial activity, and then had to work out what was going on with the weapon.
8 I’m going to Wicked (3)
ILL Remove the apostrophe from a (1’2) expression meaning “I’m going to” giving a synonym of “wicked” (or malign)
9 Discussed grandmaster’s openings (8)
FISSURES A phononym of the possessive of an American chess grandmaster, famous for his match against Boris Spassky, gives a synonym of “openings”
15 My turn, be quiet! (4)
GOSH A two-letter “turn” as a noun, followed by an exhortation to “be quiet” gets “My” as an exclamation
17 Poet kicks off cycling gear, extremely upset (8)
GINSBERG Take a word meaning “kicks off” (or starts), move the first two letters to the end (cycling) and then follow that with the first and last letters of “gear” but reversed (extremely upset)
18 Canada’s amended controls on snakes (9)
ANACONDAS Very large South American snakes are formed from an anagram (amended) of “Canada’s” surrounding (controls) “on” from the clue
19 Timber trade (4)
DEAL A double definition
20 Vulnerability to pressure and bias restricts a revolutionary (4,4)
WEAK SPOT Take “to” from the clue, the letter indicating “pressure” and a synonym of “bias” (or distort) into which is inserted (restricts) “a” from the clue, and then reverse the lot (revolutionary)
22 Proust recollected dazed state (6)
STUPOR An anagram (recollected) of “Proust”
23 Raised storage unit containing too much old foundation (6)
BOTTOM A two-letter abbreviated “storage unit” used to indicate memory capacity in electronic devices surrounds an expression meaning “too much” and the usual letter indicating “old”, which is all reversed (“raised” in a down clue). Although of course it works if just the storage unit is “raised”
26 Endlessly criticising dated language (5)
LATIN Remove the first and last letters of a synonym of “criticising” to get a Classical (“dated”)language
28 Unprofitable bank (4)
LEAN A double definition, the second being in the sense of “inclination”
29 Clumsy vessel merely capsized (3)
TUB Reverse a synonym of “merely” to get a descriptive, usually disparaging, term for a nautical vessel
I made this harder than was necessary by spelling incorrectly the world leader at 5a; not the first time I’ve done it!
The poet at 17d was my last in, and new ro me.
I liked the corrupt street cop at 29a, and the cultural development site at 3d.
Many thanks to Weatherman and to Whybird.
I found this very tough for a Tuesday Toughie, particularly to unravel some of the parsings, and I never did manage to parse my answer to 20d.
I don’t think the story in 14a is necessarily just for children.
I came up with a convoluted parsing for 2d which just about works. However, Whybird’s undoubtedly correct explanation is much better. I took “fair” to be where you might be taken for a ride, preceded by “un” (uninitiated, which becomes un-initiated using “lift and separate”).
Many thanks to Weatherman for making my poor brain cells work overtime, and thanks too to Whybird.
A very nice Tuesday Toughie with lots to enjoy throughout
Thanks to Weatherman and Whybird
Great fun, beautifully executed. 16a, 1d and 6d for me. Best thanks to Weatherman and Whybird.
Good afternoon. This is as a toughie but not unduly so. Lost to enjoy but 10a and 7d are my two. Several took some time parse, but all in all, very enjoyable. Many thanks for the review and to the setter
Most of this went in pretty swiftly but I laboured in the SW corner. It’s very enjoyable and worthy of the Toughie label – thanks to the two Ws.
I knew the plumber but not the dragon (I wasn’t surprised to find it’s in Tolkien, an author whom I avoid like the plague).
Ticks from me for 31a, 1d, 3d, 17d and 20d.
Testing, amusing, clever and thoughtful – everything that makes up a very good Toughie. Although a few of the clues were a little convoluted they were all scrupulously fair and well constructed, with 7d my favourite.
My thanks to Weatherman for a fine puzzle that would not have been out of place much later in the week, and to Whybird for a very well explained review.
Phew, that was a tough one for me but an enjoyable puzzle nonetheless. It was a bottom up solve, the south was relatively straightforward (apart from the poet), the north took much more head scratching and reference to your fine hints Whybird, thank you!
Thanks to Weatherman for the puzzle.