May 7th, 2014 The Age Cryptic by DH

Today's puzzle at first glance filled me with dread. It had a lot of phrases as clues. I don't often get phrases. Sometimes they're very British centric. Sometimes they're just really old and out of common usage. Sometimes they're just dumb and make no sense. Or make tenuous, sorta kinda sense of you look at them squinted and from the left angles.

I'm not good with them. I work around them and then try when every other clue has dried up. This time I was being a bit of a ninny. I looked it over last night and thought "UGH! yuck, can't...too hard." and went to sleep. This morning I pulled it out and had a wrangle. I got about two thirds done. My first try is in black, correct answers and missed clues I got from the answer key in today's paper are in red.

I liked 23A, 2D and 29A even though I didn't get it. Now, don't go thinking I'm some hot shot who does these puzzles in pen, either - they're erasable inks!

1A - I didn't get this until I had a few cross letters and then put the wee bars to show me how many letters per word. "Plucky clique" is a GAME SET and a "lighter end" is a MATCH. the extra three letter word is AND for the common tennis phrase for "court contest".

9A - "none disturbed" tells us to scramble the letters in none and add another word for "jewellery" or BLING for definition "dignifying" ENNOBLING.

10A - This one stumped me for ages (get it "stumped" "Tree"). I had the UP part but kept thinking Ash? Elm? Oak? Eventually running through all the three letter trees and never considering GUM. Only lived around gum forests for the past five years...duh. GUM UP "to cause a jam".

11A - Definition is "Teacher" and cooked is an anagram signpost. Scramble the words in "trout" for TUTOR.

12A - "Permit one" got me LET IT - then I faltered. Voyage? "to go unchecked"? I tossed around Let it slip, Let it by, Let it go. Looking now I see "Voyage" was TRIP. The I was the "one" LET IT RIP. Which to me, is not going unchecked, it means let it go with enthusiasm. Setting a kite into the air, racing RC cars, trying out a new bit of tech for the first time. See what I mean about the phrases not marrying up all the time?

14A - I did not get all of this clue! "Rod's tension" makes no sense to me even after getting the answer. "Rod's" isn't an anagram, it's not about fishing and I don't know what Rod I'd look up for a name hint. I eyeballed adjusted as an anagram signpost for the odd phrase "elk cub" to give me BUCKLE. So I had the second word for all of the puzzle. Answer is TURN BUCKLE. Which is one of these doohickeys. And yes they are used to "adjust tension rods" But really am I being pernickety about this being an icky clue?

16A - "Big Ring Jockey" Well you could say a "big ring" is a HOOP but what does that have to with a Jockey? No idea. I should've just ignored it and done hoop.

18A - "Sinful is WICKED but we only want mostly of that word to give us WICK, a "candle feeder"

20A - Ok, I get how "Anaesthetics" gets NUMB but that's it. The definition "political schemer" doesn't mean NUMBERS MAN to me. Actuary yes. Accountant yes. Bookie yes.

23A - I did like this clue! Follow directions - "Half of them" EM "crazy about" MENTAL  cheese - EMMENTAL!

25A - "Small guy" oh this is not PC, MIDGET "drops his last" -T gives MIDGE for fly. Terrible!! Shocking!!

27A - Another follow directions type clue. "Poland's Capital" P (not Warsaw) "put down" LAID for "some woven cloth"

28A - This one sent me in many circles. Walks about could be AMBLES and pram is short for Perambulate but that's too many letters. I had the down letters for the first and last S and thought Scrambles would work. Wrong! It was STROLLERS the American word for pram that also means to walk around.

29A - Ugh a phrase! "Negative rebound" gives NO SPRING "cowardly" gives CHICKEN for phrase relating to old people NO SPRING CHICKEN. I'm sure the pensioner solvers just loved that.

1D - Ugh a phrase! This isn't something you can break down, you either get the eureka moment or you don't. I didn't, even with most of the cross letters. GOES TO TOWN.

2D - I liked this, a more comfortable double definition clue. "Keep watch over a lizard" gives us MONITOR.

3D - "Rib-tubes" has eight letters and a hyphen just like out answer should so I put this into the anagram solver (Yes I'm lazy!) and we get SUB-TRIBE which works for "minor clan"

4D - I thought of the flower Sweet William then noticed the word displays and wondered if the answer was displayed in the clue. It is, TWILL is a woven cloth. Two woven cloth clues in one puzzle?

5D - "Funny thing" is a hint to scramble the word thing and find another word for "cosh" to get NIGHT CLUB for "cabaret"

6D - I did not get this and getting the solution hasn't helped. I can see how MIGHTY is a synonym for "powerful" but that's about it. I'm a Yankee and you can see I was playing with Mayflower and other Americana to get the answer but this one is elusive.

7D - I had to google Mexican ports and find ones with a T and chose incorrectly with Tijuana. I'd never heard of TAMPICO. If I'd not been lazy (I am lazy I admit) I'd have seen "Stamp head off" for TAMP "one" I and "company" CO.

8D - This is a double definition type clue, a dance that shares the same name as a beer ingredient HOPS

13D - I got the SEASON part right away but didn't understand anything hinting towards OPEN. Did not help I had the "Duck season! Rabbit season" skit running through my head.

15D - I saw hooker and thought rugby clue? Crochet clue (as if)? prostitute clue? I took a gamble that "US art once" had the same number of letters as the solution and ran it through the anagram solver to get the answer COURTESAN. So...prostitute clue. Midgets and prostitutes. Oh dear.

17D - I had no idea what this clue was doing or what it wanted me to do. You can see from my scribbles I knew Rainier was of Monaco but how that mixed with retail chain. I can see they wanted to get me to answer ALDI for the chain and GRIM for forbidding. Lack of knowledge that Monaco is known as the House of GRIMALDI.

19D - I guessed "direction finder" was the definition and answered COMPASS which was correct.

21D - "Wednesday features" is the definition but I did not understand "double the energy" unless it was telling me to have two EEs. I got hung up on "hump day" and couldn't be bothered thinking harder and I had no cross letters.

22D - A question mark clue means little help and just figure it out. Oh a little help with "Twist for " for BEND and a "drunken spree" is a BENDER.

24D - I don't know! Wally Richards, google tells me, is an organic gardener. An "emotional display" I went through lots of options: tantrum, hysterics, wail, cries, fit. How the answer is LYRIC I have no idea! Oh...wait. It's a container clue! There it is nestled in walLY RIChards!! I never twigged display was used again to mean the answer was displayed.  I feel I must slap something. The surface of the clue doesn't hint to anything musical so it's not a good clue.

26D - "Width" is our definition small is a hint to take the S and a "cooking utensil" is a PAN for SPAN.

Not the best puzzle. I've had DH puzzles that were better than this. Tomorrow is DA day.