The Age SMH Cryptic by DA #20,528

The Age SMH Cryptic by DA #20,528

Hey there it’s Paddy Avenell here guest solving today’s crossword! Never done this before but will hopefully be as good as Julie’s output. My handwriting is absolutely atrocious so upon finishing the crossword I rewrote all the answers onto a fresh piece of newsprint. Hope it’s legible!

The order below is in that of solving and I have written them out in a way to help new solvers (hi Mum!) try to understand how the cryptic style works how best to unlock the clues. Well, best for me anyway.

6D - Match outfit (4)

SUIT was the first word that came to mind as it is a synonym of both match and outfit. For some reason I was still unsure so I didn’t write it in immediately.

28A - Make a tidy profit? (5,2)

This was an instasolve - CLEAN UP -  both a phrase meaning tidy up and slang for making a profit. (A note on the use of a question mark in a clue - something that flummoxes my Mum - I take it to mean that there is an extra layer of wordplay involved, perhaps even in the definition (or synonym) part of the clue. I’ve heard it said before that the question mark means the cruciverbalist isn’t exactly playing by the rules; would love to know other people’s thoughts.)

20D - Leave power after 31 days (6)

First thought was that a month (or part thereof) with 31 days would appear in the answer, and with power appearing after this, I thought of abbreviations or short words ending with a P, giving me AMP. I then went through the 31-day months in order: janamp, maramp, mayamp &c.; until, finally, DECAMP, which means to leave.

25A - Noisy mass sabotaged kids’ game (5,4)

Sabotaged struck me immediately as an anagram indicator, and with preceding words comprising 9 letters, as opposed to the subsequent being only 8, I figured we were after a kids’ game: SIMON SAYS came to be almost immediately.

23D - Strains muscle when leg’s almost wrenched, straddling unfenced pit (5)

If there is one thing DA loves, it’s a definition that’s also an anagram indicator. I always try to keep an open mind when unlocking clues, otherwise you can get completely stuck on a red herring. Having originally thought pit was the definition, I switched my thinking. Strains doesn’t just mean to pull (like a hamstring), and with - - S - C in front of me, MUSIC popped out. Wrench out almost all of ‘leg’ from ‘muscle’ and you get ‘musc’, which is straddling an unfenced pit - the letter ‘i’ - music to me ears!

5D - Second self-effacing platypus? (9)

The platypus is my favourite animal at it’s one of only two MONOTREMEs in the world (echidna). Being 9 letters, I assumed this to be the answer but couldn’t quite figure out why, except that a ‘mo’ is a second (short for ‘moment’); and ‘not re me’ perhaps means self-effacing. Confident though I was, I didn’t write it in at that time.

10A - Top diplomat leaves top luxury car in trust (3,2-4)

Although I hadn’t written in SUIT or MONOTREME from earlier, I wrote out the answer like hangman with the cross letters, giving me _ _ N   _I-_ _ _ _. The unusual letter combination made me think the answer would be a person, rather than another word for diplomat, and going over the few diplomats I am aware of, it didn’t take me long to realise BAN KI-MOON fit the letter sequence. When the top leaves a luxury car - limo - you get ‘imo’, which is in trust, or to ‘bank on’, confirming the answer.

12A - Musical-sounding Berliner? (4)

My first thought was Katz is a German surname that sounds like Cats, an Andrew Lloyd Webber musical. Absolutely no confidence so I left it blank and kept going…

21A - Mandatory detention cell in Sydney suburb (4)

Being a Sydneysider I fancied myself to get this quickly but it took me longer than I’m proud to admit to see that RYDE was staring me right in the face; a ‘cell’ of mandato(ry de)tention.

24D, 19D - Messily thank… um luminary Nobelist of literature (4,6)

The (4,6) letter combination and the wording of the clue led me to think the answer would be the name of a person who had won the Nobel Prize for Literature. My favourite poet WB Yeats didn’t fit and Thomas Pynchon hasn’t won it yet - shame Sweden shame - so I wrote out the cross letters I had: _ N _ _     _ _ _ _ _ N. From here, it seemed messily was too obviously an anagram indicator, but ‘thank um’ is only 7 letters, leaving 3 at the end. A 3-letter luminary is ‘sun’, meaning I now had _ N _ _    _ _ _ SUN. Arranging the anagram fodder into the remaining letters gave me KNUT HAMSUN, an early figure in the absurdist movement and winner of the 1920 Nobel Prize for Literature.

17D - Widespread dime novel - boring saga (8)

Thinking a novel way of writing ‘dime’ would appear in the clue, and having the D and M from the previous answers, the suffix ‘-demic’ came to mind. I thought pandemic and endemic before alighting on EPIDEMIC, which has the ‘demi’ boring into ‘epic’, or saga.

11A - Reckless, yet one rigs charity (10)

The middle three words stand out as being 10 letters and reckless is a transparent anagram indicator, giving us GENEROSITY.

4D - Poser skimmed Antarctic mountain (5)

For a while I kept thinking the answer would be a mountain in the continent to our south, perhaps an obscure one that is the only word fitting the cross letters. From somewhere I remembered Erebus - I think it might have been an answer in a crossword from days gone by - and then I suddenly switched the clue around. If you skim the top off Erebus you get REBUS, which is a word/picture puzzle (I used to love them as a boy), which is a type of poser.

1A - Thief rejected food - mainly fat (7)

As I’ve gotten better at solving DA’s masterpieces - I used to stare blankly at the page feeling thoroughly unworthy - I’ve noticed that he more than any other cruciverbalist at the Age/SMH likes to incorporate parts of words into the answer, using a synonym in the clue along with a cutting word to indicate that only some of the word is involved. As seen early in BAN KI-MOON, he tells us take the top off a limo (luxury car) to get ‘imo’. It’s one way that DA makes his crosswords much harder than the others each week, but it also makes solving the clue considerably more satisfying. Anyways, the reason for this diversion is that I always keep this in mind on Fridays. Having got the R at the end of this answer from REBUS, and seeing ‘mainly fat’, I thought this answer could end with ‘lar’, which is ‘mainly’ lard, or fat. Suddenly BURGLAR came to mind - a straight synonym of thief - beginning with ‘burg’, which is a ‘rejection’ of grub, slang for food.

2D - A climber trapped south of spur’s ultimate canyon (6)

As a proud member of The Arsenal Nation, I blanched at seeing ‘spur’s’ in a clue, even with the apostrophe, which was the giveaway to unlocking this clue. Spur’s ultimate, or end, is the letter ‘r’, and with the ‘n’ from GENEROSITY in the second last position, RAVINE (a deep canyon into which Tottenham will hopefully fall) with ‘a vine’ (a climber) underneath (or south of) the ‘r’, crept up on me.

1D - Peep at author drinking, say, in bottle shop (6)

Take a ‘bo peep’ means to have a look, so I figured the answer would have the form BO _ _ G _. Back in the day I liked a band called Fun Lovin’ Criminals, which had a song called Korean BODEGA, which I knew from the lyrics was about a general store in New York. I figured that must be the answer though I’m not sure how ‘dega’ is derived. Is it something to do with ‘aged’ backwards? Or it sounds like (Edgar) Degas, who was more known for his paintings? Or it sounds like one of several obscure authors named Day making a ‘gah’ sound when drinking? Help me please!

3D - Chief lost a favoured cap off Swiss ensemble (10): L _ _ _ R _ _ _ _ _

I was certain throughout my delicious schnitzel lunch that there would be a Von Trapp element to this clue/answer, erroneously thinking the Sound of Music family was a Swiss ensemble; they were actually Austrian. The cross letters (above) have the third letter crossing with the last letter in 9A (see next solve), which appeared as D _ V _ _. Thinking that word would be ‘David’, I added in the ‘d’ to get L _ D _ R _ _ _ _ _ . A ‘chief’ is a leader, but it’s lost an ‘a’, leaving ‘leder’, and I immediately remembered LEDERHOSEN, which I actually thought was a German ‘ensemble’. It ends with ‘hosen’, which is chosen (favoured) with its cap off. Assuming the Swiss also wear this garb, I rate this as an excellent clue.

9A, 18A - Keen to see you in recital, cracking frenetic fiddle work? (5,11)

Let’s start with the cross letters: D _ V _ D    _ _ P_ _ _ _ _ E _ _ (at this stage, the e is still an educated guess from MONOTREME). Can you think of a name that fits in, without even looking at the clue?

Keen = ‘avid’; see you ‘in recital’ is ‘Cu’, symbol for copper; and then avidcopper cracks into dfield (= ‘frenetic/work/anagram’ of fiddle) to give us DAVID COPPERFIELD. Is there a definition to this clue? The magician likes to uses his fingers frenetically, like a fiddler, though that is very loose. DA has a habit of not defining answers when they are people’s names, viz the mega Australian actress theme from a few weeks back, using only the question mark to indicate that something different is going on.

14A - He wanted some more obvious card game, reportedly stopped by incomplete pack? (6,5)

Having just solved DAVID COPPERFIELD, I had no trouble cracking this one from the cross letters: O_ _ _ _ R    _ _ _ _ _ . Obvious = ‘overt’; card game, ‘reportedly’ = ‘wist’ (sounds like ‘whist’), and they are stopped by an incomplete pack = 51 = LI; for OLIVER TWIST, a beloved foundling who wanted some more. It wouldn’t be DA without at least a microtheme!

(5D was now _ _ N _ T _ E _ E; it had to be MONOTREME)

16D - XXXXX in SE Melbourne? (8)

In many sports, including ten-pin bowling, baseball and cricket, the letter X is used in scoring. All those Xes are SCORESBY, which is a suburb of Melbourne. Personally, I feel this clue could be improved by making it ‘XX XX in SE Melbourne?’, where you have two sets of 20 in Roman numerals, which is known as a ‘score’.

15D - Get one’s goat lavishly dressed before one dined (9)

One dined gives us ‘iate’, and using the slang definition for get one’s goat, we arrive at INFURIATE, which is a lavish way to dress, ‘in fur’ and all…

I’m taking the next two linked clues together, with the cross letters shown:

26A - Lost a shirt, moving in behind (2,3):  _ _    S_A

27A - One 26-across suffering hesitancy, overlooking both poles (7): Y_C_T_E

Seeing that 27A so obviously references yachts, it seemed clear that 26A must be AT SEA, which means lost, when both are preceded by ‘to be’. A shirt gives us the AT (a t-shirt, a T) but I’ve no idea how ‘moving in behind’ gives us SEA. A person driving a yacht is called a yachty, and Wiktionary says YACHTIE is an acceptable alternate spelling. Once again, no idea how the wordplay works on this clue.

22A - Issue for bush, essentially illiterate (10)

If you are for something you are ‘pro’ it, so if you are ‘for bush’, you are ‘pro mulga’. The essence, or middle, of ‘illiterate’ are the letters ‘te’, giving us PROMULGATE, a synonym of issue. I really liked this clue.

13D - Sabbatical in Congo? (5,5)

Did you know the verb ‘to con’ originally meant ‘to study’? I didn’t until I looked it up after figuring out that go = leave, and that the answer must be STUDY LEAVE.

7D - Rising troubles beset baker in central Europe (8)

Troubles = ails, but they are rising, so it’s ‘slia’, set around baker = oven, for SLOVENIA, a country of central Europe. Clue seems straightforward enough but it took me quite some time to unlock it, mostly because I was thinking of the person doing the baking, rather than the appliance.

(With the e in SLOVENIA crossing 12A, it meant Katz was definitely wrong. My next thought was WEST, which is musical-sounding, sort of, in that it’s part of West Side Story, and some Berliners came from the west. I wasn’t convinced either!)

5A - Wasted fruit core wanted biting (7)

The core (or centre) of ‘fruit’ is ‘u’, and it is being ‘bitten’ (which if you imagine a biting actions seems to make sense) by wanted = ‘missed’, giving us MISUSED, a synonym of wasted.

(With the s in MISUSED, it confirmed that SUIT from way back at the top was correct.)

8D - Daughter attends funeral? That’s some nerve (8): D _ N _ _ _ T_

I’ve included the cross letters above to show what was looking at me as I tried to knock off this second-to-last answer. For a long time I thought the answer would be a word meaning ‘brash courage’, as in ‘you’ve got a lot of nerve’, and I got stuck on ‘temerity’ for a while, even though the wordplay gave me no support. If ‘daughter’ gives us the letter ‘d’, then the remaining 7 letters might be an anagram of ‘attends’, with ‘funeral’ as the indicator? No, I tried every possible combination, looking them up on Wiktionary to see if they were obscure words, but no luck. But by now I was fairly certain the answer wasn’t a synonym of courage but the name of a nerve, as in biology. Having absolutely no nous in the sciences, I looked up the nerves of the body on Wikipedia and found DENDRITE, which includes ‘end rite’, a phrase representing a funeral. For those interested, dendrites “are the branched projections of a neuron that act to propagate the electrochemical stimulation received from other neural cells to the cell body”.

12A - Musical-sounding Berliner? (4): _ E _ R

Hmmmm. A common misconception is that a Berliner is a sausage but what JFK was actually claiming to be was a cake or doughnut; some sort of sweet baked treat. A Berliner is also a newspaper style; The Guardian is a famous example. Jens, Mezut, Per and Lukas are all German names, going by recent Arsenal players...

This sort of desultory wandering went on for some time until - bam! - what’s a 1-word, 1-syllable musical (that’s not Cats)? Hair! And what’s that sound like? HERR, the German word for ‘mister’-!

BOOMSHAKALAKA!

The Age Cryptic by DP #20,526

A Wednesday puzzle? I never do Wednesday puzzle posts! I usually have too much on and short of time and temper. I am finding the shorter form of posting is much better for me. I can get a post typed up in an hour rather than five hours when I breakdown every clue. I still think the long form is a good way to learn and solve clues but the pic also does a lot of explaining. Let me know if you disagree and which you prefer.

This puzzle had an opera mini-theme and guess what: I'm not knowledgeable of operas. I had about ten clues solved by lunchtime and was looking at a brick wall of a puzzle, frustrated and hating every bit of it when my husband asks how it's going,

"It's an opera puzzle. I don't know opera."
"You don't know opera, you don't know cricket...why do you bother with this?"
"Because I want to win!" was all I could say.
"I want to win, too." he said and went back into his office to wrestle with his own demons.

Eventually I bashed along and noticed there were a lot of double definition clues and I could get those and open up the puzzle more. In the end I had a line of gaps running from the NW corner across to the SE corner. I have errors that screwed me up and the whole thing is a mess but I did put then effort in and didn't just toss it in the trash. Here's my pic (sorry it looks crooked):

17A - Safe as banks like dear books? (4-5)

I got this with cross letters and thinking "dear books" would be old first editions with gold leaf or GILT-EDGING (I did try and work "gold" in the beginning for ages) but what that has to do with "safe as banks" I don't know. Even if "banks" = EDGING how does "safe as" = GILT?

20A - With pipes backing or coming out (5)

I knew we needed a synonym for "pipes" that when reversed gave us a word for "coming out" but I never could find the word. Then I thought maybe this was another double definition and I put in SPOUT. Answer is DEBUT which answers "coming out" but not "pipes backing" as that would have been TUBES not TUBED, right? Why not write "When piped backwards or coming out" or would that be too easy?

23A - Means to drop a sort of convenience (4)

Answer is MENS and I got this from wordplay - very straightforward ME(-a)NS -  but didn't connect at all that "sort of convenience" = MENS. What does this mean? I thought "sort" may mean to mix up the remaining letters but that gave nothing. I'm stumped.

26A - Address for one female, or two (5)

Answer is MADAM and again It was my first thought but couldn't connect that answer to "or two" because the plural would be Mesdames and then it would be like a straight clue not cryptic so how does "or two" become MADAM? These little things really trip me up and ruin a puzzle for me. I know most people could be happy with getting the answer right off the bat and not worry about the minutia but I have to know! Is it because it's a palindrome?

2D - A conductor may switch rail tracks (5)

Answer is SHUNT and I think this is an electrical shunt and the train shunt double definition but I'm not sure. Just wanting some clarification.

14D - Goes as a result of other selves (5-4)

Answer is ALTER-EGOS and I got this from cross letters and definition. I think there's some kind of anagram at play (GOES + A + RE(-su)LT) but there are no signposts I recognise for either letter removal or anagram. So how we get the answer I don't know.


There it is. I'm sure many of the explanations I seek will be obvious but please enlighten me as at this time I'm in the dark. I know the opera clues were few and I shouldn't have made such a fuss. Turned out there were more double definitions than anything else.

I have the NS but may not get to it as we have appointments today. Friday's DA will be a bust as I'm stuck in Melbourne all day while my daughter gets her braces off and is fitted for her new retainer. She's such a good doobie, her braces have only been on for 18 months and she's getting them off two years early because she did everything her orthodontist told her to do and never missed days with elastics or headgear or anything. The transformation has been amazing. I only wish she was as compliant with my requests. (Want the orthodontist's details, just ask)

As always leave answers in the comments and if you have better solutions please share those as well. If you want me to break down anything in more detail just ask and I will do my very best.

The Age cryptic by DH #20,525

I got this one done in a reasonable time for me (four hours) (shut up!) and there were no easy sides or themes or much here. Plenty of anagrams to get the puzzle opened up and it was good practice but not much stood out as fun. Am I spoiled to want fun? You can say yes.

That said I still have many gaps and five not fully parsed. Here's the pic:

9A - "Stevens returning it", states old Roman historian (7)

I'm pretty certain there's a homophone at play here but I can't figure it out. I googled "Roman historians" and from the three choices google listed I put in TACITUS from the cross letters.

23A - George to show off white of egg? (5)

The answer is GLAIR and I know the "George" = G but I don't know where the LAIR comes from. I could say "show" = AIR which leaves me with only the L unparsed. This isn't a word I'd heard before and I used One Across to help me out.

6D - Artificial surgical opening as Tom collapsed (5)

The answer I put in is STOMA.  I'm confident in my cross letters. I got a definition of pores in the skin but that's not "artificial" so I don't get this.  I was thinking it should be like an incision. I think it's "as tom collapsed" as fodder and anagrind but the "surgical opening" could be an S and the rest is something else. A Twitter friend got the same so I guess it's ok - I just don't like it very much. OK - I looked a couple of other definition sites and yes it works, I'm just new to the whole world of stomas and it seemed like it was something else than I thought it was - sorry.

14D - Companion learning everybody coming back common green alga (9)

The answer is CHLORELLA and I don't know where we get the CHLORE from "companion learning" but I do see "everybody coming back" = ALL reversed. Even if "learning" = LORE how does "companion" = CH?

17D - I am following Ivanovic and that guy in Disneyland area (7)

Answer is ANAHEIM and I know the "Ivanovic" = ANA is for the tennis player Ana Ivanovic and "I am following" = IM going after other two elements. It's the "that guy" = HE bit I don't like. I'd have thought it should be HIM? Is that splitting hairs?

The other thing I couldn't see was the connection between the three ellipses clues 13A, 15A and 16A. I did take the answers  IPSO FACTO, SWAMI and EXACT and mixed them up to get several hundred possibilities but COWE MAFIA SPATS TOXIC stood out but I'm sure isn't anything at all to do with me. Anyone suss out the triple link or was this an ellipses clue set with no link - that would be terrible and bad.

I've got Wednesday's printed and will dig in but I do not know much about opera so I may give up and go swimming at the beach instead.

As always if you want a clue broken down in more detail just ask in the comments or if you have better solutions please share them.

Happy Hump Day.

The Age cryptic by LR #20,542

LR is back again! I thought we'd get a month of EM first and LR in February so it was a nice surprise. I had an hour or so to crack through this before friends arrived and our Australia Day shenanigans began. We had friends visit who emigrated from our town in Scotland a few months ahead of us in Dec '08 to Newcastle and they've recently relocated to Melbourne. It was great catching up and seeing how big their five kids had become. We went to the beach, had BBQ snags and burgers, came back home and the kids played Minecraft and Halo while adults talked comic books, watched tennis and then played Coup.

About the puzzle (before I warble on more) I got through the top half with little trouble and found the Back To The Future theme after 6 clues solved which was great. I felt I was in my comfort zone knowing all about those movies. The bottom half took me a lot longer and was more solving bit by bit. In the end I was missing half of 27A thinking it was a theme clue and not being able to figure out the right BTTF phrase. It wasn't a theme clue. I didn't figure out the answer and as I predicted on Twitter, kicked myself. It's frustrating to come that close to a full complete puzzle and fail! Ah well. Here's the big pic:

Here's a legend for my scribbles:

Definitions are underlined
Actionable signposts or words are circled
Anagrinds are in rectangles
Anagram fodder has a squiggly underline
Dashes above letters are beginning/end letters or odds/evens 
Underlined numbers are not fully parsed unless ticked and circled numbers are ones I share with my crossword learners club.

What I'm missing bits on are:

13A - Puts an X on model - the angriest (8)

Answer is CROSSEST and I get that the "X" = CROSS but not sure why "model" = EST unless it's using the abbreviation of established which doesn't mean model to me. What am I missing?

16D - Be keen to go inside tenth US embassy (7)

Answer is ENTHUSE and I get that the end is using the US from the clue with just the E for "embassy" but how does the "tenth" fit...nevermind!! I see it's a hidden word now. damn I hate when this happens!! I missed the obvious signpost of "inside" but couldn't figure out why the second "T" was missing from "tenth" blarggg.

19D - Studs put working into glutes (7)

Answer is BUTTONS and not BOTTOMS which I had in place and I had guessed from "glutes" as the definition and put in the sidebar. I couldn't understand how we get there from the clue. All I can see is a "motto" in BS. I was thinking studs are wall supports, sexy blokes, tuxedo button bling, animal husbandry. Confession time: I only just now looked at the answers to see I had the wrong one in grid. Now it makes sense that "glutes" = BUTTS and "working" = ON and we put ON into BUTTS to get the tuxedo shirt bling definition. Again, I couldn't solve this until I typed it out...and paid closer attention to the answer key. Damned sneaky!

Hoping your Australia Day weekend was great, too. I'll pay closer attention (ha, not likely) to clues. If anyone wants a clue or element explained in more detail just ask in comments and I will do my very best to comply. 

LR makes me look forward to Mondays, which is quite an achievement for anyone. Even if he does set traps that I skip gaily into all the damn time.

The Age by DA #20,522

It took me most of the day, on and off, but I finished this one! My only error was with the second word in 8D where I thought it was a play on the eco-warriors Greenpeace and put in GREEN PEAS. It didn't make sense but it was my last clue and I wanted to fill the empty boxes. I did flip a coin over the answer being PEAS/FEES and fate made the wrong choice.  It should be FEES. Ah well.

As before I'll put up my photo and then list the ones I couldn't solve. If anyone wants a clue explained in more detail just ask in the comments and I'll gladly comply. Here's a legend for my scribbles:

Definitions are underlined
Actionable signposts or words are circled
Anagrinds are in rectangles
Anagram fodder has a squiggly underline
Dashes above letters are beginning/end letters or odds/evens (although today I circled 22A)
(Circled numbers of clues are ones I shared with my crossword club)

You can click the pic to make it bigger if you need to.

I can't parse: 

25A - Precisely restricted bug shattering quay helper (7)

Answer is TUGBOAT and I know "bug shattering" is partial fodder and anagrind but why does "precisely restricted" = TOAT? I can't think what word is being shortened to make TOAT.

8D - Putting cost onto eco-experiences lacking political backing? (5,4)

I don't know what's going on with this clue at all and answered on what best fit the cross letters. I've not heard the term GREEN FEES before. Google tells me it's related to golf - so "putting cost"  is putt, not put. I still don't get the clue side though.

That's all for stumpers this week. I hope my notes are legible enough. The note about Audrey Hepburn was for 7D and her movie Roman Holiday. The other thing that held me up too long was 13,28A where my mind would not let go of the idea of Edinburgh's 1 O'clock gun which for the first few years I lived there made me jump out of my skin, but after that I would laugh as tourists would flinch when it went off where the rest of us just quickly checked our watches for accuracy. At least I was on the right track with a cannon being fired.

We're off to a wedding today and then a massive house clean-up before friends use our house as a base point between beach and food for Australia Day. I love it. One thing I miss about back home are the 4th of July celebrations so it's nice to live somewhere where there's a similar holiday smack in the middle of summer. Fewer parades and fireworks and no lobster or clam bakes but hey! I'm happy.

Hope your Australia Day is awesome too. 

The Age cryptic by DA #20,510

I don't have the time to retype up the questions and do a lengthy breakdown of each clue. I did get all but one answer on this puzzle which is my best effort on any puzzle in weeks. It helped that the weather was a bit dismal on Friday and the kids weren't whining they wanted to go out but were happy to be couch potatoes, leaving me plenty of time to work through this cryptic undisturbed. My favourites were 4D, 22A and 28A but really there was a lot to like in this puzzle. I genuinely had fun - because I could solve them! The past two weeks have been less fun as failure taints fun.

Today we have a group of teens coming for a console party so my time is short. I've posted the picture of the puzzle which has quick breakdown explanations in a wild order - sorry. Left side are mostly across clues, right side are the down clues. Notations in the margins. A quick legend:

Definitions are underlined
Actionable signposts or words are circled
Anagrinds are in rectangles
Anagram fodder has a squiggly underline
Dashes above letters are beginning/end letters or odds/evens

Sometimes I'll underline an action word with a circle around it's found fodder like in 1D and3D. In 21A you can see I did this for just the "M(en's) leads" but later realised it meant for the whole clue to get ANADEM.

Click to enlarge. Clues with the number underlined are ones I'm not able to fully parse. These are:

11A - Stay clear when a white lummox turns into chief (4,4)
No idea what's going on, despite hints from DA Trippers. I had the wrong words in for 1D (sauna) and 3D (entomb) which hampered me for a long time. With the K in place I made a guess.

16A - Backed projections supporting a halt to historic siege (10)
My one unsolved clue. I know now the answer is SEBASTOPOL and I can see "halt" = STOP but what's the rest?

27A - Revolutionary always packing punch (3)
I guessed with "punch" as the definition and two cross letters. I had thought it was RAP as the beginnings of the clue spell that out but there was no signpost for that. At a guess I think "revolutionary" could be a reversal signpost and "packing" is a container signpost and AWL is snuggles inside aLWAys reversed.

1D - Hottie cycled on weekend (5)
I get the answer is "cycled" = SPUN and "weeKend" = K for SPUNK but why does "Hottie" = SPUNK? I know spunk to mean an enthusiastic confidence or a slang word for ejaculate. Is this trying to say spunk means hotheaded or something? Am I missing another definition?

23D - Search vacant domicile, longing to destroy cipher? (5)
I got the "vacant DomicilE" = DE but didn't understand the rest. A DAT hint that "cipher" = O and to "destroy" that meant to remove the O from a word for "longing" which I think is L(o)VE but those letters aren't in the right order to make D(ELV)E so is "destroy" doing double duty as a deletion signpost and an anagrind or have I got the wrong word or parse of this?

That's what I have. I'll get back to regular posting at some point. If anyone has a request for a longer explanation of a clue just ask in the comments and I'll do my very best. I look forward to reading help on the clues highlighted above.

Have a great weekend!

Oh the horror...

I gave up caffeine just before Christmas and then caught a nasty head cold and ear infection that I'm still trying to shift but is much improved. I was in a fog for a week and couldn't concentrate on anything and then would sleep for ages.

I now find I'm struggling with puzzles, even the easy ones. My brain will not engage. It does seem to firing off a lot of creative ideas which is nice. I've got myself some new writing pads and am putting things down to see if they want to develop into anything more. I am away with the fairies. Could quitting caffeine have cured my writer's block? We'll see.

Summer is full on and we have house guests then I'll have to entertain the kids. I think my puzzle posting will subside for the next few weeks. It's only fair.

Currently struck with a yawning cycle and can't stop. It's really annoying.

Happy New Year