Sunday, April 29, 2012 - ST 4479

Puzzle at a Glance

Puzzle Number in The Sunday Times ST 4479
Date of Publication in The Sunday Times Sunday, April 1, 2012
Setter Dean Mayer (Anax)
Link to Full Review Times for the Times [ST 4479]
Times for the Times Review Written By Dave Perry
Date of Publication in the Toronto Star Saturday, April 21, 2012

Introduction

It's blatantly obvious that this puzzle appeared in the UK on April 1. While I did complete the puzzle (with a lot of help from my electronic friends), Anax did fool me on the wordplay for a couple of clues, causing me to rely on Dave Perry's review for the explanations of those.

Notes on Today's Puzzle

This commentary should be read in conjunction with the full review at Times for the Times, to which a link is provided in the table above.

11a   A crude hole's full of milk for locals (9)

Local^[5] is an informal British term meaning a pub convenient to a person’s home • a pint in the local. Alehouse^[10], an archaic name for a place where ale was sold (tavern), is today used informally as another name for a  pub. "Milk" here means to get all possible advantage from (a situation) • the newspapers were milking the story for every possible drop of drama.

13a   Cannon vehicle order (5)

A cannon^[5], chiefly a British term, is a stroke in billiards or snooker in which the cue ball strikes two balls successively. In Canada and the US, this shot would be called a carom^[5].

14a   Pipe carrying hot gas (6)

Pipe^[5] (said of a bird) means to sing in a high or shrill voice • outside at the back a curlew piped.

24a   Battle against 26d (9)

"26d" is a cross-reference which indicates that the solution to clue 26d (woo) forms part of the clue, thus making the clue in full "Battle against woo".

The Battle of Agincourt^[5] was a battle in northern France in 1415 during the Hundred Years War, in which the English under Henry V defeated a large French army. The victory, achieved largely by use of the longbow, allowed Henry to occupy Normandy.

25a   Degenerate regretted keeping mental notes (3,2,4)

'Run to seed'^[5] is an alternative way of saying 'go to seed'.

2d   Face city bank, shabby one (9)

I had incorrectly parsed the wordplay as SCARE (?) + C (city) + ROW (bank) which left me perplexed as to why "face" would be 'scare'. In actual fact, the wordplay is SCAR (face; cliff) + EC (city; postcode) + ROW (bank; of seats, for example).

Face^[5] is used in the sense of a vertical or sloping side of a mountain or cliff • the north face of the Eiger. A scar^[5] is a steep high cliff or rock outcrop, especially of limestone : high limestone scars bordered the road.

The EC (Eastern Central) postcode area^[7], also known as the London EC postcode area, is a group of postcode districts in central London, England. It includes almost all of the City of London and parts of the London Boroughs of Islington, Camden, Hackney and Tower Hamlets.

4d   Singer's legs broken in two, like (8)

My electronic assistants erroneously told me that the only word to match the checking letters is ISLESMAN which left me thoroughly confused about the wordplay. I discovered the correct solution from Dave Perry's review.

6d   Supply cocaine, damn practical (3-8)

In the surface reading, "supply" is a verb meaning to provide^[5]. However, in the cryptic reading one must interpret it as an adverb (derived from supple) meaning flexibly^[5].

12d   April fool might, extremely stupidly, stand in the sea? (3,8)

The definition is "stand in the sea" (where "stand" is a noun) with the wordplay being an anagram (stupidly) of {APRIL FOOL + MT (the outer [extreme] letters of the word MighT)}.

17d   Democrat's farewell in time for Irish statesman (2,6)

In the surface reading, the 's forms the possessive of Democrat. However, in the cryptic reading, we must interpret the 's as a contraction of 'has'. The wordplay therefore is D (Democrat) + (has) {VALE (farewell) contained in ERA (time)}.

Vale^[5] is an archaic exclamation meaning farewell.

Eamon de Valera^[5] (1882–1975) was an American-born Irish statesman, Taoiseach (Prime Minister) 1937–48, 1951-54, and 1957-59 and President of the Republic of Ireland 1959–73. He was the leader of Sinn Fein 1917–26 and the founder of the Fianna Fáil Party in 1926. As President of the Irish Free State from 1932, de Valera was largely responsible for the new constitution of 1937 which created the state of Eire.

20d   I count on thumb being caught in here (7)

The definition is "I count on thumb". The wordplay is C (caught) contained in (in) HITHER (here). On cricket scorecards, the abbreviation c^[5] indicates caught (by) • ME Waugh c Lara b Walsh 19.

21d   Essentially a cut-off point for April fool (6)

I failed to see the first part of the wordplay (essentially a) which leads us to MIDDAY because A is the mid(dle) letter of 'day'.

23d   Shot when stopping an alarm (5)

In the cryptic reading, I would guess that stop^[10] (actually "stopping") must be interpreted in the sense of restrain : to stop George from fighting.

Key to Reference Sources: 

^[1]   - The Chambers Dictionary, 11th Edition
^[2]   - Search Chambers - (Chambers 21st Century Dictionary)
^[3]   - TheFreeDictionary.com (American Heritage Dictionary)
^[4]   - TheFreeDictionary.com (Collins English Dictionary)
^[5]   - Oxford Dictionaries (Oxford Dictionary of English)
^[6]   - Oxford Dictionaries (Oxford American Dictionary)
^[7]   - Wikipedia
^[8]   - Reverso Online Dictionary (Collins French-English Dictionary)
^[9]   - Infoplease (Random House Unabridged Dictionary)
^[10] - CollinsDictionary.com (Collins English Dictionary)

Signing off for this week - Falcon