i Cryptic Crossword 3193 Nitsy
May 3, 2021
It’s a Bank Holiday, and true to form there’s torrential rain and gales on the way, so we remain thankful for the i‘s puzzle section. Today’s offering from Nitsy won’t have held up many solvers for too long I suspect, so perhaps this is a good day for newer solves to take a look and perhaps make some encouraging progress. For myself at least there’s still the Inquisitor to take another look at, and the bathroom ceiling to paint.
The puzzle itself? 1d has been rewritten to bring it up to date, as suspected, and there was just the one – 1ac ironically – that I struggled with the parsing of. Elsewhere I made the SE corner more difficult for myself by lobbing a D rather than S at the end of 14ac, but soon saw the error of my ways, there being only so many modes of transport you’re likely to use to reach ER. Enjoyable and nicely done overall, with nothing I spotted likely to raise hackles.
Finish time as quick as they get here, to my surprise, my impression being that puzzles from Nitsy have been on the tricky side in the past.
COD? I’ll go with the aforementioned 15d – “Reach hospital department on this? (9)”.
To September 2016 for all the answers and parsing of the clues, and a little confusion regarding the setter responsible for the puzzle:
https://www.fifteensquared.net/2016/09/25/independent-on-sunday-1388-by-hypnos/
Borodin
batarde
Saboteur
Denzo
flashling
jonofwales
Cornick
sprouthater
uiytjhgmj
willow1235
idothei 
Yup, one for the improvers there – indeed it almost felt like it had been shipped in form a different newspaper at times. Oh well, perhaps I should gird my loins and tackle that Inquisitor myself, rather than sit here twiddling my thumbs. Mind you, there’s always that garden shed to build…
How many states in Europe? Quite surprised to see lists on line that feature Scotland, which has sitting MPs in Westminster, but not the Isle of Man, which doesn’t. So ‘around 50’ seems a safe bet from Nitsy. That was my FOI and favourite too.
An enjoyable puzzle with no obscure words, completed fairly quickly. However, in common with some on 225 I did not parse RAY in 27a, and was also unfamiliar with ER as a hospital dept in Jon’s CoD; though it was good to have a change from ENT, my appreciation of the puzzle took a knock when I found that many will have known ER from a US TV soap.
This apart, I found the wordplay consistently entertaining, fair and clever, and Cornick’s favourite was definitely a bit easier because the knowledge that the name must have changed made it certain that …MP… was part of the answer. How many others started off looking for a word containing L for 1a? I particularly liked the misdirection in MUSCLE, in which its drug connection👎 was easily untangled.
Hi Denzo, whilst I did indeed enjoy 1d EMPHASIS, I had meant to imply that 1a EUROPE was my favourite.
Sorry, I got a and d mixed up. What you wrote is clear.
Yep, nothing to complain about as far as the clueing is concerned, just over too quickly on a dismal day weather-wise. In fact I think this was probably my fastest ever solve.
I’m with Cornick re COD, I liked 1 ac a lot.
Yup, all fine here. A late start due to the bank holiday lie-in and the Jumbo General Knowledge puzzle.
I thought it was a little gem. I’d like to say it was not too hard … but a brain-freeze stopped me parsing 23 across (TRIAL), duh!!! My excuse is that I was solving it in the pouring rain, sat in the car, waterproofs on but still a bit soggy – having taken my dog to an agility competition. I think the water must have leaked into my grey matter.
Also, why is RAY = look, please? I assumed it must be, but I don’t understand.
Four big ticks from me for STRETCHER, EUROPE, EMPHASIS, and … drumroll … PROFESSOR! Yep, the last is my COD – that’s how to do funny, slightly risqué clues 👍.
I didn’t know “ray” = “glance” for look but it was obvious from the crossers and lo and behold there it was in the BRB, not even marked as obscure or archaic…
Thank you! So helpful.
No terribly helpful I fear. I was just as perplexed as you by it and was surprised to see it in the dictionary without comment or annotation.
Still, with cryptics one does learn something unlike the (pleasant enough) battleships and railway tracks I have just whiled away half an hour with.
Yes helpful because I didn’t find it in the dictionaries I looked at! At least I now have have it clear in my mind.
Just finished minesweeper, ABC logic and Futoshiki 😊.
Nice crossword, horrible grid.
Enjoyable while it lasted, which wasn’t nearly long enough for a wet and windy afternoon. No quibbles, no queries.
I might have a look at some of those non-verbal puzzles now…
Quickest solve yet, I think
As a novice I decided to have a go. I completed it except for 1A but didn’t understand 7 of the answers so really grateful for you people who explain
I suggest you go to the Fifteen Squared website, whee all is explained. There is a link to it at the end of Jon’s blog at the very top of this page.