Would need help with 27a. I got “UNDERSIDE” but only because I really had undercide, which isn’t a word. But in general, thank you very much for the educational walk-through of this challenging puzzle. I’m getting better each time.
Does anyone know how to parse 16D "Property handler truly faces a rise in corruption"
I see the definition "Property handler" = REALTOR and I guess "truly" could be REAL but does "faces a rise in corruption" mean reverse ROT?
Successfully finished the puzzle eventually but got hung up trying to understand TRIBECA. Figured race meant the letters RACE, and part meant BIT, and if you anagram both of those you get TRIBECA. But then part couldn’t signify it was a neighborhood anymore, and there was nothing indicating why those letters were to be all anagrammed. So I left the answer out for a long time, in turn making REENDORSE tougher to figure out.
@Maxwell Cohen race=TRIBE, around=CA (circa) - part of New York
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First finish no look ups for me. Woo hoo! Took 81 minutes, but I finally finished one of these.
This was a very beautiful constructed yet challenging cryptic! The puzzle did have a good mix of various cryptic clue types. In addition, there were quite a good number of clues that were very well surfaced and can be read very naturally as if it were in a book or newspaper. The SE part of the puzzle was indeed the toughest part of the puzzle.
I need help with 20 down.
@Nonamamo
Letters are read backwards from the first "d" in "detailed" to the "re" in "Medicare."
Wonderfully challenging cryptic!
I never did unpack REENDORSE. Thanks, Caitlin, for taking me through it.
An awesome cryptic. Best solved when fully awake.
Loved this cryptic! The southeast was definitely the toughest area to solve.
By the way, I always thought the expression was "come a cropper."
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@tb I seem to think it's "come acropper". (That's right, one word.)
@tb Never mind, you were right.
From merrriam-webster.com:
come a cropper
: to fail completely
//The plan came a cropper.
Great Cryptic! Keep 'em coming, please.
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There was one tough (for me) entry in the cryptic which Caitlin didn't mention - 27A. I thought I'd mention the correct way to parse it in case anyone else struggled with it.
Stress is a synonym for "underline", so "endless stress" results in "underlin", and "finally killing" provides a trailing "g". The result is UNDERLING (servant).
9
TRIBECA uses the letters "race" from the actual clue and "bit" as a synonym for "part" in my explanation. Very good Cryptic.
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@Etaoin Shrdlu
That was my interpretation as well.
1
@Susanne
Caitlin's explanation is also plausible, but it would never have occurred to me.
I think Caitlyn's explanation is the correct one, and I thank her for it. I, too, noticed that tribeca is an anagram of race+bit, but I think that's an accident. It would violate cryptic clue structure to consume "part" twice, as well as to anagram both a word in the clue and a synonym of a clue word, and even more so to then mix them together. Not buying it.
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Caitlin, as for 26D, it seems that he meant PASS as in passing another car on the road, rather than a piece of paper that gets you backstage.
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What do I think? I think you (Caitlin) nailed all the clue descriptions (very nice), and I think this is one of the best cryptics we've had here for some time. Very impressive, and a very enjoyable solve.
2
Could somebody please explain 1D and 4D?
@Jerrold - Caitlin was kind enough to do that for us in her column. Easy to miss because there's a lot in there, but it's there.
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@Migrant OK, thanks!
Double or Nothing is always my favorite among the “middle” puzzles.
[SPOILER ALERT]
My immediate gimmes were PACK, REBOOT and ATOMIC.
I have found that the trick is to find an “anchor square” to start with. This time it was the rightmost square in the third row – the OT of REBOOT and ESOTERIC. A second anchor square soon followed – the PA of PACK and PALATE.
It was just as well that I did not fill up the bottom row with the incorrect TEENAGER. At that point I had realized that the lower-right corner square would have to either contain the IC
of ESOTERIC or stay blank. (Of course it turned out to be the LATTER possibility.)
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