Introduction
A relatively easy puzzle today, although a few Briticisms likely made it a bit more challenging for me than it would have been for the Brits. Even though I have seen some of them before (like shop = grass = inform), they don't pop immediately to mind and I often only twig to them after having already found the solution and am trying to decipher the wordplay.
Today's Glossary
Some possibly unfamiliar abbreviations, people, places, words and expressions used in today's puzzle
Chester - a city in Cheshire, England
Chesterfield - a town in Derbyshire, England
CID - abbreviation (in the UK) Criminal Investigation Department.
grass - noun 4 Brit. informal a police informer verb 2 (often grass on) Brit. informal inform the police of someone’s criminal activity or plans.
Manchester - a city in England
SEN - abbreviation (in the UK) State Enrolled Nurse.
shop - verb 3 informal,
stump - verb 2 Cricket dismiss (a batsman) by dislodging the bails with the ball while the batsman is out of the crease but not running (likely derived from noun 3 Cricket each of the three upright pieces of wood which form a wicket).
sweet - noun 2 Brit. a sweet dish forming a course of a meal; a dessert.
Today's Links
Libellule's review of today's puzzle may be found at Big Dave's Telegraph Crossword Blog [DT 26084].
Commentary on Today's Puzzle
3d One measures initial response following decree (5)
In this clue, the definition is "one measures" and the wordplay is "initial response following decree". In the definition, the pronoun "one" substitutes for "the solution to the clue"; in essence, the definition is a very succinct stating of the idea conveyed by the much more verbose phrase "the solution to the clue is something whose purpose is to measure things" or RULER. The wordplay is R (initial response; i.e., the first letter of the word "response") following RULE (decree).
16d City linking Man to field? (7)
I have to admit that I missed the wordplay in this clue, erroneously thinking it must have something to do with a piece of furniture. In fact, the clue is asking for the name of a city with which both "Man" and "field" would have something in common (i.e., be linked). The solution, is CHESTER, a city in England, that also is common to Manchester and Chesterfield, two other urban communities in England.
The clue may be premised on the game Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon, a trivia game (often played by my children) based on the concept of the small world phenomenon which rests on the assumption that any actor can be linked through his or her film roles to actor Kevin Bacon within six steps. Thus "Man" is linked to Chester in Manchester, Chester is linked to field in Chesterfield, requiring only two steps to complete the game.
25d Self-contained during row at annual award ceremony (5)
I do have a minor quibble with this clue (as did several visitors to Big Dave's blog), since it is the statuette that is awarded that known as an Oscar, while the award ceremony itself is referred to as the Oscars (or Academy Awards).
26d Requirements for opening bars? (4)
After a bit of contemplation, I settled on KEYS as a solution to this clue. Keys would be required to open bars, as in a jail cell. Although my knowledge of music is rather limited, there may also be a musical allusion here in that I suspect that the opening bars of a musical score would indicate the key in which it is to be performed.
The other contender, and running a very close second, was KEGS - obviously a requirement for any publican preparing to open a bar.
Signing off for today - Falcon
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