27826 Thursday, 19 November 2020 Hasty to its close ebbs out life’s little day

Author   ZabadakPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
So. There’s some clever stuff in here which had me casting around long after I’d submitted with a quiet (and, as it turns out, effective) prayer to the gods of greenness. There’s some GK which I expect some to categorise as not terribly general, especially with regard to historical stuff. There’s a couple of particularly devious clues that just cry out to be biffed. But then, especially towards the end, it’s almost as if the setter lost heart and threw in some really simple stuff that you surely don’t really need me to expatiate on.
Not to say I didn’t enjoy the thing, and it did keep me occupied for nearly 25 minutes, blogging duties as ever adding to my time. And while there’s cricket (just about), there’s no birds, even when there could have been one.  And no plants (unless you count the fungus).
I’ve explained as best as I can with clues, definitions and SOLUTIONS.
Across
1 Fungus in ground you reported (6)
MILDEW We start with a homophone, of ground: MILLED and YOU in plain sight. Works for me.
4 Worked in a forest and made slow plodding progress? (8)
LUMBERED A double definition: Chambers assures me that to lumber is to work as a lumberjack, so that’s OK
10 Hasten to border, finally changing direction (9)
NORTHEAST A well disguised anagram (changing) of HASTEN, TO and the final letter (finally) of border. I lost time trying to make the last letter of some word change from W to E or L to R (etc)
11 No one getting cross, rolling round? I sure don’t react! (5)
XENON No one is simply NONE, cross is X, put them together and reverse (rolling around). One of the noble/inert gases here endowed with sentience and speech “I sure don’t react”.
12 Advance booking in doubt (11)
RESERVATION A simple double definition
14 Gossip, having poured out our drink (3)
RUM Start with RUMOUR for gossip and “pour out” the OUR.
15 Endless danger? Gosh — it’s where something is as close as possible! (7)
PERIGEE Danger: PERIL with no end plus GEE for gosh. The point at which an orbiting body is at closest approach to the body it orbits
17 Canoe extracted by archaeologist? (6)
DUGOUT Just two definition for the same word
19 Like some music of Queen in recording (6)
CANNED  ANNE the Queen turned up yesterday contributing to material, so might be fresh enough to spring quickly to mind. Here she takes her place in CD for recording. You remember CDs: those silvery discs we used to buy before downloading made them obsolete and vinyl was in any case revived.
21 One who criticises son, getting less affectionate (7)
SCOLDER Took me longer than the S(on) plus COLDER for less affectionate made it.
23 Act like any would, when just starting out (3)
LAW The first letters (just starting out) of Like Any Would
24 Looked again at study needing to get tidied up (11)
READDRESSED Study is READ and tidied up (especially in military formations) DRESSED. Or, I supposed, masonry.
26 Revolutionary army returning to wreck (5)
MARAT The French revolutionary theorist (and lots of other things) famous for being stabbed in the bath by Charlotte Corday, and for being the subject of a play set in a lunatic asylum directed by the Marquis de Sade (yes, that one). For once, the T(erritorial) A(rmy)is not qualified by “former” or such,  just invited to “return” and attach itself to MAR for wreck.
27 Member’s movement perhaps supporting country (9)
PRONATION Supporting PRO and country: NATION. My feet pronate: the soles turning inwards and messing up my walking. Hands also do it, but for them it just means palms facing downward.
29 The old man meeting unhappy woman in US city (8)
PASADENA The old man is PA, unhappy is SAD, and ENA today’s random woman. I can only think of Sharples.
30 Report of e.g. copper’s courage (6)
METTLE The across clues began with a homophone, and finish with another one: copper is and example of metal

Down
1 Male worker criticises mischievous females (8)
MANTRAPS Ah, the good old days when we were allowed to set out sprung metal clamps to capture poachers. Apparently those devices lend their name to women who “take a mischievous pleasure in attracting and acquiring men” (Chambers). M(ale), worker: ANT and criticises: RAPS.
2 House that has a Victorian pavilion (5)
LORDS I think all this is is a reference to the House of LORDS and LORDS the cricket ground which has a pavilion (including the legendary Long Room) built in 1890.
3 What would be found in alphabet hitherto (3)
ETH The letter Đ stood for the soft TH in older versions of the English alphabet and here is to be found hidden in alphabET Hitherto.
5 I turned out to be devoid of proven ability (7)
UNTRIED A simple anagram (out) of I TURNED
6 Blooming lovely is that bit of fighter’s kit! (6,5)
BOXING GLOVE I think the way this works is that the words blooming lovely are “boxing” GLOVE,  one of those clues where the answer is effectively a bit of wordplay.  I struggle a bit with the grammar and what belongs to the definition.
7 One has such a car? It brings ruin! (9)
RUNAROUND And for the second clue in a row, I’m a bit mystified. Chambers tell me that RUNAROUND is another version of the more familiar runabout, which is a sort of car. OK. And to give someone the runaround is (Chambers) “to behave repeatedly in a vague, indecisive or deceptive way towards; to reply to a question or meet a request with evasion” but that’s hardly ruin. Ah, no wait, I have it. If you have run around I (one, the first person)  it creates RUIN. Golly.
8 This writer’s in stupid short trousers (6)
DENIMS And so to firmer ground. Stupid is DENSE, which you cut short, and place around I’M for “this writer’s”
9 Religious writings penned by wise man, an English poet (6)
SAVAGE Richard Osman’s excellent TV House of Games has a section called “Highbrow/Lowbrow” where two definitions, one in each category, produce the same answer. Here they would be “Author of ‘The Bastard’ celebrated by Samuel Johnson in his ‘Lives of the English Poets’”,  and “Robbie, famously blond-haired football pundit who still turns out for Stockport Town”.  We have to deduce the former from A(uthorised) V(ersion) , the religious writings, “penned” by SAGE for wise man. Richard, if you read this stuff, you can have this one on me.
13 Revived or new form of green energy getting assessed (11)
REGENERATED An anagram (new form) of GREEN plus E(nergy) attached to RATED for assessed.
16 Way factory gives reason for stop-go procedure (9)
ROADWORKS A pretty thin clue. Way: ROAD and factory: WORKS
18 Papa not polite and nice, not one for discretion (8)
PRUDENCE NATO Papa plus not polite: RUDE, plus NICE without the I (not one)
20 Poker-faced cleric hugging a daughter quietly (7)
DEADPAN Our cleric is a DEAN, “hugging” A D(aughter) and P for quietly.
21 Join in urgent message to expose pathetic people (6)
SADDOS Join is ADD and the surrounding urgent message SOS
22 Vice around university? Say not a word (4,2)
CLAM UP Vice is the tool version, CLAMP, with U(niversity) inserted
25 Hasty author (5)
SWIFT Oh, come on. Really?
28 Always giving a positive response (3)
AYE Ever yes.

57 comments on “27826 Thursday, 19 November 2020 Hasty to its close ebbs out life’s little day”

  1. LOI MILDEW; as sometimes happens, my Murcan accent keeps me from seeing (or here, hearing) a solution. I say ‘mildoo’, which doesn’t call up ‘you reported’. (I actually wondered briefly if there were a mushroom called MILIEU.) I had no idea what was going on with RUNAROUND (which I also didn’t know), and I wondered if BOXING = blooming in some form of britspeak; thanks, Z, for enlightening me.
    1. As a ‘Dead Head’ I played ‘Walk Me Out in the Morning Dew’ – Jerry remembered so well – and then the writer Bonnie Dobson and Robert Plant – Wow! What a treat! It appears they they all sing half way between DOO and DEW! Thanks Kevin.

      Victor Mildoow

      1. I had the Plant rendition, and also an excellent version by Tim Rose (American) plus a lesser effort by the Glasgow rockers Nazareth. Both preferred dew to doo.
  2. Well blogged, Z, glad it wasn’t my turn this week. 11:58 for this one, a touch above my average, with PRONATION being the last in, and SAVAGE from wordplay.
  3. LOI MILDEW for me too, despite having the accent where it all works. Fun crossword with no major holdup. The RUNAROUND clue baffled me, firstly because I was sure it was RUNABOUT but not enough letters, and the rest of the clue was…opaque.
  4. Thanks very much for explaining BOXING GLOVE! I would have needed help on the RUNAROUND, too, but I happened to discuss it with Vinyl earlier.

    It didn’t feel like a particularly hard puzzle, but it kept me busy longer than expected. Definitely spent 7 minutes or so just on LUMBERED / RUNAROUND.

    I see what you mean with respect to clues like ‘Hasty author’. Straight out of a Quickie, and not of the same level as the rest of the puzzle.

    I was proud of myself for figuring out PERIGEE (which I didn’t know) from APOGEE (which I knew), by comparison with APHELION and PERIHELION (which I also knew).

    Edited at 2020-11-19 05:20 am (UTC)

  5. At 7dn as everyone else so far. And my LOIs were simultaneous 1ac MILDEW and 2dn LORDS which were both ‘sitters’! At one point I had AVRES – a Victorian res-idence and all of this stretched me to an inglorious hour, with the last three incl. 21dn SADDOS taking twenty minutes! So I am the SADDO! Please feel free to press the ‘Like’ button!

    FOI 17ac DUGOUT

    COD 19ac CANNED (HEAT?)

    WOD 15ac PARIGEE- whizz!

    29ac PASADENA will remind Jack of The Temperance Seven and 3dn ETH – THE GLUMS? Hoorah for both!

    1. Ah yes, ‘Home in Pasadena’ by the great Harry Warren! But it also reminds me of the fabulous ‘Pasadena Roof Orchestra’ founded in 1969 by John Arthy and still going to this day, although John retired more than two decades ago.
      1. I had forgotten all about them! Didn’t they have residency somewhere in Knightsbridge?

        However I will never forget the Penguin Cafe Orchestra!

        Edited at 2020-11-19 06:49 am (UTC)

        1. I think I remember seeing the PRO at a posh event in the nineties on the roof terrace of either Barkers or Derry and Toms, both large department stores on Kensington High street, though the memory is a bit vague now!
          1. I’ve been privileged to experience the PCO at the Union Chapel Islington in 2017, and at Cecil Sharpe House, which was wonderfully intimate, in 2013. They’re still touring, I’m delighted to say. Southern Jukebox Music will go with me to the Desert Island.

            Edited at 2020-11-19 09:17 am (UTC)

          2. Yes, it was Ken. High and not Knightsbridge – perhaps we boogalooed together!?

            Victor Mildew

            Edited at 2020-11-19 09:32 am (UTC)

        2. I’ll never forget one of the seven solemnly eating a salad in his position in the band on stage during a live show.
  6. Having got as far as 25dn without managing to write in a single answer I was grateful the setter had gifted us the Quickie escapee clue ‘Hasty author’ which at last gave me a start and something to build on. But the downside of that is that it’s never an easy job to begin at the bottom of the grid and work backwards. I got there in the end as the hour approached, with several unknown or forgotten answers. Tuff stuff!
  7. I spent about 5 minutes at the end trying to decide whether or not MARAT was correct. I had in my head that he was some sort of French revolutionary but then I also thought of the tennis player Marat Safin and wondered if that was where I’d heard the name and I was making up the revolutionary bit. It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve made such an error. So the absence of pink squares was a pleasant start to the day.
    1. Marat – there is a famous painting of him dead in the bath after his assassination, and I remembered that, but thought his name was Murat, which delayed me a bit.
      Andyf
  8. 29 minutes with RUNAROUND biffed as LOI. I have heard a second family car called as such. I can remember The Temperance Seven’s exhortation to come to Pasadena, although I’m sure, Z, Ena Sharples would have been sceptical about the grass being greener there. She preferred Southport to Blackpool though, so maybe. A good middle of the road puzzle, and the homophone worked. COD to BOXING GLOVE. Thank you Z and setter.
  9. I bunged in MORREL at the last minute which made LORDS impossible. Odd crossword but a couple of interesting clue types.
  10. Another LOI MILDEW & LORDS, which held me up for fifteen minutes and took me to the hour. DNK PRONATION or PERIGEE but got there in the end from the word play. As you say Z some very tricky clues mixed with very simple ones. Thanks for the ex re RUNAROUND too, never did get it.
  11. A challenge for me. For some reason I struggled with two straightforward clues: RESERVATION and CANNED.
    With PERIGEE, I obsessed with Gosh = My for too long.
    LOI was CANNED while COD was BOXING GLOVE. Very clever, I thought.
  12. ⁠”I,” says the Quarterly,
    ⁠So Savage and Tartarly;
    “‘T’was one of my feats.”

    After 30 mins I hadn’t cracked Lumbered (no excuse) nor Runaround.

    When my father was 91 he stopped doing the crossword. He said his brain just didn’t connect things like it used to. So I gave him a clue I was struggling with: “He got stuck in the bath (5).”
    “You see,” said my father, “I have no idea.” Then 5 seconds later, “But there was Jean-Paul Marat. He was stabbed in the bath by Charlotte Corday. There is a famous painting of it by Jacques-Louis David in the Musée Des Beaux Arts in Brussels.”

  13. 14:46. Stuck at the end on LORDS before I could see MILDEW. Failed to parse BOXING GLOVE and RUNAROUND, so thanks for explaining those Z. DNK PRONATION so guessed from wordplay. Done online as bit of belated practice for Saturday so can’t tell you what I’d have a tick against as a COD, but I think it would be the combination of SADDOS and PASADENA.
  14. Today’s offering is dedicated to Kevin Gregg who provided the inspiration yesterday……

    To SNIPE in our jokey vendetta
    We need a “bird name” for the setter
    I though, “Would PECKER fit?
    Or COCK, BOOBY, or TIT?”
    But no, SHITEPOKE is billions times better

    I can CROW now the name’s “in the bag”
    I hope SHITEPOKE will enjoy the gag
    Once I’d have eschewed
    From being so rude
    Now I’m old, and I don’t give a SHAG

    We’re “clued-up” on birds of the air
    But we’ll cheer if just one appears there
    Put SHITEPOKE in a grid
    And we’ll see what you did
    Are you CHICKEN? ‘Cos this is a dare!

    1. Excellent! And setters love a challenge. Shitepoke is sharpening his/her quill at this moment I am sure.

      When I saw today’s crossword I thought of you:

      Astro_nowt as any fule kno
      likes space not birds (which he loathes)
      he’s been waiting to see
      perigee … apogee
      (which sadly doesn’t even come close).

    2. Reminds me of my son when at about 5 years old he thought it amusing to shout out rude words in the garden. Yes ho-ho it’s a real bird’s name. For Gawd’s sake. And try and scan better.
    3. We know what you want us to do,
      Steer clear of the avian clue,
      But among cryptic setters,
      Indeed, all men of letters,
      There’s always a Cockatoo.
  15. What an inexplicable week. I have had one WITCH in the 50s and three in the 60s, yielding a batch of times well under the half hour, normally a cause for wassailing round here! I may be reclassified as a neutrino if this goes on. Either I have suddenly got much better or the universe (alias RR) has randomly dealt me four puzzles on whose wavelength I happen to have been.

    Anyway, this was great fun with the complex reverse cryptics adding intrigue along the way. Biffed NORTHEAST right at the end, never seeing the anagram. Thank you setter and Z for untangling the web as always.

    1. Was Witch’s Promise Jethro Tull or Family?

      On edit – it was Tull.

      Edited at 2020-11-19 10:02 am (UTC)

  17. I ran three marathons and numerous half marathons in my thirties, so PRONATION was a write-in, memorably it led to injury.

    Thanks for explaining RUNAROUND and BOXING GLOVE.

    13′ 08″ thanks z and setter.

    1. PRONATION (and SUPINATION) from David Leadbetter/Nick Faldo for me, doesn’t just mean palm downwards, otherwise my golf swing would be even more unusual 😆
  18. z you say ‘cricket (just about)’ but I can’t see any reference to cricket except the one you didn’t really mean did you, Sam NORTHEAST, who now plays for Hampshire having started with Kent and is held by some (I’ve never really seen him so don’t know) to be destined for England.
    1. Although edged now you mention them by one of my all time favourite songs – Family’s My Friend The Sun.
  20. Sprinted through this in 15 minutes, starting with XENON (I see X and “I don’t react”, and I was a chemist once). Then LUMBERED and the GLOVE boxed by the clue, ending with SAVAGE from wordplay only, never heard of the poet.
    Like horryd, memories of the T Seven and Whispering Paul McDowell were refreshed by Pasadena (and I have a pal I visit there, or I used to).
    Good puzzle, I’d have been happy to blog it. I liked both homophones, for once.
  21. Some interesting devices today with the Boxing Glove and Ruin.

    COD: MILDEW. Nice homophone which delayed me. I spent a while foraging for mushrooms and picked a morrel by mistake.

    Edited at 2020-11-19 11:00 am (UTC)

  22. 23.23. A symmetrical time but the solving certainly wasn’t. I suspect that in a timed environment, like the upcoming Saturday, I might well have struggled to finish but a good lesson today in keeping calm. FOI lumbered and LOI savage. In between some real posers.

    Faves from today, mantraps, mildew, perigee, marat and swift. Didn’t know pronation but seemed a reasonable conclusion. Ditto Savage but easy enough once I ditched OT and NT in favour of AV.

    A propos Gulliver’s creator “The race is not to the swift nor the battle to the strong..” but I know it will be in the upcoming competition!

  23. With the Lords/Mildew combo holding me up at the end. Thanks for explaining some of the biffs, like runaround. I’m trying to get my 3 year-old to pronounce the dental fricative formerly known as Eth. So far to no avail.
  24. Pattern for this week repeated. Nice easy one this, but held up at the end by two that just wouldn’t come. I got CANNED but couldn’t get the homophone at all, until it turned out there wasn’t one. Which left SAVAGE, trying to fit a ST and forgetting the SAGE, and also fixated on OT and NT.
    Liked BOXING GLOVE but took a while to see the X————.
  25. Struggled to get started, with RUM FOI, but then made some progress down under before returning to the NE, then finally getting to grips with the NW, where MILDEW and LORDS held out to the end. I biffed RUNAROUND from crossers without stopping to parse fully. Back in the Northwest, I only parsed NORTHEAST as I hit the submit button after a quick proofread. Enjoyable puzzle. 35:13. Thanks setter and Z.
  27. … I went for BANNED* instead of CANNED. I was worried about the definition but it felt plausible given the apparent 70s/80s reference. On that basis I think the clue works with “in recording” as a homophone indicator. Admittedly not as convincingly as the intended answer, but still.

    Other than that, good stuff. I didn’t give myself time to rationalise BOXING GLOVE but it clearly, um, fitted.

  28. ….for parsing BOXING GLOVE, I am bound to point out that Robbie Savage is now the owner of the “phoenix club” set up in the wake of the Macclesfield Town fiasco. As such, he’s had to surrender his interest in Stockport Town (not County !) and is unlikely to turn out for them again. I’d NHO the poet, but then I’m a leading Philistine.

    I’ve never heard of a car like ours (a 15 year old Ford KA) being referred to as anything other than a “runabout” but the clue was easy enough to see through.

    FOI RUM
    LOI SCOLDER
    COD MANTRAPS
    TIME 10:51

  29. 9:48. No problems, but I didn’t pause to parse RUNAROUND (which has always been a RUNABOUT in my experience) or BOXING GLOVE. Never heard of the poet in spite of reading English at university.
  30. 27 minutes, perhaps my best time ever. MARAT (after I remembered the spelling) and PRONATION my LOIs, although I misparsed the former, thinking it was TA + RAM all reversed. But MAR for wreck is much better. And I quite agree with Z’s comments about RUNAROUND (Golly) and SWIFT. Like the curate’s egg …
  31. Much enjoyed this, inventive and fun.
    Briefly thought of morel at 1ac, but unlike some I knew how to spell it 🙂
    Z, fungi are not plants and are completely separate, symbiotes and parasitical relationships apart. They are an entire and extraorinarily fascinating KINGDOM all of their own, like “animals” or “plants.” And, no fungi, no humans.
  32. Really pleased to have finished this unaided (bar checking a couple of dnks: Pronation and Savage) along the way, so it was annoying to find that my loi, 19ac Banned, was wrong. In truth, I did think the parsing was a bit iffy but couldn’t think of Canned and I was keen to finish etc etc. Unknowns aside, I thought this was much easier than yesterday, and a lot more fun. Invariant

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