28150 Thursday, 2 December 2021 Perfectly crumulent

Author   ZabadakPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
At the time of writing I am way over the average time taken for this puzzle, and although I’ll give examples of where I slowed to a crawl below, I can see that it’s not as hard as I made it. It became for me a very much piecemeal solve, with nothing much connecting to begin with, and the usually-helpful 1s not emerging until late on. There’s one curious word at the bottom which looks like it comes from the Springfield collection, but it is qualified by “once” to properly indicate a dated use, though Chambers appears to suggest it doesn’t necessarily need that. Otherwise, I think I can say with confidence that the  vocab and GK needed are pretty ordinary.

My labours are illustrated below with clues, definitions and SOLUTIONS.

ACROSS
1 Explorer heading westward, company leaves (7)
TOBACCO Your explorer is Giovanni Caboto (Italian) or Zuan Chabotto (Venetian), but fortunately for our purposes John CABOT (Anglicised). Reversed (heading westward, which to the setters credit is indeed what he did) and added to CO(mpany), he delivers the required leaves.
5 Murdered, as is Christmas turkey? (7)
STUFFED two meanings, the first equivalent slang versions, I think, of both murdered and our solution, as in NS Mura murdered/stuffed a poor Spurs side in the Europa Conference match. Turkeys are stuffed with, um, stuffing at Christmas
9 Small figure, nation investing payment finally, after day (9)
STATUETTE Nation is STATE. Insert the day TUE after the last letter of paymenT (on edit make that “before”)
10 Tailor buttoning up fashionable, retro garment (5)
TUNIC Tailor is CUT, insert IN for fashionable, and then take retro as a reversal indicator.
11 Titanic coming to a halt at sea (5)
AVAST Titanic is VAST which comes to (follows) A for our nautical term for stop.
12 I furiously tear into further performance (9)
ITERATION An anagram (furiously) of TEAR INTO after I in plain sight
14 Analyst left exposed initially by certain grey area? (8,6)
CONCRETE JUNGLE A cutesy definition, by no means a giveaway one. The (psycho) analyst is JUNG, add L(eft) and E(xposed) (initially) and place the result by CONCRETE for certain, perhaps again not the most immediate association, but OK.
17 Impact on belly as breakfast arriving? (7,7)
PANCAKE LANDING As by an aircraft with wheels up. I’m not convinced that pancakes landing on my table are a typical English breakfast, but I’ve consumed them as such in the States, with maple syrup.
21 Cold, the capital briefly windy (9)
APATHETIC Again a perfectly OK but not immediately occurring definition. An anagram (windy) of THE CAPITAL without the L (briefly)
23 Holder of blade, one fighting? (5)
ROWER I bounced all round this one before realising it’s blade as in oar and fighting as in engaged in a row.
24 Current agreement faultless (5)
IDEAL (Electrical) current comes up often enough for I, plus agreement: DEAL
25 Boarding jet, one flier — go on! (4,2,3)
SPIT IT OUT The surface of the clue pushes you away from the required meaning of “go on!” but here aboard a SPOUT for jet we have I (one) TIT for flier.
26 Translation of “let’s go”, heading for Torremolinos — “vamoose!” (3,4)
GET LOST An anagram (translation) of LET’S GO plus the first letter (heading for) of Torremolinos.
27 Swell, once, a leader of Tories, eclipsed by another politician (7)
GREATEN Chambers has it as obsolete for an intransitive verb, which arguably it is here. A leader of Tories is AT, taken in (eclipsed) by GREEN for an altogether different kind of politician. (On edit: as advised, I have extended the definition to include “once”)

DOWN
1 Italian soldiers carrying ammunition, originally stowed away in vessel (6)
TUSCAN So, the first letters (originally) of Soldiers Carrying Ammunition inside TUN for a vessel, not perhaps the first vessel you’d think of.
2 Plugging great work, notice swagger (7)
BRAVADO I take this as an exclamation version of “great work” which is BRAVO, “plugged” by AD for notice
3 One under surface, a group of arthropods (9)
CRUSTACEA Surface is CRUST, one here is ACE plus another A. Included in arthropods as are insects , arachnids and such.
4 Footballer: tedious exercises still to do? (7,4)
OUSIDE LEFT A (slightly old fashioned?) term for winger in association football, an anagram (exercises) of TEDIOUS plus LEFT for still to do. I got LEFT long before seeing that the rest was provided by an anagram, which didn’t look likely.
5 Date character recited? (3)
SEE A verbal version of date, sounding like (recited) C. Chambers spells C as see.
6 Extremist caught by powerful trap (5)
ULTRA Another not spotted as quickly as it should have been. Hidden in powerfUL TRAp
7 Barriers in sport? (7)
FENCING. Well, of course.
8 Bottle or other vessel, put off to the periphery (8)
DECANTER Written in hesitantly long before parsing. It’s CAN for your other vessel with DETER for put off on the periphery.
13 Striking, like Harold’s arrow? (3-8)
EYE CATCHING Sitting there with ‘is eye-full of arrow on ‘is ‘orse with his ‘awk in ‘is ‘and. For illustration see the Bayeux tapestry (though not on a horse and not with a hawk and possibly not with an eyeful of arrow).
15 Sabotage stock with first cut on fur (9)
UNDERMINE Why it took so long to see ERMINE for fur and hence UND (presumably FUND for stock with its first (letter) cut I don’t know. But it did.
16 Carol hosting summit — at the lectern? (8)
SPEAKING Which you might do from a lectern. PEAK for summit inside SING for carol (verb version).
18 Wolf inhabiting lair, most dapper (7)
NEATEST EAT may be the tamest form of wolf you’ve ever encountered, but there it is inside NEST for lair.
19 Town with pier one has left abandoned, somewhere in Wales? (7)
NEWPORT An anagram (abandoned), with the fodder formed from TOWN and PIER with the one I left out. The Welsh Newport (be thankful we didn’t have to spell Casnewydd) doesn’t have a pier as such, but this is crosswordland.
20 Cheesy dish is trap snaring vermin (6)
GRATIN Trap is GIN, vermin RAT.
22 Suffering over love is welcome (5)
HELLO HELL is presumably the ultimate in suffering, O is the (tennis) expression of love.
25 Hardened group (3)
SET Straight double definition, and an easy one to finish.

79 comments on “28150 Thursday, 2 December 2021 Perfectly crumulent”

  1. 37 minutes. I didn’t think outside lefts existed nowadays in this incomprehensible game, although in 1959 I was a fairly good one; fairly good by the low standards of my school, anyway. Nho pancake landing, but it was obvious enough despite the revoltingness of the idea of having pancakes for breakfast.
  2. Why ever not! The Brits are so very set in their ways. Try ’em next Shrove Tuesday for brekker – with Maple Syrup – even Marmite! I note that both Crumulent and Cromulent are both acceptable. Thank-you ‘The Simpsons’. My COD to ‘Pancake Landing’ – sounds like a Grateful Dead track.

    Edited at 2021-12-02 12:25 pm (UTC)

    3. After all, if someone doesn’t have pancakes for breakfast… when in the world do they have them?

      Maybe they have their pancakes at brunch?

      (I’ve often had pancakes for dinner, even, but… I love pancakes. With bacon.)

  3. 38 mins so not too bad today. Last two in TOBACCO and TUSCAN. Had LANDING for ages but didn’t see PANCAKE until I got SPEAKING.

    GREATEN seemed such a clunky word so I didn’t enter it til all the crossers were in. I used to play OUTSIDE LEFT, Steve Heighway was my hero, many moons ago.

    I liked TOBACCO too, once I saw it.

    Thanks Z and setter.

  5. Some QC clues were added to the mix here. 5d 6d 7d 16d 20d 22d 25d 24a. Much of the rest was harder and took some moments of inspiration to break the deadlock.

    OUTSIDE LEFT, EYE-CATCHING and NEWPORT did that before UNDERMINE and CRUSTACEA gave the tricksy CONCRETE JUNGLE.

    Finally TOBACCO (shrug to the unknown travellers), BRAVADO, AVAST and a few minutes on TUSCAN.

  6. Gave up after 50 minutes with a quarter of the puzzle not completed. Then, while my eggs were poaching (for lunch not breakfast), jungle came to mind. How does that work? From then on, it was a fairly straightforward solve with everything parsed correctly.

    Pancake landing was unheard of as a phrase but the components were familiar. Otherwise it was a tribute to the setter to produce such a challenge without including anything obscure or questionable.

    Thanks to z8whatever for the blog.

  7. while I was completing this.

    Well, it felt like it. Clock stopped at 64:14, but I did take a 25 minute call.

    CONCRETE JUNGLE was my last, after a trawl to see what might go between G and E.

    Enjoyed the puzzle, despite the time.

  8. 31.55. I felt a bit off the pace with this one. Lots of blank spaces after a first run through left me picking away disjointedly at bits here and there. There seemed to be so many word play possibilities in a lot of clues that I struggled to get to grips with them. Spent ages scrolling through mental lists of crosswordese soldiers and vessels when just focusing on Italian would have got me to Tuscan much faster. Swell once had me thinking of Fred Astaire and Judy Garland’s “We’re a couple of swells” duet from Easter Parade before the correct definition appeared. LOI by a long way was concrete jungle entered from checkers without understanding and parsed afterwards.
  9. It seems like half of the paying crowd waltzed through this; I’m with the other half who found it tricky. Thanks for pointing us to Marriott Edgar, Z, though I’m afraid you will have to take the consequent responibility for a completely wasted morning on my part.
  10. A lunchtime solve which I nearly gave up with the NW blankish. But seeing CONCRETE JUNGLE led me to COD OUTSIDE LEFT; and then I had a tricky finish. I did parse TUSCAN. LOI was STATUETTE; it’s always been TUES for me, but no more.
    Very enjoyable with some easy stuff.
    Unfortunately I see that GRETTON was an incorrect guess; I too was thinking of a swell person. Should have gone back to it but frankly I don’t think GREATEN would have occurred to me.
    David
  11. 25.40 so not exactly racing through. LOI outside left which is a bit disappointing as I’m well able to remember being skinned by one on a regular basis. Preceded by tobacco and tuscan which I struggled with for far too long. Didn’t work out the cluing on Tuscan so thanks blogger for the explanation.

    Not totally convinced about stuffed as an alternative to murder but the turkey reference made it the only option.

    COD concrete jungle.

  12. 13:29 this afternoon.
    After a country walk in zero degrees late this morning, I felt brain freeze had literally kicked in as I struggled to solve any clues in the first pass. FOI 11 ac “avast” and then I gradually got some footholds and quickened the pace.
    An enjoyable puzzle with some fine clues e.g. 14 ac “concrete jungle”, 3 d “crustacea” and 26 ac “get lost”.
    LOI “Tuscan” which I managed to parse as I was entering it (with a little optimism it has to be said). Earlier I reckoned the answer might be “Titian” but I couldn’t parse the various elements milling around my head — “It” for Italian, “Tin” for vessel and “a” for first letter of ammunition and solving 9 ac “Statuette” finally “stuffed” that notion.
    COD 23 ac “rower” — so simple but completely misled me for a while.
    Thanks to Z for an enjoyable blog and to setter.
  13. Time impacted by a phone call from daughter mid-solve. She may have wondered why I was a bit terse.

    Like denisetremble, I’m surprised at the low Snitch rating for this as I found it quite tricky. Some very creative cluing, which, if I hadn’t finished, I might have called liberty-taking. COD TOBACCO.

    Thanks to z and the setter

  14. Lynyrd Skynyrd yesterday, Bob Marley today – with Concrete Jungle. Nice. I too find the Snitch rating surprisingly low. Felt harder than yesterday. Held up at the end by Statuette and Tuscan. Couldn’t get Plaquette out of my head. Narrowly avoided Giant for 11ac, but even my fertile imagination couldn’t find a way to explain it. Grattan fitted for 27 ac (until 15d went in). Henry Grattan was a great politician, but not a Tory nor a swell. So I didn’t put him in.

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