Times 25014: 5dn my face

46 comments on “Times 25014: 5dn my face”

1. …having all but two in about 50 minutes. Not getting anywhere, I went and made a phone call, and when I came back I got ‘camcorder’ and ‘farmland’ in about two minutes.

   The thing about this sort of puzzle is that you have to keep telling yourself that the answers are not obscure words, it’s just the wordplay.

   I did mess up on ‘seacoast’ for a while, having ‘seacoals’ instead, as kind of a perverted &lit. That was my only serious error, as I exercised great caution not to put in wrong answers. I had heard of Petra and its famous sobriquet, it was ‘Amritsar’ that had escaped my prior knowledge. But the cryptic is very helpful once you get the last crossing letter and realize both ‘RA’ and ‘stir’ are reversed.

2. 81 minutes AND a mistake. I knew this was going to be tough when my first in was well into the Downs (CROATIA). Having bashed through to the bitter end – also CAMCORDER and FARMLAND – I just knew that I must have one wrong, and that that was likely to be the girl’s name. And so it was. Neither of my two contenders (ERica – last letters of ‘see monitor’ + what?! – or Evita) really convinced me but the clue was just too scaly for me. I pity the poor sods who were in this half of the draw.
3. I finished the grid in 50 minutes knowing that I should have spent longer trying to work out the wordplay at 1ac,22dn and 17dn where I had bunged in my best guesses so that I could get my head down for the night.

   On revisiting it this morning I realised that although ELIZA was correct, ESCORT and AMRITRAJ were not – the last one I put down to having tennis on the brain at the moment because of the ATP finals.

   Those of a certain age will remember The Lancers as performed by Mr Pastry: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f0DXDV1xThU

   What fun that having been deprived of hum meaning a bad odour yesterday it should turn up today!

   It’s refreshing that the Times puzzle recently used the Queen of the Iceni and now refers to the Danish King of England both spelt the way that I was taught in school instead of the alternatives that seem to take precedence these days.

   1. Forgot to add, speaking of bad odours, that 20dn doesn’t work for those who pronounce the spice properly. Okay then, the way I do, but it’s the pronunciation given first in the SOED so I think “some say” would have been in order.
      1. The word is Hungarian, so the accent should go on the first syllable. No excuses!
   2. I echo your opening sentence but with an “n” in grid!
4. 18 minutes and none wrong, so feeling a bit smug. I suspect if I’d been in the second round, this one would have been cursed rather than blessed for its twisty nature, but today I thought it was chewy and enjoyable. SW corner was most troublesome, with the deviously defined and wordplayed CAMCORDER being key. Once cracked, my CoD, though several close contenders jostled for position.
   Wed to a east-European, PAPRIKA doesn’t really work for me, but I thought PONG was clever and ELATE a cute e-device.
5. A steady solve with too many interruptions to have a meaningful time, but I won’t be troubling the championships for a while.

   When Burgon described Petra as “half as old as time” he probably meant it literally. As a devout and literally-minded churchman he would have believed Bishop Ussher’s calculation that the world was created in 4004 BC (at 9am on Monday 23 October, to be precise!)

   ANGORA CAT was a new beast to me. If it looks the way I imagine I wouldn’t want one that was moulting.

   1. Is that the Gregorian calendar, or the Julian Calendar?
6. 32 minutes, last in Seacoast. Managed to avoid the traps. First in not till the downs though. Not too keen on ‘one that secured’ for ‘owner’. Speaking of the latter, my parents-in-law once drove into Nevada. At the border they were eagerly solicited: “You two wanna get married?” “We are married.” “Oh. You two wanna get divorced?”
7. Overall an entertaining puzzle that took 25 minutes and contained some good wordplays and misleading definitions. CAMCORDER is very good.

   Surprised to see 3D in a Championship puzzle. I solved it from the “wines” and checking letters. And add me to the list of folk for whom PAPRIKA doesn’t work. Quite some time since we’ve had a really contentious homophone.

   A difficult puzzle under competition conditions I would think

8. My Greek alphabet doesn’t get much further than ‘alpha’, ‘beta’ so OMICRON was a challenge! Cracked the wordplay (eventually) for OWNER but not content with definition: ‘one that secured’ suggesting historic rather than current status. Quite pleased to have completed successfully but I would have been keeping mctext (thanks for the blog) company while others disappeared to the pub.
   1. zabadak would have been under the table by then! Assuming he drinks.
      1. You shouldn’t have, McT. Now I have visions of his wife shouting, “No more wodkas, Zabadak!”
         1. It’s actually “Enough viz ze dzin end toniks!” In round 1, we weren’t allowed to leave until the end of the hour, so early finishers mostly read. Real competitors were distinguished by the books they took in with them. “War and Peace” was just showing off.
9. 8dn. But the whole point of the story is that he didn’t rule the waves.
   1. True, but “Britannia” doesn’t fit.
   2. Nobody has suggested he did. The clue has “One commanding the waves”;the fact that he was unsuccessful doesn’t invalidate it.
      1. Interesting point here – some verbs would definitely require being successful in their usage, others wouldnt, not sure where the cut-off is?

         I suspect there needs to be an element of achievement, hence winning/beating/overtaking would require success, whereas singing/playing tennis/looking would involve any half-arsed effort worthy of the name.

         I would suggest that commanding is definitely in the first category, hence the orignal objection should stand.

         1. I think:
            “I command you to stop”
            “Get stuffed”
            … sums up the story quite well!
         2. This is an inherent ambiguity in the English language, one Shakespeare found good enough for a jest:

            GLENDOWER

            I can call spirits from the vasty deep.

            HOTSPUR

            Why, so can I, or so can any man;
            But will they come when you do call for them?

10. A bit of a struggle, but an enjoyable one. I was never tempted to abandon this one, a slow and steady solve. Hadn’t come across D notice, nor lancers, nor ANGORA CAT, nor J W Burgon’s description of Petra, but all were gettable. The only one I wasn’t really sure about was OWNER, as I’d not heard of Reno, and thought the definition a bit weak.

    Thanks, as ever, for helpful blog.

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11. The line about the rose-red city also crops up in Peter Sellers’ wonderful “travelogue” about Balham. Thanks, mctext, particularly for Canute, Camcorder and Dominance. I tried hard to fit Neptune into 8d. Similarly it took ages before I realised I couldn’t fit “Hi!” into 27ac. A similar amount of time was spent trying to fit a reversal of “vor” (divorce centre) into 25ac. But my Pick of the Day goes to Eliza. Clever use of monitor. Oh and I, too, had not heard of an Angora Cat. We used to have a Burmilla or three, which is a mix of Chinchilla and Burmese, but Angora is a new one. I’ll join the list of those slaving away while the Superstars are down the pub: 83mins 17secs.
12. Well, I managed to distinguish myself today by getting one wrong, despite solving it OK on the day (time unknown as I jumped from puzzle to puzzle). As people have said re: previous championship puzzles, it says something about the solving process that the answers seem not to stick once you’ve finished with any given puzzle. Right way round to do it, of course…
13. This is a prime example of why I probably won’t ever enter the competition. There is something about the words ‘crossword championship’ at the top of a puzzle that immediately makes my cryptic grey matter freeze. Took me far too long – I’d probably have given up and gone to the pub!
    1. In the paper version it’s only written in tiny letters at the foot of the puzzle. I only ever find out it’s a championship one once I read it on here. Probably just as well …!
    2. crytpicsue: if it’s any consolation, my whole being freezes when I run off a puzzle on a blogging Wednesday and see the words “finished by x% of competitors…” in large print immediately following the puzzle number.
14. This was moderately hard, taking me 42 minutes. I might have been slightly quicker had I gone with some of my first guesses where I was unsure of some of the wordplay. For instance, once I had the first A (and therefore AM from the clue) the most likely answer for 17 was AMRITSAR, which often crops up.

    I do agree with those who query the homophone in 20.

    Re CANUTE above, or rather CNUT, he didn’t claim to have dominium over the waves; he was merely demonstrating to his fawning courtiers the limits of his power. That doesn’t invalidate the clue, because presumably he uttered some such command for the benefit of his entourage, but it does rather invalidate Private Eye’s cartoon in a recent edition.

15. Enjoyable puzzle with some challenging wordplay. 1 hour for me. The homophone at 20dn (PAPRIKA) doesn’t seem to me at all contentious as both the RIK and REEK pronunciations of the second syllable are sanctioned by dictionaries, and both are equally common, I would say. The word has been so thoroughly anglicised that its Hungarian origin hardly seems relevant. But I accept that these judgements are always somewhat subjective. The poetic reference at 20ac (PETRA) is so famous that, surely, even the most-hardened literature-phobe can have little objection. I did exactly as Mctext predicted at 4ac (SEACOAST), wasting countless minutes trying to explain the final ST. The solution, when it finally dawned, was absurdly simple. I too questioned how Canute could be said to have commanded the waves, but I think Jack’s explanation works perfectly well – i.e. that you have to take “command” in this context as simply meaning “to issue an order or orders”, which may or may not be obeyed.
16. 34:4 but then I wasn’t able to give the puzzle my full attention once I’d clicked “play”.

    Regardless I’m glad I was in Prelim 1 and didn’t have to face this under competition conditions.

    Eliza was one of my first in without checkers. Re 8 I too was trying to get the TUN out of Neptune to make tuna, having been put off, as Jack suggests, by old whatshisname more commonly being Cnut than Canute in the Times.

    COD to farmland.

    Thanks to Jack for the link to Mr Pastry whom I can just about remember watching as a samll child.

17. 24:56 .. felt like it should have been faster. I spent a long time messing about in the top-right, not quite believing that SEACOAST was a word and looking for alternatives. Otherwise, nothing too tough.
18. 55:29 with one spelling mistake. The last 20 minutes or so were spent on my last 5 answers – 4/6/9/11/12. I think my last 2 were 12 & 9 in that order, but I misspelt DISCRIMINATORY with a DE at the start. I got it from the checkers and the definition, and was too keen to finish off the last clue to bother with the wordplay which would have pointed out my mistake.

    Pretty tricky, I thought. Not a puzzle that inspires me to take part in the Championships in the foreseeable future!

19. I also found this tough, seeing it for the first time today as I didn’t manage to get a copy of the 2nd preliminary puzzles on the day of the Championships. 28:22, with at least 5 minutes at the end puzzling over AMRITSAR/CAMCORDER/OMICRON. Still, if you thought this was tough, wait till the Final puzzles come out!
    1. If they stick them on Wednesdays, I may hang up my pen!
20. Marathon solve and slowed to a crawl at 55 mins with Canute’s inability to rule the waves until getting a second wind with seacoast; staggering over the line at 79 minutes with nothing else would fit but avalanche (alternative vote) and dancing lancer of dominance.
21. Must have been on setters wavelength today…about 20 mins which is good for me. Couldn’t parse Tuna though, so thanks McText for that. For we scientists, omicron is soooo familiar..
22. Slowish but steady with no particular hold-ups, though PAPRIKA gave me a pause while I struggled to understand the RIK in the middle. I didn’t spot the homophone straight off because I never pronounce the word that way. 37 minutes
23. I’m coming down with a cold, so I did this in fits and starts, and it wasn’t quick. I found it tough. LOI was PONG, following the wordplay literally, and not understanding at all why PONG means ‘hum’ or ‘to hum’. Still don’t.
    Tomorrow is the Thanksgiving holiday in the US, so a happy one to all, whether celebrating or not. We all have something to be thankful for, and it’s good to be reminded from time to time. Best to all.
    1. Both hum and pong are slangish terms for a bad smell, with both working as noun and verb. Are these British parochial, then?
       1. Both are in NOAD as “Brit., informal”.
24. I’m a bit confused by SEACOAST. Earlier while solving I questioned whether there are any coasts that aren’t seacoasts. I see now (fr. Wikipedia) that it’s a region in the US but, then, what was the Channel reference about?
25. SOED says that ‘coast’ was originally and more fully SEA COAST. Collins has SEACOAST as one word.
26. 10:05 for me, with the last minute or two spend pondering 4ac (searching for something rather more convoluted than SEACOAST).

    A most enjoyable puzzle, and IMO very well judged at exactly the right level for a Championship preliminary.

27. After whizzing (comparatively) through the first 3 of these, I knew I was due for a major slowdown, and this was it: 57′, with the first 15 producing perhaps ELATE. Had to look up D-notice, but I remembered hum=pong; and once I got AVALANCHE I stopped thinking that 17d began with US, and remembered AMRITSAR, the scene of the bloody massacre in 1919. A toughie, but no complaints.
28. I had 3 spells at this one, starting with 27ac and a couple more over a quick breakfast before going to work, Had another go after getting home but had to put it down to stop my brain overheating. A most enjoyable puzzle which I eventually solved correctly, (well over 2 hours in total) although I spent ages over ELIZA, my LOI, having tried to find a VGA device or watcher in EDITH EDINA EVITA and ERICA. I did chuckle after running through the alphabet until the reptile reared its head.
    I couldn’t parse 12ac until I realised it ended with TORY not TING, which gave me the unknown ANGORA CAT, and skimmed over the MC in CAMCORDER until I saw mctext’s explanation. I also missed the merit M in 15d having picked up on the dance which I used to do as a youngster. I too was pleased to see the more familiar spelling of Canute used for 8d. Took me a while to spot Reno rather than ROV as well. As a computer technician, I liked OMICRON.
    Thanks to mctext for the very welcome explanations.

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