Times 29323 – Anagram city!

Author   vinyl1Posted on Categories Daily Cryptic

Time: 17:31

Music: Shostakovich, Symphony #5, Berstein/NYP.

Here we have a typical Monday offering, which should not prove very challenging for most of our regular crew.    The use of words like arrestment and thearchy seems a little forced, but the cryptics are very helpful.     With only the early solvers in, the SNITCH is at 62.    I did have to write down the letters for the longer anagrams, but then I saw them at once.     The only biff was accompaniment, which is a bit tricky.

1 What goes with endless fear encapsulated by current criticism? (13)
ACCOMPANIMENT – A/C COM(PANI[c])MENT.   Comment and criticism as in the sense of literary criticism.
8 Dodgy dealer bowling top people over (4)
SPIV – VIPS backwards, a bit of a chestnut.
9 Driver to acclaim, restricting a disturbance (10)
CHARIOTEER – CH(A RIOT)EER.
10 Explosive women at matches in the isles (8)
HEBRIDES – H.E. + BRIDES.
11 Fade away very quietly with end of the port (6)
DIEPPE – DIE + PP + [th]E, the site of the famous disaster in 1943.
13 Bank’s ideal after change, split up into smaller units (10)
BALKANISED – Anagram of BANK’S IDEAL.
16 Keen on being at home with set of books around (4)
INTO – IN + O.T backwards.
17 Girl suffering alongside Jack (4)
JILL – J + ILL, which many will biff because of Jack and Jill.
18 Stoppage? Restart somehow involves workers (10)
ARRESTMENT – Anagram of RESTART around MEN.
20 Join forces as side promoted (4,2)
TEAM UP – TEAM + UP.
22 The cunning strategy’s ending divine rule (8)
THEARCHY – THE + ARCH + [strateg]Y
24 South Americans support huge numbers reportedly (10)
BRAZILIANS – BRA + sounds like ZILLIONS.
26 Suffering from severe cold, Greek character encounters doctor (4)
NUMB – NU + M.B, classic crosswordese.
27 Chair’s fresh prop is so shaky (13)
PROFESSORSHIP – Anagram of FRESH PROP IS SO.
Down
1 Drug Emma, suffering with the pain (11)
AMPHETAMINE – Anagram of EMMA + THE PAIN.
2 Protect cold maiden maybe (5)
COVER – C + OVER.
3 End up entertaining super fellow in part of southern Europe (9)
MACEDONIA – M(ACE DON)IA, i.e. AIM upside down.
4 Collects are primarily associated with church services (7)
AMASSES – A[re] + MASSES.
5 One young man penning one long poem (5)
ILIAD – I L(I)AD.
6 Ditched female maybe shakes, not half — is male displaying bigotry? (9)
EXTREMISM – EX + TREM[bles] + IS + M.
7 Bond and M avoiding prison sentence (3)
TIE –  TI[m]E.
12 New form of heat pump not widely established (3,2,3,3)
PUT ON THE MAP – Anagram of HEAT PUMP NOT.
14 Buddhist monk with musical instrument going about US city (9)
KALAMAZOO – KA(LAMA)ZOO.
15 Perhaps vending machine is getting spender confused outside (9)
DISPENSER – Anagram of SPENDER around IS.
19 What may be observed in spiritual settings? (7)
RITUALS – Hidden in [spi]RITUAL S[ettings].
21 Plant’s vitality (5)
PULSE – Double definition.
23 Top section of tree farm (5)
RANCH – [b]RANCH, a chestnut for sure.
25 Rebuke artist on piano (3)
RAP – R.A. + P.

68 comments on “Times 29323 – Anagram city!”

  1. Around 25 minutes, my fastest ever with 15 minutes writing answers in grid.
    Thanks V for parsing of EXTREMISM.

  2. At 22:34, I should have been way faster on this but just couldn’t get going after getting out of bed very much on wrong side. ACCOMPANIMENT was a bit tricky, as you say. KALAMAZOO feels a bit chestnutty somehow, but I had never solved it in a crossword before – I’m sure I won’t forget it! Had assumed JILL was just a thin cryptic definition – guess not. Wishing all better luck than I had! Thanks vinyl1 and setter.

  3. Just lost everything with an error 500. Been happening all weekend for me. Seems to only happen when posting a comment.

    Same experience as the blogger. Fastest one ever for me I think, not that I ever time myself preferring to just enjoy the challenge. COD to EXTREMISM for ‘ditched female, maybe = ex’ part of the clue, clever.

    Thanks V and setter.

    1. I had the 500 problem a lot last week and improvements were made, but it’s an ongoing issue that I know is still under review. In the meantime, if you have the means to do so, I suggest copying comments (particularly lengthy ones) to the clipboard before clicking the Post Comment button. Then you can try again or if it still errors, paste and save the comment into some sort of document and try again later.

      1. Or prepare comments in Word, select for copy and insert online – probably what jackkt has suggested in different terms.

          1. Admirable – and there’s no doubt something similar if U want to do it from Android or iphone.

          2. Sticky Notes, standard on Windows, is also available. Once accessed the first time (via a search on the Start button) save it as an icon on your toolbar. Messages written there save automatically and can be left open or closed and restored later with a single click.

  4. If 20 is my arbitrary cut-off point where easier starts getting harder, my time of 18.50 puts this very much on the easy side of the ledger. I would have been several minutes quicker except for hold-ups in the NW, where I got all mixed up identifying definition and anagrist for AMPHETAMINE. After sorting that my LOsI were SPIV and COVER. It also took me quite a long time to get started at all, so I was expecting a much slower time than I eventually recorded. Thanks V and setter.

    From Roll On, John:
    Tyger, tyger, burning bright
    I pray the Lord my soul to keep
    In the forests of the night
    COVER him over, and let him sleep
    Shine your light, move it on
    You burned so bright
    Roll on, John

  5. Nothing too hard. As often happens, my LOI was RITUALS the hidden that I completely missed earlier. I have actually been to Kalamazoo since there is an automotive R&D office there (General Motors, I think). It’s a bit of a stretch to call a Kazoo a musical instrument though. I wondered for a moment about PULSE as a plant rather than the bean-like things they grow, but the dictionaries support it.

  6. That was fun! Plenty easy, but with the added spice of the rare THEARCHY and ARRESTMENT, neither of which I may ever see again.

  7. Fortunately I don’t do these things on the train, as I confess to emitting a loud expletive when the pink square appeared for PROFESSORSJIP / RANCJ. And I was sure I had checked. Oh well.

    Would’ve been 8:26 otherwise, very Monday-ish but still enjoyable. Like Paul I took a while to parse my LOI, the hidden-in-plain-sight RITUALS.

    Thanks setter and Vinyl.

  8. 12:33. Over par according to the SNITCH but just pleased to finish after a run of 8/10 DNF. I particularly liked JILL – excellent clue.

  9. 26 minutes. The abundance of long anagrams helped and I don’t have any qualms about writing them down as I’m very bad at seeing them when presented as a string of letters. That’s why I’m useless at the final round of Countdown.

    1. The contestants have paper and pen to hand. I use the circular method for anagrams, only really useful today for 1d.

  10. DNF. Very fast apart from the NE, where I couldn’t construct ACCOMPANIMENT, CHARIOTEER or MACEDONIA, all quite similar containment clues.

    Easier vocabulary today, although ARRESTMENT looks odd.

    COD KALAMAZOO

  11. 22 minutes. I didn’t take the trouble to properly parse everything but the two uncommon words pointed out by Guy plus BALKANISE kept me on my toes, as did the ‘musical’ instrument’ and ‘US city’ at 14d.

    Favourite was the image of Jack and JILL and their misadventures when fetching that pail of water.

  12. 25:02. It took a while to find my FOI (ILIAD, I think). LOI RITUALS. I liked JILL and the explosive women of the HEBRIDES

  13. 22 minutes with LOI ARRESTMENT, an odd word. COD to KALAMAZOO, known from Glenn Miller and my Dad’s love of big band music. A nice way to start the week. Thank you V and setter.

  14. 30 mins with nothing too tricksy, typical Monday fare and none the worse for that. LOI THEARCHY which is an odd word.

    Like Jack I found I needed to write most of the anagrams down to unravel them. Good fun.

    Thanks V and setter.

  15. 29 minutes. ACCOMPANIMENT and EXTREMISM combined to hamper an otherwise smooth and steady solve. NHO ARRESTMENT but it looked OK so in it went without let or hindrance. CHARIOTEER employed only after first sight suggested chauffeuse, to be swiftly succeeded by the obligatory mental image from Ben Hur.
    Most enjoyable start to the week. Thanks to setter and vinyl1.

  16. I beg to differ on the Mondayness at 27 mins. .
    Many of the definitions failed to trigger the synonyms to allow biffing which pretty much describes off-wavelength I suppose. Lots of wading through anagrams which I don’t mind but made it slow. It felt like an unfamiliar setter.
    Still not sure about RANCH which was a rare biff and shrug.
    Quite liked BALKANISED and AMPHETAMINE.
    Thanks to vinyl and setter.

  17. Flying today, fifth fastest ever at 8’16”.

    Banged in JILL with a shrug, unparsed. Two strange words – THEARCHY and ARRESTMENT, pretty clear.

    Thanks vinyl and setter.

  18. About 20 minutes.

    – ARRESTMENT and THEARCHY were in the “Well I guess they’re words” category
    – Dimly remembered KALAMAZOO, probably from a previous crossword
    – RANCH may be a chestnut, but it took me a while to work out what was going on

    Apologies if I’m falling into a cleverly laid pedantry trap, but the Dieppe Raid was in 1942, not 1943.

    Thanks vinyl and setter.

    FOI Amphetamine
    LOI Accompaniment
    COD Put on the map

  19. Fairly quick solve, done pre-work, with LOI BALKANISED being held up by putting a C at the beginning of CALAMAZOO, thus not seeing the anagram for 13a! Some slightly strange vocabulary, but all solvable with clear wordplay.

  20. 9:33 Typically Mondayish with, as already noted, one or two slightly unusual words. Light relief after Friday’s trials.

  22. All pretty straightforward, so straightforward in fact that I thought the JILL clue was an extremely feeble CD, and only here noticed how nice it is. A slight delay on CHARIOTEER sent me a few seconds over the 30 minute mark.

  23. Was going well until I hit the SW corner. Then took a long tine to see KALAMAZOO, BRAZILIANS, and PULSE. Never did parse JILL so was not sure of that either.

    Thanks setter and V (especially for the parsing of JILL)

  24. My thanks to vinyl1 and setter.
    LOsI 23d Ranch (biffed) and 19d Rituals where I never saw that it was a hidden. Oh well, I do miss a lot of hiddens.
    POI 14d Kalamazoo; does anyone else remember the eponymous paper system for record-keeping?
    Just got several 500 errors. Glad I use notepad to compose my offering.

  25. 12:15 – a speedy Monday as observed above. Minor stumble around THEARCHY after entering THEO and then wondering how to proceed, but nothing else to report.

  28. 37:03 for me, so it must have been an easy one. I parsed all of them except possibly RANCH – is this “section of tree” (branch) being “topped” (first letter removed), as in the phrase “top and tail”?

    Thank you for the blog!

  30. Usually I would be fairly pleased with a finishing time of 29.15, but I somehow feel it was easier than that, as one or two clues held me up for longer than they should have. LOI JILL being a typical example.

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