Times Cryptic 29364 – Sat, 18 October 2025. Peasy?

Author   branchPosted on Categories Weekend Cryptic

After a full week, I don’t remember much about this. Perhaps it was easy?

Thanks to the setter. How did you do?

Note for newcomers: The Times offers prizes for Saturday Cryptic Crosswords. This blog is for last week’s puzzle, posted after the competition closes. So, please don’t comment here on this week’s Saturday Cryptic.

Definitions are in bold and underlined. With the luxury of a week to do the blog, I can expand on how the wordplay works, so instructions copied from the clues to explain the wordplay are shown thus. Anagram material is (THUS)*. A ^ symbol indicates where text is to be inserted.

Across
1 Dissolution of reason infuses wicked behaviour (13)
NEFARIOUSNESS – anagram, dissolution of: (REASON INFUSES)*
9 Regularly avoid only a low-sounding instrument (5)
VIOLA – alternate letters (regularly) of:  aVoId OnLy A.
10 Outlaw, finally arrested, sure makes a fuss (9)
DESPERADO – DES [arresteD + surE + makeS, finally] + PER [a] + ADO [fuss]
11 Optimistic Tories tend to be disordered (4-6)
ROSE TINTED – anagram, disordered: (TORIES TEND)*
12 Divine figure, somewhat authoritarian (4)
THOR – hidden (somewhat).
14 Select from list untrustworthy person receiving mass censure (7)
EMPANEL – E^EL [untrustworthy person] receiving M [mass] + PAN [censure]. The caret marks where to make the insertion.
16 Group lying maybe about discussions (7)
DEBATES – SET [group] + ABED [lying, maybe], all backwards (about).
17 What line is taken by productive biologist? (7)
EHRLICH – EH [what?] + L taken by R^ICH [productive]. Paul Ehrlich, author of The Population Bomb.
19 One attempt to track advanced skin condition (7)
LENTIGO – I + GO to track (follow) LENT [advanced]. Also known as “liver spots”.
20 Put part of old radio back (4)
LAID – DIAL back.
21 Worker made matching boxes for fair (4-6)
EVEN HANDED – EVEN^ED [made matching] boxes HAND [worker].
24 When adjusted, a lens can start to observe at the very finest level (9)
NANOSCALE – anagram, when adjusted: (A LENS CAN O)*.   “O” comes from the “start to Observe”.
25 Standard chapter by mystery writer? (5)
CANON – C by ANON.
26 Criminal cons tourist to enter extremely desirable shop (8,5)
DISCOUNT STORE – ISCOUNT STOR [anagram, criminal, of CONS TOURIST] to enter DE [extremely DesirablE].
Down
1 HP Lovecraft’s first piece with an imaginary universe? (5-5,4)
NEVER NEVER LAND – NEVER NEVER [HP: hire purchase] + L [Lovecroft’s first] + AND [with].
2 Fails miserably following cuts (5)
FLOPS – F [following] + LOPS [cuts].
3 Game reprobate set up involves endless change (4,6)
REAL TENNIS – RE^NNIS [SINNER backwards (set up)] involves ALTER [change, endless].
4 Perhaps second stage of infancy is filled with much noise (7)
ORDINAL – OR^AL filled with DIN. What’s “oral” got to do with infancy? Blame Freud! Read more here.
5 Temporarily stop rise of American disbursement (7)
SUSPEND – SU [rise of U.S.] + SPEND [disbursement].
6 Former city CEO? (4)
EXEC – EX + EC [postcode of “the City”].
7 Might you wind up helping yourself to this? (9)
SPAGHETTI – cryptic definition. You might wind it around your fork!
8 Agreement in writing (14)
CORRESPONDENCE – two meanings.
13 Ace cake provided by ball’s hosts (10)
ABUNDANCES – A [ace] + BUN [cake] + DANCES.
15 Do protein shakes split when served? (9)
PORTIONED – anagram, shakes: (DO PROTEIN)*
18 Try hard, after voicing enthusiasm up front in the past (4,1,2)
HAVE A GO – HAVE [first letters (up front) of Hard + After + Voicing + Enthusiasm] + AGO [in the past].
19 Light from back of vessel followed by an aquatic bird (7)
LANTERN – L [back of vesseL] + AN + TERN.
22 Two numbers covered by The White Stripes? I haven’t the foggiest! (5)
DUNNO – NN [two number N’s] covered by DU^O [NHO of The White Stripes, but they were a 1990s rock duo].
23 Requests things to do, but with no time (4)
ASKS – TASKS with no T.

22 comments on “Times Cryptic 29364 – Sat, 18 October 2025. Peasy?”

  1. 35:46
    I couldn’t parse 1d and 118d. NHO the rock duo, but assumed that that’s what they were; having the checkers made it a fairly safe assumption.

    1. I couldn’t parse NEVER NEVER LAND, although I hardly tried as it was very obviously correct. I have heard of the White Stripes and know that they are a rock duo; I assumed for a long time that they were brother and sister, since both have the surname White, but they are not; the male member’s (ooh-er missus) name is really Jack Gillis, not Jack White.

      I’d never heard of Ehrlich, but the word play was a bit of a gimme.

      I didn’t think the crossword was especially easy, but it was doable and I completed it; I didn’t send it in though, never do.

  2. I always prefer ‘ less difficult’ than ‘easy’ when describing Times crosswords but I agree that this one was eminently doable.
    Was completely thrown by HP Lovecraft , but now I know , it takes you back to the 50’s and 60’s when HP/ the ‘never, never’ was very widely used, before the invention of credit cards.

  3. Ah, gee, I didn’t know that definition of NEVER-NEVER but breezed right past it.

  4. Nice puzzle with.some good challenges. 50 minutes, held up trying to remember the biologist and EMPANEL, and by the parsing of ORDINAL (DNK that meaning of ’oral’). COD 1dn.

    1. The Ehrlich I eventually recalled was the German one who came up with a cure for syphilis in the early C20.

  5. 35 minutes. The long answers went in early so that was a help. I had a few delays in the lower half.

  6. Done in 37:02. But aids needed for LENTIGO and EHRLICH, neither heard of, and not easy to guess. Don’t understand advanced=lent, and I had the wrong EH for EHRLICH.

    Couldn’t parse DEBATES

    ABUNDANCE and DESPERADO both seem like they are appearing frequently at the moment.

    COD NEVER NEVER LAND

  7. This was ‘not too bad’ – a genuine Australian expression.
    I somewhat admired 22d DUNNO and 25ac CANON.
    Thought EEL a bit of a stretch in context for 14ac EMPANEL, also as ‘select from list’. Had to come here for parsing of 16ac DEBATES.
    Skin condition 19ac LENTIGO and 17ac EHRLICH required crossers and research to fit clue. Like some others just guessed 1d NEVER NEVER LAND from apparent meaning and crossers.
    Still do not quite understand 6d EXEC – EC ? (It’s not Clapton).
    Apologies for any crossings of posts – I have read and will read further.
    Thank you setter and branch.

  8. Two goes needed.

    – Didn’t parse DESPERADO
    – NHO the biologist EHRLICH but eventually got there from wordplay
    – Not familiar with LENTIGO either, though again the wordplay helped
    – Had absolutely no idea what was going on with NEVER-NEVER LAND as I hadn’t heard of never never meaning hire purchase

    Thanks branch and setter.

    FOI Viola
    LOI Ehrlich
    COD Never-Never Land (now that I get it!

  9. My thanks to branch and setter.
    On the whole easyish, but DNF at 17a and cheated for 1d.
    17a NHO Paul Ehrlich, not found in Cheating Machine, now added.
    1d Never never land. Cheated by looking up HP Lovecraft which did the opposite of helping. So nothing else would fit but I could not parse it.
    4d Ordinal. Oh, thanks branch for the psychobabble, I didn’t understand the clue. I’m being rude about Freud (who’s dead so won’t mind) not the blogger nor the setter!
    22d Dunno, NHO White Stripes, didn’t need them.

  10. 16.54

    Blessed relief after yesterday’s monster (I do them a week in arrears). EMPANEL and EHRLICH needed thought at the end but otherwise I thought my okay time was down to the gentleness of the puzzle though Kevin’s time suggests it wasn’t a gimme.

    Thanks Bruce/setter

  11. 11:00. No problems.
    A bit odd to see Paul EHRLICH defined as a biologist, when he’s most famous for being spectacularly wrong in a different field. Perhaps the question mark is part of the definition.

  12. Anyone else having a problem loading the cryptic from the week before on the iPad app? All other puzzles load, just not the cryptic. This has been happening for about 2 months now. I’ve deleted and reloaded the app. Any other suggestions anyone? Very frustrating!!!

  13. I thought it quite tricky, with several unparsed, or only parsed later. NHO EHRLICH, NANOSCALE, BHO LENTIGO, both worked out from wordplay. Couldn’t parse DUNNO or ORDINAL, still don’t get the latter. I did eventually parse NEVER-NEVER LAND, which gets my COD, with memories of my mother warning me not to buy anything I couldn’t afford to pay for, as the never-never would land me in debt forever!

    1. Second, like first, third, etc. is an ORDINAL number (as opposed to cardinal numbers like 1, 2, etc.).

  14. I practically sailed through this (by my standards!) having difficulty with only the one: EHRLICH, of whom I HNH, and I was attempting to wrap the middle letters in the EH for the what? I certainly didn’t get the Freudian reference at 4d, but what else could it be? Really liked SPAGHETTI ( for the word-play) and DUNNO. Getting there at last…

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