Times Cryptic 29394 – Sat, 22 November 2025. Roses are red …

Author   branchPosted on Categories Weekend Cryptic

Smurfs are blue. I was sunny – how about you?

This was a Saturday of my favourite kind. Not too easy, not too hard. Thanks to the setter.

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 show how to get the answer appear thus. Anagram material is (THUS)*. A ^ symbol indicates where text is to be inserted.

Across
1 Avoid more bizarre film genre (4,5)
ROAD MOVIE – anagram (bizarre): (AVOID MORE)*
6 Some of Giuseppe’s tomato sauce (5)
PESTO – hidden (some of).
9 Other half of ripped carpet put back (7)
PARTNER – reversed (put back): RENT [ripped] + RAP [carpet].
10 Come to see lies are bad (7)
REALISE – anagram (bad): (LIES ARE)*
11 Stop cycling, and retreat (3)
DEN – END [stop], cycling the last letter to the front.
12 Desert Frank after change of heart (11)
UNINHABITED – UNINHIBITED [frank], changing the middle letter from I to A.
14 Lobby group and Liberal refused to agree (8)
CAMPAIGN – CAMP [group] + ALIGN [agree], with the L refused.
15 Batty woman in Alaska is trainspotter (6)
ANORAK – NORA [batty woman, apparently] in A^K [post code for Alaska].
I knew nothing about Nora Batty, but here it explains she was a character in Last of the Summer Wine, about which I am equally ignorant.
17 Still elated after departure of first couple (6)
STATIC – ECSTATIC, after departure of first couple of letters.
19 Caught friend inhaling a Senior Service in a lascivious way (8)
CARNALLY – C + ALLY inhaling A + R.N.
22 Bracket mum or dad with male sibling (11)
PARENTHESIS – PARENT + HE [male] + SIS [sibling].
23 Overheard a certain amount (3)
SUM – sounds (overheard) like SOME.
25 One clobbered senior — it clears the air (7)
IONISER – I [one] + ONISER [anagram, clobbered: SENIOR].
27 Confinement at home after case of lousy liquor (5-2)
LYING IN – IN [at home] after LY [case of LousY] + GIN.
28 Daughter on covers of Tatler and European Vogue (5)
TREND – D on TREN [covers of TatleR + EuropeaN].
29 Players kiss cheek (5,4)
BRASS NECK – BRASS [players] + NECK [kiss].
Down
1 Regularly reapplied for fleet (5)
RAPID – alternate letters (regularly) of  ReApPlIeD.
2 China kept in check by America and Nato? (7)
ACRONYM – CRONY [China, in the CRS sense of “pal” or “mate”] inside (kept in check by) A^M [America].
3 Measuring chaps’ allotment after second of surveys (11)
MENSURATION – MEN’S + U [second of sUrveys] + RATION.
4 Give bear nuts and waffle (8)
VERBIAGE – anagram (nuts): (GIVE BEAR)*
5 Crude foxhole close to enemy (6)
EARTHY – EARTH [foxhole] + Y [close to enemY].
6 Pulse beginning to alter after exercise (3)
PEA – A [beginning to Alter] after P.E.
7 Tot reportedly smelt extremely rank at first (7)
SNIFTER – SNIFT [sounds (reportedly) like SNIFFED] + ER.
8 Agreed over crucial day on Love Island (4-5)
OKEY DOKEY – O [over] + KEY [crucial] + D [day] + O [love, at tennis] + KEY [island].
Perhaps the setter was amusing himself, exploring different ways to clue the same thing!
13 Crazy family’s potential sources of embarrassment (6,5)
BANANA SKINS – BANANAS [crazy] + KIN’S [family’s].
14 Shoved chaps into hole in wall (9)
CASHPOINT – anagram (shoved): (CHAPS INTO)*
16 Old lady keeping gold only in vaults (8)
MAUSOLEA – M^A keeping AU [gold] + SOLE [only].
18 Settle in open country south of Arabia (7)
ARRANGE – AR [Arabia; yes, I checked: it’s in Chambers and Collins] + RANGE [open country].
20 Way to eat Indian spinach dish (7)
LASAGNE – LA^NE [way] contains (to eat) SAG [Indian word for spinach].
21 Singer and hubby periodically adopted cute kid (6)
CHERUB – CHER + UB [hUbBy, periodically].
24 Fur coats seen originally in ex-Soviet city (5)
MINSK – MIN^K [fur] coats S.
26 Blue heads of Smurfs are delightful (3)
SAD – First letters of each word (heads).
Smurfs are indeed blue!

34 comments on “Times Cryptic 29394 – Sat, 22 November 2025. Roses are red …”

  1. I could make no sense of 15ac and just went with the definition. NHO Nora Batty; the only Nora I know of is the heroine of A Doll’s House, who is not batty. Couldn’t parse CAMPAIGN. DNK BRASS NECK. I don’t think I’ve ever seen ‘shoved’ as anagrind before; just as soon not see it again.

  2. 14:43, just did it now. Agree that it was a Goldilocks level of difficulty, at least for my frazzled end-of-workweek brain. Needing to know SAG might be a bit of a stretch for those who haven’t frequented Indian restaurants all their lives.

    On BRASS NECK – there was a character called Brassneck in the Beano (or maybe Dandy), and a parody called Tinribs in Viz. Both could be very funny.

  4. 32 minutes, all parsed. Nice puzzle, with no NHOs. ‘Last of the Summer Wine’ ran for God knows how many series (30, apparently, from 1973 to 2010, 295 eps) on the Beeb, and is still being shown weekday evenings on the U & Drama channel. It featured a small group of male pensioners passing the time messing about and interacting with a few stereotypical female characters – but it had a certain charm and appealed to those who didn’t want to watch violence as entertainment.
    COD OKEY-DOKEY, with CAMPAIGN close behind..

  5. What passes for an easy one these days. I did wonder why Minsk is “Ex-Soviet,” rather than Belorusian. Last two in, ACRONYM and CAMPAIGN, took a while to surface.
    All you who haven’t heard of LOTSW should look up an episode, and keep an eye out for Nora Batty. It is gentle, quintessentially English humour. I think the scriptwriters did well to spin it out for 295 episodes, though!

  6. Probably another example of why Saturday is usually the sweet spot for me/us. A bit to admire here, also some questions.
    Rather took a fancy to 12ac UNINHABITED as clever and direct. Also 22ac PARENTHESIS even with slang, And took a shine to 7d SNIFTER – particularly for the hint of using the incorrect ‘smelt’in clue. There were others, too. But this was not too easy, surely!
    Thought 2d ACRONYM stretchy for going from ‘china’ to CRONY as synonym for ‘mate’, combined with AM for ‘america’ and a definition by example.
    Not sure whether to admire or criticise 8d OKEY DOKEY.
    There were the usual few UK GK, such as 29ac BRASS NECK, 5d EARTHY, and 14d CASHPOINT (a double whammy). Oh yes, and NORA in 15ac ANORAK – mentioned by Kevin Gregg – may not be UK specific?
    In 20d is SAG the Indian word for spinach? Saag curry is of course familiar.
    Would be grateful to know why ‘carpet’ = RAP in 9ac PARTNER.
    But, enjoyable for sure. Thank you setter and branch.

    1. To ‘carpet’ a subordinate (often military) is the same as to ‘rap’ ie castigate them for an infringement.

      1. Is the thinking on that more generic and like: ‘A rap over the knuckles’ ? or is that something peculiar to the UK military ?

        1. Collins has n. slang – “a legal charge or case”; ‘beat the rap’ (US and Canadian slang) “to escape punishment or be acquitted of a crime”; ‘take the rap’ (slang) “to suffer the consequences of a mistake, misdeed, or crime, whether guilty or not”.

  7. A great puzzle, but I was really held up at the end by LOI ACRONYM – definitions by example can be difficult to dig out. Also ARRANGE – I could hardly believe that Arabia could be AR. My POI was CAMPAIGN – excellent clue, but took ages to work out how Liberal worked, especially without the M checker. NHO MENSURATION. I liked the quirky OKEY-DOKEY, PARENTHESIS and ANORAK.

  8. My thanks to branch and setter.
    Took a moment to get started but then sped up a bit. Good puzzle.
    14a Campaign had me puzzled for a bit then a nice PDM.
    I liked 15a a(Nora)k Batty and 8d Okey dokey, which took a bit of working out.

  9. Did anybody else encounter the issue that the grid seemed to be wrongly printed for a while on some versions of the website?

  10. 34 minutes. A fairly typical Saturday for me. Not too difficult but I was stuck at the end. This time on ARRANGE, CAMPAIGN, ACRONYM and DEN. Thanks branch.

  11. 21 mins. Saturdays have been much easier lately. On Mon 10th Nov Paul.in.London posted a quote from the editor saying that he saved his personal favourite of the week for Saturday. I am obviously on a similar wavelength and very much enjoyed this one too.
    Shouldn’t Nato be NATO? It is the ACRONYM by example here. Still COD. Liked OKEY DOKEY too.
    Thanks branch and setter.

    2. Nato is a valid alternative to NATO as confirmed by Collins and ODE. Some acronyms become common nouns and are treated like others of the type e.g. laser and radar. Others if pronounceable as a word may use one capital letter followed by lower case, e.g. Nato and Unicef.

      1. Well, I guess there really was no doubt anyway. Those 4 letters capitalised or not could have only one likely meaning . . . still.

  12. 12 minutes.

    – I assume ‘desert’ as a definition is being used in an adjectival form to justify UNINHABITED? If so, that’s new to me
    – Not sure I’ve come across MENSURATION before either, but it sounded plausible
    – More familiar with the Indian spinach spelled saag rather than sag, as used in LASAGNE

    Thanks branch and setter.

    FOI Pea
    LOI Snifter
    COD Verbiage

    1. For “desert” as an adjective, Collins has “of, pertaining to, or like a desert; desolate; barren,” and for the first definition of “desolate,” “uninhabited; deserted.”

    2. I thought of a desert island. In cartoons they are mounds of sand emerging from the sea with a palm tree on, but “desert” must mean “uninhabited”, not “covered in sand like a desert”

    3. Sag is, after all, just a phonetic spelling of what is a Hindi or Bengali word, so there’s no definitive way to spell it.

  13. 57:57 but at least I finished. Many were very gettable but ACRONYM had me well and truly fooled, yielding only to an alpha trawl. CASHPOINT, ARRANGE, IONISER, and CAMPAIGN (which I never did parse) are some others that held me up for a long, long time. UNINHABITED was fun, and ACRONYM even more fun in spite of my exhausted state.

    Thanks setter and branch.

  14. Enjoyable puzzle. I don’t think I’ve encountered mensuration since elementary maths lessons during the early 70s. A blast from the past one might say.

    1. I thought that too! I remember the word used raise furtive giggles in some corners of the classroom.

  16. I’ve noticed that weekend crosswords have been easier than the weekday ones recently, now that those have had the difficulty dial turned to 11. This was on the easier side but it was a DNF as I foolishly put in ‘okey cokey’ (must’ve had ‘hokey cokey’ at the back of my mind) which then made TREND unsolvable too.

  17. I join the band of happy solvers who enjoyed this one. Not a push over by any means but steady progress throughout with a smile or two – especially for Nora (‘her’ house from the series is still proudly shown off by the good folk of Holmfirth).

  18. Yes I enjoyed this one too, as it was a sigh of relief after all the recent struggles with complex parsing involved. So got through in a reasonable time (for me), and all entered except for ACRONYM, where I was looking for a type of ware. Liked LYING-IN ( not given much time for this these days!) and ANORAK, for reminding me of the movie TRAINSPOTTING.

  19. Thanks setter and branch
    This was a bit easier than the recent ones that I have done, finishing in just a tick under the hour and only two minor parsing misses – didn’t know of the ‘NORA Batty’ character or show and overlooked the leading E from ‘extremely’ in the SNIFTER clue. Neither of them impeded in getting the right answer.
    Hadn’t seen the BRASS NECK term – was aware of the separate elements meaning cheeky but not together. Only knew of SAAG as the Indian vegetable .
    Finished in the NE corner with PEA, REALISE and that SNIFTER the last one in.

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