Times 25913 – where’s my car?

Author   glhPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
Solving time : 9:26 on the club timer, so that stinker I predicted yesterday did not come today. I suspect there will be faster times than mine, as I didn’t see a few of the longer entries immediately, and there were some places and people I got from wordplay alone that might be write-ins for the more Euro-savvy than me.

TOLD appears in the unches in the middle of the puzzle. I think that’s an completely circumstantial, however I’m notoriously terrible at spotting nina’s, so if there’s something else going on I could have missed it.

Away we go…

Across
1 RABBI(teacher),TED(young delinquent)
6 F,RAISE(hike): got this from the wordplay, I guess it’s a type of strawberry brandy, if such a drink needed to exist
9 LUNATIC FRINGE: (FRANTIC)*,1 in LUNGE
10 ON EDGE: ONE and then alternating letters in DaGgEr
11 MENSWEAR: ME then S(lo)W in NEAR
13 PECCADILLO: PEC(k), then CAD, I’LL, 0
15 DUD,(failur)E
16 THAI: first letters of Teaching Hasn’t Always Impressed
18 WANDERINGS: RING(group) in W,ANDES
21 UNDERCUT: double definition, one cryptic
22 FIGURE: double definition
23 ACCOMMODATION: DA(y) in AC,COMMOTION
25 PEWTER: W in PETER
26 FIL(e),AGREE
 
Down
2 ALLENDE: the Salvadorian president is hidden in whitehALL ENDEavouring
3 BENEDICTINE: BE NINE containing EDICT. I’ll take it over FRAISE anyday
4 TITLE: I think this is a triple definition – Mr by example a right, and what anyone playing sport may be after (that it says “sportswoman” specifically gives me a hint which setter may be responsible for this offering)
5 DECIMAL: (CLAIMED)*
6 FARANDOLE: (AN,OLD,FEAR)*
7 A,N,N
8 STEW,(h)ARD
12 WEDDING RING: this was my favorite clue of the day, WE, (appreciate)D then DING and RING are sounds of bells
14 DOWNCOMER: M(minute) in (WORD,ONCE)* not a term I’m familiar with (it isn’t in Chambers, and Collins appears to be down right now) so I got it from wordplay and checking letters. Searching online it appears to be what I would call a downspout?
17 HEN,BAN,E
19 NUTLOAF: NUT and LOAF can both mean head
20 GIRONDE: Andre GIDE surrounding R,ON. I knew this as a dance, didn’t know it was a region
22 FL,AIL: the abbreviation comes from FLORUIT
24 COT: take the A out of COAT

47 comments on “Times 25913 – where’s my car?”

  1. Was heading for sub-30 but got stuck in the NW failing for ages to spot the hidden answer and thinking the extremist group was a specific bunch of activists with some foreign name.

    DK DOWNCOMER and GIRONDE was a guess relying on wordplay that was not entirely safe though it turned out to be exactly so.

    Jim doesn’t seem to be around this week so far which may be just as well as the “delinquent” element in 1ac would incur his wrath.

    Knew FARANDOLE from the famous one by Georges Bizet:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ibd1-ooK5as

    Edited at 2014-10-09 05:04 am (UTC)

  2. 58 minutes for this tricky little number, which requires as George suggests quite a bit of general knowledge if one wants to post a fast time. My F&B blindspot caused particular roadblocks (none of FRAISE, BENEDICTINE, UNDERCUT and NUTLOAF being write-ins), while other unknowns included FARANDOLE and DOWNCOMER. Never knew a DUDE could be defined by his confidence.

    Fortunately, I have holidayed in the GIRONDE…

    WEDDING RING the pick of the crop for me.

    Edited at 2014-10-09 01:28 am (UTC)

  3. I suppose if one’s going to go just a bit overtime (33’+change), that’s the time to have 2 errors. I put in ‘filigree’, without bothering to check the wordplay; why should I? I’d never seen the other spelling. (Not that I’ve seen my spelling that often, either.) Was clueless with 15ac, and put in ‘dodo’ in desperation. Like Ulaca, I’ve never equated, or seen equated, dudes with confidence. FARANDOLE was ever so vaguely familiar–I had to check it after putting it in–DNK DOWNCOMER, nor FRAISE, but it seemed safe. Liked BENEDICTINE.
    1. Oops! Make that one error in mine too.

      Re dude, ODO has ‘a stylish and confident person: eg “cool dudes”‘ – but I reckon in their example ‘cool’ is doing most of the confidence- (and style-) denotation work.

      Edited at 2014-10-09 03:10 am (UTC)

    2. >…
      >I put in ‘filigree’, without bothering to check the wordplay; why should I? I’d never seen the other spelling.

      Oh yes you have, Kevin. At any rate you commented on a puzzle (No. 25,519) it appeared in.

  4. Just over an hour, but all done so a victory for me. I, too, liked wedding ring, and Allende appealed to me as well. I vote with the ‘well, maybes’ on dude, and couldn’t agree more regarding the somewhat questionable Fraise. Thanks for explaining the fl in flail.
  5. Opted for FILIGREE even though I could see that the wordplay indicated FILAGREE, fell asleep mid-solve, had to confirm FRAISE and FARANDOLE, needed help to get GIRONDE.

    Bit of a train wreck all round.

  6. But a heck of a lot longer than yesterday’s easy-ish number. Liked the Jewish take on Father Ted at 1ac.

    Lots of messing in the SE corner. Very tempted by the geographically almost-correct GARONNE at 20dn and, with Galsp. et al, FILIGREE which I think is the more usual spelling. A trap, perhaps, for Finals contestants to watch?

    Edited at 2014-10-09 05:02 am (UTC)

  7. 50 minutes – but put me down for FILIGREE too (note to self: don’t necessarily go with your first answer).
    Saw PECCADILLO straight away then talked myself out of it for quite a while (note to self: don’t necessarily ignore your first answer).
    My eyebrows raised somewhat by the meaning of FLAIL to mean flourish (as in flourishing a flag I presume), but then someone’s bound to say it’s in Collins or OED.
    Overall, quite a satisfying puzzle.
    1. Can’t find it directly but the Oxfords define both as “wave” with overtones of doing so wildly or ostentatiously.

  8. Another quick one for me today (just over 30 mins), with, I felt, several write-ins from definition (BENEDICTINE, ACCOMMODATION, PECCADILLO) which took a little unravelling afterwards.

    FRAISE, DOWNCOMER, FARANDOLE all put in from wp.

    Only one left completely unparsed at the end, and that was of course filigree.

  9. 28 minutes for a game of two halves. The top half went in quickly then after several blank minutes the bottom half went in slower but steadily.

    For once I was mindful of my parsing so managed to spell FILAGREE as required. I was unsure about GIRONDE as I thought I’d heard of the word but didn’t know what it meant and I couldn’t parse the clue. Not knowing GIDE I’d have complained about using an obscure author to clue an obscure word if I’d got it wrong. As I got it right I thought it was a good clue.

    COD to BENEDICTINE – I liked the clever reference to ‘one over the eight’.

      2. Only heard of Gide in crosswordland; in real life have read books by Sartre, Camus and (attempted) Proust.
        But the best-known French author would have to be Voltaire.

        Beaten by LOI FILIGREE; unparseable because it’s wrong. Couldn’t remember this spelling since last time.
        I knew the Gironde as a river running through Bordeaux – noticed that a few years back when the Tour was there, and clicked as to why their footy team is Girondins. Having river in the clue and a the answer (a river) clued by “area” was offputting.

        Untimed as interrupted midway, but seemed a bit harder than average in the SE.
        Rob

  10. I had accidentally spotted George’s time pre-solve, and in racing ineffectively to come close to it (13.8) managed to miss a craze of typos in the top left invalidating 3 entries. The sort you get from not looking at the screen as you type and either starting in square 2 with letter 1 or just heading in the wrong direction. AALLEND, OEEEDE, and BENEEICTINE, anyone?
    I hereby forfeit the right to giggle at those writing in FILIGREE in bright confidence, which I did until I checked the wordplay. I have two consolations. My ignominy will disappear from the charts by close of play, and when solving on paper, I can see what I’m writing in.
    DNK DOWNCOMER (Andy Flower by KP?) which may be one of those terms invented by the plumbing profession so that they can give a sharp intake of breath, a shake of the head, and a massive price hike.
    Chambers and I DNK FRAISE to be brandy, unless a brandy is a horizontal or nearly horizontal palisade. It might be.
  11. 13 mins but with a careless FILIGREE. I thought about the wordplay properly post-solve and changed it to the correct (and previously unknown) FILAGREE, but in a competition the damage would have been done. Of the others the RABBITED/TITLE crossers were my last ones in. I would have been quicker (but still wrong) if I had been able to see FARANDOLE and DOWNCOMER sooner than I did because both answers provided helpful checkers.

    The THAI/HENBANE crossers were my first ones in (slow start) and the latter brought to mind the episode of Plebs from a couple of weeks ago in which Grumio overdosed on the stuff and is chased around Rome by his hallucination of a giant chicken. I’m not convinced it works like that in real life but it was excellent comedy.

  12. Not that I should need it by now, but in the run-up to the competition, that tricky FILAGREE answer should act as a reminder that it’s never a bad idea to be able to show your working for every clue before submitting. If you can’t, it’s normally a clue that the error lies somewhere on your side of the keyboard (see also GARONNE, as noted above, which was another which almost looked so obvious as not to need parsing)…

    Anyway, this was deceptively tough, especially when it came to unknowns like FRAISE and DOWNCOMER, though the wordplay made them educated guesses rather than just guesses. A good challenge.

  13. 15m, but another FILIGREE here. I didn’t know it could be spelled any other way so bunged it in without thinking.
    I was also tempted by GARONNE.
    I’m familiar with FRAISE, but I was a bit puzzled by the definition because I was thinking of the liqueur, which isn’t a brandy. You need the eau de vie to make sense of the definition. It’s a bit out there, because you could substitute it with the name of pretty much any fruit in French: Poire William is perhaps the most common.

    Edited at 2014-10-09 09:21 am (UTC)

  14. Much longer today than yesterday’s offering, and with one incorrect. I too went for GARONNE knowing it was a river in or near Aquitaine, but couldn’t see the Author. I’d previously rejected the right answer for the same reason. Doh…

    I was about to quibble with Ulaca’s reply to Pootle above. What! GIND better known than Hugo? then I saw the second line. It’s a strange world, crosswordland.

    DNK FRAISE (that definition) or ALLENDE, but I did manage to spell Filagree correctly.

    Nice challenge, apart from my mistake.

  15. 20:37 … and pleasantly astonished that for once I didn’t fall into the filigree bear trap (used to trap bears of a delicate sensibility).

    I think I might have heard DOWNCOMER used here in Cornwall with reference to relocating brand consultants from London.

  16. Just overshot my half-hour target by a minute or so; should really join the “just bung it in” school and not fret about trying to reassure myself by sorting out the parsing. (Though, reading the comments above, I was wise to do so with 26 ac)

    Excellent puzzle, I thought, which used apparently formulaic clues to cleverly mislead. (e.g. “close to Aquitaine” which I thought was the E of FILAGREE)

    Couple of words I’d never heard of or had forgotten. (Must ask the local plumber if he’s ever fitted a DOWNCOMER: a new one to me.)

    I might have mentioned this before (in which case please indulge me) but BENEDICTINE is popular here in the North West, particularly in winter where “Benny and Hot” remains, I’m told, a tipple of choice. It is, apparently, a legacy of the Great War and the Pals Brigades of the Northern mill towns. Wags have re-interpreted the D.O.M. on the label (Deo Optimo Maximo) as Distillation Of Monks’ pee.

    1. I think it was Stephen Fry on an edition of QI who brought to my attention that the greatest consumption of Benedictine per head of population is not in Paris or Marseilles, but in Burnley…
      1. Turf Moor is also the only football ground where you can get A Benny and Hot at half time.
  17. . . . so not as straightforward as yesterday but not a stinker. DNK FRAISE but wrote it in and DOWNCOMER came from the clue (as it should). Nice to be reminded that it is not only the USA that has Presidents.
    1. George already has! It’s an abbreviation for fluorit, ‘flourished’ in Latin. I forgot to mention it earlier but this struck me as a bit obscure for the daily puzzle.
        1. Still, a bit Mephistoish. Not that it matters, because you don’t need it.
          Oh, and it’s floruit, not fluorit.

          Edited at 2014-10-09 11:27 am (UTC)

  19. Back to my usual hour mark today after few in a row finished smugly and quickly. Thanks blogger, have a few beginner Qs if someone could enlighten me…. Ted as delinquent? Got pewter from checkers and definition but Peter=safe was unknown to me? All help appreciated
    1. My take is that TED refers to teddy boy, pre-punk, pre-mod and pre-rockers delinquent youth. PETER as a safe is sometimes thought to be cockney rhyming slang (St Peter the keeper?), but is likely to be more general than that. It also means cell (as in prison slang) or vault.

      Like bfgee, I’m also a little confused by the FL abbreviation. Just seen that answered, thank you on edit.

      Edited at 2014-10-09 11:22 am (UTC)

    2. The definition of a ted (teddy boy) as ‘delinquent’ comes up from time to time. It’s controversial (particularly among respectable former teddy boys!) but supported by some of the dictionaries. Collins for instance.
      Remember ‘peter’ for safe. It’s another regular.

      Edited at 2014-10-09 11:24 am (UTC)

  20. 25 minutes. Another easy one, though it took me about seven minutes longer than yesterday’s, partly because of the unknown FRAISE, though the wordplay was clear enough, and some uncertainty about 6dn until I had enough letters in place. I’ve never seen that alternative spelling for FILIGREE, but I avoided the trap.
    A nice enough puzzle, though I thought the clue to 7dn was pathetic, more appropriate for a quickie.
  21. Just over half an hour, but fell for GARONNE, and couldn’t get DUDE, bunging in DIDO in desperation (yes I know she was a woman!) SO DNF. Damn.
  22. I had this pretty much knocked off in 15 minutes but got terribly stuck on my last 3 in the SE corner. Eventually I spotted the FL part of flail which gave me figure (no idea why that one took so long) and finally Gironde. I couldn’t parse this and thought it must be the author around R ples the E from Aquitaine to give just “area”. That gave me a choice of Pierre Giond or Francois Gaonn as the authors. Luckily I plumped for the former, also recalling (my Dad had a holiday home in SW France) that whilst there are departments called Lot et Garonne and Haute-Garonne there isn’t a plain Garonne.

    Tippex needed at 17 where I initially had herbane.

    Oops, forgot, 21:32 in the end

    Edited at 2014-10-09 11:55 am (UTC)

  23. Came home in 28 seconds over the half hour mark after convincing myself this was indeed the prophesied stinker when 4 minutes had passed by and no entries made. I liked WEDDING RING best but lots of fine clues to enjoy. I did parse FILAGREE and put it in assuming I had always misspelt it previously. Thanks for the blog which explained FLAIL for me.
  24. 28 minutes, all correct, but with a few unhappy write-ins; never seen the alternative spelling of FILIGREE before although I did put it in with an A, never heard of DOWNCOMER only got it from wordplay; unhappy with FRAISE as a brandy, at best it is an eau de vie made from the fruit. GIRONDE (33) is just up the road from me and is the largest Department of metro France by area, containing Bordeaux and the Medoc. It’s named afer the estuary which runs nearly 100km from Bordeaux to the Atlantic; the estuary begins where the Garonne and Dordogne rivers meet. Apologies if you knew this already, or didn’t want to know.
    Otherwise a fine puzzle of medium difficulty with some great clueing.
    1. An eau de vie made from fruit is a brandy. I wouldn’t call it that, but it’s in all the dictionaries.
    2. >…
      >never seen the alternative spelling of FILIGREE before although I did put it in with an A

      That’s more or less what you said the last time it appeared (in No. 25,519).

  25. About 20 minutes. I had also never seen FILAGREE but the wordplay couldn’t be read to support what I consider the actual spelling. Never heard of FRAISE either, but put it in anyway. Thanks to the wordplay for helping me reach the correct spelling of PECCADILLO. Regards.
    1. >…
      >I had also never seen FILAGREE

      Oh yes you had (in No. 25,519) – just like several others who made the same claim!

  26. Well, this was all a bit of a botched operation. The opening incision (LUNATIC FRINGE) went well, but a couple of the internal organs (FRAISE, FARANDOLE, and GIRONDE) baffled me completely, so as usual I just had a stab at stitching in whatever came to hand (ARAISE and GERONNE), closed up and hoped for the best. So, DNF and DNR.

    Frankly, I blame the French for all this. No civilised nation would make a brandy out of strawberries; and if Andre Gide had wanted to be more widely known, he should made the effort and written in gods’ own English. I’m sure the French are also behind the fence-sitting spelling of FILIGREE/FILAGREE.

  27. 11:23 for me. After another ludicrouly slow start, I eventually found the setter’s wavelength and posted a time which left me surprisingly well-placed on the TCC leaderboard.

    Perhaps I was helped by having added FILAGREE to my list of difficult words when it appeared 15 months ago in No. 25,519 (5 July 2013).

    If only they’d kept this one for the Championship …

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