Cryptic 28031 July 16, 2021 holding blog

This was really really hard and I threw in the towel at 35 minutes with one I had to look up (13D) and 3 I couldn’t parse.  We badly need Verlaine, who managed it in 15 according to the club board.  This is just bare bones until he comes to the rescue.  John Interred is probably going to come along right away and fix up the bits i’ve missed or skimped.

Across

1.  OVID.  O=ball.  VID=film
4.  BACKGAMMON.  BACK=second.  GAM=leg.  MON.
9.  PARANORMAL.  Anagram of or an alarm
10.  WORN.  WO=without.  RN=service.
11.  VOLUME.  Double def.
12.  IMMODEST.  I’m. MODES=manners.  T=cross.
14.  TOWN. Subtract HR=hour from thrown=cast.
15.  PITCH BLACK.  Pitch=dive. B=B[omber] Lack=want.
17.  CORRESPOND.  R in cores=hearts.  Pond=Atlantic.
20.  SUDS.  Last letters of operas you would guess.
21.  MADHOUSE.  Mouse=retiring individual containing ADH=had confused (no I’m not sure I get it either).  [On edit, see Pootle infra].
23.  STEELY.   STE=blessed female.  ELY=see.
24.  AWOL.  A wol[f]=endless bolt.
25.  FOOTBRIDGE.  Anagram of get rid of bo.
26.  HANKY PANKY.  Rag=hanky.  Change H to P[age] in second (repeated) one
27  GURU.  Goo and rue – homophones.

Down.

2.  VIA DOLOROSA.  Anagram of OR=men with also avoid.
3.  DO A RUNNER.  AKA taking french leave.
4.  BOOZE UP.  Bop=jazz containing OZ and EU.
5.  COME INTO ONES OWN.  Come into one sow from pig farm with N from son.
6.  GALUMPH.  Lag reversed with U and mph.
7.  MOOSE.  Nope, didn’t see this one, thanks to John Interred for the parse.  it’s ELK frpm feckless reversed.
8.  NONET.  Tenon-joint revesed.
13.  SOCKDOLAGER.  Looked this up finally – DNK the word.  Sock=punch.  Lager=beer containing Do=party.
16.  LISTENING.  Lenin=red containg IST=first with G[olf].
18.  STUFF UP.  Gorge=stuff.  Hike=up.
19.  DISOBEY.  Cryptic.[Another one I missed.  [On edit and thanks to John Interred – it’s an anagram of I=one does by.]
21.  MEATH.  Remove EAD (English ad) from meathead.  Didn’t get this either.  Thanks Sawbill.
22.  DROWN.  N Word=promise reversed.

63 comments on “Cryptic 28031 July 16, 2021 holding blog”

  1. Hardest (weekday) one this year according to the SNITCH. No proper time due to several interruptions but would have been off the scale. Eventually finished with all present and correct though with IMMODEST and MADHOUSE unparsed. Spent ages on MOOSE at the end and only parsed it post-solve. SOCKDOLAGER was an NHO and so was entered as per wordplay instructions.

    Thank you very much to Olivia for filling in. Verlaine must be recovering (or celebrating) after his 15 min solve.

  2. Thanks for stepping in Olivia. MADHOUSE is a Spoonerism (initial confusion) of HAD MOUSE. Nice to have a Spoonerism not indicated as such for a change.
  3. Well done, Olivia, This was a stinker that took me more than an hour. I needed a hint from a colleague for the MOOSE loose aboot this hoose, and an aid for SOCKDOLAGER. I just guessed MADHOUSE and MEATH. COD to VIA DOLOROSA for accurately describing how I felt solving this puzzle. Thank you again to Olivia and setter.
  4. 19dn is (i does by)* I think. (John interred and I crossed.)

    How hard. Well done Olivia. The trouble with 21dn was that it could also have been Louth if you couldn’t cope with the wordplay.

    I knew sockdolager: wonderful word used by Horowitz in a chess book written probably around 1950.

    Edited at 2021-07-16 12:55 pm (UTC)

  5. Nice for once to see the Brits leading the charge!

    DNF in two sessions of about 40 mins each – but much enjoyed except for 7dn MOOSE and 10ac WORN the latter I should have seen but never the former.

    FOI 9ac PARANORMAL

    LOI 24ac AWOL and my WOD!

    26ac HANKY-PANKY, 4dn BOOZE-UP!, 14ac TOWN, 21ac MADHOUSE and 3dn DO A RUNNER were all rather neat.

    13dn SOCKDOLAGER was a write in – even though it was never in my vocab. The VIA DOLOROSA at 2dn suddenly appeared

    Thank-you Olivia

    Edited at 2021-07-16 01:08 pm (UTC)

  6. He must have ‘had a turn’, with the Snitch at 185, this was a day to remember/forget. The ‘sickie’ will be of great interest! I failed at 7dn MOOSE – ELK!? My COD to 27ac GURU and my sympathies to Olivia.

    Edited at 2021-07-16 01:20 pm (UTC)

  7. Obviously this was a swine, and my 37. 42 reflects that.
    A major hold up was a double blunder at 7d, where I saw, the backward elk, and americanised it as BISON. Yeah, I know moose is an American elk and bison is a European buffalo, but I was already blitzed.
    If SOCKDOLAGER hasn’t turned up in a CMS it will. It has been in a Mephisto in 2015, and I’d like to claim I remembered it, but I just went on the wp.
    MEATH, AWOL and MADHOUSE on hit and hope, the first only from the wp, — I saw meathead — the other two from definition. DISOBEY I thought was a pretty poor CD, Missed the too-clever wp.
    Not a whole lotta fun, but thanks Oliviaand Co for filling in.
    1. I missed that there was an anagram in there. Very clever. This was my last in after I finally saw CORRESPOND. Despite several alphabet trawls when I had __S_B_Y I couldn’t see it but then when I had the D I got it immediately. Funny how the certainty of the first letter enabled me to see it.
  8. ….a MOOSE or an elk, it was certainly a beast ! Many thanks to Olivia for stepping into the breach.

    I had to correct “Via Doloroso” in passing.

    NHO SOCKDOLAGER, but the parsing was clear. My problems (solved by others !) was the inability to parse the crossing pair of STEELY (DNK the feminine of saint), and LISTENING (Lenin was rather clever !)

    FOI OVID
    LOI MOOSE
    COD DO A RUNNER
    TIME 24:55

  9. I don’t do either of those. Only other place I could think of would be the Listener.
  10. Thank you to Olivia for the holding blog.

    Well beaten after my usual 30 minutes. Only because I was sat in a car helping out a friend did I have the time to work out some of those remaining.

    Clever but too tough to be pleasurable.

  11. As for my own solve… DNF after an hour and resorted to aids to find MOOSE and finish with WORN. What a RIPSNORTER (and hello to today’s QC solvers)!

    Edited at 2021-07-16 01:06 pm (UTC)

  12. 24:18. This was very hard but I absolutely loved it. Full of originality and satisfying penny-drops. Not every day though, eh?
    Somehow I knew SOCKDOLAGER, I’ve no idea where from. It appeared in a Mephisto several years ago but I’m sure I’ve come across it more recently than that.

    Edited at 2021-07-16 01:12 pm (UTC)

    1. Curiously I searched and found it in that Mephisto and also thought I’d seen it more recently.
      1. Weird! Maybe it appeared somewhere else recently: Guardian or Azed perhaps?
    2. I knew I’d seen it recently. Socdolagers (missing the K) appeared in Mephisto 3157 on Sunday 28th of Feb this year:

      Fresh cods so large – whoppers (11)

  13. Thanks so much for stepping in Olivia. I needed an hour for this and even then some answers (eg MOOSE) went in only because they fitted, and I still have queries (eg STE = blessed female?). I hope V has a valid sick-note!
  14. Needed two attempts to complete this. Didn’t fully parse AWOL or LISTENING, figured out the unknown VIA DOLOROSA and SOCKDOLAGER from the wordplay, guessed that “Ste” would be a female saint, and didn’t have a clue what was going on with the bunged in MADHOUSE or MOOSE – both far too clever for me. Thanks Olivia!

    FOI Suds
    LOI Moose
    COD Guru

  15. Crikey. So relieved to see the snitch rating is 183. Like everyone else I found this a bit of a killer, and several answers went in unexplained. Luckily they were all correct. I can only echo some other comments. STE for blessed female seems a bit unfair. I mean, not all female saints are French – which is where it comes from presumably. I saw the elk in 7 down, and correctly deduced moose. But I still don’t see how it works as a clue. Nearly convinced myself that a louthead existed. Should do really. And sockdolager I just had to assume was a word. Spent hours on Disobey , even though I’d seen it was an anagram of I D O E S B Y. Just couldn’t get it! Suds came late, but was worth the wait. And in retrospect I do admire the hidden spoonerism in 21A. Overall a real challenge for which many thanks!
    1. ELK (what a European would call MOOSE) is displayed in reckless, when it is reversed (flipping)
      1. A European would say elch, alce or even wapiti. Only we English would say moose. Flipping feckless!

        Edited at 2021-07-16 04:56 pm (UTC)

        1. We English are Europeans! And I expect a Norwegian speaking English would also say elk.

          Edited at 2021-07-16 05:32 pm (UTC)

          1. But we English are no longer in Europe! Brexit! My new passport (blue) says BRITISH. My old red one (with the corner removed) said EUROPEAN. The Nowegian is actually Elg.

            The Chinese have a saying:- A dog may live in a stable – but that doesn’t make him a horse.

            1. The EU is not Europe. We are and will always be in Europe, which is why Brexit is so stupid!
              [winces in expectation of being expelled]
              1. For the British, Europe is a state of mind – ever in flux. Brexit was incredibly stupid! We were deeply in Europe until the Treaty of Versailles and were not back in until 1946, once the Kaiser and all his cronies were dispatched. Only when ‘Grocer’ Heath discovered Brussels did we feel remotely European. I won’t repeat the famous words of Coco Chanel or I too will be wincing! Bon soir!
  16. That was hard, but I was all correct. I put in MOOSE since I couldn’t think of anything else but I was sure it was wrong. And, of course, having constructed SOCKDOLAGER out of a kit of parts, I was very unconvinced it was even a word. I think that was the hardest crossword I can remember recently.
  17. Doesn’t seem to have appeared in any of the Listeners I’ve attempted — I only started very recently so there aren’t many!
        1. I came across it somewhere recently too… if it wasn’t here, could it have possibly been in one of Joshua and Henri’s, or at The New York Times? Can’t for the life of me remember…
        2. I’m glad my little gag was appreciated by a couple of you. Frustratingly LiveJournal won’t let you post exactly the same thing twice, so I had to add the extra .
  18. Gave up after more than an hour with nine left. Thanks to those of you esp. Olivia who pieced it back together, and completed the blog.
  19. It was crazy tough, but not as bad as 26 October 2020! And just wait until next Friday! Meldrew
  20. No time this afternoon, as I decided, after this morning’s experience, that I would play around with the puzzle while watching the world’s best golfers test themselves at Sandwich.
    I found this really difficult but funnily enough I discovered that dipping in and out of the solving process meant that I could approach some clues afresh and suddenly see the light. Whereas when I’m concentrating 100% on a puzzle, I’m guilty of repetitive rather than flexible thinking when the going gets tough.
    This was a highly original set of clues and thus very satisfying to solve, although in my case that process was incomplete, with 10 ac “worn” and 7 d “moose” refusing to budge. “Moose” is a superb clue now that I’ve worked it out!
    CODs — most of ’em.
    Thanks to Olivia for stepping into the breach with a most concise blog and to setter for a cracking puzzle.
  21. Well done Olivia. Me, I gave up on the hour with MOOSE and WORN not entered, and having looked up the bizarre SOCKDOLAGER. Quite liked CORRESPOND but otherwise a real struggle. Didn’t like jumping for TENON going upwards either. SUDS was a clever clue. Thank you O and setter.
      1. I thought it was fine. A tenon is a joint and jumping means going up.

        As for the rest of the puzzle….

  22. The most obscure and opaque crossword we have ever attempted. Hope it’s a one off!
  23. Wow! Whew! Got ’em all, and in one session, just now. LOI MOOSE, when I finally saw the reverse hidden.
  24. DNF. Ran aground in the SW which was just too tough for me. Bravo Olivia for the emergency blog.
  25. Tackled this after a day frying on the golf course. I managed to parse most of it and construct the unknown SOCKDOLAGER. MEATH and AWOL took an age to find, but MOOSE went in because it fitted. Phew! 56:23. Thanks setter and huge kudos to Olivia for stepping in. Above and beyond the call of duty indeed!
  26. So late to this one that Verlaines blog appeared with one comment. My RENTBOY held everything up at the end.
  27. Well done, Olivia! I gave up after about 65mins and went to bed with no blog up and running. MOOSE and WORN were my stumbling blocks.
  28. Driving home was one of those trials
    (Burnt out lorry, the queue went for miles)
    Got home grumpy, I did
    Solved that pig of a grid
    Sense of triumph! And now I’m all smiles
  29. almost gave up, but after finally seeing WORN then LOI MOOSE went in simply because it was the only plural I could see to fit the checkers. Could ‘esoom’ mean ‘feckless’? It seemed doubtful, but I pressed submit for want of anything better. Thanks for the parsing John.
    43:05
  30. Tough indeed. I failed to finish, not finding the MOOSE and WORN crossers (also unsure how AWOL worked – ah, that kind of bolt).
  31. And now I know why — so tricky! Managed only about a third unaided but understood all the parsing, with thanks to Olivia, bar one. Probably a very beginner-ish question but why does OR = men (in biffed VIA DOLOROSA)? Thanks all. Glad to hear it was generally considered a challenge, and it hasn’t put me off trying again, well, not quite anyway!
    1. This was an absolute brute even for people who do the 15×15 every day and defeated some of the best solvers around. Come back on Monday if you have time – it should be a very different cup of. OR stands for “other ranks”, i.e. enlisted men. Setters seem to use it all the time because it comes in handy.

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