I didn’t find this too hard, 13:10 was my time. my LOI was 1A which always makes me a bit nervous as I proceed through the rest of the clues, with the nagging feeling that I will have to go back to it.
Merry Christmas to all.
Across
| 1 | Plant second border of sunflowers (4) |
| MOSS – MO (second) + S{unflower}S.
“In a mo”= “in a second” |
|
| 7 | Press and iron pants for detainees (9) |
| PRISONERS – (PRESS + IRON)* with “pants” as anagram indicator.
Immediately went for Iron=FE, but not right today |
|
| 9 | Finally watch The Godfather once in this place (4) |
| HERE – {watc)H + {TH}E {Godfathe}R + {onc)E
Call me a philistine, but I’ve never seen any of The Godfather films. |
|
| 10 | Perhaps boxes against coaches, missing the first right (10) |
| CONTAINERS – CON (against) + T{r}AINERS (coaches) with R{ight} deleted | |
| 11 | Charge attached to one vehicle (4) |
| TAXI – TAX (charge) + I (one) | |
| 12 | Comic prose about lab equipment (10) |
| MICROSCOPE – (COMIC PROSE)* | |
| 16 | Fling a menu, furiously expressive (10) |
| MEANINGFUL – (FLING A MENU)* | |
| 19 | Retired barrister you left fortune (4) |
| LUCK – KC (barrister) + U (you in textspeak) + L{eft}. All reversed [retired]
Now that barristers are now Kings Counsel this abbreviation is now in play. |
|
| 21 | Unclear if I intend to change key (10) |
| INDEFINITE – (IF I INTEND)* + E (a musical key) | |
| 23 | Bunch of people backing good horse (4) |
| GANG – NAG (horse) [backing = reversed] + G{ood} | |
| 24 | Reckless daughter with psychic powers endlessly berated (9) |
| DESPERATE – D{aughter} + ESP (psychic powers) + {b}ERATE{d} | |
| 25 | Found a buyer for firm leaving island (4) |
| SOLD – SOL{i}D (firm) with ths I{sland} deleted |
Down
| 2 | Area salesman brought up to support old musical theatre (5) |
| OPERA – A{rea} + REP (salesman) + O{ld} | |
| 3 | Sample rodents raised in ramshackle pens (8) |
| SPECIMEN – (PENS)* contains MICE(rodents) reversed | |
| 4 | Reportedly choose prison for al fresco meal (6) |
| PICNIC – Aural wordplay for “Pick Nick”, where Nick=prison
Nick for prison is Australian slang, from the 1880s |
|
| 5 | Weed starts to attack this organic vegetable (6) |
| POTATO – POT (weed) + A{ttack} T{his} + O{ganic}
Went for Tomato first, but couldn’t get weed=tom, although it does sound like plausible drug slang. |
|
| 6 | Marshy land contains river plant (4) |
| FERN – FEN (marshy land) contains R{iver} | |
| 8 | Southern church accepts blame for predicament (6) |
| SCRAPE – S{outhern} + CE (church) contains RAP (blame) | |
| 13 | Article in extremely right-wing newspaper (3) |
| RAG – A (article) in R{ight win}G | |
| 14 | Company claims America has abandoned academic institutions (8) |
| COLLEGES -CO (company) + ALLEGES (claims) minus A{merican} | |
| 15 | Rested, hassle an editor to some extent (6) |
| LEANED -hidden in “hassle an editor” | |
| 17 | Fixed deal in Barking (6) |
| NAILED– (DEAL IN)* with Barking as the anagram indicator
Hard to see “nailed” and “fixed” as cognates. Best I could come up with was “We finally nailed/fixed a date for the board meeting.” |
|
| 18 | The author had admitted to brawl in 24-hour period (6) |
| FRIDAY– ID (I’d, the author had) inside FRAY (brawl) | |
| 20 | Chapter with fussy passage (5) |
| CANAL – C{hapter} + ANAL (fussy)
I don’t like this definition. “Anal retentive” is cod psychology, which has now been largely debunked, Freud over-simplifying again. Let’s just say what we mean : meticulous, fastidious, methodical or inflexible. |
|
| 22 | Direction of each street (4) |
| EAST – EA{ch} + ST{reet} |
I raced through this and then got thoroughly stuck in the SE – sold, luck, gang, canal. I couldn’t get any of them, although I guessed sold and luck. Then I saw the parsing of luck, and became more confident, but I still thought I was looking for a horse and not a group of people. Notg my best effort.
Time: 12:35
No problem with nailed and fixed, as in ‘he fixed/nailed the floorboards to the joists’. Same thoughts re tomato/potato until remembering pot/weed. Everything else pretty straightforward. COD to LUCK after finally remembering that QC is now KC. Sorry M, I think you’ve accidentally put predicament instead of rap for blame in SCRAPE.
Thanks M and setter.
Sharp eyes, updated now. Thanks
Tom tomfoolery
Tom Thomas Moore
Context dictates which variation is applicable.
Seasons Greetings 🙂
4:42. Like Vinyl, I got stuck on GANG for a while, distracted by ‘gee-gee’ and similar. LUCK was unparsed.
As for ANAL, I was trying to explain this to a friend the other day (non-native English speaker), and the Freudian idea of being afraid to ‘make a mistake’ did fit quite well with other examples, such as the two kinds of people you often see learning to program – those who meticulously make sure that every line is correct and exactly as in the textbook, and are scared to run the code, and those who generate all kinds of scripts with glee, many of which crash, but potentially learn more along the way.
Same with people who are learning a language and stop mid-sentence in German when they can’t remember the gender of the noun, versus those who just guess the gender and merrily continue speaking. So, all nothing more than a useful metaphor? Perhaps!
You obviously weren’t stuck for long looking at your time. Well done for a speedy solve.
Thanks, Geoffrey!
17 minutes, so yet another missed extended target. I can’t remember now what held me up.
8:57. COLLEGES was solved well before parsing and I had the same initial thoughts as Merlin about ‘Iron’ in 7a. Otherwise an enjoyable puzzle which I didn’t find too difficult.
Thanks to Tango and thanks and welcome back to Merlin
9:53 – also one who got held up in SE corner with LOI LUCK.
6:50
Another tomato->potato solver here. And I also wondered about ‘luck’ until KC finally came to me.I doubt if anyone other than a Freudian uses ‘anal-retentive’, but ‘anal’ seems well-established; I like it.
Every time I come here now, I’m asked to prove that I’m a human; and again when I submit a comment.
Perhaps if you were a bit slower. . .?
The wizard is back! I enjoyed yesteday’s trip down Memory Lane with the old avatar though Merlin. Raced through the top but then crawled over the line in the SE. LUCK and FRIDAY both had me in trouble. Getting from ‘indecive’ because it fitted to INDEFINITE also took time. Lots to enjoy here – good all round crosswording – good puzzle, good blog!
But my horrendous run of typing goes on – SCarPE today, wrecking CONTAINERS. It’s now been six puzzles since I had neither typo nor error. Not all green in 17.09
Whizzed through the top half but the south proved a little more sticky until I unravelled the anagrams for MEANINGFUL and INDEFINITE.
Started with MOSS and finished with SOLD in 6.18.
Thanks to Merlin and Tango
5.15
Liked it. COLLEGES in punted. LUCK was good.
Thanks Merlin and Tango.
MOSS was FOI. Slowed down by my last 3 in, MEANINGFUL, INDEFINITE and FRIDAY. 8:23. Thanks Tango and Merlin.
9.33 which is slow for me .. got stuck on GANG for some reason, thinking some sort of horse was the definition. Nailed/fixed seems fine to me, as quadrophenia says above..
Fnarr fnarr!
Slow and fairly steady for me until an interruption and a consequent mis-type of the end of MEANINGFUL left me unable to see that 18 down started with an F. Friday became obvious once I checked out the almost-filled grid carefully but it took time and pushed me within half a minute of the SCC after I had sorted out gaps like MOSS plus LUCK, GANG, SOLD in the SE corner.
Overall, this was an erratic solve for me but an enjoyable QC (apart from my carelessness).
Thanks to both.
22.50. Much biffing needed to finish this.MOSS, LUCK, GANG,CANAL, SOLD , FRIDAY all posed problems. Clearly not on the right wavelength today.
You’ve NEVER seen any of The Godfather films?! Urge you to watch the first one if not 2 and 3. Av. on Amazon Prime. It won a few Oscars 1972 – for a reason! And then… watch the fabulous and hilarious series The Offer – drama doc about the making of the film. Brilliant! Find it on Apple TV – sign up just to watch it and then sign out if you don’t subscribe. Your Christmas viewing now sorted. …you’re welcome!
Many thanks for recommendations.
Saw it with my parents when it first came out.
We went again as we all got a bit lost in the plot.
My cat Egbert, whom I adopted last year, placed small gifts next to my pillow at night for the first few months.
At least I thought they were gifts.
I now know he was using Godfather tactics 😼
I only properly sat and watched The Godfather films a couple of years ago although had seen them before. The 3rd film is a bit dull compared to the first two but looks great and the performances by Al Pacino and Diane Keaton are superb.
As I recall The Godfather 2 is the only sequel to win a Best Picture Oscar. The first two films are both very good and 70s film making is so different to the modern stuff. Great to see younger versions of De Niro, James Caan, Pacino etc.
This was true until about 20 years ago. The 3rd Lord of the Rings film swept the board including best picture.
Good knowledge – thank-you 👍
The Silence of the Lambs won Best Picture in the early 1990’s. It was the 2nd Hannibal Lecter movie after Manhunter about 5 years earlier.
Watch The Godfather & Part 2 on the biggest screen you can. They are cinematic masterpieces and fantastic entertainment.
The Offer is also very good.
I suppose technically you’re correct about Silence. Although as I recall Manhunter was a Michael Mann (Miami Vice) film and probably a different production company / studio; as well as a different actor playing Hannibal Lector. When Silence was released, I’m not sure it was being touted as a sequel to Manhunter which was generally seen as a flop. And of course they remade Manhunter under its original titled of Red Dragon in the 2000s.
Anyway I’m sure that outdated nugget of trivia was something in the original edition of Trivial Pursuit circa 1983.
23 mins.
I should have been faster for this excellent QC but got off to a slow start.
I didn’t have problems with NAILED and CANAL as both terms are in common usage (even if I don’t use the second – anankastic is my preferred term.)
COD MOSS This was my penultimate clue – but a real pdm. Simple but clever
(LOI TAXI)
Many thanks to Tango and Merlin.
A fine QC, completed in average time I think but I was interrupted and when I returned the timer had ticked on remorselessly. The solve was much helped by getting all 4 of the long across anagrams relatively quickly. Some doubt while solving that reckless and DESPERATE were close synonyms but happy to accept it after some thought.
Many thanks Merlin for the blog
Also slowed down by SE corner. Not very keen on the clue for CANAL and biffed LUCK and SOLD, both obvious in retrospect. Thanks Merlin and Tango.
8:03 for the solve. A nice 2nd puzzle from Tango with quite a lot of construction needed for many of the clues but all the components familiar. Ended up in the SE corner and must have said nag=horse about three times before finally constructing the gang. LOI CANAL
Thanks to Merlin and Tango
I thought this was a nice, friendly QC from one of our newer setters, Tango, right up until the point when I was breezeblocked by my last two: Sold and Canal. Any lingering chance of a sub-20 was blown by wondering how Sark (🙄)could be shoehorned in, and of course 20d was bound to begin with Ch. The eventual Sold pdm made Canal obvious, but only the aisle were seats available by that time.
Still, an enjoyable solve, with CoD to Containers, just ahead of several chasers. Invariant
15 with the four across anagrams on first pass. Missing NW and SE corners.
Seasons Greetings / Happy Holidays
Covers all bases hopefully without causing offense 🙂
Thanks Merlin and Tango
I was on the wavelength for the top half, but not the bottom.
A slow finish took me to 18 minutes with LOI GANG requiring a lot of thought.
My experience looks similar to others above.
A good puzzle. COD to GANG or LUCK.
David
Quite agree with Merlin: good puzzle, taxing but doable. LOI LUCK – Mrs M suggested barrister = QC which just needed the obvious tweak.
Ow! Biffed INDEcIsIvE but of course it wasn’t right …..
12:40
Mostly straightforward but the same struggle as others in the SE corner, particularly LUCK, which I biffed to unlock CANAL and LOI SOLD.
I couldn’t build up much of a head of steam with this puzzle, and if I was a racehorse I would be termed one-paced. I have no issue with the quality of the puzzle, in fact I thought it was excellent, it was just a case of me not being attuned to it. Having said that, although outside target, not disastrously so at 10.33.
Challenging in parts, but cuppa still warm when I finished with all parsed. I was, like others, held up a bit by the tomato/potato choice.
LOI: POTATO
Thanks Tango and Merlin
9.31, including time spent correcting mistyping on my iPad.
After 10 minutes staring at 23a and 20d (I may have nodded off briefly during that time, or at the very least tuned out for a bit), I was stepping through the door into the SCC when CANAL flew into my mind. GANG rapidly followed and the clock stopped at 20:04.
Thanks Merlin and Tango
I was huffing away about how loose “DA” was for “barrister” as I was about to write in LOAD. Then I realised that I hadn’t accounted for the “you” and the penny dropped. Always trust the setter!
Good fun, smooth clues, LOI INDEFINITE, COD LUCK. All done in 07:06 for a Goodish Day. Many thanks Merlin and Tango.
The first four clues went straight in but then I slowed a bit taking 30m to finish.
A very pleasant way to spend half an hour on a long train journey south.
COD to LUCK
Thanks Tango and Merlin.
Dnf…
I must have been doing a different crossword – as I found this a real slog and couldn’t get any of my final two words, “Canal” and “Gang”, in the SE corner. However, upon reviewing the blog nothing seems too difficult, so perhaps it was just my first run for a while clouding my brain.
I seem to be having a poor run towards the end of the year.
FOI – 9ac “Here”
LOI – Dnf
COD – 18dn “Friday”
Thanks as usual!
Not yet in tune with Tango’s style so a rather slow 23 minutes for this one including several biffs. Struggled with the LEANED/INDEFINITE crossing and thought I’d finished but then noticed an incomplete 19ac. I was already in the SCC by that stage anyway.
FOI – 7ac PRISONERS
LOI – 19ac LUCK
COD – 4dn PICNIC
Thanks to Tango and Merlin
DNF after 22 minutes. It felt like it had been set by two different people: no problems at all in the top half, then nothing but problems in the bottom. Anyway, after spending too long failing to find GANG and CANAL I threw in the towel.
Thank you for the blog!
Good puzzle. Yes, LOsI GANG and CANAL, not that I would use the word Anal as slang. Started well but slowed down in the South.
Thanks vm, Merlin.
Top half raced in, bottom half much slower, partly becuse of writing in collAges for some unknown reason and forgetting that we now have KCs not QCs. All fair and enjoyable, thanks Tango and Merlin.
Incidentally the dark screen is now working fine, thanks for fixing it.
Failed by bunging in indecisive, which I hadn’t parsed, but having got through through the rest easily, wasn’t in the mood to grind away at one clue.
FOI here
LOI dnf
COD Friday. I went in various directions before spotting it
Thanks Tango and Merlin
The SE corner very nearly caused me to give up (again). LUCK, CANAL, GANG, SOLD and FRIDAY all combined to add 10+ minutes to my solve and prevent an SCC escape. Of those five clues, I managed to parse only GANG. The others were all lucky guesses that just happened to fit with the few available checkers. I must be losing the little cognitive ability I had.
Many thanks to Merlin and Tango.
16.33 This was mostly OK but I was breeze-blocked by CANAL and GANG. Thanks Merlin and Tango.
A mostly comfortable 9:21. The slight discomfort was from SOLD which seemed obvious though we couldn’t parse it. I was trying to think of what six letter island could result if CO (firm) were added back in. Thanks, Merlin and Tango.
On a technical matter, we solve on an Android phone and over the last few days we seem to have resurfaced an old problem in which, when you have finished and go back to review, the whole grid and timer is automatically reset. Anyone else seeing that and, more importantly, do you have a solution?
My thanks to Tango and Merlin.
Astonished that ANYONE at 4d would think that a Tomato is a vegetable; we all know it is a fruit that we would not put in a fruit salad. Oh well; -)
15:20 to finish, and I was inexplicably delayed by FRIDAY, INDEFINITE, and DESPERATE, unable to think of either “fray” or specific weekday names, unable to count occurrences of the letter I, and unable to remember ESP. I could go back to bed but Christmas baking beckons.
Actually it was fun, with the comic prose and the furious diner (or waiter?) my favorites. Gosh, COLLEGES was good too, in a sad way.
Thanks to Tango and Merlin.
Very slow today but got there in the end. LOI INDEFINITE. Biffed FRIDAY thinking it was an author I hadn’t come across 🙄 My favourites were CANAL and SOLD. Many thanks Merlin and Tango.
Being a relative newcomer (just a couple of years), I didn’t get Barking as an anagrind, but I can see it in retrospect.
But “pants”?
Also, organic = O is NHO to both me and Google. Am I missing something, or have I just not got the right edition of dictionary?
“starts to attack this organic” – notice the plural in starts i.e. it applies to all three. So it seems both you and Google are correct that O=organic is not a known abbreviation.
Think pants has come up as an anagrind before and there was discussion around how in the 90s we might say “that’s a bit pants” to indicate something which is a bit rubbish. I suppose that is a stretch to saying it’s a bit mixed up.
17 minutes.
Reasonable, but not where I want to be. I struggle badly with long anagrams and that is causing me to take a lot of time on some clues.
OK on 15 x 15, but still took forever. Snitch says it was on the easy side! Not for me.
I thought today’s 15×15 was quite a bit easier than yesterday’s ?
I agree, although the Snitch scores are the same. Everything was at least ‘gettable’ today.
Fairly straightforward until my LOsI, which were INDEFINITE and DESPERATE. For some reason these took an unconscionable time to unravel. I always forget ESP, although the clue was easy with that knowledge. Thanks to both. Christmas jobs mean I don’t have time for a morning solve, and tomorrow may be a write-off, so Merry Christmas to you all.
As others slow in SE corner.
Put SOWS in 1ac 🥴
Having read all the comments it seems I am the only one who’s not happy with the cluing of Sold. Firm leaving island? Surely it should be Island leaving firm?
I agree completely. Pretty misleading word order.
I agree too but it is a recognised construction setters often use. It was once explained here as “leaving the X” meaning “taking everything but the X”. So “firm leaving island” means SOLID (firm), taking everything but the I, = SOLD.
One to store away as it does come up quite often – a case of “remember it, even if you don’t like it!”
Well! Took me ages….. drawing teeth….