Tough, clever, rewarding. I made a flying start in the NW and for a giddy moment hoped that this was going to be an entry-level Teazel, but after that progress was distinctly pedestrian. I thought that there were some excellent clues, particularly two of the three (three!) &Lits, and despite having gone miles over target at 13:20 I really enjoyed it. Hope you did too.
Definitions underlined in bold.
| Across | |
| 1 | Having these at Christmas is insane? (8) |
| CRACKERS – the simplest of &Lits to start us off. | |
| 5 | Not initially a polite address to woman or man (4) |
| ADAM – “a polite address to woman” could be “madam”; take off the first letter (“not initially”) and you have ADAM for “man” (either as a random name, or possibly as the traditional first man). | |
| 9 | Loud number is by Yankee (5) |
| NOISY – NO for “number”, IS for “is”, Y for “Yankee” (NATO alphabet). | |
| 10 | Some of the media, working, waste no time (5,2) |
| PRESS ON – PRESS = “some of the media” + ON for “working”. | |
| 11 | Source of money shortly provides pleasure (3) |
| FUN – a fund is a “source of money”; take off the last letter (“shortly”). | |
| 12 | Rebel is concealing name, demanding attention (9) |
| INSURGENT – IS has N inside it: that’s “is concealing name”. Then add URGENT for “demanding attention”. | |
| 13 | Object to being given another errand? (6) |
| RESENT – you might be sent on an errand, and if then given another one you might be RE-SENT. | |
| 15 | Prepare leftovers: hot, consume fully (4,2) |
| HEAT UP – in these days of ready meals it’s not just leftovers that you HEAT UP, so this should perhaps have been flagged as a definition by example, but it will do. H for “hot” + EAT UP for “consume fully”. | |
| 17 | Not manage to think straight, so find nothing to go with gin (2,3,2,2) |
| BE OUT OF IT – this caused me no end of head-scratching and is actually very good. The straight definition (per Collins) is “not alert or clear-headed; confused; muddled”. The cryptic part relates to the cocktail originally (and sometimes still) known as the “sweet martini” but more often called “Gin and It”: a mix of gin and sweet vermouth. Vermouth originally came from Italy and most brands had the word “Italian” prominently on the label, so the vermouth got shortened to “It”. If you were looking to make a “Gin and It” but had no vermouth, therefore, you’d “be out of It”. Ho ho! | |
| 19 | Loaf and maybe some baked beans here (3) |
| TIN – a double definition (I think). I couldn’t understand the first but a wiser head kindly pointed me to a definition of TIN in Collins which I’d somehow managed to miss: “8. (British) a loaf of bread with a rectangular shape, baked in a tin”. Thanks Jack! | |
| 20 | Where one has an elevated religious calling (7) |
| MINARET – our second &Lit, and my COD in a packed field. A MINARET is the tall, slim tower on a mosque from which the muezzin calls the faithful to prayer – thus a place from there is an “elevated religious calling”. Very good indeed, bravo. | |
| 21 | Jacket starts off the uniform, newly in colour (5) |
| TUNIC – the first letters (“starts off”) “The Uniform Newly In Colour”. | |
| 22 | Blowing hard, losing weight in a type of racing (4) |
| INDY – “blowing hard” could be “windy”; take off the W (“losing weight”) and you have INDY. The Mecca of American open car racing is the Indianapolis 500 and that gave birth to the phrase “Indy Car” racing. | |
| 23 | Flower’s unusual drainage (8) |
| GARDENIA – anagram (“unusual”) of “drainage”. | |
| Down | |
| 1 | Hold discussion about one’s evergreen (7) |
| CONIFER – to CONFER is to “hold discussion”; stick in an I for “one” and there we are. | |
| 2 | Arrange, being ill-intentioned, to get rid of Mike (5) |
| ALIGN – “Get rid of Mike” signifies removal of an M (NATO alphabet). After spending a while wondering whether “alice” could mean “arrange”, I realised that it was [m]ALIGN I was looking for, not malice. | |
| 3 | Vital approval for four flats, for example (3,9) |
| KEY SIGNATURE – KEY is “vital”; SIGNATURE is “approval”. My LOI. I got KEY straight off but had to wait for all the checkers before SIGNATURE hove into view; my Grade 5 piano was a long time ago. Chambers: “the sharps and flats shown on the stave at the start of a piece of music, or at the beginning of a line, indicating the key it is to be played in”. | |
| 4 | One is defenceless on these, which the experienced know (5) |
| ROPES – our third and final &Lit, and another really good one. If you are “on the ROPES” you are “defenceless” (unless you are Ali, of course, playing “rope-a-dope” against Foreman in the Rumble in the Jungle). And if you are “experienced”, you “know the ROPES”. Excellent. | |
| 6 | Proper to include son in lineage (7) |
| DESCENT – DECENT is “proper”, inside which we have S for “son”. | |
| 7 | Painter late in the morning rising (5) |
| MANET – I wasted time here thinking that I needed a three letter word meaning “late” inside M***A for “morning rising”. In fact the whole thing is “rising” (this being a down clue) to give you TEN AM, which could be said to be “late in the morning”. Clever. Everyone knows who MANET is – he’s the one who isn’t Monet. | |
| 8 | Deteriorate badly around noon: made to face another way (12) |
| REORIENTATED – anagram (“badly”) of “deteriorate” + N for “noon”. | |
| 14 | Disdained starter of salami: like some beef? (7) |
| SCORNED – S for “starter of salami” + CORNED, which “some beef” is. In my youth I thought that this meant the beef had been mixed with cooked corn; in fact the “corns” are coarse grains of salt used to cure the beef. | |
| 16 | Criticise a prophet, do we hear, for universal remedy (7) |
| PANACEA – a PANACEA is a “universal remedy”; the word-play is PAN (“criticise”) + ACEA which sounds a bit like “a seer”, if you say it fast enough in the right accent. (For the Ninja Turtles – PANACEA is the beautiful girl with whom Obelix falls deeply in love in “Asterix the Legionary”. Alas, she marries Tragicomix the actor and Obelix has to content himself with scoffing yet another boar.) | |
| 17 | Curb ambition to take in animal film (5) |
| BAMBI – Spoiler alert: the hunter shoots Bambi’s mother. My sister and I cried so much that our mother had to take us out of the cinema and I’ve never seen the second half. Curse you, Walt Disney. It’s a hidden word, inside “curB AMBItion”. | |
| 18 | Obese wife given a judicial opinion (5) |
| FATWA – Chambers: “a formal legal opinion or decree issued by a Muslim authority”. My long-ago comparative law studies taught me that fatwas from muftis have a long and distinguished history in Islamic law, clarifying points of importance or uncertainty . Thanks to Ayatollah Khomeini, however, most of us now think of a FATWA as a religious death warrant. Neat word play – FAT (“obese”) + W (“wife”) + A. | |
| 19 | Backing group of musicians in joint (5) |
| TENON – I’d never even heard of a “nonet” before I started doing crosswords; now it’s my first thought for a musical group. Reverse it and you have TENON, which is a sticky-out bit of wood shaped (using a tenon saw, natch) so as to slot into a mortise, thus forming a “mortise-and-tenon” joint. Those who also solve Big Puzzle saw a very similar clue on 11 March – “Musical group turning up that may be in the groove (5)“. | |
62 mins
What’s the point of carrying on with this?
14 mins yesterday and 55 mins for first 3 days of week. Just for once, I thought I might make my target (5 solves in 2 hours).
And then this garbage! How the hell do I go from 14 mins to over an hour?
I’m exhausted, humiliated and despondent in equal measure. Today was as bad as it’s ever been. So many clues that meant nothing to me.
I know that progress can be uneven, but this level of incompetence is just ridiculous.
Yet another week of failure. My confidence is shot to pieces and my level of enjoyment non-existent.
I haven’t read any other comments as I have a horrible feeling this wasn’t anywhere near as hard as I thought it was.
To compound my misery, I missed two simple anagrams in other Times puzzles today. I really am useless.
When I played golf, one of the psychology books I read said that the inability to forget was far stronger than the ability to remember. I understand now what that means. It will take a long, long time to get today out of my mind.
Seriously, please don’t comment. I’m turning the computer off and want nothing more to do with the QC today. Frankly, there is nothing you can say at this precise moment that will make me think the last 3.5 years toil have been anything other than in vain.
I shall return for another day in hell tomorrow, not sure why.
Thanks for the blog.
DNF
Gave up with KEY SIGNATURE and INSURGENT unsolved.
Something weird is going on, I found that fairly straightforward and finished in 16:53, which is quick for me. I think I got lucky with some of the GK and must have been much more attuned to the wavelength than I usually am. Even dragged NONET up from somewhere (probably Cracking the Cryptic, thanks Simon!) to flip over. NHO “gin and it” but didn’t seem to hold me up.
Thank you for a very entertaining blog!