Lots of fun, if challenging in parts, and displaying a near-complete set of teflon-smooth surfaces. There’s definitely some sort of Nina going on, but I can’t for the life of me see how it all fits together. If any of you manage to crack it, do enlighten me.
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | Urgent request halved enjoyment (4) |
| PLEA – half of PLEASURE | |
| 4 | I can’t remember main case collapsing (8) |
| AMNESIAC – anagram (‘collapsing’) of MAIN CASE | |
| 8 | High spirits and energy seen in a nobleman (4,4) |
| LIFE PEER – LIFE (high spirits) + E (energy) inside PER (A) | |
| 9 | Killer whale snatching men from Spanish island (4) |
| ORCA – MENORCA minus MEN | |
| 10 | Notice difference at sea (6) |
| ADRIFT – AD (notice) + RIFT (difference) | |
| 11 | Get flying boat home (6) |
| OBTAIN – anagram (‘flying’) of BOAT + IN (home) | |
| 12 | Ruling class setting up business? (13) |
| ESTABLISHMENT – triple definition. Hooray! | |
| 16 | Soldiers securing help for young woman (6) |
| MAIDEN – MEN (soldiers) outside AID | |
| 17 | Fanatic turned first-born son on mother (6) |
| MANIAC – CAIN (first born son. Literally the first son ever born), reversed, on MA | |
| 19 | Talented person murdered by brother, reportedly (4) |
| ABLE – sounds like ABEL. Biblical theme developing…? | |
| 20 | Protective cover breached before soldiers enter? (8) |
| EGGSHELL – cryptic definition. Bread soldiers, obvs | |
| 21 | Last part of school year popular with almost everybody (8) |
| TERMINAL – TERM + IN + AL[ |
|
| 22 | Model making a comeback divides opinion to some extent (4) |
| POSE – reverse hidden word | |
| Down | |
|---|---|
| 2 | Young man guards Irish landowner (5) |
| LAIRD – LAD around IR | |
| 3 | Dire cameraman destroyed myth of Hollywood? (8,5) |
| AMERICAN DREAM – anagram (‘destroyed’) of DIRE CAMERAMAN | |
| 4 | Attentive porter perhaps on resident’s case (5) |
| ALERT – ALE (porter perhaps) on R[ |
|
| 5 | Restricts introduction of nuclear missiles (7) |
| NARROWS – N for Nuclear + ARROWS | |
| 6 | Wears fashionable clothes belonging to guy? That’s fair (13) |
| SPORTSMANSHIP – SPORTS (wears) + HIP (fashionable) around MAN’S (belonging to guy) | |
| 7 | Legal case involving United’s sale (7) |
| AUCTION – ACTION with U inserted | |
| 10 | A great service (3) |
| ACE – Double definition | |
| 13 | Walk unsteadily from unending chaotic scene (7) |
| SHAMBLE – short for SHAMBLES | |
| 14 | Learnt about new source of light (7) |
| LANTERN – anagram (‘about’) of LEARNT, + N | |
| 15 | Heard parasite’s spasmodic movement (3) |
| TIC – sounds like TICK | |
| 17 | Influential individual is feature of ski resort (5) |
| MOGUL – double definition, the second being a bump on a ski slope created by skiers turning. | |
| 18 | American sailor returned collection of charts (5) |
| ATLAS – A (American) + SALT (sailor) backwards | |
Well, we have PLACEMAT and CANTICLE on either side but that’s all I can see.
LIFE PEER took a while to see and still don’t like ‘life’ for ‘high spirits’ but I suppose if you’re full of life, then you’re in high spirits. Liked the triple ESTABLISHMENT. COD to EGGSHELL.
Thanks C and A.
13 minutes. I didn’t know the skiing thing at 17dn so I wrote in MOGUL from the other definition and checkers and hoped for the best.
Groan for EGGSHELL and then four full minutes on LIFE PEER. Needed the hint to get from ‘a’ to ‘per’. All but one in 6.40, all done in 10.25. Previously held up by an unnoticeed typo at the end of AMERICAN DREAM making TERMINAL hard. Trying to make the first word ‘live’ was a big part of LIFE PEER problem. No typos!
Breezeblocked by mogul which unlocked eggshell at 21.23
Took a while to get started but got a decent foothold down the RHS, although not helped for a long time by not being able to spell amnesiac (a touch of the Eric Morecambe’s) making 6d and 7d impossible
Thanks Asp and Curarist
15 minutes. Another good QC – some harder clues but overall not too difficult. I blew any chance of a half-decent time by initially putting in SPORTSMANLIKE for 6d and MOVER for 17d which mucked up the SE corner, particularly EGGSHELL which I spent a while trying to make into a def plus wordplay clue.
Maybe I’m missing something but I can’t see how the words making up the Nina are related to each other or to other answers.
Thanks to Asp and Curarist
A fun puzzle that didn’t put up too much resistance, although one day I’m hoping that the a/per connection will finally stick.
As usual anything nina related went over my head but I’m sure all will be revealed later.
Started with PLEA and finished with MOGUL in 5.57. COD to EGGSHELL.
Thanks to Curarist and Asp
14:26 which is very good for me!
14:50 Plea for maiden with sportsmanship able to shamble over mogul took time and effort.TaCAA
22:42 and no pink squares. Happy with the lack of errors, but can’t seem to string a sub-20 AND no errors together at the moment.
FOI PLEA and AMNESIAC went in straight off, but then dotted around a bit. 17D was slowed by an incorrect TERMINUS before I saw what was happening. Got through it all but one with an easy sub-20, and then sat looking at my LOI LIFE PEER for far too long. I thought it was some Latin/French saying for high spirits before realising I needed to look at it differently. COD EGG SHELL.
Thanks Asp and Curarist
15:35, but AUCTION and SHAMBLE held me up for about 3 mins for some reason.
Pi ❤️
8:14 for my quickest ever Asp solve. His early ones were a lot stiffer, and it is both interesting and encouraging to see a response to some of the pushback they generated. And what a fine set of clues too – perhaps not quite all of them 5-star, as the clue for ACE was barely cryptic (I thought it was more of a straight definition as I was doing it, rather than a DD as our blogger has called it), and I join others with a slight query over High spirits = Life, but in general much enjoyed. We had soldiers as the accompaniment to a boiled egg only last Saturday, so that one went straight in, and my only real hold-up was SHAMBLE, my LOI, where I was looking for something more complicated.
Thank you Asp for the puzzle, and a hat-tip especially to AMERICAN DREAM for its surface, my COD. And many thanks Curarist for the blog.
I think you’re underestimating ACE Cedric. It’s a triple def as well as an all-in-one.
Oh yes- I see that now – good clue!
Wow. Far too clever! Such gems are wasted on me alas
Another SPORTSMANLIKE which posed a problem with EGGSHELL and ran up the clock to 30 mins which was annoying as I was motoring along nicely till then. Forgot a= per but soldiered on with a shrug. Wondered about a Nina with Cain and Abel emerging but didn’t look any further.
30 mins, well it is Friday, but would have been under 25 if it had been more sportsmanlike.
Thanks Curarist and Asp.
7:42 for the solve. Rather enjoyed that and felt it was a good mix of buildable, biffable and a small bit of headscratching required for MOGUL/EGGSHELL.
Been a good week coming in at a few ticks over 44mins with just Wednesday’s failing to be sub-10. While my ability at the puzzles has certainly improved in recent times, I also feel they are now hitting a nice level.
Thanks to Curarist and Asp and have a good weekend everybody 👍
I thought I was on for a quick finish, when the grid was almost full with the clock on 12. I was helped by seeing the long anagrams very quickly. However, I was slowed by MOGUL (NHO in a skiing context so bifd based on crossers) and then stopped dead by SHAMBLE and ABLE. Just couldn’t see them until 17 mins had elapsed. Very frustrating.
Good puzzle, though; probably my quickest Asp to date. COD EGGSHELL.
Thanks, both.
8:10, with LIFE PEER and ACE my last two in.
COD to EGGSHELL.
Thanks Curarist and Asp
5:04 and a thoroughly enjoyable QC. EGGSHELL a great clue, and LIFE PEER was LOI as for others, with the unhelpful checkers.
LIFE PEER went in with fingers crossed. Thank you for explaining the rather difficult parsing. Life for Spirits is a stretch and per for A is always a hard one to spot.
Overall a very enjoyable Friday puzzle with EGGSHELL as my LOI and COD.
An unhurried 30 minutes which I am quite happy with or with which I am quite happy as Churchill would have put it.
Thanks Curarist and Asp.
Good puzzle from the Asp which I finished in a slightly better than par 9:03
17:08 – quicker than normal for me despite pondering a while before I saw EGGSHELL (COD) and biffed MOGUL (NHO in skiing context).
Also NHO MOGUL in skiing context. Saw Cain and Abel, but nothing else that could give a Nina. Quite a tricky but satisfactory puzzle today. Thanks Asp and Curarist.
6.45
Finally saw how PEER worked. AMERICAN DREAM was very good. Thanks Curarist and Asp.
Spot on 20 minutes gets me a window seat in the club. Most enjoyable and seemed quicker but still probably my quickest Asp ever. POSE entered from checkers – completely missed the reverse hidden as usual. Otherwise all parsed.
FOI – 9ac ORCA
LOI – 8ac LIFE PEER
COD- 20ac EGGSHELL. Also liked OBTAIN and NARROWS for the misdirection.
Thanks to Asp and Curarist.
13 in 20 which is probably my best for an Asp and for a Friday. Is a boiled egg with soldiers a particularly British thing or was it stolen from another culture like a lot of other things? Didn’t we have soldiers in that context quite recently? Took me a while to realise that flying was the anagrind after I bif_fe_d obtain from the O and the I crossers.
Should we add a notional 30 second penalty for a bifd answer that we cannot parse immediately after?
Is the eggshell clue classed as a cryptic definition?
Thanks C & A
I found this one to be quite tricky. I had absolutely no idea about 8a but with the letters I had all I could think of was LIFE PEER, so in it went.
EGGSHELL took me forever to answer and I groaned when I eventually got it.
Unfortunately a spelling error MOGeL tripped me up with a pink square.
First Lap: 9
Answered (no help): 23
Answered (with help): 1
Time: 41:52
Undone by a careless ADVERT. Over my target time too. Drat! Thanks Asp and Curarist.
I finished in a reasonable time, but couldn’t parse life peer or orca, both obvious answers. Eggshell was my LOI, and I couldn’t think of any word that fit the crossers – until I could. I never noticed the canticle placemat, which was probably just as well.
Time: 8:25
10.08 which we think is a PB for us…. soooo close to getting under 10, delayed however by OBTAIN and ALERT (slow start too after part biffing stumble in lieu of SHAMBLE).
COD EGGSHELL. Makes me happy – as did egg and soldiers when a child. Why does time reduce the flavour of such pleasures? The meals still tastes the same – the moment is not the same 😔
Confusion of the day, pera 🤔 Can someone give an example please, to help it stick?
Thank you ASP and CURARIST
The cost worked out to be £5 a head (per head)
thanks for this!
Of course! – so elusive when not known so obvious once recognised : )
I was heading nicely for a sub ten minute solve with only two to get before the wheels came off. It took me ages to get 8ac where I was looking for a synonym for ‘high spirits’, and then my LOI where EGGSHELL finally entered my mind. I didn’t have a lot of confidence that MOGUL was right, which rather distracted me with solving the former. I eventually crossed the line in 15.28.
My total for the week was 53.38, giving me a daily average of 10.44.
A friendly puzzle from Asp, and a sub-20 on a Friday: will wonders never cease?
Wrong end of the clue (🙄) issues with 1ac, but a good start in the NE gave me a foothold that Establishment quickly widened. Thereafter it was just a case if making best use of crossers and first letters. Loi Mogul (I don’t ski) ensured that the sub-20 was borderline, but it matched the first definition, and anyway I couldn’t think of anything else that would fit.
CoD has to be Eggshell for the smile. Invariant
Seeing the setter I embarked on this QC with a sense of dread, only to be proved wrong 26 minutes later. The words speedy and Asp don’t generally appear in the same sentence, but today was an exception.
AMNESIA, ORCA and OBTAIN were my first clues in and I made steady progress throughout. Two incorrect biffs (StAgger and SPORTSMANlike) held me up a bit, but my luck held with a number of other clues I couldn’t fully parse – PLEA, LIFE PEER, and ACE. My LOsI were ABLE and SHAMBLE.
Many thanks to Curarist and Asp (especially for toning down the level of difficulty).
5.22 Before tackling the puzzle I ate a couple of eggs with soldiers. I still needed all of the checkers for EGGSHELL. 30.23 for the week is seven minutes quicker than my previous best, though it has been a fairly gentle week. Thanks Curarist and Asp.
Phew, great puzzle. Finished all OK, fairly quickly. Despite having been a skier, I was held by at the end by MOGUL until a PDM, which gave me another PDM/groan EGGSHELL. (Admittedly I tended to avoid ungroomed mogul pistes.)
Liked ACE, Cain and Abel, AUCTION, ORCA and NARROWS.
CNP LIFE PEER
Thanks vm, Curarist.
Fairly quick overall with LOIs MOGUL/EGGSHELL holding out the longest. Enjoyable but prefer tackling (and sometimes failing) Asp’s trickier offerings. Appreciate likely a minority view! COD MOGUL. Many thanks C.
11:23, with LOI LIFE PEER, could not parse A=Per. Had biffed KING LEAR earlier since it fitted checkers.
This must be my PB overperformance vs the QUITCH – all done in 5:29 landing me 43rd on the leaderboard – everything just came to me!
Lovely puzzle. Not for the first time this week it was a speedy-ish solve held up at the end by a crossing pair.
Thanks to LIFE PEER/NARROWS which I just couldn’t see (being fixated on ‘LIVEWIRE’ didn’t help) finally staggered home in 17:30.
COD most definitely EGGSHELL.
Thank you both.
A modestly swift 10:20 for us with our nemesis timewise being LOI SHAMBLE which stumped us for at least a minute. I even went back to check MAIDEN in case we’d missed a stumble. I had, though, intended but forgot to go back and check LIFE PEER which we had been unable to parse. I’m still unable to quickly bring to mind a = per despite having seen it many times now. Thanks for the reminder, Curarist. AMERICAN DREAM was very good and, though we’ve seen variants of eggs and soldiers at least three times now, we still find the likes of EGGSHELL amusing. Thank you, Asp.
6:45
No major issues, though having thought it would be very fast, slowed towards the end. Slow on the uptake with SHAMBLE and failed to spot that POSE was a reverse hidden.
Thanks Curarist and Asp
12 minutes today; LOI OBTAIN.
COD OBTAIN.
Enjoyable QC. Nina not noticed whilst solving.
David
I believe ACE is a triple def wrapped in an all-in-one. Nice clue actually.
12:08 here, with LIFE PEER put in unparsed and unconvinced by the definition. COD to EGGSHELL, where I first saw EDGEHILL as being something to do with soldiers that fit all the crossers.
Not a clue on the Nina.
Thanks to Asp and Curarist.
NHO skiing MOGUL. Heavy fingers prolonged timer to
Yes, well, this is Friday and we have boiled eggs for lunch, but no soldiers, that was very long ago! Let’s call it Cryptic B++, perhaps. Did not see Hidden POSE, but put it in by definition. So of course I saw MOGUL, when the soldiers arrived but not before. Happy Friday.
DNF. Gave up after 17 mins with narrows outstanding. Not that hard, but just couldn’t see it. Oh well.
FOI Plea
DNF
COD Ace
Thanks Asp and Curarist
11 mins…
I thought there was a biblical theme going on as well, but apart from Cain and Abel I couldn’t see what it was . A good puzzle from Asp who has been tricky in the past. Only issue was trying to parse 8ac “Life Peer”.
FOI – 2dn “Laird”
LOI – 13dn “Shamble”
COD – 13dn “Shamble”
Thanks as usual!
Another DNF, but slight improvement (today was 69%, yesterday 67% and Wednesday 63% complete).
On revealing the grid there were a few that I felt I probably should have good, but also a good few that even if I’d had all the checkers in place I’d wouldn’t have; and couple that I needed to read the blog to understand.
10:37 and I would have had a fast time but I was undone by EGGSHELL, just to put me in my place after I boasted the other day that I had learned the “soldiers” trick at last. I paused briefly to ponder the Biblical brothers situation, then forgot all about it, and only saw the PLACEMAT CANTICLE on review. It seems no one has an explanation; has Asp gone in for absurdist ninas? Also the two 3-letter downs together spell ACETIC. So?
So many good clues, but the two! triple defs and SPORTSMANSHIP my favorites.
Thanks Asp and Curarist.
24 minutes.
Yet another appalling display to cap off a miserable week. How can I still be this bad after 5 years?
I am so far behind those I could once compete with that I seriously wonder why I bother continuing with this. My times are woeful and I still make stupid errors.
Several clues made no sense to me today and were pure guesswork. I feel like I have wasted so much time on these puzzles when I clearly have no ability to progress.
I look at the times of solvers who started cryptics at the same time or after me and feel like giving up.
Please don’t reply.