Saturday Times 24197 (11th April)

Author   linxitPosted on Categories Weekend Cryptic
Solving time 14:40, so about average. This was a puzzle of fits and starts for me, where I got off to a good start, then stuck completely for a while, then raced to the finish. So annoying (especially in a puzzle you’re supposed to blog) when you’re staring at a half-finished puzzle for five minutes thinking “Help, I’m stuck!”, then finally spotting an error and all the rest just fall into place!

Across
1 BUSHBABY – H(ot) + B.A. (degree), inside BUSBY. This was one of the last I got (mainly due to a mistake on 3D).
5 CRUMBS – double definition, one of them cryptic.
9 GRADIENT – DIE inside GRANT.
10 CHORAL – H(usband) in CORAL.
12 WHITE RABBITS – WHIT (piece) + BARE rev. + BITS.
15 ACUTE – A + CUTE
16 EGLANTINE – T(rees) inside NINE (square), after (gale)*. Nice wordplay – I don’t think I’ve seen a square number defined as just “square” before (but opportunities to use it would be very limited anyway).
18 BAGATELLE – A GAT inside BELLE. A piece of light music, as well as a pinball-like game.
19 MOUSE – MO (second) + USE (function).
20 SMALLHOLDING – (Holland smiling)* minus IN (home).
24 INSANE – S(ickness) inside INANE. Very subtle wordplay that looks like a straight definition (well, it did to me for a while anyway).
25 FLATMATE – FLAT (dull) + MATE (game’s ending).
26 GUSHER – double definition.
27 EYESTALK – YES (certainly) + TALK (say), after E (back of platE).

Down
1 BAGS – double definition.
2 SNAP – double definition.
3 BRIGHTEST – RIGHT inside BEST. For some unknown reason I put CLEVEREST in quite early on from the definition. Really messed up the top left corner.
4 BEND THE ELBOW – BEND (corner) + THE ELBOW (a bend at Aintree just before the finish of the Grand National).
6 REHAB – HE inside BAR, all reversed.
7 MARTINIQUE – MARTIN + (p)IQUE.
8 SELF-SEEKER – cryptic definition.
11 TROLLEY DOLLY – ROLL inside YET rev. + DOLLY (an easy catch in cricket).
13 EARBASHING – (Serbian hag)*.
14 SUNGLASSES – SUNG + LASSES.
17 NOMINATES – (Minnesota)*.
21 LANCE – N in LACE.
22 NADA – hidden in “oN A DAte”.
23 WEAK – “week”.

15 comments on “Saturday Times 24197 (11th April)”

  1. There’s not much to say about this puzzle. It’s just ordinary standard fare. I liked INSANE, thought there must be more imaginative possibilities than an anagram of “Serbian hag” for EARBASHING, and said hello to an old friend at NOMINATES

    Jack, I thought today’s was much the same standard.

  2. This puzzle continued my run of bad solves and took the best part of an hour. I don’t remember feeling completely stumped at any point, just that very little came easily to mind. I did much better with today’s so I am hoping everybody else won’t be complaining it was too easy!
  3. A couple of sexist expressions here. Bags, which Chambers has as offensive slang and Trolley Dolly which, generously, it just has as slang. Try it out on your next flight and you might just get coffee poured in your lap. Otherwise a gentle solve with a couple of minutes at the end to get Martinique and Crumbs. I didn’t know that bushbabies were primates but now I do.
  4. I’m with you, jackkt. I started fast then struggled, scraping in around the half hour mark. CRUMBS, GRADIENT, EYESTALK and BUSHBABY all had me scratching my head.

    lennyco – not to mention the ‘topless bird’ in 7d! I thought I’d woken up in 1975 (this week’s setter, Gene Hunt). I’ll admit to liking the expression ‘trolley dolley’, probably through association with an era of elegant cabin crew who didn’t treat you like you were five.

  5. As a novice solver, I got about halfway, not helped by thinking 8d was soul seeker. I got completely stuck in the NW corner -a question for the experienced -is it realistic for anyone to get 1a without checking letters?
    1. 1A: If you see HBA from (hot=H, degree=BA), or “fur hat”=BUSBY, it seems at least possible.

      You’ll quite often see from comments here that many solvers finish up with the same clue as the last one solved. As long as the clue can be solved with the help of checkers, I don’t think that’s a problem.

  6. I’m a frequent sub-15-minute solver, and I didn’t get it. I had S_B in the middle and was convinced that SABLE=fur was going to be in there somewhere.
  7. I didn’t finish this solo, but if I recall correctly that wasn’t for grinding to a halt so much as needing to go to sleep and abandoning it. The following day, I was roped in to help the parents with their efforts. even the three of us put together didn’t come up with BUSHBABY (see above comment) or CHORAL, despite that being blindingly obvious in hindsight.

    I have no idea what kind of plant an EGLANTINE is, but I’ve met it before in Cruciverbia.

  8. CRUMBS was last in for me. (Was this an oblique reference to Penfold?) I’m still not sure I understand it. I kept thinking it had to be a triple definition with 1=Gosh, 2=not much and 3=of a bloomer, but it appears more and more unlikely.
    I have a TROLLEY DOLLY in my garage. It’s a trolley (two wheels on ground in vertical orientation) which converts into a dolly (four wheels on ground in horizontal orientation) by repositioning the handle. It’s a very useful thing and I wasn’t aware of any perjorative association with those (male & female) who tell you to close the shutter on your window because it’s time to go to sleep.
    I can’t say how long this took me, but it was a fair while. COD was the &lit INSANE.
    1. As an expression for a flight attendant, “trolley dolly” dates back to the time when flight attendants had to be female, single, attractive, and flirt with the customers. They’d be fired if they turned 30 or got married.

      Those days are thankfully gone. Nowadays, flight attendants are competent at their job, rather than hired as eye-candy to persuade businessmen that this plane has more ogle-able women than the other one.

    2. Chambers: a longish crusty loaf of white bread with rounded ends and a number of slashes across the top.

      Doh! I hear you say.

      1. That explains it perfectly. Not a doh! moment for me though, since I’ve never heard of this kind of bloomer. It sounds like what we Aussies refer to (probably erroneously) as a Vienna loaf.

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