Saturday Times 25897 (20th Sep)

Author   linxitPosted on Categories Weekend Cryptic
Solving time probably around 20 minutes – can’t be too accurate as I was solving it while working from home and had numerous interruptions, but I found it quite tricky in places – certainly much tougher than the previous week’s. As jackkt points out, it’s also a pangram. I hadn’t noticed, probably due to solving it in bits and pieces rather than in one session.

I’m working from home again today, which is why this is a bit late – I’m actually being paid to watch the Ryder Cup (I know, tough job but someone’s got to do it), so I’ve been on since 7am.

Across
1 Turn out a satire that hasn’t succeeded (3,2)
END UP – SEND-UP (satire), without the S for succeeded.
4 Brill poem about King and Queen visiting country (5-4)
FIRST-RATE – IF (poem) reversed, then R (king), then R (queen) inside STATE (country).
9 Uncertainty of argument against marriage (9)
CONFUSION – CON (argument against) + FUSION (marriage).
10 Silly boozer, swallowing a drug (5)
INANE – INN (boozer) around A, then E (drug).
11 Wrong date, say, not a date seen regularly (6)
STEADY – (date say)*, minus an A.
12 Hear about embrace, say, having backed violence (8)
THUGGERY – TRY (hear) around HUG (embrace) + EG (say) reversed.
14 One that’s criminal, amoral etc with frequency? (10)
MALEFACTOR – (amoral etc F)*, &lit.
16 Spice Girl’s back from nightclub (4)
HERB – HER (girl’s) + (nightclu)B. Not keen on this one – for me a herb is not a spice and a spice is not a herb.
19 Band’s timeless collection (4)
SASH – STASH (collection), without the T.
20 Critical after imprisoned duke cracked (10)
JUDGMENTAL – D(uke) in JUG (i.e. imprisoned) + MENTAL (cracked).
22 What’s afoot minutes before event in which second round’s lost (8)
MOCCASIN – M(inutes) + OCCASI(o)N (event, minus the second O).
23 Leader of expedition must be caught and restrained (6)
CHASTE – HASTE (expedition) with the C for caught in front of it. Unusually worded, and hard to spot the definition.
26 Pong in empty twin-tub developing hitch (5)
THUMB – HUM (pong) inside T(win-tu)B.
27 Hiding from epidemic, having phobia about it (9)
THRASHING – RASH (epidemic) inside THING (phobia).
28 Quickly get out unopened bid and become confused (9)
SKEDADDLE – (a)SKED (bid, unopened) + ADDLE (become confused).
29 Claim that’s good in a way for Montreal? (5)
ARGUE – G(ood) inside A + RUE (way for French-speaking Montreal).

Down
1 Overlook mix-up before finishing dances (6-3)
EXCUSE-MES – EXCUSE (overlook) + MES(s) (mix-up, minus the last letter).
2 Poet’s appointment not initially to be accepted (5)
DANTE – DATE (appointment) around N(ot).
3 Sweet found in best pants (4,4)
PLUM DUFF – PLUM (best) + DUFF (pants).
4 Food kept fresh in this hamper (4)
FOIL – double definition.
5 Weak person on horse given violent blow (3,7)
RUN THROUGH – RUNT (weak person) + H(orse) + ROUGH (violent). Definition in the sense of “to spend wastefully”.
6 Fine chap (not posh) — what’s-his-name? (6)
THINGY – THIN (fine) + G(u)Y (chap, minus the U for posh.
7 Discompose Smetana and be demeaning (9)
ABASEMENT – (Smetana, be)*.
8 Ideal support for English? As much as possible (5)
EVERY – VERY (ideal) under E(nglish).
13 Familiar expert making case for sweet drinks primarily (10)
ACQUAINTED – ACE (expert) around QUAINT (sweet) + D(rinks).
15 Badly cooked cassoulet, one that can’t be saved (4,5)
LOST CAUSE – (cassoulet)*.
17 Bird dog cut by a blade oddly ignored (4,5)
BALD EAGLE – BEAGLE (dog) around A (b)L(a)D(e).
18 Debates after accident involving hospital’s healing pool (8)
BETHESDA – (debates)* around H(ospital). A pool in Jerusalem mentioned in the gospel of John.
21 Country’s unknown capital doctors looking up (6)
ZAMBIA – Z (unknown), then A1 (capital) + BMA (British Medical Association, doctors), all reversed.
22 Couples with destinies altered by sex-change (5)
MATES – FATES (destinies) with the F changed to M (altered by sex-change).
24 Brandish small arm (5)
SWING – S(mall) + WING (arm).
25 Page removed from empty press (4)
URGE – PURGE (empty), without the P.

14 comments on “Saturday Times 25897 (20th Sep)”

  1. Yes, found this harder than the last few months of Saturday puzzles. LOI BETHESDA by a long way, as I didn’t know that meaning of it and it took me some time to spot the anagram.
  2. I don’t think it has been mentioned yet that this was a pangram.

    Along with some other recent puzzles I found this rather heavy going but I was pleased to get there in the end.

    I agree about herbs and spices. Why have distinguishing words if they are synonymous? It doesn’t make sense.

    The parsing of CHASTE had me baffled and on reading the explanation in the blog the order of words seems to be stretching things to the limit.

    I knew BETHESDA because of the fountain in Central Park.

    Edited at 2014-09-27 07:59 pm (UTC)

  3. 25m. I remember enjoying this enormously, but looking back it’s hard to identify why.
    I also agree on herbs and spices. I use a lot of both and everything is very clearly either one or the other.
  4. This took ages. Almost an hour in 2 sessions. BETHESDA my FOI, mainly because of its popularity among the Welsh as a name for their chapels. (I think I once looked it up out of curiosity). It is annoying that there are 2 great poets D_N_E. I bunged DONNE in and intended to go back and work out the cryptic. But forgot. I went through the alphabet in a time-wasting attempt to find an alternative for HERB. In my book a HERB is not the same thing as a SPICE. In fact, we refer to “herbs and spices” – the implication being that they are two different things.
  5. Sadly, after two Saturdays on the spin, this one was beyond me.

    Gave up around the 2 hour mark with about 2/3rds done. Now, having read the blog, I’m a little more encouraged that this level of Cryptic isn’t completely out of my reach with a bit more perseverance.

    That said, even with the answer, herb as spice is difficult to stomach.

  6. After a couple unknowns (plum duff and hum, eg) and quite a lot of British-flavoured usage that I recognise but wouldn’t think of, I didn’t finish, and took a long time to do so. So thank you for the clear blog, Andy. I agree with all the herb/spices comments.
    Regarding your tough day on the job, just this morning I was thanking the gods for the miracle of bifocals: golf on the television and puzzle on my lap.
  7. Kept chipping away at this one, which was probably the toughest puzzle I’ve managed to (nearly) complete to date.

    Got all but BETHESDA, which was a complete unknown. I had figured from the clue that it had to be an anagram of debates with an h included somewhere, so eventually I took to checking out an online anagram app in frustration – and that did not yield it either!

    CHASTE went in but could not parse it – thanks for the explanation Andy. As usual, “easy” once you see it.

    Quite chuffed when I got FIRST RATE – thought this was a pretty complex little number with so many moving parts, so to speak.

    Anyway, great experience.

  8. DNF; never figured out 4d.Also DNK ‘duff’ in the relevant sense, so couldn’t figure out why the answer was PLUM DUFF. I knew 21d had to be ZAMBIA, but I couldn’t figure out where the A came from, having carelessly taken ‘doctors’ to be MB. BETHESDA, on the other hand, came fairly easily, both because I had a vague memory of the NT reference, and because the US Navy has a huge hospital at Bethesda, Maryland. I actually liked 23ac; marked it as my COD, in fact.
  9. 27 mins. I also found this on the tricky side, particularly in the NE. RUN THROUGH was my LOI after FIRST RATE, mostly because I failed to see how “blow” was the definition. I echo the HERB comments. Unlike Jack I actually thought the wordplay for CHASTE was extremely clever and I had no problem with it, from a quibble perspective, at all.
  10. I used a different parsing for 23ac: C (caught) + HAS T(o) (must, restrained) + E (leader of expedition). I don’t know if that’s any more satisfactory but at least it uses all the words in the clue. For 16ac, having got the checking letters, was anyone else tempted to put MELB (one of the Spice Girls!)? I think some of the clues were unusually vague. For instance, IF for poem in 4ac was not convincing, and using R for queen instead of ER? I’ve never heard of RUN THROUGH being used as a synonym for blow (‘go through’ would be more common). Nevertheless I did complete the puzzle, but in an indeterminate time off and on over several days. Pretty usual for me!
    1. Hi Anonymous,

      23ac: your parsing fails to account for the wordplay going in backwards as well as the definition, but it’s a nice idea. I’m sure those wordplay elements could be made into a decent cryptic clue for CHASTE (I won’t attempt it now, far too tired after a crap journey home – left work at 4:21, arrived home 8:55, about 2 hours later than expected).

      16ac: sorry, but MELB isn’t a word – don’t be tempted (and the Times never uses living people as answers). Hint: if you see a common phrase or two words that usually go together (e.g. Spice Girls), try splitting them up and ignoring the capitals, as it’s a common setters’ trick.

      4ac: IF is the only poem crossword setters know – you learn that from experience! R for queen is less common than ER, but still not that unusual. R for king is used in 4ac too – both are abbreviations of the Latin, Regina / Rex.

      5dn: RUN THROUGH – that definition’s in Chambers, so I’ll give the setter the benefit of the doubt, but I got it from the wordplay and looked it up later myself. I suppose it’s ok: e.g. “He ran through his wages at the bookies on payday”. I used to work for Ladbrokes, and I know for a fact it happens all the time!

      Finally, why not set up a free account on LiveJournal and introduce yourself? We prefer to know who we’re talking to 🙂

  11. Many thanks, linxit, for your response. I know the rule on living persons and so I resisted the temptation to use MELB; but I thought the idea made the clue more clever – a sort of antidote to the herb/spice mismatch. I will follow your suggestion and set up a LiveJournal account forthwith.
  12. I’m satisfied that 23a works if you treat ‘must be’ as ‘this is what must be done in order to solve the clue’. So caught (C) must be leader of (ie in front of) expedition (HASTE). This leaves only the slightly dubious ‘and’ as the definition indicator.

    Apparently I’m still banned as tenbob.

    1. Last time you mentioned this I sent you an invitation to join the community, which hasn’t been accepted yet. Check your LJ messages, as I’ve just resent it. Out of interest, what error do you get? This is an open forum with no restrictions on who posts, and nobody’s ever been banned.

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