Times 24,098 A Straight Run Through

Author   dorsetjimboPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
Solving time : 12 minutes

There’s not much to say about this puzzle, which is very easy indeed. When I got to 19A having solved every across clue as I went I decided to press on and did what I haven’t done for years, solved every clue in order from 1A to 26D. Often writing these blogs it is difficult to know which clues to leave out. Today it was a case of wondering which ones needed to go in! I guess AMARANTHINE may be new to some.

Across
1 BRAYS – sounds like “braise”;
4 HOBGOBLIN – HOB(GO)BLIN(g);
9 EMOTIONAL – E-MOTION-AL (Capone);
10 ANVIL – hidden word; one of the three small bones of the inner ear
11 DIAGNOSTICIAN – (into disc again)*;
14 OVAL – O+(LAV reversed); reference London, Kennington Oval cricket ground
18 REAWAKENED – (keen+aware)*-D;
21 TEST,THE,WATER – Cheltenham is a spar town;
24 OWING – O-WING;
25 BREAKDOWN – two meanings;
27 GREEDIEST – GREE(DIES)T;
28 TACET – TAC(E)T; musical term instructing a particular voice or instrument not to play
 
Down
1 BREADBOARD – cryptic definition; a “tin” is a type of loaf;
3 SKINNY – SK(INN)Y;
4 HANDSHAKE – sounds like “hand sheikh”;
5 BALTI – BALTI(more);
6 OCARINAS – (SAN-IRA-CO) all reversed; reference Ira Gershwin 1896-1983 lyricist brother of George
7 LIVINGSTONE – LIVING-ST-ONE; Dr David Livingstone 1813-1873 I presume;
8 NULL – NU-(wi)’LL;
12 AMARANTHINE – (anthem an air)*; the fabled never fading flower;
13 SACROSANCT – (co-stars can)*;
16 PRECEDENT – P-RECEDE-N(o)T;
17 MASSAGED – MASS-AGED;
20 BASKET – B(ASK)ET;
23 TONG – TO-NG; to=closed as in “pull the door to”; Chinese secret society akin to the mafia;
26 ORC – CRO(w) reversed; mythological sea monster;

23 comments on “Times 24,098 A Straight Run Through”

  1. No idea of time, as I was subject to continual interruptions, but pretty easy, as Jim says.

    A query on 21ac – I think the usual expression is to “test the water”, whereas at a spa one takes “the waters”. I think Jim has confirmed my query in his answer.

    1. I agree 21 is not right. And “pull the door to” was an everyday expression in darkest Middlesex where I grew up.
  2. 35 minutes on the commute so it was done in dribs and drabs and I didn’t get a proper run at it. Last in was AMARANTHINE which I’ve never heard of so it was a best guess given the checking letters and the ones remaining to be slotted in.

    1. I grew up in Essex – “pull the door to” meant (as in the clue) “all but closed” (= ajar).

      Mind you, that was 125 years ago…

  4. A very leisurely 20 min. And don’t know where all that time went, except that I went (Too hastily) for “amaranthian” and had a tizzy bit over tacet/tacit.
  5. Today was the first time in over a week that I’ve been able to enjoy a leisurely solve in my lunch hour. 18:50 then with amaranthine and Tong guessed at and tacet based on wordplay and knowing tacit.

    Jimbo, I’m sure the pubs in Cheltenham get pretty rowdy duting Gold Cup week but I’d still describe it as a spa town rather than a spar town (unless it’s got more than it’s fair share of diddy supermarkets).

    Q-0 (I’ve found “test the waters” listed in a few places as a valid variation of the idiom), E-5, D-4.

    I’ve got to take some parcels to the post office tomorrow so that’ll be another late (or non) solve.

    1. I can confirm the rowdy bit – you know the Gold Cup’s round the corner when the Queens Hotel takes the pictures off the walls – though my experience when living there during festival week was that almost everyone packing the town’s pubs was actually too drunk to throw a punch. I’ve had many interesting “conversations” with festival goers who only remained upright thanks to the sheer volume of humanity pressing around them.
    2. I do of course apologise to Cheltenham for letting its secret out of the bag. I too lived there for a couple of years. However, the clue is a reference to the spa waters about which the least said the better.
  6. A fast 28 minutes here, thought I thought I was in trouble for a bit, as on a first read I went through 8 clues before getting anything. A few of the long anagrams then began to make sense of things, and everything fell into place. 21ac caused me grief for a minute or two when I threw in ‘test the ground’… COD 8d.
  7. 9:58 here – took a while to build up steam, partly from wondering whether DIAGNOSTICIAN might be something else, so not putting it in.
  8. But not that easy
    amaranthine i handt heard of and Massaged i thought was clever…

    around 40 minutes…(but after a long lunch)

  9. 8:40 …. Very easy top half, where everything went in without a pause, then a bit more thought needed further down, with TONG and PRECEDENT taking a while.

    A confidence boosting puzzle, especially for those of us who found yesterday’s strangely tricky.

  10. After an hour I had only done the anagrams 11A and 18A. Sneaked a look at dorsetjimbos blog and read the first line-very easy indeed, eh! OK second shot. another hour and all done. But not that easy.1A last in due to spelling hobblin(g) with only one b.
    1. Don’t on any account let it get to you. We all have days when we make heavy weather of things. Today I was both on form and needed to get on with it because I was going out so I abandoned my usual laid back approach and reverted to my mind set of many years ago (when I used to care how long it took me!)
  11. Took about 40 minutes, even though it was in fact a relatively straightforward puzzle. I didn’t know Cheltenham is spa town, so that took a bit of time, and I didn’t know that meaning of ‘tacet’, nor that ‘to’ can be all but closed. Overall though, no great problems, but no COD for me either today. Regards all.
  12. Not sure I understand 26D. I flung it in quickly, thinking it was CRO(p) reversed. Now I can’t make sense of anything, unless ‘up’ is doing double duty.

    Tom B.

  13. OK, got it now. I was assuming the definition was ‘monster bird’, getting my orcs and rocs mixed up!

    Tom B.


    1. Hi, Tom. I always look at 3-letter words first if present, and I had ROC pencilled in here within the first minute, and solving 28 later added credibility. Because of this 25 presented major problems until eventually the penny dropped.
  14. Nobody at all has mentioned this and so perhaps I’m missing something quite obvious, but what is the significance of ‘very’ in this clue (Asian space, very fluid: CASPIAN SEA)?
  16. I thought the double word anagrind at 15a was confusing even though the answer was clear. The explanation above does not quite justify it for me?

    There are 4 “easies” including 15a:

    15a Asian space, very fluid (7,3)
    CASPIAN SEA. Anagram of (Asian space). How can a sea be very fluid? One sea surely cannot be more fluid than another unless the other one is frozen? I think this is a 19a clue.

    19a Shoddy work returned – nothing right (4)
    PO 0R

    2d A social occasion – stew is provided (3)
    A DO

    22d A lie about British food (5)
    TA B LE

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