Times 24,265 by Saturday’s Child

Author   dorsetjimboPosted on Categories Weekend Cryptic
Solving time : 25 minutes

I have a lot to do today (off on holiday tomorrow) so got up early only to find the Times website couldn’t be accessed. Rushed off to local newsagent to be told “Times is late today, mate”. Ended up in Bournemouth station to get the paper. Truly sods law in action.

An entertaining puzzle with some interesting clues and well hidden definitions that rewards logical application. I’m off now to get the house-sitters.

Across
1 WIDOW – W-I-DO-W; W=wide (cricket); “one left” is definition;
4 IPSO,FACTO – IP-SOFA-CT-O; IP=one penny=cheapest possible; CT=court; O=nothing;
9 DER-RING-ER; DER=German for “the”; reference the Ring Cycle;
10 STRAW; two meanings 1=reference to “draw the short straw” 2=used for sucking;
11 ELYSEE – ELY-SEE; ELY is well known cathedral;
14 DEALT,WITH – DEAL-TWIT-H; DEAL=hands; TWIT=fool; H=hearts; “sorted” is definition;
16 GRIST – GRI(S)T; S=spades;
19 BLASPHEME – BLAS-(hemp)*-E;
21 CHEERIOS – CHEE(RIO)S;
22 PER,PRO – (tam)PERPRO(of);
25 INERT – (L)INER-T; L=libra=pound; “still” is the definition;
26 HORSETAIL – H-(C)ORSET-AIL; stays=corset; a somewhat obscure reedy fern like plant;
28 STONY – ST(ON)Y; reference “stony broke”
 
Down
1 WEDNESDAYS,CHILD – WED-(say ends)*-CHILD; reference old poem “Wednesday’s child is full of woe”;
2 DARCY – DA(RC)Y; reference Fitzwilliam Darcy from Pride and Prejudice;
3 WHITEST – W(HIT)EST; WEST is a position at the bridge table;
4 IAGO – I(M)AGO; an imago is the adult stage of a beetle’s life;
5 SCRATCH,PAD – PAD=bottom of paw; “here note” is definition;
7 CARMELITE – CAR-M-ELITE; M=motorway;
8 ON,WITH,THE,MOTLEY – (they wont let him + o=start to organise)*; to prepare for a performance by dressing like a clown;
13 BIG,BROTHER – reference 1984 by George Orwell, Winston Smith becomes Jack Cade;
15 AWARENESS – A-WAR-(sense)*;
18 STRETCH – two meanings 1=a period of imprisonment (period inside) 2=reference phrase “to stretch a point”;
20 PEERESS – PEER(L)ESS; L=liberal; a lady peer who sits in the House of Lords;
23 PLATO – PLAT(E)-O;
24 BRAE- BRA(C)E; a Scots hillside

28 comments on “Times 24,265 by Saturday’s Child”

  1. Another disappointingly pedestrian solve. MOTLEY took an age then spent another age trying to think of an Italian dish beginning PI before PLATO dropped like a particularly heavy penny.
    Thought DERRING must be something to do with derring-do before coming here. Off tonight to see the divine Renee Fleming in Traviata which might go some way to explaining why I failed to see DER RING. (Peter will be livid). Have a good holiday Jim.
  2. This is like the English title of a famous aria from I Pagliacci if I remember right. 23m today, started slowly but NE corner got it going, last in per pro and Plato. Bridge and prison life again… but a satisfying solve.
  3. I think this may be quite a difficult one for some as there are several references that one either knows or one doesn’t. I felt I got lucky because I seemed to be on the same wavelength as the setter and I completed it in 30 minutes.
    1. IPSO FACTO now edited, thanks Jack

      Jack Cade led the peasants revolt. Didn’t Winston Smith lead the revolt against Big Brother? All done from memory in a bit of a rush this morning so apologies if wrong.

  4. This was just my level, demanding but attainable. I got the Pagliacci reference first but missed the Ring reference, assuming, like Barry, that the derring was something to do with derring-do. I didn’t know Mr Darcy’s first name but the wordplay was clear. Also, it took me a long time to realise that the Winston I wanted was Mr Smith.

    Otherwise, there was some clever and amusing wordplay with admirable restraint from the setter in clueing Cheerios without mentioning breakfast cereal. I was pleased with my progress when I read the word “stays” and immediately thought of corsets for Horsetail. Last in was Carmelite because I failed to lift and separate “Friar’s superior”

  5. 16:21 .. Being a Wednesday’s child certainly helped. A good workout for the little grey cells, and the sort of puzzle I’ve improved at greatly since hanging around this particular den of ingenuity. Last in was the Wagner (presumably the fat lady singing).
  6. I found this a bit of a struggle and was pleased to finish without aids. Didn’t time myself but guessing towards 40 mins. Enjoyable puzzle though I seem to have found it more difficult than other posters. bc
  7. Shocked to miss the second or third reference to the ring in the last month. A delightful puzzle. too easy for the swift workers just right for me at around 35 minutes…back from watching the lions lose to the boks!
    very hot here!
  8. 15:57, with one mistake: for the last in, 10ac, I couldn’t fathom the wordplay (no surprise, it being a double definition), and opted for SCREW on the tenuous basis that it has all sorts of slang meanings, one of which could be “sucker”.  I had also guessed at the unknown DERRINGER (9ac), which like Barry I thought was something to do with derring-do.  Other unknown answers got from the wordplay were HORSETAIL (26ac), DARCY (2dn) [according to Wikipedia, his first name is mentioned twice in the novel, which I haven’t read], ON WITH THE MOTLEY (8dn), and BRAE (24dn).

    Nice to have something more challenging again, though several of the surface readings are rather odd (4ac, 21ac, 4dn, 18dn, 20dn).

    Clues of the Day: 26ac (HORSETAIL), 28ac (STONY).

  9. Although I got onto the setter’s wavelength quite early there were a few stumbles along the way, but a reasonably good time of 9 minutes in the end.

    Quite an odd mix of clever wordplay and a handful of obscurities but, as Mark says, some surface readings were on the strange side which makes COD choice a bit difficult – some of the cleverest devices appeared in clues that didn’t read too well. Apart from one…

    Q-0 E-7 D-6 COD 15D AWARENESS – for me, by far the strongest of the set.

    Enjoy your holiday Pete! I was going to remind you to get the Indy on Saturday then remembered you don’t have to ;o)

    1. I forgot to mention that this Saturday sees Anax’s first national paper puzzle under that name – I had a sneak preview a while ago.
      1. Jimbo – should have read your intro more carefully. Enjoy your holiday too!

        And my apologies for the shameless but unintentional plug. After typing “Enjoy your holiday Pete” I went into “Why use four words when twenty will do?” mode. ‘Twas pure verbiage.

        1. Thanks for good wishes. I’ll have to do your inaugural named crossword when I get back. Something to look forward to.

          What became of the new crossword to be named after the flying insect (having a senior moment and cant recall its name)?

          1. Ah – that’ll be “Imperator”. In a word, nothing. It was quite disappointing as I’d hoped it could replace the (IMHO rather redundant) Samurai Sudoku in Saturday’s Times. There is already a selection of sudoku and variant puzzles and I hoped Imperator would offer something more interesting, but there had been some recent re-jigging of the puzzles section and they didn’t want to make further changes. And I suppose we also have to consider that (given the time taken to set the thing – the best part of a week) Imperator would be an expensive replacement for something they probably get for nothing.

            The other quality dailies seem fixed up for Mephisto-type weekend puzzles, so I’m not sure what to do with it now.

            1. Yes, the Times re-jigged Sudoku from today and we have now lost Killer, the only one I do regularly. They say it’s temporary but it’s yet another example of them introducing changes before they are ready to do so without disrupting the service to readers. As we don’t pay for Sudoku I suppose I don’t have real grounds for complaint but it’s still a bind.
                1. Thanks, but I had assumed it was still in the printed paper. I should have said “without disrupting the service to on-line readers”. Killer is off the Times website until further notice.
  10. 12:51 – quite challenging, this one. I’m going to disappoint Barry by saying that at 9A I also thought of “derring-do” rather than “Der Ring”, when working back from Derringer=pistol. Others with less than complete wordplay understanding when solving: 8, 10, 22, 1 (the “say ends” anag.). Last in were 27 (poor work on my part) and 18 (ditto). I’m sure I’ve seen the “1p sofa” before (almost certainly for the same word), but it still took a couple of goes. Intriguing to have “Elysee” with no mention of Ely cathedral being a crossword cliché match for “see”.

    8D is indeed an English translation of “Vesti la giubba”, the name of (and a line from) the curtain-raising aria from Pagliacci. Modern rendering: “put on your costume”. “motley” as a clown/jester’s costume is much older, but the specific phrase “On with the motley” seems to start with the translation of Pagliacci. Enrico Caruso’s 1904 recording was apparently the first million-selling record in history.

    Off on hols early tomorrow until next Thurs, so will leave you in the capable hands of sotira for the next two Wednesdays.

    1. … failing to log in when using different computer due to some tedious local connection difficulties.
  11. About 19 minutes for me today, about 3 of them at the end looking for alternatives to SCREW or SHREW for 10A. I don’t know why STRAW took so long to think of – the phrase is familiar and ‘sucker’ is akin to ‘flower’ for river, so another familiar crossword convention. Only one I didn’t know was Darcy’s first name – a bit unfortunate, as P&P is next on my reading list.
  12. 23 minutes – would have been under 20 if it wasn’t for BRAE. Some pretty tough clues made for a good challenge.
    Oli
  13. 27:30 with a bit of difficulty at the end having put in harestail at 26 (valid as a plant but hail outside ?arest or ?resta didn’t quite work) which made 20d more than a little ticky. Got there in the end though.

    Put me down as another derring-do rather than der ring.

    COD per pro

  14. 10.15,I had an idea of the W’s at 1a/1d immediately but had to wait for some checking letters to convince myself. DERRINGER got from the definition. Last to go in was STRAW where I was another looking at Screw,shrew… Good clue – would have been tough without the checking W.
    (Much better than my time for Race the Clock (T2) on Times website today – 8hours53minutes!! Blimey! I ‘d only been up for 5 hours when I did it. Must have been a 2 minute+ time – the miracles of IT are sometimes beyond me)
  15. About 55mins, a large chunk of which seemed to be spent on the PLATO/HORSETAIL crossing (couldn’t think beyond garters). Enjoyable solve though; liked enlightened period = day, DEALT WITH, the Motley, but COD to STRAW.
  16. 40 min, so much more challenging than yesterday. Plodded along until getting mired in the SE. Finally went to the aids to get HORSETAIL, then the rest fell quickly.
  17. About 50 mins having been held up in the SE corner. Not knowing ON WITH THE MOTLEY buggered the whole thing up. Much the same with PER PRO despite having written “pp” several thousand times without knowing it stood for “per procurationem”. 20dn only dawned on me when I remembered the signs on the toilet doors in the House of Lords: “Peers” and “Lady Peers”.

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