Times 24320

Author   petebiddlecombePosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
Solving time: 10:05

Forgot to note which answers came last, but can certainly tell you which wordplay came last – 3D, well after solving and explaining everything else. There are some very good clues here, the kind that make you wonder whether you’ve seen them before as they seem so obvious after the event. In a couple of cases, the answer has to be that you have, given sufficient experience.
But there’s plenty of new stuff to enjoy too.

Across
1 CHOP-CHOP – old-fashioned slang for quickly – “expedition” can mean “speed”
6 FA(c)ULTY – “American” in “American scholars” seemed unnecessary, but is justified by the dictionaries when “faculty” is the whole academic staff of an institution.
9 PLAN(e) – plane (adj.) is “completely level or flat”
10 AIRMAN=marina*,SHIP=vessel
11 SECOND=support,HAND=help
13 AUKS = rev. of skua – I’m sure this has been used before, but don’t mind.
14 ROMANCED=dated – MAN in rev. of DECOR
16 TE(T)CHY – variant of the more common techie, in COED
20 BIRD=”Byrd”,CAGE (he of 4’33”) – “arrangement of bars for singer” is a very clever def here
22 KAYO = K.O., opposite (= reversal) of OK
24 ROYAL JELLY = (jolly early)*
26 NIGHTSHIRT – R in (this thing)*, and an &lit
28 TOGO = “to go” as in “Tall latte and pastrami on rye, to go”
29 POORLY – 2 defs, adverbial (not well) and adjectival
30 NEOPHYTE = (telephony – L=line)* – initiate (noun) is the def.
 
Down
2 HE’LL(E)BORE
3 PANDORA – P and O = P&O = (shipping) line, RA = artist, ref. Pandora’s box
4 H(E)ARD – I guess some will complain that “extra” is superfluous, but it improves the surface a bit for me
5 PAR(a)
6 FRAUDSTER=(draft user)* – another &lit, as long as we’re happy to accept (counterfeit …. perhaps) as an extended anagram indicator, which I think I am
7 UP=on a horse,START=jump
8 T(R)ICK – US meaning of check as in “check box” in computer user interfaces
12 AUDIBLY – CD, with waves=”sound waves” as the main point to see
15 CAME=appeared,R,ASHY=pale
17 HIGH=”Oxford street”,LIGHT=fair. Nice slippery wordplay, with “Oxford street fair” divisible in several ways, and Oxford possibly masquerading as a shoe. Two important roads in Oxford are High Street and Broad Street, sometimes called “the High” and “the Broad”.
19 A,NOT,HER
21 CHEETAH=”cheater” which is another unobjectionable chestnut
23 AMI,GO
25 LIT=plastered=drunk,HO.
27 INN – 2 defs, the river Inn being the one bridged at Innsbruck, which might be more in your mind than the setter expected if you read the obituary for Toni Sailer, who died there.

39 comments on “Times 24320”

  1. About 30 minutes today with no real problems but without fully understanding HIGHLIGHT and guessing KAYO, which I don’t think I’ve come across before.
  2. after a few slightly longer efforts led me to read this blog in the evenings rather than the mornings, I am glad to have an easier one today and be able to participate in the goings on “live”.

    I really thought this was going to be a blinder having raced through 95% in about 8 minutes, but spent a relatively large amount of time unravelling the NE corner – 6A, 7, 8, 13, and bizarrely the last in was the (possibly most obvious) 29A. I put the latter down to slight weakness in the double def, but I suppose given how PB notes one is adverbial and one adjectival, then this is my stupidity rather than the same concept twice. All in all a satisfied 15 minutes after a few less than impressive 40-60 minute calamaties over the past week.

    In the NE, 7 opened the way, leading to 6A, (was thinking CH for ages, not C) then 8, then 13. On 8 I was slightly delayed by thinking of EDICT, being C for castle (???) in EDIT, but the T from FAULTY soon sorted this.

    I would be interested to see what the general thought is, since, as we know, Mr.B is not the best yardstick for difficulty !

  3. Easy one today, coffee not even brewed.. 10 mins maybe.
    Some tricky clues (I particularly liked Pandora) but enough easy ones, like 1ac, so I never got becalmed
  4. About 45mins for me, although I didn’t think it was as difficult as that. Must have been those tricky short clues again. Became becalmed as I crossed into the southern hemisphere, having all but finished the northern one fairly rapidly. Last in KAYO. First CHOP-CHOP. Some very slick clues in this one. I liked BIRDCAGE, AUKS, KAYO but COD to PANDORA; good definition and I had to think for more than a moment why PANDO was a line.
  5. Ran out of time available at 45 minutes with 14ac, 20ac, 28ac, 12dn and 21dn unsolved and PANDORA, which I thought of very early at 3dn still doubtful because I couldn’t explain it. Some of this was as a result of convincing myself that 12dn had to be AURALLY. On arrival at work I used a solver to get BIRDCAGE and everything then fell swiftly into place.

    Dictionary.com lists the meaning of “counterfeit” required here as “now obsolete”.

    I thought the Oxford High reference was a bit much as it’s local jargon but I suppose the Times likes to think most of its readership has studied there and would be familiar with it. I live less than an hour’s drive from Oxford and I never heard of it before today and I wasted for ever thinking about components of shoes.

    1. perhaps they are just compensating for (eg) “gangsta rap?” and the ever-recurring drug culture themes? Or then again, perhaps that is Oxford for you these days.. 🙂
      1. A timely point, Jerry. Some changes are afoot at the moment, and the list of allowable single-letter abbreviations is one area being looked at as it needs updating. It so happens that I’ve mentioned a distaste for our casual use of drug references, so these might just be on the way out.

        It’s early days just now – all setters are putting forward suggestions about what should be removed/added and, even if that leads to confirmed changes in the very near future, we’ve probably got several months’ worth of crosswords to use up before changes become visible in published puzzles.

          1. Hi Mike

            Probably not me. I’m assuming the crossword editor will “use the proper channels”, as it were, to make known whatever changes come into effect. If I’m given permission to let the cat out of the bag all well and good, but I’ll keep schtum until then (as it stands, there’s nothing to announce anyway).

            What I can say is that several setters have put forward suggestions for changes to the list, and certain abbreviations (as additions) have been mentioned by at least three or four.

            The really good news, though, is that a consensus is forming that seems to strike a very good balance between generally updating the nature of the puzzle and keeping its unique Timesy feel. For example, some setters have mentioned the Living Persons policy but most seem to agree that, quirky to the point of anachronistic as it may be, it’s something that’s inherent to the flavour of the puzzle – so I doubt that will change.

              1. I for one would certainly be glad to see the back of “E” for example, it really grates
  6. 26 min here, but was stuck for some time on exactly the same four as Jackkt. Eventually cheated to get CHEETAH {which I rather like) and worked backward to get the other three. 12 dn AUDIBLY is just plain awful. COD: PANDORA.
    1. I agree it’s awful and I’m not sure there isn’t a case to be made for AURALLY (sounding like “orally”) but for the checking letters.
  7. Agreed a substantially straightforward puzzle – 15 minutes to solve. Unlike Peter I kept feeling I had seen lots of them before as I read them, not sure if imagination or not. I’m not keen on Oxford street=high. Far too parochial and obscure. A great many towns and cities have similar nicknames for streets – where do we draw the line? I thought P AND O clever.
    1. I guess one way of drawing the line is to see whether the “parochial and obscure” usage is listed in a dictionary. Collins has “high” defined as “(cap) (esp in Oxford) the High Street”. That said, the same source wouldn’t justify “Oxford street” = BROAD, and my gut feeling is that I’ve seen that as well in Times puzzles.
      1. Yes, I think they’ve both appeared before and are anachronisms from the crossword’s elitist past (which is how I know them). Time surely to dispense with such stuff.
        1. Indeed.
          And reference the interesting stuff from ANAX above I for one welcome any neologisms, (drug related or not) like today’s TECHY for example. What should be “on the way out” is anything that smacks (oops!) of dusty old classicists with nothing to do since Bletchley Park closed down except knock off the odd puzzle for The Times. (I exaggerate).
          (I should say of course that anything relating to the “drug culture” is to me every bit as obscure as some of the poets who feature here).
          1. Taking up my usual case for the defence …

            We’re talking about one clue in 30 here – a clue which everyone has apparently managed to solve. What I’m looking for in a Times puzzle is an interesting batch of words clued fairly, and a balanced variety of knowledge and vocabulary. In this puzzle we’ve got a bit of Oxford slang, other slang old and new (chop-chop, techy, “to go”), composers, art/printing (LITHO), gardening (HELLEBORE), myth (PANDORA), Geography (Inn), and more variety.

            If we chuck out “anything that smacks of {my pet hate}” we have to treat all the pet hates equally, and then risk finishing up with very dull puzzles based on a universally acceptable subset of COED.

  8. BECALM only one in on first run through which I thought ominous but decided should be an admonition (BE CALM!).
    Came here not understanding PANDORA,POORLY,TETCHY and AUDIBLY. The last 3 seem a bit weak and HIGH for Oxford street is outrageous. Since KAYO is not an actual reversal of OK I stuck in YAKO.
    Otherwise I thought this was absolutely brilliant (effusiveness brought on by relative newness no doubt).
    COD from any of the following because of the cleverness of the deceit in the definitions:
    NEOPHYTE
    ROMANCED
    CHOP CHOP
    BIRDCAGE
    The old timers may be a bit blase but this setter made my day.
    Views of other newcomers would be most welcome (well, to me anyway).
  9. Not as easy for me as some seem to have found it, but pretty straightforward at 30 mins or thereabouts. I agree that AUDIBLY was weak, and that “Oxford street = HIGH” was a bit much for those who do not know Oxford well (or at least haven’t re-read Brisdeshead Revisited lately). But a lot of good clever stuff elsewhere, all mentioned above. PANDORA was particularly good. The wordplay of the PANDO bit defeated me until coming here. Simple really!
  10. Fairly straightforward for me too, 10:51, although without fully understanding PANDORA or HIGHLIGHT.
  11. I found this very difficult. It’s always quite depressing when I come here after a difficult puzzle and nearly everyone else has found it a doddle. I got completely stuck after only completing a third. Then I contemplated Bach and Bloch for the composers giving me Barrcage or Bloccage for the obscure musical term. This unsound reasoning kickstarted the rest of the solution because it gave me the crosschecking Audibly. Eventually, I was able to get the much more obvious composer Byrd. Last in were Togo and Kayo. Togo on the definition and Kayo after much head-scratching.
  12. Sorry to have missed out yesterday: out of range by the time the blog was posted. 26 minutes today and very enjoyable. Got in quickly with the suite of anagrams at 18, 24, 26, 30 and 6dn. Then becalmed (?) by trying to justify MOSAICED (is that a word?) with the crossing letters at 14. Not to mention persuading myself that 13 had to be AFAR — the NE being the hardest all round. COD to 3dn with P&O matching H&C that other day.
    9:13pm WAST
    1. Time test added in the post above.
      It was definitely 9:13pm here and 2:13pm in London — my MacBook told me so: yet the LiveJournal time gives 01:13pm (UTC). What’s going on?
      1. UTC = “Universal time clock” = GMT, renamed so as not to upset the French. Until the clocks go back, London time is GMT/UTC plus one hour.
        1. Ah so that’s it! Bloody French. I’m surprised they didn’t insist on HUT, “Horloge Universelle du Temps”.
          If I want to know what time it is UTC, I should set my Mac’s world clock to Atlantis? Or maybe the Malvinas? This is a strange fiction. Next I’ll be expected to believe that Britain has a summer!
  13. 12.10. Surprised that I’ve never seen the Royal Jelly -Jolly Early anagram before. Last in was POORLY which gave me a bit of a problem (for no good reason).
    My tuppenceworth on Oxford is that whilst it is the variety of the clues which makes this puzzle so enjoyable for me I think that Oxford Street = High is beyond the bounds. Why, unless I had lived there, would I possibly know this?. It is a medium size town with a university – as are Dundee and Exeter.
    And I don’t say this just because I didn’t know it. Another one which I always recognise but think of as obsolescent is the almost universally forgotten thespian Herbert Beerbohm Tree – where Actor=Tree- which crops up from time to time.
    It seems sensible that as usages like this are deleted from the list the GANGSTA RAPS and such replace them
    1. I have no Oxford axe to grind, but can’t let the “small town with a univesity” pass – this small town with a university is the source of many words listed in English dictionaries (including this meaning of High). As far as I can tell from a quick punt with fulltext on the Chambers CD, Exeter and Dundee university jargon hasn’t made enough impact on the language to get anything into the dictionary.

      I don’t know when Actor=Tree was last used at the Times – a crossword Blog search for “Beerbohm” only got hits for Guardian puzzles, but they’re not always 100% reliable.

  14. 25 minutes but with one wrong: I’ve never come across lit = drunk before so I plumped for lotto at 25d on the basis that you shout “house!” or “bingo!” when you win at bingo and lotto is like bingo and lotto sounds like blotto which means drunk. As for the “work of art” element, I offer no defence m’lud save that it seemed just plausible that some artist or other* produced a famous painting, sculpture or Turner Prize-winning installation called “Lotto” which would then make it a triple definition.

    *Banksy? Damien Hirst? Tracy Emin

    Overall a clever puzzle, which held me up most in the NE corner but all over I had question marks and had to go back and unravel the wordplay.

    1. Now you mention it, I’ve not met “lit” = “drunk” before either. In my experience it has always been “lit up”.
      1. And having arrived home and checked the usual dictionaries it appears none of them supports “lit”= “drunk”.

        But Collins has “lit up” with that meaning. It also has it as “drugged, esp.on heroin” which might be worth remembering in view of the way things are going at the Times crossword these days!

        As so often my knowledge of quaint expressions such as this comes from an old song lyric, in this case “I’m going to get lit-up when the lights go up in London” written by Hubert Gregg (he of “Maybe it’s because I’m a Londoner” fame) in 1943. It was a big hit but I’ve an idea the po-faced BBC of the day banned it from the airwaves in case it might corrupt some poor innocent.

        If anyone’s interested the full lyric is on my journal at: http://jackkt.livejournal.com/

        1. You’re right, with the minor exception that Chambers (not supposed to matter for the Times) has “lit (up)” which suggests that the “up” is optional.

          My only memory of the BBC and “lit up” is from reading about a “lit up” commentator’s statement that “the fleet’s lit up”.

  15. 12:11 for me, though I had to guess at 22ac, as I can’t remember seeing it written like that before. I agree that ‘Oxford’ is out of order; most towns and cities have a high street.
    1. It is interesting that wikipedia has an entry for High Street, Oxford along with about 15 or so others. I wonder what its criteria are for inclusion? Scanning the list however, a great deal appear to be High street, County, or even high street, country, which confuses me!

      FWIW I am firmly in the “it’s okay” camp, since it is natural for some places to have more historical or cultural significance than others. The counter-argument smacks of political correctness or new labour over-compensation. Not everything has to be equal – hierarchy is good and it creates incentivisation and hence productivity. Next it will be famous people…. moan moan, why should William be Shakespeare, what about the countless other Williams that are unsung? Where will it end?

  16. 11 minutes, I wondered if the setter was going for a record of &lits (Ploy??? If it was you, then that would be why it was a fast solve). I had a lot of fun with the definitions, first spotting of TECHY. Last in was AUKS with a question mark (I had originally put AFAR as RAF,A reversed thinking it was another &lit).
  17. 12-13 mins, last in was 22A KAYO which I’d overlooked. I thought 15D CAMERA-SHY worked very neatly, with a clever definition, and choose it as COD narrowly ahead of 8D TRICK. Surprised not to see a 5-6 mins time for this one.

    I’d also be happy not to see ‘drug’ for E or H any more.

    Tom B.

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