Times 24363 – homesick

46 comments on “Times 24363 – homesick”

1. I raced through this and then got held up by several isloated answers: shelves, staple and strap (which I got but couldn’t convince myself was 100% right since I’m not sure parts are talents and I’m still not; I finally wrote it in since it couldn’t really be anything else (ports/strop made even less sense).
2. ‘Parts’ is 18th-century slang for abilities, as in ‘he is a man of great parts’, the sort of thing Boswell would say about Johnson. I was a bit surprised such an obscure and obsolete meaning appeared.
   1. It comes in a number 7b. on dictionary.com’s list:

      a quality or attribute establishing the possessor as a person of importance or superior worth: Being both a diplomat and a successful businesswoman, she is widely regarded as a woman of parts.

      No mention of being obsolete; quite the reverse given the example. As for my parts, the medical profession keeps telling me they don’t make them anymore.

      1. Well, do you hear anyone using it that way? It’s 18th-century. Look in the OED, it says ‘now archaic, rare in speech’, where now = about 1880.
3. I’m paulmcl. I seem to be logged in but when I try and post a comment I’m tyold that my login cookie seems to have disappeared. But it’s impossible to login so that it works. Hmm. I have the same problem with the crossword site that always takes me back to the login page even after I log in. But I’m logged in and can get the crosswords. There seems to be some problem with Firefox.
   1. I get that sometimes with the livejournal site in Firefox. I find clearing both cookies and cache under ‘clear recent history. then refreshing the page or restarting Firefox, usually seems to do it. Livejournal and the Crossword Club are the only sites currently causing such problems for me.
4. Was feeling quite smug about finishing in 15 min. Then, horror of horrors, realised that I had one unfinished. SHELVE appeared from nowhere to save the day.

5. Very much a repeat of yesterday in that I raced through most of it and then ground to a halt, the last one in being 22ac. I’m not very happy with “president” = RON

   I needed assistance to correct PLEIADES having convinced myself that with all those vowels in play and probably being Greek it would contain an AE. I also thought the “secretary” in 24dn would be PA but this proved not to be so once the final checking letter was in place.

   I didn’t understand SPLINT at 1ac before coming here, nor SATISFACTION at 14ac where surely “at” is stopping “relation” rather than vice versa as the clue has it?

   So 35 minutes, sort of.

   1. I think we’ve had this conversation before. “Stopping” appears to be used in both senses; the one you favour, as in “acting like a stopper” in the sense of a cork, and its exact opposite, as in “acting like a stopper” in the sense of a fence, corral or general prohibitor of freedom. I’m not condoning either usage.
6. Chalk and cheese compared to yesterday. It looks like a few people ended on SHELVE, and i will join that list. Still dont quite understand the “handle” bit, but at least it covers both the planks and the not now bit. My only guess is that SHELVE = “deal with later” = “not now handle”, but that still seems a little cumbersome.
7. Solved IMPRISON and then for some unaccountable reason wrote in EMPRISON even though I knew the IMP was our troublemaker. This gave me T?S?A?E? for 5ac. In desperation put in TISWASES on the basis of 2 new verbs, to devil and to tiswas, and reckoning that TISWASES was probably an island in Swift or somewhere.

   Oh well! Steady if unspectacular solve although not as spectacular as 9 minutes (just exactly what wine was it George? Must get some).
   COD to GUNGA DIN just for “My better”. Lovely.

   1. Helping a friend show a visiting Brazilian philosopher around town we decided the venue should be a french cafe run by an argentinian where the wine special was a cotes du rhone 97. Maybe after dinner and wine with two philosophers and all that comes with it, I was ready to solve.
      1. George.
         Away from xwds for the minute, I have recently discovered the novels of Sharyn McCrumb, in particular those set in Appalachia (or Ap pal a cha as she insists). Nobody I know has ever heard of her and I was wondering if she is admired in your part of the world as she deserves to be?
         1. I’m not quite in Appalachia, I haven’t read any of her books, but I’ve heard of her. Around here the lauded old novelists are Thomas Wolfe and O Henry and more recently Patricia Cornwell and Wilma Dykeman.
8. The setter did say “some elements” and all the trans-uranics have a half-life.
   1. All trans-uranics are naturally radioactive, but the property of half life belongs to the individual isotope, not the element. There is no such thing as the “half-life of polonium”, but there are half-lives of polonium-206, polonium-207, polonium-208 etc.

      It’s rare I get to be a chemistry pedant, so I’m going to have my fun while I can.

      1. Wow! And my Missus thinks I’m a pedant? I have to have her meet you! 🙂

         Some elements have no (known) isotopes with a half life [I say this without having checked; please tell me if I’m wrong!]. Some elements have no isotopes that do not decay. Yes, the value of that half-life depends on the particular isotope: but to say that having a half-life is a property of Plutonium [and/or all of its isotopes] is not incorrect. To say what the value of that half-life is, would require a knowledge of which isotope is under discussion.

         To recap: I assert that having the property of having a half-life is a property of every element >92. (And the value of that property varies for each isotope of each element ….)

         1. But the half life is the value. This is perversely fun, any chance you’d like to sign up for a class on radiochemistry? Monday, Wednesday, Friday 9am beginning January 11
            1. Also perversely enjoying this… how about:

               1) The property of being (a) radioactive, or else (b) not radioactive: that’s a property of an isotope.

               2) The property of being (a) radioactive, or (b) not radioactive, or (c) sometimes radioactive: that’s a property of an element.

               You are arguing (1), I’m allowing (2). Jimbo is right in that if it were restricted to (1) it’d be a lot clearer. But it would be less fun 🙂

               I’d love to sign-up. My background is astrophysics so I’ve never really had reason to delve into radio-chemistry. Are your lectures available or followable online?

               And thanks for your always entertaining comments.
               AV.

               1. I recant. I can’t find a single element of which all known isotopes are stable…
            2. If I can intrude on this very esoteric exchange I think it unreasonable for a setter to assume that the ordinary solver will have such specialist knowledge. I’m amongst the first to complain if I’m expected to know some obscure literary character and I think the same applies to scientific topics.

               However, I think it quite reasonable to expect solvers to understand broadly what an isotope is and how half life works and in the case of carbon what it is used for.

               1. It’s a welcome addition, Jimbo. And I didn’t realise it was esoteric, though your saying so gave me a nice warm glow! 🙂

                  Can I ask: do you mean that you accept that a person with some general knowledge should know that lead isn’t radioactive, but Plutonium is… hence assume that having a half-life (i.e. being radioactive) is a property of the element. Or are you suggesting that people should know that He3 and He4 are stable whilst He5 emits a neutron? Ie. that radioactivity is a property of each isotope…

                  1. I think you’re still being over specific in seeking to distinguish say lead from plutonium and He3,4 and 5 is well beyond most. Come up a level. The ubiquitous man on the bus should know some elements have isotopes and isotopes are radioactive and that the rate at which they deteriorate creates something called a half-life. He should also know that this rate of deterioration is the basis for carbon dating. Anything more is in my view asking too much.
9. 35 mins (not counting the 10 I spent trying to get SHELVE at the end, speaking of senior moments) which makes it relatively straightforward. COD to BEDAUBED.

   5ac might have to be redrafted as “Devil’s island once” if things go on the way they are. Few populations of the cantankerous critters are free of the mysterious facial tumours which are wiping them out.

10. All but one solved over my muesli with only a slight pause to work out where to put the vowels in Pleiades.

    The one exception was, of course Shelve, which did not come to me until an hour later. I think Fathippy’s explanation is correct as it passes the substitution test: “I shall not now handle the issue”, “I shall shelve the issue”. I still think it’s a clumsy construction though

    1. A helve is a handle, so 11a no problem for me. 15 mins, last in 19 & 20 a. Liked the physics, halflife pedantry did not hold me up, this puzzle a 10a for 14a.
       1. One of the things that distracted me was that I was trying to fit helve into the wordplay but, ultimately, I think it was a red herring.
11. Came in off the golf course a drowned rat so slightly irritable. I think 9A would be improved by the use of isotope – it’s knowledge that should be far more in people’s general ken. I don’t think SHELVE quite works, far too clumsy. I too object to Ron=president. Where do we stop on that path? How about Dan for Daniel Moi? And wasn’t he known as Ronny rather than Ron?

    The rest is OK without being special. I thought Jack might enjoy “swing” and memories of the big band era. 25 minutes to solve.

    1. I should have refreshed the page before posting, jimbo, as I’ve pretty much recycled your material.
       1. No problem – it can be quite tricky can’t it.

          I’m very much with you and Jack in your comments made below about such as Ike and Abe. Ron is indeed not in that bracket.

12. Fared much better with this one after being beaten all ends up yesterday. All but SHELVE solved in about 20 minutes. Thanks for explaining SHELVE, fathippy. I wouldn’t have got that one.

    Daniel

13. 11:43 .. This seems to be one of those days where we solvers are as sheep, all solving much the same way.

    Last in SHELVES which, as fathippy says, appears to be written in Yoda-speak.

    I share jackkt’s reservation about ‘Ron’ for president. I suppose the precedent is ‘Ike’ for Eisenhower, but the only diminutive I recall being used for Reagan was Ronnie (which was what Nancy called him). I don’t think we would be happy with ‘Prime Minister’ cluing ‘Marge’ or ‘Gordie’ or ‘Nev’.

    But a fun solve. COD 14a SATISFACTION – and thanks for the Devo reminder, George – suddenly I’m seventeen again.

    1. I’m happy with Ike because it’s a famous nickname much-beloved by headline writers. Similarly if they could ever be incorporated into crosswords clues FDR, JFK, LBJ. But the only one I can think of that’s really comparable to RON for Reagan might be ABE for Lincoln which we seem to accept as being okay.
14. 25:20 – Quite straightforward, with a few good clues. SHELVE went in fairly easily for me, last in were RECIPE/STRAP. I wasn’t convinced about strap, so I waited for all the checking letters before putting it in.

    I also failed to understand 1a fully before coming here. Is the ‘One’ strictly necessary? It doesn’t seem to add much to either the definition or the surface, and it spoils the &lit slightly.

    COD to BEDAUBED. I also liked IMPRISON, but we saw an identical construction in Jumbo 837 earlier this month.

15. I’m also happy with Ike, and Abe for Lincoln, since he’s often referred to that way. ‘Ron’ is in a different category.
    1. Whoa. I just checked out the only accurate reference on US current affairs that I know; the Doonesbury cartoon strip. Today’s flashbacks (and I mean today’s because if you’re reading this tomorrow, things will be different) have a strip from 1989 featuring Ron Headrest (Ron Reagan’s alter ego who appears very occasionally) but also one from 1974 mentioning Gunga Din, referred to as Sen(i)or Din. Things have turned very weird indeed here.
16. about half an hour without aids – like many others shelve was last in and i believe the weakest clue in what was otherwise an entertaining solve. a man of many parts is the most common use of 6d and could not be described as obsolete. cod joint 20ac and 25ac.
17. Like most I found it easy and finished in 20 minutes. I was taken aback by the wordplay to 14 as I haven’t before seen ‘stopping’ to mean ‘containing’ rather than ‘being stuck in’. It’s not the first time RON’s appeared as a president so it didn’t bother me much – it’s no worse than ‘Bill’ to referring to the bard in barred cryptics.
    My main dislike was the awkward word order in the definition for SHELVE. It doesn’t even make for a smooth surface so it seems an odd choice.
18. 14:03 here, so about average for me. I didn’t have a problem with SHELVE, although I also thought it was a bit clumsy. Last one in for me was STRAP, although I was fairly convinced it would be the answer before finally remembering the phrase “a man of many parts”.
    COD 25ac BEDAUBED.
19. 14 minutes, would have been quicker but for a 17 where 3 was concerned, not being able to conjur up a word that would go with “in full” and fit big band music. Flow, voice, march, flight? Only twigged when I got the G from Gunga. Like duh!

    Thought splint was just a poor CD so thanks George for the enlightenemnt. Hesitated over strap, stuggled with EIA/AIE at 26 and, guess what, shelve was last in.

    COD imprison for the reversal of NO SIR.

    Right, I’m going off to sit in a dark room until the visions of Sotira at 17 become less frequent.

    1. I’ll still be there, cross-legged in the corner drinking Woodpecker cider, the incense burning and Steve Hillage on the record player.
       1. ….I’ve still got my copies of ‘L’ and ‘Fish Rising’, but lost my ‘Green’ somehow.
20. 15.56 Was all the way down to PLEIADES before I got an across answer , should have started on the downs as a few of them came easier. Nevertheless I found this to be above average difficulty so George is my GUNGA DIN today. Last in was SHELVE which must have taken 2 or 3 minutes alone.
21. 7 mins filling in the grid followed by 5 more figuring out the wordplay for SHELVE. Overall, agree with George that it was pretty easy.
22. 6:50, with the last in MOVE IN (19dn) and OBERON (22ac) – the former because of the definition by example (“source of gold” for VEIN) and the latter because of RON as discussed above.  No unknowns, but “parts” meaning abilities (6dn STRAP) was unfamiliar.

    I don’t see why “smashing” should indicate containment, as it does in 12ac (RE-PUB-LIC).  “A stopping B” as a dubious indication that A contains B (as in 14ac S-AT-ISFACTION) was discussed a few months ago here.  The anagram indicator in 17ac (“MENTIONS MORE need to revise”) is faulty, because “revise” is transitive in the required sense (cf. “need to be revised” or “need revising”).

23. First Times puzzle solved after returning from holiday, so 14:30 rather than about 7 isn’t too disappointing. Smiled at 5A, having taken quite a while to understand “Devil’s domain?” for the same answer in a difficult US-style puzzle solved on the plane home.

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