Times 24428 – Fun In Acapulco

40 comments on “Times 24428 – Fun In Acapulco”

1. 32 mins and thankful for an easier morning. (Though the Club Monthly is still on the go with two remaining.) Agree with Uncle Yap that INFRA DIG is a stand-out. Just a couple of notes: (1) not sure that “playful” and “larking about” can be the same part of speech. (2) As well as its dramatic meaning, a strophe is also “a structural division of a poem containing stanzas of varying line-length, especially an ode or free verse poem” (US OED).
2. Superbly blogged Uncle Yap, thanks very much. About 25 minutes here, helped by much Latin instruction in high school, so I could dig INFRA DIG from the far recesses of my brain. ELDRITCH is new to me also, otherwise no complaints. KILKENNY CATS was also very good from the unlikely looking anagrist. I was deceived by the ‘young swimmer’ in 22 which I took to be ‘fry’ by itself; I saw it to be ‘fry’ around ‘eel’, but I thus had some trouble trying to see where the ‘eel’ had come from. Regards to all.
3. McText, How come you are always the earliest? Don’t you sleep?
   >not sure that “playful” and “larking about” can be the same part of speech.

   When I first took up crosswords, someone told me that a synonymous relationship is established if you can construct a sentence where the two can be inter-changeable without affecting the meaning. I worry about my son’s “playful”/”larking about” attitude towards his work.

4. Uncle Yap, I live in Western Australia where the Times appears rather late … 8:00am when the Poms are off daylight saving. (Though I may be later next week when I have a visitor from KL.)
   The blog and the puzzle were great so I don’t want to take issue. Still, if “larking about” is to be an adjective, I guess it has to be hyphenated. And I’m pretty sure that it’s the second meaning of “strophe” that’s intended at 19dn: “part of ode”.
   My best as ever.
5. 6:58 with a nice easy start, identifying the anag in 1A and then “bug”, and then a quick burst of “what’s that Indonesian percussion band?” before seeing 9A, the top right downs, and getting lucky with the cats at 11A. 2/13 were last in. 17D is very good though not fully understood in my speed merchant’s haste. With mctext on strophe – “first section of ancient Gk ode” must be the meaning required here.

   Also on 3D, though I must admit it didn’t trouble me while solving – “My son’s larking about attitude to work” doesn’t really fit. “He’s larking about” and “He’s playful” seem to pass the substitution test, but don’t really say the same thing – one’s a current action, the other a longer-lasting state.

   Edited at 2010-01-07 08:11 am (UTC)

6. Another def of strophe is ” one section of a lyric poem or choral ode in classical Greek drama ” (Alan Beale’s as used by Ross Beresford’s Tea) That should equate to “part of ode” in the clue.
7. OK. A view from someone (a trifle dense) still in his first year of doing this. I reckon anyone resolving to tackle The Times in 2010 is having second thoughts after the last 2 days. Aids assisted finish rather quicker than yesterday with post-solve checks on MEALY BUG, KILKENNY CATS and ELDRITCH and although my parsing for INFRA DIG, FREELY and EGGHEADS was the same as our avuncular blogger I remain unconvinced of their precision. Even with all the checking letters I don’t think I would ever have got PAWNEE without a machine.
   Tough and not in a good way.
   Terrific blog though but.
   1. EGGHEADS – “include” is a formal meaning of comprehend, so you don’t need the flaky kind of “comprehend = understand = take in” sequence of steps that Mark T would grumble about. The rest is complex but explicit. At 17D, “in for” is in the “We’re in for some cold weather” sense so I can’t see a problem there. At 22D, “young (plural) = fry” is tricky but fair, ditto the word order.

      Getting PAWNEE without help: the key for me was “almost” very probably meaning “drop the last letter” – but of what? “Handle almost” suggested NAM(e), but NAMN?E is a dead end, so “almost essential” was the next thought, and remembering that “essential” can be a noun was the next step – then it was who are those ?A?NEE Amerindians? YANKEE had been a brief contender before 3D went in, and its final -EE might have helped towards the right answer.
      It’s surprising how often two components in a 6-letter answer are both 3-letter words or word fragments – 22A is another example.

      1. Thanks as ever Peter. (Newcomers seeing this should take note of the kind of uncondescending assistance that might be received from the regulars here).
         Comprehend as an indicator I had belatedly if reluctantly surmised. I was in the “FRY as a young fish school” (pun intended) with Kevin. Your parsing of PAWNEE came to me immediately I saw the word on my machine and I suppose my objection was the vagueness of the definition.
         1. (a) Your cheque is in the post.
            (b) Fair point about the vague def – the clue could have been “Handle almost essential for one with a tomahawk?”, but here we’re into the tricky issue of how to prevent the old hands from identifying a narrow field from the def alone.

            Edited at 2010-01-07 01:32 pm (UTC)

8. 40 minutes today, the last 5 of which were wasted on the 17dn and 23ac intersection where I had lost sight of 17dn being 5,3 rather than 8 letters as I had been trying to work out anagram fodder from the clue. Once I reread and spotted 5,3 the answer came immediately and 22 followed on.

   No aids and no new words for me today. I even knew ELDRITCH because at school for one term we were taught by a shy young trainee teacher of that name. It didn’t take us long to find out it was a real word and bring its meaning to his attention (as if he wouldn’t have known it already). I’m afraid we may have given the poor man a rather hard time. I hope he ended up with a long and fruitful career in teaching.

9. I whizzed through this with just a couple of minutes at the end to get Bullseye. I had to follow my own maxim that, if the checked letter pattern looks impossible, it must be a compound word.

   I only know Eldritch from reading H P Lovecraft. I have never come across it, either written or spoken, anywhere else but Lovecraft sprinkles the word liberally throughout his prose.

   The last time Gamelan appeared in the Times Crossword, defined, I think, as an Indonesian orchestra, there was a letter to the editor the next day complaining of its obscurity. I hope the letter-writer had a go at yesterday’s puzzle.

   1. I was married in Jakarta and we had a gamelan orchestra at our wedding. (I suppose it just shows that “obscure” means “something I don’t know”.)

      Kurihan

10. Back to normal today after yesterday’s excursion with a standard 25 minute job. A reasonable puzzle in all respects.

    Two trips down memory lane. ALL CLEAR brought back memories of sirens wailing. They used to test them on a regular basis until some time in the 1950s I recall. KILKENNY and Cromwell was a favourite topic for my Irish uncle as we discussed Irish history over a glass or three of poteen.

11. Looking in again after a bit of an absence. Found today’s tough and yesterday’s even worse. Finished today without aids except for 12d which went in as calparea dove as I hadn’t heard of ‘collared’ ones and didn’t know that the Dove was a river in the Peak District. (I just assumed it must be a river somewhere.) Mind you I hadn’t heard of ‘eldritch’ either. ‘Pawnee’ was last in.
12. Must be feeling better – back to under the half hour though last 5 mins getting to pawnee. Liked inf(o)ra dig (I think we are with all this snow), the gym-slip and the quarrelsome cats. The doves – we have several pairs in the garden in summer. Elia used to appear frequently, welcome back. I remember my father reading me the Pork essay.
13. Having done most of yesterdays and todays in a row this morning, the difference in difficulty was very apparent. That said, I struggled for a while with FREELY, mainly because in that age old trap when one believes a puzzle to be on the easy side, I had spelt COLLAR(R)ED with a double R and sharing its D with DOVE, and for some reason didnt notice for ages. Was desperately trying to shoe-horn in FIRMLY to mean without resistance and a kind of FILLY=young straw to clutch at…. Less haste more speed perchance. I also had to use aids to get PAWNEE as the word meant nothing to me, as didn’t TAGNEE, BARNEE, BAGNEE, or anything else which could conceiveably suggest HANDLE. I would also think that PAW for handle may be a little obscure.
14. Also – forgot to mention that Eldritch is, I believe, the given first name of Mr.T (or should that be E) Woods.
    1. Nope, it was Eldrick, but when turned pro he went to the local courthouse and changed his legal name.
15. ….I was very slow on this one. It wasn’t like I hadn’t heard of ‘eldritch’ and ‘Pawnee’, either.

    The bottom wasn’t too bad, but I was really stuck on the top until I got ‘Kilkenny cats’. When working an anagram like that, you’re looking for a four-letter plural as the second element. I looked for ‘kids’, ‘lads’, that sort of thing, but took a long time to see it must be cats.

    I was also convinced that ‘blue gym slip’ had something to do with ‘sad PE err’, which held me up for quite a while.

16. 45 minutes despite not knowing who Eldritch was (thought character from Harry Potter) and being more than a little shaky on Elia (I know he’s in regularly but how am I supposed to remember?) and finagle (related to the great sport of farnarkling?). I liked FREELY but COD to INFRA DIG.

    As for mealy bugs, if everybody in the world squashed just one per day, there’d still be enough of the little blighters to destroy three football fields worth of indoor plants every minute.

    1. Talking of farnarkling, does anybody else remember the Farkle family on Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-in, including the twins, Simon and Garfunkel Farkle?
17. On balance I’m with Barry here too. For me this was the least satisfying kind of puzzle, one where any difficulty resides in wilful obscurity of the vocabulary rather than the ingenuity of the wordplay. I didn’t know mealy bug, bullseye (as a sweet), kilkenny cats, collared dove. I did know finagle and eldritch, but one is an archaism and the other on its way to becoming one. Got there with one incomplete (bullseye) but not an enjoyable experience.
18. When I started, my pen could not keep up with my brain and most of the top half was filled very quickly. The lower half was trickier, though even ELDRITCH was very familiar from barred puzzles, and many clues were absolutely straightforward. COLLARED DOVE was new to me, and I was really stuck for some time at the end with this and 16. My error was to be fixated on C as ‘caught’. 22 minutes in all.

    Although 1 was easy to get, the clue doesn’t really work. The letters of A BLUE GYM ‘slip'(used intransitively), so “in” makes nonsense in the cryptic grammar.

    I liked the clues for 3 and 22, both of which were far neater.

    1. If you permit nouns as anagram indicators, you can read “slip” as “an instance of slipping” or just “mistake”. That seems to resolve the cryptic grammar, and as far as I know, Richard Browne is like former Times xwd ed Brian Greer who wrote “I see no reason to rule out the appropriate use of nouns for this purpose” in his “how to solve” book. I know that strict Ximeneans differ on this point.
       1. I know that is how some setters and solvers justify it. For me it does not work, especially after a phrase, rather than a single word. It requires some tortuous gymnastics to see it that way. If I included such a clue in one of my puzzles I know at least 3 editors who would reject it or at least have strong reservations about it.
19. As a newbie I found this puzzle straightforward apart from 7 down where ALLA was my only error (thought it must be some kind of corruption of ALAR = wings). So a very enjoyable 50 minutes. Several words had to be dragged up from the memory banks , ELDRITCH, KILKENNY CATS,STROPHE, BRITCHES, LA LA LAND and FINAGLE/GAMELAN very guessable. Never heard of the abbreviation ARP nor the word BULL’S-EYE for gold. I enjoyed the clues which take a third reading before the penny drops e.g. CONSTRUE, IGNORANT
20. About 25 minutes (managed to make a right mealy bug of the timing) with Kilkenny Cats and eldritch new to me and Pawnee, finagle and strophe right on the outer edges of recognition. I’m surprised at how many haven’t heard of the collared dove. I’m no Bill Oddie but we get them in our garden from time to time.

    I’m firmly with Koro on Elia, knowing for sure it has appeared before but failing to remember it.

    Aside from the knowledge gaps I was also held up by taking too long to see berated and envisage.

    Anyone visiting York would do well to take the short detour to Castle Howard. An absolutely stunning place (as seen in Brideshead Revisited).

    COD a dead heat between bullseye and Acapulco.

21. 12:50 and an enjoyable solve with some words which don’t crop up too often. GAMELAN was a new one for me but no other logical option from the wordplay. ELDRITCH took a bit of time as I immediately looked for an UN start. last pair were BULLSEYE which I found quite difficult as double def. clues go , and then PAWNEE which as often with the last one in was my COD. A point made yesterday was that it appears some of us might prefer the easier puzzles. For me, it is usually the other way although I did enjoy today’s puzzle just as much as yesterdays.
22. It’s always interesting to read what people regard as obscure words. Eldritch is familiar from many role playing computer games and Dungeons and Dragons type sci-fi. Bullseye sweets must be familiar to readers of The Beano or Billy Bunter.

    Very quick time (for me), took ages to see that ‘handle’ was a verb in PAWNEE.

23. 14:05 here. Last one in PAWNEE very tentatively. I could see NEE(d) straight away but thought PAW = to handle was a bit loose and wondered if there wasn’t another alternative. Other difficulties: (countres)* for CONSTRUE took a while to spot, even though I saw the anagram straight away. I see Chambers gives that meaning as archaic, so that’s my excuse. KILKENNY CATS – again I spotted the anagram fodder immediately but needed a few checkers before the penny dropped, although I had heard of the expression before. I thought INF(o)RA DIG very clever and that gets my COD nomination.
24. Almost got there within 30 minutes but last 3 took ages. They being Elia…so simple when you see it finally, Gamelan-very obscure-kets all write in and Finagle! come on!
    anyway easier than yesterday!
    but the club puzzle now thats a toughie this month!
    1. “finagle” is maybe one of those informal words that you either know very well or not at all – I’m pretty sure I didn’t learn it from xwds but couldn’t tell you where I first saw or heard it.

       Gamelan has influenced Western music from time to time, so isn’t completely obscure. The complaint letter referred to above related to an appearance in the Times 2 puzzle, by the way.

       1. As many posters here keep saying: one person’s obscurity is another’s commonplace. As for GAMELAN, I just wrote it in, finding it rather easy. Where I used to work, there’s a pendopo in the quad where gamelan music is frequently played. Less obscure for many solvers, then, than say CASTLE HOWARD, (Philip) LARKIN or old air-raid warnings.
25. I thought this somewhat harder than average. After 20mins I had 4 clues left that took some time to resolve. Also stupidly putting “trophes” instead of “strophe” didn’t help me.. these damned poetic descriptors pop up all the time and I know nothing, nothing about them..

    Don’t personally see any necessary difference at all between “You are larking about today” and “you are playful today”

    Nice to note that some of us are trying the club special crossword.. I hope you are all carefully writing down your comments, so they will be available when the blog finally comes out! (should be 29th Jan)

26. Hard to finish this one having stuck in Colorado dove without obviously understanding the parsing. But it certainly seemed to fit with peak district and river. Also convinced myself that a tal was some sort of oriental and that gametal decribed a form of union. D’oh! Still don’t understand how paw = handle. Tony d
    1. To paw = to handle
27. After receiving a book on cryptics for Christmas, I, and three friends, have just completed our first Times crossword. Very pleased to have made a start, and my New Year’s resolution is to complete one on my own by the end of the year! Will be sure to post on here as soon as I’ve done it.

    Particularly enjoyed Infra Dig, and also Side.

    Time taken: Four and a half hours. So, a little off the pace… Still, feel like we’ve all achieved something today!

    Jack B

    1. Well done. I hope you tell us about some other progress before your first solo completion. Don’t worry about speed until finishing is routine, if ever. Which book was it?
    2. Well done Jack and friends. Don’t wait until you finish one – join in the fun. Never be embarrassed to ask any question. We can all remember being at your stage and are only too willing to help where we can.

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