Times 24473 – Athlete’s foot in mouth

Author   kororarekaPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
Solving time: Let’s not go there

For about fifteen minutes I thought I was going to do a Personal Best until I arrived on the banks of the Tyne and my mind became a complete blank. Isn’t it the Lethe that’s supposed to have that effect? Eventually I sought the help of Ms Koro, who can always think of the bon mot, albeit with at times imprecise knowledge of pourquoi, and we finished it as one. You are all deeply indebted to her today.

Across
1 R.U. for Rugby Union before BoY PORT for left = RUBY PORT. A drink and a port in the opening clue should have been a warning to me.
5 CARD + US for Sir John Frederick Neville Cardus CBE, music critic and cricket writer, no doubt well known to all in the UK. I wavered between he, caddis (not really a cricket) and waldos (as in “Where’s Waldo? He’s at the cricket.”) before deciding correctly, thinking if Virgil wrote on bees, maybe Cardus was a one of his pupils who got crickets as an assignment. He (Cardus, that is, not Virgil) lived in Sydney for “a number of years” (see 10ac) during WWII, so I should have known who he was. Apparently “He helped to lift the standard of musical criticism in Australia.” I’ll refrain from making a facetious comment at this point.
10 DECADE before N for northern C.E. = DECADENCE
11 CH[IN]A &lit. Tinea was the best I could do for some time.
12 O + (SIT)rev = OTIS, a name familiar to anyone who has ever stepped into a lift.
13 P.E. + R + SEVERE = PERSEVERE or soldier on. Excellent clue.
15 (NARCOTICS)* around A = COSTA RICAN
17 GrETNA. Scottish villages are not my forté, but this is one of the most famous.
19 Omitted. Ask if you can’t pick it.
20 (HOTEL SUITE)* = SILHOUETTE. Nice anagram.
22 GAR for fish + ANT for worker in (AUG)rev = GARGANTUA, a Rabelaisian giant, from which gargantuan.
24 LIED, heteronymic double definition
26 ALO[N for noon]E = ALONE
27 Omitted. Pass enquiries to the forum.
28 E[LE]VEN
29 TRUE + BLUE. This has a different meaning in Australia, meaning “dinky di” or “in possession of veracity, uprightness and a stubbie”, but only in a certain kind of folk song.

Down
1 Omitted.
2 BACK TO SQUARE ONE, a double definition, the first a reference to Monopoly, say.
3 (PLASTERED – R)* = PEDESTAL
4 RUN + UP
6 ARCH + ED. I’m going to tattoo arch=chief on the inside of my eyelids.
7 DRIVEN TO THE WALL, is a better answer than bussed to the wall, which was all I could think of, then guided, nailed, anything but driven.
8 STAGE NAMES. I’m hazy about the relevance of “travelling”, unless it belongs with the coach idea. I think we’ve visited both the Doris Day and HBO arrivals of the Deadwood stage, previously. Whip crack away!
9 REP + ROACH. I’m thinking that’s Hal rather than Jay. At the time I was probably thinking Ken, but would have been wrong on several counts.
14 Seduce + CAPE + GRACE = SCAPEGRACE, an early 19th century hoodie. It sounded more Shakespearean than that.
16 Omitted. Ask if you haven’t the wit.
18 BULL’S-EYE, double triple definition (see Kurihan’s comment below) . Bull’s eye windows are round, although possibly also ones made from bullseye glass.
21 (AVERSE)* = VARESE. Here’s the only one of his works I’m familiar with. Altogether now…
23 fALTER
25 Omitted. Ask the club.

34 comments on “Times 24473 – Athlete’s foot in mouth”

  1. A strong sporting theme to this one, even at 2dn which I think was once a phrase used by football commentators on the radio. As I understand it, the pitch was divided up into imaginary squares and BACK TO SQUARE ONE was used to describe a back-pass to the goalkeeper.

    I too was on for a record time until I got held up in the SW, where I failed to spot GRACE at 14dn and kept seeing GOATS instead. Having lost momentum, I eventually finished in 35 minutes. But I now see that I’ve entered DRIVEN UP THE WALL at 7dn and JURA at 17ac, with no sign of a Scottish village anywhere.

    1. I agree with the OED on this:

      “[Often said to derive from the notional division of an association football pitch into eight numbered sections for the purposes of early radio commentaries (see Radio Times 1927, 28 Jan.), but this is unlikely, as the system was abandoned several decades before the first record of the phrase. A more plausible origin may be a game involving counters and numbered squares, such as hopscotch or Snakes and Ladders (cf. quot. 1952).]”

      See also:

      http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-bac1.htm
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Back_to_square_one – for a picture of the diagram, showing that the goalkeeper could easily be in square one or two (and the other goalkeeper would be in square 7 or 8).

  2. Started off well (not!) with the well-known American eccentric, Fred Penleg, at 5ac. That had to go when I got 7dn which reminded me of an old favourite (obviously not from The Times): “Was promoted like flying taxis” (4,4,3,5). COD to 13ac for the “soldier on” mis-direction. 12 mins in all. Still can’t get through the 10 barrier.

    >You are all deeply indebted to her today.
    Indeed!

    1. Perhaps when you rise from the ranks you’ll crack the 10-minute barrier.

      Forgot to mention earlier that my Sydney-centric approach to 9dn had Cock as the film-producing roach. It’s just about plausible.

  3. I’d have finished in 30 minutes but for 5ac which I failed to solve even using aids. I know of Sir Neville with reference to music but not to cricket.

    I think I have heard of Varese, and given the left-over letters available the answer seemed the most likely to me. Going by the music on the link above I shall not be seeking out any more of his composotions.

    Never heard of SCAPEGRACE.

    Other than the above it seemed quite easy and I enjoyed being reminded (at 12ac) of one of Cole Porter’s very best songs, Miss Otis Regrets.

  4. Twenty minutes, but with two wrong, as I thought ‘stage lines’ was a splendid answer for 8. Fortunately I had mctextual assistance.
  5. An unflustered 17 min, with only 21 dn VARESE entered on a wing and a prayer. COD? probably 15 ac COSTA RICAN for working on more than one level. The out of towners will love 5 ac which is doubly British.
  6. Any puzzle with a sporting theme is grist to my mill. Finished in 38 minutes with the slot for Obligatory One Wrong today taken by 20ac, of all things. I’ll keep that dunce’s hat for another day, I think. Had 8dn as STAGE COACH for a while, which slowed me down until I got ETNA.
      1. Not if I told you (in the strictest confidence, of course) that I actually entered LITHOUSTLE …
  7. This was ok for a Monday I suppose, but I thought it was rather dull, full of trite conventions.

    I think 18dn is a triple def by the way – Sweet / shot may hit this /window.

    1. I believe you are spot on with that thought. I’ll amend the blog accordingly.
  8. Well under the hour today and would have been half that time had I not had to unravel a couple of beginners’ errors in NE corner having entered UP the wall (first in) and then forgotten there was an alternative; so was left looking for a peak ?U?A and wasted further time trying to remove GK rather than GR from a Scottish village.
    Put money on OTIS inventing the lift and that Jack would mention the missing lunch guest.
    1. 7dn did give me pause to reflect on the subtleties of English – “to drive s/o to the wall” and “to drive s/o up the wall” having quite different meanings.
  9. Aargh! 8 m, = pb, and would have had a new one but I am rubbish at film stuff, 9 last in. Worked diagonally down from solved clues, liked 8 & 13.
  10. No probs at all with this, 16mins which is fast for me. I guess I just struck lucky in the general knowledge stakes.. this puzzle struck me as needing rather more than usual.
    The only thing that held me up was entering up instead of to, as in “driven up the wall” (perfectly reasonable answer, have you ever been on a coach tour?) which made Etna somewhat harder than it need have been..
    1. I have been on a few coach tours, including a day going to the Great Wall from Beijing, which was one of the most frustrating days of tourism I’ve ever had – annoying enough for the “driven up the wall” pun not to occur to me.
      1. With standards of driving what they are out here, you’re lucky it wasn’t driven INTO the wall.
  11. 9:38 for me, no real problems at all. I did briefly enter UP in 7dn but it only stayed there for 5 seconds or so. Last in was PERSEVERE, excellent clue that gets my COD nomination.
  12. 5:49, failing to notice the sportiness. Also rubbish on films, so 9 was one of the last in, mostly from the def.
  13. I came up five short today, missing SCAPEGRACE, CARDUS, ARCHED, STAGE NAMES and ETNA. Should have got ARCHED but thought “ED” was chief journalist and was looking for a four letter word meaning “of”! Also, couldn’t think beyond ?TOR or ?TOP for ETNA. The rest was a gentle start to the week with simple wordplay. DRIVEN TO THE WALL raised a smile. I don’t know many composers and was lucky to guess VARESE correctly at 21. RAVESE or SAVERE looked just as likely on paper.

    COD to COSTA RICAN because of its aptness: my in-laws were there yesterday at the port of Limon on a Caribbean cruise, and b) I speak to work colleagues in San Jose most months.

    I’m trying Saturday’s Listener puzzle. Haven’t done a Listener before but this mathematical one caught my interest. Have made a very inauspicious start though – after an hour’s deep thought and scribbling last night the grid is still blank!

    1. Listener mathematicals usually appear on the last Saturdays of Feb, May, Aug, Nov. If you’ve got access to the Times club site, have a look at a few previous ones and their solutions, possibly including the “detailed solutions” page here. The linked site may also have some general tips on solving mathematicals.

      For the few I finished (many years ago) I found it essential to keep a list of numbered steps in the same manner as a mathematical proof, so that mistakes leading to impossibilities could be identified without losing the benefit of other work towards the solution.

  14. 7:49 .. solved while still buzzing from a trip to the symphony which turned into a night of celebration, the concert starting, as it did, minutes after our local hero scored the winning goal against the USA in the hockey (Canadians would gladly have swapped all the other medals for that one). This was a great place to be last night, even if, like me, you spend most of a hockey game wondering where the puck is and saying things like “Was that good?” and “Is he on our side?”

    A few guesses here in a largely guessable puzzle. No wordplay scribbles for once. Last in VARESE, who was knew to me.

    A very entertaining blog. Thanks to Koro and his better half.

  15. Complete guesses from wordplay were STAGE NAMES (phew), CARDUS (phew), SCAPEGRACE (though I think John Barth used it somewhere, phew) and SAVERE (bzzzzzt). The youtube link didn’t help either, so congrats to you, VARESE, and apologies to Paulus Savere, composer of three concertos for kazoo and castanets in F minor sometime in the mid 1840s.
  16. No problems here and strolled home in 15 minutes after my best round of golf this year – wonderful what the sun shining does to one. No real points of interest, just a standard fairly easy workmanlike puzzle
  17. 6:47 .Only held up for a bit by venturing a BARRACUDA for 23. Sympathy with non-cricket lovers re CARDUS. Hadn’t heard of VARESE but found myself thinking ‘was he not a painter?’. Probably thinking of Veronese, so was fortunate not to have opted for Savere. COD for me was 13 where I needed all the checking letters before I cottoned on to the definition.
  18. Very straightforward northern sector solved in three minutes. Held back when I realized that ‘Stage Coach’ was wrong when solving the interconnector as ‘Silhouette’. The southern sector took another 14 minutes.

    Solving time 17′

    Some elegant surfaces, redolent of Roger Squires who as Rufus today reached his milestone of 1,000 in todays Ugnadiar.

  19. Got through the puzzle in 20 minutes save for the ARCHED/CARDUS pair. I saw ARCHED after another 10 minutes, but had to resort to aids to confirm ‘Mr. Cricket’. No other real comments. VARESE was a bit of a guess, but nothing like the stab in the dark at 5. I liked PERSEVERE for COD. Congrats to Sotira and the rest of the happy Canadians for persevering through the very good competitive hockey game. Regards.
  20. Like many others I would have had a very quick time today had I not been held up in Tyneside. Mind you I also had a rebellioun in the SW with 19 resisting a long time and 14 only falling thereafter. 25 mins in all so not bad even so. COD to 11 as I have a soft spot for &lits.

    Regards to all.

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