Times 25,043 A Puzzle To Suit The Occassion

Author   dorsetjimboPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
Solving time 20 minutes

A reasonable puzzle when one is slightly dozy. There are two clues I don’t completely understand and can’t quite raise the steam to delve into. On Edit – sorted one out myself and had stylistic help with the other

Across
1 CODICIL – LICI(t)-DOC all reversed; wherein Aunty Maud leaves it all to the dog’s home;
5 SHIFT – two meanings 1=alter, change 2=type of loose fitting dress;
9 DRILL – RD=road “back” – I-LL; you know the drill;
10 BRIDEWELL – BR(ID)EW-ELL; measure=ELL; Jug=prison is the definition (Bridewell was an infamous London prison);
11 CALGARY – CAL-GARY; City in Alberta famous for its annual rodeo;
12 CONFINE – CON-FINE; put in Bridewell;
13 BARBERSHOP – BARBER-SHO(w)-P; the Dapper Dans singing Sweet Adeline perhaps;
15 SKEW – S-KEW; colour as in introduce bias;
18 ERSE – hidden (b)E(a)R(d)S(l)E(y); setters favourite language;
20 NIGHT,HERON – NIGH(THE-R)ON; a rare sight;
23 FAN,MAIL – sounds like “fan male” = “cool, guy” – geddit?;
24 STRANGE – S-T-RANGE; small=S; temperature=T;
25 LAMPOONER – (moral + p=pressure)* surrounds ONE; Monty Python rides again;
26 CLONE – CL-ONE (CL=class or not as the case may be) or C-LONE first C(lass)=C=C (a)lone; see comments; more Christmas cracker stuff!
27 TENOR or TONER – (note)*-R(ecital); inadvertantly discovered there are two possible answers by mistakenly typing “toner” (see comments) – like I said, dozy;
28 SPARTAN – S(PART)AN; back to Bridewell;
 
Down
1 CHILLER – (s)CHILLER; Stephen King country;
2 DOLMADES – (sold)* surrounds EDAM reversed; Turkish nosh;
3 CABBY – C(r)ABBY; r=(passenge)R;
4 LOINCLOTH – (cool + thin + l=top of leg)*; me Tarzan, you Jane;
5 STERNE – take ERNEST and move ST=street=way to the top;
6 ICEPICK – I(CE)PICK; CE=C(revass)E;
7 TILDE – (detail without “a”)*; Cervantes was Spanish;
8 EDUCABLE – E(very)-D(epartment)-U-CABLE; old message really, a bit like Vince;
14 SKIPLANES – SKIP-LANES; aircraft for Calgary;
16 WANDERED – W-AND-ER-ED; with=AND; hesitation=ER; day=WED(nesday);
17 SHORT,CUT – rat run is definition; why number one?; On Edit – a “number one” is a very short haircut – like I’d know that!;
19 SANDMAN – SAND-MAN; reference Chopin’s squeeze;
21 RUN,DOWN – two meanings 1=to knock, to disparage 2=under the weather=off;
22 LABOUR – RU-O-BAL(l) all reversed; game=Rugby Union=RU; reference political party;
23 FILET – (I felt)*; de boeuf is delicious cooked rare with a claret;
24 SYRIA – hidden reversed (d)AIRY S(tores);

27 comments on “Times 25,043 A Puzzle To Suit The Occassion”

  1. 17d: a ‘number one’ provided by a barber (or Barber) wielding clippers is a very short haircut.
        1. But it could be toner – Chambers ” a person or thing that tones” with tone meaning to harmonise. It’s TENOR, though.
            1. I agree, of course, though “tone” is also archaic for “intone”. Mephisto might try it!
  2. I was on for a very quick finish (for me, that is) but stared at 13 B?R?E?S?O? for ages, not least because, wanting “short entertainment” to be ENT, I had TRIPLANES for quite a while at 14, even though I thought miss=trip was a bit thin.
    There are a lot of composers beginning with B, and I even wondered for a while if BARTOK was making an unlikely container.
    Otherwise, this was fun, straightforward without sacrificing wit and intelligence. I particularly liked SANDMAN, my CoD, the smoothly hidden SYRIA, and the painful reminder that, if you went into the local BARBERSHOP in school uniform, they appeared to be under instruction to supply a NUMBER ONE regardless of what you asked for.
    Never knew some herons only come out at night.
  3. Completed all but three clues in 40 minutes but failed to finish without resort to aids. My problem was entering TRIPLANES at 14dn and sticking with the idea despite not being able to justify TRIP = ‘miss’.

    My other sticking point was 26ac. I was happy with cl=class but Jim querying it sent me to the reference books and it’s true that none of the usual sources list it, however it is in SOED. My query on this clue is wondering what ‘in a way’ has to do with it. ‘First class copy’ would have done the trick perfectly and the additional words distracted me. Fair enough if they were relevant, but I can’t see that they are.

    Thanks to aphis99 for explaining ‘number one’ at 17dn. Hadn’t thought of that.

        1. And on reflection I now think ‘in a way’ is telling us that we are looking for a different way of saying ‘first class’ i.e. ‘class one’.
          1. OK. I’ve put CL-ONE back in but I’m not really keen. What a stew over what should be a very straightforward clue!
            1. CLONE had me in a stew too! Jack’s explanation, for which thanks, must surely be the right one. Seems to me quite a clever clue, now I understand it!
  4. Because I was watching Tendulkar bat while solving. (If that’s not an excuse, then nothing in this world is.)

    Bottom right was a complete dog. NIGHT HERON, SHORT CUT, RUN DOWN and … to me … the still mysterious CLONE (“In a way, first class copy”). Eh?

  5. A dire 68 minutes but glad to have finished, after a complete hold-up in SE and barbershop (unknown composer to me though I like the trad jazz of Chris B.) / skiplanes. I tend to think it’s cl/one i.e. cl= class, in a way; seems natural enough. A tough little number.
  6. is everyone OK with RANGE = OVEN? As far as I can understand a “stove” comprised the oven and the range, being the burners and hotplates on top. In modern kitchens the range is generally separate from the oven.
    1. Interesting, never thought to check this. Chambers gives range=an enclosed kitchen fireplace fitted with appliances of various kinds – so the oven is part of the range rather than synonymous with it perhaps?
    2. I had a ? against it for that very reason but didn’t get round to pursuing it. Collins has ” a large stove with burners and one or more ovens”, COED doesn’t mention ‘oven’, SOED has much the same as Collins.
      1. It could be a usage that hasn’t reached the dictionaries. I’d say a setter can anticipate the official take-up. In a farmhouse I know, range and oven are interchangeable.
  7. The site is making me anonymous today. About 30 minutes for an unremarkable puzzle, but that was just what the doctor ordered today. Regards. Kevin_from_ny
  9. To save people from seeking out the clue, it’s ‘In a way, first class copy’. My interpretation was In = on (yes, doubtful I know, but I bet it’s there somewhere, the sort of thing that’s in Chambers), e(ast) = a way, and coming first of all is cl. Not sure that’s correct, though.
  10. 12:09 for me, slowed down (like others) by BERG (instead of BARBER) and TRIPLANES. Don’t recall coming across NIGHT HERON before, but only a slight hold-up there.

    I thought this was an exceptionally fine puzzle. My compliments to the setter.

  11. Have learned ‘rat run’ = short cut(used to take many when I was a rep) and that a ‘number one’ is a brutal cut of a type I used to experience too. Prefer the, to me, more elegant C + LONE explanation of CLONE. Nice puzzle.
  12. In my mum’s kitchen, the range included an oven – but as she also had a gas appliance, so when we referred to the oven, it was always to the latter.

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