Times 25098: Don’t come the uncooked crustacean with me

Author   mctextPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
Solving time: 20:40

For me the third easy-ish day in a row — though some won’t agree about Monday. (Stinker for George tomorrow? Though, if so, I’m sure he’ll polish it off with his usual proficiency.) Quite a lot in the will & testament dept. today (dead giveaways), the first few of which I’ve noted. Wonder how many others will have solved 11ac before 9dn?

Across
 1 RO,BUST. Our men are the ubiquitous OR (Other Ranks).
 4 LAPPED UP. Anagram of ‘apple’ and reverse of PUD.
10 CAN(A,LETT)O. An inhabitant of Lettland (now Latvia) inside CANO{n}; as in ‘the Shakespeare canon’.
11 ADDER. For which the whole of the answer to 9dn is the clue. L (line) deleted from ‘ladder’, steps.
12 ROLL(M)OP. M (male) inside {t}ROLLOP, tart.
13 DENT,1ST. Today’s first giveaway.
14 {t}ERROR. The second such.
15 OP,OS,SUMS. This would be {cr}OP; OS (outsize, massive); SUMS (problems). Brought to mind the Bash Street Kids in detention with books of Hard Sums.
18 NU,THATCH. Reverse of UN (French indef. article); THATCH (reed). [Not strictly a warbler though they do “advertise their territory using loud, simple songs”. Hence the common name: Bogan bird.]
20 Omitted. Third giveaway.
23 CAST-OFF. Anagram: scoff at.
25 WEED OUT. Cf ‘wee doubt’.
26 PARIS. PeAbRaInS.
27 INSTITUTE. IN; boSTon; IT; U (university); E (note). On edit: not E but TE. Thanks to Anon at IP 81.155.31.134.
28 SWEET PEA. WE inside SET (planted); PEA{t}.
29 RE,PENT. ‘On’=RE.
Down
 1 RE(C)ORDER. With just the initial, it looked like REF….. to me.
 2 BU(N)GLER.
 3 SALT MARS,H. Tar=sailor=SALT; MARS (spoils); H (entrance to ‘Holiday’).
 5 A WORD TO THE WISE. Anagram: so we had to write.
 6 Omitted. See title.
 7 DADA,ISM. Reverse these: M{useum} S{upervisor} I{s}; AD+AD (two posters).
 8 PIRATE. Would you believe a pie with a rat in it?
 9 STEPS OUT OF LINE. Two defs, the first a peculiar use of ‘queue-jumps’ meaning to jump out of said queue where we may have been expecting just the opposite.
16 SPARE TIME. Reverse of EMITS (broadcasts) including PARE (cut). Originally thought S(LACK) TIME until that banjaxed 25ac.
17 F,LATTES,T. I’m with Jerry on this: latte is hardly coffee.
19 UP,SURGE. UP being ‘to the summit’ and SURGE the wave. The def is ‘hike’ (increase). Though there may also be an argument for ‘wave’ as the def and ‘hike’=SURGE, I don’t think it works as well.
21 PROF,USE. Not for this particular one!
22 S,COP(E)S.
24 ONSET. An anagram.

45 comments on “Times 25098: Don’t come the uncooked crustacean with me”

  1. 26 minutes and rather a flat white of a puzzle. Wanted to put ‘a word in your shell-like’ at 5 but it wouldn’t fit.
  2. 20′ exactly. I normally don’t do these online, and I can see why not: the pressure to solve probably improves my time –not to mention the absence of scotch– but at the price of not knowing why I’ve put in what I have until afterwards, if then. My LOI, like vinyl’s, was 8d, a clever clue that may make up for, say, 13ac. I suppose a queue-jumper has to step out of the line in order to step in; but still.
  3. The cunningest bit of queue-jumping I’ve ever witnessed took place in the line that members of the MCC would form at 8 in the morning to get the best seats in the Warner Stand on the Friday of a Test match. This bloke crossed the line in front of me, walked down a stairwell which led to a basement of some kind, walked right back up and took his place behind me.

    Little queue-jumping here in China as there are precious few queues.

    Edited at 2012-02-29 06:14 am (UTC)

  4. 27 minutes, so the second in a row under 30 for me. I enjoyed this and thought the standard of cluing was mostly rather good. Several amused me but 8dn wins the biscuit.

    I couldn’t see the wordplay at 18 or 25 so decided to sleep on them, but this morning I came here without remembering to review the clues so I don’t know whether I would have understood them in a flash of inspiration or continued to be mystified.

    1. Glad you said this Jack. I should have added that simplicity doesn’t necessitate poor clueing. As Anax said recently, it’s harder to write a good puzzle on the simpler side than to construct obscure clues for obscure words. So, yes, there are some excellent surfaces in this puzzle now I look back under your prompting. 4ac, for example, is delightful.
  5. 35 minutes for me. I enjoyed the clueing immensely, particularly LAPPED UP, PIRATE, SCOPES and the ADDER, STEPS OUT OF LINE pair, which gets my joint COD. I thought the idea was you got out of the line and found alternate means to get served first, like the “cashed up” ones who arrive destitute in Australia in un-seaworthy vessels, if their luck holds out.

    I liked your Bogan bird joke, but hatches are not usually their vehicle of choice.

  6. 21 minutes with what was pretty decent, smooth cluing, I thought: I don’t think I had set myself to spot the gimmes and rather chewed over each one.
    I liked the STEP/LADDER combination, and yes, I did get ADDER first and it helped not one whit with 9d. Just a very satisfying drop of the penny.
    Didn’t construe NUTHATCH, so thanks for that.
    CoD to PIRATE for sheer mischief.
  7. A slowish 48.15 today but at least I’m completing them these days. Lots of enjoyable clues here. My favourite was 12 ac which raised a smile. My one doubt was in 28 ac with PEAT as a fertiliser but I can’t research this while I’m away.
      1. Thanks, Koro. It seems that as an additive to soil it becomes a fertiliser for among other things its water retentive qualities and the vegetable matter it adds to otherwise impoverished soils. SO I think my ‘definition’ of what is a fertiliser is at fault rather than what I thought peat was.
  8. Fair rattled through this one, c12 minutes. Some ridiculously simple clues – anyone held up even momentarily by 13ac, for example? – but also some very neat ones. I liked 11ac and 23ac.

    Latte is decaffeinated, even when it isn’t…

    1. Yeah, I was. I thought it was DENT in front of expert and meant tooth. Dentine? Dentace? and so on.
  9. Easy puzzle even in my analgesic inspired state – 15 minutes to solve

    Solved ADDER from A.D.. plus “venemous sort” and forget to go back and understand the “9”, so a clever device rather wasted on me. Agree “latte” is wet and warm but not coffee – I avoid it. And “peat” adds body to the soil, helps with water retention, but so far as I know doesn’t act as a fertiliser.

    1. The question mark mitigates that in my view. ‘Warbler’ like ‘singer’ which is more common, is being used here to suggest the answer will be a bird of sorts rather than a particular breed or classification.
      1. I agree. This is one of the cleverer clues, using “warbler” in a misleadingly general sense.. “warbler” = bird, just as “flower” = river
  11. 17:05 here, far slower than I should have been, but tired as usual when solving. I got A WORD TO THE WISE straight away and solved anti-clockwise from there, leaving the top left empty until the end. For some reason that corner took ages (well, over 5 minutes anyway), with my frazzled brain even struggling over 14ac ERROR. LOI was ROBUST.
  12. Top left took some time (probably because I couldn’t parse CANALETTO, so thanks for that), but all others went in quickly.

    Cod: PIRATE

    Ps. Yes, I too got ADDER before 9dn

  14. 30:08 – I too found it on the easy side. I got 9 before 11, because 9 was my first in, quickly followed by 5, and these two together opened up the whole grid. I would have been faster but I spent almost 10 minutes on the last 5 in the NW corner (1/1/2/10/14)
    I’m not very good on artists, so I didn’t know CANALETTO, but otherwise no unknown words.
    Some great clues here gave me a really enjoyable solve. 4, 8 & 11 were all excellent.
    I think I’d better get some strong coffee ready for Friday…
  15. Third easy day in a row for me – 12 minutes – I bet that I will find Thursday and Friday impenetrable. Main hold up was with 19d and yes I did solve 11a before 9d.
  16. Not sure what happened to me today but I did this in 7 minutes.
    Lots went in from definition without full understanding, but I did at least understand the ADDER device as it went in. Very clever. I didn’t understand PIRATE at all, so thanks for that one.
  17. 22 minutes – didn’t find it as straighforward as some. Don’t go for 8 really; scarcely a dish. I think coffee’s broadened its meaning to include lattes.
      1. I was actually taking a little more of the clue into account. The pie is qualified.
        1. Thanks. I thought I must be misunderstanding something but I’m afraid I’m still no clearer on what your objection is.
          1. You know what jackkt? I think we’re destroying the poetry of the rat in the pie. Life’s worth more than that. – joekobi

  18. Picked away at this all day and 11 hours elapsed between FOI Error at 0630 over breakfast and LOI Upsurge a moment ago.

    Rather liked the image of the bungling brass band player and the pirate finding a rat in his pie.

  19. About 15 minutes, pretty easy, agreed. My only problem was not knowing what a ROLLMOP is. ( I thought it was a mop that rolls around in the bucket with the attached wringer.) I also got 11AC before 9D, and ended in the NW corner, with the ROLLMOP/RECORDER pair. I liked the PIRATE and the PRAWN but I thought the ADDER/STEPS.. connection was more of an embellishment than a clue. Nevertheless, nice work from the setter, and regards to all.
  20. Glad 8d puzzled some of the experts as well as me. Just one quibble: ‘”a” European’ = ‘un’. Surely ‘a’ is just as European as ‘un’?
    1. You forgot to take into account the parochialism of poms, who might for instance travel TO Europe for holidays.
  21. I found this fairly easy giving me my best ever time of 45 minutes. I chewed over PIRATE for a while, seeing the rat in the pie but not quite believing it. I got ADDER first, but didn’t put it in until I’d got 9d to confirm. I wasted quite a bit of time trying to make WIPE OUT fit 25ac, but on the whole enjoyed the steady solve as opposed to staring at a half blank grid. I liked the twist on energy saving PCs.
  22. 8:30 for me, relieved to have an easy puzzle when I was feeling tired after a couple of busy days. Another collection of delightful clues: I particularly liked 4ac (LAPPED UP) and 22dn (SCOPES) for their excellent surface readings, and 8dn (PIRATE) for its amusement value.
  23. Somewhat over an hour; maybe it started off easy, but having passed the hour I took ADDER, PIRATE and DENTIST out again and thought awhile, as I didn’t believe any of them. Finally I saw the wordplay for DENTIST and then I just risked putting the other two back, so all correct. PIRATE just seemed too audacious, and although I also filled in ADDER before getting 9, I never did see how it worked until coming here. I thought there were quite a few good clues, including ROLLMOP, SCOPES, ROBUST…
  24. Did this over a pint last night, didn’t get a time down but did get the pint down. CANALETTO from wordplay and rather liked PIRATE.
  25. I will remember this one for some time to come, as it was my first ever Times cryptic crossword completion! Only took me a couple of years, and a grid with some lenient clues! Very proud of myself. With a bit of practice I’ll be joining you guys and solving in minutes, I’m sure!
    1. Congratulations!
      I’d encourage you to keep visiting (and contributing perhaps?) because if my experience is anything to go by you’d be amazed at how fast you can improve when you use this blog.
      1. Agreed! I’ve been doing the Times crossword for just over a year now, and thanks to the blog have gone from taking a day or two to do 75% of the puzzle to finishing one in under 40 minutes yesterday.
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