Times 25112

37 comments on “Times 25112”

1. ….putting in a fair amount around the edges in 20 minutes, but then slowed to a crawl. ‘Misnomer’, ‘cordillera’, and ‘Angel Falls’ were tough, but then I was left with ‘Islamabad’ and ‘door handle’, which I could not make any sense of for a long time. As usual, turning my attention away for a few minutes caused me to see ‘Islamabad’ instantly, and then ‘door handle’ was the obvious correct answer, although I didn’t care much for the cryptic.

   So I ended up at 67 minutes, not really that good, but all complete and correct. I thought it was a good-quality puzzle, didn’t mind ‘innit’.

2. Off to a flying start with both 1s going in straight away and several others in the NW following on closely but I struggled as the time slipped away finishing eventually in 56 minutes.

   DK CORDILLERA but guessed it from the checkers and wordplay and was surprised to find it was correct. I surely can’t have lived as long as I have without coming across GRAND AUNT before now, but I have to admit I took a while to convince myself that it exists – the alternative ‘ Great Aunt’ being the term I know and have always used.

   Unless I’m missing something the MISER in 12ac is clued as ‘mean lad’ which seems rather odd – the ‘lad’ bit, I mean. I thought ‘what’s top of the charts’ = N at 19ac from Number One – the first letter of ‘number’ but I now see N for North is a better fit. I thought it was a bit strange.

   Good stuff otherwise though.

   Edited at 2012-03-16 02:35 am (UTC)

3. … both over the half hour. So: the tough one we’ve been expecting. But perhaps the most satisfying of the week.

   Tried not to be grandly daunted by the puzzle but, after a few obscurities (CORDILLERA, ANGEL FALLS), I think I was. Especially in the very hard SW corner.

   Also wondered what the lad was doing in 12ac.

   COD to 19ac (NEAR) for its lift-and-separate. My last one in.

4. Finished but I’ll take the Fifth on the time. Last in the mountain range which I should have got earlier as my family spent a most enjoyable holiday in Northern Spain a few years ago, including a stay in the Cordillera Cantabrica.

   Many good clues and only one chestnut I can recall (the Australian vehichle, which I wish they’d send to the knacker’s yard along with bra). COD to OFFEND, ‘though, for one light moment in an otherwise teeth-gritting experience.

5. I wonder if PRIG held anyone up. It’s one of CS Lewis’s favourite words (alongside such gems as ‘wiseacre’ and ‘mare’s nest’) and yet it caused me endless grief.
6. 34 minutes after thinking I was heading for another quiche (That’s quickie, George) like yesterdays. Others’ comments so far could easily have been written by me, so closely do they mirror the experience. It was CORDILLERA that brought me to a shuddering halt.
   I tend to think of a branch as being a lot bigger than a sPRIG, almost enough to be a difference of category not degree. Should have thought of PRIG sooner though, and GUTENBERG should have been a gimme – I don’t know many other printers.
   NEAR and MEDIOCRE on definition alone – thanks to Dave for unscrewing those two. Must remember: red=wine of some sort.
   CoD to the nicely observed sentence that is ISLAMABAD.

   Edited at 2012-03-16 09:30 am (UTC)

7. This seemed to go alright; 33 minutes and the sense of no more than mildly demanding. (Whereas I often find tough what others get through in no time.) Held up by writing grays: I always like to use “a” for the colour. Finally saw sense. I was surpised by the grand-aunt too. COD to the door-handle.
8. Couldn’t get started so followed the old advice about beginning at the bottom right. Worked back’ards and up’ards and finished in about 35 minutes.

   Crosswords never cease to … er … puzzle me. For the past month I’ve struggled with the ones that everyone here found easy, but have found the “stinkers” if not easy, at least reasonably straightforward.

   What causes this variation between solvers in the perceived difficulty of puzzles? Serendipity? Specialist knowledge? Just being on the same wavelength as the setter? Having one’s mind elsewhere? Drinking too much brandy the night before?

9. Believing that ‘innit’ couldn’t be it delayed me. And is ‘wooden’ really a synonym for clumsy?
   1. Collins defines it as ‘awkward or clumsy’
10. Solving time just over the hour. A stinker for me. Took ages to get my first answer, ABED, and when I did I wrote it in the wrong place at 19ac, causing mayhem at 1d. Not much fat on the bones of any of these clues. A superb effort from the setter, I thought. COD to DOOR HANDLE, my last in after sorting CORDILLONA out, although MONSIGNOR was also excellently hidden. And thanks for explaining MEDOC, Dave; “Must be some sort of red”, I remember thinking.
11. Similar experience to thers. Didn’t know the obscure relative, couldn’t explain “lad” in 12A or quite believe the HANDLE = treat device. Had vaguely heard of the mountain chain but needed the cryptic to solve it. I thought the hidden word was another good example of the genre. Didn’t even register INNIT as unusual!! 25 minutes to solve.
12. 23:55 .. with an interruption, so I didn’t find this too hard.

    Anyone fighting against the spread of INNIT is probably in a losing battle. You’re now as likely to hear it in an Old Etonian drawl as a ‘street’ voice (Prince Harry is very fond of it).

    COD .. ROUND .. or maybe MORAG.

13. 30 minutes here. I didn’t like this puzzle. It was tough but the difficulty came from arcane vocabulary (chid, tilth, CORDILLERA, Woden, GRAND AUNT) and stretchy definitions (SPRIG = branch, “top of the charts”, why “lad”?). And it contains the kind of clue I hate: an obscure composer clued ambiguously. Having never heard of LEHAR I put in LAHER, which seemed much more likely.
    Unlike some others though I though “trick or treat” for DOOR HANDLE was rather good.
    1. Lehar. Obscure? Surely not. Frothy Viennese stuff is admittedly not to everyone’s taste but “The Merry Widow” is a standard in the repertoire. Now yesterday’s CHERRY – that was obscure.
       1. Well of course in this context “obscure” just means I haven’t heard of him! I’m certainly not one of the musical mafia but neither am I entirely ignorant about music. Anyway the real point is that you can’t get the answer without the knowledge. I hadn’t heard of CHERRY either but you didn’t need to know it to get the right sport out of A_C_E_Y.

          Edited at 2012-03-16 08:24 pm (UTC)

          1. Too true. A “hard” question is always the one you don’t know. Actually, nearly all cricket references are obscure to me, though the years spent struggling with this crossword has lightened the darkness a bit. You’ve got a point in that it is particularly difficult to guess a proper name, especially one in a foreign language.
             1. Indeed, particularly when the alternative is an English name. I will be on the lookout for composers called Jenos or Stimh.
             2. And this puzzle was book-ended with foreign proper names, NE and SW.
                Guessed LEHAR correctly, but incorrectly guessed MORIG. What’s wrong with a decent English-language girls name?
14. Joan Sutherland’s deservedly acclaimed 1966 recording of Lehar’s Vilja Lied.
15. I must be on a roll, found this reasonably easy, although will join the band who have never heard of a grand aunt. The ‘thought for the day’ chap on R4 this morning was on about Gutenberg so that helped. Cod Angel Falls, a place I’ve always wanted to visit. Never heard of Lehar? Lucky you, he wrote the sort of stuff my Father loved and I can’t stand.
16. I found this difficult, taking about an hour, and I have one wrong, entering MORIG instead of MORAG. I’ve never met a MORAG (or a Morig). Same reaction as others re: why ‘lad’?, grand aunt, but no problem really with INNIT or DOOR-HANDLE, except maybe the hyphenated form, which looks odd. It was my LOI. COD to the cute ABED, and I also commend the setter for the clever ones at COME AGAIN, OFFEND, and FAVOURABLE. Nice puzzle, though time consuming. Regards to all.
    1. Quite a popular name in Scotland, and I’ve met one or two who have escaped, but apparently it’s not a popular name in the USA. I can see why Morig might seem to fit.I was considering ‘shrug’ as something to wear, until I got ‘mediocre’.
17. Grand aunt? No relation to any of the terms I’ve ever heard for family members and it would appear many of the experienced solvers here. Innit? Well, it ain’t English. And I find handle hard to wist and mean ‘treat’. My congratulations to all who turned in a sub-30 minute solve and to your blogger who parsed the above and, in my opinion, saved the compiler’s blushes.

    Enigma

    1. Innit fast becoming as English as aint innit? Can’t see the problem with handle as treat; it’s far from an exact synonym but will work in a number of cases. If grand-aunt’s OK for Murcans (below) it’s OK for me and so is the whole crossword . The mean lad gets his youth from the clue’s context which seems alright (I was called one at school more than once).
18. 43′; it was a comfort to see the club leaderboard, and many of the times here, and to discover that I wasn’t the only one to need some time. I wavered on PUNY (vs. punk) for some time, since the only explanation I could think of was, as it turned out, the correct one, but I’d never heard of ‘punity’, which struck me as on a par with ‘couth’. Also wavered on NEAR, although I knew it had to be right; finally twigged to the map meaning. I’d give my COD to CORDILLERA, where I wasted ages trying to think of a -less word to account for ‘not so good’. And ‘grand-aunt/uncle’ are what I, and I expect lots of other Murcans, call them.
19. In 21dn, should “God” be capitalised? The Telegraph style guide says “References to pagan gods are lower case”. The Times style guide doesn’t seem to be available online. Someone out there must be able to verify whether it agrees.

    Edited at 2012-03-16 05:49 pm (UTC)

    1. I think upper and lower cases switches are fair game in the setter’s need to misdirect and accepted as such.
20. I found this quite enjoyable and, by my own unremarkable standards, fairly
    straightforward. Could someone please explain the significance of ” wine” in 2 Down?

    I apologise for being anonymous – I shall attempt to register a.s.a.p.

    David S.

    1. it=Italian, as in gin and It, innit? (I notice that my autocorrect has underlined ‘innit’ in red.)
21. I did this in 2 sessions but the break didn’t help. It still took ages. I had the same problems as others. Held up in SW because I’d bunged in GREAT AUNT which totally messed up the corner. Never heard of GRAND AUNT. I had more problems with the 1a/1d corner although it sorted itself out once I thought of CHID – a very odd word which is surely archaic. (“Chidden” is even odder!) COME AGAIN reminded me of a very beautiful madrigal of that name. 49 minutes.
    1. 45 minutes, feeling that not only was this significantly tougher than the last two or three, but I really wasn’t in tune with the setter. As mentioned upthread, it’s hard to analyse why different solvers should find different setters congenial or otherwise, but I know I can tell reasonably quickly if I’ve got the wavelength right (or not, as today). Clever puzzle, but one I found myself admiring from a technical point of view rather than relishing as I solved it.

       And even though I’d say I’m far from reactionary in my attitudes, INNIT is a horrible word…

22. ahhhh…. gin and it! Thank you, Kevin. I am, unfortunately, sufficiently ancient to
    remember the time when gin and it ( It? ) was a popular drink.

    David S.

23. I may be missing something, but why does wine=IT in 2D? Edit: just seen explanatory comment above

    Edited at 2012-03-16 10:04 pm (UTC)

24. 13:20 for me – starting quickly for once, but then slowing dramatically on the lower half.

    INNIT made its first appearance in a Times crossword in last year’s Championship final (published as No. 25,032): “Prerequisite for winning, we hear, to be this common question (5)”.

    Like others, I wasn’t too keen on “lad” in 12ac, but this was offset by the clever “trick or treat” for DOOR-HANDLE.

25. 
    DNF today. 25/32 with problems in the NE corner.

    My sister-in-law is called Morag so 22D was easy.

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