Times 25,237 – The Advent of Mario

Posted on Categories Daily Cryptic
For the second time in succession when it was my turn to blog, I found three quarters of the puzzle a stroll and then got horribly held up at the south-east corner. This setter has been very precise with the choice of fodder and there is much to admire in many clues. Very entertaining and a quarter challenging.

ACROSS
1 QUARANTINE Ins of AN (article) in QUART (volume) + IN E (English)
6 BUFF dd and if he were not wearing anything, he would be in the buff
10 EQUATOR The Republic of  ECUADOR (Spanish: República del Ecuador, which literally translates to the “Republic of the Equator”) is a representative democratic republic in South America and of course, it straddles the equator.
11 SANDBAR Ins of AND (moreover) in S (small) BAR (tavern)
12 TAILORING *(Thackeray ORIGINAL) with novel as indicator
13 ITALY Acrostic, first letters of in the autumn last year. In the wake of the Italian debt crisis, Mario Monti, an Italian economist and academic became the 54th Prime Minister of Italy in November 2011; making this clue an &lit and my COD
14 IRISH IRIS (name of girl & name of flower) + H (hot) for whiskey. Worth remembering that the American and Irish version of this elixir has an E whereas Scotland and the rest of the world enjoy WHISKY
15 HOYDENISH *(DISH HONEY) new word to me meaning tomboyish
17 TIMESAVER TIMES (this newspaper) AVER (state or claim)
20 SEPIA Ins of P & I (first letters of photographic images) in SEA (ocean)
21 MEDIC MEDICI (Florence’s family) minus I – The House of Medici or Famiglia de’ Medici was a political dynasty, banking family and later royal house that first began to gather prominence under Cosimo de’ Medici in the Republic of Florence during the late 14th century
23 NEWSINESS Ins of I (current in physics notation) in a combination of N,S,E & W (points on the compass)
25 THIRSTY THIS TRY with R moved two places to the left
26 REALIGN Ins of A L (large) in REIGN (rule)
27 DATA Rev of AT + AD (advertisement or notice)
28 BEDSITTERS Ins of SITTER (model) in BEDS (Bedfordshire)

DOWN
1 QUEST QUI EST (French for who is) minus I
2 ALUMINIUM Ins of I (one) in ALUMNI (former students) + UM (hesitation)
3 ASTROPHYSICIST Cha of A S (second) TROPHY (prize) SIC (as stated) IS T (last letter of right) for an expert in the branch of astronomy which applies the laws of physics to the study of the stars and interstellar matter
4 TARNISH *(TRAINS) + H (hard)
5 NOSEGAY Ins of EG (exempli gratia, for example, say) in NO SAY (lack of influence) Very neat
7 UMBRA UMBRIA (part of Italy, answer to 13A) minus I (one)
8 FORSYTHIA Ins of O (old) in *(HAY FIRST) shrub of the genus Forsythia, a popular garden plant producing clusters of yellow jasmine-like flowers in the spring named after William Forsyth (1737-1804), Scottish botanist
9 ANTIPERSPIRANT *(REPAIR PANTS IN Time)
14 INTIMATED Ins of TI (rev of IT) in INMATE (prisoner) + D (last letter of guard)
16 IMPRECISE Ins of MP (Member of Parliament, politician) in IRE (rage) + ins of IS in CE (Church of England)
18 VANDYKE VAN (vehicle) DYKE (embankment) for Sir Anthony van Dyck, (1599–1641), Flemish-born painter
19 REWARDS Ins of WAR (fighting) in REDS (revolutionaries)
22 DRIFT dd
24 ha deliberately omitted

++++++++++++++
Key to abbreviations
dd = double definition
dud = duplicate definition
tichy = tongue-in-cheek type
cd = cryptic definition
rev = reversed or reversal
ins = insertion
cha = charade
ha = hidden answer
*(fodder) = anagram

29 comments on “Times 25,237 – The Advent of Mario”

  1. Agreed with Uncle Yap that the SE was the least obvious. But, overall, the anagrams really helped this qute straightforward puzzle.

  2. 30 minutes exactly with a short delay on 3d, my LOI, where for a while I had a wrong letter in the third light having put ECUADOR instead of EQUATOR at 10ac.

    Much of this went in on definition alone and this accounted for another error at 23ac where I had originally gone for NEWSITEMS. On further reflection I realised it didn’t fit all the wordplay and it’s probably two words anyway.

    No unknowns for me today.

    Of the usual sources, Collins is the only one that lists NEWSINESS and it’s also the only place I could find VANDYKE as an alternative spelling of van Dyck.

    Edited at 2012-08-09 01:51 am (UTC)


  3. All correct today, with the only unknown being HOYDENISH, but that was all it could be, so in it went.

    My LOI was IMPRECISE. Not come across it meaning ‘not very nice’ before.

  4. 23:37, but I, too, threw in ‘newsitems’; not really justifiable, of course, but this is what happens when I do this online. Not to mention the numerous times when something I thought was two words was treated as one here (Van Dyck, for instance). I hardly helped myself at 9d, when inspiration told me to throw in ‘antideodorant’; never misunderestimate my densitude. 14d: I have some difficulty equating intimating with announcing.
    1. Chambers has “Intimate (vt) to hint; to announce” and “Intimation (n) an indication, a hint, an announcement”.
  5. 34 minutes but with one wrong – ‘newsitems’ for NEWSINESS. Should really have stopped to realise that an ‘item’ (sing.) can hardly be a current love interest (pl.).

    Liked IMPRECISE, enjoyed 1dn’s ‘Not I’ after yesterday’s discussion of pronominal prescriptivism, but wasn’t so enamoured of VARNISH (= ‘not looking good for cup’, or am I missing something?).

    According to the Wikipedia entry for the pointy beard, the facial growth enjoys ‘Van Dyke’, ‘Vandyck’ and ‘Van Dyck’ as variant spellings, and, according to the entry for the man himself, the growth is also called a ‘vandyke’ or ‘Van dyke’. So, five variants for the growth, and no doubt some source will confirm the odd looking, to me, ‘Vandyke’ for the Charles I lookalike.

    1. Well, an ‘item’ can be a pair, but then why ‘current’? If ‘current’=I, that leaves TEM, which doesn’t add up.
      After yesterday’s overlong exchange, I hesitate to say that when my brother came in this afternoon (I’m staying at his place at the moment), he announced, “It is I.” But of course he was being facetious. Really.
      1. I actually managed to produce complete nonsense by putting ‘sing.’ and ‘pl.’ in the wrong brackets!

        As for the awkwardness and unnaturalness of ‘It is I’, that it was put into the mouth of a clueless foreigner (French, to boot) in the comedy ‘Allo ‘Allo says it all. Here is the master of disguise, LeClerc, in all his 5-second glory.

        Edited at 2012-08-09 03:25 am (UTC)

    2. I’m intrigued to know what you have for 1ac. TARNISH doesn’t look good on the silverware, though I’m sure you’ll find some collectors of antiquities that would turn up their nose at varnish, too. All the best for Monday!
      1. I think I must go home and sleep my Olympic tiredness off! I actually wrote TARNISH in the grid. And, thanks, I now see (via ODO) how the word can be used as a noun, ‘though it’s new to me in that sense. Thanks too for your good wishes…

        Edited at 2012-08-09 08:44 am (UTC)

  6. 15 minutes, most of them enjoyable. There were some pleasant quirks in here, “not very nice” as a definition, and the clue for THIRSTY managing to conceal rather well a one-letter-move anagram. 3d Had a nice (sic) line in sequential cluing.
    I remembered HOYDENISH, at least when I had most of the checkers, but for some reason TAILORING refused to surface until I had all of them, with new words triagonal and trigonial being early essays. The latter nearly exists, the former should.
    ALUMINIUM called to mind a tongue twister I can’t do: “Are you copper-bottoming ’em my man?” “No, I’m aluminiuming ’em ma’am.”. Is it easier in American English?
    BUFF’s clue made me smile most, so it’s my CoD.
  7. 21 minutes after a hold-up with newsiness, since had mis-spelt 9 down with an e for the second i. I rather like ‘hoydenish’ – a useful term for my six-year-old grand-daughter. Good fare if with a strong dash of the anagrams.
  8. 10:30 online, so I found this quite easy. A lot went in from definition and a couple I didn’t understand, including EQUATOR, so thanks Uncle Yap.
    Two unknowns clued by anagrams today: FORSYTHIA and HOYDENISH. This sort of clue can be dangerous but fortunately there were no alternatives today.
  9. 9:12 so not detained for too long. Didn’t care for NEWSINESS, partly on the grounds that it seems to me a rather inelegant word, and more because I don’t really care for these clues where you have “many points” = lots of Ns, Es, Ws and Ss, or “many notes” = some randomly selected combination of the letters A-G. Perhaps I crave too much precision in my life? On the whole, though, perfectly pleasant daily puzzle on the light side of things.

    Edited at 2012-08-09 12:31 pm (UTC)

  10. Van Dyck was the artist Van Dyke is the beard. Two words both. Least that is what my barber tells me.

    And he’s a man who knows how to run the world.

    Enigma

    1. Collins has Van Dyck or Vandyke for the painter so the answer is validated. There’s also Vandyke beard, Vandyke brown, Vandyke collar and Vandyke cape.
  11. Enjoyed this one; better than yesterday’s, I thought.
    I have always spelt it Vandyck, but evidently wasn’t consulted…
  12. 11:25 on the club timer, last two or three minutes on BEDSITTER. I figured VAN DYKE may have been a moustache artist, and put in NEWSINESS with a shrug.
  13. One wrong today (Newsitems not Newsiness) but no trouble with the others. Didn’t know Hoydenish. COD to Italy and I liked its interplay with Umbr(i)a. LOI Bedsitters.
  14. As many of you, enjoyed this in 20 minutes, HOYDENISH was guessed and unknown, the rest straightforward and liked anag. 9 dn for its clever surface.
  15. This would have been the ideal 15 minute solve in a deckchair at the beach, were it not for NEWSINESS which I couldn’t get for love nor money, and being on the beach meant that I didn’t have access to the usual helpful stuff.
  16. Finished inside 15 minutes, so on the easier side of things. I also didn’t know HOYDENISH, but that wasn’t too difficult to see once the checkers went in. LOI was NEWSINESS which I also don’t remember seeing before. Everything else was fairly straightforward, although I can see how the clue for 10ac can yield either the line or the country. I had to change Ecuador to EQUATOR once I read the clue for ASTROPHYSICIST. Anyway, COD to BUFF and regards to all.
  17. Lovely puzzle, 43 minutes (very good for me) and very enjoyable. HOYDENISH? Well it was obviously an anagram, and after I moved all of the crossing letters to their proper position this was all that was left, but strangely enough, it did ring a bell somewhere in the dungeons of my subconscious. COD to IMPRECISE (for “not very nice”), TIMESAVER and THIRSTY, perhaps.
  18. …and the penny dropped on “Beds” in the last few of minutes of the half hour it took me to solve this satisfying puzzle. Didn’t we have “Bucks”of late?
    Not bad for a lad in the colonies.
  19. A fair bit easier than the last couple of days.
    REgarding 23A I wondered if the second part NESS was a single point rather than a medley of points. It would improve the clue. COD 1d
    Mike and Fay
  20. 20a SEPIA was my COD for its &lit quality, being a colourant in photographic images originally found in squid in the ocean.
    Isla

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