Times 25330 Classic, Cryptic and Corny

Posted on Categories Daily Cryptic
Two in a row for me, as I will be in England for Christmas – where, incidentally, I hope to meet up with as many solvers and setters as can make it to a pub in London, probably the City, on the evening of Thursday 14 December. More details anon.

Back to the puzzle, and I had to hoist the white flag in the SW, where I thought of the right answer at 20dn, changed it to something else, but in any event was always going to struggle with 26ac. In the end, the easy (for me) Classical stuff proved a false dawn…

Across

1 B+I+REME – the boat with two rows of oars, favoured by various Achaeans.
4 E+QUIPPED
10 SNOW LEOPARD – a snow leopard is an ounce, so the idea here must be that it weighs more than the unit of measurement but cannot weigh more than itself. Can’t say I’m mad about the clue.
11 NUN – ‘cos oop North, they’d say ‘non’ – some of ’em at any rate.
12 B(LOSS)OM[b]
14 THESEUS – after it came down to a head-to-head between Theseus and Perseus, the former had to win because only he hails from THE South-East of the US.
15 DEFENESTRATION – I thought this must mean to take a window out rather than to chuck some unfortunate out of one, but in the end it made little odds.
17 INDIVISIBILITY – HG Wells wrote a book called The Invisible Man.
21 omitted
22 DUSTMAN – the key to this is spotting that ‘refuse’ is a noun in the cryptic reading.
23 A(C)E
24 ORIENTALIST – ORIEL containing tan* + IST; ‘sporting’ here is the anagrind, with ‘in’ taking inserticator duties.
26 LAYETTES – I had a baby once, but never one of these, let alone several; ODO ‘a set of clothing, bedclothes, and sometimes toiletries for a newborn child’.
27 ITALIC – revoise hidden, as they might say in 25dn, if it also wasn’t hidden.

Down

1 BUSYBODY
2 R(I)O[w]
3 M+ALISON
5 QUARTER BINDING – ODO ‘a type of bookbinding in which the spine is bound in one material (usually leather) and the rest of the cover in another’; not sure of the wordplay here: my best bet is something along the lines of ‘taking responsibility for quarters/lodging’. My best bet was wrong – it’s BIND in QUARTERING where bind is a noun, as in ‘it was a real bind’. Thanks to Jack and Diogenes.
6 IN+D+WELT – ‘welt’ in ODO ‘leather rim sewn round the edge of a shoe upper to which the sole is attached’.
7 PAN+DEMO+N(I)UM – the NUM (National Union of Mineworkers) was most famously led by Arthur Scargill, who was ultimately defeated by someone with an even scarirer bouffant hairdo.
8 DANISH – andhis*. Nice.
9 COMMISSIONAIRE – CO+M(MISSIONA)IRE; lovely wordplay – ‘Miss Iona’, indeed – but completely wasted on me till I came to do the blog.
13 OFFENSIVE+L+[awa]Y
16 HYPNOTIC – lady’s bottom, AKA Y, in topinch*. Nice.
18 INTROIT – inserting I in IN (wearing) TROT (red) will give you an introit, which is often a psalm used in a church service.
19 INSTANT – double definition.
20 AG+NAIL – the ‘nail’ did for me – it is of course what a detective does to a criminal…in time…hopefully: ‘agnail’ in ODO ‘a piece of torn skin at the root of a fingernail’, or a corn. We’ve had it before, but I hadn’t remembered it securely enough.
25 omitted double definition

46 comments on “Times 25330 Classic, Cryptic and Corny”

  1. 5dn is BIND (bore) inside QUARTERING (lodging).

    39 minutes with time lost at the end working out the second word in 5dn. It’s not a term that I’m familiar with. Not sure that I knew INDWELT and certainly not the meaning of WELT required to explain the wordplay. Loved the DEFENESTRATION clue and the word itself which I first heard of with reference to the composer Handel dealing with a particularly demanding prima donna he was forced to work with. MISS IOWA was simply brilliant. A good start to the week.

    Edited at 2012-11-26 02:45 am (UTC)

    1. Miss Iowa is more likely, Jack,, but, as you say, Miss Speck in the Inner Hebrides even better.
      1. Thanks. I’d spotted my error above but unfortunately the reply prevented me editing a correction.
  2. Helped by three easy long ones and stumped by the 4th: QUARTER BINDING. Here, I suspect that “lodging” = QUARTERING (affording quarters); then we have to find “bind” = BORE; but I can’t.

    6dn WELT. There’s a more specific version in NOAD: “a ribbed, reinforced, or decorative border of a garment or pocket”.

    11ac NUN. Despite having changed almost all of my Scouse vowels in order to be understood in Australia, I still can’t quite manage “none” as “nun”.

    Two cryptic defs today: 22ac and 26ac. About average quality I’d say.

    16dn HYPNOTIC. Note the double duty of “to pinch” — anagram fodder and inclusion indicator in one.

    COD: toss up between Canute and Miss Iona.

    Edited at 2012-11-26 02:50 am (UTC)

      1. Hmm … good rethink. I’d thought the question-mark was showing that something was dodgy. If you’re right … and I’ve no real doubt about that … the question-mark isn’t needed.

        And while you’re on can you also explain my other bit of ignorance: “bore”=BIND?

        On edit: have now read ulaca’s version of “bore”=BIND. Isn’t the latter a dilemma and the former not? Maybe a colloquial I don’t know.

        On further edit: Chambers has it, but as a verb. “to bore (old fashioned slang)”. Total unknown to me.

        Edited at 2012-11-26 03:22 am (UTC)

        1. I seem to have known the expression “what a bind” meaning “what a bore” or “what an annoyance” all my life, so I never gave it a second thought. It’s in Chambers: (n) a bore (2003 edition, and the newest).

          Edited at 2012-11-26 07:05 am (UTC)

  3. 14:51, although I put in a couple on checkers and hope alone, like 9d; now that it’s been explained to me, I’ll give it my COD. DNK ‘brill’ in that sense, but luckily it didn’t matter. I didn’t realize that an ounce was a snow leopard, my knowledge of the word being based on Shakespeare; I see that the SOED gives as an archaic meaning the Eurasian lynx. In any case, I think I share Ulaca’s opinion.
  4. Bind = bore imo is RAF slang, recalling “Much Binding in the Marsh” a radio show of yesteryear (and RAF station Moreton in Marsh)
    1. I’m sure you’re right there’s a connection but in that sense I think ‘binding’ is closer to whinging/whining/complaining rather than boring.
  5. 33 minutes after staring at the end at the 5/22 cross. 22 is an odd clue – unless there’s something I’m missing – both for the awkwardness of the definition – the almost painfully laid-out verb/noun swap – and the summariness behind it – a little “off”, no? But maybe there’s an inner weave I don’t see.
    1. I thought it was an attempted misdirection to make the solver think of sit-down protests, the Occupy movement, etc.
  6. When used when I was much younger – a bind was a chore – something one did not want to undertake.
  7. Got this as it couldn’t be anything else – get group= body – why detectives?- I must have missed something. Didn’t know quarter binding and agnail.
    1. ‘Busy’ is slang for ‘policeman’ and/or ‘detective’ in certain parts. It comes up regularly so is worth remembering.

      Edited at 2012-11-26 09:53 am (UTC)

  8. 21m.
    This really irritated me. Most of the clues were very easy and where they weren’t it was only because of obscurity (AGNAIL, MALISON, INTROIT, QUARTER BINDING, INDWELT) or absolutely awful cryptic definitions (SNOW LEOPARD, DUSTMAN, LAYETTES).
    Harumph.
  9. 24 minutes,with a lot of time lost to AGNAIL and BINDING (I had assumed “lodging” gave quarters, and a bore that filled in the rest looked unlikely). Bind and bore sit rather loosely together if you push their slang use, I suppose.
    I can’t imagine in these (or any) days “summoning” dustman. Lonnie Donegan said it:

    “Now one day while in a hurry
    He missed a lady’s bin
    He hadn’t gone but a few yards
    When she chased after him
    ‘What game do you think you’re playing’
    She cried right from the heart
    ‘You’ve missed me…am I too late’
    ‘No… jump up on the cart’.

    Some decent clues: Miss Iona, The SE US, and the blink-and-you-miss-it anagram for DANISH made up for some slightly dodgy stuff, including the above. I wondered whether the “in the south” bit for NUN was redundant, as I’m not convinced that northern folk pronounce “none” and “nun” with much distinction. Differently from us southerners, of course, but isn’t it pretty much the same difference in both cases?
    I’m pleased to be informed that there’s another DEFENESTRATION apart from “of Prague”. Perhaps a modern use could be “to stop using Microsoft”. Sorry.

    1. No, indeed, we say “none” to rhyme with “gone” … see my comments on the difficulty of shifting this. (Hope you don’t say “gone” as “gun”!)

      Edited at 2012-11-26 09:35 am (UTC)

      1. There is a slight local tendency to rhyme gone with pawn, but let’s not go there!
        Australia is very much “in the south”, isn’t it?
        1. Yep, the Oz pronunciation is as per S. England.

          For the last three decades I’ve been carrying my rolling tobacco in an old Three Nuns tin. Always wondered why the motto on the tin is “None Nicer”. Now I know!

  10. I’m with keriothe on this one – it has an irritating quality to it with the poor cryptic definitions heading the parade. Summons a dustman these days and you have a three month strike on your hands!

    NUN is surely a word for which a clue based upon a homophone is most unsuitable. I wonder if the Crossword Editor added the clumsy “in the south” in an attempt to head off the critics?

    1. The Times of London crossword is culturally very English, being in a very English paper (albeit with American owner).
      The Times of London is from London, so London pronunciation must be the default.
      I don’t speak with a London accent but have no problem with (most) homophones being in a default accent different to mine.
      I find it annoying when for instance Scots complain about homophones… poor and pour apparently have totally different pronunciation to each other up there, but who cares? It’s a London paper, not an Aberdonian one.

      Rant over. I thought “in the south” was unnecessary.
      Rob

  11. Whatever the quibbles expressed elsewhere coming across the delectable Miss Iona was worth the subscription price and, not for the first time, leaves me frustrated by the anonymity of the setter.
    Any ideas anyone?
  12. Well, I thought this was a cracking puzzle, even though it took me over three-quarters of an hour: lots of ticks and chuckles and none of those over-wordy clues that sometimes cause me to throw my paper across the room.

    NUN –none. We still keep this pronunciation throughout in nation in “Monday”, for example, but I remember when “Coventry “was “Cuventry” and George Dixon was addressed as “Cunstable”. Prince Charles, however, is unusual in speaking of “wun’s hice”, meaning Clarence House.

    1. Do many people actually say constable where the con is like con in scam? I mean apart from up north?
      1. It’s given as the first pronunciation in the 2011 edition of Chambers. I’ve a feeling it’s the sort of thing they say in Reading (Berkshire), where I lived (extremely reluctantly) for a few years at the end of the 1960s.
        1. Thanks, Tony. Didn’t think to check. Indeed, rather affected. Never heard it south of the river in Sy. when I were a lad.
    2. I enjoyed this one too, John – I share your dislike of over-wordy clues.

      I remember “Cuventry” (I think may still pronounce it that way myself occasionally) and I certainly still say “cunstable” – I hadn’t realised that had gone (or is going) out of fashion. And I say “wun” (all those years in the soft south have taken their toll :-), but not “hice”. (Wasn’t Princess Margaret supposed to have described Buckingham Palace as “a nice little hice”?)

  13. I say none just like nun and I’m originally from Doorrset.
    29 minutes of pleasure, had to check agnail as LOI, my COD to Miss Iona. And also Danish for its neat brevity.
    1. Which ever part of Dorset you hail from it’s probably under water at the moment. Whilst the far west is grabbing the headlines much of Dorset has become an enormous lake with the Stour from Blandford to Christchurch causing considerable concern. My daughter in Sturminster Marshall reports lots of problems with blocked roads etc.
      1. I went to school in Durweston for a couple of years and the meadows between us and Hod Hill were always flooded in the winter even without bad weather. I bet they’re a lake now and I saw the pics of Blandford. I hope you and your daughter have no further miseries. Here in NY we just had our own weather event.

  14. 28:17 … Bottom half went in fast but I was completely topless (ooh, matron!) for nearly 15 minutes before finally wising up to EQUIPPED, from which all else flowed.

    I was so frazzled that I threw COMMISSIONAIRE in without parsing it. But that’s what this blog is for – to make the slapdash among us appreciate the finer points.

  15. An epic fail (as the kids say) with 6 gaps when I gave up after 35 minutes. I wasn’t getting enough enjoyment from the puzzle to carry on to a finish. Maybe my mojo has been washed away.
  16. As you say, some good stuff and some awful stuff in this, which took me around 35 minutes. A few offensively tricky words didn’t exactly ease the process, but at least I finished the damned thing.

    Cheers
    Chris Gregory.

  17. Another DNF – done for by agnail and binding neither of which I knew or could guess from the cryptic. I’m with those who were not overly impressed – challenge through obscurity is never satisfying and this setter can be witty as with miss Iona. Not a good day today overall in sodden NE of England!
  18. Not easy for me, about 45 minutes ending with guesses at AGNAIL from wordplay and …BINDING from the definition. Much unwelcome obscurity, but redeemed by DANISH, Miss Iona, and the very smooth surface for HYPNOTIC, which had me fooled for some time. Regards to all.
  19. I agree with many of the criticisms of this puzzle. Certainly there was too much reliance on obscurity, but I’m prepared to forgive a lot for COMMISSIONAIRE, DEFENESTRATION and HYPNOTIC.
  20. Reminds me of the old prison joke: “what tobacco can you smoke in here?”. “Three Nuns. None yesterday, none today and none tomorrow”
  21. 10:32 for me after a ridiculously slow start in which I solved only one of the first 10 clues I read – and that was the one with the shortest answer: NUN (fortunately I completely missed “talked of in the south” as I’d forgotten how NONE was pronounced up north).

    I thought of SNOW LEOPARD straight away, but felt there had to be something more to the clue (I’m not mad about it either, but I liked 22ac (DUSTMAN) and 26ac (LAYETTES)). And I spend far too long trying to think of a Greek hero fitting FL‑‑‑GA.

    After finally getting going, I was held up at the end by QUARTER BINDING, which was only a quarter familiar.

  22. After staring at an empty grid for about 8 minutes I decided to start at the bottom and work my way up. Got there in the end. 41 minutes. Lots I liked and some I didn’t. Loved MISS IONA,LAYETTES and THESEUS but didn’t much enjoy SNOW LEOPARD and DUSTMAN – I kept thinking there must be more to the clue. A curate’s egg of a puzzle. Too busy to comment before (choir practice followed by pub quiz – which we won so I’m £6 better off tonight) Ann
  23. I enjoy it when I get an obvious answer that turns out to be incorrect. is it intentional or coincidence? I knew nothing about Canute and so to google. it turns out he was known, especially, for having a hooked nose. “Manoeuvre” Canute and you get “uncate”. First in. No need to think any further…….Of course, though, all the connecting clues become fiendishly difficult.

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