Times 25698

Solving time: 46:26

I consider anything less than hour to be a good result on a blogging night, so I’m quite happy with this time. I went through the NW corner quite quickly, then slowed down on the RHS quite a bit.

No new words for me today – even Finno-Ugric seemed vaguely familiar. Plenty of good clues here, although 18a is my personal favourite. An enjoyable crossword – not too difficult, but not too obvious either.

cd = cryptic def., dd = double def., rev = reversal, homophones are written in quotes, anagrams as (–)*, and removals like this

Across
1 FINNO-UGRIC = (ICING ON FUR)*
6 HARDy
9 RE + CYCLE
10 T + wHISTLE – Whistle is CRS (whistle & flute) for suit
12 RESENTMENT = MEN in (RESENT + Turn)
13 A + fIRe
15 RARITY = PARITY with R (queen) for P (page)
16 LIBRETTO = LIBRa + (OTT + E) rev
18 ANTEATER = T in (A + NEATER) – ‘Individual living off workers’ was the inspired definition. Great misdirection here. My LOI and COD.
20 W + bAFFLEs
23 ClUB
24 IMAGINABLE = (BIG ANIMAL)* + Everest
26 UNCANNY = tUNNY about CAN
27 PO(THO)LE
28 B + ROW
29 NEGLECTFUL = (GET UNCLE + L + F)*
Down
1 FARE = “FAIR”
2 NUCLEAR = UN rev + CLEAR
3 OR + CHEST + RATION
4 GypsyisH + EncmpmenT + TO (closed)
5 INTREPID = (I + PRINTED)*
7 ATTRACT = A + CART rev in TT (motorbike race)
8 DEEP-ROOTED = D (key) + EE (errors excepted) + PRO (for) + OT (books) + ED (editor)
11 INTERGALACTIC = (CLEARING ATTIC)*
14 BREADCRUMB = BRUM + B about (CARED)*
17 MEGABYTE = (A + GEM) rev + BY + TE (tellurium)
19 TOBACCO = CABOT rev + C (about) + 153O
21 FALLOw + Farming Failure
22 DISPEL = DIeSEL about P
25 WELL – triple def – Very much / a plentiful supply / all right

39 comments on “Times 25698”

  1. Just threw the unchecked letters of 1A into the air and they happened to land in the right order.

    Aside from that, a nice steady solve.

  2. The puzzles seem to go in pairs at the moment and this one has the same ring to it as yesterday’s for me, with very wordy clues and intricate wordplay that’s often only apparent via reverse engineering. I felt I was steaming through it but time slipped away towards the end and I finished only 3 minutes under the hour with the NE corner taking ages to polish off.

    I had TRACT at 7dn from quite early in the proceedings but couldn’t get past RE- or just possibly EX- as the first two letters, and this left left me stranded trying to think of a possible author at 6ac. Incidentally, with reference to another clue in this quarter I have never come across EE = errors excepted before, which I find incredible. I looked it up eventually with little hope that it would be listed.

    I was unable to parse 17dn for the simple reason I had the wrong answer having settled for TERABYTE, never considering for a moment that tellurium might be clueing the last two letters instead of the first two.

    Edited at 2014-01-31 02:16 am (UTC)

  3. managed to complete this one in a good time for my cranium, a relative stroll in the park.
    DNK finno-ugric, but working on Finn = Lapp it was the only anagram that seemed reasonable.
    Yesterday’s was a DNF stroll through the bramble patch.
  4. So I must have been slightly more on the ball than usual judging by times and comments so far. Only hesitated over “dashes” as the indicator in 5dn and whether there might be a PITHOLE (27ac).

    COD to TOBACCO (19dn) for a great surface.

  5. As with vinyl, 1ac was a giveaway for me; never thought I’d see the term in a cryptic. With the 30′ mark fast approaching, I rushed to finish and put in too many on checkers and def alone, although I could have thought all day and never got THISTLE, ‘whistle’ being one of many CRS words I didn’t know. And I was hesitant about POTHOLE, as I’d never have thought to use ‘cave’ to refer to one. Liked WAFFLE, RARITY, & ANTEATER.
      1. Well, there’s my problem: I didn’t know of any other sense of ‘pothole’ than the annoying road phenomenon. Live and learn; or live, anyway.
  6. 32 minutes and a nice gentle end to the week.
    Incidentally, has anyone seen the letter in today’s Times from Mr Neil Jones complaining about the crossword’s “consistency of difficulty, which…has been noticeably lacking in recent months”? I couldn’t disagree more. It’s the variability that makes a lot of the fun – sometimes it’s a breeze, sometimes a slog – but you never know how it’s going to turn out until you get stuck in.
    I do hope Mr Jones isn’t one of our number, or if he is perhaps he can explain his views further.
    1. I’m with you on this.. besides, it doesn’t take Einstein to work out that it will vary whatever you do. Richard Browne told me he was usually quite unable to guess in advance, how difficult a given crossword would be thought to be
    2. I agree too – not knowing how tricky a puzzle is going to be until you start is a lot of the fun. Interestingly, if you talk to setters, quite a lot of them say that they have no idea how difficult they have made a crossword because, of course, they know the answers.
    3. . . . and apart from the pleasure of the individual solver in not knowing whether he/she is facing a stinker or not at the start, the paper should take account of the range of solving abilities of the solvers. When I started, even finishing was a rare joy and a spread of difficulty (intended or not) at least gives beginners a chance to improve, if not necessarily to crypticsue’s level!
    4. Just read it. What a silly letter – I’m surprised it was published. As any fule kno, even experienced solvers (well not Magoo and Jason perhaps) have off days when the grid remains stubbornly empty while everyone else is solving away merrily. And then we have the all-too-rare occasions when we positively scintillate. All part of the fascination. P.S. On an unrelated matter, we had twerking in today’s Guardian puzzle (by Paul). I hope this isn’t the shape of things to come.

      Edited at 2014-01-31 03:26 pm (UTC)

    5. At the risk of violently agreeing with everyone, surely nobody who does the crossword regularly has at the top of their wishlist “Must be of a consistent level of difficulty every day”? Presumably it was only published because the editor of the letters page has no understanding of the crossword fraternity either.
      1. I suspect the editor of the letters page is just being a “brown arm” with the aim of stirring up other correspondents to contradict this load of nonsense.

  7. Unlike Galspray, my letters didn’t fall into the right places…

    However, the rest was fine, but I didn’t parse GHETTO, and couldn’t parse DEEP-ROOTED. Like Jackkt I couldn’t imagine that EE would be clued as ‘errors excepted’. Will have to try to remember that one…

    About an hour for me today.

  8. Steady slog. I am more used to seeing E&OE – errors and omissions excepted – but I see that EE exists. I wrote this one in without parsing anyway. COD 18A
  9. 20 minute gentle run down hill to end the week for a very middle of the road puzzle

    I don’t think I’ve come across 1A before and had to get checkers to see both “finno” and then “ugric”. Other than that no problems. I’ll bet George, and other Mephisto regulars, have no problem with EE for “errors excepted”. I especially liked 18A and 19D

  10. Couldn’t resist a bit of smug at writing 1ac straight in, but soon got held up, esp. by 14dn. 17 mins in the end, still quick for me these days
    LOI 18ac, lovely clue, nice to finish on a smile
  11. 24 minutes, so quite a bit easier than yesterdays. If only we had consistently tough ones like that (irony alert)!
    The affinity between Hungarian and Finnish is well known in this household, which has a connection with the former. It still helped to know which letters to use, but it was my SOI after the gimme at 1d.
    I have a blind spot with regard to RARITY, wanting to spell it with an E, so again the cryptic was kind and another strong argument for not doing T2.
    22 took a while, as I had NEGLECTFUL already and “fuel” without its E gives you another obvious -ful.
    ANTEATER was my LOI – “smarter” gives a lot of options – but I liked the definition.
  12. 45 minutes. A slow start, but speeded up towards the end. I guessed 1a fairly early on. Some good clues, especially 19. I was quite surprised to see the use of ‘errors excepted’. I know it from solving Listener puzzles, but didn’t think the Times daily went in for unusual abbreviations.
    i wasn’t keen on ‘top of Everest’ to indicate E in an across clue.
  13. 16:55 .. fairly straightforward here. I wasted a minute or two pondering the notion that one can be simultaneously devoid of care and full of neglect before remembering that I was solving a crossword and moving on.

    Enjoyed ANTEATER.

  14. So just me who went for the singer of You can’t roller skate through a reindeer herd rather than the language it was sung in?

    Like others I favoured the vermilingua for COD

  15. I got most of it done in 12 mins and then spent a further 9 on the NE corner. D’oh of the day to the appropriately impenetrable 6a.

    I did know the language because I once had to test solve a crossword that contained a couple of the more unknown languages of the world. Having a memory that retains obscurities is obviously the answer to cryptic solving.

  16. Done at the in-laws place amid the racket that accompanies Chinese New Year celebrations. After deductions using the D-L method I find that my raw time of 42 minutes is revised to 35:30.
  17. A few seconds under 15 mins. My time was helped immensely by FINNO-UGRIC being a write-in as soon as I saw it, and the helpful checkers from it meant that I fleshed out the NW very quickly. The rest of the answers flowed out from there, and THISTLE was my LOI after ANTEATER. I only saw “whistle” a few seconds after I wrote in my last answer, but I had figured it couldn’t be anything else.

    I thought the clue for FALL OFF was particularly clever.

  18. 1) Penfold61 ho ho ho.

    2) ‘Mr Jones’ is an idiot.

    3) 57 minutes.

    4) Happy weekend.

    Edited at 2014-01-31 02:15 pm (UTC)

  19. 18m. I wrote in FINNO-UGRIA immediately, but on finding I didn’t have enough space I re-examined the anagram fodder. I’ve never come across the -ic version of Finno-Ugrian before but it wasn’t hard to deduce.
    Lots bunged in from definition today, so I didn’t even notice EE.
  20. Another one very much enjoyed. FOI NUCLEAR, having left FINNO-UGRIC till I had a few checkers. (Knowing the affinity with Hungarian, I always want to put an “n” into Ugric/Ugrian. I know, I know.)

    For an obvious anagram, INTERGALACTIC took a long time to unscramble. GHETTO and POTHOLE very nice clues. Indeed today’s offering is full of clues where, for me at least, the penny took a long time to drop but all were clear and not over-complicated in retrospect. Bravo setter. And thanks Blogger for clearing up the parsing of ATTRACT. (I’d ventured AT T-RAC-T, which was clearly wrong.)

    Touched the 30 minute mark with the NE still blank. Held off entering DEEP-ROOTED until I had a few checkers, and only then unpicked the parsing. Had never heard of EE before (E&OE yes). LOI the hard HARD. 50 minutes-ish.

  21. DNF, but enjoyed what I did get. SE did me in where my having properly learnt Cave! as a warning but not being in any way able to fit that sense into anything useful was compounded by gleefully and in ink stripping ‘espouses’ = talk to produce ‘spouse’ = wife (and ignoring the perplexing perplexed bit). Ready for the weekend I think.
  22. Nice puzzle, entirely worth it for ANTEATER alone. Like others, it was my last entry, and it raised a broad smile. About 30 minutes, having never heard of the language or today’s version of CRS. Thanks to the setter and Dave, and regards all.
  23. 11:31 for me. No problem with FINNO-UGRIC as I studied Finnish for a few years at Lontoon Suomalainen Lauantaikoulu (London’s Finnish Saturday School), but generally I seemed to have difficulty finding the setter’s wavelength and made heavy weather of some easy clues. 7dn was worst: like jackkt I wasted time trying to make RETRACT and then EXTRACT fit the clue.
  24. A fairly straightforward 50-minute solve. I couldn’t parse DEEP-ROOTED either, but it was obviously the right answer. I immediately understood how FINNO-UGRIC was going to work and then hesitated looking for the anagram because I counted 6 letters in icing (and so 11 in the whole) — I was relieved when I recounted. THISTLE was also the only possible answer, even though I didn’t know the rhyming slang — I thought perhaps a whistle was what a suitor would give her to further his suit.

    Edited at 2014-01-31 11:45 pm (UTC)

  25. I was unhappy with 38 minutes, because I felt I was being more than usually dense at a few points. So, I’m relieved that some others also had sticky patches.

    My antepenultimate was DEEP ROOTED – I was lacking the D of 6ac (too many potential authors), and the other checkers were all fairly uninformative. Nor had I come across EE as “errors excepted”. LOI was LIBRETTO.

    Nice to see my favourite plant – tobacco – make another appearance. I consider it to be one of my five a day. Good, too, to see a small smattering of science, with INTERGALACTIC (good clue, I thought) and NUCLEAR (nice to see the setter sticking to the English spelling on that one). And FINNO-UGRIC finally justified my long hours spent randomly browsing Wikipedia pages. I presume that the Ugs were the less successful nation in that partnership.

      1. Yes, the famous American “nucular missles” (as opposed to the British “unclear defence”).

        Edited at 2014-02-02 11:33 am (UTC)

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