Times 25757 – so when is the first qualifying puzzle appearing?

Author   glhPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
Solving time : 15:26, and I’m currently fourth on the leaderboard, so I think I was just a little off on the wavelength here. Though there’s one that I can’t figure out the wordplay for right now, thankfully it’s near the end of the list so hopefully it will come to me.

I suspect there’ll be some scorching times from those that pick up on the definitions, with a lot of long entries where the definition stands out in the clue, you could complete most of the puzzle that way. I had a few I needed the wordplay for, particularly 14 down, where I initially played the “let’s go by definition alone” game and put in CARILLION.

Away we go…

Across
1 DELICATESSEN: ESSEN next to (CITADEL)*
9 WORST: hidden
10 REAR-LIGHT: EARL in RIGHT, and the estate is the setter’s favorite car
11 RELIABLE: ELI in RABBLE missing one B
12 INBRED: sounds like IN BREAD. Having lived in both Tasmania and North Carolina, I’m used to this having a more sinister meaning
13 PREACHER: P then CHE in REAR
15 KIDNEY: KID then YEN reversed, I think we’ve had this definition of KIDNEY recently
17 ENTOMB: MB(GP) after (NOTE)*
18 COVETING: COVERING with T for R
20 FINNAN: INN in FAN got this from wordplay, it’s a type of smoked haddock
21 PROSPERO: S in PROPER, 0 – the duke from “The Tempest”
24 CONTINENT: CONTE(story), NT(New Testament) surrounding IN
25 (d)OVER,T
26 PERSISTENTLY: (STYLE,PINTER)*
 
Down
1 DEWDROP: WED reversed, then DROP(shed)
2 LORD LIEUTENANT: LORD(noble), TENANT(lessee) surrounding LIEU(place)
3 C,OTT,A: another one from wordplay, a surplice
4 THRILLER: RILL(runner), in THE,R
5 SPAT: double def
6 EGLANTINE: EG, then ANT in LINE(cable, as in “drop me a line”)
7 AGGRANDISEMENT: anagram of DEIGN and GREAT MAN’S
8 STODGY: DG(Director General – old BBC boss) in S,TOY
14 CAMP,A,NILE
16 SOCRATES: I liked this double container clue – RAT in CE in SOS
17 EFFACE: all six letters are musical notes
19 G,HOST,L(oft)Y
22 SCONE: this was my last in and I was convinced I was going to be incorrect. I’d never heard of the Stone of Scone
23 MESS: double def

44 comments on “Times 25757 – so when is the first qualifying puzzle appearing?”

  1. At 23 minutes this took me only 5 minutes longer than today’s Quickie which was admittedly a little more difficult than usual. Not much to say about this except the definition part of 9ac is rather fun and I absolutely hate clues like 17dn
    1. I agree with you about 17d. I’m on record on the subject of GK, so no surprise that 21a foxed me. If I’d persisted a bit longer to find the right synonym for genteel, I’d have got it. Otherwise, a bit on the easy side, too many popped out (and in) from definition alone.
  2. Much easier than yesterday’s nightmare. Though I had no idea how 8dn worked. Many thanks for helping with that. With Jack on the problems with clues such as 17dn.
  3. Much easier indeed; I don’t even want to think about yesterday’s. This was actually too easy in spots, like 1ac–‘ruined citadel’ + ‘German city’, I ask you–or 14d, or 5d, or 21ac. We just had ‘stodge’ in a Concise, which helped immensely with 8d. And I, too, would welcome a ban on 17d-type clues. I think 7d was my LOI: I was working on (deign to be)* plus something for a long time. Liked SOCRATES, but it was pretty easy to get with a checker or two.
  4. Held up by putting STABLE in for 8D for a time: S + TALE with B in (BBC Boss). I aupposew Dull and Stable aren’t quite the same though. But -N-R-B looked pretty unlikely.

    I don’t recall seeing that meeting of KIDNEY although it had to be right.

  5. 35 minutes, so not as easy for me as others. I don’t mind an assortment of musical notes such as we have at 17, given that there is a fixed and limited set. Even if I put ‘deface’ at first. The more clue types the merrier…always excepting of course Spoonerisms and anything referencing ‘The Tempest’, which always gets me in a cold sweat. Not because I never read it, but because I did, and never really got it.

  6. 11.02 but with quite a few wordplay element s skated over. I mean, Africa, for example, 9 letters, beginning C. I might have seen CONTE, and NT books had to be there somewhere, but the clock’s ticking and there might be more interesting clues around.
    My piano teacher, who used to rap me over the knuckles with the sharp edge of a ruler, had a series of fill-in-the-blanks stories which included ALL the words possible with the seven letters of the scale, so 17 was ACE clue of the DECADE as far as I was concerned. As for DEFACE, I’ve always wondered if it’s a misprint in “God rest ye merry Gentlemen:
    “This holy tide of Christmas all others doth deface”
    We had KIDNEY/sort/kind in September last year. What do you mean, you don’t remember? Tim posted a Fry and Laurie video especially to bed it in the memory. Pay attention, class!
    CoD, for want of better, to the matrioshka SOCRATES.

  7. All done and dusted in about 30 mins, so good enough for me. Like our blogger I ended with SCONE, not quite knowing why.
  8. In 17D, the setter may have had in mind that the notes between the lines on the treble stave are F A C E. Garry
  9. A pleasant 11 minutes, with the only eyebrow-raiser being 17dn, as I’m with those who don’t like this sort of clue much (see also: clues which are effectively “this word can be made up entirely of Roman numerals”, which make me livid…I mean LIVID). For entirely personal reasons, I chuckled inwardly at KIDNEY, which, as Z points out, I always hear in the voice of Stephen Fry impersonating Robert Robinson. Glad to see some of these things sticking, Form 4A: remember, there will be an exam in the summer.
  10. I did a bit of double-take at the savoury scone, as they are for me prototypes of sweetness, whatever weird variants might exist.
  11. When I read 17D I chuckled because I knew Jack would be spitting feathers. I agree, such clues are a bit of a cop out by the setter.

    Pretty boring puzzle really – 15 minute meander.

    Interesting comment about inbreeding George. It’s allegedly commoner than one might think. Sotira will hear about in the deep of Cornwall I’m sure. In Dorset there are a set of hamlets between Dorchester and Bridport that lie between the sea and the scarp face where all sorts of things go on – so I’m told

    1. You really are trying to get me into trouble, aren’t you?!

      I’m sure the good people of Cornwall were far too busy being great engineers and attending chapel for any of that nonsense.

    2. The term we use for some of the outlying villages in Somerset is “limited gene pool”.
  12. 21.14, raced through most but held up by stodgy for some reason. Can’t see why the different way into a clue such as 17 dn. raises hackles. There’s more than one way of being cryptic. Scone is in ‘Macbeth’ as the place of coronation for Scotland’s kings, making a nice Arts corner with Prospero, Dickens and Socrates; and prompting thoughts of King Alex 1st nae less.
    1. ‘King Alex eh? Now there’s a thought. If ye give up yon Mrs Windsor, will her summer residence at Balmoral become a state visit? Crivens!
  13. 11 mins, which was only a couple of mins longer than it took me to complete today’s QC. As others have noted, too many answers could go straight in from their enumeration and their less-than-well-hidden definitions. COVETING was my LOI after INBRED.
  14. 16:31 .. I felt a bit slow on the uptake with this one. Perfectly satisfying puzzle, though.

    Last in .. LORD LIEUTENANT, which gets my COD vote, too.

  15. 20 min.

    On inbreeding – my father’s eldest sister never really forgave him for marrying an ‘overner’: a ‘foreigner’ (from that unknown country. West Wight) might have been acceptable, but do real people live across the water ?!

    1. West Wight contains such well known sites as Yarmouth and The Needles. It’s possibly the most beautiful and least populated area of the Isle and how people amuse themselves has not been revealed to me.
  16. First 15×15 for several weeks so am pleased with a successful finish in 50 minutes. COD to 10ac for misleading me with the surface, LOI 17 ac as I’d also put defaced into 17dn.
  17. Just at the hour, also with a ‘can’t be anything else’ at SCONE last in. Was very pleased with beginning to learn how to have confidence in unknowns (cotta, eglantine, finnan) derived from vague memory and wordplay.
  18. I made hard work of this, finishing in about 45m. I also had CARILLION in 14D even though I thought it to be misspelt (confirmed now that CARILLON is part of a bell tower and CARILLION is a construction company). Also having put DEFACE in 17D the SW corner took some time to unravel.

    I still don’t know why 15A is KIDNEY other than by wordplay. Can someone enlighten me to the definition I am missing please.

    1. The relevant meaning is kind, type or temperament, as in Eliot’s poem “A cooking egg”:

      I shall not want Honour in Heaven
      For I shall meet Sir Philip Sidney
      And have talk with Coriolanus
      And other heroes of that kidney.

  20. Very close to a midweek finish – which for me is a major triumph. (Essentially stuck in the space between quickie and full version).

    All present and correct except went haywire in the south west (story of my life, really, as I look back on mis-spent youth in Somerset): frustrated by 17ac I put in Intern (knowing I could not parse it – dangerous move)which then led to Carmelite for 14 dn and Infect for 17 dn. Immature approach, as got over excited at prospect of finishing.

  21. A strange mixture of the tricky and the obvious, which included two anagrams which almost solved themselves, PERSISTENTLY and AGGRANDISEMENT. About half an hour. FOI DELICATESSEN, LOI SCONE (which could just as easily be sweet as savoury, so why savoury in the clue?). The Stone itself is no longer symbolically kept under Coronation Throne at Westminster Abbey.

    Agonised long over how “Che” could be put in place of a “light” reversed (rear) in a word “prea-r” meaning power. Left unparsed, so for me a DNF.

    COD a toss up between EGLANTINE, for taking me back to Keats’ nightingale, and PROSPERO for reminding me of the National’s final season at the Old Vic (a real theatre not a concrete enormity), with Gielgud as the duke.

  22. Much easier than The Nightmare aforementioned, but I too was held up, not to mention slightly bored, by the ‘notes’ clue. Too many options, it may as well have been a straight def clue.

    Cheers, Chris.

  23. Fairly straightforward I thought. Held up by putting DEFACE early on, then realised it didn’t really fit the definition. About half an hour.
  24. A straightforward puzzle with a combination of obvious definitions and helpful checkers, but I thought the clues were slick nonetheless. Not too fussed either way about clues like the one for EFFACE, but I’d perhaps rather see things of that ilk as a gimme in a more difficult crossword. COD to REAR-LIGHT.
  25. A very pleasant hour or so with this one, didn’t know this meaning of kidney and hadn’t heard of finnan so I continue to learn new things.

    Nairobi Wallah

  26. A gentle Thursday. I join the general disquiet about clues like 17dn (not least because DEFACE was my first stab). Perhaps because I am married to a Scot, I have never seen or heard the word FINNAN disconnected from HADDIE.
  27. 16m. No real problems, but I was slow to see the long down clues. I’m not a fan of the 17dn clue type either: you might as well clue a word as ‘a combination of letters’.
  28. 23 mins after rattling through the LHS and hoping it wasn’t all going to be as straightforward as some of the clues already mentioned, and then getting my comeuppance by being bogged down on the right by choosing wrong fodder for the long anagram and failing to spot eglantine immediately, despite having lived near Eglantine Lane for my first two decades.
  29. I find myself agreeing with everyone today. With our esteemed blogger and others re my LOI, SCONE; with most everyone for not caring for 17D; with many for entering STODGY without completely getting it. And also, perhaps, with many who fear to say it, but feel that FINNAN HADDIE is just awful. Not the clue, the ‘food’, if it deserves the name. I will now go hide to escape the fury of the finnan devotees. Regards.
  30. Being from Scotland, Finnan as in Haddie and Scone (pronounced Scoon) were my first ones in! Being in the medical profession this meaning of kidney was far from my usual thoughts…
    Much better than yesterday’s horror.

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