Times 25852 – not a 10 ac by any means

Author   piquetPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
The LHS went in smootly and the two long across clues followed, I thought I was going to get off lightly and set a hot time, but the NE corner took longer; 37 minutes in total, and one remained to parse (8d) which is now edited so I can seem to be on the ball. And there’s a </tbody> appearing mysteriously in my HTML which won’t go away.

</tbody>

Across
1 LICK – I think this is (C)LICK, press button without C, but it could be FLICK I suppose; def. ‘quick application’, as in ‘a lick of paint’.
3 SMALL PRINT – My FOI falsely leading me to hope for a quick solve. Cryptic def.
10 NO-BRAINER – NOB (peer) ER (monarch) about RAIN (to fall) def. ‘very easy clue’. I spent a while trying to work with NOBLE.
11 GUSTO – GUST ( to blow) O (over), def. ‘enthusiasm’. I think I’ve seen this clue or a close variant before.
12 ALLYING – AL(L) LYING, ‘def. ‘in Coalition’. Nice surface, but of course it can’t be true.
13 STEELY – SLY (artful) around TEE (part of golf course), def. ‘hard’. This took me longer than it should have done, as I stand on tees three times a week.
15 HANSEL AND GRETEL – Anagram [N(ew) ANGLE THREE LADS]*.
18 ROUND-SHOULDERED – ROUNDED (fully grown) around SHOULDER (take responsibility for), def. ‘poor posture’.
21 SHEARS – SS (ship) around HEAR (try), def. ‘cutter’.
23 SUMMONS – SUM (final, as in sum total), MONS (battle), def. ‘order to attend’.
26 OPINE – O (old) PINE (wood), def. ‘offer view’.
27 SCINTILLA – (CALL ISNT I)*, indicated by ‘criminal’, def. ‘trace’.
28 FORTY WINKS – Amusing double def.
29 BRAE – BRAVE with the V removed, Scottish word for bank, of the river variety not the fiscally imprudent.

Down
1 LANCASHIRE – LANE (road) around CASHI(E)R (bank employee with E removed), def. ‘part of country’.
2 CABAL – CAL (California) with A B(ook) inside, def. ‘intriguing’.
4 MONOGRAPH – (PORNO MAG H)*, def. ‘paper’. My second one in./td>
5 LORIS – LORDS (cricket ground) with D (died) removed and I put in. I spent ages trying to parse LARGO until I remembered there was such an animal as a SLOW LORIS. I now know it’s a species of strepsirrhine primates which make up the genus Nycticebus.
6 PIGS EAR – PI (good) GEAR (clothes) around S(on), def. ‘complete mess’. The origin of this phrase is obscure, possibly from the ‘can’t make a silk purse… ‘ expression.
7 INSULATOR – INSULAR (narrow-minded), around TO, def. the opposite of a conductor.
8 TROT – Thanks Kevin for the enlightenment – it’s Schubert’s Trout quintet with the fourth letter U removed.
9 FACILE – AC (bill) inside FILE (folder), def. easily done’.
14 CLYDESDALE – CLYDE’S (bank robber’s, as in Bonnie and), (LEAD)*, def. ‘horse’. A draught horse originally from Clydeside, and nothing to do with the Bank.
16 NAUGHTIER – (HUGE TRAIN)*, def. ‘not so good’.
17 DRUMSTICK – Double def., seen with a smile once the final K was in place.
19 DRAPERY – DRY with RAPE (crop) inside, def. ‘curtains’.
20 DIMITY – MIT (college), with DIY (amateur work) plastered round, def. ‘fabric’. Used for tablecloths and such.
22 SUSHI – Hidden word MAKE(S US HI)CCUP, yummy Japanese food.
24 OILER – BOILER (chicken) loses B, def. ‘well’ as in oil well.
25 WOOF – WOO (try to win) F (female), a dog may be going woof, or barking.

41 comments on “Times 25852 – not a 10 ac by any means”

  1. I was wondering about this while doing the puzzle, and it just now came to me: Remove the U from (Schubert’s) Trout Quintet.

  2. Just missed my half-hour target with this one (31:59), but, as Pip, I was left with TROT unparsed. Thanks, Kevin, for that. Also dnk BRAE, so that was a punt. Ooh, and dnk DIMITY as a fabric. It is the colour of our bedroom walls…

    Liked the symmetry of the two counties.

    1. G&S to the rescue again: The Pirates (of Penzance), believing that Major-General Stanley is an orphan (although Frederick later explains that he isn’t, and what’s more, never has been), give up their plans to forcibly marry his daughters, and sing:
      Pray observe the magnanimity
      We display to lace and dimity …
      1. Impressive libretto knowledge! There a few things I really can’t stand, and G&S is one of them. Mr Gilbert must have been a while finding a rhyme for ‘magnanimity’. Mrs K is my fount of K when it comes to fabrics.
  3. I charged (for me) through this in 30 minutes but then got totally stuck on 20dn and 23ac. Didn’t know MIT for college and didn’t know dimity – nor could I see final=sum so I turned to the blog – thanks Pip – I can now get on with my day.

    Edited at 2014-07-30 08:35 am (UTC)

  4. This actually took less time than the Quickie, although that was in part because I could use checkers (as in 8d, 18ac, 23ac, and 14d) without immediately parsing the clue. Yet once again, MIT is a college. Like Pip, I remembered the slow loris and then worked out the (rather nice) wordplay. You didn’t know the slow loris was a strepshirrhine?
  5. Steady stuff with no unknowns (neither known nor unknown). SHEARS as ‘a cutter’ raised a hmph – to me a pair of shears is a cutter but shears are cutters. Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a leading educational establishment in Crosswordland.
  6. By way of encouragement for other relative newbies – 67%.

    As usual I was foiled in part by some absent GK (LORIS, BRAE and CLYDESDALE) and obscure (for me) meanings (CABAL).

    Very disappointed that I didn’t get STEELY, SHEARS, OPINE and OILER. Had the clues decoded but just couldn’t see the answers.

    I had LICK but didn’t write it in because I just couldn’t parse it. Wrote in TROT but didn’t get the wordplay even though I should have. I find the clues involving removal or substitution of letters the most difficult. Must be something to do with the way my mind works (or doesn’t). Just put on the Trout because I haven’t listened to it in years.

    Thanks very much for the blog Pip. I envy your ability to play golf three times a week.

  7. Was cruising towards a sub-20 but spent more than five minutes on my LOI DIMITY. The word’s unfamiliar but it was clued by two chestnuts, so should have got it sooner.

    TROT seemed a safe bet but didn’t have the GK to parse it. Everything else seemed pretty standard fare.

    Thanks setter and blogger.

  8. 14 mins. I’d heard of the Trout Quintet so I didn’t have a problem parsing 8dn. However, 1dn and 14dn both took longer than they should have done, and I was held up at the end by LORIS/STEELY and LICK/CABAL. An enjoyable puzzle, IMHO.
  9. Bit distracted by a couple of deadlines. But had time to enjoy this one. I’d never thought of a MONOGRAPH as a “paper” before. In my experience, monographs tend to be longer, book length even. But I was interested to see what the word actually means, according to the Oxford, and “paper” looks OK now.

    Count me in as getting TROT before parsing it. The quintet, for me, always has shades of “The Lumberjack Song” (in terms of melody). Maybe, as my music teacher used to tell me, “You have Van Gogh’s ear for music”. (He also said, on receiving a composition: “Your music will be remembered when Mozart and Beethoven are forgotten … but not until”.)

    Still … hats off to Franz for including the double bass in a string quintet. Never could get the hang of two violins. Nasty screechy things.

  10. 22.30. All straightforward enough. 28 rather nice. I can’t stand Dr Who or Monty Python but love G.& S.
  11. Spent perhaps a quarter of my time on the SUMMONS/DIMITY crossing, which got me wondering whether OILER was correct. Didn’t know DIMITY and I’ll be surprised if anyone got SUM from final rather than spotting the answer and reverse-engineering it. A bunch of good clues in this one.
  12. Was racing through this until I hit the DIMITY/SUMMONS crossers and after much head scratching finally gave up. Though I’d never heard of DIMITY, with hindisght both seem gettable so a bit frustrated not to have seen them.

    I also spent a while on LORIS, being unable to parse the clue and unsure whether it might be LORUS. Eventually plumped for LORIS when I recalled that LORUS is a brand of watch rather than a primate.

  13. 24.5 minutes, with no real hold-ups, but a slight Roger Mooresque lifting of the eyebrows at ’rounded’ for ‘fully grown’.
  14. Nice gentle puzzle this one solved in 20 minutes sitting in the sun with a coffee and at peace with the world
  15. I always think of these in connection with Sherlock Holmes – the varieties of tobacco ash. Very glad to see you’re still here Alec, as is Tony Sever. Which makes those of us who meekly cough up our weekly danegeld look a bit foolish.

    Started out completely off the wavelength with this one and read all the way through to “sushi” before pulling wits together. 18.31.

    1. I was sent into a Holmesian reverie, too. In the television reboot it’s one of the few updates that really doesn’t work:

      SHERLOCK: Mmm: ‘Kasbah Nights’. Pretty racy for first thing on a Monday morning, wouldn’t you agree? I’ve written a little blog on the identification of perfumes. It’s on the website – you should look it up.

      A “little blog” sounds a bit weedy next to a “monograph”.

  16. Straightforward one, about 15 minutes. Dimity will be well known to the Georgette Heyer fan club members..
  17. 16:42 .. a blank start where I thought we were dealing with a mind-bender but HANSEL AND GRETEL got me going.

    COD .. WOOF, which will always bring a smile as it it makes me think of the now sadly late Rik Mayall and that performance.

    Edited at 2014-07-30 11:47 am (UTC)

  18. 27 minutes with many going in on definition and a hunch. Rather oddly, one of my two unknowns (MONOGRAPH) was my first one in as I spotted GRAPH in the anagrist and there was little choice how to use up the remainder. The other unknown was DIMITY although I suspect I have met it previously.

    Couldn’t decide between (c)LICK and (f)LICK at 1ac as neither quite corresponds to pressing a button in my book.

    CLYDESDALE my LOI lost me several minutes at the end.

    Lots of fun.

    Edited at 2014-07-30 10:50 am (UTC)

  19. 16:39 (eat my dust Sotira!).

    I thought this was quite uneven, thinking I was on for a sub-10 and making a mental note to recommend it to newer solvers then suddenly hitting the buffers where there were unfamiliar words (dimity) or tricky wordplay (loris, steely, trot). It also took me ages to see Clydesdale (not for the first time).

    COD to lick for “quick application”.

    1. I would come back at them fighting words but I seem to have got slower since I moved to Cornwall …
        1. I am. I’d better start out a couple of days early.

          Currently weighing up whether to spring for 2 nights at The Tower. I think I will. Are you staying down or commuting? Anyone else planning to make it a weekend?

          1. Coming down on early train from Yorkshire for the first sesh, 7dPenguin is coming down on early train from Lancashire and we’re both staying over on Saturday night near Tower Hill.

            Which session are you in?

            1. The first, I think. I Don’t have the letter with me.

              We should probably carry a copy of The Times or something for purposes of recognition.

              1. 🙂

                Jerry wore a name badge last year with his TfTT avatar on it. I’m thinking of doing the same this year.

                1. That was good thinking. Anyway, let’s figure something out closer to the time. Looking forward to it.
  20. 12:25. I happened to have all the knowledge for this one, including (surprisingly) the fabric and the quintet.
  21. Never heard of dimity, but it fitted. Like others, TROT went in unparsed, but was right. Stuck to LARGO unfortunately then plumped for OPENLY for 13 ac, not being able to parse it and now seeing why!
  23. Reasonably new to all this so happy to complete the grid in a (for me at any rate) good time. As a wet behind the ears solver, could someone explain “PI” for good please
  24. About 30 minutes, ending with unparsed but somewhat clearly correct entries for LORIS and TROT. DIMITY from wordplay, and a COD vote for WOOF. Regards.
  25. 7:57 for me, so not a disaster – c.f. Monday’s puzzle! However, looking back over the clues afterwards, there were a number I made extraordinarily heavy weather of – but at least TROT and DIMITY went straight in.

    All in all, a pleasant, straightforward solve.

  26. Comes more readily if you’re a fan of Under Milk Wood (or, come to that, The Nine Tailors).

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