Times 25876 – much to 11ac on

Author   piquetPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
After a poor night’s sleep with one less molar after yesterday’s appointment, this took me a scary 38 minutes and at times I wondered if it was going to be my ‘nemesis blog’, having had lucky escapes so far. The bottom half went in quite fast but the rest, apart from 1ac, was like pulling teeth. Well, not that bad. Even now some of the parsing (8ac, 22ac) is going to be fine tuned (hopefully) as I write, so sharpen your metaphorical pencils.

Across
1 BOLUS – LOB = shot up, reversed, US. A small mass of chewed food about to be swallowed, or a large veterinary pill.
4 CHARLOCK – CHAR = cleaner, LOCK = hair, a plant of the mustard family, I had vaguely heard of it.
8 ROBOTIC DANCING – I had to get all the checkers before convincing myself this was right. Def. ‘posey jerks’, as explained in first comment, it’s an anagram (BIN ACCORDING TO)*. Doh!
10 HOLY SMOKE – Amusing cryptic def. Expression used to show surprise; also a 1999 movie with Kate Winslet, worth a watch.
11 MUNCH – Double def., MUNCH = feed, and Edvard again, the chap who painted four versions of The Scream in 1893.
12 ANTHEM – NT = books, inside AHEM = attention-seeker, def. a number (i.e. tune) of patriots. A Doh! moment when I eventually saw it.
14 FIRETRAP – PARTER, (one escaping), IF, all reversed, def. potential killer.
17 SHOCKING – SING = talk, around HOCK = wine, shocking wine is likely to be spat out.
18 DEIMOS – DEMOS = recordings by new artist, around I. Def. satellite. I knew this because I’m into astronomy; Deimos is the smaller of Mars’s two moons, a pathetic 12 km across, just a big rock, the other one is Phobos. You knew that. If not, see Wiki, it’s interesting.
20 IDLER – RIDER = one on saddle, drop the initial R, insert the L, def. bum.
22 PEPPERONI – IN O (popular opinion initially, reversed) after PEP = go PER = by; def. meat product.
24 SPECTATOR SPORT – (POTTER ACTORS)* retaining SP = betting, indicator for anagram ‘harry’, def. Quidditch, say. Good stuff.
25 SPROCKET – SOCKET (eyeball place) around PaRt, def. tooth. Thanks setter, for the reminder.
26 SHEER – SHE = lady, ER = queen, def. very fine.

Down
1 BIRTHDAY SUIT – Amusing cryptic def.
2 LIBEL – LIB = party, E, L, ends of statE triaL, def. defamation.
3 SO TO SPEAK – Sounds like SEW, TO SPEAK; def. as it were.
4 CUCKOO – Double def. Nuts as in potty, batty.
5 ACADEMIC – Well, a college is academic, and academic can mean not of practical importance; a sort of double def.
6 LOCUM – LUM is a mainly Scottish word for a chimney; insert CO (carbon monoxide, poisonous gas) reversed; def. substitute.
7 CONUNDRUM – CON = against, UN = outside letters of UmpteeN, DRUM = something to beat; def. challenger, not unlike this puzzle.
9 SHAPE-SHIFTER – (FRESH PHASE IT)*, def. being capable of change. Harry Potter echoes here, although the notion is widespread in mythology.
13 TOODLE-PIP – (PILED)* = piled high, surrounded by TO OP, def. I’m off, as Bertie Wooster might say. No Pip jokes please, I’ve heard them all.
15 ELEVENSES – EVEN, inside ELSE = (in) other (circumstances), then S = final letter of circumstances; def. break.
16 KNAPSACK – SPANK = hit, reversed, then (B)ACK = the rear not the top; def. carrier.
19 SPROUT – The author is PROUST, move the S to first place; def. grow. I tried A la recherche du temps perdu, in French then in English, and gave up on both. Anyone called Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust was likely to be too big a read for me.
21 RECTO – A hidden answer clue at last. Reversed in PL(OT CER)TAINLY, def. page, the RH one.
23 OZONE – Time for some dodgy chemistry. OZ = lightweight, ONE is the atomic number of hydrogen. Ozone, O3, is an allotrope of oxygen, O2, not the same thing, although both are molecules made of oxygen atoms; I (and the chap in Dorset) will have to allow the inexactitude.

44 comments on “Times 25876 – much to 11ac on”

  1. 8A – anagram (Rubbish) of BIN ACCORDING TO
    22A – PEP (go) + PER (by) + the rest as you’ve explained it
  2. …had to look up DEIMOS. Should have got it though.

    Another nice challenge, COD to ANTHEM.

    Pip, you have “circumstances” doing double duty in 15dn. I think the clue just uses “other” to mean “else”. Which sort of works in several programming languages, I’ll let others decide whether it works in English.

  3. I had all but three done on the commute then managed to sort out ACADEMIC, FIRETRAP and DEIMOS in my head on the walk to the office. So about 45 minutes all told.

    I hampered myself by putting in tentative crossers for SO IT SEEMS at 3D then taking the crossers as gospel when looking at the across clues even though I didn’t think SO IT SEEMS was right. Another bad habit to try to shake!

  4. Would have been my blog if I were still on the list and I knew exactly what Pip must be going through. It’s a terrible feeling, let me tell you, when a potential “nemesis”, as he calls it, crops up on your watch. And this was one.

    I too had trouble with the wonderfully disguised anagram at 8ac and the exact parsing of 22ac. But 14ac and even 3dn weren’t obvious at first sight.

    Highlights: the other anagram at 9ac; and the excellent “clothing piled high” at 13dn. (Memo to self: there is washing to be done.)

    Never had so many failed parsings scribbled on the sheet. But enjoyed the whole bolus.


  5. Very tricky one today, much harder than yesterday’s and not so satisfying…

    Took well over the hour (not saying how much over!), and still had two blanks when I finally gave in… HOLY SMOKE (so convinced was I that it was hale=well + S-O-E), and the unknown DEIMOS. Didn’t help that I had ‘so it seems’ in for ages at 3dn.

    dnk CHARLOCK and dnp FIRETRAP or PEPPERONI

    Many thanks for the blog, a real challenge today.

  6. Excellent puzzle again – two days running wow! I can imagine the sinking feeling Pip so well done – not an easy blog by any means.

    As well as being superbly clued there is a balance to this puzzle that other setters should note. I looked twice when I reached “Hydrogen’s atomic number” – in the Times (and I’m not over concerned about oxygen being used to define OZONE). I also wondered if the setter is a computer programmer with that “other” and “else”

    Thank you setter

  7. 41′. Tricky. Not too sure about ‘parter’. 8 brings to mind the Peter Crouch celebration on scoring. Worth keeping him in the England team just for that.
  8. Well I saw it. And I am to programming what Jimbo is to the post-Kantian German romantic philosophers!

    I think I was working on “other-wise” = “else-wise”.

    Edited at 2014-08-27 09:38 am (UTC)

    1. Indeed. Hegel – one of those names one can drop into a conversation without having a clue what one is talking about.
  9. Pleased to finish as quick as I did. Same two queries as Mr Toodle. Is it worth pointing out that ‘lower’ in 23d is an instruction to place the ONE below the OZ? Very nice puzzle, puzzlement notwithstanding.

    COD to TOODLE-PIP.

  10. Took me the best part of 5 minutes to come up with my first answer (LOCUM at 6dn). This is another one I lost track of time on i.e. I got stuck and fell asleep with less than a third of the grid complete. On resumption this morning I was short of time so with an additional 30 minutes on the clock I resorted to aids. On reflection I should have solved three of the four I looked up, the exception being DEIMOS which I’ve never heard of.

    Edited at 2014-08-27 08:49 am (UTC)

  11. 21m. Like Jack it took me a long time to get my first answer (IDLER) so I thought this was going to be a real stinker, but once I had a few checkers they began to fall steadily.
    I liked this one. I always enjoy puzzles where not much goes in from definition alone, which was the case here, and I find it satisfying to work out unknowns like CHARLOCK and DEIMOS from wordplay.
    I’m not sure I’ve ever heard 8ac referred to as such. I can’t help hearing a plummy accent saying it in a sentence that also includes the phrases ‘beat combo’ and ‘hit parade’.
    I thought 24ac worthy of special mention. One of those WTD?* clues where at first glance you haven’t a clue what’s going on. Very clever.

    *What the Dickens

    1. The “Harry Potter” device turned up in a Graun at the beginning of last month, which certainly helped second time around.
      1. I think I must have seen it before somewhere, because I spotted ‘Harry’ as a potential anagrind quite quickly. I also remember querying ‘sp’ for ‘betting’ last time it was used. I still think it’s a bit strange but it helped me this time so I’m not complaining!
  12. Far too long! This has been a difficult week so far for me. I put it down to the bank holiday weekend re-booting my brain, which I need to train again into the right way of thinking.

    I got all of them, but failed with a couple of the parsings. Whilst I had no trouble with the SP in the sport, I completely missed the rest of the anagram, and the clue to its existence, doh!

    Good puzzle, my foi was a confident shape-shifter, and loi a rather slow academic.

  13. Found this considerably easier (and more fun) than yesterday’s. ROBOTIC DANCING (or robotics, as I remember it) was a thing when I was at secondary school, though I initially assumed that “posey jerks” was referring to vogueing. Didn’t know CHARLOCK (or rather didn’t remember it from January of last year). Had M_N__ at 11A and wondered which of Manet or Monet would fit the wordplay, until I got the final H and realised it was neither. Not one clue more than a line long – excellent.
  14. I enjoyed this one, despite getting obsessed with CANNELLONI which a) is wrong and b) doesn’t fit. Chambers has SHAPESHIFTER as one word but OED allows it as hyphenated. Once again, the enumeration in the app is (5,7) which does not help. DNK CHARLOCK but bunged it in from the wordplay
  16. 29 mins. It’s quite apposite that SHOCKING was my LOI because that’s what I feel my solve was. All my troubles were caused by confidently entering “so it seems” at 3dn without bothering to parse it, and that made 8ac and 17ac impossible until I eventually revisited it. If I had seen BIRTHDAY SUIT immediately I probably wouldn’t have had any of those problems, but I needed the checker from ROBOTIC DANCING before it fell into place. As others have said, a fine puzzle.
  17. Echo to general praise for this one, which took 23’40”. Several got left until checkers became available: I can’t believe there are no other 6 letter possibilities for “nuts for bird”. Can’t actually think of any!
    LOI ELEVENSES because a) it was a well-constructed clue with a well concealed definition and b) I can’t spell DEIMOS (I after E except in pieces)
    Good quality throughout makes a pick of the day too tricky to contemplate.
    1. The old rule of “I before E except after C when the sound is E” doesn’t work too well for proper nouns, such as “Sheila” (my sister), “Keith” (me), or, for that matter, “seize”.
  18. Easier than yesterday but definitely one to ‘start with the Downs’ as I didn’t write anything in until 24a. A couple I should have got much earlier than I did – 19a being one – but an enjoyable battle was had.
  19. Another smashing puzzle, with some really good, tight cluing. Took me 25 min in total – didn’t know Deimos so had to look it up. My only issue with the puzzle was “parter” to mean “one escaping” in 14a (see joekobi’s comment above) – I hesitated to put the answer in for some minutes because it didn’t seem quite right. Given the overall quality of the puzzleand the pleasure it gave me to solve it, I’m happy to forgive this minor quibble.
  20. Interrupted by a phone call, but about an hour’s solving time, held up for some time ny my wrongly barring 1dn as 4,8 instead of 8,4. Quite a few guesses – DEIMOS, CHARLOCK, BOLUS, SHAPE-SHIFTER and uncertainty about OZONE because of the loose definition. But they were all solvable from the wordplay, so no complaints. I’m not sure that ‘academic’ means unrealistic, more like theoretical or not relevant. That aside, the clues were excellent.
  21. Puzzle three in what is shaping up to be a very good week.

    45 mins taken for this one, again fairly tough, but some amusing moments (HOLY SMOKE) and slick clues.

    Keep up the good work, setters, this is great!

    Thanks
    Chris.

  22. I thought this was much harder than yesterday’s and not quite as enjoyable. But still a fine puzzle which kept me contented for an hour.

    Edited at 2014-08-27 12:32 pm (UTC)

  23. I really enjoyed this despite being detained for over 30 minutes. I think Deimos was a difficult clue if you hadn’t heard of it, but other than all devilishly clever and fair. I’m struggling to see a context where per can mean by, can someone please enlighten me.
    2. ODO gives ‘send it per express’ as an example, although I’m not sure I’ve ever heard it used that way.
  24. Very amusing. 32.36 and had quite a struggle with this. I’d always thought of it as “holy smokes” as in the 1960s Batman series that my little brother was addicted to (wham pow). Completely failed to parse “pepperoni” so thanks for that and a fine blog.
  25. Thought this pretty hard but absolutely superb, especially the anagrams of Potter actor’s and SP,and the robotic dancing one.
    Many thanks to the setter for getting the old neurones going.
  26. Another very nice puzzle. I was lucky to enter BIRTHDAY SUIT on first read, so I had a string of initial letters to work from. But I was held up by thinking (not entering) SO IT SEEMS, and by thinking and not entering CUCKOO because it would make the first word in 8A end in an unlikely ‘c’. Plugged ahead and came all clear in 35 minutes, LOI being LOCUM, due to unfamiliarity with ‘lum’. Regards to all.
    1. Hi Kevin. It appears in the Scots phrase “lang may your lum reek” meaning “long may your chimney smoke” or “I wish you a long life”
  27. Well over the hour here – LOI spectator sport, not seeing Harry as the anagrind. Clever clue. I too jumped at so it seems….
    Lum is always evocative of the old Scottish benediction of “Lang may your lum reek!”, wishing someone good health and wealth – at least enough to keep your fire going!
  28. Called it a day after 33 mins suspecting there was an error somewhere. Knew ACADEMIC had to be right but couldn’t see the parsing and had twigged FIRE—- but couldn’t see the obvious because I had put PHASE SHIFTER at 9D. Should have known that two scientific references were too much to expect (especially one that didn’t fit the definition!). Other than that, a disappointingly spineless way to concede defeat. Put me down for another early SO IT SEEMS too, though ROBOTIC DANCING soon put paid to that.
  29. And me too for SO IT SEEMS – also COWSLICK for 4a, which meant a DNF.
    Even so, I was pretty chuffed to get most of the rest.
    COD 24a – very clever.
  30. I’ll rarely put praise on a crossword with two cryptic definitions, but the beautiful incorporation of the anagram into the surface of the clue for ROBOTIC DANCING makes up for it. Lots of fun, and in the end everything made perfect sense, though I only knew CHARLOCK as the name of a dragon.
  31. Very enjoyable for me. Not a good time, but I’m listening to the very tense Arsenal/Besiktas game too. (Although I’m a Tottenham follower, I’m not a Gooner hater).
    Did not parse ‘pepperoni’, and solved ‘Deimos’ from the wordplay rather than knowledge.
    I suppose that a sprocket is a part with teeth, but I was misdirected as, no doubt, the setter intended.
    Thanks for the blog.
  32. There’s also an instance (non proper noun) in today’s Quickie – weirdo
  33. 14:38 for me. Like others I started very slowly, but then got going, until I became bogged down with DEIMOS at the end: I spent far too much time a) imagining the I was going to go between the M and the S, and b) trying to think what on earth “recordings by new artist perhaps” could be. Annoyingly as soon as I tried putting the I between the E and the M, I thought of the answer immediately from the definition.

    Another very fine puzzle – my compliments to the setter once again. That’s three highly enjoyable puzzles already this week.

  34. To be precise, both O2 (strictly, dioxygen) and ozone, O3, are allotropes of oxygen – which is the atom, not the molecule. I wasn’t keen on the clue, as ozone is the heavier of the two molecules, so not lightweight. In the last couple of decades, some more exotic allotropes have been isolated, including O4 (hypothesized but not discovered as oxozone a hundred years earlier), and O8, a metallic form. Doubtless these will turn up in some future puzzles.

    Malcolm Oliver

    1. You are correct of course, Malcolm; I didn’t want to over-complicate matters for non-chemists, only point out that ozone is not the same as oxygen. The lightweight bit is nothing to do with O2 / O3, it’s the derivation of the OZ part of the answer.

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