Times 26,891 – Better 9ac Than Never

47 comments on “Times 26,891 – Better 9ac Than Never”

1. 9a is “former” LATE and X for “times”. I had METRE at 23d as a hidden for a while and CLENCHER as a guess for 17d.
   1. Oh yes, that’s brilliant! So well concealed in the cliched phrase “former times”… shame that the crossers made the answer so unambiguous that I didn’t have to do the required thinking to get there! Further proof if any were needed that the speed-solving approach doesn’t always allow you to stop and smell the roses.
2. 19:13 … 12’6” is 150 inches? Good grief. It would take me about a week and a calculator to work that out. As it is I thought about it for ages, decided it must be something to do with Roman numerals and inches, and slung the answer in.

   Very easy in parts, very hard in others. I was slow to see the PEARLY KING and spent a long time thinking 1d must be some Germanic geographical term — a feldstrup or something.

   COD to LATEX

3. 30 mins with a Fat Rascal (hoorah).
   This morning’s unfortunate coupling is ‘Latex Restraint’.
   This was more like it: fun, witty, do-able. Only one easy plant and one random personage.
   And we got to do some arithmetic to calculate the inches – fantastic. It is difficult to choose between 12’6” and the End ‘orse for COD. But the use of arithmetic is the clincher.
   LOI was Stagnancy where I was trying to use Ann for too long.
   Mostly I liked: the aforementioned plus Pearly King and Filmstrip
   Thanks super-witty setter and V.

   PS One for the mathematicians. Show that (in the land of integers) 26 is the only one with a square immediately before and a cube immediately after.

   1. I’m slightly alarmed that you noticed that, Myrtilus
      1. You’ve reminded me of the Doctor who was alarmed by his patients sex-mad responses to the Rorschach test. The patient replied: “Well it’s you that keeps showing me the mucky pictures!”
      2. I’m slightly alarmed that I’m now picturing “unfortunate couplings”.
         1. I was worried that he was trying to use Ann for too long.
            1. So was I. Ann
4. My first 30-minute solve for a while I think, so I was pleased about that, and not falling into the bear-trap at 13ac. Never quite got my head around the wordplay at 1ac and 21dn but didn’t spend long thinking about them what with not being on blogging duty. I also had SCAN at 20ac which probably lost me 5 minutes in the SE corner. DK PATCHOULI.

   Edited at 2017-11-24 09:06 am (UTC)

   1. You’re better off; patchouli stinks.
      1. Doesn’t it just!
5. I has 21 as for=pro and file=data collection, which pulled me out of the SCAN trap. Climbed out of the RANG trap unaided. Eventually.
   1. Ah yes, I think that’s a much better parsing. I was thinking of police “profiling” people by… er, I actually don’t know what I was thinking. More haste less speed!

      Edited at 2017-11-24 10:12 am (UTC)

6. as per Sawbill.

   FOI 3dn SAXONY Dresden area.

   LOI 1dn FILMSTRIP and my COD.

   WOD 25ac PATCHOULI an Asian extraction of Asian extraction

   Lord Verlaine: we used to have to get dressed (in the dark), do our latin homework, bike ourselves to school, gobble down our Readybrek* and do the Times Crossword, all within 15 minutes! Kids today, the Volvoed classes!

   On the Verlaine scale my kids would have been at 11 minutes plus – late for school

   Pearly King Meldrew

   *I wonder what our Mr. Myrtilus had for his ‘brek back in the day?

   Edited at 2017-11-24 09:29 am (UTC)

   1. Sugar puffs
7. Easy one today

   CLINCHER a bit convoluted. For me its normal usage means “decisive argument” or “final piece of evidence”. And why should I suddenly decide to switch into roman numerals having established the 150 inches part?

   1. Yes, it’s quite a frivolous clue on many levels, but I needed a bit of that this morning. A Verlaine often randomly switches into Roman numerals of course, it’s just the kind of person I am.
      1. Quite. Personally I always see 150 as 96.
         1. There must be a hex on you!
         2. I used to tell my work colleges my age in hexadecimal in the annual “it’s my birthday, have some cake” emails, but sadly the jig was up when I turned 2A.

            Edited at 2017-11-24 04:52 pm (UTC)

8. Had RANG and ANIMATE entered when I started my final pre-submit eyeball, so dodged a couple of slugs there. Unlike Saturday.

   CLUNCHER the best of a good bunch of clues

   1. A CLUNCHER sounds like a great word for a bad clue if anything! Maybe I should try introduce the terminology Clinchers & Clunchers at the next Sloggers & Betters. Talking of which is there a crossword meetup in London this weekend or thereabouts, I seem to remember some talk of one?

      Edited at 2017-11-24 10:16 am (UTC)

      1. Yes, apparently there will be crosswordy types drinking in the Parcel Yard tomorrow afternoon, if anyone’s London-based and at a loose end…
9. As with our inestimable blogger, I found this a combination of trite and indigestible. Left with 2 holes in NW and SE, I was forced to make wild guesses and had to come here for the explanations. I thought 12’6″ was about 4 metres, but it didn’t help…
   1. 12’6″ is almost exactly twice the height of a Verlaine, which I suppose makes me a DEMI-CLINCHER at best.
10. 14.49 and fortunately didn’t dwell too long on RANG. Puzzled over 6d until I realised I needed to correct MUSTTAD to get LOI AGITATE, but only managed to change it to MUSTAAD.
11. 
    Got there in about 40mins. Never worked out the CLINCHER clue, but saw it had ‘inch’ in it (well done, me!), and PROFILE was another I was unsure of. Tried to make FILMSTRIP more complicated than it was, and never got past EX for ‘former’ in LATEX. Clever clue.
12. I too found this a weird mix of QC easy and a few tricky ones that took an age to mop up. LOI PROFILE with a shrug, having run through numerous options for the checkers.
    27a has one of my pet hates – the dropped H device as here in ‘unt. All much too ‘lor blimey guvnor’ Dick Van Dyke cockney for me.
13. Well, just a single anagram in this one. I must have spent ages hunting for anagrinds, all to no avail. An eclectic mix of quick cryptic and proper Friday clues. The 12’6″ clue was a beauty, my LOI: I biffed it in desperation as the hour turned and then suddenly I saw the ‘INCH’ and how it worked. Super.
14. 16:59. I liked this one. Some interesting words, some tricky (but always fair) wordplay, a bit of whimsy. CLINCHER is very silly, my last in and favourite.
15. Struggled mightily with this one. Avoided the bear traps after initially falling into them, but climbing out almost immediately. However I was delayed for some time by having FRETWORK at 8d with the final K as the metal(potassium) and fret as the annoyed bit. SCAN also held me up at 20a until I was forced to rethink. I went as far as converting 12 feet to inches, but still failed to make the connection with Roman numerals, and just biffed CLINCHER from checkers. After 45 minutes I was left with F___STRIP and __T_X and went into brain freeze. I eventually had to cheat and used a word finder on 9a and clapped a hand to my forehead when I saw LATEX. FILMSTRIP then went straight in and I submitted at 59:55. Well done devious setter and thanks V.

    Edited at 2017-11-24 12:00 pm (UTC)

16. Think I must have been on the wavelength with this one – at the second attempt, on paper since the iPad version resolutely refused to let me type anything into it, then stopped showing the grid at all – coming in at 13:45

    Almost fell for the tense-trap at 13, but managed (geddit?) to reel myself in.

    FOI CONDESCEND which was when the iPad decided that every letter I typed was, in fact, the delete button. On closing and reloading there was an expanse of grey and the options box but no grid. Or timer. Or clues for that matter.

    LOI PROFILE because, well, yes, because.

    particularly enjoyed (in no particular order) the ‘Untsman’s steed, CLINCHER (which I read to be a grappler is someone who has others in a clinch – bit of a stretch but just OK i think) and the aromatherapy substance that immediately brought back memories of dubious rock concerts in the 80s and the associated biker fraternity that would inevitably be present, along with their distinct whiff. Some of which may well not have been from legal substances.

17. Thanks for the parse V – I flipped a coin between that and “clencher” and never did get there. I also completely missed the point of 1d (nice one) and thought it might be a sort of andlit. referring to movie Westerns (Sierra, Sierra Vista, High Sierra). Oh never mind. SAXONY reminded me of an old joke of my father’s – if this is Upper Saxony, what on earth can Lower Saxony be like. 20.05
    1. It’s beautiful! Lived there 2006-2014 🙂
18. Pretty straightforward and a good (for me) 36:40.

    Lots of enjoyable clues here, especially 18a and COD 17d. If all the clues were mathematical I’d probably finish in 2 minutes.

    LOI 1a even though FOREST was the first word I thought of, but for some reason I couldn’t parse it.

    Thanks for the blog. At the risk of nitpicking, you have an extraneous S at 1d.

    1. Well spotted! When I started blogging (a few years ago, cripes) the “deliberate” mistake in my parsings was a regular feature. Clearly, er, I’ve decided to bring it back by popular demand.
19. Screwed up royally. Had ‘feltstrip’ (??) and ‘promise’ at 33 mins. Just couldn’t see them; really annoyed at myself. I thought it was tougher than yesterday’s, but the snitch disagrees.
    Great blog, V, thanks.
    Thank you, setter.
20. Why do computer scientists think Halloween and Christmas are the same? Because DEC25 and OCT31 are the same.
    1. I remember one of my work colleagues celebrating his 13th birthday with a drink in the pub before his birthday dinner with his wife and kids when he got home.
21. 55 minutes, with the last five of them spent on 21d PROFILE. FOI 1a FOREST, loved 27a when the penny dropped (I always hear these things in George Cole’s “Flash ‘Arry” voice), lots of question marks (including CLINCHER) along the way.

    Glad I spotted the possibilities in 13a and plumped for the right one, especially as in my adopted city of Bristol, different grammatical rules apply. “Have you ran that script yet?” is a common call in the IT department here, and that’s just the way the word works among native Bristolians, apparently…

22. Great fun. Loved ENDORSE. 31 minutes. Ann
23. …before 16d highlighted the blooper. I found this mostly not too difficult, but took a while to see that 8d had IRK rather than IRATE round the outside and ended up stuck on 1d for about 5 minutes. I was amused to see 4a here after 18d in the QC, where opinion seems to be divided about whether English or French is best. I too liked the last ‘orse and 15d, when I eventually got it. 27:26
24. 22 mins on the commute this morning followed by 32 mins at lunchtime for this one. Bit of a strange offering. As I raced through the first half I began to think that the Monday setter had escaped and taken over. The length of time taken to get my last few in soon disabused me of that notion. The 150 incher took a fair while to crack but brought back fond childhood memories of lying on the rug in front of the electric fire at me nan’s house in the early 1980s with World of Sport on the telly and Kent Walton introducing grapple fans to the likes of Big Daddy, Giant Haystacks, Mick McManus and Kendo Nagasaki. The pearly king, ironwork, filmstrip and latex (which I bunged in from checkers without seeing former times – very good) took ages to materialise.
25. My second DNF in a row*, having failed to get either PEARLY KING or CLINCHER.

    (*I console myself with the thought that two is the minimum number needed for a row.)

    Edited at 2017-11-24 09:45 pm (UTC)

26. “Extent of public notice”. Well, that’s the NON-cryptic part of the clue for PROFILE, is it? What an inept and unfair one it is. I got the answer thanks solely to “for data collection” and three letters already known.
27. DNF in 30 mins. Couldn’t find filmstrip, stagnancy or profile

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