Times 27141. Dum spiro, spero.

Author   piquetPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
A twenty minute stroll, but a few tricky ones to parse once the answers were plucked from the likely-box; 17a, 18a, 3d, 15d for example. A pleasant if not demanding puzzle for a Wednesday, I don’t expect to see orange on the SNITCH.
The definition / meaning of 6a may be new to some, as may be the geography of the far end of Wales, but the wordplay is clear enough. I think I like 18a best, for its neat but misleading surface.

Across
1 Soldier wearing suitable American equipment (9)
APPARATUS – PARA = soldier, has APT around it, then US.
6 Unskilled work from son of afflicted man? (5)
MCJOB – JOB was afflicted, needing patience, so McJob could be his son… a bit odd but different I suppose.
9 Trick cyclist performs in bin (7)
WHEELIE – Double definition.
10 How unmarried couples used to live, swallowing extremely unusual hormone (7)
INSULIN – Couples used to live IN SIN, they swallow U L being the first and last letters of UnusuaL.
11 Squirrel away almost months in terrible weather (5)
STORM – STORE loses its E, adds M for months.
12 Take fish with rod, it’s plain (9)
PIKESTAFF – PIKE = fish, STAFF = rod. A pikestaff was carried by a pilgrim, so plainly showed his situation, the word was corrupted from PACKSTAFF it seems.
13 Provided with backing, cease being addict (5)
FIEND – IF is reversed then END = cease. Fiend in the sense of ‘he’s a golfing fiend / addict’.
14 Academy dancers after training were very nervous (3,6)
RAN SCARED – RA = Royal Academy, (DANCERS)*.
17 Provincial shopping centre in the way now made to move (5-4)
SMALL-TOWN – MALL = shopping centre, inside ST = the way, then (NOW)* = now made to move.
18 Less threatening, to be deprived of all love (5)
MINUS – OMINOUS = threatening, loses both its O’s.
19 Conspirator hanged: rope splits in two, we hear (3,6)
GUY FAWKES – Sounds like GUY (= rope) FORKS = splits in two.
22 Discharge returned bill first, producing capital (5)
ACCRA – AC = bill, account, then ARC reversed. Capital of Ghana. I wanted to get in ABUJA at first just because I knew it had replaced Lagos.
24 Part of opera, some number about sailor from foreign land (7)
ARABIAN – ARIA = part of opera, N = some number, insert our AB sailor, an Arabian is from a foreign land, if you’re not currently in Arabia I suppose, a bit of a weak definition.
25 Giant in forest wore odd pants (7)
REDWOOD – No Ents or Sibelius trees, simply the Giant Redwood tree as in California. (WORE ODD)*.
26 Detective, modest and attractive (5)
DISHY – DI = detective, SHY = modest.
27 Proverbs about heroin that are employed by the chippy (9)
SAWHORSES – SAWS are proverbs, around HORSE slang for heroin.

Down
1 Formerly a hated symbol broken in half (2,3)
AS WAS – A, half of SWASTIKA. Neat.
2 Remarkable events in empty patch with flower springing up (9)
PHENOMENA – P H = patch ’emptied’, then ANEMONE reversed. Maybe I will now remember not to spell Anemone Anenome.
3 Look right up across unnamed newspaper, for example (4,5)
ROLE MODEL – LO = look, R, reversed, = ROL, around LE MO(N)DE = newspaper losing its N for name.
4 The turf an object of derision for Cambridge college? (3,5,2,5)
THE SPORT OF KINGS – Cryptic definition. I can see the Kings bit but not sure why SPORT equals derision, unless it’s ‘having sport at the expense of’ meaning deriding?
5 Scarcities known to be artificial are unacceptable (5,2,4,4)
STICK IN ONES CRAW – (SCARCITIES KNOWN)*.
6 Doctors succeeded saving European national leader (5)
MOSES – MOS are doctors, S = succeeded, insert an E for European.
7 No new sort of calendar girl (5)
JULIA – the JULIAN calendar loses its N.
8 Carelessly, behind sofa husband dropped proof of honesty (4,5)
BONA FIDES – (BE IND SOFA)*, the H for husband dropped from the anagram fodder.
13 Port that protects marine resource? (9)
FISHGUARD – Slightly witty cryptic definition, although having been through Fishguard many times going to and from Rosslare, there’s nothing very amusing there, it’s dull and at the far end of Wales.
15 In mock game, have decided to be inconsistent (4-3-2)
COME-AND-GO – COD = mock, GO a game, insert MEAN = have decided, in the sense of ‘I mean to go to Tesco’.
16 Meet rhyme for first clue? (3,6)
RUN ACROSS – Seems to me this is supposed to be a rhyme for ONE ACROSS but if that’s all there is to it, not a great challenge.
20 I agree about returning thanks for poet (5)
YEATS – TA reversed inside YES I agree.
21 A college year provides friendship (5)
AMITY – A, MIT (Mass. Inst. of Tech.), Y for year.
23 Chain of human descent not complete (5)
ANDES – Today’s hidden word in HUM(AN DES)CENT.

69 comments on “Times 27141. Dum spiro, spero.”

  1. Isn’t (or wasn’t) ‘make sport of’=make fun of a phrase? ODE gives ‘ a source of amusement or entertainment; and gives as an example sentence “I do not wish tos how myself the sport of a man like Wildeve.”
    I got 12ac from the phrase ‘plain as a pikestaff’.
    1. I thought I knew it from somewhere, and it might’ve been Pride and Prejudice: “For what do we live, but to make sport for our neighbors, and laugh at them in our turn?”
    2. Yes I thought the expression wasn’t in need of spelling out, I just tried to explain wwhy pikestaffs are plain! P
      1. Yes, I had the feeling that was it as I typed; 釈迦に説法する, as they say in this neck of the woods; ‘preaching to Buddha’, or teaching your grandmother to suck eggs.
            1. Well, I stuck it into google and for once it got it spot on! Do you / they do crosswords in Japanese?
              1. They do (I sure as hell don’t), but I don’t know how they work. Actually, I don’t know if they would count as ‘crosswords’, but a good friend of mine does them; I’ll ask him.
  2. Slowed myself down by putting in STORE instead of STORM for some (dumb) reason. Didn’t get ARC as ‘discharge’, but it had to be. I biffed 4d from the T, P, and K, and then saw the wordplay; see above. LOI was MCJOB, which I’d like to say I didn’t know, but I must have come across it somewhere; totally stumped until I got the J. Once again, MIT shows up as a college. Liked 3d and 5d.
  3. 22 minutes. Rather enjoyed McJob – the more so because the giant corporation fights against the use of the term. Word/phrase never heard of today was COME-AND-GO.

    Edited at 2018-09-12 05:06 am (UTC)

  4. I’m going through a run of those days where one wakes up at 3am and can’t get back to sleep again, and feeling quite dopey. That’s my excuse for not being able to think of another collection of letters than ANARIAN at 24a, just assuming it was some obscure word for a sailor I’d not heard of. Certainly wouldn’t have been the first time!

    Apart from that, enjoyed 6a MCJOB and 18a MINUS, and was done in 31 minutes, so it’s a shame I didn’t get them all right…

    Edited at 2018-09-12 06:15 am (UTC)

  5. I didn’t find this quite as easy as our blogger and in fact, as is my wont at the moment, I was unable to finish because of getting stuck on M?JOB at 6ac. I had taken JOB as being clued by ‘work’. I guessed there was a biblical reference in ‘son of afflicted man’ but assumed it was the whole definition with the answer as some biblical character I never heard of. In the end I plumped for MAJOB as the most likely use of the vowels available. I never considered consonants (other than Y) as a possibility. MCJOB has come up before so I did know it but it has been a while and it had slipped to the back of my mind. On reflection it’s rather insulting to the people, mostly youngsters, who work in such places.

    I just did a search of TftT for MCJOB and the only hit was in a Sunday Times puzzle dated 22nd December 2007, only a month after I started blogging here. Andy was on duty for that day, but in my contribution I noted that MCJOB has been in the OED since 1986. If that was its last appearance I’m not surpised I had forgotten it!

    Edited at 2018-09-12 05:34 am (UTC)

  6. 20 minutes, with quite a lot of them spent on the MOSES/MCJOB pair. The latter is even trickier if you don’t have the M to play with. I can understand McDonalds being being touchy about the term, not least since they run Hamburger University to posh up its trainees (Wiki: “not to be confused with Hamburg University” – well duh!). But I haven’t forgotten their ad campaign in which a pound was described as a “bob”, which they strenuously sought to defend against universal derision. It was fun making SPORT of their discomfort. I sympathise with those whose alphabet trawl for MCJOB (naturally) excluded consonants.
    Nice to have ROLE MODEL in on the morning after the excellent Alastair Cook’s final Test, with its utterly improbable, couldn’t-make-it-up endings.
    Fine, entertaining blog – thanks Pip. Haven’t worked out the title relevance yet, mind. Dum Spiro was Nixon’s running mate, wasn’t he? Something of a McCandidate, as I remember.
  7. Another stroll beside the Stour. Like others remember MCJOB from the entertaining court case. Does anybody visit FISHGUARD itself or is it just an embarkation point?
    1. Not for a long time, but when we lived in Co Tipp we used it a lot and got stuck a few times overnight in B&B there, sea being too rough or ferry broken. Nothing to recommend it. Like most of Wales IMO.
  9. Much quicker than Monday’s and Tuesday’s for me though the SNITCH tells me all three have been on the easy side so far this week.

    MCJOB reminds me of the time I went to a restaurant called McBenny’s in Malta. It looked exactly like McDonald’s with branding including the golden arches logo though the food was nicer. I wonder if it’s still there or if McDonald’s ever got it closed.

  10. 23 minutes with LOI MCJOB, the C coming from an alphabet trawl before the light bulb smashed into my head. I didn’t parse MINUS before coming here. Of course, I can’t let the unrhyme of RUN ACROSS/ one across go unnoticed. COD to REDWOOD for its surface. Still no official confirmation of the reported deal on the courtroom steps for Wanderers yesterday. We live in hope. Thank you Pip and setter.
    Update – Just in. Wanderers have avoided both administration and points deduction. I hope this isn’t too far off the subject!

    Edited at 2018-09-12 03:50 pm (UTC)

  11. I found this a straightforward solve, but had to come here to find the C in 6a – a “Doh!” moment.
  12. 22:35 with two wrong. MOJOB for the unknown MCJOB and where one was meant to stick in one’s CRAW one stuck in one’s CROW.

    I liked Ominous but COD goes to Wheelie.

    Edited at 2018-09-12 09:54 am (UTC)

  13. Found this very straightforward.

    Fishguard is a nice little seaside town, just down the road from my daughter’s cottage in Rosebush so quite familiar. Pembroke is a lovely part of Wales, once you finally get there.
    Re pikestaff, I regard the pilgrim derivation as highly suspicious. So far as I can see it derives from Brewer’s dictionary and is likely a folk etymology .. lots of people used packstaffs or pikestaffs, and a much simpler idea is just that they tend to be big – especially the military kind – and obvious. Unfortunately the OED is silent on the matter.
    Enjoyed McJob, as always..

    Edited at 2018-09-12 09:02 am (UTC)

  14. <22′, enjoyable. Got MCJOB by putting the two parts together, didn’t know the meaning or derivation until I read this. (Declare interest, my niece, who has faced many challenges, is doing very well at McD, being cared for). I have been to Fishguard, where to get from the train station to the required bus was a hefty uphill walk – it’s near the beginning of the Pembrokeshire coastal path, which I completed in sixteen days in 2004.

    There is a Beckett play called COME AND GO, no hyphens. I won’t spoil it for you, so don’t be tempted to look it up, but maybe today’s definition is where the title comes from. And, while we’re on high culture, anyone put YATES in?

    Thanks pip and setter.

  15. Am safely back in warm and sunny Kuala Lumpur. In my shorts and sipping a cold beer. Had lots of trouble for inking in 15Down as stop-and-go until MINUS disabused me. Great fun this puzzle and I learned a new term, MCJOB.
  16. Excellent crossword but I just want to register my usual gripe about the pronunciation of ‘one’ which for my money most certainly does NOT rhyme with ‘run’ (see 16ac). I consider that I speak pretty reasonable English without any particular accent but I would rather jump off Beachy Head than announce, perhaps, ‘We won! Won Nil!’
    OK perhaps not Beachy Head. But you know what I mean. An enjoyable 19m.
    1. I am really curious about your (and boltonwanderer’s) pronunciation of the two words ONE and WON, because — though I’m well aware that the sound I make for ONE may be different from that which you make — I assume that you would produce the same vowel sound for both words. In the exclamation “We won! One nil.” would you *not* rhyme ‘one’ and ‘won’?
      1. One rhymes with John in most northern English, and in much of the Midlands too. Won rhymes with bun. The challenge was laid by an anonymous contributor a few weeks ago to produce a poem when John and one were rhymed. I immediately came up with Elvis Costello’s American without tears.

        “By a bicycle factory as they sounded the siren
        And returned into the dance hall she knew he was the one
        Though he wasn’t tall or handsome she laughed when he told her
        “I’m the Sheriff of Nottingham and this is Little John”

        Anon didn’t reply. Listen to Jeff Stelling’s Saturday afternoon football score show on Sky and you’ll be hard pushed to find anybody who rhymes one and won. Tringmardo makes the same point above.

        1. Must say, being originally from London but now living in Lancaster, I struggle with my southern-born children speaking like northerners. But then again, my ma-in-law and I used to banter around the pronunciations of words such as ‘pub’ and ‘jug’ which she claimed southerners pronounced as ‘pab’ and ‘jag’ rather than ‘poob’ and ‘joog’.

          So when you say that ‘won’ rhymes with ‘bun’, should that be ‘wan’ or ‘woon’?

          1. Using those phonetics, Mike, it would be woon. But when I see a double-o I would probably first rhyme it with moon. There are exceptions, look and book for instance, but in Lancashire many would go for the full double-o sound even for those.
            I have your problem the other way round with my three children all brought up just North of London. I’m generally OK with North Londonese. But my daughter went to a very posh independent school which conducts its business with the most contorted vowel sounds, last heard from the Queen’s mouth circa 1954. I often have to ask her to repeat something.
          2. Ah but, Mike — the point about using ‘rhymes with’ is that we know there are regional differences in vowel sounds, so for Londoner ‘won’ rhymes with ‘one’ AND for a Yorkshireman ‘won’ might rhyme with ‘one’. Note how bw says that for him (and he claims ‘for most northern English’) ‘one’ rhymes with ‘John’. That is not what I expected, and is perhaps not what you expected either. Here’s a summary:

            London: ONE rhymes BUN Yorkshire: ONE rhymes JOHN
            London: WON rhymes BUN Yorkshire: WON rhymes BUN
            London: PUB rhymes JUG Yorkshire: PUB rhymes JUG

    2. Oh! I recognise, too, that the vowel sound produced for RUN may be different from the vowel sound produced for ONE; this is perhaps what boltonwanderer is complaining about. the ‘o’ in ONE may create a rhyme with, say, ‘Ron’, ‘don’ or ‘upon’ and ‘u’ in RUN may rhyme with ‘bun’, ‘fun’ or ‘sun’.
  17. Having just returned from holidaying in the wilds of Scotland, I have had what I believe is called a digital detox, which included crosswords, so it’s good to be back; and this was a gentle and entertaining reintroduction. MCJOB was my last in, but I obviously hadn’t forgotten my previous acquaintance with the word, and didn’t get caught out by that nasty MC beginning.
  18. I enjoyed this. ‘Trick cyclist’ had me immediately looking for a name such as Freud, R.D Laing or Jung. Some time wasted there! Of course, I think RUN ACROSS and ‘one across’ rhyme perfectly — surely the ‘ACROSS/across’ is uncontentious? MCJOB took me a while: the afflicted man must be Job, but did he have a son called Moab perhaps? I liked the ‘ominous’ –> MINUS clue; very good. Completed in 27 mins.
    And let me, like jerry, put in a good word for Fishguard — and indeed more generally for Pembrokeshire: the area has some beautiful coastal scenery, good walking, good beaches, some pretty villages and sites of historical interest.
    Thanks to the blogger and setter.
    1. I considered MOAB might be in there somewhere but it was a place I think, not a person. Moab is My Washpot is the title of one Stephen Fry’s autobiographies.
      1. OK – place not person. What a bizarre title! Well, I suppose Stephen Fry is your go-to guy for arcane references.

        1. A small room wih a basin in my prep school was known as MOAB for precisely this reason. I do not know whether the room (or indeed the school) is still there 60 years later.
  19. As Tim above, just returned from Scotland and thought all was functioning in my upstairs department as I had all but 6a done in about 15mins. After a lot of googling of MUJOB, MAJOB, MIJOB and various others I gave up. I’m afraid that MCJOB passed me by I obviously am not tuned in enough! Even my regular crossword cheat site hadn’t heard of it

  20. Unskilled newspaper. I object to anyone ridiculing people working hard for a living, so this goes into my crap puzzle category. Didnt get the blasted clue anyway. Also held up by putting a ridiculous Yates for poet until I put brain in gear. DNF in 25.
    1. Who’s ridiculing the workers here? McD offers crap wages and comparable working conditions for jobs that require little skill and lead to no advancement; so do lots of other employers. Given that MacD is a major employer of this sort, categorizing the kind of job as a Mcjob strikes me as appropriate, and in no way reflecting on the people stuck in such jobs.
  21. 27’17. The parsing of 15 seems a bit of a stretch, if technically a fair clue. Not a crackling puzzle to me, though the dishy sawhorses of the lowest rung took the eye momentarily.
  22. Unfortunately reminded me of Boy George and Karma Chameleon. It’s a complete mug’s game for large food chains to sue over the small stuff. Years ago there used to be a small family-run restaurant on upper Main St. on Nantucket called (quite appropriately) Starbucks and I think they won against the Goliath. “Plain as a PIKESTAFF” crops up quite a bit in the Georgette Heyer oeuvre. 12.32
    1. There was a fellow named Johnny Carson somewhere in the Midwest (of the US), who had a bar, and had it before Johnny Carson became a TV name. It was called “Johnny Carson’s”, and he was hounded to death over it by the celeb’s lawyers. I don’t know who won, but I’m not going to bet on the innocent party.
      1. You jogged my memory Kevin. I didn’t know the Johnny Carson bar story and I hope it did actually have a happy ending though I share your doubt in that case. But there was also a small b&b on Nantucket called Holiday Inn and they were harassed by the “hospitality” giant and won (or should I say “wun”) and to this day there is no Holiday Inn(tm) on the island.
  23. A fairly easy puzzle today, done in 6m 18s with a fair bit of biffing – ROLE MODEL, SMALL-TOWN, COME-AND-GO. Like others I struggle to imagine RUN and ONE rhyming, but Chambers assures me that it can happen… not in my part of Worcestershire, it didn’t.

    ARC as a discharge was new to me, but fortunately the clue was kind and I had the checking letters.

    P&P was my also first thought for ‘sport’ (that rhymes… for me, at least).

  24. I liked this but was annoyed to miss 6a which, in retrospect of course, would have been solveable if only I’d made the effort to extend the alphabet run from six to twent-six characters. Couldn’t get the parsing of 18a and 3d which I doubt I would have ever worked out. A yet another frustrating DNF, in 35 minutes.

    The surface for 9a was great, and as a confessed ‘one rhymes with run’ vowel mangler, I liked 16d.

    Thanks to setter and blogger.

  25. I found this quite straightforward until I came to my LOI MCJOB, at which point the wheels came off. After trying to make sense of the the wordplay I had the patient one, but the “son” bit rang no bells as I failed to associate McDuff with son of Duff etc. Having tried all the vowels and Y, I gave up and resorted to aids. I enjoyed the rest of the puzzle, even managing to get the poet instead of the wine lodge this time! WHEELIE took a while, as did AS WAS. 36:57 with 1 cheat. Thanks setter and Pip.
  27. I saw that my archrival Aphis99 had posted a fast time on this and so went for it, crossing the finish line in a pleasing 4 and a half minutes… if you know it ought to be easy, it’s easier not think too hard about whether biffing is advisable or not! Another LOI MCJOB here.
  28. I got through most of this in about 20 minutes, but then ran into problems in the bottom-west corner. Those problems arose from my spelling the poet “Yates” – no doubt I was confusing him with Kates*. Once I’d sorted that out, though, ARABIAN was my LOI at a total time of 28 minutes.

    [*Wikipedia tells me that there is a J. Michael Yates, poet.]

    Edited at 2018-09-12 02:15 pm (UTC)

  29. Easy and pleasant here, too. I liked McJob and As Was, and was pleased to get the two less commonly appearing celebrities Moses and Guy right off. I was especially pleased to think of the Fawkes — Forks bit while solving the clue rather than as a restrospective bit of parsing. Less pleased to have stared at Abarian for quite a while before sorting out the B and the R

    Can someone help me understand the chippy sawhorse connection?

        1. If you’re old enough to remember Trumpton, the carpenter was called Chippy Minton.

          Another use of chippy was used in a most excellent exchange of views about throwing bugs on a fire by Lady Colin Campbell when she tarred Tony Hadley (ex Spandau Ballet crooner) with the withering put down ‘chippy oik’. Nothing to do with carpentry that time.

          1. I’m probably too old for Trumpton, but mostly was in the wrong country. At that age my use of the word was at ice hockey, meaning aggressively physical, with a borderline hint of flying elbows and high sticks. I also know what chippy means when I’m hungry.

            Edited at 2018-09-13 07:24 pm (UTC)

  30. Having done the QC early online, I tried this also online.
    It is somehow different from solving on paper.
    Anyway I nearly finished this. Defeated by Moses and McJob.
    I thought Sojob might be the right word and never thought of Moses. David
    1. Mac or Mc means “son” or “son of” in Irish and in Irish influenced Scotland. Similar to Ab or Ap in Wales.
  33. Where have I bin?
    Working.
    Did this just now with egg and chips (hoorah).
    30 mins for all but M-job and failed.
    Mostly I liked: Guy Fawkes and Wheelie (ha).
    Tomorrow is another day.
    Thanks setter and Pip
  34. 49:12 held up for ages by Mcjob, Julia and LOI Arabian. Didn’t twig the Mc bit of 6ac but I was familiar with the term. I didn’t know the expression plain as a pikestaff but the word play for 12ac was generous.
  35. Sorry to be so late, but I actually had to perform some work today and that kept me away until now. So maybe no one will see this. The puzzle was fine and I finally completed one this week, although the MCJOB answer took a long time coming as LOI. I finally realized that Job was my afflicted fellow, and saw who the son must be. Regards.
  36. Where I come from, ‘forks’ has a pronounced R in the middle. I think homophones that only work in some dialects should be banned.
    One way round this would be to modify the clue a little:

    Conspirator hanged: rope splits in two some hear.

    42 minutes, held up too long by said ‘homophone’.

Comments are closed.