I pottered through this pleasant little challenge in my target of twenty minutes or so, held up at the end by 25a until I saw the devious definition. I think Mr Setter or Mr Editor must be being kind to me, after the snorter two weeks ago, as I don’t think it will push the SNITCH over the 100 mark. My fav clue was 8d for avoiding silver = Ag for once and getting a smile. Not much else to add, unless ‘disputed science’ is worth disputing.
| Across | |
| 1 | Secure temporary container for lighter, say (4) |
| LOCK – A lighter can be a sort of cargo boat, so can be temporarily in a lock as on a canal. Or perhaps a loch in Scotland, hence the ‘say’ if it’s a homophone clue. It’s the only one today, so I think it must be. | |
| 3 | Violently hector and rail in speech (10) |
| RHETORICAL – (HECTOR RAIL)*. | |
| 10 | Transport minister meeting Russian? (7) |
| MINIVAN – MIN(ister) meets IVAN the russian. | |
| 11 | Old airline to circle course (7) |
| BEARING – BEA (British European Airways, defunct), plus RING = circle. | |
| 12 | Bury New Street collects intermittently larger tax abroad (8,7) |
| INTERNAL REVENUE – INTER = bury, N(ew), then AVENUE has L R E inserted, LRE being alternate letters of LARGER. Tax abroad seems an odd way of referring to it? I presume he means Federal tax in the USA, I think in the UK it was more usually called INLAND Revenue. Thankfully I only need to know about IMPOTS.GOUV | |
| 13 | Old still can be this good, but not fine (6) |
| GRAINY – G(ood), RAINY so not fine. | |
| 14 | Disputed science eastern genius devised to trap carbon (8) |
| EUGENICS – E = eastern, (GENIUS C)*, the C for carbon. | |
| 17 | Client fools river bird heading west (8) |
| CONSUMER – CONS = fools, then R EMU reversed. | |
| 18 | Commercial about Clio, say, was entertaining (6) |
| AMUSED – AD goes around MUSE, the Muses of whom Clio was one. | |
| 21 | Booking calls for bands showing promise (10,5) |
| ENGAGEMENT RINGS – ENGAGEMENT = booking, RINGS = calls. Chestnut time. | |
| 23 | Producer of evergreen staple song retired (4,3) |
| PINE NUT – PIN = staple, thenTUNE reversed. | |
| 24 | One very dead strand (7) |
| ISOLATE – I (one) SO (very) LATE (dead). | |
| 25 | Potter stars rush around, keeping track (10) |
| NURSERYMAN – NAMES RUN = stars rush around; reverse that and insert RY for track. I didn’t see this until all the checkers went in, as was thinking of other kinds of potter, as in clay, or potter about = do this and that. | |
| 26 | Crooked mountain top work shed (4) |
| BENT – BEN = mountain, T = TOP without OP. | |
| Down | |
| 1 | Heather nursing English married couple’s rodent (7) |
| LEMMING – LING = heather nurses E MM. I remember playing Lemmings on a very early PC many years ago, maybe 1991, probably before the mouse was being used; tricky fun but I finished it before 1993 I think. | |
| 2 | Force prisoners on coach (9) |
| CONSTRAIN – CONS = prisoners, TRAIN = coach. | |
| 4 | Sea mist masks no good planes here (6) |
| HANGAR – HAAR has NG inserted. | |
| 5 | Top Roman bishop in row with one American (8) |
| TIBERIUS – B for bishop, inside TIER = row, I, US.Roman Emperor, 14 AD – 37 AD. | |
| 6 | Driver glances at this stern opinion by paper (4-4,6) |
| REAR-VIEW MIRROR – REAR = stern, VIEW = opinion, (Daily) Mirror. | |
| 7 | Rocky pile of Irish tin boxes (5) |
| CAIRN – IR inside CAN = tin. | |
| 8 | Silver was thus, on one side, hammered (7) |
| LEGLESS – Long John had only one leg; hammered as in drunk. Is this term used outside the UK? | |
| 9 | Finished grant once, putting away too much (14) |
| OVERINDULGENCE – OVER = finished, INDULGENCE. Indulgences were granted in the early Catholic Church to reduce the punishment for sins, often in exchange for money or for dastardly deeds being done. | |
| 15 | Subtly introduce new form of annuities (9) |
| INSINUATE – (ANNUITIES)*. | |
| 16 | Travel around eastern Maine to test some maths (8) |
| GEOMETRY – GO around E, ME = Maine, TRY = test. | |
| 17 | Cut Mass among Anglicans before November (7) |
| CHEAPEN – HEAP = mass, without a capital M, inside CE for Anglicans, N(ovember). ‘Cut’ as in cut the price. | |
| 19 | Protest as daughter gets posted (7) |
| DISSENT – D daughter IS SENT = gets posted. | |
| 20 | Girl defending Joe’s heartfelt complaint? (6) |
| ANGINA – ANNA has GI Joe inserted. | |
| 22 | He’s unlikely to recover unit in Greece (5) |
| GONER – GR = Greece has ONE = unit inserted. | |
Here in the US, the tax collectors are always referred to as ‘the IRS’, so the spelled-out version of their name did not ring a bell. I did, however, work out the cryptic to make sure I was correct.
‘Potter’ for ‘nurseryman’ was interesting; presumably, he transplants seedlings into pots when they are ready to sell to customers.
I wasn’t quite sure how PINE NUT was “producer of evergreen”. I suppose because it is a seed from which a new pine grows?
I don’t think 1ac is a homophone clue. A lock is without doubt a temporary container for the passing traffic such as a lighter or barge, whereas a loch is a lake which I can’t see being defined as temporary, nor really as a container.
It may say something about me that when trying to parse LEGLESS after solving, my first thought was that something untoward may have eventually befallen the Lone Ranger’s horse. It was only somewhat later that I remembered the character in ‘Treasure Island’. “Ahaargh, Jim, lad!” (Hancock squints and rolls eyeballs as he thinks of Robert Newton in the role of Long John Silver).
Edited at 2019-02-27 07:32 am (UTC)
My only real problems here were NURSERYMAN and CHEAPEN. The definition of the former is cunning, and of the latter a bit surprising to me. I wouldn’t use CHEAPEN to mean ‘cut the price of’ but it is in the dictionaries.
I agree with jackkt that 1ac isn’t a homophone.
6d, 9d were biffed, as was LOI 25a.
Spent longer than I should trying to work BOAC in as the airline, before dredging up BEA from the murky depths of my mind. And that’s a scary place to go sometimes……
CoD for me definitely LEGLESS, a smile and half a chortle when that penny dropped – I don’t think too many people on the train noticed……
I found this an easy one, apart from trawling through all the Spodes and Wedgwoods I could think of for 25a. Okay once ‘cheapen’ had fallen into place.
Stuart
FOI 3a RHETORICAL, then a pretty steady top-to-bottom solve, slowing towards the end, adding myself to the club of those who finished off with a NURSERYMAN, as it were.
A single question mark on the “indulgence” definition in 9d was my only… er… marginale?
CHEAPEN, PINE NUT and BEARING all had me slightly perplexed (I had no idea what BEA was). Still, got there in the end.
I, too, chuckled at LEGLESS. NHO ‘haar’. And I thought most of the surfaces were rather neat. Good.
Thanks to our blogger and setter.
I think BOAC had one of the best ATC call signs which was “Speedbird”, named after the symbol on the tail, of course. I think BA still uses it. Another evocative one was “Clipper” which was Pan Am’s.
MER at “song = tune”. A song needs lyrics, a tune doesn’t.
I found this easier than today’s QC, and agree with Jack that LOCK definitely refers to canals, rather than being a homophone.
FOI RHETORICAL
LOI NURSERYMAN
COD GRAINY
TIME 7:52
Edited at 2019-02-27 10:46 am (UTC)
You can refer to a song or a short piece of music as a tune.
e.g. She’ll also be playing your favourite pop tunes.
If we’re getting into pedantry, I think most songs have a lyric, not lyrics 🙂
Edited at 2019-02-27 12:07 pm (UTC)
Edited at 2019-02-27 12:16 pm (UTC)
I can see why non-British puzzle users might be disadvantaged in not knowing that ‘legless’ and ‘hammered’ are terms for being blotto, stotious or otherwise bibulous, but I’m not so sure The Times should make allowances: is it not part of the attraction of Times and other UK puzzles that they include such quaint Englishisms?
Edited at 2019-02-27 04:33 pm (UTC)
I never usually do The Times so late in the day but I was done in a healthy (for me) 19 minutes – in bed!
FOI 1dn LEMMING
Nowt wrong with being 8dn – my LOI!
COD 17dn CHEAPEN
WOD 6dn REAR-VIEW MIRROR
Edited at 2019-02-27 04:55 pm (UTC)
I won’t dampen Jim’s spirits by suggesting that this was on the easy side, but I got through it a little less than my average – about eighteen minutes. All very good fun. I enjoyed 8ac, and I’m sure neither “hammered” nor “legless” would be too challenging for solvers in the US, once they’ve mastered the distinction between being pissed in either country.
I worked in civil aviation all my life and my career started with BEA. I was a General Apprentice between 1965 and 1968. I went on to work for them at Gatwick. BEA there morphed into the holiday airline BEA Airtours and then British Airtours after the merger with BOAC in the 70s.
My favourite today was ENGAGEMENT RINGS.
several weeks puzzles requiring some assistance
on a few, particularly with local expressions, place names.
Damn, thought I knew all the river and creek names.
Quicker than my average as well at 31 min. Had a lot of fun working out the word play on many of them, particularly OVERINDULGENCE, NURSERYMAN and HANGAR (having not heard of the North Sea mist). Had gone down the homophone path at 1a, but think that the LOCK container does make more sense.
Finished with LEGLESS (with a chuckle when the penny dropped), EUGENICS (after the dictionary reminded me of what it was) and down to CHEAPEN in the SW as the last one in.