Times 27309 – certainly not vanilla, but not tickling my taste buds much.

Author   piquetPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
Maybe I’m a bit rusty, but I struggled to get on to the setter’s wavelength with this, working slowly from top left to lower right and ending in an unimpressive 40 minutes with a few not fully understood. I think I now get them all fully, except 19d, q.v. below; the answer is correct but I’m not sure why. For my taste, too many ‘well I suppose so’ clues and not enough ‘aha, very good!’ ones. Maybe it was just me, on verra.
Thanks Olivia for stepping up last week when I was hors de combat, your contribution did our Wednesdays proud.

Across
1 Wild man-eating maiden’s cornering me: no good running! (13)
MISMANAGEMENT – Easier to guess the answer than to unravel the parsing. (MAN EATING MS ME)*, where MS = maiden’s and ME is added into the fodder. I spent a while leaving the G out as in ‘no good’ before saw the definition was at the end.
9 Vet mostly stopping alcoholic drink for Lent (5)
GIVEN – GIN has VE(T) inserted. If I have lent you my car, I definitely haven’t given it to you, but someone is going to tell us the words are possible synonyms in the big dictionary.
10 A solid, almost gracious branch of science (9)
ASTRONOMY – A, STRON(G), O MY ! where O(h) My is an exclamation as in ‘Gracious!’.
11 Dressing down for work in mill? (10)
EARBASHING – I presume this is a DD, where working in a (cotton) mill in olden times was a very noisy affair. EDIT see below keriothe’s thought about bashing ears of wheat. But don’t you grind the grain, not the whole ears?
12 Wine from Spain that’s ok for the French (4)
CAVA – Fizzy white wine from Spain indeed, and it is spelt like the French for ‘it’s going OK’, i.e. ça va.
14 Dope, slowing down, facing punishment? (2,3,2)
IN FOR IT – INFO = dope, RIT, short for ritardando, slowing down in music.
16 Possibly when contracts were short term or medium (7)
TEMPERA – Contracts were short in the TEMP ERA, one might think; tempera is a painting medium, with or without egg.
17 Arrived embarrassed (5,2)
SHOWN UP – Double definition.
19 Work unit coming to no harm potentially without uniform (3-4)
MAN-HOUR – (NO HARM)* with U inserted.
20 Dowdy dresser that fashion originally left behind (4)
RUMP – FRUMP is the dowdy dresser, loses its F from fashion.
21 Very fatty steak may not be well done (4,3,3)
GOOD FOR YOU – I suppose this is about fatty meat leading to blocked arteries, seems a bit of a daft example of something that’s not good for you, though, if it is that fatty I’m going to send it back.
24 One pointedly protected small cavity storing trophy at home (9)
PORCUPINE – PORE = small cavity, has CUP and IN inserted.
25 Lie that one’s missing following bean count? (5)
NOBLE – NOB = bean, L(I)E.
26 Complete daily high school rounds, arriving at French gallery (4,2,7)
HALL OF MIRRORS – ALL OF = complete. MIRROR = daily (paper). Insert all into H S = high school. I presume this is referring to the noted Hall of Mirrors in the Palais de Versailles, although there are halls of mirrors elsewhere.

Down
1 Electronic data repository permitting case to be resolved (8,6)
MAGNETIC STRIPE – (PERMITTING CASE)*. Now replaced by a microchip, but still used on some access cards.
2 One no doubt taking interest or delight in speaking (5)
SAVER – Sounds (perhaps) like SAVOUR = take delight in.
3 Scrap to hold on to area taking toll: a sign of age (6,4)
ANNUAL RING – ANNUL = scrap, insert A, add RING = toll.
4 Rascal had mucked about, interrupting calm, briefly (1,3,3)
A BAD HAT – (HAD)* inside ABAT(E) = calm briefly.
5 Put out no tips for messaging court (7)
EXTINCT – Put out in a past tense sense. (T)EXTIN(G), then CT = court.
6 Poetic dark age probed by book (4)
EBON – EON = age, insert B for book. Old and poetic word for black or dark as in ebony.
7 Battle scene coming up, unexplored, a cortege crosses (9)
TROCADERO – Hidden reversed in UNEXPL(ORED A CORT)EGE. Battle in Spain in 1823, after which the famous bit of Paris was named. And presumably the restaurants in Leicester Square and elsewhere followed.
8 Pair one assumes heading for the sack? (6,8)
PYJAMA TROUSERS – Well, a cryptic definition, but not very.
13 Area of the church: one Cranmer reformed (4,6)
AMEN CORNER – (ONE CRANMER)*. Apparently there is or was a spot in a church near the pulpit where sycophantic worshippers gathered, and kept repeating ‘AMEN’ to every bit of the output from the priest above. I think of it more as holes 10 – 12 on Augusta National Golf Course, or the 1966 Welsh band led by Andy Fairweather Lowe.
15 Unceremonious arrest method of old in W Germany, preceding demo (9)
FROGMARCH – FRG has O inserted, then MARCH = demo.
18 Rider being paid six shillings on round (7)
PROVISO – PRO VI S = for six shillings, O = round.
19 Where you’ll find Queen’s University at Kingston exam? (7)
MIDTERM – I’m a bit flummoxed by this one. I can see ER is mid tERm and ER is HM The Queen. Why it refers to one of the several Queen’s Universities, the one at Kingston, Ontario for example, I do not see. And is a MIDTERM a kind of exam? Not one I ever had to sit.
22 Surly youth to come and go with Boys Brigade for a year (5)
YOBBO – YOYO would be to come and go, change a Y for BB = Boys Brigade.
23 Deserts line in battle (4)
DUEL – DUE = deserts, as in ‘get what is due, get his just deserts’ I think. L for line.

74 comments on “Times 27309 – certainly not vanilla, but not tickling my taste buds much.”

  1. 20:07. I found this chewy, but enjoyably so.
    At 11ac I think the idea is that a mill would be involved in ‘bashing’ ears of wheat.
    I’m a little bit puzzled by 19dn too. There’s a Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario, which would presumably hold mid-terms, but the construction still seems a bit odd.
    2. I read EARBASHING in the same way as you did, though whether ears of grain are bashed rather than ground in a mill is at the very least a moot point.
      1. Indeed, but I think that’s what the question mark is there for: to indicate a slightly whimsical definition.
  2. I’m afraid I lost confidence (and interest) in this one and abandoned it with a few unsolved, including EARBASHING. I didn’t know the battle, and couldn’t make head or tail of MIDTERM, other than knowing it was an exam in America colleges.

    I also failed on ANNUAL RING. I’d always thought of them as ‘growth rings’, although I see from the dictionaries that they’re not always the same thing.

    Just not my tasse de thé, as the French probably don’t say.

    1. Pas ma tasse de cha, non plus! But that is probably to say no more than that I was not tuned into the setter’s wavelength. It would be interesting to know if this is a setter we haven’t encountered before.
      1. I am more concerned that we might encounter this setter in the future. Not to my taste.
  3. I also struggled but got there eventually in 70 minutes having been on the verge of abandoning it for the night on several occasions. I settled for MIDTERM as an exam as I thought I remembered it coming up once before and perhaps not that long ago, but on searching for it now I can’t find it.

    Re 10ac I’m sure I was taught that O is used for the vocative case when addressiong someone, but the interjection expressing surprise is OH, so I would have expected ‘Oh my!’ to take the H.

    At 15dn I never heard of FRG which seems odd usage as it’s the initials of the translation of Bundesrepublik Deutschland. Did the West Germans use BD I wonder?

    Edited at 2019-03-27 06:30 am (UTC)

  4. I’m afraid I can’t enlighten anyone regarding MIDTERM but with the checkers in place it had to be that.
    The whole puzzle felt very different somehow, as if we had a new setter.
    Thanks, Pip, for explaining EAR BASHING and HALL OF MIRRORS.
    Regarding AMEN CORNER and Andy Fairweather Lowe, I see him a lot in YouTube videos in support of Eric Clapton. There’s also a terrific video of a band led by Dave Edmunds giving a wonderful performance of the Chuck Berry song, “Promised Land”. AFW is in that ensemble and, apparently, the whole band was Welsh and it was recorded on St David’s Day at some point.

    I hope you are fully recovered now, Pip. I believe Olivia told me you were hors de combat because of a hip operation.

    1. 1. you need 13 letters, MAN EATING MS is only 11; 2. those letters plus ME anagram out to the answer. What’s your point? Who are you?
  6. Tough going, reflected in this being rated Very Hard by the Snitch. I eventually finished with DUEL, which I was unsure about as although I’d thought of ‘just deserts’ I had it that the phrase was ‘just desserts’. On reflection ‘just desserts’ doesn’t make much sense, particularly if the recipient has a sweet tooth.
    1. Well, it depends if you ‘corner’ ME into the rest of the anagrist and then make it ‘wild’ as
      I would, or anagram MANEATINGMS to get MISMANAGENT and then stick in the ME. Personally I find the former preferable, but either leads to the same result.
      1. ME say so too. I would choose your second option, but as you say both roads lead to Rome.
  8. Took me over 30 mins, but I quite enjoyed this one and unlike you, Pip, I did have a few “Aha!” smiles. I hate to go against the grain, but my COD was ‘earbashing”.
  9. A full hour with yoghurt, granola, blueberries, etc.
    All very chewy. I have heard of Mid-term exams but the rest of 19dn was a mystery. Also NHO a Bad Hat, but it had to be.
    Mostly I liked: A stron O My! and COD to Pyjama Trousers.
    Amen Corner also did:
    Bend me shape me anyway you want me
    As long as you love me it’s all right…
    Thanks setter and Pip
  10. Hmm, still rated as very hard by Snitch, which cheers me up no end as I did not find it so.
    19dn is just a laboured attempt to show that “midterm” is an American usage. Since there is quite a well-known Kingston University in London, it doesn’t really work.
    To me Trocadero is a cinema and Amen Corner is a pop group so it was interesting to discover the origins of these terms
    Welcome back, Pip! Keep on taking the factor 8..

    Edited at 2019-03-27 09:17 am (UTC)

  11. the Clue could have been “Where you’ll find queen’s university exam” which is a lot neater but as MIDTERM is very specifically an Americanism I felt it needed indicating.
    These things are always difficult to judge: often the hoops you go through make it even more confusing but the fact there actually is a “Queen’s University at Kingston” made it hard to resist 🙂
    1. Thanks for the explanation. It’s a neat clue, but personally I find the obscurity of the university a slight flaw.
    2. It’s difficult to judge when you should have known something when you don’t. As you say, MIDTERM is a specific Americanism, one I didn’t know, other than as an election. I’ve done degrees at two British universities, and my children at four, and I’ve never heard of an exam so described, so I don’t think it’s just because I’m ancient. I did think that ER might be making an appearance somewhere, and maybe I’d have guessed the right answer from your rewritten clue. Perhaps if I watched more contemporary American TV, I would have come across it.
    3. I must say I’ve have preferred it without ‘at Kingston’, if only because, as pootle suggests, most people in the UK won’t have heard of the university so it isn’t very helpful!
    4. Thank you for the clarification, which is appreciated. And also, I now know where Kingston, Ontario is, right there on the shore of Lake Ontario 🙂
  12. I come here with three missing after nearly an hour’s honest endeavour: MIDTERM, EXTINCT and TEMPERA. I was furthest away from MIDTERM. I’ve never heard of the exam. If I see Kingston, I think of Hull or the place on the Thames or Jamaica. I didn’t know there’s a town called Kingston, if indeed there is, let alone a University, in Ontario. I did toy with EXTINCT as it ended in CT and ‘put out’ could have been EXTINGUISH, but I didn’t put it in. And TEMP ERA didn’t spring to mind. If it had, I doubt I would have made the connection with ‘medium’. COD to DUEL. Thank you Pip for explaining and setter for expanding my knowledge.

    Edited at 2019-03-27 09:47 am (UTC)

  13. This one defeated me. I thought of Pyjama but then rejected it for no good reason.

    I liked CAVA but COD goes to DUEL.

  14. Actually I am proud to have finished in an hour. What a sad thing to admit! Never ever ever would have figured out Midterm from the clue. It was a pure checker-chucker for me.
  15. Hard but fair, 43m in all. I’m not clear about ‘proviso’ though; what is it that indicates ‘pro’? How is this ‘being paid’?
  16. You got back just in time Pip, and thank goodness! I was stuck on the Kingston Bypass (association of ideas with exams) for quite some time.

    PYJAMA TROUSERS are called “pAjama bottoms” in our house, not that anyone wears them any more. And the fog of war enveloped the battle for a while too because I couldn’t get past Trasimeno which I just about recalled from the Punic Wars in Latin class. TROCADERO now makes me think of the Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo – a troupe of men in tutus and point shoes. https://trockadero.org/

    This collection of funhouse mirrors took me a solid 29.43
    P.S. I think GIVEN/lent is fine Pip, as in lending verisimilitude to an otherwise bald and unconvincing narrative. I seem to be the designated “someone” around here…..

    Edited at 2019-03-27 02:08 pm (UTC)

  17. I’m never going to enjoy a puzzle where I end up biffing five answers. “O my” was very old hat – indeed A BAD HAT, which I feel alludes to something far more severe than a mere rascal.

    FOI SHOWN UP
    LOI CAVA
    COD GOOD FOR YOU
    TIME 22:28

  18. I knew I was in for a hard time when my first entry was YOBBO. However, this did indicate that there may be some off the wall definitions, and so it proved. I eventually managed to parse all but MIDTERM which was my LOI on a wing and a prayer, and was as Napasi would say, a checker-chucker, although I was vaguely aware of the exam. HALL OF MIRRORS and DUEL were my anti-penultimate and penultimate entries. I found this a bit of a chore with occasional bright spots. 47:14. Thanks setter and Pip.
    On edit: I see The Snitch has just dropped from Very Hard to merely Hard by 1 point.

    Edited at 2019-03-27 12:55 pm (UTC)

    1. Maybe that’s as North Americans, more familiar with MIDTERM exams, wake up and submit.
  19. Like Pip (may I call you Pip?) I had great trouble starting this. After 15 minutes all I had was Ebon. I went away and came back and it all began to flow. So maybe it was just my tired brain. Not helped by Biffing A Bad Lot sted Hat.
    1. I answer to Pip, Philip or Piquet (as in PK). Never Phil. You may call me what you wish! The French find Pip a bit giggle-inducing (when pronounced peep sounds like pipe which is a rude if pleasant thing) so they call me Philippe.
  20. 24:09. Unlike some, I enjoyed this and managed not to get defeated by the tricky bits. Count me as another who couldn’t parse MIDTERM. Unlike Pip, I liked GOOD FOR YOU. I liked ASTRONOMY, EARBASHING and CAVA too, but COD to RUMP. I was a little puzzled as to why the HALL OF MIRRORS was a French gallery, so thanks for explaining that Pip…. and thanks to our setter too.
  21. If anyone has any crossword time left after this there’s a very good Picaroon in today’s Guardian.
    1. yes Olivia I did it having already done 27309 earlier, it was a good test, and I learnt a new word at 13d, had to be from anagram fodder. But a boson is not a photon.
      Wish the G would stop popping up their begging window every time, whether I’ve already paid or not!
      1. As I remember my standard model, a photon is a boson, Pip. It has Spin 1. The distinction between a fermion and a boson is between half-integer and whole-integer spin. Now let’s try the crossword. On edit, done with 7 down not quite parsed.

        Edited at 2019-03-27 05:24 pm (UTC)

            1. Yet another case where bothering to consult a dictionary in the first place would have served.
              I’d not expect Picaroon of all people to slip up so fundamentally

              DF

  22. I found this pretty tough at 23:04 but enjoyed the tussle.

    Never heard of bad hat but I’m determined to tell someone they’re one before the day is out.

    I raised the same eyebrows as others at annual ring, PJ trousers and Amen Corner (as well as at strip/stripe), shrugged at the exam thing and chuckled at the earbashing.

  23. Waiting to be called in for a cystoscopy certainly sharpens the mind.
    I thought 19D was simply clumsy, with the definition being simply all of “University at Kingston exam” . . .? The apostrophe can be taken as ‘is’ rather than showing possession.

    Edited at 2019-03-27 01:14 pm (UTC)

  24. I ran out of time in my hour this morning with a few left, and put this one aside for after lunch, when—as seems fairly typical—I quickly got the last few that I’d been staring at with nary an idea earlier.

    So, probably an hour and a quarter at the outside. Given I’d NHO ANNUAL RING, AMEN CORNER, A BAD HAT (though “bad lot” and “black hat” are familiar), knew nothing of a HALL OF MIRRORS in France, didn’t know what The TROCADERO was named after, and also didn’t know what was going on with Kingston, I’m just happy enough to have dragged myself all the way to the finish line. Enjoyed 16a TEMPERA, but not much else, I’d say…

    Edited at 2019-03-27 01:13 pm (UTC)

  25. Really didn’t enjoy this one I’m afraid – lost interest and gave it up as a DNF. Too many iffy and obscurantist clues.
  26. I think Amen Corner is holes 11-13 by the way, a 4, a 3 and a par 5. Thanks blogger and setter.
  27. Going against the tide slightly, in that I didn’t find this easy, but I certainly didn’t hate the struggle. Apart from MIDTERM, I’m afraid, which was as baffling to me as it was everybody else, apparently.
  28. I thought this one was chewy and rather good. You will find a queen in the mid(dle) of {t}ER{m}, not that inexplicable surely?
  30. I almost gave up on this. But dug in and finished in 75 minutes! My mistake was trying to parse 1a instead of just looking for anything that fitted the checkers and also not seeing the anagram at 1d. I always find a puzzle off-putting if I can’t get the NW corner. I didn’t know TROCADERO as a battle. I thought it was a kind of cafe. Neither did I know that AMEN CORNER was an actual place in a church. I thought it was a kind of street corner soapbox where preachers could harangue passers-by. Btw, Andy Fairweather Low, of Amen Corner, was still around quite recently playing squash for Cardiff. His team visited our local club and my son played him at pool (and lost!).
  31. A squidgy, imprecise feel about this puzzle. 4dn – why ‘a’? 10ac ‘oh’, surely. Pyjama trousers? Pyjama bottoms, why yes, of course – but trousers? 19dn – just clumsy. Sorry, I don’t mean to be grumpy, and I couldn’t do any better at setting a puzzle, but it was a bit woolly here and there. Not sure how long it took as I was multitasking while solving it (i.e. alternately watching parliament and falling asleep). Nice blog, pip.
    1. It’s A BAD HAT because that’s the entry In the dictionary. And it’s PYJAMA TROUSERS because PYJAMA BOTTOMS would have to be used in a 13 letter answer. The latter isn’t in Chambers dictionary FWIW.
      All puzzle criticism is useful but setters appreciate sometimes the bloggers taking time to consult the dictionaries too 🙂
      And correct their own errors eg at 1 across.

      Just saying …

      1. 1. A bad hat. Sorry, the entry is ‘bad hat’. I can’t find an entry that reads ‘a bad hat’.
        2. I am aware that there are 8 letters in ‘trousers’ and 7 in ‘bottoms’. My point is that the garment in question is universally referred to as ‘pyjama bottoms’. Type ‘pyjama’ into Google: you won’t see the suggestion ‘trousers’ come up, but ‘bottoms’ is there on line 4. I fully accept that ‘pyjama trousers’ is a possible answer, but it flies somewhat in the face of everyday usage, which takes the edge off its elegance as an answer.
        Apologies if you are the setter. I enjoyed the puzzle and meant no offence, but as a solver of over 40 years I felt that the puzzle was not quite spot on, for the reasons I’ve given. Best wishes.
      2. Don’t know if you invented the slippers, but I think you quite rightly pointed out a few weeks ago that the correct term for the ensemble is ‘Jim jams’.

        While I’m here, since the setter has got quite a kicking today, I’d like to say I thought 12ac, 16ac and above all 21ac were excellent clues. And since this is a rare sub hour solve for me on a Snitch 138-er, the puzzle gets my thumbs up.

        Rupert
        (And if yesterday’s setter is reading, 19d was also a first rate clue).

  32. Gave up after an hour with several remaining. Not on wavelength (though I did get MIDTERM) 🙂
  33. A late solve today to show willing, but (with BBC news burbling away in the background) struggled to make sense of it, and submitted without leaderboard partly to avoid embarrassment and partly to cover bits and pieces of outside help.
  34. I assumed the definition was “Mid-Term”, with the first half of the clue being the wordplay?
    1. The definition is “University at Kingston exam”, but the whole clue is also the definition.

      I think the clue works perfectly well but I agree that that unconventional overlap is confusing, not helped by Kingston not being recognisably North American.
      If I had my time again I’d rewrite it, probably leaving out “at Kingston” 🙂

      TS

  35. Gave up on this – after 30 min had answers for all but 11ac, where after another 15 min failing to find anything at all to fit checkers, even after resorting to aids (best fit was VERSAILLES except the V), submitted off leaderboard with rubbish to fill spaces.
    So it came back with 3 errors and a lot of pink – I’d biffed A BAD LOT at 4dn derived from ‘had blot’ somehow and ENTREAT at 5dn, suggested by ‘court’.
  36. Came to this late, finished it quite a lot later, and found it (despite the Kingston bypass) an exceptionally witty and economical jeu d’esprit – thankyou setter!
  37. 51:37. I found this very tough and felt far from the wavelength at times then suddenly tuning in and getting a quick flurry of answers before tuning out again. My mind is prone to wander a bit when I’m struggling to come up with anything. There seemed to be a few clues where I wasn’t seeing the wood for the trees, I spent ages trying to work out which 13 letters (or 11 going round 2 if you prefer) were being anagrammed at 1ac for example. Standing back and looking at the whole picture might’ve got me there a bit quicker. Also some looseness, like the very fatty steak as a random thing which may not be good for you, which my mind wasn’t sharp enough to latch onto at first reading. I liked earbashing and tempera (I really needed to see temp era before seeing the medium).
  38. Thanks setter and pip
    This took a number of sittings and a total time of just under the hour and a half to get out. Found that each clue would need to be prised out with long gaps in between each of them.
    Enjoyed working through some of the complicated wordplays, such ah in ASTRONOMY, YOBBO, A BAD HAT and EXTINCT.
    Made life difficult for myself by writing in MEAN CORNER (from the anagram fodder, and thought that I actually found a meaning for it) but eventually re-anagramatised it to get AMEN and then able to patch up for whatever I had written in the place of TEMPERA originally. They were my last two in !

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