Times 27337 – I guess why that’s why they call it the blues

Author   ulacaPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
This is an eminently Mondayish sort of puzzle that will terrorise no horses. Indeed, even donkeys and mules – as it were – are likely to find that fear is not the primary emotion with which they are dealing when they come to grips with this offering. Actually, 1 across may well be the toughest clue; so if, like me, you start elsewhere, then you may be at a fractional advantage. Anyway, enough of me – well, no, actually, I was about to say that this took me 15 minutes. However, I expect some very fast times from the like of mohn, Keriothe and the other speedsters. Away we go…   

ACROSS
1 Female hit hard by awful film swindle (8)
FLIMFLAM – F (Female) anagram* (indicated by awful) of FILM LAM (hit hard); I sort of knew the nonsense meaning but not the swindle one. I’ve lived a sheltered life.
6 Dissenting group dropping original lawsuit (6)
ACTION – [f]ACTION
9 Pub with short lease, empty (6)
BARREN – BAR REN[t]
10 Set off from Berkshire college in time (8)
DETONATE – ETON in DATE; sorry, but for me, who used to live in the area, ETON will always be in  BUCKS
11 Numerous staff close to embassy (4)
MANY – MAN [embass]Y
12 Film everyone in wide thoroughfare (4,6)
WALL STREET – ALL in W STREET
14 Periodical trouble working around ornamental tree (8)
MAGNOLIA – MAG (periodical) reversal (around) of AIL (trouble) ON (working)
16 Play‘s length also reviewed (4)
LOOT – L TOO reversed: I know Joe Orton wrote it, but that’s the sum of my knowledge of this piece
18 Pretty good food, reportedly (4)
FAIR – sounds like FARE
19 Scrooge has English note hidden in top drawer? (8)
EBENEZER – Eben-Ezer means the stone of help in Hebrew and is the place where the Israelites and the Philistines went at it hammer and tongs on a number of occasions. I only mention this because I have no idea how the clue works.Thanks to Kevin for the parsing (though since it is a shoo-in as finalist of The Biff of the Year Show, it will be of only academic interest for many): E (English) N (note) in BEEZER (top drawer, as in the PG Wodehousian sense of ‘What ho, Jeeves, that wag really is rather beezer!’). BEEZER can also – apparently – mean nose, person or chap, most attractive and ‘an extreme example of its kind’.
21 Point out top equestrian (10)
SHOWJUMPER – SHOW (point out) JUMPER (top)
22 Overpriced close (4)
DEAR – double definition (DD)
24 Ready for posting? Private, ultimately, in a mad rush (8)
STAMPEDE – STAMPED (ready for posting) [privat]E
26 Number heading off fool my younger sibling (3,3)
OUR KID – [f]OUR (heading off) KID (I fool you not)
27 Small vehicle, a black Beetle? (6)
SCARAB – S CAR A B
28 Work on mock trial (5,3)
DUMMY RUN – DUMMY (mock, as in, on trial as a prototype) followed by RUN (work)

DOWN

2 		Monk astride large beast (5)
LLAMA – L in LAMA
3 Slightly drunk warden, silly clown (5-6)
MERRY-ANDREW – MERRY (slightly drunk) WARDEN* for the name first given to a clown or buffoon in the 17th century 
4 Volatile fellow rounding on one preferring his own company (4,4)
LONE WOLF – FELLOW* around ON; I always think of Lone Wolf McQuade, which is odd, as I have never seen the film. 
5 Pot from medieval times? BC? (6-3,6)
MIDDLE-AGE SPREAD – MIDDLE AGES pre-AD
6 Performer‘s skill is evident at the end (6)
ARTIST – ART IS [eviden]T
7 Loaf in old money? (3)
TIN – a tin can refer to the loaf as well as the tin in which it is baked, which may cause some confusion in a bakery if you’ve just hired someone with no previous experience from the local Jobcentre. Or perhaps a lot of fun…
8 Honest one managed to win (2,3,4)
ON THE NOSE – HONEST ONE*; in betting parlance, this means to win only, i.e. no place
13 Wave hat in race for skaters in New York? (6,5)
ROLLER DERBY – ROLLER DERBY; well, yes, if you were asked to come up with a pithy name a for a roller-skating tournament in Central Park, you might choose Roller Derby, though I remain to be convinced that you will win 
15 Indifferent in a way to quote raised (9)
APATHETIC – A PATH (way) CITE reversed
17 Valuable family piece the man and I left in vault? (8)
HEIRLOOM – HE I L in ROOM
20 Splendid agent aboard coach going north (6)
SUPERB – REP in BUS all reversed
23 Farewell to the French about to depart (5)
ADIEU – DIE (to depart) in AU (‘to the’ in French if you are speaking masculine)
25 Cause harm to planet, not the first in system (3)
MAR – MAR[s] (S – the first letter in system – is deleted)

71 comments on “Times 27337 – I guess why that’s why they call it the blues”

  1. E BE(N)EZER; where ‘beezer’ means ‘excellent’, according to ODE. You reminded me that I’d biffed this and forgotten to work it out.
  2. A technical DNF, as I looked up DUMMY RUN (NHO); that is, I looked up DUMMY to see what might follow. A number of DNKs, in fact: the Orton play, OUR KID, TIN=loaf, ON THE NOSE (no idea how it could mean ‘to win’), the connection between ROLLER DERBY and New York, and, of course, BEEZER.

    Edited at 2019-04-29 12:48 am (UTC)

    1. If you place a bet on a horse “to win”, as opposed to “each way”, your bet is “on the nose”. Bookmaker’s colloquialism.
  3. after five weeks sojourn in Bavaria and The Perfidious Albion.

    I would suggest our American chums watch a few episodes of ‘Coronation Street’ (Corrie) on YouTube to get acquainted with 26ac OUR KID – a most Manchunian expression. Liverpudlian too so ‘Brookside’ (Brookie) as well! But what of Bolton Wanderers!??

    Joe Orton’s 16ac LOOT is a hoot, as are his other plays such as WHAT THE BUTLER SAW. He once interviewed for a secretary and asked if the prospective candidate could spell? ‘Yes, of course!’ came the reply, ‘But, not particularly well!’

    FOI 8dn ON THE NOSE
    LOI 18ac FAIR
    COD 3dn MERRY ANDREW
    WOD FLIMFLAM

    Time – I dawdled to 31 mins

    Edited at 2019-04-29 03:27 am (UTC)

    1. Our kids may well be playing our last two games, with the others on strike.
      1. Commiserations, John – that’s a very unhappy sign of things to come. The Leeds v Villa debacle was also most unpleasant.

        Modern English football is becoming deeply shallow!

        However, I did enjoy my afternoon at the Woking v Torquay game (3-3) and Lincoln are up!

        1. I noticed you copped for six goal thriller. I went one better that afternoon – Altrincham steamrollered Alfreton Town 7-0 on their own ground !
  4. Yes, pretty straightforward. I spent a couple of minutes checking if I could think of something better for OUR KID and LOOT, not knowing the term or the play. Otherwise I might have scraped in under 20 minutes again.

    Great time, U, and thanks for the blog. And thanks, as ever, to the setter.

  5. 8:33 … and mostly a biff-fest. Just a bit of a delay with 3d as I’d certainly forgotten MERRY-ANDREW (if I ever knew it).

    My sibs and I had a subscription to The Beezer once upon a time. Glancing through the Wikipedia list of its characters — Hornet Wilson and his Educated Insects, Bucko’s Flying Bedstead, Willie Wink the Missing Link, Mr. Licko and his Lollipops — it’s no wonder the later parodic Viz enjoyed an abundance of inspiration.

    Cheers, all

    1. I knew MERRY ANDREW had come up here before and on looking it up was horrified to find that was in 2008 – tempus fugit! I remembered it because I mentioned a film of that name starring Danny Kaye (made in the UK in 1958) which featured the Johnny Mercer / Saul Chaplin song ‘Tickety-Boo’- another Wodehousian expression to go with today’s BEEZER.

      Edited at 2019-04-29 06:08 am (UTC)

      1. I don’t think its been in a crossword before has it, Jack? I saw you mentioned the film in a comment on an answer “Tickety boo” .. all I could find. I hate forgetting previous answers, but I won’t beat myself up for not remembering that!
        1. Yes, you’re right, it was in a comment not as an answer, but I’m still amazed that I remember anything I posted here 11 years ago. I’m still amazed to be around to remember it, come to that!
      2. It also features ‘The Square on the Hypotenuse’, a clip desired by maths teachers…
  6. 22 minutes with a couple not fully parsed before coming here – I’d probably have worked them out but forgot to go back to them. Looked twice at ‘vault/ROOM’ but I suppose it’s fair enough. Rather surprised that LOOT is not better known overseas but perhaps its anarchic humour didn’t travel. The original Broadway production lasted just 22 performances in 1968, and the only revival there (in 1986) fared only a little better with 96.

    Edited at 2019-04-29 04:57 am (UTC)

  7. I failed to get TOOL today, not knowing the play and not recognising ‘reviewed’ as a reversal indicator. I still can’t see it now – can someone please enlighten me as to how it works?
    1. As Ulaca says, it is LOOT a play by Orton. L is length and, for me, reviewed is an anagram indication of TOO.
    2. I took “reviewed” as a reversal indicator, thinking it mean “went back over”. I don’t think it could be an anagram indicator, as we don’t have “too” in the clue. I understand that taking an anagram of a synonym, rather than the actual word itself, would break the Ximenes rules.
      1. I read it as ‘looked back on’. If you look back on a word, you sort of see it in reverse. I’m not entirely convinced, but then I’m not (yet) convinced that any meaning of ‘review’ indicates a reversal of the thing being reviewed. But I think you’re right that indirect anagrams are still a no-no in the Times so it has to be a reversal indicator.
  8. ….ON THE NOSE. A PB for me though DNK MERRY ANDREW nor TIN as Loaf, did not parse EBENEZER.

    OUR KID appears in a northern spoof of the J J Barrie UK #1 song ‘No Charge’ from the 1970s. The spoof version is by C C Sandford – worth a listen if you can find it on youtube.

    There was also an mid-70s boy band called Our Kid – one hit single called You Might Just See Me Cry

    Edited at 2019-04-29 07:08 am (UTC)

  9. 20 mins with yoghurt, granola, etc.
    MER: ‘reviewed’ as reversal indicator might be pushing too far.
    Mostly I liked Middle-ages pre-AD.
    Thanks setter and U.
  10. I have never broken 10 minutes but I could have if I had not enjoyed my tea and biscuits so much. Thanks for parsing EBENEEZER. COD to the pot at 5d.
  11. 5:54, but with a stupid mistake. I was so much in merry-biffing mode that when I misremembered the expression OUR KID as OUR SIS it went in without hesitiation. Brain not quite connected yet, clearly.
  12. 18 minutes. Can I assume there is no such thing as the ROLLER DERBY from the question mark? I don’t think I’ve heard of MERRY ANDREW either. I seem to remember that, when The Beezer was launched in 1956, they tried to tempt us away from our regular comic (in my case, The Wizard) by a tacky whizzing toy that was well beneath my dignity, so there was nothing Wodehousian about it. EBENEZER remained unparsed. I think OUR KID is commonly used in the North, not just the North-West. I’ve heard Jack Charlton refer to Bobby as such. COD to MIDDLE-AGED SPREAD. A word of advice to our younger contributors, ie all those under seventy: it doesn’t disappear in old age. I have seen both LOOT and WALL STREET. Greed may not be good but it does add to the waistline. A fun puzzle. Thank you U and setter.
    1. There is a sport called roller derby, if ‘sport’ is the right word; it used to be on TV when I was a kid. (As I said above, I don’t know what New York has to do with it.) Google it and you can learn much more than you want to know about it.
      1. I just assumed that ROLLER DERBYs were an American thing, and the question mark was there because ‘New York’ indicates the Americanism in a by-example way. None of the dictionaries mention Americanism, but I’m pretty certain it’s more common on that side of the pond.
        Incidentally the 2009 movie Whip It, directed by Drew Barrimore and starring Ellen Page of Juno fame, is unexpectedly charming. It’s a girl-power coming-of-age movie centred around a ROLLER DERBY team. Nothing on earth could have induced me to watch such a thing other than having a teenage daughter.

        Edited at 2019-04-29 08:40 am (UTC)

  13. Riffled through in 11 mins or so but with a couple of shrugs .. never heard of merry-andrew, and struggled to parse EBENEZER as to me, beezer just means “good,” not top drawer, which means aristocratic.
    LOOT is an interesting example of a clue which appears technically suspect; but everyone has nevertheless managed to solve it OK so wotthehell, wotthehell ..
  14. …I think, as I don’t keep specific records on this.

    MERRY ANDREW not known but couldn’t see any other option. For LOOT I had L + TOO (=also) reversed; although I suppose a reversal is – technically – a type of anagram so I guess that could count too.

    Dabbled with Something SIS for 26 for a while (so have some sympathy with keriothe there), before remembering my Corrie a la Horryd.

    Also took a bit of time over EBENEZER – thought of Beezer straight away but couldn’t get out of my head that I needed a double “E” somewhere.

    All in all a happy monday morning for me with a good time on the QC as well.

    6.37

    1. I did actually know OUR KID, and if I had thought about it for a bit longer I think I’d have remembered it properly. I don’t know where I know it from. Certainly not Corrie. Shameless perhaps.
          1. Would I be right in thinking that Noel Gallagher from Oasis may have used it to refer to Liam?
  15. Similar unknowns to others; in particular I’ve just read Joe Orton’s Wikipedia entry, and it certainly sounds like it’ll be worth taking in one of his plays if I spot one coming up… Sadly his untimely death was a few years before my birth, so I probably missed a lot of newspaper coverage.

    This might’ve been a personal best if I’d known that OUR KID meant “my younger sibling”. When I finally worked it out (at the 28 minute mark) I did recognise it, I think from Carla Lane’s Bread, but I’m not sure I ever knew what it meant, in particular. Being southern and not having any siblings probably doesn’t help. On the other hand, being southern didn’t help with knowing where Eton was, either, so perhaps my class is also a disadvantage!

    PS: Do we think the crossing of WOLF and WALL STREET is deliberate?

    Edited at 2019-04-29 08:45 am (UTC)

    1. Identical twin boys, who I grew up with in the West Riding, always used ‘our kid’ even when talking to each other.
  16. A lifetime best for me today, after a few days away, 8′ 25”.

    Do Americans mispronounce both the race and the hat?

    BEEZER – was that Beryl the Peril? Not quite a match for Minnie the Minx.

    I look forward to other loaves making an appearance.

    Thanks ulaca and setter.

  17. Finished in about an hour, couldn’t parse ebenezer, haven’t seen beezer in pg wodehouse’s golf omnibus yet. Just lots of niblicks, and foozles.

    Had roller disco for a while.

    Cod middle age spread.

  18. 15 minutes, but DNF as 16a was a mystery. Tried LAOS as an anagram of also. Biffed Mr Scrooge unparsed, the rest was fun.
  20. 10.15 today, resigned to not breaking the ten minute barrier out of fear of the colour pink.
    No, I didn’t work out EBENEZER either – but I’m grateful to you all for memories of the comic from the DC Thomson stable which brightened up my youth.
    Also didn’t parse LONE WOLF, wondering briefly why volatile translated to flow reversed.
    MERRY ANDREW from the Danny Kaye film, I’d assumed even then that it’s just what the film was called.
    OUR KID is indelibly in Scouse for me.
    And Ulaca is spot on: FLIMFLAM contributed to a slow start which underlines how much of a whizz the rest of it was.
  21. Congratulations to [rinteff]! Yet another solver whose time I have no hope of beating, alas.

    Twenty-three minutes for this one, with ROLLER DERBY and DUMMY RUN my LOsI. I spent a while with “tool” at 16ac for no good reason, having never heard of the play (or perhaps having heard of it and forgotten it). MERRY-ANDREW was also an NHO, but otherwise it all seemed reasonably straightforward.

  22. 16’35, didn’t exactly skate through it though nothing there to frighten the llamas. Mainly good Monday fare. 15’s surface seems tired.
  24. Never heard of MERRY ANDREW, but it had to be what it is, so it’s now added to the ever-expanding list of Previously Unknown Unknowns. I’d never heard of that film, either (though on the plus side, I did know 1967’s The Flim-Flam Man, which helped me to a fast start). I was always amused that Jack Charlton never referred to Sir Bobby as anything other than “our kid”, even when both were well into their 70s.
  25. OUR KID local fare around here, too much biffing to really comment. NHO MERRY ANDREW otherwise Mondayish. Could have been quicker but wife kept talking to me….
  26. 13 minutes – about as fast as I can do it without typos, Spent a little while on EBENEZER after biffing, but couldn’t quite see the parsing – I’d forgotten about The Beezer ! However I did know of the Orton play, though nothing of its plot.
  27. ….was the greeting favoured by my neighbour during my exile in the West Midlands nearly 50 years ago. He was from Tipton, and spoke fluent Black Country.

    Biffed EBENEZER (thanks Ulaca and Kevin !), but otherwise sailed through this one.

    FOI FLIMFLAM
    LOI MAGNOLIA
    COD MIDDLE-AGE SPREAD (c’est moi !)
    TIME 6:02

  28. A gentle Monday to get the week started. 28 minutes with a few minutes spent at the end on OUR KID. Had no idea how EBENEZER and TIN worked and had never heard of MERRY-ANDREW.

    I’ll go for STAMPEDE as my favourite, mainly because it reminds me of the great buffalo stampede scene in the film “How The West Was Won”.

    Thanks to setter and blogger.

  29. I was rushing to catch a bus to pick up my car from Guisborough after a merry night at the folk club, so I didn’t spend as long as I should’ve on 16a. I thought of LOOT, but didn’t know the play and like Pip, plumped for LAOS. Drat! No problem with FLIMFLAM, OUR KID or ROLLER DERBY. Didn’t know MERRY ANDREW as a clown, but it had to be. 14:32 WOE. Thanks setter and U.
  30. A disappointing 11:30. Nothing was particularly difficult but not enough of the “easy” stuff went in as quickly as it might have.

    DNK Merry Andrew and the clever BC part of Middle-A S was completely wasted on me.

    Our kid known from real life.

    1. Yes, the rift between Mrs Charlton senior and Lady Charlton seemed to accentuate the differences in character of the two brothers.
  32. Finished rather quickly but some biffery required to do so, especially with the ‘beezer’ which was unknown. MERRY-ANDREW new to me as well. I also never saw the ‘pre AD’ hiding in there for BC, which is an admirable piece of setting.
    ROLLER DERBY still exists over here although happily no longer occupying any TV time that I know of. It’s more of a professional wrestling exhibition on skates than it is a race or a sport. Featured a banked racing oval with 2 teams trying essentially to get one of their members to lap members of the other team, aided by a lot of physical contact among the skaters, who often were launched off the high side of the banked oval, flying over the rail and landing, or more accurately, crashing outside. Fighting between the teams was neither discouraged nor rare. A real crowd pleaser, that. Regards.

    Edited at 2019-04-29 04:07 pm (UTC)

      1. Do you mean the movie? Well, the roller derby didn’t involve fatalities, nor did it involve any actual balls.
  33. A rather remarkable time of 19.23, which I’ve exceeded a few times recently on the QC. To be fair it was a bif fest with a number unparsed but still I’m in shock, as I’m usually nearer the hour mark on the odd occasion that I do manage to finish. I knew OUR KID as it’s how Jack Charlton refers to Sir Bobby.
    Thanks for the blog
  34. What a nice start to my evening -a Monday puzzle where I’d solved 3 or 4 clues before going out and a Charlie Bigham lasagne for dinner-just for me, as my wife has gone out. Both were tasty and I managed to finish both.
    LOI the puzzle was ON THE NOSE; I did not spot the anagram till right at the end. Prior to that the unknown Merry Andrew appeared as did the tin loaf. I liked Our Kid and Showjumper.COD to Middle Age Spread.
    I did not time myself but I was much slower than plett11, my fellow QCer. Congrats to him. David

    Edited at 2019-04-29 07:11 pm (UTC)

  35. Like Plett11, I’m also in shock – and for the same reason! A pb for PB of about 18 minutes as supposed to my usual hour or so. I found everything went in easily and parsed in that time, apart from Ebenezer and the latter part of Middle aged spread, which were biffed, and Merry Andrew, which I got from wordplay. It’s a charming phrase which I hope I don’t forget 😊 But i was really entertained by 5d even if I didn’t fully get it, so COD to that. Thanks to the setter for a confidence boost and to Ulaca for the (as ever) entertaining and helpful explanations.
  36. 4m20, not a bad time, much of it spent agonising over whether a TIN could really be a loaf. But it seemed much better than TAN, TEN, TON or TUN, so in it eventually went.
    1. That’s insanely fast. I could barely write the answers down at that speed!
  38. 15:15. A swift romp with no real need to switch the brain on at any stage. Hesitated over Ebenezer which I wanted to spell Ebeneezer, possibly due to The Shamen spelling their biggest hit Ebeneezer Goode (well he was the main geezer), now there’s an ear worm. DNK merry-andrew but it seemed probable. Pre-AD also wasted on me. Always good fun to race through one like this.
  39. Chasing the < 1 hour goal!

    FOI 11. LOI 7. COD 5 but also liked 23 which had multiple readings and 7 which was pithy (groan…) . 19 was biffed as DNK beezer. Like other’s heard the earworm.

    Completed both weekend xw’s – Saturday’s was another PB at around 87 mins so the times are coming down (groan…). Sunday’s was super-slow – around 6 hours in various nibbles, but got there eventually. Now summoning courage to have a look at Mephisto…

    That leaves my 3 month challenge at 10/12 so far.

    Thanks to all
    WS

  41. Thanks setter and ulaca
    As I slowly trawl my nearly year old pile of our syndicated puzzles, found this one of the quickest grid fills that I have done. Having said that I couldn’t, like others, parse EBENEZER after not knowing the beezer term. Didn’t see the clever finish of SPREAD in 5d and took ADIEU to be a basically straightforward clue rather than the clever charade that it was.
    Started with the gimme LLAMA and finished with LOOT and OUR KID (both of which I had to confirm afterwards as a ‘play’ and a term for a ‘younger sibling’). Think that the two latter unparsed ones were my joint clues of the day.

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