Times 27615 – back to normal, unlike my life.

Author   piquetPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
After ten weeks of blogging the 2019 TCC puzzles retrospectively, each of which many of our community had seen before (if not remembered!), I’m now back on track with this quirky and medium difficulty midweek offering from our setter. It was one of those puzzles with several clues where I had faint pencilled-in answers at first, not totally convinced I was on the right path, until seeing the parsing which convinced me I was right even though the definition seemed iffy; for example, 11a, 18a, 25a, 5d. I put in NUN for 26d as obvious but did have to resort to Wiki to confirm this was a Biblical chap.

We shall have plenty of time in coming months for more crosswords, as we’re staying home alone except for essential things like golf, (without any clubhouse socialising), country walks and minimal shopping. All bridge clubs and Arts Society events are cancelled already, and our visits to family in London are now on WhatsApp only. We could be worse affected; I hope you all see it through without tragedy or too much tedium.

Across
1 The best lubricant for a bed’s surface (7)
TOPSOIL – TOPS (the best) OIL (lubricant).
5 Record publicity about coffee (7)
PLATTER – PR around LATTE, that whitish liquid which some sad people think is a worthwhile form of coffee.
9 Passion of republic once ousting English (3)
IRE – EIRE (old name for the Republic of Ireland) loses its first E.
10 Magician in exhibition centre, one given to exaggeration (11)
NECROMANCER – NEC (the centre near Birmingham) ROMANCER one who has an exaggerated or overblown view of something.
11 Lowly enemy in a period between actions? (8)
MEANTIME – MEAN (lowly) TIME “the enemy” in proverbial sense.
12 Row with almost everyone about old-fashioned system of society (6)
FEUDAL – FEUD (row) AL(L) almost everyone.
15 Catches in preparation for cricket match (4)
NETS – double definition. A practice session for a cricketer is called a ‘net’ because the batter and bowler or bowling machine do it in an area surrounded by a net to stop the ball.
16 One cast left in hovel with oppressive atmosphere (10)
STIFLINGLY – Insert I FLING (one cast) into STY (hovel).
18 Tedious person holding fair opinion in newspaper survey? (4,6)
BOOK REVIEW – Insert OK (fair) into BORE (tedious person) add VIEW (opinion).
19 Phone sound — what you get when engaged? (4)
RING – double definition.
22 Naughty rebel captures queen (6)
RISQUE – Insert QU (queen) into RISE (rebel).
23 Perhaps man with heart. as you might say, getting girlfriend? (8)
CHORDATE – CHOR sounds like CORE (heart) then DATE = girlfriend. A chordate animal (like man) has a dorsal nerve chord, among other features.
25 Study stretch of land by river — a problem affecting movement here? (11)
CONTRACTURE – CON (study) TRACT (stretch of land) URE (River Ure a river of 74 miles length, in Yorkshire.)
27 Stuck in chair — knitting needle (3)
IRK – hidden in CHA(IR K)NITTING.
28 Feature of monastic life certainly after Mass (7)
TONSURE – SURE after TON a mass.
29 Hat — no as-you-were instructions when it’s back to front (7)
STETSON – NO STETS reversed

Down
1 Skinny French chum must get in substance needed for growth (7)
THIAMIN – AMI (French friend) goes into THIN (skinny). Thiamin or thiamine is Vitamin B1.
2 Pa’s neurotic about preliminary safety procedures (11)
PRECAUTIONS – (PA S NEUROTIC)*.
3 Like some fancy stuff old sailors had (6)
ORNATE – O (old) RN (sailors) ATE (had, to eat).
4 See firm reason for alternative to car? (10)
LOCOMOTIVE – LO (see) CO (firm, company) MOTIVE (reason).
5 Get wind up in game (4)
POOL – LOOP (wind) reversed. A string can loop around / wind around something.
6 Pointed article about upset in Oxbridge and suchlike (8)
ACADEMIA – All reversed, AIMED (pointed), A, CA (about).
7 Twitch irregularly — or regularly — with this (3)
TIC – alternate letters of T w I t C h.
8 Country-style game introducing meeting (7)
RURALLY – RU (rugby union) RALLY (meeting).
13 Number gathered around November — stars and VIPs (11)
DIGNITARIES – DIGIT (number) around N for November then ARIES = stars.
14 Our father’s working beyond closing time? (5,5)
AFTER HOURS – (OUR FATHER S)*.
17 Two squares have each run up in fancy dress (8)
FROUFROU – FOUR FOUR would be two squares, in each the R for run has gone “up”.
18 Knight coming to court drinking hot soup (7)
BORSCHT – BORS (either of two knights in Arthurian legend), the H for hot into CT for court. Soup usually made from beetroot in Ukraine and other Slav countries.
20 Bit of food and drink — kilo the female’s put on must be hidden (7)
GHERKIN – HER and K for kilo inserted into GIN the drink.
21 Country match starting late by church (6)
GREECE – AGREE (match) “starts late” = GREE, add CE the Church.
24 Line in earth where river has disappeared (4)
OCHE – OCHRE (earth) loses its R, the line e.g. from where darts are thrown at the board.
26 Joshua’s father‘s sister (3)
NUN – double definition, apparently Nun was Joshua’s father in the Bible (1 Chronicles 7:26)

​

103 comments on “Times 27615 – back to normal, unlike my life.”

  1. I went offline with 23ac left and 6d iffy, and spent 5 or so minutes over lunch to deal with them. I biffed NECROMANCER, parsed post-submission, when I recalled NEC, known only from a previous puzzle. I knew that someone was the son of Nun–‘son of Nun’ has stuck in my mind for some reason–and why not Joshua? Not to mention the clue was a gimme. Didn’t know that Ireland wasn’t still called Eire; it’s still Eire (as well as Ireland) in the Constitution. I’d made the mistake of taking 23ac to be (man, heart)*, which just doesn’t work; it was only playing with the alphabet at last that brought CHORDATE to mind. My LOI, though, was actually 6d, since after flinging in ACADEMIC based on checkers only, I finally thought to see how it fit the clue, and the scales fell from my proverbials.
    1. The way I read it, it was Eire (which has two “e”s) only ousting E for English once.
  2. Another difficult solve completed in 52 minutes but with one error on my LOI where I guessed CHORMATE instead of the unknown CHORDATE. CONTRACTURE was also unknown but the wordplay was more precise. DK Joshua’s father but ‘sister’ left no room for doubt. Only knew the word FROUFROU, though not what it meant, from a character, a French nobleman I think, in a ‘Blackadder’ episode.

    1. Le Comte de Frou Frou, in fact, who turned out (spoiler alert!) to be one half of the Scarlet Pimpernel in the episode Nob and Nobility.
    2. …also turns up in Beauty and the Beast: I’ll leave you to work out which version’s the ninja turtled one.
  3. Took a long time convincing myself that 23 didn’t end in MATE. Oh, and that the game wasn’t SNAP. Right, now what else can I do today?
  4. 48 minutes, so marginally better than yesterday. I must have tried to spell the soup at least five ways before chancing on the right version. Very enjoyable challenge.

    Here’s Froufrou (AKA Tim McInerney)

    Obviously, a popular name with Atkinson/Curtis, as it had already popped up in NTNOCN’s Belgian eating habits sketch.

    Edited at 2020-03-18 08:10 am (UTC)

  5. Just snuck in under the hour at 58 minutes in a couple of sessions. I had no idea about the parsing for ACADEMIA (though should have seen it) or the ‘Knight’ bit of BORSCHT. Not helped in the NW by having ‘downtime’ for 11a which I think works just as well as an answer, even if it is incorrect. CHORDATE took a bit of working out and helped with GREECE, my last in. Interesting that Eire is now a ‘republic once’.

    I liked the idea of monk in a frilly dress – TONSURE and FROUFROU.

  6. 20:43. I had most trouble with SW corner – NHO the knights BORS or CONTRACTURE but luckily remembered FROUFROU from another crossword. DNK what CHORDATE meant – at least I do now. Thanks Pip and setter.
  8. Taken into my 31st minute by the unknown CHORDATE, but otherwise I didn’t have much trouble with this one. It was lucky BORSCHT was familiar from Cold War thrillers set behind the Iron Curtain, as I didn’t know either Bors of legend. Enjoyed the surfaces in several places, especially 22a.
  9. Serious slowing down towards the end with OCHE and CHORDATE, both of which were resistant to even a glimmer of what the clue might be getting at. Time therefore stretched to 22.26 after I’d thought I was on to a quickie.
    Hopefully in these days of self-isolation we’ll have plenty of time-stretching crosswords to work on, or what will we do with all the time?
    1. Dip into the archives? Puzzles back to about 2001 available in the club, and if you’re like me (and seemingly everybody else) any puzzle you did more than a month ago becomes a complete, unfathomable mystery.

      My favourite: 25011.

  10. Thanks, Pip. Where I live in NZ I don’t need to self-isolate. I AM self-isolated. I survived the weekly grocery shopping trip but if the rate of infection increases I may well have to resort to click ‘n collect from my nearest supermarket. Otherwise plenty of empty beaches to walk Bianca (miniature poodle) on.

    I found this difficult and got stuck completely on CONTRACTURE and FROUFROU. I also didn’t know Bors was a kerniggit but it had to be BORSCHT

    1. thought NZ as a country was self-isolating and being 1000 miles from anywhere with borders closed, would be relatively V-free? What colour is the poodle? After our WH Fox terrier died in Jan we took on a beautiful 3 year old Welshie but we couldn’t cope, he just kept on rotovating and escaping, passed him on to someone younger after 2 weeks.
      1. Hello Pip,
        Bianca is -of course!- white! She has the most beautiful nature and, mirabile dictu, was gifted to us by a breeder! She, Bianca, had had dental issues and could no longer be shown so, when we were put in touch with this breeder after a previous Miniature Poodle had been put to sleep, all we had to pay was the NZD50 air freight charge from Whanganui to Whakatane via Auckland. Bianca is 7 next month and will get her morning walk as soon as I finish this!!
        NZ now has 20 cases of Covid-19. That’s not many but it’s a doubling in the last few days. Anyone arriving in NZ now has to undergo 14-days mandatory self-isolation.
        I do sympathise with you about your WH Terrier. That’s the third Westie I know of that has died in the last year. Very sad.
  11. A certain Mr Wilson as I remember it. 31 minutes but another CHORMATE. The smoke must have got in my eyes from reading 5a more than once. Otherwise this was reasonably straightforward. Joshua son of Nun has stuck in my head from my Old Testament studies, so was a write-in. COD to NETS which would normally be about to start up. Nice puzzle forgetting the human biology. Thank you Pip and setter.

    Edited at 2020-03-18 08:56 am (UTC)

  12. 40 mins with yoghurt, granola, etc.
    NHO Bors, I’m ashamed to say.
    Nice one. Thanks setter and P.
        1. Not funny. Keep your politics for the appropriate website, which is not this one
  13. All straightforward until the alphabet trawl at 23a. I got confused with CORDATE and CHORDATE. I must remember that CHORDATE is the one with a cord (spinal). No, that’s not going to help.
    1. Collins: ‘any of various natural earths containing ferric oxide, silica, and alumina: used as yellow or red pigments’.
  15. The BORSCHT Belt was the name given to a a string of resorts in the Catskill mountains that were popular with Jewish families (as in the movie Dirty Dancing). I just about remember Sir Bors from the Arthurian tales. As I recall he was a misogynist and a bit of a bore and part of the story had him resisting the lures of a bunch of very un-nunlike NUNs. When it gets light I’m going to get a week’s groceries before Mayor de Blasio tells us we can’t go out. 20.32
    1. Surely he’s not going to tell people not to buy groceries! And surely, I’d like to think, shops will set limits on how many X’s a customer can buy. Where I am, toilet paper is finally coming back to supermarket shelves, after everyone decided to buy a week’s worth or so, despite there being no shortage whatever. (Well, there was a shortage, after everyone bought …) My brother’s in San Francisco, where they have shut down restaurants and bars, but not grocery stores, laundries, and such.

      Edited at 2020-03-18 10:43 am (UTC)

      1. Based on some of the videos I’ve seen people are buying a couple of years’ worth of the stuff.
        1. Not me. Just came back from the expedition. Two well-dressed women wandering about as if they’d never set foot in a supermarket before. A number of elderly men looking completely lost, and the early bird regulars like me. No loo paper or jars of pasta sauce and only the expensive meat. Plenty of fish so that’s what’s on the menu this week for us.
      2. I read somewhere a couple of days ago that 65+ year-olds are confined to their homes by law in some cities in California (SF was one of them, I think). Do you know if this is the case? I haven’t heard about it since. A friend of mine 70+ living in a tiny apartment in Manhattan is terrified of a similar law being passed there, but so far it hasn’t happened. Here in the UK all over-70’s have been advised to stay home but it’s not compulsory yet.

        Edited at 2020-03-18 08:02 pm (UTC)

        1. Jack the mayor says he’s considering it but the governor says no way. Like everything else we’ll wait and see. I can’t see how a stroll down the street or in the nearest park is going to pose such a problem it needs to be prevented.
        2. The Bay Area counties have closed bars, restaurants (other than take-out), theaters, gyms, etc. and ban group activities. They urge staying in, but no one is confined. You can still go grocery shopping, do the laundry, take a walk (keeping 6ft. from anyone else), and so on. Violations are misdemeanors, but as the SF chief of police said, they’re not going to be looking for violators to arrest. My brother lives in SF, and the new regulation doesn’t seem to have had much of an impact on him, other than he has nowhere to go for lunch. His various volunteer jobs–docent at the Presidio, storyteller at the Asian Museum, guide on city walks–had already disappeared.
          1. Many thanks for this. I never heard the 65+ ban mentioned again so wondered if it was false, and from what you say it seems it was.
            1. I belatedly remembered that I still had the text of the announcement (taken from I forget where), which gives a bit more information. Anyway, not a ban on leaving the house.

              San Francisco and five other Bay Area counties in California have ordered all residents to shelter-in-place to curb the spread of coronavirus, in a drastic move similar to ones taken in Italy, Spain and China, but the first of its kind in the US.

              The order came Monday following a 14% increase in positive coronavirus cases in California, with 335 reported and six deaths. More than a third of all positive cases were in Santa Clara county, the home of Silicon Valley, as well as two deaths. San Francisco has had 40 positive cases.

              More than 6.7 million people live in San Francisco and the five counties issuing the order – Santa Clara, San Mateo, Marin, Contra Costa and Alameda counties. The order, which goes into effect at midnight Tuesday until 7 April, does not confine residents to their home unless they have permission to leave, as the lockdown orders in Italy and China do, but directs them to stay inside unless absolutely necessary.

              All businesses considered non-essential – such as bars and gyms – were ordered to close, and its workers to work from home. But London Breed, the San Francisco mayor, made a point to emphasize that grocery stores, pharmacies, restaurants serving take-out, gas stations and other “essential businesses” would remain open, while municipal services such as garbage collection will continue.

              “The time now is not to panic,” Breed said in a news conference. “It’s for us to come together. It’s for us to follow the directives. It’s to do everything in our respective capacities to prevent the spread of coronavirus so we can get past this very challenging time.”

              Residents can go to the grocery store, the laundromat, the doctor and to perform essential work, as well as to engage in outdoor exercise that complies with social distancing requirements.

              “With this order in place, you will still be able to get food, care for relatives, run necessary errands and conduct the essential parts of your life,” said Dr Grant Colfax, the director of the San Francisco department of public health. “You will still be able to walk your dog or go on a hike alone or with someone you live with or even with another person as long as you keep six feet between you.”

              Under the order, essential travel is categorized as traveling for necessary supplies, accessing healthcare or going to provide aid to family or friends. Airports, taxis and public transit will continue running, but only for essential travel. Those using any mode of travel are expected to practice social distancing.

              The order requests that the sheriff and chief of police “ensure compliance with and enforce this order”. William Scott, the San Francisco police chief, explained that while the order was enforceable as a misdemeanor, his officers would be taking a “compassionate, commonsense approach” and looking at it more as an “education process”.

              “We’re looking for voluntary compliance,” he said. “This order, by law, is enforceable as a misdemeanor. But that is an absolutely last resort. This is not about a criminal justice response to a public health issue.”

      3. Surely the answer to any toilet paper shortage is one of those wonderful Japanese/Korean toilets that do it all for you?!
    2. I’d always assumed the Pythons invented Castle Anthrax.

      Edited at 2020-03-18 10:45 am (UTC)

  16. 17:58. I didn’t find this too hard but then got completely stuck with 23ac and 21dn unsolved. After several minutes of head-scratching I revisited all of my crossing answers and realised that my hastily bunged-in CONTRACTUAL was wrong. The country then went from impossible to easy and I figured out CHORDATE from the wordplay.
    NHO Bors but I knew the soup fortunately. I’m not sure I’ve ever had it, which is a bit of an omission because I love beetroot.
    No idea about Joshua’s father obviously but I was reminded of Baldrick: ‘my dad was a nun’.

    Edited at 2020-03-18 10:39 am (UTC)

      1. Clearly another man who recgnises that beetroot is not a food, it’s an abomination.
        1. I had a salad recently that was a mixture of raw beetroot, very thinly sliced, cooked beetroot, goat’s cheese and bitter leaves. It was absolutely delicious.
          That was in a restaurant, of course: won’t be going to one of those for a while.
          1. Balthazar restaurant in Soho here has a delicious salad too. Roasted beets, walnuts, leeks, green beans and bibb lettuce with roquefort. Will any of these places be able to re-open?
            1. There will certainly be a lot of bankruptcies in the sector. It’s not the worst thing about this whole business of course but it’s nonetheless sad.
              1. I have a favourite from BBC Good Food I did for lunch just last week… Chorizo, beetroot, feta and mint salad. But beetroot fan of them all has to be Bert from The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole. Oh to be 13 3/4 again! [Oh I see horryd has already referred to this, Sorry].

                Edited at 2020-03-18 08:56 pm (UTC)

          2. I’ve had many a beet and goat cheese salad, and loved them; I was animadverting on borscht.
              1. And I’ll confess that my borschtlich experience is largely based on my grandmother’s productions; but the burnt child fears the fire, and mutatis mutandis with soup.
                1. Fair enough. As I said I can imagine it being delicious, but I can also quite easily imagine it being absolutely disgusting.
        2. Beetroot sandwiches are most East Midland-dish, UK – please note ‘The Diaries of Adrian Mole, Aged 13¾’ – beetroot ‘vinaigrette’ with celery salt and cream cheese on ‘Mother’s Pride’ – to die for! Yummm!

          Used to enjoy 18dn BORSCHT at Luba’s SW1. My WOD.

          FOI 11ac DOWNTIME later changed to MEANTIME!

          LOI 22ac RISQUE – another soup made with lobster!??

          COD None particularly not 18ac BOOK REVIEW! What a lousy clue! Why newspaper? These are found in all media particularly magazines and online!

          Time 53 minutes. I found this puzzle a bit 27ac-some.

          fyi – via good old Gyles Brandreth I now learn that the collective noun for teddy bears is – ‘a hug’.

      2. I have absolutely no doubt whatsoever that made well it could be delicious. Actually I might treat this as a challenge to relieve the quarantine boredom and make it myself. It will be worth it if only to see the faces of my children when I serve it to them.

        Edited at 2020-03-18 11:03 am (UTC)

          1. I sometimes think that’s what they’re resisting the urge to to at the best of times.
            1. To test this theory:
              1. Serve them beetroot/borscht
              2. Later, tell them that red urine is the first sign of the virus.

              Yes, everyone, I do not have children.

    2. My wife is Russian and makes a super borscht.
      She couldn’t help me with “Chordate”, though, so I’m a DNF.
  17. Well, I’ll see Pip’s 4 iffy (or tricky) definitions and raise him about 15. Often tricky definitions are tangential or abstruse. Today I found definitions that were generally straightforward became much more difficult because of a misdirecting modifier. For example, I get Republic as Eire, but since it’s still Eire the ‘old’ took some thought and faith. And many more.
    Otherwise a steady, if slow, solve except for the unk Chordate – I’m never going to get an unk via a homonym. I liked Meantime.

    Edited at 2020-03-18 05:40 pm (UTC)

  18. Zoomed through the top half, but the bottom was trickier – contracture, Bors, and a few minutes at the end to guess chordate. Considered mate, but pleased to spot date rather than mate as a girlfriend rather than a wife. Chordate strikes me as a word I didn’t know, but might have seen before.
  19. Unfortunately I biffed ACADEMIC so one wrong. BORS unknown but love the soup so it had to be.
    Some confusion when I googled CHORDATE. First thing I got was: Humans are not chordates because humans do not have a tail. However, as always with things Googly, there are also several opposite opinions.
    1. I think that’s caudate. Aren’t we lucky the setter didn’t think of that as a homophone?!
      1. Lesson in googling. On further research, the quote I gave was actually from a test paper and was asking students “is this true or false”.
  20. Not finding the inspiration this week. 26.58 . Last ones in were chordate- never heard of it but made sense from the cluing and academia for some unfathomable reason, should have been ultra obvious.

    I think lock down is starting to atrophy my brain.

  21. …a LOCOMOTIVE isn’t an alternative to a car !

    A strange puzzle, full of simple stuff padded out with a few weird clues.

    Thank you for sorting out FROU-FROU Pip. Another one for the Hyphen Police to investigate.

    NHO CONTRACTURE but it was easy enough to parse.

    My real problem was with CHORDATE, as I’d no idea what it meant. I tried an anagram of “man” and “heart” since all the checkers were relevant, before eventually realising that “chor” was a sound-alike. Then I’d to choose between “date” and “mate”, fortunately opting correctly. This clue alone took me longer than this morning’s QC.

    FOI TOPSOIL
    LOI CHORDATE
    COD RISQUE
    TIME 17:01

  23. Steady solve. I’d nho BORS or NUN (in the father sense obv). I didn’t know what CONTRACTURE meant (or even if it was really a word). I knew the word CHORDATE and even (at least roughly) what it meant, but not sure how the parsing went since I figured the H was the heart, which left “cor date!” which didn’t seem like something anyone would say to their girlfriend, at least if he wanted to keep her. I was pretty sure it was all correct but pleased to see no annoying pink squares when I submitted it.
  24. Hi – I’ve been a longtime but occasional visitor here, marvelling at speeds and solving abilities, but never plucking up the courage to “join in”! I’ve been attempting the Times for years and have made some progress (finally) over the last few years. I always buy the paper, in hard copy, and have a crack on the way to work and have never subscribed to any of The Times’ online services. I wondered whether a subscription contains a printable version of the crossword or is it all online only? My daughter has COVID19 symptoms and this is day 1 without a paper and I’m missing it already!

    Thanks

    Ben

    1. Yes Ben there certainly is a print option. Come back and comment, do. Good luck to your daughter. One of mine has symptoms too but there’s no way to get tested in NYC unless you’re (a) very famous or(b) very sick or (c) a journalist with persistence and connections.
      1. Thanks Olivia, that’s much appreciated and I’ll finally enter the 21st century it seems.

        I hope that yours is ok, too. Testing in Edinburgh seems to be pretty much non-existent unless you are dangerously ill with them.

    2. Hello Ben. I’m a hard copy man too, so can’t advise you. I’m sure someone will give you some pointers. I’m still picking up the Times most days at Sainsbury’s – hope I can continue to do so.
    1. I think it happens automatically when a thread has multiple posts. The reader has to “expand” each item or click “thread” on the first message.
    2. Yes, it kicks in at around 50 replies but I can’t apply any logic after that as to which posts get shrunken and which remain open. I think if there’s a whole string that have closed up, if you expand the first one the comments beneath it open up too. It’s very irritating but nowhere near as annoying as the way Facebook behaves in this regard.
  26. Relatively slow for me, jumping about and not settling anywhere all the way through.

    FOI IRE, always those three-letter ones
    COD IRK, the other three-letter one
    NHO or rather VVHO (very vaguely heard of) BORS, CONTRACTURE, CHORDATE

    Yesterday’s answer: the five countries you can’t colour in are LIECHTENSTEIN, FIJI, SEYCHELLES, CHILE and YEMEN. Inspired by GUAYANESE and BENI(so)N.

    Today’s question inspired by an answer: name ten parts of the body with three letters each (no rude ones!). How quickly can you do it?
    Today’s

      2. I’ve got three of those on my head, but none of them are on the top. If I wore a wig, would that count ?
        1. Without a K it’s still a part of the body (the head) although I confess that wasn’t really the one I was thinking of. 😉
  27. Just realised rather late in the day that I forgot to check in here after solving this morning. I blame the Current Inconvenience, which has meant the wife setting up an office in the spare room, and me going out in a fruitless search for food, including actual fruit, all of which has vanished from the shelves. The first of what might be many frozen dinners tonight, then.

    Anyway, this was a diverting solve, and not easy. Finished on the tricky CHORDATE after several stabs at the correct spelling of the soup.

  29. I started the puzzle this morning and after 27 minutes was left with _H_O_A_E, which baffled me, and as I was due to break curfew and meet up with some retired colleagues at a country pub, for our quarterly get together, saved the puzzle for later. We were a much reduced group of 4 as opposed to the usual 10-12, but had a whole Snug to ourselves, so were able to keep an acceptable social distance during lunch. On my return I spent another 15 minutes or more getting absolutely nowhere with multiple alphabet trawls, so gave up and used a word finder. ‘Twas all in vain anyway, as I’d managed to mangle 17d with FRAU FRAU, despite parsing it correctly with Four Four and the Rs moved up. Quel Plonqeur!! 44:37 with a cheat and a mishap. Thanks setter and Pip.
  30. 37:37, nice and neat. I got through much of this in reasonable time but couldn’t see what was required at 23ac. Went down several blind alleys before finally alighting on the correct parsing to arrive at the answer which looked to me as though it had more to do with chemistry than biology, shows how much I know.
  31. I can see that when I finally have to self-isolate (sometime soon) I will not be without entertainment by following our banter here. Looking foward to more o the same… and some good crosswords too!
  32. Nobody seems to have explained the full stop in the middle of the clue of 23a
    Could someone please enlighten me- i didn’t know the answer but ….
  34. 31 mins, so about par. LOI 24d OCHE, though it should have been brought to mind quicker having seen it before in a Times crossword.
    It’s interesting to read the comments from last month, and knowing, from this relatively unscathed part of the world In mid April, how much worse things will get for those of you in NY and UK. I hope you all get through it. I suspect that most of us are in the age group at greatest risk!

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