Times 27639 – one coffee was enough.

88 comments on “Times 27639 – one coffee was enough.”

1. I was helped by being able to biff the four long ones, each on the basis of a checker or two; I didn’t even bother to parse PARTNERS IN CRIME, the others I did post-submission. DNK the cows, and DNK the donkey, so I was at a loss what letter to eliminate; to make assurance doubly sure, I eliminated all of them. NESS= quarters; [sigh].

   Edited at 2020-04-15 05:57 am (UTC)

   1. I get compass points but why NESS? N-E ok but S-S is puzzling me.
      1. I think the final ‘s’ is there to denote a plurality of compass points (N, E and S), though given the discussion in the QC blog about Otter(s), who knows…
         1. Ah, thanks!
2. Before coming here I checked the SNITCH (in fact what I do every day) to find it a sea of green so there will be some fast times today.

   Looking back I can’t see much on which to comment from the crossword itself. It was enjoyably straightforward.

3. I don’t think anything held me up much on this. Like others the 4 long clues went in mostly from the enumeration and the slightest hint from the clue (and a couple of checkers). My LOI was also CURTSY, about the only trap for the unwary sending me in the wrong direction for a moment. I thought it was going to be one of those annoying puzzles when you race through and then you just can’t see the final clue as your wonderful time ticks away. But today was less than 20 minutes which is fast for me.

   Also, funny that int today’s quickie we have “old rockers” for Teds, and here we have “old bikers” for Mods. Neither of which seems very accurate from what I know, although just a little before my time.

   Edited at 2020-04-15 05:51 am (UTC)

   1. Just tacking on here, Paul, since you’ve mentioned it.

      Jim, would you care to drop into the QC blog today and give us your take on TED clued as ‘old rocker’? There’s a bit of a discussion going on there. Thanks.

      1. No problem. Done, Jack
         1. Thanks, Jim.
4. Same as others, long answers banged in with a couple of checkers. Also CURTSY LOI, thought it had an ‘e’.

   Why did God destroy SODOM? Nothing to do with depravity or sex, but because the Sodomites did not show hospitality to the angels.

   Thanks Pip and setter.

5. Simples
6. 50 m. Went along carefully to avoid any silly errors, and that includes some work and maths homework (decimals).

   Only question mark was for nail as security but makes sense now.

   Last few were otic, curtsy, and accoutre.

   COD brief or neurotic.

7. I was very happy to score a PB (by over 2 minutes) on this one, so I was definitely on the wavelength.

   A couple only fully parsed post-submission (e.g. I was glad PARTNERS IN CRIME was a write-in from the crossers, so I didn’t need to work out the long anagram). And I was happy to know both the Irish county and the Scottish cow.

   1. I noticed your personal NITCH of 28 today. Very impressive!
   2. Congrats! And please see my suggestion below…
8. 14 minutes, never threatening a sub 10, particularly as I was a time accepting NAIL. As others have said, the long clues fell nicely into place from the definitions and crossers. The COD PACHYDERM House at Chester Zoo, now just called the Elephant House, brings back some happy memories. Pleasant puzzle. Thank you Pip and setter.
9. 27 minutes. I knew the donkey but I hesitated over NAIL as ‘form of security’ though I see it now of course as a cryptic definition. Not sure I’d view it as an escapee from the QC though.
10. I don’t every remember biffing so many answers, to the point that it’s hard to comment on the clues when you’ve only read the definition. Having just re-read the clues I only properly solved 12 of them while solving, so that’s a 57% biff rate. It’s nice to finish the thing quickly sometimes but it kind of takes the point away if you can guess the answers that quickly, and post-solving parsing seems anticlimactic. Sorry setter, but looking forward to something more challenging tomorrow.
11. …That held the pear to the gable-wall.
    25 mins with yoghurt, granola, banana, blueberry compote.
    I thought the Nail one was going to be NADA with Non Disclosure Agreement as the form of security, which I would have liked. But I was robbed by the partners in crime.
    Thanks setter and Pip.
12. Nice day for a walk in the park, albeit a short one. BIFD and BIFC my way through this, so nice to see the a/m sea on submission.
13. When I saw Verlaine’s incredible time, my 6V target seemed daunting but I made it with possibly a PB – memory is failing me on this issue. As others have said, multiple BIFD and parsed post-solve; overall, short but sweet so thanks setter and Pip.

    Starstruck, here’s a suggestion – not sure if it would be easy or hard to do in your next update. The SNITCH contains every time submitted by many solvers. Could it reveal, on selecting a solver’s name, that person’s fastest (and maybe also slowest) time and number of entries? Then we’d be able to check our own PB (and find out if Verlaine has ever gone faster than 3:43!).

    1. I do track the “top 10” internally and would be happy to display this if it’s of general interest and I can find a nice way to do it. There would be some caveats, e.g. I only track back to mid-2015, some of the top 10 might not be real results (e.g. due to technical failures), etc. The “slowest” times are not reliably recorded (and, indeed, people might not want to be reminded of them) so that’s not something that would make sense.

       Perhaps people could let me know (e.g. by “liking” this comment) if they’d be interested.

       As for Verlaine, 3:43 is only the 6th fastest time I have recorded for him. I think he only really gets excited these days when he breaks the 200-second barrier (which he has done twice).

       Curiously, 18:13 is also the 6th fastest time I have recorded for you, pleasuredome. Your fastest was 14:03 on 30 March (not long ago!).

       1. Thanks Starstruck. I see your point on slowest. On fastest, well this site is called TftT so it does seem to matter. Perhaps the SNITCH could have a page for each recorded solver with earliest entry, number of entries and fastest entry that pops up if you click on their name? And thank you for confirming my PB: I shall note it now!
14. I woke up with a bit of a headache after a poor night’s sleep, so being able to breeze through this one in 21 minutes was something of a relief.

    FOI 4d EDDY (“neddy” for fool came up in 2018, and happily I added its entire dictionary entry to my Big List O’ Words at the time) LOI 19a ACCOUTRE, having finally convinced myself that ACQUIRE didn’t fit in any way, shape or form. Odd how it’s hard to dismiss some words once they spring to mind, no matter how obviously wrong they are.

    If the CHAPLAINCY of SODOM wasn’t actually a late-90s Californian nu-metal band then they probably should have been…

    1. I also have had a headache all day and was therefore pleased to sail through this one in about 30 minutes – may well be a record for me – still have the headache, though
       1. Yes, same here 🙁 Let’s hope we wake up feeling better tomorrow.
15. 9:04. I foresee a great deal of 1A from the regular quicker solvers today. Only ACCOUTRE and my last 2 in DESCRY and NEUROTIC gave me much pause for thought. Having a few checkers I saw PARTNERS IN CRIME after reading the first 2 words of the clue. One for the QC club to try today, I think.
16. 13.23, and now that I’ve seen other entries here today, that looks positively sluggish.
    Perhaps a little touch of my Bristol past with the nail as security: 4 bronze pedestals, “nails” still exist, now outside the corn exchange, where merchants sealed their deals with cash, though the phrase above probably predates them.

    Edited at 2020-04-15 08:14 am (UTC)

    1. I was at university in Bristol in the 70s/80s and, like many students at the time, became aware of the Corn Exchange nails. I’m sure I wasn’t the only one to be assured that those nails were the origin of the term. I was very surprised, therefore, to discover similar nails and the same claim to the expression in the covered market in Bath only four weeks ago. So I suppose it has to go down now as “etym. unk.”. A shame.
       1. Not entirely unknown. Nothing to do with Bristol, as the expression sur l’ongle is recorded in French, and so definitely relates to fingers, but I’m not sure anyone’s ever nailed down the exact reference…
17. Thanks, Pip. I, too spent too long looking for a spoken greeting in 18d.
    And thanks for clearing up some queries in 9ac, 11ac, 7d and 21d.
    Interesting that we have NESS meaning ‘quarters’ in 1ac and NESS meaning ‘head’ in 9ac.
    GALLOWAY as a ‘Scottish Beef Producer’ could also describe George of that name! He was always complaining about something. Wonder what he’s doing now?
18. Certainly the fastest time I’ve recorded since lockdown and doing the puzzle online. A witch of 77 means I did it faster than I was expected to, right? (And don’t you like the new Snitch favicon?) Astonishing time, Verlaine!

    COD: PACHYDERM

    Yesterday’s answer: Mr Darling and Captain Hook are usually played by the same actor.

    Today, a joke: why didn’t Adam and Eve make a pie with the forbidden apple? Because they had no cloves.

    1. Because they had no cloves?
       1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Th-fronting
          1. Lord Vinyl.You missed my point! Mr Walker, turned to a joke after his quiz idea seemed to fizzle, after he wanted a convention where no one would give the answer, until the following day! One day there were about ten entries all politely alluding to the answer, and clogging up the blogging.

             But with today’s joke he provided the answer thus breaking his own convention! Making the whole idea pointless. It was this I was querying.

             And I probably missed your point!

             1. Fizzle, clogging, pointless – my blog posts seem to be annoying you.
19. You could always try parsing each clue as you solve it, I suppose, and take your time
    1. Preposterous suggestion! 😉
    2. Well yes, but that would not improve my position on the leaderboard!
20. Isn’t it unusual for “without” in a clue to be used in the sense of outside, as in “there is a green hill far away”. Whenever I see “without” I try to fit it in the sense of “outside”, but it always seems to be in the sense of “lacking”. Or am I imagining it?
    1. This use of “without” is one of those things peculiar to crossword-land. It’s technically correct, e.g. definition 12 of the preposition in Chambers has “outside or out of (archaic)”, but virtually nobody uses it that way in normal life. Those of us who’ve been solving for some years automatically consider it as a possibility for the cryptic definition.
       1. Thanks for that. I spent years in childhood wondering why a green hill might lack a city wall; why would you put a wall round a hill? Once I had found out I searched for the “outside” meaning, whenever I saw “without”. It certainly seemed to be archaic, in fact as dead as a dodo – until today.
          Richard
       2. The hymn is probably the best known instance of this, but it’s also common in the names of London parishes, e.g. St Giles Without Cripplegate. Up here in Scotland we say “outwith” quite a lot, but I’ve never heard anyone use “without” in that sense, except in the fossilised expression “within and without”, which sounds a bit old-fashioned even to a superannuated classicist like me.
21. This was in doddle country! 14.45 mins

    FOI 10ac SANEST

    LOI 18dn CURTSY once 19ac ACCOUTRE was nailed-in.

    COD 16ac NAIL

    WOD 6dn DESCRY

    My headliner is in memory of adland’s Mike Court and Logan whatsisface.

    Edited at 2020-04-15 08:41 am (UTC)

22. I’m not usually one for the sprints (being built for comfort not for speed) but SNITCH confirms that this was right up my street, even for a straightforward puzzle. No horses (or donkeys) were frightened during this solve.
    1. Great time tim!
23. 13:09. Nail = form of security is stretching it a bit, I thought. Thanks pip.
24. I was moving along with some CELERITY. The 10 minute solve barrier was going to breached. I had 1 across at my mercy. – – P – D – E – -. With rising RAPIDNESS in went …… EXPEDIENT.

    FOR GOODNESS SAKE. Which was also my COD.

    Edited at 2020-04-15 09:00 am (UTC)

25. 10:19. Well I didn’t find that desperately easy, although it was easier than average. I was held up at the end by the crossing DUCAT/DESCRY pair, which seems to have escaped from an 18th-century puzzle. What with those, the NEDDY, STEREOTYPE, CURTSY, ACCOUTRE and the churchy references this had a rather old-fashioned feel to it. Nothing wrong with that though, I rather liked it.
26. A straightforward top to bottom solve and no complaints. Everything in the garden is rosy (apart from the elephant in the gloom).
27. Much quicker than usual for me, so it must have been relatively easy.

    George Galloway can be found ( along with Alex Salmond ) airing a variety of egregious views on the Russian propaganda news channel RT. My only excuses for watching this rubbish occasionally are:

    a.) Lockdown boredom.

    b.) Laughing at the fluidity of this pair’s opinions
    to fit in with the views of their paymasters.

    Thank you to setter and blogger.

    Dave.

28. Like others, bang on the right wavelength from the word go. WOD to ACCOUTRE, which I have only really come across suffixed by -MENT. FOI DUCAT, my default old coin, thanks to early exposure to The Merchant of Venice.
    1. Was thinking Merchant of Venice yesterday, when a few said they’d never heard of Rialto.
29. My only excuse for this very slow time is that my wife was having an interesting phone call in the next room which distracted me. I don’t remember having such an easy LOI EDDY
30. I began with the headless donkey, then became DROWSIER before meeting my PARTNER IN CRIME, which gave me pause for just long enough to check that there was an M somewhere in the anagrist before biffing and moving on. I was prevented from having a sub 15 minute solve by NEUROTIC, DESCRY and ACCOUTRE, my LOI, which, I see, also gave johninterred pause for thought. Nice puzzle. 18:23. Thanks setter and Pip. Nice to see Verlaine sticking it to the Neutrinos:)

    Edited at 2020-04-15 10:33 am (UTC)

31. I don’t often do the ‘biggie’ but, encouraged by comments ln the QC blog, I thought I’d give it a go. I enjoyed this and found it largely straightforward. As with today’s QC, my time was close to flashman’s (above) although I was quicker by a couple of minutes (experimental error?). LI were NEUROTIC, OTIC, NAIL. I had to trust my reading of the clue with ACCOUTRE. Plenty of fun once you stop worrying about your time! John M.
32. I’ve recently got into the habit of checking the SNITCH before attempting to solve and I’m finding it counterproductive at times. Any SNITCH in the green leads me to expect an easier solve and I find myself getting anxious/frustrated if I don’t get off to a flier. This was very much the case today. Only three or four answers in the first five minutes or so – like wading through treacle. I put my pen down to make a coffee and, on my return, rattled through the rest in about ten minutes.
    My thanks as ever to setter and blogger.
    15’ish in two sittings.
    1. I make a point of not looking at the SNITCH until after I’ve done the puzzle for that reason:)
33. This might have been a rare under-10 for me except for a MER at the bikers and wanting an E in CURTSY (ditto Rob). 10.10
34. Good one by Crucible in today’s Guardian, right up Verlaine’s street. 28108.
    1. Pip
35. I got this one out in the end, though with little confidence as I’d never heard of DESCRY. In the SW corner, both ACCOUTRE and CURTSY took me longer than they ought to have done – whenever I see “Bill” in a clue I find it hard to get away from “ad”. I needed OTIC to help me get NEUROTIC.

    FOI BRIE
    LOI DESCRY
    COD PINEAPPLE

    1. Some of us don’t need any help to get NEUROTIC.
36. A very slow but satisfying 34 minutes spent doing this. At least all was parsed and I was happy to get ACCOUTRE without much of a hold up. CURTSY was my last in, entered with some relief that I didn’t have to slog through an alphabet trawl.

    A bit kinder than yesterday’s and a pleasing view along the way.

37. I hadn’t realised how competitive cryptic xword solving was until coming to this site. I knock mine off if I can in the evening post-prandially with the print edition, probably just before some start cracking on with the next one online. Are there world records(wind-assisted or not), performance-enhancing drugs or other aids barely legal?
    1. Welcome to hell/heaven! Mr. Egregious. This blog is a veritable mirror of today’s society, pre-prandials, millennials, Americans and wind-assisted pedants such as myself. Only Mr. Jordan (7.36!!) appears to be normal and Lord Verlaine (3.43!!!) has used stimulants occasionally.

       Edited at 2020-04-15 12:25 pm (UTC)

       1. Yes, I’ve noticed Americans butting in with their ignorance of things a little more English English than perhaps they can handle. My favourite personal experience (in real life, not crosswordland) was a soi-disant poetess who insisted Descartes said ‘Cognito, ergo sum’ and cited Webster which, I believe, is an American dictionary of some kind. I mean, really.
          1. I’m guessing the 7.36 and 3.43 are times of some unit (seconds?) and not, say, body mass index.
          2. Yes, it takes a real Englishman to quote Descartes’s Latin correctly.

             Edited at 2020-04-15 01:49 pm (UTC)

             1. Although he himself was French
38. Another tipped off by the QC blog. I managed to finish this before lunch, in about 40 minutes. FOI was SANEST then RUFUS. A slowish start but once I had a few letters I was up and running. Had doubts about NAIL;DNK EMERY as a coarse rock; ACCOUTRE seemed odd at first but quickly looked certain.
    LOI was PERPETUITY where I had wanted to put Perversity but thankfully waited until I had all the checkers.
    Very enjoyable puzzle.
    Did anyone else think of the Hippy Hippy Shake?
    David
39. What felt like a slowish 17.43. Stuck at the end for a time on 1.ac. and 4; couldn’t think of a rapid noun beyond -ity. Given the lumbering nature of their clues the four long ones seem almost too biffable. Like the name Rufus; should have thought of it for one of my sons.
    1. Unspammmed for you Joe. LJ mustn’t have liked the dot between 1 and a.
       1. Thanks. Seems a wicked dot then.
    2. I think that would only work if your son had red hair.
40. ….than I felt I should have done. My frustration was compounded by a typo I failed to spot when transferring my written entry to the damned Smartphone.

    FOI SANEST
    LOI CURTSY
    COD NEUROTIC
    TIME 7:36

    Edited at 2020-04-15 12:13 pm (UTC)

    1. Smartphone transfer!? For NEUROTIC read NEUTRINO!
       1. I always use Smartphone transfer, taking great care not to press submit until I match exactly my time on paper. Maybe I should invest in a tablet or a laptop.
          1. I love it Phil – is the Jordan Smartphone transfer method unique!? It’s so beautifully Bitcoin bonkers! Dead honest and sooo very English! Now you’ll have to patent it! I retract my diabolical accusation.
             1. I’d probably use laptop transfer myself if I weren’t reliant on my own printer at home rather than the one in the office. I completed today’s on the club timer in 10:04 but would have been faster on paper. For instance I wouldn’t have written URTSYY at 18d or found myself overwriting DUCAT with DESCRY.
41. 12:13. A quick time by my standards. This was pretty much read ’em ‘n’ write ’em in from top to bottom. I dithered over descry which was unfamiliar but other than that, by the time I got to pachyderm there was barely any need to read the clue let alone trouble parsing it. Fun to get one like this once in a while.
42. has meant I attempt this as well as the QC more often. 20:05 for me today. Which is at the quicker end of things, and only 3 mins more than i managed for today’s stodgy (for me) QC. Quite a bit of biffage though…

    Must investigate NITCH SNITCH, I like a statistic.

    Edited at 2020-04-15 01:22 pm (UTC)

43. I’m another one who did this in less than half the time I took over the quickie!

    As I’m not going for speed records (no point), I like to enjoy the ride and parse as I go, and this was just fine for me! There was enough to make me ponder a bit – PERPETUITY, ACCOUTRE, EDDY and DESCRY – but others fell into place very quickly.

    As a matter of interest, the phrase PAINT THE TOWN RED is supposed to emanate from the East Midlands. Melton Mowbray has been a centre for foxhunting over the centuries and attracted rich young men from all over country. The story goes that in 1837 the Marquis of Waterford and a group of friends, who were much the worse for wear, ran riot in Melton, after refusing to pay at the tollgate. They got hold of some red paint and rampaged through the town, painting the toll-bar and all the front doors in the high street. Melton has a free festival every year called Paint the Town Red, although it probably won’t be happening this year 🙁

    FOI Ducat
    LOI Accoutre
    COD Nail
    Time c 26m

    Thanks setter and fellow East Midlander!

    1. Pebee that is my kinda info. Melton is a most interesting place – and still the home of Stilton and Mr. Vardy!

       A fellow East Midlander

       1. Never forget the Stilton 😉 Although I’m sorry to say that I think Mr V is having a party in Lincolnshire now – he got fed up with people ringing at his front door and asking for selfies! At least they didn’t paint it.
44. 27 minutes, the last minute or two spent frantically trying to submit. Eventually I closed the browser and reopened it and resumed and all went well. Extremely easy. No problems at all (except that I wasn’t quite sure whether N or some other letter went before EDDY to make the donkey).
45. Slowed up a little by last few in – PERPETUITY, CURTSY, DESCRY
46. Couldn’t get ID since I was convinced that 10ac was HONEST H Hospital on est French one is.

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