Times 27772 – my first palindrome!

Author   glhPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic

Time taken: 13:14, although even with checking through my answers I managed a particularly silly typo at 13 down, which was one of the ones I felt good about parsing.

I think this is a tricky puzzle and the early times are a bit slower than usual (since I’m writing this a bit later than I usually do, the SNITCH is up and is at 126. There are a number of entries I had to piece together from wordplay, but that is a good thing.

I do have an error, so it is a good day to get in front of me on the leaderboard!

Away we go…

Across
1 Trickery from monkey scratching rear (4)
SCAM – the monkey is a SCAMP, remove the last letter
4 Cold friend’s wrapped in warm material (10)
CHINCHILLA – CHILL(cold) inside CHINA(friend)
9 Possible relief from lumbago, an old issue (4,6)
BACK NUMBER – if you have lumbago, your BACK could use some NUMBing
10 Dogs perhaps retreating, one in flight (4)
STEP – PETS(dogs, perhaps) reversed
11 Instinct about welcoming policeman, a patent expert? (6)
EDISON – NOSE(instinct) reversed, containing DI(policeman).  Thomas EDISON was renowned for patenting his inventions
12 A number eleven entering field of play, hungry-looking? (8)
ANOREXIC –  A, NO(number), then XI(elven) inside REC(field of play)
14 Italian white jacket’s taken off over the hill (4)
ASTI – remove the outside letters of PAST IT (over the hill)
15 Chance of a thousand in income, but not five (10)
LIKELIHOOD –  K(a thousand) inside LIVELIHOOD(income) missing the V
17 Like ham I repeatedly mixed with this corn (10)
HISTRIONIC – anagram of two I’s and THIS,CORN. A stage ham, so right up my alley.
20 What indicates relief from power cut (4)
PHEW – P(power), HEW(cut)
21 In this building, are those inside waiting to buy it? (5,3)
DEATH ROW – cryptic definition
23 Exposed relative’s endless bill (6)
UNCLAD – UNCLE(relative) missing the last letter, AD(bill)
24 Gas one twice bottles? (4)
NEON – it would be hidden inside oNE ONe
25 TS Eliot works about animal giving a lump in the throat (10)
EPIGLOTTIS – anagram of TS ELIOT surrounding PIG(animal)
26 Evil man providing returns with little cash (10)
MALEFICENT – MALE(man), then IF(providing) reversed, and a CENT(little cash)
27 Dated scoundrel with hand missing and a slippery customer (4)
HEEL – HAND without AND, then EEL(slippery customer)
Down
2 Group meeting fate underground (11)
CLANDESTINE – CLAN(group) and DESTINE(fate as a verb)
3 Rough and ready ladies’ clothing brand put first (9)
MAKESHIFT – SHIFT(ladies’ clothing) with MAKE(brand) first
4 Extremely nice lunch forged deep international connection (7)
CHUNNEL – anagram of the outer letters in NicE with LUNCH
5 Where NYPD cop may put perp, clearly! (2,5,3,5)
IN BLACK AND WHITE – NYPD cars are black and white, so a titchy double definition. OK – I thought I remember the NYPD cars in the 90s being black and white, but the clue here really relies on Collins dictionary having “black-and-white” as US slang for a police car.
6 Wheels turn handle used by writer (7)
CARROLL – CAR(wheels), ROLL(turn) for the writer Lewis
7 Tangerine’s skin in sloppy plant secretion (5)
LATEX – outer letters of TangerinE inside LAX(sloppy)
8 Like image showing pork pie ingredient (5)
ASPIC – AS(like), PIC(image)
13 Useless musical theatre about one revolutionary (11)
INOPERATIVE – long reversal of EVITA(musical), REP(theatre) ON(about), I(one). I managed to switch the V and T at the end
16 Hard work put an end to child’s play (9)
HOPSCOTCH – H(hard), OP(work), SCOTCH(put an end to)
18 National leader’s deposed by Tory statesman (7)
ISRAELI – remove the first letter from Benjamin DISRAELI
19 Impressive feat by service lines (7)
COUPLET – COUP(impressive feat) with LET(tennis serve)
21 Material exploited the wrong way (5)
DENIM – MINED(exploited) reversed
22 Single fee for the main feature (5)
ATOLL – A(single), TOLL(fee)

68 comments on “Times 27772 – my first palindrome!”

  1. a typo I didn’t notice; and I was rather pleased with my time, too. FOI STEP, LOI PHEW. I thought of CHINCHILLA once I had the L_A, but for some reason I couldn’t see how it worked; I actually biffed it and twigged post-submission. Never did understand how NEON worked.
  2. I worked so hard on that upper left corner to get CLANDESTINE and MAKESHIFT, and ASTI which I couldn’t see the wordplay of. Even changed BACK RUBBER to BACK NUMBER at the last minute.

    But…. it wasn’t CARPOOL. And it wasn’t CARCOIL. Or CARROIL. Ah yes, my esteemed Lewis Carroll. What a dolt I am.

    Can’t seem to finish a puzzle without an error for the life of me these days, but I loved working through this one.

    1. For a long time I was convinced MAKESHIFT was going to be _ _ _ _ S + CENT, parsed as:

      Rough [and] ready (CENT) ladies’ clothing brand ( __ ‘S) put first

    2. I stand with you, having thrown in the towel at 54 minutes with the last ten of them failing to see CARROLL. Curses!
  3. Second day in a row with an indirect hidden word, is this the new normal?
    Really liked this puzzle, very tricky in places. Struggled in the top left SCAM/CLANDESTINE/MAKESHIFT/EDISON, but LOI was LIKELIHOOD after finally seeing CARROLL.
    COD to heel – it’s spelled out in black and white, but so hard to see.
  4. Nice puzzle – that’s two of just the right trickiness for me in a row. NYPD cars are blue and white, though.
    Thanks, George, nice blog.
          2. In the film the “Bluesmobile” was an ex-Mount Prospect police car (with a 440-cubic-inch cop motor, cop tires, cop suspension, cop shocks…) and there the cars are black and white.
  5. Hidden words, once spotted as such, are on the less challenging end of the spectrum, so mechanisms to make them more difficult, as in 24a, are appreciated.
    The NW was difficult, made more so by thinking 9a would be an anagram of ‘lumbago an o’, and having this erroneous belief reinforced by the U and B checkers. Eventually revised to the correct spinal anaesthetic. 30:50
    1. Although about 40 years ago, the setter (might have been the Telegraph since my parents got both) managed to hide CARDIFF ARMS PARK and I didn’t see it. I forget the actual clue, something to do with car parking on a farm. The literal was just “ground” so not sticking out obviously.
  6. I’m glad to find myself in good company here. When I had a few letters in I biffed MALIFICENT, I think having conflated maleficent and magnificent. Elsewhere I felt completely off the wavelength. I thought the instinct in 11A was going to be nous; I thought 9A was an anagram of “lumbago an o”; I couldn’t think why 27A was HEEL; at 1A I wondered if CHIM meant trickery; and reading 6D as CAR ROLL I wondered how that could be an author. With hindsight 20 minutes seems good. If only I hadn’t made that stupid mistake. Grrr!
  7. Held up at the end with COUPLET and UNCLAD. But DNF since I biffed CARPOOL at 6D, meant to go back and check, but forgot.
  8. 48 minutes, with a lot of time wasted on 13dn where my first thought had been INOPERABLE until I realised it wasn’t long enough. My problem was being fixated on OPERA as ‘musical theatre’ which used up the wordplay that would have led me last four letters.

    I still don’t get the NYPD reference at 5dn and even if the cop cars are b/w as stated by George (but disputed by Paul) how does that fit the cryptic part of the clue? The cop arrests a perp and puts him IN BLACK AND WHITE?

    Edited at 2020-09-17 05:58 am (UTC)

    1. In the US, a black and white is a police car (although I don’t know if the term can be used with e.g. blue and white cars); so the perp is put in a black and white. The ‘a’ has been elided, but.
      1. Thank you. So there is actually some sort of US jargon in which a cop car is called a ‘black and white’?
        1. That’s my understanding, and ODE’s. It’s not in my vocabulary, but I’m sure I’ve seen it.
          1. Thanks again. I’m much happier with the clue now that I’ve seen the b/w reference is in ODE and in Collins. However after reading Paul’s comment I googled ‘NYPD police cars’ for images and it’s clear that at least in the modern era the cars are white and blue so I suspect what’s gone on here is that the setter has used NYPD simply to indicate something American, in the same way as ‘Nice’ is used to indicate things French, but not realising that being so specific would make the clue unsound. Unless of course the NYPD use the jargon even though it doesn’t apply to their current fleet.

            Edited at 2020-09-17 07:11 am (UTC)

            1. jack – it comes from tv shows, where the detective in charge tells someone “put him in a black and white” or “send a black and white around to …”. But it isn’t used in NY, ever at all that I’ve heard, and I’ve never seen it on TV or in a movie for a NY cop show (not that I watch too many – I’m too busy with re-runs of Blues Brothers). The disconnect for may come because the LAPD does use black and whites, and most screenwriters live in Los Angeles, so that’s what they know.
              1. This is a bit like the way frogs in movies – wherever in the world they are set – always sound like Pacific Treefrogs.
            1. (I could swear I wrote the following and posted it, but) Bosch? The only Bosch I know is Hieronymus, and he didn’t paint any patrol cars.
  10. Glad I avoided CARPOOL and thought more to get CARROLL there. Merrily put in PLOP instead of PHEW at first and laughed to myself. Egregious error in the QC today, have you tried it?

    COD: CHUNNEL, lovely surface.

    Yesterday’s answer: if something isn’t fire, air, earth or water it is quintessential (i.e. of the fifth element – gave the number of letters to avoid variations on aether).

    Today’s question: British, Danish, Finnish, Irish, Spanish, Swedish, Turkish – what is the other -ish nationality?

    1. When Jonathan Miller was once asked if he was a Jew – he replied with some hesitation – Jew-ish!

      The Saltire says it all.

  11. 35 mins with half a fat rascal, hoorah.
    Quite chewy I thought (not the rascal). Eyebrow quivering at ‘destine’ and ‘service’ being thought sufficient for ‘let’.
    Thanks setter and G.
  12. Satisfying workout, I was very pleased to remember bianca is Italian for white, but it was our old friend ASTI.
  13. Great crossword. Spent a minute or so trying to work out 13d with the ‘opera’ bit as the musical theatre before the penny dropped. Some lovely clues and a most enjoyable solve. Thanks George and setter. 17m.
  14. 14:09. Pleased with that time for what I found a bit chewy, but never got stuck. LOI PHEW after CARROLL. Hard to pick a COD, but I go for BACK NUMBER as I’ve a bit of a sore back at the moment.
  15. My error was at 20ac where PEEP was my answer.

    FOI 4dn CHUNNEL

    LOI 11ac EDISON so no lightbulb moment.

    COD 21ac DEATHROW not the airport.

    WOD 26ac MALEFICENT – bad guys in flying machines.

    What was going on at 5dn? – can we please keep the NYPD out of British crosswords! Pandas first please.

    I loved the recent cartoon in the New Yorker – I think it was – with two Martians demanding of two perplexed bystanders on Main Street – ‘Take us to your Leader!’

  16. 41 minutes after tats with puppy. I had no idea about IN BLACK AND WHITE despite frequent enough visits to New York, but the crossers gave the answer. I used to have visions of nostalgic cops there singing Galway Bay at Christmas in Times Square courtesy of The Pogues until I found out that the NYPD didn’t have a choir and the phrase referred to inebriated Irish in the drunk tank. COD to BACK NUMBER. A tough puzzle I thought, but fair apart from the NYPD. Thank you George and setter.

    Edited at 2020-09-17 08:48 am (UTC)

  17. Very happy with my time. Answers seemed to come fairly easily. Thanks for explaining black and white. It couldn’t be anything else, but in my mind’s eye was an image of prison clothing – not the cars.
  18. I too thought of the Pogues, but it didn’t help. CARROLL LOI like others. Avoided CHIM as a chimp is an ape.

    23’06” thanks george and setter.

  19. I had no difficulties with this (except from the two visiting relatives who kept talking in the background). COd to NEON.
  20. No trouble with the BLACK AND WHITE because ALL US cop cars are modelled on the one driven by Jake and Elwood*
    No trouble with INOPERATIVE because OPERA was in the middle and I didn’t feel the need to untangle it further.
    All my trouble (and most of my 26 minutes) was in the top left section.
    I was obsessed with the writer’s handle being some sort of PENNAME, so wheels involved a COG-something. Great clue.
    I read patent as patient for ages, stymieing that clue until I focused better.
    I was looking for a more literal monkey at 1: is CHIM a thing?
    I was sure we were supposed to use BIANCO somehow in 14, mildly annoyed that digging the Italian for white out of memory was useless.
    I don’t think I know DESTINE without its PRE-. Looks like a character from a bodice-ripper.

    * Actually, all the other police cars in Blues Brothers are blue and white

  21. Thanks, George for explaining CHINCHILLA, HEEL and, especially, NEON.
    IN BLACK AND WHITE was very good. It brought back images of DSK, Dominique Strauss-Kahn doing the perp walk in NYC after he had been arrested for molesting a hotel worker. DEATH ROW was my COD.
    Another one who saw OPERA in INOPERATIVE and thought that meant ‘musical theatre’.
  22. Chinchilla seems rather odd warm material: lots of things keep you warm; why chinchilla especially?

    George a tiny slip: in 15ac it’s missing a V not a K.

  23. … close to the bird’s high fever. It’s an Auden day. I too thought black and white might be prison clothing. I’d have thought a let’s a non-serve. Echoed 20 ac. as finished – quite tough. Liked the twice-hidden hidden. 37 minutes.
  24. Complete with no errors. Yay! Chief difficulty was trying to put AK as a thousand which held me up for LIKELIHOOD, and not being female, I’m not very good at female attire. I needed the final T to get it. LOI COUPLET, again needed the final T to get the answer. I even spelled MALEFICENT correctly.
  25. Must be a bad day for silly typos… 7m 42s for me but it turned out I’d written CUUPLET. Oh dear.

    By far the trickiest one for me was CLANDESTINE, which was my penultimate answer (EDISON coming quickly after once I had the checkers) – sneaky one. I didn’t manage to parse INOPERATIVE, and indeed only got the OPERA from ‘musical theatre’ which was rather a red herring, but all the checkers were there so I was hopeful.


  26. I found this strangely straightforward given the times and comments of solvers with whom I normally vie. Must have had a brainstorm.

    Was held up by “material” in the clue to 4ac – would have been much easier if the setter had managed to incorporate “small cuddly animal”.

    All done in 30.36.

    Thank you to setter and blogger.

    Dave.

  27. Thanks for the parse on NEON George. I had both opera and Evita in 13d and it sounded ok so I didn’t stop to find out that it didn’t actually work. After a slow-moving week I zoomed through this. Nice one. 14.30
  28. Here in Patagonia we have a relative of the Chinchilla called a chinchillón (the southern viscacha), known locally as the Patagonian Killer Bunny.
  29. My SNITCH neighbour Angus consistently leaves me in his wake these days but I’m happy with a WITCH of 80 today.

    My only real hold-ups were trying justify MACHIAVELLI at 26 (never mind that the letter count is wrong) and trying to parse INOPERATIVE with OPERA accounting for “musical theatre”.

  30. I got really stuck on the last two (1a and 2d) after 45 minutes, and was just about to abandon ship but decided to give myself another five minutes. I’m glad I persevered, because I finished with all correct. Not all parsed I must admit! 1a caused most trouble – I was sure we needed something with the rear of scratching for far too long. Eventually I realised it must be SCAM but couldn’t see it – thanks for the explanation George! Also for explaining NEON and IN BLACK AND WHITE.

    That’s an interesting point that Corymbia makes about new techniques for hiddens. I find that they either jump out at me straight away, or they’re LOI. It will be interesting to see if these new tricks start to appear more frequently. This slowcoach hopes not too often, although I’m sure the whizzbangers will love them! Having said that, I got henna straightaway the other day. Wavelength, huh!

    FOI Anorexic
    LOI Scam
    COD Back number
    Time 49 minutes

    Thank setter and George

  31. 14:24, but with MALIFICENT. I followed the wordplay but obviously this is how I thought it was spelled because my subconscious took control of my typing fingers and I didn’t notice the error when checking at the end. And after sitting through the damned movie with my kids, to boot.

    Edited at 2020-09-17 11:16 am (UTC)

  33. 19:48. FOI step. LOI couplet. Moment of inspiration needed to get Carroll and never quite parsed neon otherwise a steady solve.
  34. Not easy, 69 minutes, and a number of rather obscure clues (like IN BLACK AND WHITE). LOIs were COUPLET and then UNCLAD. But at least I was not tempted to any mistakes and I didn’t have to make up any words at all today, a rare occurrence (I mean NOT having to make them up).
  35. A few sittings for this one. NW held me up the longest, SCAM, CLANDESTINE and ASTI being last in.

    Enjoyable though without too many unusual words.

  37. NW corner beat me today and I feel beaten up. I tried “Afar” for ” over the hill” as in Safari without it’s jacket ( I know it doesn’t work!). Even thought of Asti but couldn’t see why. I also got hung up on Nous instead of Nose. Couldn’t see Clandestine nor Makeshift nor the tailless monkey. Total washout.
  38. 30.00 on the dot. Another one done the day after. A toughie I thought. FOI back number ,LOI Asti which have me much grief before accepting that must be the right answer .

    Some tricky little blighters clandestine would have been even tougher without the final e. Liked Edison,Carroll and phew.

    Will try to catch up on the puzzle chronology later today.


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