Times 27,773: Gimme Shelter

61 comments on “Times 27,773: Gimme Shelter”

1. Tough enough. I biffed AMARANTH, having failed to recall AMAH. And I wasn’t sure about SIMON–well, I was sure it was SIMON, but not about SON as ‘disciple’. DNK the Rugby term, DNK ANDERSON. Are two hiddens OK in one puzzle? Somehow I’d thought it was one; given my inability to spot them, one is enough: LENTEN was my POI. LOI MEANEST; I hesitated as to the definition, and was slow to parse.
   1. AMARANTH took me a wee while to parse, for sure. I guess the Sons of Anarchy and the Sons of the American Revolution are disciples rather than literal blood relatives…
2. …as I was surprised to finish in under an hour, having started so slowly. I do keep nearly getting the answer and giving up, only to discover 20 minutes later it was correct. I really needed all the crossing letters to make any progress at all, as I struggled from my FOI mated to my LOI Anderson. At least we had Anderson shelter recently.
3. Gave up with lenten and anderson empty – not knowing of the air-raid shelter, and *knowing* you can’t have 2 hiddens in one puzzle. Found it entertaining and tricky apart from those. Quite liked the duck.
   1. I hate to tell you this but you also didn’t know the air raid shelter when it came up a mere three weeks ago.
      1. That’s not unexpected. But still a worry – yep 27755 exactly 3 weeks ago.
         Had the opposite checked letters, and was clued as a person’s surname, so easier to guess that time.
4. A bit over an hour. Held up in the SE corner as well, including guilty as charged for the fruitless candle search at 16d. Happy to see both the cricket reference and our waddling crossword friend – second only to pochard in my affections – at 22d. Once I’d worked it out, I liked AMARANTH (makes a ‘Most excellent’ porridge as it happens) and the ‘Dance being held in workhouse’ at 26a.
5. Like our esteemed blogger I spent much of my time in the SE where ANDERSON and LENTEN in particular took some while to tease out. The latter gets my COD for being very well hidden to my mind. Elsewhere I risked an AMARYNTH, where I realise now I was thinking of amaryllis. The fact it also had a woman in it in Mary made it particularly tempting but I persevered until our old friend the amah/ayah/aia appeared.
   1. Fingers crossed that a deal will be done on the golf course today!
      1. I’m surprised but it looks like it’s going to happen. On to Messi next 😉
6. Crosswordland is a funny place where for example the most feted Anderson is not Ian, Jon, Lindsay, Gerry and Sylvia or even Neo but some bloke who designed air raid shelters that don’t exist any more.

   Like others I hit a brick wall in the SE after much biffing elsewhere. Not sure about SON = DISCIPLE and although I get MEAN as excellent (he makes a mean Martini) I doubt the superlative is often used with that sense. But then common usage is definitely not a criterion here! And could one of our experts clear up if two hiddens are allowed?

   Thanks to Verlaine for explaining the knotty SE, and to the setter for tying the knots!

   1. What about Jimmy?
      1. Most if them are happily still alive (unless Leroy has taken them on a “Slay Ride”). I’ll let myself out….
         1. Haha yes those are the rules – it was the resulting landscape I was commenting on. Sorry to omit the mighty Jimmy.
7. Going by the time it took me to complete the whole of the top half of the puzzle I was thinking this was easy for a Friday, but I hit a brick wall in the lower half. After a very long unproductive gap I managed to get started again but almost every answer from then on was a battle. In the end I finished in 66 minutes.

   Edited at 2020-09-18 05:55 am (UTC)

8. Another day, another DNF. Particularly galling that a hidden was one I couldn’t see, but even though I do the Guardian regularly, apparently I still stop looking for a hidden after coming across the first one in the Times… Not knowing HERBAGE didn’t help, either.
9. NQF I went over the hour after racing through the top half as per Jack. My stickler was 16dn IN SERVICE as I did not see the hidden at 29ac, but was sure it was sommat to do with LENT. And at 20ac SON as disciple is iffy IMHO.

   FOI 8dn POLISH more racing!

   COD 26ac TWIST

   WOD 18ac AMARANTH who I thought was an Indian batsman of note!

   Lord V. may be a vegetarian but he at least does have 25ac to offset 21dn

   William Paterson and Oscar Carl Kerrison designed the Sir John Anderson (1938) and John Baker the Herbert Morrison (1941) shelters for WWII – known as ‘hochbunkers’ by the Bosch.

10. Difficult SE as others have mentioned. Thank goodness the Anderson shelter came up recently. I hadn’t heard of it prior to that. Nonplussed by ‘son’ as disciple, but put it in anyway for want of anything better. In-service took far too long, as I wanted to put SIN in somewhere until VICE made a late showing. A struggle in 48:19.
11. …Is heap’d upon her, maiden most unmeek,—
    I knew to be my Demon Poesy.

    After 30 mins, with toast and excellent Lime Marmalade (Edinburgh Preserves), I was left with:
    Sat/—h- (duh), Lenten and the one in between.

    Nice one. Thanks setter and V.

12. 13:56. Biffed my way merrily through this failing to parse IN SERVICE, ANDROMEDA and TWIST. Mind you I had to be quick as I have to go out for the day in 5 minutes. Thanks V and setter.
13. Slow but steady does it, no particular difficulty. Satisfying for a Friday.
14. I used to play hooker in school rugby and ‘foot up’, in which you anticipate the scrum half putting the ball in, is a penalty offence. However, to win a scrum AGAINST THE HEAD, where the side not having the put-in gains the ball, is very difficult, unless your scrum is much heavier.

    Disciple = SON was made easier by thinking of the daughters of Rebecca in Wales, or the sons of Jacob in Gilead.

    Dragged up AMAH to get the plant. SCOTER, RAG TRADE LOsI.

    17’57”, thanks verlaine and setter.

15. Just about the hour post-walk. And the first thing Penny did on return was a pee and poo on the puppy mat. As everyone has said, the SE was tough. LOI was MEANEST which I wanted to be MOSTEST as in the hostess with. Slight MER at the anachronism of TED for rocker. And I remembered the plant as AMARYNTH for some unaccountable reason, spending time wondering what the letters round Mary signified. 600 test wickets on, don’t forget Jimmy in the list of living Andersons. A pretty hard puzzle. Thank you V and setter.
    1. I promise I didn’t!
16. Thanks V as I never parsed LENTEN and MEANEST. Interesting to see POLISH clued after several of us had tried yesterday thanks to Angus.
17. So not too bad for a Friday for me. Like V and others got caught up in the SE corner. Not really getting SIMON and took an age over HERBAGE. LOI LENTEN. COD to 5d which I did know but not quite the technical reasoning behind it. Thanks V and setter.
18. …but had to use aids to get ANDERSON and AMARANTH.
    I seem to be the only one who cannot equate “producing tension” with TONIC in PLATONIC.
    Thanks, verlaine for other explanations that foxed me.
    1. I agree: how on earth does tonic mean producing tension?

       (The Indian cricketer was Amarnath, horryd)

       1. Chambers has these exact words as a definition of TONIC! With the clarification ‘eg of the muscles’. Lexico has the same meaning defined differently: ‘relating to, denoting, or producing continuous muscular contraction’.
       2. Anagram of a foreign surname! Thx!
19. Came in at 28’30 which feels a bit slow, given some of the times above. What’s the difference between an amah and an ayah? I wasted a lot of time imagining an ayacanth or some such.
    1. One’s Chinese and the other Indian but I’m not sure which is which.
       1. Also one’s a nursemaid and the other’s a nanny but again I can never remember which is which. You don’t normally need to!
          1. Amah is ‘grannie’; ai is used here in Shanghai, where it means ‘auntie’. China is an archetypal matriarchal society even today – the ‘nannie state’.
             1. Amah is an Anglo-Indian term for ‘wet-nurse’, derived from Latin amma (mother) via Portuguese ama (nurse).
20. On whom the years could model any feature,
    And fake with ease a leopard or a dove.

    Found this one pleasantly straightforward with a nice twist here and there. 22’21 but with a careless amarinth. The more annoying as my mother, who changed her forename to Asphodel,
    gave herself an e-address including asphodel and amaranthine, which everyone loved except when it came to writing it out. I should add the address is no longer extant. (As far as I know.)

    Edited at 2020-09-18 11:13 am (UTC)

21. See yesterday’s comment about hiddens! Sadly this one didn’t jump out at me, and it was only after reading V’s intro that I dashed back to the grid to pop it in, hoping it might lead me to finishing. Really annoying as I was fairly certain that Lent was involved 😕 Same experience as others with the SE corner – got stuck with about four to go after an hour, so packed it in. Still there was lots to enjoy – I liked AGAINST THE HEAD, POLISH and CARAMEL.

    FOI Id est
    COD Chorister
    WOD Ninnies
    DNF

    Thanks setter and Verlaine

22. ….only at a slower pace. During my travails in the SE corner I began to doubt that SIMON was correct.

    FOI OUTSIDE
    LOI MEANEST
    COD LENTEN
    TIME 12:34

23. Halted in my run of fast solves by the SE corner, as with others. NHO AGAINST THE HEAD. For some reason I’m always tempted to spell it ‘Andersen shelter’. Two hidden answers – omg! Avoiding sex, to have sex – sex on the brain, dear setter?

    Yesterday’s answer: the remaining -ish nationality was Polish – amusing to see it clued today, what are the chances?

    Today’s question (inspired by two clues today): what surfboard did Simon Anderson invent?

    1. What about Scottish? Not at the moment, perhaps, but. Or English, for that matter?
    2. Two short birds on main board (8)
       1. Or for astronawt:
          Rebuilt her trust in rocket power (8)
24. Jimbo might have something to say about ted=rocker. Very slow start but managed to pick up the pace and finish in 17.26.
    1. I expect he would as it seems to be referring to two different eras of popular culture. Still better than ‘hooligan’ though as used by many setters in the past!
       1. Hooligans haven give the O’Houghlaghan family a bad name. Father Ted.
25. A mixture of wonder and yuck,
    In the SE I also got stuck
    Andromeda great,
    But then my pet hate
    A scoter’ a ruddy duck
26. 
    Same experience as everyone else, really. Bit of a grind, finishing in the SE corner.

    All correct in one hour and one second.

    Thank you to setter and blogger.

    Dave.

27. The SE occupied 15 of my 45 minutes as I didn’t know the rugby expression and it took an age for HEAD to occur to me. It was all in vain though, as I had a careless DOMEN at 6d. No problems elsewhere. Thank setter and V.
28. 13:18. I really enjoyed this, but unfortunately made an error so stupid I’m too embarrassed to tell you what it was.
    I had most of the knowledge – even the obscure plant – but the rugby term was new to me and this meaning of ‘duds’ only occurred to me as I was putting the answer in from the checkers.
29. After yesterday’s misery, I was pleased to finish this one. I suspect my grey cells work better at midday than in the evening.
    As mentioned above, we saw Anderson Shelter recently, which helped me in the tricky SE corner.
30. 28.50. Decent end to the week for me though I started very slowly. FOI ninnies. Steady progress on the down clues gave a bit of momentum and then the across started to fall into place. LOI meanest.

    Struggled with amaranth but biffed in the end, kept thinking of the nursery rhyme mary, mary which made for a difficult/ impossible route to an answer. Amaranth was dimly remembered so in it went when the letters coincided.

    Liked twist, andromeda and caramel in particular.

31. …two pinks in the same answer. Didn’t get SAT TIGHT – went for SET SIGHT.

    Plenty I didn’t really know – SON for disciple, AGAINST THE HEAD (I was never in the scrum at school, always stuck on the wing chatting with the opposing winger, as those who were good at kicking seven bells out of each other never passed the ball, which led me to decide that rugby was a game for those with no finesse and little between the cauliflower ears. Discuss!).

32. Hi there. I haven’t been around in a while but I continually check in here, although far too late in the day to say anything useful, or that anyone will actually see.
    But I’m dropping by to say that I reached 20A SIMON via recalling that he was the son of John. Which jived with the wordplay, at least to me.
33. My time felt slowish but is more or less bang in line with the NITCH so the puzzle must have been a little trickier than “average”.

    V, I had OUTSIDE parsed t’other way about from thee, i.e. unfancied as the definition (as in outside chance / shot) and a cryptic indication: a team no longer in the dressing room would be an out side.

    I think it works both ways so I won’t fight you for it.

    1. Is a “team no longer in the dressing room” the same as a “team no longer in the closet”?

       Yes, your interpretation is probably the better one!

34. Finished in the end after a struggle in the SE like everyone else. LOI LENTEN. It’s not a proud moment when the LOI turns out to be hidden, and so right there in your face the whole time. But a careless AMARINTH so one pink square.
35. With a lot of time spent checking and checking and doubting and re-checking and doubting myself but being right in the end. I’ve submitted too many puzzles with errors lately, and I actually wanted this one to count!
36. 35:00
    Enjoyed this puzzle – steady solve; no dramas. Thanks v.

    Edited at 2020-09-18 04:03 pm (UTC)

37. Anderson shelter is very familiar to me from histories of WW2 (we even have one in our local park) but this did not stop me putting in UNDERSKY ‘lacking roof’
    1. Undersky, oversky, mombling free…
38. 24:56. A satisfying solve. A few tricky bits but never really got bogged down anywhere. This puzzle completes a Monday to Friday of all correct sub-30 minute solves. A pleasing achievement which I have found much harder in practice than theory might suggest.

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