Times 27895 – Around here, we do study there…so to speak.

Author   vinyl1Posted on Categories Daily Cryptic

Time: 19 minutes
Music: Khachaturian, Violin Concerto, Oistrakh/Khachaturian/MRSO

Another easy Monday, I would say, and so far the results in the SNITCH are confirming this.   I did biff a quite a few answers, but had to think about a some of them.   There is a little knowledge required, but most regular solvers should be up to the task.   If you can spell Addis Ababa, and know your clergymen and authors, there’s not much to stop you from posting a very good time. 

Across
1 Prince given a drink and a cut of meat over by hotel (9)
MAHARAJAH – A JAR + A HAM backwards + H[otel]
6 Mine accommodates East Anglia’s first religious painting (5)
PIETA – PI(E)T + A[nglia]
9 Temporary way old people initially getting break (7)
STOPGAP – ST + O[ld] P[eople} + GAP.
10 Dependent on a set of books about Long Island (7)
RELIANT – RE (L.I.) A N.T, with the standard abbreviations for long and island, since the actual Long Island is not usually so abbreviated. 
11 Amphibian Buddhist monk caught in power-driven polisher (10)
SALAMANDER – SA(LAMA)NDER, a clue I’ve seen before.
12 See member with a seductive woman (4)
VAMP – V + A + MP.
14 Army doctor has wobbly about decorative design (5)
MOTIF – M.O. + FiT backwards.
15 Parliamentarian leader following prescribed course (9)
ROUNDHEAD – ROUND + HEAD, in entirely different senses.
16 Southern fellow restraining endlessly caustic church worker (9)
SACRISTAN – S (ACRI[d]) STAN, our random chap of the day.
18 Asian banker’s attempt to quit business (5)
INDUS – INDUS[try], a chestnut.
20 Loathe contributing to church at Easter (4)
HATE – Hidden in [churc}H AT E[aster]
21 Offensive old goat misbehaving in part of Ulster (10)
DEROGATORY – DER(anagram of OLD GOAT)RY.
25 Priest about to enter quiet curve in road (7)
PREBEND – P(RE)BEND. 
26 A vain, strutting person, Thomas Love! (7)
PEACOCK – Thomas Love Peacock, to be exact – it helps if you went to grad school in English lit.
27 Liqueur not at all unknown to the French (5)
NOYAU – NO Y AU, which I didn’t exactly know, but the cryptic hands it to you.
28 Headgear secured by male volunteers finally on island (9)
MANHATTAN – MAN (HAT) TA + [o]N
Down
1 One who laid down the law: Grandma, possibly? (5)
MOSES – Gradma MOSES, the folk-art painter, who still fetches surprisingly good prices at auction.
2 Obstruction holding up pirate — not much of a catch (7)
HOOKLET – [captain] HOOK + LET.
3 resultsUrchin’s bungled action limited by resistance once more (10)
RAGAMUFFIN – R AGA(MUFF)IN.
4 Varnish judge used on a vessel (5)
JAPAN – J + A PAN.
5 Sort of duck, fast mover, one of five crossing lake (9)
HARLEQUIN – HAR(L)E + QUIN.
6 Requirement of patient initially under the weather? (4)
PILL – P[atient] + ILL. 
7 Call up Greek character over issue (7)
EMANATE – NAME + ETA, each one upside-down.
8 A despot in foreign, diametrically opposite territories (9)
ANTIPODES – Anagram of A DESPOT IN.
13 A doctor and a couple of bachelors swallowing up one’s capital (5,5)
ADDIS ABABA – A DD (I’S) A + BA + BA.
14 Twisted young woman beginning to harass a writer (9)
MISSHAPEN – MISS + H[arass] + A PEN.
15 Swimmer in river crazy about Dutch port (9)
ROTTERDAM – R (OTTER) + MAD upside down.
17 Charlie replaces top of accumulator in Tom’s place (7)
CATTERY –  (+C,-b)ATTERY.
19 Doctor abroad securing work for hippie (7)
DROPOUT – DR (OP) OUT.
22 Briefly express view about end of tractor plant (5)
ORPIN –  O([tracto]R)PIN[e]. 
23 Canadian territory the solver studies, so to speak? (5)
YUKON – Sound like YOU CON. 
24 Bill of fare that’s united soldiers at the front (4)
MENU – MEN + U, one escaped from the Quickie.

62 comments on “Times 27895 – Around here, we do study there…so to speak.”

  1. Is there a Long Island in the UK? At least in New York, LI is a common abbreviation.
    1. No Long Island in UK, but stamps issued for Long Island Aegean Sea, in 1916.

      Edited at 2021-02-08 07:28 am (UTC)

        1. The Outer Hebrides, which are in fact several islands but look like one long one when viewed from eg Skye, are known locally as the Long Island. But never abbreviated to LI in Scotland!
          Cedric

          Edited at 2021-02-08 06:43 pm (UTC)

  2. Biff City, including SACRISTAN, which I can’t now think of what prompted me, with no checkers at the time. Never did go back and parse it. DNK the duck, DNK ORPIN, barely remembered NOYAU. Under 10′ for the first time in ages.
  3. Nothing too challenging. The few unknowns/vaguely-knowns were handed over by the cryptics. I live in the US, but on the west coast, and I’ve never seen Long Island referred to as LI, although I can imagine that is common in NYC…like SV for silicon valley here.
  4. 7:01 – bit of an American flavor here with Grandma Moses and Long Island, which I really only recall being abbreviated as LI in LIRR (Long Island Rail Road)
  5. 9:44. Nothing too taxing here, but I was slowed down somewhat by the funny words, none of which was completely unknown to me. ORPIN just isn’t the first thing i think of.
    LI for Long Island is in all the dictionaries.
  6. 22 minutes which seemed a little slow given the speed with which the early answers went in. SACRISTAN gave me pause for thought as I knew the word but had no idea what it meant other than something vaguely to do with church or religion. DNK (OHF) ORPIN but trusted in wordplay. Also DNK NOYAU where I paused long and hard considering NAYAU as a possible alternative but eventually decided NAYAU wouldn’t account for ‘unknown’ in the clue.
    1. I’m sure we’ve had NOYAU here before, as I can’t imagine I’d picked it up elsewhere.
      1. Yes, it came up in a 15×15 in January last year when the wordplay just involved taking the first letters of five consecutive words, so the answer barely registered with me and I didn’t mention it in my comment. Vinyl blogged that day and said he’d never heard of it. Its previous appearance was in 2009. By coincidence I noticed another clue in the January puzzle that relied on OPINE in its wordplay.

        Edited at 2021-02-08 07:32 am (UTC)

    2. I thought the SACRISTAN and the sexton were one and the same (one RC the other not) but I see that’s not the case.
  7. I looked at the SNITCH expecting to see this crossword rated at the harder end of the scale but instead I find that I was well off the wavelength. My main hold up was SACRISTAN which I’ve vaguely heard of but which took some time to come to mind and which I’d not been able to come up with via parsing alone. But as well as that there were many places where my instinctive parsing was different to what was required. Indeed it was a relief just to finish and not see the all too familiar pink squares.
  8. This would have been fairly easy for those who didn’t carelessly biff AMSTERDAM I should imagine.
    2. I’m not sure that hamsters, even Cockney ones, are that renowned as swimmers… 😉
  9. 30 mins, just, pre-brekker — on an iPad pending more printer ink.
    Clergymen and liqueurs. Not my cup of tea.
    Thanks setter and Vinyl.
    1. The world’s most expensive liquid (QI: Stephen Fry)

      Edited at 2021-02-08 08:14 am (UTC)

      1. Used to be, though now the big players have relented and produced inkjets with refillable tanks that print many thousands of pages. Back in the day, you could virtually get printers free with cornflakes because the makers knew you would be bankrupted buying the miniscule cartridges at £50 a set twice a week.
  10. 35 mins. My Uncle Fred was once in Notre Dame and overheard an American exclaim to his wife, ‘Gee! I never ‘new Napolean Bonaparte was a Christian?’ ‘Nappy’ was crowned there.

    FOI 6ac PIETA – originally from sculptor Michelangelo Buonarroti

    LOI 22dn ORPIN the purple flowered Eurasian stonecrop

    COD 1dn MOSES – Anna Mary Robertson Moses

    WOD 5dn HARLEQUIN (Histrionicus histrionicus) Northern Chinese, Alaska and 23dn.

    And all to Joe Jackson and Cat Stevens from ‘er indoors.

    To the under-tens, biff-on dudes! Meldrew

    Edited at 2021-02-08 08:14 am (UTC)

  11. A new week, but alas, same old story
    And I HATE to be DEROGATORY
    HARLEQUIN and PEACOCK
    Were an unpleasant shock
    Is this some kind of pre-purgatory?
  12. Dnk ORPIN, NOYAU, HOOKLET, or duck meaning of HARLEQUIN.

    Liked PREBEND and YUKON.

    13’22”, thanks vinyl and setter.

  13. 48 mins. Held up oddly by the two French words, SACRISTAN (which is a long pastry thingy I see in my bakers everyday) and NOYAU. Just couldn’t see it. LOI DEROGATORY as I was working on old goat for too long. NHO Grandma MOSES, ORPIN or PEACOCK, but bunged them in anyway. Several unparsed so thanks v for the workings. Setter too.
  15. This is the fourth appearance of noyau, if you count jumbos. The last time it came up I said “I have a bottle of noyau. It is about 20 years old and the bottle is nearly full, which is all you need to know about noyau.”
    Still got it, still nearly full ..

    On the subject of Prebends, and Prebendaries, here is a verse by Harry Graham:

    When Mrs Gorm (Aunt Eloise)
    Was stung to death by savage bees,
    Her husband (Prebendary Gorm)
    Put on his veil, and took the swarm.
    He’s publishing a book, next May,
    On “How to Make Bee-keeping Pay.”

    Strictly speaking, the priest is a Prebendary and his benefice or stipend is the Prebend.

    Edited at 2021-02-08 09:50 am (UTC)

    1. I now remember your comment. Shame I didn’t earlier on this morning! I don’t think I’ve ever tasted it, but I’m sure I wouldn’t like it.
  16. 12.38 but guesses for noyau and orpin which were NHOs for me. FOI Moses, LOI emanate having tried initially to place eta at the top. Some nice cluing of which my favourites were prebend and derogatory.
    At least I’ve started the week positively which wasn’t the case last time.
  17. 18 minutes while watching the cricket. I was then told by my daughter’s dog that we were going for a walk in the snow, so there’s been a delay in posting. PEACOCK was a write-in: the TLS training is paying dividends. LOI was the unknown NOYAU. COD to YUKON. A pleasant start to the week Thank you V and setter.

    Edited at 2021-02-08 10:06 am (UTC)

  18. 14.17, so a tad meatier than a Monday simples. HOOKLET gave me pause, because although it’s a simple and obvious enough word, I wasn’t convinced it was also a thing. I’m clearly going to have to get my 2003 CD version of Chambers updated – I’ve managed to transfer it across several computers – which doesn’t have it. I’d miss its many uncomplicated features, though, like the search facilities and anagrams.

    NOYAU looks like the perfect cover for Prebendary Gorm should Mrs Gorm prove unsusceptible to bees. Bitter almonds, eh? If I’ve ever had any, I’ve disposed of it along with the other unwisely purchased local liqueurs that were never going to be consumed in a recent grand clearout.

  19. FOI 6D: PILL
    LOI 2D: HOOKLET

    I estimate time taken would be 30-40 minutes, so a poor showing. A few words (SALAMANDER, RAGAMUFFIN, JAPAN) that I have often and easily used before only seemed to come to mind this morning after an interruption (and possibly aided by a strong cup of tea). I’d heard of GRANDMA MOSES but have never before looked in to who she was.

    Thank you, vinyl1 and the setter

  20. Not a problem with this, fifteen minutes, with coffee and tennis. Didn’t know whether hooklet was a thing, but what else could it be. The rest were things I’d heard of, or thought I had. Noyau liqueur is not that bad, Jerry, put it on ice cream to use it up. Pour off the first glass, though, it might have cyanide in it which rises to the top if left for ages. The stones of the fruits it’s made from can contain hydrogen cyanide. Dorothy L Sayers did a short story about it.
  21. After watching the Superb Owl (as the Times crossword would have it) I’m suffering a bit of Thomas Love myself.
    Otherwise a few unknowns, but very easy nevertheless. Probably the picks were Rotterdam and Addis Ababa, where I needed the cryptic to spell it.
  22. JAPAN was my FOI. NOYAU vaguely remembered from previous puzzles, but I needed the wordplay to fully recall it. I also had to assemble the unknown ORPIN. My biffed SAMARITAN, which messed up RAGAMUFFRN, was soon replaced by SACRISTAN when CATTERY showed up. I seem to remember the SACRISTAN was the guy who looked after the priest’s vestments in the Sacristy. 8d was a write in as one of our regular Zoom folk attendees lives in Warrington, South Island, NZ, and labels herself as Aunty Podean. 22:25. Thanks setter and Vinyl.
  23. Monday fare with rather religious bent, I felt. Could LONG ISLAND be L for LONG followed by I for ISLAND (rather than LI for LONG ISLAND, if you see what I mean) but not sure that L for LONG is cruciverbally acceptable … Thought NOYAU clue was neat; biffed quite a few.
  24. 25m today at a steady pace, with same unknowns (or forgottens) as already mentioned. Longest pause was HOOKLET but happy to find out it was a thing. Thanks, setter and Vinyl. Your music today brought to mind a solo concert of Oistrakh’s in the much lamented and now closed Darlington Arts Centre. I think his wife was on the piano. The ‘hall’ held about 200 at best yet hosted some of the world’s finest — such as Angela Hewitt, Paul Lewis and Martin Taylor.
  25. A sluggish start, middle and finish for a puzzle that, judging from comments, I found trickier than most. 22 minutes.
  26. I accidentally started this under the misapprehension I was doing the QC. Clearly it was pretty Mondayish for the 15×15, as I didn’t spot that it wasn’t until I got to the likes of NOYAU (barely recalled) and ORPIN (not recalled at all but the wordplay was pretty clear, and it sounds a bit like lupin, so why not), at which point I realised the vocab had become a bit esoteric for the quickie.
  27. Relatively easy Monday offering. It is most unusual for me to have to resort to parsing an alcoholic drink but it is nearly always required for plants. My LOI was HOOKLET.
  29. More biffing than I would expect on a Monday: Orpin, Noyau, and Cattery (didn’t twig the accumulator reference). I once saw a fast food place in Wandsworth offering kebabs in pieta bread.

    An intriguing day’s cricket in prospect tomorrow.

  30. I don’t agree that this was particularly easy, with several unusuals/unknowns.

    NHO ORPIN, NOYAU, Grandma MOSES, HOOKLET, HARLEQUIN duck, Thomas Love PEACOCK

    All were gettable with enough checkers and educated guesswork though.

  32. We thought this was pretty straightforward although NHO noyau so we invented noydu!

    FOI: Japan
    LOI: hooklet
    COD: harlequin

    Thanks to the setter and blogger

  33. I thought this was quite hard for a Monday ( always thought that Monday’s 15×15 were less tricky to ease us into the working week…) a few biffs , 27ac for example, hadn’t seen ‘au’ before in a cryptic . Liked 11ac, they are strange creatures, remember seeing some high in the Picos of northern Spain on a walking holiday. Those were the days.
    Biffed orpin , had heard of Thomas Love Peacock.
    Solving interrupted by the cricket. What a treat though.
    At least a finish, always feels good.

    Thank you blogger and setter.

  34. Not too taxing, but a fair bit of biffing. Thanks for introducing Thomas Love Peacock, of whom I had not heard. My brain sent me (briefly) down to the file marked T.S.Eliot.
  35. The usual holdup at the end, SACRISTAN being the guilty party. All the other unknowns had obvious parsing, but just never saw ACRID.
    1. vide is Latin, ‘see!’, imperative of videre. Where ‘video’ comes from…

      Edited at 2021-02-08 03:46 pm (UTC)

  37. A steady solve apart from a few hold ups with unknowns like Orpin, Prebend and Noyau. Sacristan was close enough to sacristy to make it plausible, and it seemed a good fit to the cryptic. Loi was 2d, Hooklet, but only once I had managed to resist the tempting Hooklat(ch). Having lived a sheltered life, 12ac Vamp also took a bit of working out. Invariant
  38. 38 minutes for me. Not fast by blog standards but I’m always happy to complete the 15×15 at all. Would have been quicker if I hadn’t had to correct Rotterdam for Amsterdam – well it is at least a Dutch port.
  39. Fast time (for me) but much guessing …
    .. with all done in 25 minutes, but that included real “hit and hopes” for 27A Noyau, 22D Orpin (both NHO) and LOI 2D Hooklet, which I really didn’t expect to be a real word.

    Much fun, and even if not all parsed, I shall count it as one of my rare 15×15 finishes.

    Many thanks to Vinyl1 for the blog
    Cedric

  40. This took me about 32 minutes, with no real problems and few unknowns (ORPIN, NOYAU). Noyau means “pit” in French and is made from apricot pits, which explains the name. I would like to chime in on the LI discussion. I grew up on Long Island (smack dab in the middle of it, in the town in which Hitler’s English nephew settled after breaking with his uncle and joining the US Air Force!, but I didn’t know that at the time, nor did anyone else). But that was so long ago that I can’t really remember how common the LI abbreviation is. However, the trick I applied was to Google “Eastern LI” and voilà! there are indeed companies and organizations which have that, so abbreviated, in their name — it is not as common as NY for New York or LA for Los Angeles, but certainly used freely when it is convenient.
  41. 13.14 a pleasant and straightforward solve, the only difficulty of my own making when I mis-biffed Amsterdam but Rotterdam wasn’t too long in coming. The whiff of a bygone age about this one.

Comments are closed.