Times 27,965: Hufflepuff Shufflestuff

63 comments on “Times 27,965: Hufflepuff Shufflestuff”

1. Once again I overlooked a typo (GREUHOUND). Otherwise no real problems, especially for a Friday. Didn’t know that CAROM was a US term, nor that ‘cannon’ was a term in billiards. I was held up at 26ac, where I tried BAFFLED at first but of course couldn’t make FAB fit ‘rabbit’ (and I was thinking of the verb ‘rabbit’), not to mention H_B looked very unlikely.
2. Well there you go – did know carom and cannon from billiards, but didn’t connect them – thought a carom must fire large iron balls at soldiers in US. Also realise I failed to parse middle ear… had enough crossers to guess an answer, saw “Cavity heart…” and stopped reading – ear was in the middle of heart – though that doesn’t work. Only hold-up was mentor: the only things I know about Dartmoor are a prison and the Hound of the Baskervilles, I think, took a minute or two at the end. Very quick and un-Friday-like. Liked greyhound, even with an aversion to Spoonerisms, COD to comptroller.

   Edited at 2021-04-30 01:15 am (UTC)

3. I didn’t know Picot or, like isla, that particular connection of carom and cannon. The cryptic were clear, but I still had fingers crossed at submission time. I liked Repeats, Thanks, setter, verlaine.
4. This puzzle was way easier than most Fridays recently. Time Lord Verlain’s 7 minutes gives lie to that! I was over the line in 32 minutes-solved bottom-up. I bet he went top-down!

   Kevin – surely the London Times singers, sitcoms, actors, and so on baffle you too, but you don’t seem to struggle as per the NYT?

   FOI 25dn SAD

   LOI 5a REPEATS (Old Sitcoms)

   COD 8dn SYMMETRY

   WOD 4dn COMPTROLLER

   I thought at first 16dn was PARAMOUR but it wasn’t, but it sure helped at 26ac RUFFLED and not BAFFLED.

   15dn GREYHOUND – are Spoonerisms getting easier?

   1. I struggle enough, but the UK names aren’t as pervasive, and I’ve even remembered a few, like Cilla Black is that the name? or Eric Morecambe. But e.g. the other day there was a Dad’s Army Nina, and I was totally out of it. But luckily the relevant GK wasn’t necessary to solve the clues.
      1. Yes, it’s not really comparable. The NYT (and, I would say, most US setters) aim to be current. The best aim for a mix: one foot in the past, one in the present. I respect what they’re trying to do, but too often it’s a slog. And nothing annoys me more than being unable to finish because of two obscure names crossing.

         With British puzzles, as Kevin says, the handful of names (and even abbreviations and chestnuts like IT and SA) is pretty fixed and reasonable. And while they themselves may have no intrinsic interest, they are used in the service of ingenious wordplay and teaching us peculiar words from our language’s rich history — which more than excuses them in my book.

         1. Interesting debate. As mentioned in a few other posts my grown up kids have used some of their lock down time to start doing the QC but they get frustrated at words/names which their generation have never encountered. Isn’t it reasonable to have a bit of old and new as Jeremy says? There was a Harry Potter reference/word a few months ago about which there were a few adverse comments but if we cavil at one of the most popular current (not even that current now) literary/film phenomena then what chance of The Times growing its crossword readership?
            1. I can only speak for myself but I think it’s a matter of priorities. The best US puzzles try to use words and references which are modern and fresh (mind, some older things can be considered modern and fresh), and they use clues which are similarly snappy and taut — sometimes but not usually misleading.

               On the other hand, the Times cryptic is a celebration of the rich history (present history included) of our language. Most of us learn a word or two or more each time we solve a cryptic. The magic is that we can be taught such words through letterplay, and we sense that the proposed answer is correct through word roots and other general knowledge about our language.

               There’s no reason a cryptic crossword couldn’t also try to use modern, fresh references. A GK-cryptic, if you will. There are probably puzzles like that out there. But for me, there is no substitute for what the Times puzzle tries to do. I look forward to doing the Times puzzle every day because of how it forces me to look at my language in a fresh way, and I hope that this main focus never changes.

            2. The young people I assume are all solving the Guardian puzzle which is (a) a bit more pop-culturey and more importantly (b) free online!
5. ….but a rapid finish got me to 27 minutes. I don’t usually solve Spooners with no crossers, but this one was very easy. I did like tote mic – there’s one for the audio club.

   In answer to DH’s question, I would say that the advantage of cryptics is that they give you a way to arrive at answers you’ve never heard of, if you just trust the wordplay. It doesn’t always work, but I am always surprised at how many solvers with little GK manage to finish.

   1. On the other hand, with the US puzzle you only have to solve half the clues.
6. A nice end to a rare error-free week for me. As for others I was held up on the PICOT/CAROM combination and, knowing neither, trusted the wordplay with fingers crossed.

   Nice blog, V, and thanks for the report on the NYT competition. My American brother-in-law would love me to get into the NYT crossword (just as he has learned to solve the Times Cryptic over the years) but I struggle with the general knowledge required.

   1. I do the NYT daily at breakfast, and I struggle increasingly as more and more clues require knowledge of rap singers, sitcoms, actors, and so on that I’ve never heard of.
      1. Ditto Kevin. I only do it on the weekends and the “novelty” puzzles are quite enjoyable.
      2. Generally the nature of the crossers means that you can get away with not answering *most* of the clues you don’t like, I find. Once in a while I will get an acronym for a US TV channel crossing with an acronym for a US college, though, and throw my hands up in despair…
   2. The SNITCH seems to be acting up again, nothing serious, but you might want to take a look at it.
7. I forgot to note my starting time but this was the easiest Friday puzzle for a while and I know I completed it within my half-hour target and with time to spare.

   It was handy that both NATURAL SCIENCE and TRACTABLE have come up very recently either here or in another publication.

   I didn’t know the ‘flat’ meaning of TABULAR nor what a COMPTROLLER does, but sometimes when wordplay is helpful it’s enough just to know that a word exists.

   Edited at 2021-04-30 05:28 am (UTC)

   1. 18 year old Musician Mike Oldfield produced his first album ‘Tabular Bells’ in 1972. It was roughly a quarter-tone flat, due to faulty recording equipment. It was re-mastered the following year and released as ‘Tubular Bells’.
8. I found this enjoyable but not overly taxing. I didn’t understand REPEATS but having now seen V’s explanation I very much like it — a COD for me. A misspent used playing lots of snooker and dabbling very occasionally in billiards meant I knew CAROM as the American for cannon. More of the same please setter! I look forward to double kiss, swan neck and masse.
9. …Dare frame thy fearful Symmetry?

   20 mins, so quick for me for a Friday.
   DNK Picot or Carom, but they rang bells. Mostly I liked the &Lit anagram.
   Thanks setter and V.

10. 24 minutes with LOI SYMMETRY, which wasn’t fearful at all. WOD to COMPTROLLER.
    who has always sounded much more powerful than a mere controller. COD to REPEATS. Easyish for Friday but with some nice surfaces. Thank you V and setter
11. A TRACTABLE puzzle we had
    I trust no-one’s RUFFLED or SAD
    FREEDOM FIGHTER, for me,
    Wins the best clue TROPHY
    20 minutes for Friday — not bad
12. 32:56 so I needn’t have worried about having a go at a Friday one. The NE corner was the trickiest. Like others, PICOT and CAROM not known but rang bells. Liked TOTEMIC and NODULAR but COD SYMMETRY
13. A silly ‘acrabat’ typo not picked up on the pre-submission check meant this was a 28 minute DNF. A pity as this was a good mix of the easy and not so easy with what I thought was a new word in CAROM, though I now see it’s a variant of ‘carambole’ which I had previously come across (and then had forgotten) a long time ago.

    FREEDOM FIGHTER was my COD – and it seems like a ‘proper’ &lit.

14. Lots in this puzzle which rang bells or sparked memories, which helped with this, for me, fast Friday time.

    Applied to Cambridge in 1972 to do NATURAL SCIENCE and didn’t get in, felt bad about this for many years until I read that only one in five were successful at that time.

    I know that R. Ashwin bowls a CAROM ball, not sure how it works. Incidentally, having watched the first twenty matches I have given up on the IPL — how can they continue during the horrific situation in India?

    Knew about TORs on Dartmoor as in the past large groups of young people would have to be rescued during the Ten Tors challenge.

    Overall an excellent puzzle.

    Thanks verlaine and setter.

    1. I’m in two minds on the IPL, not just because it’s virtually a different sport from “real” cricket, though hugely entertaining, but yes, also because of the horrific progress of covid in India. They have, at least, built in limited pandemic advice to the programmes, cricketing heroes extolling the virtues of hands, face, space and such, and I think there’s something to be said for trying to give a taste of normality, especially in India where T20 cricket is fantastically popular. Clearly letting the crowds back in was a terrible idea (discontinued), but Covid is unremittingly vile and perhaps a little circus to brighten lives isn’t such a bad thing.
    2. Known locally as the Ten Torments.
15. 13:37. This felt harder than my time suggests, perhaps because about half of it went in very quickly. The rest required a focused effort.
    I also misspent a lot of time playing pool and snooker in my youth but I didn’t know CAROM. It looks like the name of a foodstuff (somewhere between carob and cardamom) but the wordplay was very clear.
16. 16.57 so for me a very pleasing time for a Friday. Didn’t start off too brightly with tractable my FOI but gradually got on the wavelength. A lot of good clues I thought including trophy, ombudsman, totemic and stimulant.
    My COD was my LOI tear off- a real head banging moment.

    NHO carom but clear enough from the clue.

    Thanks setter and blogger.

17. Almost the easiest of the week for me, in 15.23
    Sometimes you can get a clue completely wrong and still put in the right letters. CAROM was that clue for me, solved from the wordplay but assumed to be some sort of US firepower, since adopted into cricket as a particularly devious spin delivery. Turns out that’s spelt with two Rs and is derived from an eastern form of tiddledywinks, and (as disclosed here), the CAROM is from billiards.
    I quite liked the Spooner clue, though I’d usually expect the reverse phrase to mean something (town drain, tasted two whole worms), and hay ground, unless the concept of milling comes into it, is just two unconnected words.
    Thanks V, especially for patiently explaining TRATTORIA, which I didn’t.

    Edited at 2021-04-30 08:16 am (UTC)

    1. For ‘Spooner Clue’ read ‘Snooker Cue’!
18. For those who are interested in the American Crossword Championship that Mark G and Verlaine so bravely entered, the results are here, with a video or two to boot. The rather impressive spreadsheet (RR please note!) that a link is provided to, shows that Mark G came 110th out of 1033 entrants, with no errors; and fourth out of those classified as “foreigners” (which category appears not to include V). Verlaine came 216th, still a very creditable result imo. If classed as foreign he would have been the 11th one:

    https://www.crosswordtournament.com/

    1. I was quite displeased with my performance as I essentially did another “DEVONPORT” and hit submit as soon as I’d filled the last square on puzzle 5 without taking the time to check my work — with the result that MANNEQUID was not some kind of centaur, as I’d blearily hoped, but a glaring error. This discombobulated me enough that I went on to submit puzzle 6, unaccountably, without even filling in all of the clues. Completely on tilt! I should’ve been in the top 200 too.
       1. Pff, practice hard and do better next time, eh?
          I btw cannot even begin to imagine the sheer terror that would grip me, in a similar situation; which I therefore avoid at all costs. And remain in awe, of those willing to put themselves in harm’s way ..
19. Fairly straightforward for a Friday, I thought.

    Is a MUL(e) a drug dealer, or just a carrier as the name implies? My knowledge of drug cant is very limited; and most of what I do know comes from The Times crosswords, which I sometimes think have a rather unhealthy liking for illegal drugs

    Thank you for the blog, V, and very well done in that nightmare competition..

    1. Yes a mule is a carrier, sometimes (rarely) unaware (but in my experience nearly always claiming lack of guilty knowledge.)
       Andyf
    2. I agree. I never heard of mule as a drug dealer, and it doesn’t make much sense. A mule is a beast of burden that has no conception of the value of its load.
       1. Mm, mule as a “dealer” doesn’t quite work now you make me think about it — though it’s clearly part of the drug operation. A dealer by association, perhaps.
          1. If a mule started dealing the drugs they were carrying, their existence would be brutally terminated.

             They get a fee, on condition that they produce the drugs at the other end, and that they don’t get caught.

20. FOI: FREEDOM FIGHTER
    LOI: REPEATS

    Enjoyable – I DNK (or perhaps had only vaguely encountered) PICOT but relied on the wordplay.

    Thank you to verlaine and the setter.

21. Like many others, I winged it for picot and carom but felt pretty confident they were right. Straightforward for a Friday, though maybe Fridays ain’t what they used to be. My OED says that carom (and variant carrom) are abbreviations of Carambole, which meant the stroke at billiards. Cannon is a corruption of carom. So we have the corrupted form, and the Americans are closer to the original.
22. 9:43 Easily my quickest Friday finish this year. FOI and COD to REPEATS, although I liked the &lit and spoonerism too.
23. I didn’t really know PICOT or CAROM, but trusted the wordplay for both. TRAIL also went in with a bit of a shrug, as the rail bird hasn’t yet lodged itself in my brain. I was worried that 20d would be referring to a specific Dartmoor landmark that I couldn’t think of, but eventually the penny dropped that it was a more general one and MENTOR was the answer. This was an enjoyable workout, considerably more straightforward than other Fridays.

    FOI Run
    LOI Mentor
    COD Repeats

24. An easier Friday but an enjoyable challenge. The fairly straightforward Freedom Fighter and Natural Science getting things under way nicely. Carom was new to me. COD Comptroller.

    Odd that the term Hire Purchase (HP) seems to have disappeared while, presumably, the practice still exists.

    Thanks to verlaine and the setter.

    1. I guess most people use credit cards these days.
       1. The difference is that with a credit card, you buy the item and then have a residual debt with the card provider. With HP on the other hand, you do not legally own the item until the debt has been fully paid off, and it can be reclaimed if you don’t keep the payments up. Not surprisingly, given the choice credit cards are usually preferred.
          This form of purchase is still quite common with cars, but dealers consider HP a demeaning term, so use “Finance Agreement” or similar, instead ..
          1. Yes I remember the “demeaning” sense of it. People talked dismissively of buying things on the “never never”.
25. Biffers beware… I biffed several, particularly when I realised I was on for a decent Friday time. Unfortunately that included CAFETERIA at 21a before I realised it was TRATTORIA… but somehow ended up with a mish-mashed TRATTERIA. Bah. 5m 28s with that error.

    Nice &lit at 14a.

26. Kept thinking, I must have the day of the week wrong. Thought CAROM was ubiquitous in crossword circles, one of those words that stick in the brain.
27. An elegant and gentle crossie that didn’t seem at all like a Friday offering. Slow to start in the NW but no hold-ups once underway, apart from the avian RAIL. 22 minutes.
28. Just on the hour so I’m happy with that. Quite tricky in parts. I wrote the letters down for 8d and thought, that can’t be a word, surely. LOI.

    I liked the Spoonerism but I agree that Hay ground is a bit of a push. Although I know the cannon term (World snooker championships on Brit TV at the moment) I didn’t know CAROM. Luckily the wordplay was generous. COD NODULAR. Odd word but fun sounding. Nothing like a nice module! RUFFLED never parsed so thanks V for that.

29. You can play a CAROM (also known as an in/off) in croquet and a wicked shot it is. For some reason my fingers typed in the surfer-speak “tubular” at 2d. Congrats to the UK competitors in the NY Times crossword prom. I shirked it. 17.56 with a pink square – first in a while.
30. An Indian friend and I used to play a game on a square wooden board with pockets for the draught-sized pieces which he called CAROM. i didn’t know it was also a billiard term.

    Otherwise agree that this was pretty easy for a Friday.

31. Steady solve, about 20 mins.
    Didn’t know carom, but the wp was generous.
    Thanks, v.
32. Pleased to finish a Friday puzzle without any issues. Similar experience to others wrt “Picot” and “Carom”.
    My thought process went Treatable then Traceable until finally seeing Tractable.
    Thanks for the blog.
33. With just over 30 entries today I and one other share the wooden spoon with 32 minutes!

    Is not that some kinda record for a Friday!?

    Sincerely, well done everyone.

    meldrew

    Have I become the 15×15’s Mr. Wyvern?

34. Another one. Ho hum. Never the easiest tapping away on an iPhone (other makes available) and I can’t be bothered to do the 30 secs check at the end

    Otherwise a steady sort of solve bottom up as per normal. As others have said for CAROM PICOT and REPEATS

    Once recited that Tyger poem for a Third Year school English competition or something. Annoying teacher called Mr Unsworth who didn’t like jumped up 14 year olds (understandably). We successfully wound him up by rhyming symmetry with eye at which he banished us from the competition and gave me an appalling mark for my next assignment. Serves me right. But every time I see the word SYMMETRY I’m immediately transported back to Newcastle RGS in 1980…

    Thanks setter and Verlaine

    1. If you’d told me that they pronounced “eye” to rhyme with “flea” in Newcastle I would have believed you…

       Enjoy this American TV atrocity: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fwVhI4O8ecE

       1. That is truly an abomination to end abominations. Absolutely love it!

          When I first took my wife to the NE (or is that took my first wife) to see my folks we took a taxi for the 15 minutes to my parents’ house. I happily chatted to the cabbie as you do. She turned to me as the cab departed to confirm she hadn’t understood a single word he’d said. Happy days. No connections up there now but obviously stuck with supporting the Toon. Haway the lads *in a rather resigned voice*

    2. That wasn’t your fault, it was Apple’s … hidden algorithm .. they don’t like their users starting to feel they are in control of things 😉
35. A leisurely but pleasant meandering solve, sleepy after golf and while watching snooker; all done in 40 minutes or so with 22d my LOI the only one not quite parsed. Lovely puzzle with not a bad clue and a little easier than usual Fridays.
36. Not the most testing Friday, but another in this week’s series of puzzles which have been interesting without being too obscure. Based on what I discover from the aficionados here, I think I may be too old to add US crosswords to my skillset, so I shall stay in my lane.
37. 12.25 a very good time for me today, quicker than a few folks who are usually light years ahead of me, and nothing to scare the hack possiblys. I think it helped that I saw freedom fighter and natural science pretty quickly. Others have already mentioned the very enjoyable game carrom which I came across and played several times in India. The word carom cannot help but call it to mind. Has there ever been a class of 13 year olds in the UK that has refused to force symmetry to rhyme with eye when reading Tyger Tyger aloud?

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