Times 28000 – when we fall on a round number

68 comments on “Times 28000 – when we fall on a round number”

1. I was held up mainly in the NE and SW corners: I didn’t know COCOTTE, and I’d put in BAG at 25ac, which seemed just fine, so it wasn’t until a long time had passed struggling hopelessly with 16d and 18d that I finally thought of TURNSPIT. Luckily, I had just learned here that soccer players dribble, or 26ac might have taken me much longer. I think of a leer as a lecherous look, not a disdainful one. FOI EIGHTSOME REEL, POI COCOTTE, LOI POT. Liked AGGRO.
2. Also slightly slowed by NE and SW, but not for long. Also was thinking FAIRGROUNDS, but looked up from keyboard to screen before typing the S, to check.
   Completely missed the dribblers, wondered what was going on.
   Right on the wavelength and zipped through in 15 minutes against 20 minute average, last one or two spent figuring out STRIP LIGHT. Consequently I liked this a lot 😉 Forgot to look for a 28000 reference, but don’t see any.
3. ….but fair, and took 48 minutes. I was a bit surprised by a flat cap having a peak, but just faithfully followed the cryptic. I also NHO the eightsome reel. FOI, leered, LOI pot.

   I’m pretty certain this one is by Dean Mayer, his style is very distinct.

4. Some relief after yesterday’s toughie (and an even harder one elsewhere) but there were still three new words in EIGHTSOME REEL, COCOTTE and TURNSPIT, fortunately all gettable one way or another. Same comment as Kevin above re LEERED. TANGENT for ‘Very different topic’? Well I suppose so, sort of, maybe.

   Home in 46 minutes. Favourite was the not so simple (without crossers anyway) POT.

   Thanks to setter and blogger

   1. Have you become some strange S American rodent?
      1. Yes, it’s a capybara – I’m one of their biggest fans. I first heard about this here at TftT a couple of years or so ago, but if you want to read a feel-good news story, Google “capybara escape Toronto”.
         1. Did that, interesting. At least it’s not a coypu, or ragondin as they are called in French; those were prolific, all over our golf course, with nasty yellow teeth, like huge rats.
         2. Called carpincha here in Argentina. The Catholic Church in Brazil declared it to be a fish some years ago so that it could be eaten, presumably with chips, by the faithful for whom, presumably, no-legged fish were either too scarce, too expensive or too dangerous.
            1. Thanks. I’ll do as instructed by the eminent Brazilian cardinal(s) and remember that (or maybe not) for Good Friday next year.
               1. I think they’re fish on any Friday!!
5. As per 4dn Kevin, I too had BAG initially at 25ac which later caused a slight hold-up in the SW.

   I was therefore 1 minute over the thirty.

   FOI 10ac CHI – qi to Scrabblelanders

   LOI 27ac TANGENT – I have never liked that peculiar ‘on’ direction; logically to me ‘GENT-TAN’!

   COD 1ac FINICKY also finickety

   WOD 17ac UNMENTIONABLE(s) – you know you know you know!?

   If only ‘they’d’ add the ‘nom’ of the setter, we would know for sure who me (15dn) is! A new ARAUCARIA (Guardian 1970-2013)or even a XIMINES (Observer 1939-71) might emerge and that would be such fun. Why ever not!? Everything else is changing Post-Covid: from Crypto-currencies, VAR to the Zoom-life. The QC is better for it – is it not!? And his Blog lives by it! horryd

   Edited at 2021-06-10 04:57 am (UTC)

6. I’d put in FORCE for 22 Down (with a shrug) and forgot to go back and check it. Oops. First mistake in some time.

   I had FLAT TOP for awhile which made it very hard to see COCOTTE.

   Edited at 2021-06-10 04:34 am (UTC)

7. Most of this went in quickly but then I slowed considerably in the SW corner where I feared I might grind to a halt much like I did yesterday. After “writ” having been the only thing I could think of for document for some time I finally thought of FILE and I was able to mop up the rest. In hindsight FILE for document seems quiet obvious, but isn’t that always the way with solving these things? I didn’t know TURNSPIT but trusted to the cryptic and finally finished with POT, where like others I’d considered “bag”.
8. 47 minutes with at least the last 5 spent on the TURNSPIT / NAIL FILE intersection. Eventually I thought of ‘pit of hell’ and both answers fell into place.

   I also looked twice at LEERED defined as ‘eyed with disdain’ but Collins mentions ‘sneering’ which would seem to cover it.

   Those who watched the hugely successful TV series ‘Peaky Blinders’ will have no difficulty associating peaks with flat caps, the peak being the hard bit at the front that shades the eyes of the wearer. This Wiki article has more on the subject: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peaky_Blinders.

   Dean’s name also popped into my head when I saw a two-word clue to an eleven-letter answer (9ac). However I don’t want to know who the setter is as it influences solvers’ approach and I like to start out with an absolutely open mind. One of the problems is illustrated by comments made in the QC discussions, and Tuesday’s this week was a good example, when some people were quaking in their boots or actually scared off because they saw the setter was Izetti. If they didn’t know this they might find his puzzles not as difficult as all that – or not always. There are plenty of other publications who reveal setters’ names; I say let the Times continue to be different.

   Edited at 2021-06-10 12:49 pm (UTC)

9. As it’s number 28000, and also my birthday, I think it’s about time I stopped lurking on here and said hello! I’m very thankful indeed for this blog and for all the help it’s given me understanding all the answers I biffed – and many I didn’t 🙂

   After finding yesterday’s absolutely brutal, I was on the wavelength for this one, which for me means a time of 20:46 (against an average time, according to the SNITCH, of 29:57 [npweston]).

   Thanks again everyone. Hopefully it won’t be another 28000 crosswords before I post again.

   Edited at 2021-06-10 06:16 am (UTC)

   1. Yes, please don’t leave it so long until next time!
10. Average sort of crossword. Expected something special for 28000. Liked Top left.
11. 25 mins pre-brekker. I agree with others, this did feel Dean-ish.
    Somewhere in the corners of my mind I could convince myself that Cocotte, Cotton Gin and Turnspit were really things.
    Thanks setter and G.
12. Perhaps my poor brain’s had enough
    And i always find Thursday most tough
    I wrote bag; what a twit
    Then MOISTEN wouldn’t fit
    So my finishing time was quite duff
13. Got nowhere with this one today, but just had to try it, seeing as it was number 28000.
    1. Sir, You appear to be having little luck lately – why not revamp your ‘avatar,’ as per my ‘Pendragon tattoo’, which you can easily find on-line. It will strengthen your good fortune. Ed.
    2. If this puzzle is by Dean Mayer, I’m not surprised. Less able solvers find him very difficult, especially if they encounter his unique style for the first time. He does the most with the least, and experienced solvers know that every word in the clue is there for a reason. Look at a clue like 1 down – both very simple and very opaque at the same time.
14. 20:08. DNK TURNSPIT, with that and the subsequent TANGENT holding me up for a couple of minutes at the end. COD to STRIP LIGHT. Nice puzzle.
15. This is so-so common along les Boulevards de Paris et Los Angeles – ‘shirred eggs’. Crack eggs into buttered ramekins. bake in a ‘Bain Marie’ – et voila les ‘œufs en cocotte’. Also Cocottes (coquettes) – high class courtesans in France during La Belle Époque. My word! My COD! My time 9:40

    Edited at 2021-06-10 07:27 am (UTC)

    1. Is there anything else that goes into a cocotte except oeuffs? Nothing springs to mind!
       1. Only add black pepper from ‘le Paul Robeson’.
       2. Depends on which type of cocotte.
          1. Un oeuf is enough….
    2. And here was me thinking coquettes were deep-fried potato balls…
       1. ‘Spudulike’ rather than ‘Pudulike’? How goes Baroness Bakewell?
16. Sneered is a more accurate answer than LEERED, surely LEER is sexual, usually oppressive?

    SW hard, with TURNSPIT LOI. I have seen the string/wire pulley contraptions in heritage houses which made the servant redundant.

    I knew CHI from martial arts, also spelt QI and useful in Scrabble.

    ‘Very’ in the TANGENT clue is unnecessary, and for me misleading. Nho COCOTTE, but now know it’s to do with eggs.

    A fine puzzle, but was also looking for a 28000 link. 28 is the second perfect number.

    21′ 15″, thanks george and setter.

17. (2 to the fifth) × (5 to the third) × 7
18. I’m even more convinced than ever that wavelength is a thing. After yesterday’s debacle I swanned through this one in 14.21. This time the many clever deceptions and oblique (tangential?) references triggered almost instant responses and fell into place.
    I did wonder about LEERED where disdain seemed too distant a concept, but I gather from others here it’s OK.
    I’ll give COD to the long Tube journey with its deceptive capital, which raised another smile.
19. Last time this word showed up in the QC it caused ructions! Why!?
    1. Tricky subject moistness. Probably apocryphal, but I was told that the team working on the Daily Mail diary in the 1980s had dared each other to get the term ‘moist gusset’ into print, and eventually one of them invented the dashing Swiss playboy Moi St Gusset. Tales of Moi’s romantic escapades appeared regularly, until he was killed off in a skiing accident.
       1. Dear M. Gusset, that explains everything beautifully. The diaries’ of so many Fleet Street ‘rags’ contain some lovely tales and truths. I have the entire collection of ‘Atticus’ Sunday Times when Ian Fleming was ‘in the seat’. I was also a contributor to the Grauniad’s seven page ‘San Serife’ hoax – 1 April 1977. We provided some of the ads.

          Edited at 2021-06-10 02:33 pm (UTC)

20. 37 minutes with LOI the unknown COCOTTE assembled from the given ingredients. I didn’t know COTTON GIN either but the plantation reference made it likely. EIGHTSOME REEL solved from the anagram plus expecting a reel. COD to UNMENTIONABLE, if I’m allowed to say it. Quite tricky in places but fair. Thank you George and setter.
21. I thought this was a good test to start off the 28th millennium. My time was also pretty much what I have averaged for the past couple of years: 51-52 mins.
    PRINCELY was my COD today and, for once, I ‘got’ all the clues.
    1. Or, correctly, to conclude the 27th !
       1. It concludes the 28th or starts the 29th.
          1. Ran out of fingers ! It concludes the 28th.

             28001 tomorrow will commence the 29th.

22. Didn’t find this too bad and worked my way around the grid quite comfortably. Only really held up with the two unknowns TURNSPIT and COCOTTE but the cryptic was quite generous for both.

    Again I didn’t know the term COTTON GIN but that was plain enough with most of the checkers in place.

23. 32 mins
    Quite tricky. No 28K refs or ninas 🙁
    Thanks, g.
24. Half the time of yesterday so on wavelength for sure. Impressed by the conciseness (concision?) of so many clues, even if perhaps excess of double defs. LOI TURNSPIT, as others, which took up last 2 mins of my time. Many thanks to setter and blogger.
25. 7:54. I had no problems with this: as z8 says, there’s clearly such a thing as wavelength, whatever the reasons for it may be. I didn’t know TURNSPIT but I did know COCOTTE.
    MER at ‘very different topic’. The whole point about going off at a TANGENT is that it isn’t a very different topic: it’s a related one that just takes you in an unintended direction. But I see that Lexico at least disagrees with me.

    Edited at 2021-06-10 08:58 am (UTC)

    1. Côte de Nuits; sub-region of Burgundy Pinot Noir the sole grape variety.
26. Moderately hard, 32 minutes, ending with TURNSPIT and TANGENT. Agree with above comments re LEERED and the needless misleading VERY in 27a.FINICKY was good.
27. I struggled for a while in the SW corner, but eventually unblocked it with FORTE and then TANGENT. NAIL FILE then convinced me that 16d wasn’t an anagram of hell for o(LD), and MOISTEN allowed the UNMENTIONABLE to drop in, after which TUNRSPIT was inevitable. I then turned my attention to my LOI, the unknown dish, which I concocted from its ingredients. An enjoyable tussle. 34:49. Thanks setter and George.
28. I seem to be in a minority in finding this a fair bit easier than average (if the NITCH were working it’d score me 73). I got 1a straight away and its 4 danglers followed immediately so I was able to build from there, although the grid did seem to make it a solve of 4 near-isolated corners.
29. ….I hit a minor spot of the doldrums in the NE. I got going again with AGGRO, and it fell into place thereafter. Elsewhere, I wasted time trying to justify “force” at 22D.

    FOI AGNOSTIC
    LOI PRINCELY
    COD STRIP LIGHT
    TIME 11:52

    1. Quite a lot of people waste time trying to justify force.
30. A Very enjoyable puzzle, most welcome after yesterday’s battering. Slightly surprised at LEER but fair enough.

    LOI TURNSPIT took an age – How often would someone so employed have to put up with “if you can’t stand the heat…” remarks?

    Thanks to the blogger and setter.

31. At Rockefeller Center
    Now they’re fighting to get in
    They all laughed at Whitney and his COTTON GIN
    They all laughed Fulton and his steamboat
    Hershey and his chocolate bar
    Ford and his Lizzie
    Kept the laughers busy
    Etc. As sung by Ella Fitzgerald
    20.53
    1. A great lyric by Ira Gershwin and music by brother George. First sung by Ginger Rogers in ‘Shall We Dance’. Fred Astaire danced with her (a great routine) but didn’t sing any of it until the short reprise at the close of the film. He later made a solo studio recording and that’s my favourite version of all.
       1. Just watched the Rogers/Astaire version John and it’s lovely. But Fitzgerald’s is the one I know – I often listen to her when I’m cooking. (And sing along if I’m sure no one can hear).
32. Didn’t know COCOTTE, COTTON GIN or TURNSPIT but constructed them from the wordplay. Eventually figured out the anagram for EIGHTSOME REEL. This was certainly a lot easier than yesterday.
33. Another typo here GUN for GIN! And about 40m, missing some obvious ones such as TANGENT for far too long really. Ho hum, always tomorrow. Thank you, setter and blogger today.
34. This had the feel of a Sunday Times cryptic where one gets used to the liberal mix of antiquated words (16D), obscurities (7D), never-heard-ofs clued as long anagrams (14A) and definitions stretched to breaking point (27A). Suffice to say I didn’t enjoy this much.

    SD

35. 16 unknown to me- I think I may have seen it in an AZED. With limited letters available I also put COI at 10.
    Hoping tomorrow’s effort will be better.
36. 13:40 this morning. After missing out on yesterday’s challenge because of other commitments, I guess I enjoyed this puzzle. When I felt I was grinding to a halt a piece of obscure GK would come to my aid and a few more clues would be solved. For example, “Turnspit” is a word I’m sure I’ve picked up over the years solely from doing the Times crossword.
    I too was impressed with the concise and precise clues with nary a word wasted.
    COD 8 d “Princely” which made me smile.
    Thanks glh for the explanatory blog and to the Setter, who I would agree could well be DM
37. Finished (finally)in just under the hour so quite tricky I thought. Had to rush off to golf, so late posting. Just got back. 32 degrees here, phew! FOI FLORAL, LOI TURNSPIT. NHO EIGHTSOME RÉEL, but worked out from the wp. I liked RIGHT WINGER and the conciseness of OUTSTANDING. Also agree the « very » is unnecessary at 27ac. Thank you setter, whosoever you may be and GL.
38. with a goodly nap included. As I am won’t to do these days. TURNSPIT and POT caused most trouble at the end. In fact the SW took about half the time.
    COD STRIP LIGHT which sent me down the wrong rabbit hole
39. 22.54 including a long delay in the SW corner. LOI pot but bit of a guess and the other options seemed even less likely. Strip light took an especial age but I thought it was a very clever clue . Too much time spent wondering if there was some secret in Richmond to Upminster.
    Thx setter and blogger for putting me right not for the first time.
40. I didn’t recognize EIGHTSOME REEL from anywhere, and got it only from the wordplay.
    I did recognize COCOTTE, et ça me fait venir l’eau à la bouche…

    Edited at 2021-06-10 06:29 pm (UTC)

    1. Not suggesting that you should have remembered it (I forget stuff the next day!) but EIGHTSOME REEL was in #27579 in February last year. It was one of the Championship qualifiers.

       Dance crew walk unsteadily after a few (9,4)

       1. …where my comment is first, and about this one, i wrote:
          “NHO the dance, but the cryptic and crossers spelled it out.”

          I should have used it three times in sentences.

41. 32.45. A tricky puzzle and I think I was a little slow on the uptake with some. I liked the uncertain agnostic and the dribbling Tory.
42. I know I’m not very good at these, but I’m amazed at all the comments describing this one as easy! Found it obscure, convoluted, and three-quarters of it impenetrable. Just couldn’t figure out which end was which and thus what I was looking for from the clues. Did manage a wee cluster in the south-east, plus the problematic EIGHTSOME REEL which was – hurrah! – my FOI. I’m with jackkt in preferring the setter to remain anonymous, and his reasoning. I know that when I see Dean Mayer’s name on the Sunday cryptic, I go in with a negative mindset, the feeling that I’ve got no chance. Anyway, thanks to blogger for the explanations.

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