Times 28011 – assemble from the blue and yellow store.

Author   piquetPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
Solving this, I found it somehow frustrating and at times annoying, but when I came to blog it I wondered why, there’s nothing really unfair or obscure, even if some of the definitions are a stretch. It all has a sort of old-fashioned feel about it, with 8d, 11a, 22a, 6d, and 5a perhaps helping that idea. I didn’t much like 5d, 15a or 28a, with clunky surfaces and obtuse answers, but I did enjoy 19a, 22a eventually, and 20d.

Across
1 Fitting in again with leader of military ceremony (7)
BAPTISM – APT (fitting) inside BIS (again) add M the leader of military.
5 Cooler dance venue where lovers get together (3,4)
FAN CLUB – simple, and a slightly misleading definition, but it took me ages to stop wanting ICE as the first word and not keeping dance and venue as one idea. FAN is a cooler, and CLUB is a dance venue.
9 One may invest in more rococo houses (9)
FINANCIER – FANCIER (more rococo) ‘houses’ IN.
10 New money must include a plutocrat (5)
NABOB – N (new) BOB (shilling, money) insert A.
11 Boastful fixing end component where screwdriver may be had? (8,5)
COCKTAIL PARTY – COCKY (boastful) has TAIL (end) then PART (component) inserted (fixing).
13 Track to follow round peaks where fruit grows (8)
ORANGERY – O (round) RANGE (peaks) RY (track, railway).
15 Give a ring to prince returning figure welcomes (6)
ENHALO – ONE returning = ENO, insert prince HAL. Not a word I knew but it does exist.
17 Wave very gently, upset about that (6)
RIPPLE – PP = very softly, as in music, insert into RILE – upset. I guessed the answer before seeing why.
19 A little work in green grass pile (8)
LIMERICK – LIME (green) RICK (pile of grass). Cue comments with limerick examples. I can only think of rude ones, like “there was a young lady from Bude…” Oh, and I like this one, not rude.
There was a young woman called bright,
Whose speed was faster than light.
She set out one day,
in a relative way,
And returned on the previous night.
22 Travelling off, I repeatedly wintered in port? (9,4)
FORTIFIED WINE – how long did you spend thinking about a seaside city with two words? Not as long as me, possibly. But no. (OFF I I WINTERED)* is the anagram.
25 Period of waiting in car without book (5)
LIMBO – insert B into LIMO.
26 I’m going to answer guy that’s awkward (3,2,4)
ILL AT EASE – I’LL (I’m going to), A (answer) TEASE (guy).
27 German’s relative has handy habit around food (7)
YIDDISH – DIY a handy habit, reversed = YID, DISH = food. Oy vey.
28 Old hand in part shepherds one learner: it may bear fruit (3,4)
OIL PALM – well we’ve all heard of palm oil, and not surprisingly it comes from the fruit of the OIL PALM, but it’s not a tree bearing fruit you think of instantly. O for old, I L one learner, PALM part of hand.

Down
1 Hit cover of Bellini at thunderous volume? (4)
BIFF – BI (outside of Bellini) FF (very loud). My FOI.
2 Aide receiving a service and fabulous treatment (7)
PANACEA – P.A. (aide) has AN ACE (a service in tennis) inserted.
3 Kind of bond that’s archetypal, caught only once (5)
IONIC – ICONIC = archetypal, lose one of the C’s. Ionic as opposed to covalent.
4 Wet suit off, with further clothing (8)
MOISTURE – MORE (further) has (SUIT)* inserted.
5 Official recalled film full of hot passion (6)
FERVID – REF = official, recalled > FER; VID = film. I don’t much like vid for film, Collins says it’s short for video, which 30 years ago may have meant a movie you rent, but I’ll have to put up with it.
6 Born writer tucked into tasty bit of bread once (9)
NINEPENCE – NE (born, French masculine) PEN (writer) inside NICE = tasty.
7 Left part of Europe for part of Africa (7)
LIBERIA – L, IBERIA. Chestnut time.
8 Attire for teen, one on beat boxes (10)
BOBBYSOCKS – annoyingly simple, but another that took me an age. BOBBY one on beat, SOCKS = boxes. Collins has “ankle-length socks worn by teenage girls, especially in the U.S. in the 1940s”.
12 Second lot of ashes likely emptied with sadness (10)
MOURNFULLY – MO (second) URNFUL (a lot of ashes) LY (likely emptied).
14 I see rifle almost raised in WWI campaign (9)
GALLIPOLI – all reversed; I, LO (see) PILLAG(E) = rifle almost.
16 Abroad, plonk last of bread on potato curry (8)
VINDALOO – VIN (plonk abroad) D (last of bread) ALOO (English-Indian word for potato, originally Hindi); curry, vinegary, very hot, delicious but always gives me hiccups.
18 It’s a wonder Biblical figure blocks sink up (7)
PYRAMID – All reversed; DIP (sink) with MARY inside.
20 Art of homeware dealer hemming raised collar (7)
IKEBANA – IKEA that blue and yellow store (which I hate visiting)  has NAB reversed inside. Ikebana is the Japanese art of flower arranging.
21 Perhaps put polish on or polish off (6)
FINISH – double definition.
23 Dope‘s home telephone (5)
INTEL – IN (home) TEL(ephone).
24 Wave combination in pools (4)
PERM – double definition, a wavy hairstyle and a permutation of options in (e.g. football) pools.

69 comments on “Times 28011 – assemble from the blue and yellow store.”

  1. I very much enjoyed this, although I took an hour and a quarter to finish it. None of the across answers went in on first reading (BIFF was my FOI), and like so many others I had PERM as my LOI. And actually, I can understand our blogger’s comments on the puzzle: ENHALO is very strange, for example, and when I saw BOBBY SOCKS I wondered if all of the setters are as old as I am. But there were many things to chuckle at: the URNFUL in 12 dn, LIMERICK as a “little work” appearing all of a sudden from the wordplay, IKEBANA and VINDALOO with its foreign plonk. So thank you, setter.
  2. Slower than it deserved I feel in retrospect. LOI Perm. Of course evening solves are always going to be slower, cos of tiredness,
  3. I normally don’t do the crossword until late afternoon at the earliest so I don’t usually comment. But I seem to have been somewhere on the right wavelength with only the SE delaying me – like others the lime rick was my LOI when I got the clue in the right order.
  4. Another half-done effort after an hour of…effort. But the comments above tell the same old story – I’m just not good enough yet at the wordplay of too many clues. FOI BIFF, which made me smile since it’s my general MO. LOI an uncertain YIDDISH since I only have the Y, the D and the second I. Reading the comments I was on the right lines for MOURNFULLY, just hadn’t got there yet. Maybe with a break and another hour but really, who has that kind of time?

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