Times 28029 – quatorze juillet, and a storming crossword.

Author   piquetPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
Once again our mystery setter has delivered the goods, I think, with a very enjoyable and erudite puzzle; it does require a little GK (1a, 4d, 19a, 24a, 16d) but there’s almost nothing my 11 year old granddaughter would consider obscure. (I think!). I did have trouble parsing 12a, and haven’t yet fully understood how 21d works, but the answers are obvious enough. Happy Bastille Day! Santé!

Across
1 Sausage trimmed in small rooms in Manhattan home (3,6)
LOS ALAMOS – SALAM(I) inside LOOS (small rooms). Not a condo in New York, the home of the Manhattan project in WWII. Clever.
6 Snare left like this (5)
LASSO – L, AS SO = like this.
9 Nose back to side of road shortly in banger (7)
KNOCKER – CONK (nose) reversed, KER(B) = side of road shortly.
10 Give a lift to employment, packing pair in somehow (7)
UPRAISE – USE = employment, insert (PAIR)*.
11 Sacred text I removed from clothes drawer (5)
SUTRA – SUIT = clothes, remove I, add RA for artist, drawer. Sutras are ancient Hindu sacred texts, the only one I’ve come across is the KAMA SUTRA which tells you all you need to know.
12 Boots may be showing lout in a bad light (9)
HOBNAILED – a HOB is an old word for a lout, amongst other meanings (says Collins); (IN A)*, LED = light (light emitting diode).
13 A measure of money — coins not initially sufficient for good book (5)
MICAH – M1 is somethig to do with money supply in economics; CA(S)H is coins without S (initially sufficient). Micah is the sixth of the twelve minor prophets books of the Old Testament.
14 Trace reported fault with steering device (9)
SCINTILLA – double homophone; SCIN sounds like SIN (fault) and TILLA sounds like TILLER of a boat.
17 Hunger — it’s terrible, no doubt (4,5)
SURE THING – (HUNGER ITS)*.
18 Pine produces this flower, cut to take home (5)
ROSIN – ROS(E), IN = home.
19 Make an accurate plan of PM’s residence (9)
CHARTWELL – Where Churchill lived. CHART WELL = make an accurate plan of.
22 In husband’s absence, warm through and polish off (3,2)
EAT UP – HEAT UP loses H.
24 Don’t start stupid song about Shakespeare’s country (7)
ILLYRIA – (S)ILLY, AIR (song) reversed. Illyria in Shakespeare was the fictionalised setting for Twelfth Night, in ancient times it was on the Adriatic coast of the Balkan area.
25 Red slogan I must follow, and join in (7)
CHIANTI – CHANT = slogan (?) insert I and add I.
26 That is nothing for a fool to admit (2,3)
TO WIT – insert O (nothing) into TWIT.
27 Appointed period in which to put name on back of certificate (9)
DESIGNATE – DATE = period, insert E (back of certificate) and SIGN (put name on).

Down
1 Satisfies thirst — not principally in their water? (5)
LAKES – SLAKES = satisfies thirst; drop the S.
2 Wear short muffler, one that goes with a zip (6,3)
SPORTS CAR – SPORT (wear), SCAR(F) = short muffler.
3 Willingly enjoy drink of spirits (4,1,4)
LIKE A SHOT – double definition, one colloquial.
4 Island outlet stocks French wine ready to be drunk (7,8)
MARTHAS VINEYARD – MART (outlet) HAS VIN (French wine) (READY)*. Easy one for Transatlantic chums.
5 At first, snipping cascading black hair presents obstacles (9,6)
STUMBLING BLOCKS – S(nipping) TUMBLING (cascading) B(lack) LOCKS (hair).
6 Burden almost overwhelms Catholic poet (5)
LORCA – RC inside LOA(D) = burden almost. Spanish poet killed by Nationalists in the Spanish Civil War.
7 Son is going to drink a lot (5)
SWILL – S(on) WILL = is going to.
8 Too tense thus at the bank? (9)
OVERDRAWN – &lit.
13 One taking pains to enjoy Russian resort: nuts about it (9)
MASOCHIST – MAST = nuts (of beech tree); insert SOCHI, resort beloved of Mr Putin.
15 Sailor receiving heartless victimisation (9)
TARGETING – TAR = sailor, GET(T)ING = receiving, heartless.
16 Italian bombing has caught American ship — it sank (9)
LUSITANIA – insert US into (ITALIAN)*.
20 Smouldering with rage, at heart depressed (5)
AGLOW – AG = rage at heart; LOW = depressed.
21 Turning up, bang on about leader of Rat Pack (5)
TAROT – this looks like TO(R)AT reversed, R being the leader of Rat. But how does TOAT mean bang on? My dictionaries say it is an alternative spelling of TOTE, but that makes me none the wiser. Enlighten me!
Thanks to jackkt and others for pointing out it’s TO A T as in “it fits me…”.
23 Prepare to paint very formal European (5)
PRIME – PRIM = very formal, E(uropean).

​

72 comments on “Times 28029 – quatorze juillet, and a storming crossword.”

  1. Fun crossword which I thought I was on-wavelength for. But I made a careless mistake putting RESIN instead of ROSIN. I was a bit confused by MAST since I didn’t know they were nuts, but SOCHI was obvious enough. Since I did Twelfth Night for O-level many years ago, no problem with ILLYRIA.
  2. That was hard. But enjoyable. All I can say is your 11-y-o granddaughter would leave me in the dust… lots unknowns for me: hob, Illyria as Shakespearean or even as a place, Micah, Chartwell, Martha’s Vineyard (well-known) being an island, mast. We’ve had mast as nuts before, but I’d forgotten it; we’ve had Martha’s Vineyard before but I can’t remember if it was clued as an island. There were some really smooth and simple clues that seemed impenetrable at first, e.g. SUTRA. Maybe just too early in the morning for me.
    LOI Chianti, after finally seeing the misspelled targettin
    COD Knocker
    Thanks setter and blogger.
  3. I notice that Google haven’t celebrated with the usual art banner! Mr. Macron……..?

    FOI 6ac LASSO

    LOI 1ac LOS ALAMOS – but only ‘cos I had HAVE A SHOT at 3dn throughout, instead of TAKE A SHOT!

    COD 19ac CHARTWELL – the House at ‘Pooh Corner’

    WOD 14ac SCINTILLA

    There is hard mast and soft mast – where I come from it is simply pig food.

    I suspect that HOBNAIL and HOBGOBLIN are related — as louts.

    My time was 49 minutes

    Edited at 2021-07-14 05:04 am (UTC)

  4. I suspect there were (will be) a few more RESINs besides Paul; I started with it but could make nothing of RES. No idea how MICAH worked. I biffed MARTHA’S VINEYARD, needing some checkers plus the VIN before I saw it, LOS ALAMOS, and STUMBLING BLOCKS, parsing them post-submission. A number of clever clues, eg LOS ALAMOS, MASOCHIST, SUTRA, TAROT.
  5. To a T.

    Well for me this was the hardest 15×15 for weeks. I can’t say exactly how long as I don’t keep records of these puzzles, only the QCs. I finished in 86 minutes but only because I gave up and used aids for my LOI, CHIANTI, and I was rather sorry I did as I should have considered that sort of ‘red’ but it hadn’t occurred to me. I was getting absolutely nowhere with the wordplay even with all the checkers in place and I had run out of steam by that time.

    I enjoyed the puzzle though despite its difficulty (for me). I was helped a little along the way by knowing HOB as a lout, which I met for the first time within the past week, presumably not here or it wouldn’t be unknown to our blogger, so perhaps it was in the Everyman or Guardian which I now do daily. I have to admit that applies to TO A T also.

    I believe ROSIN is the spelling used by string-players for the stuff they put on their bows and in that context I knew it as a child long before I came across the ‘E’ spelling

    I had no idea how the first bit of MICAH worked, but I knew of the book of the bible. And I was baffled by the wordplay in MASOCHIST although now it has been pointed out, I remember coming across ‘nuts = MAST’ before. I have never heard of OCHI despite my Russian heritage.

    Apart from CHIANTI, LOS ALAMOS held me up for longest having been completely distracted by the Manhattan reference, not that I have ever been to the island but one of my closest friends lives there and we correspond daily so from her writings I feel I know the place pretty well.

    Edited at 2021-07-14 05:33 am (UTC)

    1. I remembered ROSIN from my childhood playing (badly) the violin. In baseball, pitchers use a ROSIN bag, a small canvas bag filled with rosin powder, to keep their hands dry.
      Didn’t we have HOB here recently, as ‘yokel’?
      1. Yokel sounds familiar which doesn’t really equate with ‘lout’ I think, but my misremembering got me to the answer and near enough the parsing so that’s all that matters. Previously I had known ‘hob’ only as a mischievous spirit as in Hobgoblin – an excellent brand of English ale by the way.

        Edited at 2021-07-14 06:16 am (UTC)

    3. Thanks for the To A T, that makes tarot much clearer and I’m now kicking myself I didn’t see through the cluing!
  6. Looked hard initially but managed to get a foothold by starting “down south”. I avoided the potential ‘resin’ trap and finished in 42 minutes. I had no idea about the MI bit of MICAH and the parsing of HOBNAILED also defeated me.

    Wrong country and ten days late for their Independence Day, but I liked the USA related LOS ALAMOS (good misdirection) and MARTHAS VINEYARD answers. I wondered if it might be the anniversary of Chappaquiddick but that’s not for another 4 days.

    Thanks to blogger and setter (and to previous crosswords for helping with TO A T).

  7. To a T! Thankyou Jack. I put TAROT in early at 21d, but then took it out again as I couldn’t parse it. It ended up as LOI still unparsed. We’ve had this construction before, but I’d forgotten it.
    19:08
  8. I found this tricky, and it felt a little forced here and there. I am another Resin. I lost time due to a vague memory of a Shakespeare connection to Arcadia, and the obvious “aria” bit sucked me in. Mostly I liked Los Alamos and Chianti, and was chuffed that I saw Micah and Sutra quickly. thx pip and jackkt

    Edited at 2021-07-14 04:41 am (UTC)

  9. Tough and enjoyable. I was helped by knowing LOS ALAMOS and MARTHA’S VINEYARD. Thanks Jack for helping with TO A T!
  10. I feel like I dodged two bullets today. Firstly I managed to avoid the temptation of RESIN. If the parsing hadn’t come to me quickly I reckon I’d have been suckered into that one. Secondly I finished with an unparsed SUTRA. Although I’ve heard of the Kama Sutra I’ve not seen SUTRA on its own before which gave me some doubt. As for the parsing I thought there was a word meaning “clothes drawer” — “sutira” maybe? — which was unknown to me, leading me to just throw SUTRA in and submit. A lucky escape!
  11. Still somewhat inexperienced, but making progress towards holding my head up amongst the illustrious solvers here. I previously reported a PB of 41m, but Saturday I recorded 32:03!

    Instead of frittering my life away in front of the flickering screen, I tend to allow an hour before declaring DNF and checking this page to reveal what I didn’t work out. Switched a week ago from folded paper and favourite pen to the online puzzle, and I think that helps significantly. At least it enables me to correct my mistakes neatly without the dreaded overwrites…
    …on the subject of which, I was delayed today by falling into the 3d TAKE A SHOT trap, preventing me from getting 1a for a long time. Must remember to use the handy electronic pencil, because I knew I wasn’t really convinced when I wrote it in.

    Started this one off pretty strongly, but the euphoria tailed off as I got bogged down without 1a or the two 15-char down clues. Was fully on-course for DNF until I fixed 1a – after that, it all fell into place.

    Time 51:56 / FOI SCINTILLA, LOI TARGETING.

    Onwards! Best wishes, Denise

    1. I don’t think we’re all that illustrious, Denise. Not in my case, certainly.
  12. 37:24
    We had resin/rosin not long ago – I fell into the trap then, but was alert to it this time. Great puzzle.
    Thanks, pip.
  13. 41 minutes with LOI KNOCKER. I still occasionally use konk for nose in memory of my Dad who always called it that. I didn’t parse MICAH or TAROT. Very tough crossword but one which played to my knowledge base. COD to LOS ALAMOS for the penny drop moment, not that I’m sure Oppenheimer’s achievements should be celebrated. Thank you setter for making me feel good, and Pip for the two missing explanations.

    Edited at 2021-07-14 11:22 am (UTC)

    1. With respect, the clue does not celebrate Oppenheimer’s achievement. The alternative would have been an American invasion of the Japanese mainland. You just have to kesee the footage of the Okinawa invasion to appreciate the cost in lives, both Japanese and American. The probability of mutual assured destruction has kept a fragile peace in Europe and indeed the world for more than seventy years.
      1. It was the penny drop moment celebration that I was thinking was perhaps off key.
  14. 15 mins so much quicker than yesterday for me. I thought this was a really good puzzle, los alamos, marthas vineyard and masochist to the fore. I would have added knocker if I’d actually worked it out but I guessed it from the crossers. Took a punt on tarot only because of the pack reference, these alternative but arcane spellings make life very much harder!

    Thanks setter and blogger particularly for offering enlightenment that I never would have achieved on my own!

  15. Much enjoyed this crossword, tricksy but fun.
    how irksome for poor Micah, to be classed as a “Minor Prophet,” and thus miss out on the big time. Who could have predicted that? Not him, anyway ..
        1. Operating at the prophet margin.
          Trying to achieve the designation of ‘major’ was known in the trade as the prophet motive.
          I’ll get my coat.

          Edited at 2021-07-14 01:02 pm (UTC)

  16. …like others I fell into the RESIN trap.
    Thank you Pip (and Jack) for HOBNAILED, MICAH, DESIGNATE and, particularly for TAROT.
    COD to MARTHA’S VINEYARD. The author Geraldine Brooks set her novel “Caleb’s Crossing” largely on that island. The Caleb in question was the first Native American to graduate from Harvard.
        1. Sorry I was showing off that I’d been watching Clarkson’s Farm! His simple-wise sidekick is a wonderful young man called Caleb, who has apparently now become famous as well.
  17. I’m afraid I don’t understand this one. Why is ‘their water’ equivalent to ‘lakes’? Could some kind soul enlighten me?
    All done in 32m, very enjoyable but quite tricky. Thanks setter and Pip.
    1. It isn’t really: the clue is a semi-&Lit where you have to read the definition as the whole clue, indicating something like ‘you probably wouldn’t want to drink out of this’.
      2. Most of Manchester’s water supply comes from Thirlmere, but I stick to bottled.
  18. Solved mostly with help from my teenage daughter, explaining things along the way, hence a slightly raised time.

    I have set some target times for myself e.g. for a NITCH of 110, I should be aiming to complete in 40 minutes or less — obviously other solvers may have their own targets.

    NITCH TARGET
    50 10 mins
    60 15 mins
    70 20 mins

    ….and so on up to

    150 60 mins

    Anything over 150 and I’d be happy just to finish!!

    Didn’t know ILLYRIA — though thought I’d heard of it — nor MICAH, and did not know the significance of LOS ALAMOS — every day’s a schoolday.

    Good puzzle.

  19. 23:36 but with RESIN. I found this rather tricky with many of the clues holding for quite a while, although I finished with a rush with my last few once I got the checkers. DNK CHARTWELL or LOS ALAMOS and had no idea how HOBNAILED, my LOI, worked. Thanks Pip and setter.
  20. Resin did for me, as many others from the leader board, which shows numerous 580s including some illustrious names. I assumed there was a river or plant I didn’t know called RES-. As so often, shrugs end in the pink.

    A shame, since I greatly enjoyed this and felt very pleased to have ‘finished’ in under 40 minutes. Thank to the clever setter: you win! And to Pip for unpicking the unknowns and explaining all.

  21. I don’t think I have felt deja vu so much in a crossword for a long time. No idea if the setter is re-running some of his old favourites or re-using chestnutty bits of clues. Mind you, it didn’t improve my time. Liked MASOCHIST. Lots of (beech)MAST on the chalk in Wiltshire.
  22. 8:05, but with RESIN. I didn’t know that ROSIN was made from pine or I might have hesitated, but I just assumed there must be a river somewhere that would fit RES_. There probably is somewhere.
    I didn’t find this hard but it is absolutely chock-full of general knowledge. If your granddaughter is familiar with the location of the Manhattan Project, SUTRA, HOB, the technical term for money in circulation, MICAH, SCINTILLA, ROSIN, Churchill’s home, the finer details of Twelfth Night, CHIANTI, MARTHA’S VINEYARD, LORCA, MAST, SOCHI, and the fate of the LUSITANIA she is without doubt the most erudite 11-year-old in the country!

    Edited at 2021-07-14 08:08 am (UTC)

    1. Yes, I’m with you on the assessment of Pip’s granddaughter!

      I found the crossword fun, but had to work hard to sort out most of those references. Thankfully I did manage to avoid to RESIN/ROSEN trap.

      1. I just tested this with my own 12-year old and starting with the very first clue he has never heard of the phrase ‘the smallest room’ or LOS ALAMOS, never mind the Manhattan Project!

        Edited at 2021-07-14 08:15 am (UTC)

  23. Completed, but a biff fest: LOS ALAMOS, the ‘ker’ in KNOCKER, the ‘drawer’ in SUTRA, HOBNAILED, MICAH and the ‘mast’ in MASOCHIST all passed me by either entirely or in part in terms of how they worked. I’ve also heard of MARTHAS VINEYARD and ILLYRIA without knowing what or where they were. On the plus side, I managed to avoid the ‘Rosin’ trap.

    FOI Lusitania
    LOI Tarot
    COD Los Alamos

  24. we have Martha’s Vineyard, Illyria Township-Iowa, Los Alamos NM, Chartwell- Bel Air Ca, Lusitania Ave Harvey La and there are the townships of Rosin Hills in Arkansas and North Carolina. Just sayin’. Scintilla Or has long gone. COD 3dn
  25. Found this hard and doubted I would finish. But I persevered and I got there in about an hour, save for the mistake at 18ac. I thought of ROSIN but assumed that it had to be RESIN. Oh well.

    Didn’t know 1ac LOS ALAMOS, NHO HOB for lout, MAST for nuts or MICAH. Took me too long to come up with 25ac CHIANTI for ‘red’, when I had failed only yesterday with the wine / white clue.

  26. 35m but had to check some of the references post solve — my gk definitely lacking around the US references, money supply and hobs. Quite a lot of blind guessing on the letters and the enumeration — TAROT for example. Thanks, Pip, for the explanations and setter for the challenge.
  27. …gets you a pink square.

    Very enjoyable puzzle. Joint COD MARTHA’S VINEYARD & LOS ALAMOS. Will drown my sorrows later with a glass of rosé as it’s July 14th.

    Thanks to Pip and the setter.

  28. This felt like it took longer than it did. No problem with SUTRA and ROSIN and the other little traps, though I did triumphantly write in KERBOOM before overwriting it rather less triumphantly 10 minutely later. Had never heard of the yobby HOB either. 25 mins.
  29. A most enjoyable puzzle for which I had most of the requisite GK. LAKES was FOI, rapidly followed by LOS ALAMOS, as I hit lucky with my first thoughts for smallest rooms and sausage. Only twigged the Oppenheimer connection later. PDM! MARTHAS VINEYARD and TAROT were my last 2 in, although proof reading revealed that I’d mis-spelt LUCITANIA, and so my guess at RICIN foe 18a had to be revisited. Happily my first rethink to RESIN, was immediately rethunk to ROSIN. 37:08. Thanks setter and Pip.
  30. Micah is a ‘minor’ prophet because his book is short. The three ‘major’ prophets Isaiah, Ezekiel, Jeremiah have the longest books. This is a Christian classification, which does not occur in the Hebrew Bible.

    Really liked SCINTILLA and MASOCHIST.

    Big stage at TDF today, the French are very visible at the front.

    16′ 49″ thanks Pip and setter.

    Edited at 2021-07-14 11:25 am (UTC)

  31. Quickish today in just over 17, and happily pink free.
    I did think ROSIN would sink a decent few, and their behalf have researched both the river RES? and the actual flower. No joy, sorry, though there is someone called River Resh on FB, living in Colorado.
    I’m disappointed with myself for not spotting the Oppenheimer connexion, blindly assuming there was a bit of New York remembering the Alamo. The cryptic was unmistakable.
    The only Russian resort I could think of was Sochi, because of the Olympic connection: it just took me a while to believe it could be part of a real word.
    I was content with HOB NAILED, stretching nailed as in pinned down or arrested for being shown in a bad light. Whatever works!
  32. Definitely an advanced grade puzzle with many a cleverness within, sometimes perhaps a step too far (“drawer” for a member of the Royal Academy is imho borderline disparaging). Didn’t fall into heffalump trap. Loved “Manhattan location” and neat inclusion of SOCHI in MAST (thankfully the clue had very kind definition). But, when all was writ and done, was impressed and so big thanks to setter and to blogger (on a tough day to blog).
    Still monsoon season here … in Geneva!
  33. Happy Bastille Day to Philippe and Francois. The latter (Rose de Provence) helped me to the correct pine product. No trouble with ILLYRIA thanks to the very boring Olivia in that play. I was nicely bamboozled by the Rat Pack for a while. 18.24
  36. ….for parsing MICAH which was actually the only query I had. Mind you, I came within a whisker of falling into the “resin” trap !

    A great puzzle, and I was on the setter’s wavelength.

    FOI LASSO
    LOI TAROT
    COD MARTHA’S VINEYARD
    TIME 9:13

  37. KNOCKER defeated me, for some reason. Frustrating. The rest of this was challenging but fun.
  38. 50 odd minutes for a pink square, ah well…
    Quatorze Juillet and France is erupting in protest. Wonder if it will make the news.
  39. Finished this in two sessions, but I didn’t even remember starting my Sunday blog last night and there it was on my desktop, so I must have been blitzed. Had STUMBLING BLOCKS and most of the right half when I took it up again. MARTHA’S VINEYARD was my POI, so not so easy for this Yank. I had to fetch up the “nuts” meaning of MAST from some dim mental recess, and never actually finished parsing KNOCKED, I see only now, but I had the right answer! CHARTWELL was a guess (I am always much more confident in the morning!) and I didn’t know the “lout” meaning of HOB either, so that was my LOI, after the island. ILLYRIA was neat, MICAH and SUTRA fiendishly hard to parse for such short words.

    Edited at 2021-07-14 06:13 pm (UTC)

  40. Very clever and a very enjoyable 37 minutes. I also didn’t see TO A T, but TAROT was biffable, and although I would usually spell it RESIN, there’s no flower I know of that starts RES?, so no problem there. LOS ALAMOS was superb and SWILL drew a loud chuckle, but there was lots of other good stuff.

    Edited at 2021-07-14 07:21 pm (UTC)

  41. 19.40. I felt more on the ball today. The lout meaning of hob was not remembered and M1 as a measure of money was unknown but no other stumbling blocks. Satisfying to puzzle out the rest of it.
  42. 19:57 with a late start this afternoon, after our up and over garage door decided to implode over Mrs P’s car (for which we’d just negotiated a private sale yesterday). Somehow we managed to get the door re-locked without any damage but now we’re petrified to open it again! No matter we have notified our favourite garage door company and intend to let them earn their corn.
    After all that excitement this puzzle came as a pleasant relief.
    I found it a lot of fun and personally stretching although I was helped by being aware of most of the GK. I also confess to a few biffs ( 9 ac knocker, 22 ac Hobnailed, 13 ac Micah where I knew M1 money supply but couldn’t parse the “cah” and LOI 21d “tarot” — where I couldn’t see how “taot” backwards meant anything like “accurate”. Nice one, setter!
    Here’s hoping for a quieter day tomorrow!
    Thanks to Pip for an enlightening blog and to setter for a very enjoyable workout
  43. Not a hope with this one! Got a measly three and had to give up, and reading pipkirby’s answers and explanations, I can see I never would have got any further no matter how long I toiled. Words I’ve never heard of, GK I don’t have, and clues that were just too clever for me. Well done to all who completed.

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