Times 28275 – look sharp, eh?

Author   piquetPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
This was fun. So many interesting words, I felt like setting the ‘write a short story using all these words’ test which we did once or twice before. My LOI was 27a EVENT – the answer seemed obvious but I couldn’t see why, and then the penny dropped. And there are two homophones here, not just the usual one. Nice work, Mr Setter.

Across
1 With no waiting in line, chain store’s popular (4,1,4)
LIKE A SHOT – L (line) IKEA’S (of that blue and yellow store we all dread visiting but sometimes have to)  HOT (popular).
6 Time to get into bubbly musical work (5)
MOTET – T goes into MOET as in Moet et Chandon delicious champers.
9 Charlie having successfully dieted daily? (7)
CLEANER – C for Charlie is LEANER having dieted.
10 Obtain old clothing if not waterproof material (4-3)
GORE-TEX – GET (obtain) around OR (if not) EX (old). The inventor of Gore-Tex, Mr Gore, has sued many people, maybe he’ll sue TT for using his brand name, although the patent has expired.
11 Instruction for player — left winger, perhaps, entering pitch (10)
ALLEGRETTO – pitch = ALTO (as in alto sax, perhaps); insert L, EGRET for left, winger.
12 Girl India put in goal (4)
ENID – I for India inside END for goal.
14 Artist performing in opera company (5)
MONET – ON (performing) inside MET for NYC’s Metropolitan Opera.
15 Maybe one with elan stripped off and pranced exotically? (3,6)
LAP DANCER – (E)LA(N) > LA (elan stripped off) then (PRANCED)*. I would say this is &lit., but someone always tells me it’s not and I’m never sure what is and what isn’t.
16 Harmonious, exclusive component of hymns and rhythms? (9)
CONSONANT – there are no vowels in HYMNS and RHYTHMS so exclusively consonants.
18 Wanting practice in game enclosure (5)
RUSTY – RU (Rugby Union) STY (enclosure).
20 Men giddily at the edge in wild revel (4)
ORGY – OR (men) G Y (edges of GiddY).
21 Organised filing near item for filing? (10)
FINGERNAIL – (FILING NEAR)*.
25 A pain to accommodate dry official on mission (7)
ATTACHE – A, ACHE, insert TT for dry.
26 Forms short row, with leader of soldiers on point (7)
SCULPTS – SCUL(L) = short row; PT = point, S = leader of soldiers.
27 A number could be seen outside this sporting fixture? (5)
EVENT – if you put SEEN ‘outside’ EVENT you get SEVENTEEN !
28 Today, disheartened depositor admitted to strain in chilly bank (9)
SNOWDRIFT – SIFT = strain, insert NOW for today and D R for disheartener depositor.

Down
1 Group of stars holding cape’s clingy fabric (5)
LYCRA – insert C into LYRA a constellation where you find Vega.
2 King heading off cause of malfunction in government (7)
KREMLIN – K for king, GREMLIN loses its head; Kremlin defined by government seems rather loose, it’s Russian for citadel, but I guess it’s top of mind at the moment.
3 Seaman, say, hemmed in by land is giving up (10)
ABNEGATION – AB (abel seaman) NATION (land) insert EG (say).
4 Pack squirrel away that’s been caught? (5)
HORDE – homophone for HOARD = squirrel away.
5 Fix pocket on the bottom of legwear (5,4)
TIGHT SPOT – TIGHTS = legwear, POT = pocket, as in snooker.
6 Either end of musician or poet’s early period (4)
MORN – musician starts with M and ends with N, so M OR N, you choose.
7 Incredible tact in entertaining one liner (7)
TITANIC – (TACT IN I)*.
8 Stuffing starter of turkey with mix ready for cooking (9)
TAXIDERMY – (T MIX READY)*.
13 Just two different forms of golf for entertainment (10)
FAIRGROUND – FAIR (just) G, ROUND (golf, golf).
14 Bird between two big roads in heat (9)
MICROWAVE – MI = M1 motorway, CROW = bird, AVE = avenue. Microwaves don’t necessarily heat things, but I guess you can say the kitchen device, a microwave oven, does, or use ‘to microwave’ as a verb.
15 Punishes breaking into fields having much greenery (9)
LEAFINESS – FINES (punishes) inside LEAS (fields).
17 What may go on after retiring in close game (7)
NIGHTIE – NIGH = close, TIE = game.
19 Endlessly whet top of incisor or canine (4-3)
SHAR-PEI – SHARPE(N) = endlessly whet, I for top of incisor. Breed of dog.
22 Buffet with bagel or relish (5)
GUSTO – GUST = buffet, e.g. of wind; O = bagel, zero as in a 6-0 tennis score, we had this recently.
23 Virtuoso pianist‘s record picked up (5)
LISZT – sounds like LIST. If you can play Franz’s stuff, you are probably a virtuoso too. Some people said he used to write pieces that only he would be able to play.
24 Do jazzy vocals in musical with elevated finale (4)
SCAT – CATS is a musical, which I shall never go to see; move the final S to the beginning.

59 comments on “Times 28275 – look sharp, eh?”

  1. The penny never dropped for me; I put in EVENT because I couldn’t think of anything else. I never saw IKEA, and I don’t know why I put in LIKE A (I didn’t have the K yet); SHOT was a long time coming. A tough one, but fun.
  2. What a fun crossword. But I never worked out how EVENT worked, nor ALLEGRETTO. I always thought that the Y in words like RHYTHM was actually a vowel, but the answer was obvious with a few checkers. Definitely harder than the last couple of days, for me at least.
  3. Failed on ABNEGATION, KREMLIN, MICROWAVE and LIKE A SHOT. Looking on the bright side very pleased to solve the rest especially SNOWDRIFT, NIGHTIE, SHAR-PEI, LEAFINESS and GORETEX. Had “legal spat “in for a while till crossers showed TIGHT SPOT more sensible. Like blogger thought of KREMLIN more as building than government but common usage must permit the latter sense. Similarly I felt FAIRGROUND was more the location rather than the entertainment. Thanks, PK for setting everything out so clearly.
  4. 11:38 – very good fun and a crossword where working out the wordplay felt quite satisfying!
  5. I saw that EVENT was the “inside” of the number SEVENTY and wondered about how such a weak clue could be included. Of course it comes as no surprise these days to discover that the fault is my own. Thanks for clarifying Pip.

    COD to TAXIDERMY, a profession that first entered my consciousness via numerous references by the Two Ronnies.

  6. Like a shot, Enid the rusty lap dancer rose in the morn and discarded her nightie for a gore-tex coat. As she recalled the tight spot she’d been in at the orgy last night with the lycra-clad Kremlin attache who’d snorted snowdrifts of cocaine from a Monet before going down like the titanic, she scatted a consonant motet (allegretto) with gusto, and microwaved her breakfast. The hordes of cleaners at the shar-pei taxidermy event would have to wait – she was off to enjoy Liszt and have her fingernails sculpted in the leafiness of the fairground. No abnegation today.

    Edited at 2022-04-27 02:42 am (UTC)

      1. Probably not every day — while it didn’t take as long as you’d think, that was down to the high quality words, and it did after all take as long as actually doing the crossword
  7. Tutti: Witty and entertaining puzzle.
    Paul: We were taught at school W and Y were semi-vowels – could be vowel or consonant depending on the word (though we were never given an example of W being a vowel, presumably it’s Welsh?)
    Galspray: also saw seventy outside event, and stopped thinking further, so missed a good clue.
    curryowen: Kremlin as government works for me, same as you might use Whitehall or Number Ten to indicate govt/PM in UK.
    1. What the Scots call a corrie, the Welsh call a cwm, so I guess the W is vowelish.
    2. I solved LYCRA with joy and GUSTO
      So I’ll excuse the egret and crow
      But a CONSONANT, Y???
      I’ll maintain till I die
      There are six vowels in English, you know
    3. [w] and [y] ([j] in IPA)–are glides, or semi-vowels. The letter Y in ‘hymn’ or ‘rhythm’ is a vowel (or represents a vowel), as it is in ‘rhyme’.
  8. I very much liked the puzzle, I have two or three appreciative ticks. I am always less keen on product placement — Gore-Tex, Lycra, Ikea, Moet. Thanks, pip
  9. I found this very hard and wondered at times whether I would complete it. In the end I did so in 52 minutes.

    Like others, I was unable to explain EVENT. NHO GORE-T nor the stars in LYCRA.

    I looked twice at ‘after retiring’ at 17dn as I’d have expected the NIGHTIE to go on before or when retiring to bed rather than after!

    1. One retires to the bedroom, no? and there one dons (or not) one’s nightie.
      1. I guess it’s okay, but ‘retire’ is listed in all the usual sources as meaning ‘go to bed’ so I’d assume that ‘after retiring’ means ‘having gone to bed’ or ‘in bed’ at which stage it seems a bit late to be donning nightwear. That’s why I suggested ‘before’ or ‘when’ as an alternative.

        I didn’t mean to suggest I had a major problem with it, only that it struck me as a bit odd and I looked at it twice.

  10. No prizes for guessing that I finished with EVENT today. The parsing was beyond me, but now I have it explained I think it a great clue. I did wonder if the crossword was now sponsored with IKEA and GORE TEX putting in an appearance. I thought the use of the former in LIKE A SHOT was excellent — what a fantastic surface that clue has!
  11. That love was meant for beauty queens…

    30 mins pre-brekker for this cracker. After three trademarks in the first four clues I thought it might be a theme.
    Great words today. LOI Event, of course.
    Thanks setter and Pip.

    PS My grandfather used to say his wife had fur round the bottom of her nightie… to keep her neck warm. Times was different then.

    Edited at 2022-04-27 07:11 am (UTC)

    1. Beautiful song! Nice to be reminded of it. I think Janis Ian also did Society’s Child- another gem.
  12. …you know what I mean. Well, I did eventually, setter. 39 minutes, despite only managing four on the first run down the puzzle. And they didn’t include GORE-TEX despite re-proofing my anorak recently. Nor LIKE A SHOT, but then wild horses couldn’t drag me to IKEA a second time. Everything then fell into place steadily and satisfyingly, until LOI, a biffed GUSTO. I’d forgotten about BAGEL for zero and no doubt will have again the next time it crops up. I’d constructed the unknown ALLEGRETTO once all the crossers were in place. COD to TIGHT SPOT, a PDM along with many others. Good puzzle. Thank you Pip and setter.
  13. Bit of an emotional rollercoaster …starting off with the trivial ENID, I had the distinct (but fairly infrequent these days) “this is never going to happen” feeling. I was especially nonplussed when I entered the unknown MOTET at 6a, followed by MORT at 6d – where I misinterpreted the cryptic, peevishly assuming another NHO word.

    After that, I trudged my way through at a snail’s pace – nevertheless enjoying the wordplay for LIKE A SHOT, MICROWAVE and others, and eventually realising a completion was on the cards. LOI was ALLEGRETTO, which I know only from (dare I admit it) The Wombles@ “Minuetto Allegretto” Eeuuurrggghhh!

    Ended up feeling inordinately pleased to get the comp0letion, only to be disappointed by my brainless mistake 35 mins previously. Thanks Pip and setter.

  14. 76 minutes. Slow but v. happy to finish after I almost gave up a few times. Once again, it didn’t help to be stymied by 1a and 1d – LYRA was an NHO for me too. I’ll excuse CONSONANT, even if I always include Y in a vowel alphabet trawl.
  15. I really enjoyed this.

    Steady solve but held up a bit by the NW corner until I saw LYCRA – I’d been trying to think of constellations that fitted for some time. After that finished the rest (LIKEASHOT, KREMLIN, ALLEGRETTO, HORDE) quickly.

    Pleased to work out the cryptic for EVENT and to remember bagel = O (which I’ve never heard of apart from here).

    Also surprised by the number of products and the LAPDANCER ORGY – I wondered if the Private Eye crossword had leaked into the Times somehow.

    Thanks setter and Pip

  16. Some very nice clues, but why did it say ‘perhaps’ in 11ac? There’s no ‘perhaps’ about it: an egret is a winger. If it had been the other way round, with ‘…egret, perhaps …’ to clue ‘winger’ in the clue, then the ‘perhaps’ would have been correct because an egret is only an example of a winger. And surely in 20ac ‘giddy at the edge’ is either g or y; should it not have been ‘edges’ and pity about the surface?

    About 35 minutes until I completely stalled on SCULPTS and couldn’t think of anything that fitted, eventually using aids. Fair cop.

    1. Agree entirely with both your points, but I try to allow a little slack. For me: close enough. Though my tolerance for such things varies widely and unpredictably, today must have been a good day.
      Sculpts’ crossers looked extremely unlikely to be able to form a word. Took a long while to guess then confirm from the cryptic. My LOI.
  17. Some very clever stuff here and most enjoyable. I got all the harder ones and stalled at SCULPTS where I couldn’t see the wordplay and the checking letters refused to look like anything for a while. Neat work. 21.20
  18. Couldn’t get the dog. I doubt I’d have got SCULPTS with all the checkers anyway. Bad day at the office again.
  19. 25:05. A fun time had by all apparently, me included. So many good clues, it seemed churlish to rush through and I happily slowed down to work out the parsings of the many that deserved it. Unusual to have a puzzle with so many registered trade marks/brands, I thought (four by my reckoning). Quality stuff.

    Edited at 2022-04-27 03:10 pm (UTC)

  20. Enjoyed this so much that the time flew by and just beat 20mins albeit with a couple of successful biffs (sculpts and Goretex).
  21. A lovely puzzle, all done in 5m 23s with SCULPTS the hardest and my LOI.

    I failed to parse EVENT (excellent clue) & ALLEGRETTO, and was glad of the kind wordplay to remind me how to spell SHAR-PEI.

    Same comment as jackkt about avenues, which if anything I would normally consider to be smaller than roads.

  22. Forgot to say earlier re 14dn that I wondered why ‘avenue’ was clued as a big road? Some can be grand tree-lined boulevards, but many if not most, particularly in big city suburbs, are modest little roads.

    Ref the comment in the blog about &lit clues, I’m glad I’m not alone in my confusion. Every time I think I’ve got it sorted in my head somebody eventually pops up and tells me I’m wrong about a certain clue.

    BTW, if Jerry’s around, we seem to be missing a definition of semi&lit in the updated Glossary.

    Edited at 2022-04-27 10:26 am (UTC)

    1. For me, if every single word in the clue is involved in the definition and the wordplay it’s an &lit. Semi-&lits usually have a pronoun or similar – often ‘this’ – for the definition, and the rest of the words in the clue make both the definition and the wordplay.

      If the clue were presented: ‘With elan, stripped off and pranced exotically’ I’d say full &lit; but that doesn’t quite work in the definition part – it’s a verbal phrase, doesn’t clue a noun.

      Today I’d say semi-&lit: ‘Maybe one’ is not part of the wordplay to produce the answer, it’s the pronouny, definition part. The rest of the clue is both wordplay and definition – definition when added to ‘maybe one’.

      Yesterday we had:
      ‘What could provide reductions to shopper primarily?’ clueing discount store. For me that’s tougher to decide. The entirety of the clue defines the answer. But there is the pronouny ‘what’ up the front. I’d say full &lit, arguing ‘what could provide’ is a reverse anagram indicator: discount store -> reductions to S. But far from cut-and-dried.

      Don’t really care, I just love clues like this. But I’m an engineer/mathematician and very methodical in my thinking and defining, so have an opinion even against my will.

      1. Thanks, isla, for taking the trouble to reply in so much detail. I shall try to apply your thinking in the future but I expect I shall manage to misinterpret it and someone will tell me I have! I’ve found it’s not a bad ploy to avoid trying to categorise every clue when blogging.
    2. You have a good point Jackkt about the size but I think one’s take on the clue depends a lot on the geography that’s in one’s head. When I think of an avenue what springs to mind immediately is Fifth in NYC or Pennsylvania in DC! (Yes I know these are British puzzles….)
        1. Nice memory jog BW! Also from Irving Berlin:

          Have you seen the well-to-do
          Up and down Park Avenue (puttin on the ritz)

          On the Avenue, Fifth Avenue
          The photographers will snap us
          And you’ll find that you’re in the rotogravure.

  23. Very enjoyable though missed the finer points of GORE-TEX, ALLEGRETTO, EVENT, each of which I failed to completely/completely failed to parse.

    Simple I may be, but I really enjoyed TAXIDERMY, enhanced afterwards by Mr Weed’s notion of stuffing SHAR PEIs.

  24. SCULPTS my LOI. Row is such a versatile word for setters…. With this grid I was left with 3 separate holes to fill. It’s a bit frustrating when you manage to fill one hole only to realise that it didn’t provide any help for the next hole.
    I had a similar misreading of EVENT, and never did understand FAIRGROUND till I got here

  25. DNF with ALLEGRETTO, SHAR PEI, SCULPTS, EVENT, LEAFINESS and SNOWDRIFT all unsolved, and some clues biffed but unparsed, e.g. HORDE — knew it had to be a homophone for ‘hoard’ but couldn’t spot the indicator (and still haven’t..!). Pleased with progress overall. Very enjoyable but still exceedingly challenging for me. Very big step-up from the QC! Thanks all
    1. The homophone indicator is “that’s been caught” as in “that’s been heard”
      1. Oh, I see! Didn’t get ‘heard’ from ‘caught’ but it’s very obvious now — many thanks for replying
  26. Didn’t see how EVENT worked at all, so thanks for the explanation. Tried to justify ‘Squares’ for 26a, thinking form=shape and having the U (remembering the advice from previous crosswords that if there’s a U, there’s a good chance there’ll be a Q), until I got SHAR-PEI and saw SCULPTS. No major problems otherwise.

    FOI Consonant
    LOI Kremlin
    COD Like a shot

  27. KREMLIN was my LOI. As Wikipedia reminds us, ‘The name “Kremlin” means “fortress inside a city”, and is often also used metonymically to refer to the government of the Russian Federation.’

    Edited at 2022-04-27 03:11 pm (UTC)

    1. Metonymy! Yes, that’s the term for that sort of thing. Thanks, Guy, for reminding me of something I think I knew a long time ago.
  28. Came to this late after a resumption of the quarterly lunch meetings with my retired colleagues. Today we met at the Wentworth Arms in Malton. Excellent steak pie! Nice puzzle too. Once HORDE and LYCRA were in place I was off LIKE A SHOT, although I didn’t hang around the IKEA bit of the parsing. SCULPTS took a while to spot and I never did parse LOI, EVENT, so thanks for that Pip. 26:05, and surprisingly still well inside the top 100 on the Leaderboard! Thanks setter and Pip.
  29. 15:01. LOI SCULPTS which had me scratching my head for a minute or so. Lots to admire, as others have said. I liked CONSONANT best. I failed to parse EVENT. Very clever. Thank-you Pip and setter.
  30. Oh calamity! 35 mins but just did not get morn so a first failure in ten efforts . Really disappointing when explained. Never mind enjoyed the puzzle, lots of clever clues. GoreTex my COD .
    Thx setter and blogger.
  31. Another who failed to read 27A properly and thought it was a poor one, whereas it’s actually very fine. POI was 2D, where I was considering both K and Gremlin throughout, but the penny never dropped, until I finally unravelled the brilliant LIKE A SHOT, which has to be my COD. With the crossers, KREMLIN was confirmed, though I always think of it as a building. LOI was HORDE, where I was being inexplicably dense about the homophone, and LYCRA also caused me problems. Like Olivia, I managed all the ‘hard’ ones before cracking the rest.
  32. Another late solve today, happy with 20.45 with a very intelligent and entertaining puzzle. I struggled at the last with SCULPTS: it just looked impossible to fill the spaces and “forms” is a rather unhelpful definition, capable of taking on many -um – forms.

    I don’t know if it’s the same for everyone, but for me the adverts on LJ are now all in Russian: presumably the KREMLIN’s antics have trashed any western investment.

  33. Took ages (1hr 17 minutes), but I did finish with SCULPTS as my LOI. Many tricky clues. My favourite was LIKE A SHOT for the clever use of the chain store.
  34. 23.02. I got off to a slow start on this one and thought it might be a struggle. Failed to twig the Ikea bit of like a shot or the parsing of event. Sculpts took ages at the end.

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