An interesting test from the setter today. If you knew every word you entered in the grid, then go to the top of the form. Apart from the odd dodgy synonym, I thought everything was clued fairly. There was even a candidate for that most rare of things, a homophone that people of all creeds and colours (on either side of the Atlantic, whether rhotic or non-rhotic) will unite in decrying. Or will they..?
29:27
| Across | |
| 1 | Jerks in bank making money (6) |
| COPECK – PE (Physical Education > PE > jerks) COCK (in the sense of tilting or turning, say, an ear; similar in meaning to an aeroplane banking, i.e. tipping its wing) | |
| 4 | Tot has to stick around to get protection (8) |
| CLADDING – ADD in CLING | |
| 10 | Nasty smell with unruly part of city (7) |
| BOROUGH – BO ROUGH (again, not the most obvious synonym, but I suppose a boisterous person may be rough and unruly) | |
| 11 | Former regret about famous chemist (7) |
| PASTEUR – PAST RUE reversed | |
| 12 | Endure as a model (4) |
| LAST – a double definition; once again the second one is rather allusive, a last being the wooden or metal form [model?] on which a shoe is made) | |
| 13 | Scottish drink imbibed by cold couple of chaps (10) |
| CALEDONIAN – ALE (drink) in C (cold) DON IAN (two random chaps) | |
| 15 | Indifference shown by a nincompoop turning head (9) |
| ALOOFNESS – A FOOL reversed NESS (head, as in cape, as in Cod) | |
| 16 | Ballet position found to be tricky (5) |
| FONDU – anagram* of FOUND; a ballet move in which you bend the knees to lower the body | |
| 18 | What French saint is seen in pursuit? (5) |
| QUEST – QUE (‘what?’ in French) ST | |
| 19 | Curbs ways to limit speed (9) |
| MODERATES – RATE in MODES; I experimented with STs | |
| 21 | Home crowd at match — in need of a time for police officers? (10) |
| INSPECTORS – IN (home) SPECT |
|
| 23 | Catch some retreating (4) |
| TRAP – PART reversed | |
| 26 | Exotic seafood’s strong taste acquiring reputation (7) |
| TREPANG – REP in TANG; a sea-cucumber | |
| 27 | Song in church, a new song endlessly going on (7) |
| CHANSON – CH A N SON |
|
| 28 | Get rid of fish stew component? (8) |
| DUMPLING – DUMP LING | |
| 29 | Arenas remain expensive, as some might say? (6) |
| STADIA – to someone, somewhere in the world, this word can be pronounced to sound like ‘stay dear’; I am currently reading Philip Roth’s <i>Portnoy’s Complaint</i>, in which the eponymous character (an intellectual Jew) struggles to overcome his contempt for a woman from Hillbilly country, who is very good in the sack but whose lack of the fundamentals of education is evinced by her spelling of DEAR as ‘dir’. | |
| Down | |
| 1 | A Liberal supporting taxi group (5) |
| CABAL – CAB A L | |
| 2 | Is wearing a clerical garment what could help with overseeing? (9) |
| PERISCOPE – IS in PER (‘a’, as in ‘three a year’) COPE (ceremonial cloak) | |
| 3 | Wooden timbers said to be an essential element (4) |
| CRUX – sounds like ‘crucks’, which are curved wooden timbers | |
| 5 | Revolutionary chum has fits of temper and flaps (7) |
| LAPPETS – PAL reversed PETS (temper tantrums); a small hanging flap in costumery (a write-in for the Georgette Heyer fans, I imagine) | |
| 6 | Unease of party male built up defence (10) |
| DISCOMFORT – DISCO (party) M (male) FORT (built up defence) | |
| 7 | Diamonds linked with little country tribe once (5) |
| ICENI – ICE NI (Northern Island); call it a country, province or region, as you wish | |
| 8 | Measuring different garden plants (9) |
| GERANIUMS – MEASURING*; cunning clue | |
| 9 | A few words form the stage, about right (6) |
| PHRASE – R in PHASE | |
| 14 | Unconventional, like picture removed from art gallery? (3-3-4) |
| OFF-THE-WALL – almost a double definition, with the second part of the clue being whimsical | |
| 15 | Bill departed, as a man found innocent (9) |
| ACQUITTED – AC (account, or bill) QUITTED | |
| 17 | No sailor dies at sea? That’s officially confirmed (9) |
| NOTARISED – NO TAR DIES* | |
| 19 | Maybe harmful chemical upset stomach — a fellow taken short (7) |
| MUTAGEN – TUM reversed A GEN |
|
| 20 | Blunt little female minister putting men off (6) |
| DIRECT – DI RECT |
|
| 22 | Second eleven? It may be let off when there is bad language (5) |
| STEAM – S TEAM; not sure about this one. Is the setter running out of his second eleven? | |
| 24 | Pain associated with a knife (5) |
| PANGA – PANG A; knife from East Africa | |
| 25 | Husband in club making a bit of money (4) |
| BAHT – H in BAT; why do I always spell it ‘bhat?’ And, while on the subject, why do I always style the Welsh island ‘Anglesea?’ | |
I can’t believe I’m the first to comment on this, for me anyway, demon. Mostly finished after 30 mins then ground to a halt wit COPEK, CRUX (NHO CRUCKS), TREPANG & MUTAGEN. Gave up on 45.
Thanks U for sorting it out.
The same four stumbling blocks.
Almost word for word what I would have said but perhaps changing “demon” for something less polite.
🙂
Well, you got there just 12 minutes after this blog went up!
I couldn’t stay awake so long!
45 minutes with a third of that time spent on 4 clues in the NW segment.
A very strange puzzle packed with unknown or forgotten words or meanings most of which have appeared here no more than once or twice before.
FONDU. I was going to say NHO, but it appeared once, in May this year, when I also didn’t know it. LAPPET(S) appeared once in a Jumbo in 2013 before I started solving them regularly.
‘Cruck(s)’ required for wordplay at 4dn has never appeared before.
PANGA appeared in 2023 and in an earlier Jumbo but I didn’t know it then either.
MUTAGEN(ic) appeared in 2016 and in 2009 when I also didn’t know it.
TREPANG has turned up a couple of times, most recently in December 2023.
I think ‘bank / COCK’ in 1ac is a bit of a stretch.
For all the above, today’s puzzle was not particularly difficult which I suppose is a sign of good clueing but I just found it unsatisfying having so many things I needed to look up afterwards.
Agree with all of these!
DNF. Unusually I threw in the towel with several unfinished. With hindsight I was happy with that decision, doubting that further thought would have been more fruitful, particularly for CRUX.
There was nothing nearly this hard in the championship!
I knew lappet because there’s a lappet-faced vulture (Torgos tracheliotis) but looking at its picture I don’t see why
DNF. Had everything done apart from COPECK and CRUX after about 12 minutes but gave up about 5 minutes later having made no further progress. Had considered COPECK but not with that spelling, and didn’t think of PE for jerks nor COCK for bank. Should probably have thought of CRUX but NHO the timbers.
This is exactly my post!
Even if I’d confirmed COPECK I’d never have ventured CRUX.
26 minutes with LOI CRUX, despite for five years having lived in a thatched cottage with cruck beams like an upside-down boat. Didn’t know PANGA or that meaning of FONDU but the cryptics were kind. I wonder if BOROUGH was a nod to The George and the Championships? Decent puzzle apart from the unknowns. Thank you U and setter.
25:57
NHO cruck, and for good reason; and the clue was ambiguous as to which sounded like which, which didn’t help. Had to take COCK=bank, as DNK. I can’t believe we actually had FONDU just a few months ago. I could have done without CLADDING being defined as protection.
DNF
Straight back down to earth after the championships, which as Pootle says, was rather gentler! Never heard of a cruck, nor of PE as ‘jerks’. COPECK did float into my head at one point but I couldn’t parse it, nor did it help with CRUX to give me confidence in the C.
Thanks both.
I know we are a generous gang here – but we should stop trying our best to justify bank=cock. They just aren’t the same.
Ta setter and U.
Quite right!
Chambers has a minor definition of the noun cock as”a small pile of hay, dung, etc” – perhaps that’s the one the setter meant. Very obscure but better than the verb theory I think.
Snap!
The second entry for cock in Chambers is a pile of hay and one of the definitions at the second entry for bank is to deposit or pile (up). Less of a stretch perhaps?
Too right! I was going to bank an ear, but the spare parts depository wasn’t interested.
A reasonable 30′ both sides of breakfast but a few biffs in the NW (and a check if I could spell COPECK in that way). But parsings of COPECK and CRUX were beyond me. PET as a tantrum I’ve only seen in crosswordland but I did remember it, and LAPPETS sort of sounded right. Thanks Ulaca and setter
14:23, of which more than 5 minutes on – you guessed it – COPECK and CRUX. Both ‘jerks’ for PE and ‘bank’ for COCK are stretchy at best, and ‘crucks’ is pretty obscure.
I found the rest of this fairly straightforward, in spite of the smattering of less-than-familiar words.
I thought PE (or PT) was fairly standard for “jerks” (it helps if you’ve read 1984) but COCK is very strange for “bank”. According to Google there’s a Cock Bank near Victoria but I don’t think it’s very well known.
I’ve read 1984 but it was a long time ago! This is an unindicated definition by example, which I don’t mind in principle, but I for one do not at all associate ‘jerks’ with school PE classes.
Not even the teachers?
😄
My thought exactly!
18:10. Held up by all the unknowns – ‘crucks’, the ballet move, TREPANG, LAPPETS and PANGA. LOI PHRASE after an alphabet trawl. I held out on putting in COPECK not understanding ‘bank’ for COCK. I find such wilful obscurity (more in 1 puzzle than all 7 on Saturday) a bit irritating, I’m afraid. We have the Mephisto and Monthly Club Special for that sort of thing.
23.09 after a struggle. NHO trepang and doubt I’d want to eat it. Intrigued by the use of cock as a synonym for bank never seen that before. Another NHO with fondu but geraniums gave the game away and spent an unnecessary amount of time trying to make d the first letter of 7dn!
But agree with ulaca that the cluing was very fair.
13:14 (albeit with a time technically nullified by writing INSPRCTORS – even though my handwriting is now utterly execrable, because I barely do any from one Finals Day to the next, I suppose at least it’s unlikely I’ll make that sort of error using a pen). Anyway, yes, mostly normal stuff with a scattering of the surprisingly obscure, some of which I worked out more confidently than others: mostly I was going to complain that CRUX doesn’t sound like CROOKS, as I’ve never knowingly come across CRUCKS, but there you go, we live and learn.
Ok there were many words I hadn’t heard of here but the last 9 minutes were spent on COPECK and CRUX. I think I should have got CRUX much quicker with hindsight, even though I didn’t know the timber aspect. That got me to COPECK or COPECS but only cock made a bit of sense for bank.
The puzzle had been pretty easy till then. The other unknown words were lappets and trepang but both easily worked out. Panga has come up before otherwise that would have been unknown too.
Thanks setter and blogger
1a/3d delayed me. Finally remembered a cruck house that my geog teacher wanted us to look at. Made from a tree and large branch, split, giving a matched pair of “crucks”, repeated at the other end of the house.
16a Fondu, NHO in the ballet sense or have forgotten. Very unconfident but it looked the best bet.
25d not Bhat, baht. Had me stuck for 27a Chanson to fit c_h_s_n. I can’t spel Angelsea either!!
5d NHO Lappet AFAIK, but it seemed credible.
8d Geranium, hard,but easy enough once I finally noticed it might be an anagram.
30 minutes to finish all but NW corner. Took another 45 minutes to finish not including breaks. I need breaks when I am getting nowhere as looking at the clue afresh can change one’s view. For example I spent ages looking for a word ending in S meaning jerks when after a break I realised the definition was money. 9d I kept reading form as from and I kept thinking of asides related answers. LOI CRUX
Thanks U.
16:12
I got COPECK fairly early but CRUX had to wait until the end along with TREPANG.
I caused a bit of a hold-up by hastily bunging in MERINGUES at 8d despite their not being plants or anagrammable from measuring.
Surprised not to get a pink square somewhere.
DNF. Beaten by COPECK and CRUX.
Mostly there in 30 mins, took another 10 for PART / PANGA, gave up after another 10.
NHO Cruck, FONDU, TREPANG, PANGA, LAPPETS (except the vulture mentioned already)
Lots to like esp the GERANIUMS anagram but too many obscures.
Thanks for the explanations as usual.
27 mins but a bit of help from my friends at the end, otherwise I’d never have finished it.
Thanks goodness I’m not becoming utterly feeble-minded, as it’s Monday and I expected a SNITCH of around 70 and I floundered around, taking 52 minutes with aids that were in some cases fully needed, since there were so many unheard-of words. Thank goodness it did at least to a little extent reflect the difficulty of the puzzle. Cock = bank, PE = jerks, rep = reputation, and various other obscurities, seemed very unsatisfactory.
The only thing that wasn’t unsatisfactory in my opinion was the STADIA clue, where people don’t seem to accept that the homophone can be loose and so long as the connection is apparent then OK …
Very similar story to others: I even have COPECK written on my sheet from when I tried to justify it, having got the PE bit. But I couldn’t and I never thought of CRUX, nor have I heard of CRUCKS. Threw in the towel when my hour timer went off.
I feel like “physical jerks” had become something of a comedy phrase even before I was born; I think I might first have heard it in a Carry On film. Certainly it would have already dropped out of the vocabulary of PE teachers by the time of my youth…
Elvis Costello – Living in Paradise
Another DNF. Defeated by COPECK and CRUX.
Not the start I’d hoped for, following the latest iteration of my post-Times Championship annual resolution to complete the crossword every day and post my results here.
Basically yeah to all of the above, especially as far as cock is concerned. I came and went from this but would guess my time at about 45. Too many weird things to make this enjoyable for me, thanks Ulaca.
From You’re Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go:
Dragon clouds so high above
I’ve only known careless love
It’s always hit me from below
This time around it’s more correct
Right on target, so DIRECT
You’re gonna make me lonesome when you go
Started with CABAL and worked my way back to COPECK and LOI, CRUX. NHO crucks, TREPANG, FONDU or LAPPETS, but the wordplay was helpful. 25:26. Thanks setter and U.
DNF. Didn’t get COPECK, where I hadn’t heard of either of the two bits of wordplay or the definition, TREPANG (another unknown), CRUX (not heard of crucks) or MUTAGEN (again unknown).
– Didn’t know FONDU but fortunately the wordplay and checkers made it obvious
– Never heard of LAPPETS but again the wordplay helped
– Hesitated over OFF THE WALL as I thought it could have been ‘off the hook’
– NHO PANGA so relied on wordplay
– Needed the A checker to get the spelling of BAHT right
Tough for a Monday. Thanks ulaca and setter.
COD Geraniums
Yet another defeated by COPECK and CRUX. The monetary unit did occur to me but I thought it was a five letter word COPEK[S] in the plural. Perhaps I was mixing it up with KOPEK which seems to be another way of spelling it. With my architectural background I suppose I should have heard of Crucks, but I haven’t. I can probably name most other roofing timber components, but not this one.
Kind of easy but hard, and not as Mondayish as some we see. I agree that the words chosen for the grid gave this a somewhat unfamiliar feel.
Too many guesses to make this enjoyable and failed with my last two, which I don’t have to mention because I seem to be in good company.
Very tricky throughout. 48:10. Stuck at the end with COPECK and CRUX. straight away I thought PE or PT looked promising for “physical jerks” but then struggled to produce either COPECK or COPPER as two equally unlikely possibilities. Trying them in the grid gave me CRUX, so COPECK had to be. Must mention my delight with with The Homophone and the wonderful DUMPLING.
Do you suppose the setter deliberately set out to give a reality check to all those of you who had all those (allegedly) easy ones on Saturday?
DNF – and for similar reasons to other. NHO words tend to catch me out as word play is not my strong point. Failed on the following:
PERISCOPE – not much excuse here, since, of course, I know the word and the ‘SCOPE’ part was obvious. but the ‘a’=’per’ convention is one I always miss, even though I must have seen it before. That said, if periscope had come to mind, I would have written it in.
CRUX – no checkers, NHO ‘crucks’, so zero chance.
LAPPETS – even though I had all the checkers; a double NHO; NHO ‘lappets’. NHO of ‘pet’ as a “fit of temper”.
MUTAGEN – NHO.
TREPANG – it did occur to me from the wordplay, but NHO and couldn’t convince myself it was right.
COPECK – Just an annoying clue and I don’t feel guilty at all; I only had the ‘C’ and ‘copeck’ did not come to mind at all because I have only ever seen it spelled ‘kopeck’. On top of that ‘cock’ = ‘bank” is beyond a stretch, they are not synonyms.
This has left me in a pet.
Not what i needed on my sickbed this. I was only cheered up by geraniums anagram. I hope to improve tomorrow.
The Snitch?
The Snitch is not picking this one up. It is showing the times for the Championship Final puzzle
Not only that, it seems like some of the solvers just typed in their answers to see if they are correct.
Yes, apologies for the SNITCH error. It picked up the championship puzzle instead of the day’s puzzle. I need some work to fix this, which I haven’t been able to do today.
DNF – Skewered by CRUX, TREPANG and COPECKS, with a mis-spelt MUTAGEN twisting the knife.
33:04
Same issues as others:
NHO MUTAGEN though guessable from three checkers, nor PANGA
TREPANG sounded familiar but couldn’t have said what one was
FTP DISCOMFORT and INSPECTORS
L2I COPECK (couldn’t parse but couldn’t think of anything else) and CRUX (which seemed to confirm the former)
Thanks U and setter
It’s rare that I come away from a crossword hating it, but really that NW corner is a bovine booby trap*. For years, I’ve been happy to latinise King’s Cross as Crux Regis, which of course is a different pronunciation anyway, but that was never going to come from the soundalike offered anyway. As for COPECK, well, just no. A proper bank up.
17.37, but I cheated.
*That’s a bomb in a bull, just to cheer you up.
That’s just a crazed mineral prospector. (Ore fool)
Jerks = PE. Mmmmm ok
Chucks. Bah
Cock = bank. Nah
One wrong letter again: LAPPElS instead of LAPPETS (I’ve never heard of “pets” as tantrums). I feel I’ve done well getting PANGA, TREPANG and FONDU.
I think we’ve had four tricky Mondays in a row now.
Thanks to blogger, and to setter for some Mephisto vocabulary.
22:19 (1 error)
I had NHO PANGA and MUTAGEN, faintly recalled TREPANG … and failed to parse COPECK. So I guess my luck had been used up when I finished with LAPPELS, having discounted LAPLETS – but not having considered LAPPETS, despite having commonly heard PETS during my childhood.
Thank you, ulaca and the setter.
PANGA was vaguely familiar, TREPANG accepted on faith, and FONDU the only possible answer from the wordplay. What hung me up a while, at the very end, was the COPECK/CRUX crossing, with the unflagged DBE for PE, the seemingly stretchy clue for COCK, and the NHO “crucks.”
DNF. Failed to understand the wordplay in 1a and 3d. I note that I’m in very good company.
I did finish, but I’ve spent the weekend wrestling with a tough Mephisto, so I’ve gotten used to making up words from the cryptic. The only problem here was that you’re not allowed to look them up, but the crossers seemed to confirm them. My NHOs were trepang, fondu, and panga. I actually did think of PE, which proved helpful, and crucks seemed like it was something I should know.
Time: 37:33
I absolutely concur that this week’s Mephisto was a freakish beast. Too many clues where I could make no sense of the wordplay, a few where the definition didn’t work for me either. Why do this to us on Champs weekend?
Ah, not just me then with the Mephisto. Tough going.
I quite enjoyed this. Yes, there were about half a dozen answers which I did not recognise, as listed by others, but the clueing was generous. All done in 26 minutes.
FOI – PASTEUR
LOI – TREPANG
COD – BOROUGH
Thanks to ulaca and other contributors. And congratulations or commiserations to those involved in the recent comp.
Couldn’t see CRUX for the life of me, so I went with CLUE, on the basis that a ‘clew’ must surely mean a bundle of timbers.
(I was also rather distracted by the phrase ‘wooden timbers’. All timbers are wooden, surely? It made me wonder if we were supposed to separate the two words.)
Glad to hear others struggled with this. I thought it was just my hangover.
Thank God the setter went easy on us in describing timbers as ‘wooden’. I’d never have guessed.
I found it the same as everyone else except CRUX seemed perfectly good to me (unlike PE+COCK which is doubly unforgivable). But for the ability to forever associate ballet with a Swiss cheese dip I am eternally grateful. Thanks for the blog.
Not sure about both sides of the Atlantic, but there’s one little corner of the Indian Ocean where the homophone works.
Despite Australia having almost no discernible regional differences in pronunciation (city v country maybe, but not so much state v state) there’s one little quirk that helps identify a West Aussie. It’s the way they pronounce words like beer. They drink bee-ya over hee-ya, despite it being quite dee-ya.
And even that little quirk is much less apparent in these days of greater interstate mobility.
I wasn’t going to comment, as my comment will be very late, but I gave up yesterday after an hour with COPECK and CRUX not yet entered but just beginning to form in my mind. CRUX was the only “essential” word I could think of that sounded like a plural, and COPECK was money, although PE for “jerks” and COCK for “bank” sounded quite far-fetched. Today I couldn’t resist finding out what the answer should have been, so I banged them in and submitted and was surprised to find out that they were right.
This was indeed a very strange Monday puzzle — perhaps too strange in places to be much fun.
25’10”
Good early pace, stayed on gamely when the going got a trifle sticky.
Another late post, but I felt I had to say that I thought the jerks, crucks, cocks and copecks were tricky but fair enough.
Thank you to Ulaca and setter; I enjoyed it.
In 10a B O is an old British euphemism for Body Odour, nothing to do with boisterousness
The blog clearly separates BO from Rough.