Times 29099

69:30

Too good and complicated for me; I even struggled to motivate myself in the parsing. I hope it’s just grumpiness brought on by tiredness. Roll on the holidays.

Definitions underlined.

Across
1 Sailor, half frozen, stumped by subzero conditions (4,5)
JACK FROST – JACK (sailor) + half of FROzen + ST (stumped).
6 Putting down my name, sign for holiday place in Italy (5)
CAPRI – CAPRIcorn (sign) minus (putting down) ‘cor’ (my) and ‘n’ (name).
9 One reluctant to change light in the kitchen is ringing friend endlessly (7)
LUDDITE – LITE (low in calories, light in the kitchen) surrounding (ringing) bUDDy (friend) without its ends.
10 Heading west, sailor’s leading series of races in Uruguay’s River Plate (7)
RISOTTO – reversal of (heading west) OS (Ordinary Seaman, sailor), before TT (IoM Tourist Trophy, series of races), all inside RIO (Uraguay’s river).
11 Edge chipped off delicate china (3)
PAL – delete the last letter of (edge chipped off) PALe (subtle, delicate).
12 Game twin kids play without delay on a regular basis (11)
TIDDLYWINKS – anagram of (play) TWIN KIDS, surrounding (without) DeLaY (on a regular basis).
14 One’s skill in quiz crystal clear (6)
QUARTZ – replace I (one) with ART in QUiZ, for a clear crystal.
15 One keeps back shock career, not allowed to be spoken about (8)
HAIRBAND – homophones of (spoken about) “hare” (career) and “banned” (not allowed).
17 Stick around outside public house, or I can be transported (8)
EUPHORIC – CUE (stick) reversed (around), surrounding (outside) all of PH (public house) and OR I.
19 Fizzy drink overflowing in round dish (6)
ADONIS – SODA (fizzy drink) surrounding  (overflowing) IN, all reversed (round).
22 Nothing like a century to reverse form (3,1,7)
NOT A SAUSAGE – AS A TON (like a century) reversed, then USAGE (form).
23 It’s time for stag do on river (3)
RUT – UT (an earlier syllable for ‘do’, from the musical scale) on R (river).
25 Inches in front of drone — a new animal (7)
INHUMAN – IN (inches) + HUM (drone) + A + N (new).
27 Casual firing range warning? (3-4)
POT-SHOT – POT’S HOT (a warning one might hear at the oven (range)).
28 Daughter leaving very much in advance (5)
EARLY – ‘d’ (daughter) from dEARLY (very much).
29 Shorter of two chords from Iron Maiden hit is on American guitar (5,4)
MINOR AXIS – anagram of (hit) IRON + M (maiden), then IS on AX (American spelling of ‘axe'(guitar)). I think. I don’t pretend to understand the musicology reference.
Down
1 Judge in court keeping legatee’s case cordial? (5)
JULEP – J (judge), then UP (in court) containing the first and last (case) of LegateE. A cocktail (or cordial?) from the American south. I only vaguely remembered the mint version from The Great Gatsby.
2 Smart chap holding hat raised is mark of a soft-spoken character (7)
CEDILLA – ALEC (smart chap) containing LID (hat), all reversed (raised).
3 Playing with wind trio, flautist out of time (11)
FLIRTATIOUS – anagram of (wind) TRIO FLAUTISt, minus ‘t’ (out of time).
4 Go too far with party in the wake of several balls (6)
OVERDO – DO (party) after (in the wake of) OVER (several balls).
5 St Anton native perhaps has to limit year on slope (8)
TYROLEAN – TO containing (limit?) YR (year) then LEAN (slope). The grammar of this does not work for me, so I suspect I’ve got the parsing wrong… Native of a place in Bavaria.
6 Socialist shortly gets up and leaves (3)
COS – SOCialist (very shortly) reversed (gets up).
7 One may be found in bed, knocking back excellent fruitcake after workout (7)
PETUNIA – reversal of (knocking back) AI (excellent) and NUT (fruitcake), all after PE (physical education, workout).
8 Cromwell’s cavalry — mounted men breaking guts (9)
IRONSIDES – reversal of (mounted) OR (other ranks, men), contained by (breaking) INSIDES (guts).
13 Learner leaving two-barrelled shot gun in the outback? (5-6)
WORLD-BEATER – anagram of (shot) TWO-BARREL(l)ED minus one ‘l’ (learner leaving). Presumably an Australian gun?
14 Squeeze in to tank having larger dimensions than normal (5-4)
QUEEN-SIZE – anagram of (to tank) SQUEEZE IN.
16 Consume uranium in energy plant (8)
VIBURNUM – BURN (consume) + U (uranium), all contained by (in) VIM (energy).
18 One aiming to sell diamond surrounds this sportsman (7)
PITCHER – cryptic hint, a diamond surrounds the pitcher in baseball.
20 Area right between west end of nave and entrance (7)
NARTHEX – &lit. A (area) + RT (right), all contained by (between) the first letter (west end) of Nave and HEX (entrance). All is forgiven, setter; this is what I buy The Times for. Superb.
21 Moderate results from having booster jab study (6)
DAMPEN – AMP (booster) contained by (having it jab) DEN (study).
24 Totally casual kicks hampering tango (5)
TOTES – TOES (kicks) containing (hampering) T (tango).
26 Part of spring vegetable uprooted (3)
MAY – reversal of YAM (vegetable).

87 comments on “Times 29099”

  1. DNF after an hour plus.

    Will, your wordplay at 5dn is correct but the grammar of the clue is a little awkward. I think it’s intended to be read as [The answer meaning ] ‘native’ has TO limit (contain) YR, on LEAN. Incidentally, since the native is TYROLEAN he/she would come from St. Anton in Austria rather than St. Anton in Bavaria which is some 50 miles away.

    I found the top half very enjoyable if a little tough, but the bottom of the grid, especially the SE, was another story and I eventually got myself completely bogged down and running out of ideas. I had been put off my stride by realising the answer at 13dn had to be WORLD-BEATER, but even after consulting Collins I was unable to explain why. After an hour had passed I decided to use aids sparingly in the hope of kick-starting myself but I was put off by finding answers I never heard of so I gave up and revealed the remainder. VIBURNUM, NATHEX and MINOR AXIS were unknown. And ‘totally’ = TOTES? Really?

    1. In 13d “gun in the outback” is the gun shearer in the outback sheep station shearing shed. The gun shearer is the top or fastest shearer. There is competition and a lot of prestige in being the “gun”. The competition goes on as shearers move from shed to shed so the gun shearer may well be a world beater.

      1. Thanks. I think we may have had that meaning of ‘gun’ once before, but many moons ago. It still seems to me an enormous leap from fastest shearer in the middle of nowhere to WORLD-BEATER though.

        1. Whilst “ gun” may have originated in sheep shearing, it has now come to mean someone outstandingly good at almost anything. For example, Magoo, the completion winner this year, might be called a “ gun cruciverbalist”.
          Whoever set this puzzle is a gun setter!
          Tough but most enjoyable. Nearly an hour to complete.

        2. Jackie Howe! “The” gun. 300-and-something sheep sheared in a day with hand shears. So famous they named the iconic blue workman’s singlet after him.

      2. Are you sure ‘Gun’ is specific to sheep shearing? I think Gun is just an aussie word for someone who is very good at something (Ive heard “Gun Batsman” and “Gun” refer to people who are very good at work)

      3. World Beater is the nickname given to the Winchester .300 round which was a revolutionary bullet and used the the US outback

    2. Totes, Gen Z speak — which I knew from being an aficionado of Richard Osman’s House of Games (the “Totes Emoji” round)!

  2. It makes no sense to say one musical chord is “shorter” than another; the reference is geometrical.
    This was not easy (litotes!). I was slow getting started and had to finish after dinner. But it gradually won me over. The hiding/blending of the definition with the wordplay was frequently brilliant. I especially liked CEDILLA.
    However, I, too, do not get the definition here of WORLD-BEATER.

    1. I agree, it’s a bit obscure. But, here in Australia we have people called ‘Gun Shearers’ who can shear as many as 400 sheep per day. I’ve also heard of ‘Gun Pickers’ who pick fruit from trees for a living and are extremely fast as, like the shearers, are paid per unit. And, it’s extremely competitive. I can only assume that this is supposed to translate to ‘World Beater’.

  3. Only about 30% done, and then quit. Several beauties, but NARTHEX is truly next level, a genuine &lit which doesn’t seem forced, as it describes what and where a Narthex is completely. And ending with Hex=entrance, sublime.

    Was a good choice for me to quit early and just enjoy the Reveal for each clue. I especially liked TOTES, (“totally”, casual) and PITCHER (so that’s what the Diamond was doing there).

    MINOR AXIS is the shorter axis of an ellipse. I remember sniggering in Maths A Level about Semi Latus Rectum which is something similar.

    1. Or indeed a hyperbola, both being conic sections. A parabola has a single axis, and a circle has equal axes. I believe this sort of knowledge is deemed too hard (or, erroneously, irrelevant: anything requiring computer graphics of any sophistication leans on a lot of conic geometry) for today’s mathematics A-levels.

  4. Stretched to an hour and three minutes; I might’ve been faster getting to VIBURNUM if I’d remembered my earlier observation that this puzzle was shaping up to be a pangram, but I got there in the end and that helped with the final two of EUPHORIC and PITCHER. Some lovely surfaces, let alone anything else. I’m glad I already knew what a NARTHEX is!

  5. Gosh that was hard. I came and went but it took me, I’d guess, about 70, with help from the cheat button for NHOs like NARTHEX. There were some extremely clever and fiendish clues here, a real struggle but an enjoyable challenge. Thanks William, tough day to blog, I’m still in the dark about RUT and there were many other high-end obscurities. Eg QUARTZ, eg NOT A SAUSAGE. As an Oz solver I would like to say that yeah, sure, they have gun shearers, but I’ve never heard them called WORLD BEATERS and I’m pretty sure there are no actual sheep in the actual outback. Cue dispute re def of outback.

    From Isis:
    I married Isis on the fifth day of MAY
    But I could not hold on to her very long
    So I cut off my hair and I rode straight away
    For the wild unknown country where I could not go wrong

  6. Quite slow, and hard work, albeit with some very good bits. But once again, after all that, a silly, unnecessary mistake. Bah humbug!

    Thanks both.

  7. Another DNF staring blankly at the last 4 in the SE. POT-SHOT, the AXIS bit, the NHO NARTHEX & TOTES all beat me. As mentioned, really? I have a feeling this may be our US setter, no?

    When I saw CEDILLA I was thrilled as my name contains one, but I slowly became unthrilled as I traipsed slowly through the rest.

    I liked HAIRBAND .

    Thanks William and tricky setter.

  8. 40:00. My that was hard! But a good sense of achievement having completed without aids. The SE took me longest finishing with VIBURNUM and DAMPEN. Too many great clues to pick a favourite. Thanks William and setter.

  9. Stopped after the hour with three missing in SE, TOTES unrecognisable without the amazeballs, NARTHEX and MINOR AXES. I don’t think I would have got any of those in another hour. It was a good challenge up to thar point. Thank you setter and William. Ear worm for the day, I’m a lonely little petunia in an onion patch. Boo hoo.

  10. My father introduced me to cryptic crosswords some 45 years ago by letting me solve the Sunday Times crossword with his guidance (He seemed to me to be a genius).
    But, every clue i attempted to solve was complete confusion to me, sometimes even after my father had explained the word play, anagram, &lit etc etc.
    Trying to solve todays puzzle brought back those memories because, no matter how i studied the clues, they were completely beyond any logic I could muster.
    Total Number of clues solved = 9. After 1 hour, and that total, I totally gave up!
    And just like when I had my father explain the clues to me all those years ago, after seeing the answers above, I am still at a loss to parse those I couldn’t get.

    Im guessing when Simon. A solves it on youtube later it will be a long, long video!

  11. About 35 minutes.

    – Once I thought of LUDDITE, didn’t parse the ‘light in the kitchen’=’lite’ bit
    – Had no idea how NOT A SAUSAGE worked
    – Didn’t know ut=do for RUT
    – Relied on the wordplay and checkers to get the unknown JULEP
    – Didn’t know why WORLD-BEATER is a gun in the outback, so I’m grateful to others for providing the explanation
    – Took a long time to think of ‘consume’=’burn’ to get VIBURNUM
    – Couldn’t have told you what a NARTHEX is, but it sounded plausible

    Delighted to finish a very tough puzzle. Thanks William and setter.

    FOI Overdo
    LOI Viburnum
    COD Pot-shot

  12. Couldn’t do the SE, and even accepting that and revealing words left me stumped.

    NARTHEX nho, and no idea re WORLD BEATER, even though I put it in.

    A day on which I’m glad I have a 30′ limit.

    Thanks william and setter.

  13. 61 mins and a lot of head scratching. Church architecture came in handy for NARTHEX, but like others I biffed WORLD-BEATER without really knowing why. In fact lots of biffing: thanks for the parsing, I was starting to feel “I know this is right but I can’t be bothered to work out why”. A tad convoluted, some of it?
    Thanks all.

  14. It had its moments, but it was way beyond my pay grade and I gave up after 20 minutes with nine clues not solved.

  15. Slow but steady with long, long pauses. Faced with N-R-H-X I decided I must have made a wrong entry and caved. Glad to hear I wasn’t the only one.

    COD INHUMAN possibly an oldie but made me smile when I saw it, after looking for so long in the wrong direction, and convincing myself I was after a three letter abbreviation for a small flying machine in the middle.

    Thanks William

  16. Wow. That was hard, but (as others have stated) included some superb clues. “Casual firing range warning” and “Squeeze in to tank having larger dimensions than normal” were my favourites. LOI ADONIS.

  17. I ha ent looked at the solutions yet, but it spears to be very hard. After four very enjoyable puzzles this week, I was hoping for a SNITCH around 110-120 ish. I haven’t got a prayer with this one.
    A plea to the new editor: maybe reserve these for bank holidays? We expect Friday’s puzzle to be the best and toughest challenge of the week, but have a thought for the chap who is still trying to achieve an all correct week!

  18. I’ve done the MCS in less time than this! Even then I’m well up on the leaderboard possibly because of a lot of no-shows. I was so flummoxed that even the easy one (there was one!), Cromwell’s IRONSIDES, took a long time to emerge.
    I’m all for a challenge – I’ve completed Broteas’ TLS this week – but I think it’s gone a step too far when even if you’ve sussed the answer, why it is so is unfathomable, and needs elucidation from our courageous blogger to begin to make sense.
    So I struggled with making form mean SAUSAGE, got stuck with the booster jab, smeared over LITE because kitchen wasn’t helping.
    Now then: WORLD-BEATER. Sure you can squeeze it out of the anagram fodder (once you’ve worked out it’s an anagram from “shot”) but “gun in the outback” is both ridiculously obscure (sheep shearer? Really?) and an awful long stretch. Google indicates there is such a thing as a beater gun, but the initial Google search led straight to this clue.
    Don’t get me wrong, I admired many of the clues once I’d cracked their far-out cleverness: NARTHEX, HARE BANNED, POT’S HOT and QUEENSIZE are all outstanding clues that would grace any crossword. But the process of getting there was often like punching holes in fog.
    Oh, my time was 45.28, just inside average. Thanks those of you that persevered beyond the 100 minute mark!

  19. Think this was harder than the rest of the week put together. I dont make a record my times but I think i took 90 mins mon to thur and gave up on the hour 9 down. Roll on monday.

  20. One of the few Times cryptics where I was actually pleased just to finish in over half an hour, with a couple of biffs, and a few resorts to aids. I wouldn’t say I enjoyed it, but have to admire the setting skill involved, bravo!

  21. Laid up with cold so while the brain may be sluggish I have time to kill so determined to relax and enjoy regardless of time. Completed without aids in 1h 48m only to accidentally hit Submit without leaderboard.
    Really enjoyable sense of achievement with almost every clue and those unparsed like the sheep shearer or NHO like NARTHEX now explained above. Most people wont have that much time most days though.
    I think the Minor Axis is the shorter of the 2 axes in an ellipse which is more in my GK than UT = do.

    Thanks to setter and blogger. Time for a nap.

  22. I share the consensus view this morning that this was a real toughie, I eventually staggered over the line in 35 minutes thanks to some very lucky biffing. That said there were several delightful clues among the incomprehensible stinkers, with CEDILLA and NARTHEX my personal favourites. Thanks William and setter, with a particular plea to the setter to give the authoritative parsing of WORLD-BEATER.

  23. Done in two stages, with a break between to refresh the grey cells. Overall about 50 minutes, with NARTHEX found to be correct from looking up, and no idea why WORLD BEATER was correct. Otherwise a really good one I thought.

  24. Well I enjoyed this. I do enjoy the challenge. All done in about 50 minutes although I did fill all of the squares with letters before I remembered that I had not solved the anagram for flirtatious so got an unlucky message to start with.

    I did look up narthex which was unfamiliar to me.

    Thanks for helping me understand rut and world beater which I assumed was some sort of hunting gun.

    Also, thanks to Merlin for reminding me of a long forgotten maths term.

  25. Too hard. DNF. Cheated for 6a Capri which allowed me to finish the NE but the SE was a disaster area. NHO Narthex, didn’t get the Minor Axis clue, tho’ it looked the best bet, the Pot-shot was beyond me, and Rut not really biffable as DNK ut=doh. As for Totes!
    Oh well, I guess I learnt some stuff, particularly the just-about-rings-a-bell…
    I’m a lonely little petunia in an onion patch.

  26. 41:10 – pleased to see I wasn’t alone in struggling to wrestle this down. NARTHEX and the sausage answer only partly parsed but enough to be confident. The logic of my LOI, the sheep shearer, completely passed over my head. As a questionable description of an obscure slang term, I still think it was one cryptic jump too far.

  27. Quite relieved to come here and see that it isn’t just me. 93 minutes and plenty of aids by the end because the answers wouldn’t come, of course. Nho VIBURNUM — but people must have done so because nobody has commented on its obscurity. The rest of it was full of the obscurities that so may people talk about. Nho NARTHEX either, but a magnificent clue. WORLD-BEATER is just too much, though, in my opinion and evidently that of some others. I suppose that the difficulties that people have talked about have hidden the fact that it’s a pangram.

    1. VIBURNUM did for me. I couldn’t get past GO and ZIP. Maybe I should have done better as I too had realised this was going to be a pangram, but after more than an hour I was feeling pretty punch-drunk.

  28. A DNF in the south-east, just too hard. ADONIS, POT-SHOT and the unknown NARTHEX beat me, even after guessing RUT. VIBURNAM also guessed, but NHO. DAMPEN was only pencilled in… < embarrassed> an AMP is a unit of current, not an amplifier. </embarrassed> Vaguely remember – now, afterwards – from puzzles past that UT (and H, after ABCDEFG) was a note. One of the few who saw WORLD-BEATER quickly; for once it was an advantage to be an Australian, who has lived in the outback. Even after all that, mostly enjoyed it.

  29. Managed the top half, but most of the bottom beat me. Gave up at 45 mins knowing I was going nowhere. At least half a dozen I’d simply never have got.

  30. That was difficult. DNF, defeated by the SE corner. NHO NARTHEX, and the wordplay not helping me. Got the MINOR bit of 29, and biffed the AXIS. ‘AX’ for ‘guitar’? New one on me! NHO UT for the note.
    Brain-meltingly enjoyable nonetheless.

  31. Typos in the quick and concise. Two good things – firstly I finished, secondly there were no typos.

    Only a few biffs – RUT(LOI), DAMPEN and NARTHEX. WORLD BEATER the opposite of a biff – got the wordplay, but not the definition.

    V hard as everyone else has said, and a chastener after a relatively easy week.

    38:24

  32. DNF . I found three quarters of this reasonably straightforward but the SE a completely different story. The unknown NARTHEX was never going to appear from the word play.

  33. DNF and still not really sure I understand some of the parsings after reading the blog.

    the existence of UT is why I don’t play Scrabble any more, harrumph.

  34. Wow, what a beast that was. Challenging all the way but I got particularly stuck in the SE to finish. Very pleased to have got through unscathed. It almost atones for all the other silly failures over the last couple of weeks.

    There are a mere 78 correct solutions so far on the Crossword Club leaderboard, certainly exceptional for this time in the afternoon.

    Oh, and the funny thing, NARTHEX was in the Concise just 11 days ago, and yet I didn’t manage to remember it. I wonder if it worked out better for anyone else?

  35. DNF. Some great clues, I particularly liked dampen.
    I wasn’t impressed with rut, neither as the definition nor with the inclusion of “ut” defined as
    “syllable used for the first note in the diatonic scale in an early solmization system and later replaced by do”. Really? Should I now research and remember that whole early scale?
    No need to comment on world beater, as so many people have already done so.

    On second thoughts, perhaps the “it” in the clue for rut refers to sex?

  36. I was reasonably pleased to finish this with one mistake, which I’m blaming on tiredness. I persuaded myself there might be a dish called an ADINES, which I derived from ADES (as in orangeade or lemonade, drink) round IN. Looking back, I should obviously have seen the implausibility of this, especially since ADONIS probably wasn’t among the half-dozen or so most difficult clues in the puzzle, but my stamina had gone and I just wanted an answer.

  37. Well, I finished, and was all green, but with several things I didn’t understand like the outback gun. NARTHEX was a guess so I was happy it was right. Never heard of VIBURNUM but assembled from the Ikea parts. I couldn’t parse my LOI DAMPEN but was confident it was right. Definitely a workout.

  38. Well that was something else. Delighted to complete in 49:50 and to find that was less than 5 Verlaines. Came here with so many unparaed – RUT, NOT A SAUSAGE, CAPRI. Once I had IRONSIDES, Capri had to be Capri but i could not for the life of me justify putting it in until I had all the checkers. NHO NARTHEX or VIBURNUM but submitted with crossed fingers in the hope that I’d followed the wordplay correctly.
    BTW do we have a pangram?

    Thx William ( for dedication above and beyond) and setter for your brilliance

  39. 42.09

    I came across (the superb) NARTHEX very recently – must have been in an old one (I’m slowly churning through from 2010) or a concise, which massively helped.

    I did really like this though it’s never ideal when you biff a few without any understanding of the parsing – here’s looking at you CAPRI RUT and RISOTTO

    Simon’s video is going to be sooo long. A little side bet on how many times he says “brutal” 🙂 (If you are reading this Simon your vids are absolutely cracking entertainment – thanks a bunch for doing them).

  40. DNF with RUT and TOTES remaining. I couldn’t believe there was an UT even though I knew it was allowed in Scrabble. But TOTES? Step too far…

  41. 61:13

    Once I’d spotted that IRON M was an anagram, bits of the SE fell onto place – VIM for energy gave VIBURNUM; TOTES was totally bunged in, along with RUT – didn’t know the do = UT thing; didn’t quite get the parsing for NOT A SAUSAGE but that appeared to be the obvious answer – that in turn gave DAMPEN. Glad to have seen NARTHEX somewhere lately.

    Thanks William and setter

  42. Eventually got narthex from the wordplay; had never heard of it. Very clever! Didn’t understand world-beater – thanks for the explanations. Amazingly, having failed maths O-level twice and then given up, I realised at once that 29 would be about geometry rather than music, but it still took me ages to get the answer through wordplay. A brilliant puzzle which took me well over an hour, at a conservative estimate – stopped timing myself while grappling with south-east corner!

  43. Gave up after 70 minutes with just N_r_h_x remaining. I could see it began Nar…. but otherwise perplexed as NHO Narthex and have just now cottoned on to Hex= entrance.
    Ut=do also new to me.
    Toughie today.

  44. DNF. I’ve been travelling this week and unable to do the puzzles, so I had the slightly disconcerting experience today of getting a PB on Wednesday’s and then completely failing on this one. I gave up after about 25 minutes with 7 clues unsolved. Looking at the answers I’m glad I did: I don’t think I’d ever have got there and the attempt would have been torture.

  45. Another DNF here, just out of my league I think. I started off promisingly enough with the top half going in relatively quickly. The bottom section was more problematic however, but the sw corner eventually got sorted. About 40 minutes had elapsed with the se corner looking pretty blank. Pretty blank also describes my countenance from then on as I came to a grinding halt. I pulled stumps at about 60 minutes, and on going to the site and seeing the answers, am fairly confident I did the right thing.

  46. Due to a day on the spanners replacing and removing a wrongly ordered headlamp unit for my car, (it needed an adaptive Xenon lighting unit and I ordered a standard one, drat!) and cobbling the old one back together so I have a drivable car, I didn’t get around to this puzzle until well into the evening. It took me 47:21 and I was astonished to be 77th on the Leaderboard. The NW went in easily apart from FLIRTATIOUS and TYROLEAN which arrived much later. Nothing else materialised until TOTES and MINOR AXIS gave me a foothold down under. The rest of the puzzle was ground out through gritted teeth, and LOI VIBURNUM almost had me reaching for aids, but inspiration struck at the last minute. Jeez that was tough! Thanks (I think) setter and well played William! So pleased I didn’t try to fit this in before I ventured into the toolbox!

  47. 137′-ish
    Started slowly, got slower, and slower…..

    ….but finished, exhausted, but with all parsed. The gun/world beater equivalence seemed feasible for the outback and, when I arrived inevitably at the portico, I convinced myself that as narthex would only work as an outstanding &lit. it must be the only way to complete such a beautifully crafted puzzle.
    Bravissimo to the setter, William and all who managed to see this one out !

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