Try as I might, I couldn’t tame this puzzle, even though it was certainly no beast. By the end, I felt like a Californian firefighter trying to quench the flames with the non-existent water of a half-built reservoir.
I hope you all fared better…
| Across | |
| 1 | English doctor arranged doses with superior effect? (8) |
| EMBOSSED – E MB OSSED (anagram* of DOSES) | |
| 5 | Argument about Arabic customs duty (6) |
| TARIFF -AR in TIFF | |
| 9 | Cold morning: difficult job hosting Government’s first initiative (8) |
| CAMPAIGN – C AM G in PAIN | |
| 10 | Shoe sale’s opening with everything reduced (6) |
| SANDAL – S AND AL |
|
| 12 | Discover that man wants minute dish from Japan (5) |
| SUSHI – SUS HI |
|
| 13 | Backfire managed to be suppressed by thunder for example (9) |
| BOOMERANG – RAN in BOOM EG | |
| 14 | Man worked with don, I bet? Definitely (3,2,7) |
| AND NO MISTAKE – MAN DON I* STAKE (bet) | |
| 18 | Writer’s trip by wagon taking in grand prison like Alcatraz? (9,3) |
| CARTRIDGE PEN – CART (wagon) G (grand) in RIDE (trip) PEN (penitentiary – US term for prison) | |
| 21 | Trunk for captain going round Channel Islands (9) |
| PROBOSCIS – PRO (for) CI in BOSS (captain) | |
| 23 | Press locating Republican in sleazy bar (5) |
| DRIVE – R in DIVE | |
| 24 | Story presented by the German songs in recitals (6) |
| LIEDER -LIE (story) DER (the German) | |
| 25 | Fail to return a lot of anger, lacking courage (8) |
| TIMOROUS – OMIT reversed ROUS |
|
| 26 | Disruption to El Nino connected to Internet (6) |
| ONLINE – EL NINO* | |
| 27 | Line adopted in instinctive, fashionable sin (8) |
| GLUTTONY – L in GUT (instinctive, as in gut reaction) TONY (fashionable, in North America, allegedly); interestingly, while TON meaning fashion pops up in crosswords regularly, TONY is a much rarer visitor. A lot to do with morphology and a little to do with tradition, I would imagine. | |
| Down | |
| 1 | Duty shown by former monarch disembarking from train (6) |
| EXCISE – ER removed from EXERCISE | |
| 2 | Puzzle busy person about rising total (6) |
| BEMUSE – SUM reversed in BEE | |
| 3 | New toaster in shop (9) |
| STATIONER – TOASTER IN* | |
| 4 | Urges monk to avoid popular English breakfast dish? (4,8) |
| EGGS BENEDICT – EGGS (urges) BENEDICTINE lacking its IN (popular) and its E (English) | |
| 6 | A good mimic offering astonished expression (5) |
| AGAPE – A G APE | |
| 7 | Ship Inn has a girl turning up inside (8) |
| INDIAMAN – A MAID reversed in INN; this is the clue that bamboozled me. I couldn’t get past ‘Indianan’, where the girl occurs (‘turns up’) in the INN. I actually know that an Indiaman is a ship, which makes it all the more galling. | |
| 8 | Endless membrane, I concur, is lacking a lacy structure (8) |
| FILIGREE – FIL |
|
| 11 | Be involved with grisly tome of a romantic nature (3-5-4) |
| BOY-MEETS-GIRL – BE GRISLY TOME* | |
| 15 | Best pedalo’s left out at sea for something better? (9) |
| SPEEDBOAT – BEST PEDA |
|
| 16 | University student taken on by a hat company in Mexican city (8) |
| ACAPULCO – U L (L for learner, as in L plates for a learner driver) in A CAP CO | |
| 17 | Tidal flood in sea that’s shrinking due to trees? (8) |
| ARBOREAL – BORE in ARAL (sea that’s shrunk – a lot, by 90%); interestingly, drought-resistant saxaul trees are being planted on the dried bed of the Aral Sea in an attempt to hold back the man-made desert | |
| 19 | I’m ready to wear knockout Oriental gear (6) |
| KIMONO – I’M ON (I’m up for it, I’m ready) in KO | |
| 20 | Gutsy fellow that is upset over messy situation (6) |
| FEISTY – F EI (i.e. reversed) STY (messy situation, where situation represents location) | |
| 22 | Old article about church is deep (5) |
| OCEAN – CE in O AN | |
As my time of 32 minutes suggests I didn’t find this hard.
I regret not reading the clue at 24ac more carefully, because I bunged in LEADER (story) supported by aural wordplay [in recitals] “Lieder” (German songs). As I had been solving at some pace to that point this seemed reasonable, but on reflection a leader in a newspaper is not really a story, it’s an opinion piece, and the homophone would have been indicated by ‘in recital’ without the ‘s’. Of course the correct definition isn’t perfect either as LIEDER are German songs per se, and ‘in recitals’ is only there for the surface reading.
I looked more than once at TONY (fashionable) at 27ac and concluded it was an Uxbridge Dictionary construction (TON-Y), so I was a little surprised later to find that it’s in Collins.
So pleased not to be the only one to think LEADER sounded like LIEDER with no further thought until ARBOREAL would not fit.
10.05, without having remembered the ARAL Sea (I was looking for ARAL_). The ship was also new to me, but it seemed quite plausible it existed. I had similar thoughts to Jack on TONY.
In BOY-MEETS-GIRL, ‘tome’ is part of the fodder rather than the definition.
Thanks both.
Thanks
15:06. I’d not heard of INDIAMAN or TONY and would have misspelt PROBOSCIS without the wordplay.
COD: SUSHI.
9.00
Not sure that SUS means discover, but otherwise quite a Mondayish puzzle.
LOI CARTRIDGE PEN
COD BOOMERANG (as Milton Jones points out, BOO is the Australian First Nations word for “comes back”, because if you throw an ordinary meringue…)
Does he actually use ‘Australian first nation’ in his one-liner? Seems very cumbersome.
made me laugh …. : )
.. ..a meringue…. (or a ‘pav’ in Australia)… : )
22:02
I didn’t exactly race around the grid but no typos for once so there is that.
I struggled on some relatively simple anagrams e.g. STATIONER and I stared at my last-in CAM_A_G_ for what felt like age.
A nice start to the week though so thanks to both.
36 minutes with LOI FEISTY. I dredged INDIAMAN up from a literary source I have forgotten. In another example of lack of persistence of memory, I was going to wax lyrical about the ITV music show BOY MEETS GIRL of my youth starring Marty Wilde, only to check and find the girls were plural. Some guys got all the luck. I found this tougher than it looked. Thank you U and setter.
6:12. On the wavelength this morning, with a WITCH of 65. As always knowing all the words helps a lot.
DNF, defeated by INDIAMAN and ARBOREAL.
In 14a, the I isn’t part of the anagrist – ‘I bet’ is giving ‘I stake’.
Thanks Ulaca and setter.
COD Speedboat
I think it works either way.
Damn, DNF as I had stupidly misspelled « TARRIF » and therefore staring at R-D-A-A- for ages meant I could not get INDIAMAN which I do know.
Anyway, I enjoyed the rest. I liked BOOMERANG, BOY-MEETS-GIRL & CARTRIDGE PEN.
Thanks U and setter.
How could you misspell “the most beautiful word in the dictionary”?
It might be for some, clearly not for me! All I do is pay ‘em.
I made exactly the same mistake. What made it worse is that I’d correctly parsed it as TIFF round AR and should have been in no doubt about the correct spelling.
A quick and enjoyable 26 mins but 1 error with a lazy FILAGREE. Annoying because I consider relishing every aspect of the parsing to be part of task and the fun but failed to do it. The clue is very clear.
Cant remember when I last encountered a Cartridge Pen.
Thanks both
I have several. None of them in use, but you can’t just throw them away, can you?
Mine is still in use, and was last used for writing out the letters when untangling an anagram.
Standard Monday fare I’d say, though it was a DNF as I couldn’t get the answer to 20D (feisty). 1A FOI and 7D LOI. No problem with ‘sus’ for ‘discover’ but ‘rouse’ for ‘anger’ was a little weak IMO
Around 45 minutes for a most enjoyable puzzle. I found it reasonably straightforward with no real difficult spots. FOI ONLINE LOI FEISTY. FEISTY was easy with all the crossers but I was delayed by TIMOROUS because I accidently misspelt KIMONO as KIMINO. As a result I left this to the end where I immediately saw my mistake.
Thanks U
A gentle Monday work-out, all done in 21 minutes. I seemed to be getting nowhere in the top half, but then the bottom half answers emerged and the rest fell into place.
FOI – DRIVE
LOI – BEMUSE
COD – SPEEDBOAT
Thanks to ulaca and other contributors.
22:39 but with a pink sqaure for FILAGREE. Meh!
Found this fairly tricky, INDIAMAN was new to me but fairly clued. Thought the same as Jack for TONY. COD SPEEDBOAT
THanks to Ulaca and the setter
14.04, with only ARBOREAL holding out against the tide. I got it in the end, but I’m still wondering whether a tidal bore is in the sea or a river mouth, and whether the Aral Sea is still shrinking, because there’s virtually none of it left.
Add mine to the list of TONY sceptics (what does Collins know?) and a similar Uxbridge musing on CARTRIDGE PEN being perhaps a small-arms dump.
The Severn bore goes all the way up past Tewkesbury
Ah yes, Tewkesbury-on-Sea!
16:06 having been breeze blocked for several minutes in the SE by the interconnected 20/25/27 trio. I’m also in the NHO TONY camp.
26:36, a bit sluggish to start but reasonably straightforward and indeed enjoyable once I felt I was roughly on the same wavelength as the setter (with occasionally patchy reception in the SE corner). FOI AGAPE, LOI FEISTY, joint COD EGGS BENEDICT and BOY MEETS GIRL
Thanks both
I entered PROBOSCIS with a shrug because from my memory of butterflies and moths as a child the proboscis is that curled thing that the butterfly uses to dig down into the flower when extracting nectar. And I see that I was right: it’s like an elephant’s trunk but it isn’t the trunk itself. Slow to get started on this, but once afloat all went smoothly enough. CARTRIDGE PEN a problem as I never knew of it, or had forgotten, 43 minutes.
Just under 30′, though with quite a few unparsed (SUSHI, TIMOROUS, GLUTTONY – having never come across the “tony” meaning). INDIAMAN constructed but NHO. Otherwise fine, but with the SE corner taking quite a few minutes of biffing. Thanks Ulaca and setter.
Got off to a quick start with EMBOSSED and the rest of the NW apart from STATIONER, which I inexplicably failed to see until much later, but slowed down when I got to the bottom half. CARTRIDGE PEN took a while, as did BOY MEETS GIRL. AND NO MISTAKE was LOI. No problem with INDIAMAN once TARIFF and SANDAL were in place. 23:11. Thanks setter and U.
25.51 so no major problems and a nice puzzle. OK, tony was a bit meh. Thanks to Ulaca for sorting EXCISE and INDIAMAN which I bunged in without really thinking about.
From One More Cup of Coffee (Valley Below):
Your sister sees the future like your mama and yourself
You’ve never learned to read or write, there’s no books upon your shelf
And your pleasure knows no limits
Your voice is like a meadowlark
But your heart is like an OCEAN
Mysterious and dark
Fast, helped by knowing all the words. Indiaman probably from books, and tony from of all places the home of the boomerang: in 70’s Australia I’d heard tony said, but would have spelt it with an E i.e. having a lot of TONE. Cartridge pens were what we graduated to when our cursive writing was considered acceptable in pencil. No-one was allowed – can’t remember their name – the pens with the reservoirs. And though our desks had holes for inkwells, never seen one in my life.
Thanks setter and blogger.
I was on a gig in Toronto. One of clients said, “gee, he’s using a fountain pen, someone take a phodo”.
Clearly not old enough … my primary school had inkwells, and an ink monitor to keep them supplied…
Mine as well…
I was the ink monitor
Mrs McG
My elementary school years( 1953 – 60) spanned the use of straight pens, fillable fountain pens, cartridge pens and finally ballpoints. The first two required ink bottles in holes in the desk and blotters, with all the consequent chaos of smears, spills, ink fights etc. A girl sitting behind me once scratched her name on the back of my neck and she got in big trouble for possibly killing me through blood poisoning and I was yelled at too for sitting quietly and letting her do it!
C S Lewis used a straight pen his whole life for all his writings, which I find remarkable. And I was brought up on fountain pens and cartridge pens + inkwells.
You must have fancied her!!
25:44
Pretty steady until the SE, but took a while to see TIMOROUS and LOI FEISTY. Fine Monday fare: particularly enjoyed the four long ones.
Thanks all.
U, I meant to say earlier that in 2D you have EMU where it should be SUM that is reversed in BEE.
Pretty shoddy performance all round, today! Tks
22:22
Modestly challenging Monday fare, I thought. Half a dozen left at fifteen minutes – took some deep thought to come up with both INDIAMAN (ignoring the tempting DIANA) and ARBOREAL, which left three in the SE corner – GLUTTONY went first, but as with others, wasn’t sure where that Y came from; TIMOROUS followed though wasn’t sure of the parsing; and finally FEISTY once that S checker was in.
Thanks U
25:10 – and a bit of a struggle with clever clues and a couple of unfamiliar/unknown words. TIMOROUS and FEISTY last to go.
18.30 . Started brightly but then becalmed over cartridge pen( or at least the second part), Indiaman, and no mistake and feisty. Tricky and another example of the not so simple Monday.
An enjoyable puzzle, where a third of my time was spent on the final three clues. Took longer than I should have done over ARBOREAL because the tidal flood didn’t come to me, and had to use pen and paper for BOY-MEETS-GIRL before the resultant L gave me the LOI (“tony” and its opposite “atony” are common in Words With Friends where my club has a fair number of Australian players).
FOI EMBOSSED
LOI GLUTTONY
COD EGGS BENEDICT *
TIME 9:00
* This was my “go to” breakfast in Wetherspoons pubs – then they introduced Miner’s Benedict, where the ham is replaced by black pudding. Black Pudding and Hollandaise Sauce work surprisingly well together.
I’m trying to imagine black pudding and hollandaise sauce together and failing. This can only be remedied by trying the concoction. Presumably a Bury style pudding rather than the oaty Irish style one? Or does it make no difference?
Someone should do that with sausages and call it Benedict Cumberland.
😩
Sorry.
lol
Not too hard for me 20 mins but biffed indiaman and gluttony as did many I see.
20’16”, with a cold. TONY seems such an ugly word.
Thanks ulaca and setter.
Wrote in INDIANAN, couldn’t parse it, but worked out that M needed to replace N to satisfy the wordplay. NHO the ship. No idea what TONY was doing in GLUTTONY, but felt it had to be. LOI was FEISTY.
17:38
6:17. Gentle to start the week.
A tale of two halves, the differnce being clues with very direct and obvious definitions (customs duty, connected to the internet, Mexican city), and those with ‘maybe yes, maybe not’ definitions (boomerang, superior effect) or wordplay.
19-min (quick for me) biff-fest, but very enjoyable. Didn’t know TONY or INDIAMAN. Good Monday fun!
No time to report as it was done in three sessions thanks to unexpected visitors and a lunch break. I didn’t find it too difficult however finishing in an estimated 30 minutes. I had the vaguest recollections of seeing reference somewhere to an INDIAMAN, so was fairly confident that was correct. Other than that, I was only really held up with my last two TIMOROUS and finally FEISTY.
Nice and straightforward, but rouse for lots of anger doesn’t work for me.
Surely it’s ‘rous’ for lots of anger, indicating that the last letter of ‘to anger’ is missing?
I started quickly, then ground to a halt over some of the lower half particularly, owing to some strange definitions, I thought, though they don’t seem to have bothered anyone else. Fail for omit, Captain for boss, ARBOREAL = due to trees? LOI GLUTTONY, with a MER at ton-y. Never heard it said, and it appears to be an Americanism. However, all completed, so mustn’t grumble!
I omitted to tell you.
Captain of industry – close enough?
Arboreal shade?
31’20”
Quickly away, struggled to match the early pace, stayed on, but too late …
… but no smudges! Completed with a broad-nibbed Waterman (fountain, not cartridge) as usual; we were not allowed biros, even in the Sixth Form. Come to think of it, I think this rule applied to the masters too. I never got out of the habit and still use my great grandfather’s drawing instruments that can be adjusted for thickness of line before being dipped in ink.
TONY’s miffed me before, but I think that was in another place.
I’m thinking that those of us who dredged up INDIAMAN may have seen it in Conrad ? His little novelette about a young captain saving an absconding seaman was a one of the best Christmas presents I ever received.
All parsed, and under my par at least; thank you setter, and Ulaca for your tribulations.
That sounds like The Secret Sharer, quite a suspenseful ending.
I can’t claim a time as I opted to review the puzzle to check on some parsings and lost the display of my time, but I think that it was 14.25. The clues fell kindly for me today.
I had two thirds of this done in 20 minutes or so, then came to an abrupt halt. SPEEDBOAT, TIMOROUS, AND NO MISTAKE were the ones that held me up.
I enjoyed CARTRIDGE PEN- I got a lovely Parker one when I started at grammar school, only to be told to write in black biro.
Liked INDIAMAN
The opposite in my grammar school. Biros not allowed, had to use fountain pens which caused many stressful moments when underlining in case excess ink flow was dragged down by the ruler. To cap it all, this geeky eleven year old got one on each hand (the cane) in English for the heinous crime of forgetting my blotting paper!
Peter
Caning on the hand is appalling.
Must be done on the buttocks, which were made for it…
19.04, but that involved finding a tv prog for my wife.
Biffed GLUTTONY as it was a sin, but as for TONY…..?
Aral Sea possibly the worst man-made disaster ever? Depriving the sea of water in order to grow cotton. Caspian Sea going the same way – material for a clue in 2050 perhaps.
Liked Speedboat.
I have been solving the quick cryptics for 5 years now and only now starting to tackle the 15x15s, but although slow compared to others’ achievements (29m 29s today) I am at least finishing more and more quickly. LOI today: ARBOREAL.
I have been solving for 50 years and still think any time under 30 minutes is good.
DNF
Poor effort here. “Done” in 22.02 but failed to see (on phone) the failure to fill in the far right hand side FEISTY. Had spelled FILIGREE wrongly in any event.
Also thought LEADER was perfectly good until coming here and seeing the light. If that sneakiness was deliberate it was a nice touch from the setter.
I didn’t find this too hard but I did go down the LEADER dead end before rethinking and realizing that while a LEADER might be an article in a newspaper it would probably never be called a story. I only realized FILIGREE had one L when I couldn’t fit it with two. Since I live in California I know lots of Mexican cities, but only ACAPULCO and Tijuana ever show up in crosswords (potentially Mexico City, but that is pretty crossword-unfriendly). As a kid, at home, I had a desk with an inkwell, but wisely my parents stole the actual well so I just had a desk with a hole, but no massive spill of ink on my carpet.
My LOI was INDIANAN which I was pretty certain was wrong, so why didn’t I take more care. It’s not as though I was trying to achieve some time. Oh well.
A very Monday puzzle but none the worst for that. I liked it.
FOI CAMPAIGN
COD SPEEDBOAT
I see like others I started fast but then found it much stickier ending up taking 36:03 with LOI FEISTY
30:38
L2I were SPEEDBOAT and AND NO MISTAKE. Both of these are candidates for COD.
45:12. That felt extremely slow for me … definitely not on the wavelength. I can’t even blame the vocab as I knew all the words apart from TONY as fashionable (which didn’t stop me for long). oh well.
many thanks to both.
Completed this in 25 minutes.
The only clue I was unsure of was Timorous and the rouse=anger question.
Not sure I’ve seen F=fellow nor AR=Arabic before.