Time taken: 9:15. Although that is a shade below my average time, a look at the early leaderboard makes me think I can declare this one an official Tricky Thursday.
I had a few late appointments tonight, so I’m in the odd position of writing up a daily puzzle nearly four hours after I solved it, so let’s see what I have forgotten in the interim. I do remember I had to focus hard on the wordplay, there’s some crafty work here.
How did you get along?
| Across | |
| 1 | Intentionally signed off after purchase delivered (2,6) |
| BY DESIGN – an anagram of SIGNED after a homophone of BUY(purchase) | |
| 5 | Gruesome ban following change of leadership (6) |
| MORBID – FORBID(ban) with the first letter changed | |
| 10 | Chew some pork that’s medium on the inside (5) |
| CHOMP – a pork CHOP containing M(medium) | |
| 11 | One upshot of having much demand on the law changed (6,3) |
| WEALTH TAX – TAX(demand) after an anagram of THE LAW. I don’t have to worry about that for two reasons. 1) I live in Americadoodleland where being disgustingly wealthy means you pay less tax, and 2) The obvious. | |
| 12 | Eddy’s hands wrapped in trendy fleece gloves (9) |
| WHIRLPOOL -R and L are the hands, inside HIP(trendy) inside WOOL(fleece). Nifty double container! | |
| 13 | Attitude entertains small group of friends (5) |
| POSSE – POSE(attitude) containing S(small) | |
| 14 | Setter is taken in by semi-optimistic primate (7) |
| SIAMANG – I AM(setter is) inside half of SANGUINE(optimistic) | |
| 16 | Before payment, barely eat and drink (6) |
| COFFEE – FEE(payment) coming after SCOFF(eat) minus the external letters | |
| 18 | Very valuable ancient information banks (6) |
| GOLDEN – OLD(ancient) inside GEN(information) | |
| 20 | Arab revolutionary patrolling hospital in sheikhdom (7) |
| BAHRAIN – anagram of ARAB containing H(hospital), then IN | |
| 22 | Man giving up coat for senior citizen (5) |
| OLDIE – SOLDIER(man) minus the external letters | |
| 23 | When email fails in the interim (9) |
| MEANWHILE – anagram of WHEN,EMAIL | |
| 25 | Converting garden, use work clothes (9) |
| DUNGAREES – anagram of GARDEN,USE | |
| 26 | Porter maybe abandoning poet in mountainous region (5) |
| RIDGE – remove COLE Porter from the poet COLERIDGE | |
| 27 | Grasping cap on gas piping (6) |
| GREEDY – first letter of Gas, then REEDY(piping) | |
| 28 | Prompt cat eats last of mice and departs (4-4) |
| FEED-LINE – FELINE(cat) containing the last letter of micE and D(departs) | |
| Down | |
| 1 | Repercussion that’s best dealt with by another near Bath? (8) |
| BACKWASH – double definition second one referring to washing each other’s backs | |
| 2 | Senior copper bags stolen garment (5) |
| DHOTI – DI(senior copper) containing HOT(stolen) | |
| 3 | Economic relationship with flexibility, as a consequence exact (6,3,6) |
| SUPPLY AND DEMAND – SUPPLY(with flexibility) , AND(as a consequence), DEMAND(exact) | |
| 4 | Break down dispute cycling medal introduces (2,5) |
| GO WRONG – ROW(dispute) cycled, inside GONG(medal) | |
| 6 | Where marine life will never be happy (2,3,2,3,5) |
| ON TOP OF THE WORLD – double definition | |
| 7 | Biblical adulterer, extremely tough female, crushed by degrees (9) |
| BATHSHEBA – external letters of TougH, and SHE(female) inside BA and BA(degrees). Needed the wordplay for this! | |
| 8 | A little lower on the right-hand side (6) |
| DEXTER – double definition – I did not know the first one, a breed of Kerry cattle | |
| 9 | On policing, essentially Eastern girl bites tongue (6) |
| GAELIC – central letters of polICing, after E(eastern) inside GAL(girl) | |
| 15 | Dodging deacon via dithering (9) |
| AVOIDANCE – anagram of DEACON,VIA | |
| 17 | Go before stake and surrender (8) |
| ANTECEDE – ANTE(stake) and CEDE(surrender) | |
| 19 | 10? — the ultimate position for Gordon Brown (6) |
| NUMBER – last letter in gordoN, then UMBER(brown) | |
| 20 | Drag queen, formerly from lingerie club (7) |
| BRASSIE – remove ER(queen, formely) from BRASSIERE(lingerie) | |
| 21 | Show off on board, appealing fare? (3,3) |
| HOT DOG – double definition. The baseball game near me on Friday has them for $1, they are pretty appealing then! | |
| 24 | Animal caught in spin-drier (5) |
| INDRI – hidden inside spIN-DRIer | |
I was thinking this was Monday’s pulling into the station late—which would have been appropriate, after yesterday’s echo of the title of a book I’d just finished, since Monday was the day my new WHIRLPOOL refrigerator arrived (I got that having just the first L and “Eddy”)—until I got to the SE, where I was hung up a good while parsing two fiendish “subtraction from a hinted word” clues, BRASSIE and RIDGE.
DNF
NHO SIAMANG, and had no idea how the clue worked. I also failed to get RIDGE, which I biffed. I took ‘lower’ to be a cow of some sort, but DNK the relevant one, but didn’t have to. BATHSHEBA took me a while, as I tried to think of a male adulterer; finally thought of her, and worked out the wordplay. I took ‘revolutionary’ in 20ac to indicate reversal of ARAB, not that it matters. Definitely a tricky Thursday for me.
I also had SIAMANG noted as NHO, but it appeared in 15×15 #29087 in November last year and neither of us knew it then either. I thought the wordplay today was especially tricky for such an obscurity. This was only its second appearance here in the TfTT era; it’s never once made it to a Mephisto!
I had to cross my fingers for the NHO SIAMANG. I took it on trust that DEXTER was a type of cattle. I never did fully understand BACKWASH and I was unclear why a HOT DOG was “appealing”, especially since I don’t like them!
25:26 but with one silly pink (GALLIC for GAELIC) so DNF. Was surprised to get the rest right, lots of semi-guesses and unparsed clues. Not on wavelength.
Was glad to think of FELINE for the NHO FEED-LINE. NHO INDRI. NHO BRASSIE. NHO SIAMANG and didn’t get wordplay either – was thinking of ‘sangfroid’ but didn’t really work. Only recently learned the ‘outcome’ meaning of BACKWASH – before that only knew it as unwanted saliva when a friend had drunk from your bottle. Many others unparsed so thanks for the blog!
I tried BACKLASH at first, but my friend showed me the error of my ways which led to 12ac.
39 minutes when I gave up and used aids for SIAMANG (more on this in my reply to Kevin above).
I wasn’t sure about INDRI but assumed it was hidden and entered it with crossed fingers.
BRASSIE was biffed from ‘club’ and checkers but I was unable to make sense of the rest of the clue other than ‘lingerie’ accounting for BRAS. I bet the setter smiled when he came up with the surface reading of that clue. ‘Drag queen, formerly’ indeed!
I was pleased to remember HOT DOG as a surfing manoeuvre.
Is that what the other meaning of hot dog was? This clue really had me scratching my head.
That pesky little NHO primate did for me, DNF in 26. I figured out the obscure wp after the answer was revealed, but needed G’s assistance to understand how OLDIE, BRASSIE, NUMBER and RIDGE were devised. Like others I assumed DEXTER was some form of cattle, NHO INDRI and was just glad there weren’t any more animals.
From Subterranean Homesick Blues:
Look out kid, you’re gonna get hit
By users, cheaters, six-time losers
Hanging round the theatres
Girl by the WHIRLPOOL looking for a new fool
Don’t follow leaders, watch the parking meters
I enjoyed this. Went pretty fast through most of it and was left with the primate and the club. Eventually saw what was going on with BRASSIERE which left the monkey, but I just couldn’t see the wordplay. The two long downs went in straight away which gave plenty of crossers. Forgot to remember the surfing manoeuvre for HOT DOG but it went in with checkers. INDRI went in with a prayer. Liked BACHWASH. So much to like in this I thought and felt it was on the easier side for a Thursday, not counting the primate. COD to WEALTH TAX.
Thanks George and setter.
Trying and failing to come up with a jocular definition of ‘bachwashing’ here.
A form of ritual brainwashing considered pleasing by some?
BACHWASHING: A community choir trying to appeal to the classical set by learning a couple of cantatas?
Purporting to have Welsh ancestry?
😁
Very good.
Around 60 minutes FOI ON TOP OF THE WORLD. Doing a lot better than yesterday. Got SUPPLY AND DEMAND early but came to grinding halt at the bottom. NHO INDRI LOI Saw it hidden but didn’t click as possible until I got all crossers.
Thanks G
DNF after about 30 minutes, completely stumped by FEED-LINE, and like some others needed aids for SIAMANG. INDRI, on the other hand, comes up often enough that it was a write-in.
Thanks g and setter.
24 minutes. Didn’t know FEED-LINE as a thing and had forgotten DEXTER as a breed of cattle. Had to rely on wordplay for SIAMANG, one of the two primates appearing today. I liked BRASSIE, with The Open (watching on TV at the moment) starting today and NUMBER for the politically apt ’10?’ def and surface.
I couldn’t spot any GOLDEN OLDIE(s) but maybe I’m missing something.
Thanks to George and setter
SIAMANG was a tricky clue. I had the crossers and knew that both SLADANG and SIAMANG are animals of some sort, so it was the ‘I AM’ that tipped me into picking the latter, without full comprehension
Thanks for sladang, added to Cheating Machine. Hope I never meet one in real life.
What are they feeding you glh . . . good grief!
Slow start for this one but got there eventually (!) with only a few parsing questions. Much better in my opinion than some recent dailies.
COD 17d ANTECEDE for conciseness and clarity, and rather applaud the financial combination of 3d – helping the more difficult 11ac WEALTH TAX.
The potential association inferred with 20d remind me of an amusing clue in recent times in the Times cryptic with the answer ROYAL FLUSH.
Grateful for the further explanation of 19d re UMBER which more fully justifies the cryptic status of the clue, beyond number by example and Downing St.
Presume glh is being economical also for 21d HOT DOG being a particularly surfing expression (‘on board’).
Of course had to research (cheat) to get 14ac SIAMANG as an option, and like jackkt thought that expecting someone to pick and modify ‘sanguine’ a little much – to quote the same source as yesterday.
This was a serious challenge but enjoyable.
Thank you setter and glh.
Apologies for crossing with others on ‘hot dog’.
Also suggest 10ac might be better clued as ‘bite’ rather than ‘chew’ – FWIW (not much).
39 minutes, without errors much to my surprise.
Chanced SIAMANG from the word play. Didn’t really understand BRASSIE or BAHRAIN so biffed. Hesitated before opting for MORBID as I thought it ambiguous.
Liked DUNGAREES. Very pleased to remember HOT DOG . COD WHIRLPOOL.
Thanks to setter and glh.
Yes MORBID seems a bit off for ‘gruesome’ – although dictionaries might suggest otherwise. ‘Forbid’ is more straightforward for ‘ban’ and I wondered whether M (male) for F (female) was intended in the ‘change of leadership’. Probably not.
DNF, not having heard of SIAMANG in the recent enough past, nor having the nous to think of FEED-LINE. HOT DOG was and is still a biff and BACKWASH only half understood. Scratching backs, yes, but washing them? It was one of those days when I felt excluded from knowledge everyone else seems to have. COD to RIDGE. Thank you George and setter..
This was quite quick although I wasn’t getting a lot of the parsing so maybe I got lucky. I was probably buoyed on by the uplifting earworm from The Carpenters. Unfortunately the adulterer was not BATHSHEMA so ultimately a DNF.
Don’t think I have encountered drag as a removal indicator before so something new learnt.
COD WHIRLPOOL
Thanks setter and blogger
Strictly speaking the removal indicator here is ‘drag…from’. ‘Drag’ on its own wouldn’t work.
Cheers, that’s actually really important. I couldn’t get my head round drag=remove. I will rescind my ‘meh’ and say it’s actually a great clue.
Just under 30 minutes, but I was hitting and hoping with LOI BRASSIE, as I hadn’t parsed the removal of dear old Lizzie.
Lots of crafty wordplay here I agree – GAELIC took me a while, but it might be my COD for all that. FEED-LINE was also a toughie for me, and the primate went in with some trepidation.
Thanks blogger and setter both.
Like Dr.Shred I was torpedoed by entering “gallic” at 9D, which was one of a number I couldn’t parse (CHOMP became obvious later, but I needed the blog for WHIRLPOOL). 14:02 in vain, COD SUPPLY AND DEMAND (as a retired cabbie, I spent a while looking for an alternative to “hire and reward”).
24 mins and apart from SIAMANG I found this a welcome bit of light relief by this weeks standards.
Like most of my golf knowledge BRASSIE was known from Wodehouse so sufficiently out of date to be useful for The Times.
I think of Sanguine as being more neutral, accepting of the reality but I now see that, rather confusingly this is another meaning.
Enjoyed HOTDOG which I learned from Countdown is all one word in the showing off sense so maybe not quite a DD?
Thanks George and setter.
Collins has it as two words. OED lists it as hyphenated but in the citations there are examples where is one or two words. So I guess anything goes!
U mean: ‘business as usual’.
DNF, with SLABANG rather than the unknown SIAMANG (I figured out the sanguine bit, but then for some silly reason thought ‘setter’ could mean any dog so went for Lab).
– GREEDY went in with a shrug as piping=reedy was new to me
– DHOTI and INDRI are both in the ‘Words I only know from crosswords’ category
– Didn’t know either of the definitions for DEXTER
– Failed to parse NUMBER
– Got BRASSIE but by complete fluke, having forgotten that it’s a golf club and not thinking that we might need the full word brassiere for the wordplay rather than just bra
Thanks glh and setter.
COD Whirlpool
But Ur not putting yourself in the doghouse as much as I – both here and elsewhere.
73m 29s
Re 20ac, BAHRAIN is not a sheikhdom, it’s a kingdom.
A couple of clues held me up for quite a while. Firstly I had BUFFET iso COFFEE for 16ac; then I had BACKLASH iso BACKWASH for 1d
Thanks, George, especially for GAELIC, RIDGE and BRASSIE.
Correct, but it was originally – poetic/setter licence – if one believes in that thing?
But isn’t crosswordland where pedants gambol and frolic? :-))
Yes-ish – a word a friend of mine taught me (no-ish being its mate).
Time for all good pendants in Oz (and others) to get some shut-eye.
Good night/day all !
DNF. It’s always nice to come here and find you’re in good company, that being the case with SIAMANG today. I was stuck on thinking of a three letter word for setter and never considered that I might be looking for “setter is”.
40 minutes roughly. as the app isn’t working (still) I’m having to use the web version which has the habit of ticking away when you are interrupted… I’m finding these puzzles interesting but a bit involved – definitely a different tone in recent weeks, a bit too clever by half?
I knew INDRI but not SIAMANG, couldn’t see the SANG(uine) part although only needed one letter (N) to guess. I got HOT DOG but thought it was to do with skateboarding (and find a hot dog disgusting not appealing!) Like @MartinP1 I had a MER about Bahrain being a sheikdom, it would be nice if setters got their facts right. 23 minutes watching early golf from wonderful Portrush.
Good effort but two short at the one hour mark. One was the easy MORBID, where I only considered-ED words, and the harder FEED LINE which doesn’t look like a word. Not for the first time I unaccountably took the last letter of “mice” and so was inserting an M, so TIME looked possible.
Wasted a lot of time with WATER as the final word on the marine life clue.
Amazed that my total guess of the unlikely SIAMANG turned out correct, I only had the I, and never heard of this primate, nor the INDRI.
Not too tricky IMHO. I had thought it was Friday when I started but soon decided to check, and it isn’t. That said there was some NHO and tricky wordplay.
14a Siamang NHO, and wordplay not a gimme either. But I have already added plural to Cheating Machine so accept it has come up before and I forgot it. Actually I was MER because I thought the optimism came from sang-froid, so a bit less than half.
28a NHO Feed Line.
1d Backwash. You wash my back….
7d Bathsheba. Had thought the only Biblical female adulterer was in the New Testament (cast the first stone) but of course all the male adulterers had female accomplices, also guilty (even if not married,) and one of them is famous, if only because David has such a big role. I also thought of Judith who seduced Holofernes before beheading him, but she was a widow apparantly, so that’s all right then. It is not recorded if Holofernes was married. Anyway the adulterer didn’t have to be female, but the clue deceived me into thinking so.
8d Dexter. We have some of these on the common to mow it. They have no other function and can’t be eaten because they are too old, being kept there until old age kills them off.
COD 19d Number, for the PDM.
20d Brassie. Not built up from bra plus SSIE then. I biffed this.
Thanks glh and setter.
Bit mean to call BATHSHEBA an adulterer, since she didn’t really have an option, being collected by King David as an addition to his substantial hareem. Bit mean to expect us to know (or deduce) SIAMANG. I also spent too long trying to work out which poet minus what sort of porter could leave ANDES.
And just for fun, marine remains have been found on or near the summit of Mount Everest. It may take a while for marine life to revisit the spot, but never might be overstating the case.
24.38, marred by careless pink.
Sh, it’s a secret . . . don’t tell the setter.
DNF
Same as pootle: looking for a three-letter setter. Binned the whole thing after I got stuck on that, with less than half completed.
Thanks, g.
Needed aids for the NHOs BRASSIE and SIAMANG. The latter I thought was asking quite a lot of the solver. Couldn’t parse DEXTER (relied on the Latin meaning and crossed fingers) or HOT DOG. A weird mixture of very easy and very tricky.
DNF due to SIAMANG. Would never have thought of sanguine. Gave up and looked it up after 49 minutes and submitted off leaderboard. I had the rest right. 32 minutes for all bar the monkey. Thanks setter and George.
Another DNF, again beaten by one obscurity unhelpfully clued, this time SIAMANG. I can’t remember this happening so often in a short space of time as in the past several days.
Nice puzzle. I got around 3/4 the way there before hitting an impasse.
Setter is = I AM was an obvious thing I missed.
NHO BRASSIE, SIAMANG, FEED-LINE, BATHSHEBA.
16:26. I made heavy weather of this, often identifying a valid-looking answer but struggling to justify it from wordplay. The tricky double-containment in WHIRLPOOL, for instance, or the obvious-once-you-see-it cryptic hint for BACKWASH.
A powerful man covertly ogles a woman, kidnaps her, rapes her and has her husband murdered and she is forever defined as an adulterer. Patriarchy is one helluva drug.
Looks like you’re reading a different Bible from the ones I’ve read.
You’d make a helluva lawyer!
Well yes I left out one of the worst bits, this is a family website.
Well I might have to check that in my Knox . . . the hard Knox perhaps!
That’s in every Bible. It’s just that preachers soft-pedal the many, many nasty bits and layfolk don’t spend much time exploring the text on their own (a common path to atheism). Ten Commandments, not one of which says, “Don’t rape.” Or “slavery is wrong.” Or “don’t commit genocide.”
(But don’t get me started. Ha.)
As far as I can see we haven’t really been told what a HOT DOG is in its non-edible sense. Some move in skateboarding or surfing or something, evidently, which I eventually suspected when solving. I can’t remember when I wrote down so many clues to be checked for parsing here. Most of them were understandable afterwards, occasionally even on a second look before checking here, but I was defeated by BRASSIE and RIDGE. Just biffed them and hoped for the best and used the check button, as I also did with INDRI and DEXTER to confirm that they were correct. 51 minutes.
I mentioned it as a surfing manoeuvre in my comment posted at 5:50am. I knew it since it came up here some time ago.
Yes, you were the closest. But I would have expected someone to say precisely what it is.
Actually, I understood it was not a particular manoeuvre but just being overly showy in general on the board or ‘hot-dogging’.
If someone has better info and I have missed it here I would be pleased to know.
I am being a little coy. If I were still living at ‘Coolie’ I could ask my next door neighbour Joel.
Reached a dead end with SIAMANG and FEEDLINE . Could not finish . Maybe a bit distracted as watching the Open .
Always thought Bahrain was a kingdom and not a Shiekhdom . Did not figure out Gordo(n) and umber . Thought it was number 10 Downing Street . So still got number right.
My mum’s family in Ireland kept Dexters. She said they were lovely animals with a very sweet nature.
DNF
Another careless GALLIC in around 25 minutes.
Like Dr Shred was thinking of SANG-FROID so SIAMANG was both punty and lucky (and tough for anyone knowing SLABANG). Did get FEED LINE at the end though had not the foggiest in relation to the biffed HOT DOG.
Thanks George/setter
26:09
A pretty good day. Didn’t know LOI SIAMANG but once thought of I AM, needed only one letter, and answer vaguely rang a bell – didn’t think of SANGuine.
Failed to fully parse GAELIC too, can never remember whether ‘essentially’ is the first, first+last or middle letters, but saw GA(E)L which was enough for me.
Liked BATHSHEBA, WEALTH TAX and DEXTER (Mrs H and I talking about the new tv series only this morning) – never heard of the cow…
Thanks G and setter
DNF. Rushed to judgment by putting in top dog rather than the hot one. Worked out siamang but checked it before putting it in. Bit of a struggle to be honest.
No idea what is going on with HOT DOG**, but otherwise I found this pretty straightforward. No time as the app has been assuring me for the last couple of weeks that I am completing puzzles in 00’00”, which I suspect is an under-estimate.
** Before coming here, that is.
A relatively early in the day solve for us but sadly a DNF for us after about 36 minutes (timer not working) having a) revealed SIAMANG (couldn’t see the parsing and took a punt with SIAKANG); and b) also taking an incorrect punt with GALLIC (should have been able to see that one). BRASSIE was a lucky guess based solely on the checkers and BRAS but couldn’t parse it. For DEXTER we had no difficulty with the first meaning because a local farm shop that we frequent from time to time keeps its own herd. Thanks to setter and to glh for the explanations.
This took me an hour (again), held up by Backwash and Siamang – didn’t much like either clue. Some odd definitions in this puzzle, I thought.
No time to report as I completed this whilst watching the Tour de France and then The Open golf. However answers came relatively regularly till I ground to a halt on my final two. I put in LEAD LINE for 28ac, even though I couldn’t parse it of course, and gave up on SIAMANG, even though I was looking for a three letter introduction to SANG[uine]. I was on the right track but the ‘setter’ defeated me which ever way you look at it.
Some tough ones in there, definitely. Not finished till 31’44” on the clock. I was going to make an adverse comment about 22ac, and how the COAT for SENIOR (S…R) was being used in both the cryptic and the definition parts, a trifle unfairly. But of course the COAT in the clue refers solely to SOLDIER, and it’s a coincidence this coat is also S…R. I hope I am clear.
DNF on SIAMANG 😳 and FEED LINE. About 25 mins for the rest so not too disheartened; I am gradually losing my fifteenophobia. But a finish remains rare. Many thanks G.
25:25 of which I reckon at least the last 5 minutes were fiddling round with siamang when I finally tried M in the middle and realised setter is could be I Am and not just I, then i saw sang(uine) and hey presto by some miracle that was it.
Thanks setter and blogger
As many others, NHO SIAMANG, INDRI, nor DEXTER for the little lower, but that went in on the second definition. Like Merlin, I wasted time carelessly entering WATER for the marine life clue, and struggled to get HOT DOG and FEED LINE. Really liked NUMBER (especially the brown/umber connection). All in all an enjoyable experience.