In my still somewhat drowsy post-ailment condition, this was just what the doctor ordered.
Among the other 29 (I’m guessing) other clues, one stood out by virtue of its kitchen-sink, Adolescence-style vibe.
Not complaining – just seemed a bit weird.
18:04
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | Hit performance by current politician (6) |
| IMPACT – I MP ACT | |
| 4 | Periodically, news reporters love coffee (8) |
| ESPRESSO – |
|
| 10 | Bureaucrat training new parking attendant (9) |
| PENPUSHER – PE N P USHER | |
| 11 | Penniless guy changes side (5) |
| BROKE – B |
|
| 12 | Present royal fellow less well, faced with absurd cost (8,6) |
| STOCKING FILLER – anagram* of COST KING F (fellow) ILLER | |
| 14 | Problem children (5) |
| ISSUE – double definition (DD) | |
| 16 | Charts do not reveal cases blown apart (3,6) |
| HIT PARADE – APART* in HIDE; first used in this sense in the year of the Wall Street Crash | |
| 18 | Proprietor’s path runs around rolling hill (9) |
| LANDOWNER – DOWN in LANE R | |
| 20 | Trainee section of designated activity is over (5) |
| CADET – reverse hidden | |
| 21 | Mysterious event left drilling company with spotted work surface (5,9) |
| CLOSE ENCOUNTER – L in CO SEEN (spotted) COUNTER (work surface) | |
| 25 | Lots of people went by car, perhaps (5) |
| DROVE – DD | |
| 26 | Page with space for truism (9) |
| PLATITUDE – P LATITUDE | |
| 27 | Request agreement, in French first (8) |
| ENTREATY – EN (today’s French lesson) TREATY | |
| 28 | Where ownership details can be checked, to be sure (6) |
| INDEED – in a deed (unless you live where I do, on an outlying island in Hong Kong, where construction and occupation were harum-scarum – not a place to buy…) | |
| Down | |
|---|---|
| 1 | Mobilises poorly, accepting pawn is hopeless (10) |
| IMPOSSIBLE – P in MOBILISES* | |
| 2 | Show underwear with nothing covering bottom (5) |
| PANTO – PANT |
|
| 3 | Shy and hollow little laugh (7) |
| CHUCKLE – CHUCK (as in throw a ball) L |
|
| 5 | Dismisses retracted line at end of letter (5) |
| SERIF – FIRES reversed | |
| 6 | Are bull flies cause of mild rash? (7) |
| RUBELLA – ARE BULL* | |
| 7 | Record of performance scratched on outside of motor (9) |
| SCORECARD – CAR in SCORED | |
| 8 | Unlock old enclosure (4) |
| OPEN – O PEN | |
| 9 | Two mates finally dropping down the hatch (4-4) |
| CHIN-CHIN – CHIN |
|
| 13 | Company information is possibly dealt with there (10) |
| LETTERHEAD – |
|
| 15 | Carol free, wanting some time, to choose (6,3) |
| SINGLE OUT – SING LE |
|
| 17 | Rotate bed to accommodate a renegade (8) |
| TURNCOAT – TURN A in COT | |
| 19 | Inappropriate milieu for after-school networking? (7) |
| OBSCENE – the Old Boy (OB) SCENE; odd, this one… | |
| 20 | Prudence raising hundred in sale (7) |
| CAUTION – AU |
|
| 22 | Social media platform stops recording about foreign resident (5) |
| EXPAT – X in TAPE reversed | |
| 23 | Start to cheat, breaking honest agreement (5) |
| TRUCE – C |
|
| 24 | Creep uncovered financial records (4) |
| EDGE – |
|
Having got attuned to the new hard-nosed style of Times cryptics, this felt like a little bit of a damp squib to me, only a one-cup crossword at best. Very Mondayish!
And I don’t think I’ve ever said either “Chin-chin” or “Down the hatch” in my life. Calling British culture “Alcohol obsessed” seems rather a rash generalisation to me. Unless it was intended to include a decent Chablis or Beaune.
Could I suggest that 13d is an anagram of ‘dealt’ and ‘there’?
Thank you for pointing this out. You have thereby prevented flocks of fly-by posters swooping by to inform me, while disregarding your contribution.
Zipped through this until LETTERHEAD which only fell when I tried the DEALT THERE anagram. Otherwise, maybe a bit too easy. even for a Monday. Thank you U and setter.
20 minutes. Enjoyable with a few good surfaces, especially at 2dn!
oh no it wasn’t
Eh? Perhaps you meant “I don’t agree?” .. which is a different thought
Panto, Jerry…
Oh, yes it is!
😂
A PB today at 10:04! I didn’t think such things were possible these days, thanks for stroking my ego with an easy puzzle Mr Setter. IMPACT was FOI and SCORECARD was my LOI
6:54. No problems today. The biggest puzzle is trying to work out which clue has the kitchen-sink Adolescence-style vibe.
I do say CHIN-CHIN sometimes, but it’s done with a sort of conscious irony, and may be partly because the French say ‘tchin’. Same origin of course.
You’ll be glad to know, u, that the drinking culture is less prevalent among the current youthful generation. They prefer drugs.
I think it’s nip and tuck in Weston-super-Mare, where my English family (comprising three generations) are all now based.
Still I hope you will agree that blanket statements about “British culture” are doomed to be wrong. Or just irritating, which is as bad or worse
Amen to that.
28:08, a very fast one.
LOI SCORECARD held me up, not seeing car=motor. Looking for “outside of motor” to be MR til all the checkers ruled that out.
Saw the DEALT THERE anagram and tried LEATHERED, LATHERED and even LEATHERHEAD.
X=“social media platform”, good one. Not sure about F=fellow, which only exists inside other acronyms. I know this is how E=European, S=society work, but why not R=royal, C=college etc?
10:49 finishing with HIT PARADE, which held me up a bit thinking HOT something at first, and LETTERHEAD. Nothing to scare the horses here. Thanks Ulaca and setter.
17 minutes – a PB – so was not surprised by the snitch rating. I raced through the top half but was slowed lower down by SINGLED OUT where the use of carol invoked the recent festival for too long. Also tarried over various automotive possibilities in 25ac before remembering that people can, like sheep or cattle, mass in droves.
LOI ENTREATY, COD PENPUSHER – although just one of the many archaisms today.
Thanks to setter for a gentle start to the week and ulaca.
At the easier end but absolutely no complaints about that. Thanks setter and U.
DNF, defeated by INDEED.
– Didn’t parse CLOSE ENCOUNTER or OBSCENE
– Considered and initially ruled out CHIN-CHIN before checkers forced me to reconsider and see that it was in fact right
– Would expect to see ‘droves’ rather than DROVE meaning lots of people
Thanks ulaca and setter.
COD Penpusher
12:41 for a PB today. Not the first one today reading the comments and probably won’t be the last. Obviously spending too much time completing Friday’s monster has paid off.
I quite like this level of difficulty for a Monday although I can see why people may want something a bit chewier.
I get the impression the setter intended this to go out before Christmas with the PANTO, STOCKING FILLER and reference to singing carols. There may have been more.
LETTERHEAD LOI which like the blogger I solved as a cryptic definition. Now I see how it’s meant to work that’s my COD.
Thanks blogger and setter.
26 minutes. Had CHORTLE at 3d initially and took a few minutes to cotton on to SERIF and SINGLE OUT, so should have been a bit quicker. No complaints though and enough to keep me challenged and interested.
Thanks to ulaca and setter
14.12, but with a ridiculous typo. I was a bit worried about OBSCENE: I could make it work, as was intended, but was prepared to refer to VAR if necessary. LETTERHEAD took a while to work out, though I decided it had to be an anagram. I think I was moving in the direction of Companies House rather than in-house stationery. I take it the adolescent style clue was the one appropriately to the left of CHUCKLE.
Thanks to Ulaca for explaining the ones where I skipped over the explaining part.
A low Snitch and some lucky biffing got me round in 14 minutes; a few downright gimmes (OPEN, PLATITUDE), most of the rest were – to echo the pop-pickers reference – “easy listening”, with a handful of more intricate clues (SCORECARD, LETTERHEAD).
Thanks U and setter.
16:25. Just enough friction to cause a slowdown at the end on HIT PARADE, LETTERHEAD and fixating on SCOREBOARD.
“Pop Pickers” was precisely my thought. Some adolescent memories there, trying to tape my favourites on a Sunday evening.
Good fun, thanks Ulaca and setter.
19 mins, by the comments so far, on the slow side. Held up by assuming that the literal was sale not prudence. You should never be prudential….
16.58 with a typo
Lovely puzzle. A bit off the pace, struggling at the end with the excellent HIT PARADE and LETTERHEAD.
Thanks Ulaca and Setter
21 minutes, Not quite a PB but very fast for me. I don’t remember any particular holdups. LOI was SCORECARD.
From IMPACT to EDGE with a detour to CHORTLE before immediately seeing the errror of my ways. LETTERHEAD and HIT PARADE were late entries. 14:11. Thanks setter and U.
24 mins so pretty quick for me. Enjoyable, no probs for me starting the week on the easier side.
LOI OBSCENE took a few minutes to see. . I liked STOCKING FILLER and the CLOSE ENCOUNTER,
Thanks U and setter.
Quite a nice change from Friday. If I can do it in 23 minutes it must be easy, and the SNITCH confirms this. Actually I couldn’t see 15dn (SINGLE OUT) but entered it and spent a minute parsing it afterwards as it was strongly suggested by the checkers. ‘Wanting some time’ suggested to me that the last T was that one and that it was added to something.
10:18 – rats at a just missed sub-10, though I can’t imagine I could write any faster however easy the clues were.
First solve under 15 minutes on a main cryptic. We didn’t parse 13d properly, thinking it was just a cryptic but otherwise both definitions and wordplays seemed fair all round, and some lovely surfaces to brighten a cold Monday morning. I wouldn’t want every puzzle to be as easy as this one, but it is nice to catch a break occasionally.
Thank you setter and Ulaca.
For goodness sake let’s not complain about the occasional ‘easy ‘ one. It gets the week off to a good start and we will pay the price later in the week.
14:11, so not as fast as some very impressive times above!
Keriothe has already alluded to the origin of ‘chin-chin’, and the link is interesting given that you mentioned your Hong Kong residence! 請 is pronounced qǐng in Mandarin, as some will know (it’s one of the first words you learn)*, but apparently the English comes from Shanghainese, with an -n rather than an -ng final. It makes sense that it would have come from either that or Cantonese (I don’t know if the same etymon/character is used with the same function in Cantonese.)
*It literally means ‘invite/request’ but is used in polite formulas, where it often has the more of an imperative force, in keeping with rather rigid cultural expectations: “[I] invite/request you [to] sit down/drink/eat”.
About 16′, would have been a sub PB of below 15 had I not got in a tangle with LETTERHEAD. Otherwise a bit QC even for a Monday (Of course I’ll now fail miserably on the QC…)
Thanks Ulaca and setter
13:49 PB. Struggling to make any sense of whether I’m improving having only got 5 correct answers on Friday before throwing in the towel.
The trick is just to enjoy doing it… if you finish it fine, if you do it quicker than last time fine, but neither has the least importance.
A rare sub-20 time for me at 19:12. Failed to parse HIT PARADE – thanks to Ulaca for the explanation.
18:01. First one I’ve skipped through in ages. top left did give me some bother though, and probably was 5 mins of my time staring at IMPACT and the like. Good way to start the week, thanks both
15:07
Easy Monday, though missed the parsing of CHIN CHIN (doh!). Spotted the anagram at 13d early, but did need the final checker (T) to see 16a. Otherwise, all good.
Thanks U and setter
Enjoyed this, thank you Setter, and despite not needing the blog for once we enjoyed reading it, thank you Ulaca.
Just one question: was the clue you referred to by “Among the other 29 (I’m guessing) other clues, one stood out by virtue of its kitchen-sink, Adolescence-style vibe.” 19d OBSCENE? Assumed that you meant the television programme “Adolescence” due to your use of italics. I presume we’re meant to firmly separate the wordplay from the definition but I can see it might have given a vaguely unpleasant frisson.
If that wasn’t the clue you meant, apologies for misunderstanding.
20 mins PB for me. Although I have a vague memory of a 15 minutes over the breakfast tea and toast many years ago.
delighted to say this is the first times ‘full’ cryptic we managed to get out (graduating from the quick) in a squeak under an hour, although slightly dismayed to see everyone else calling it easy!
I didn’t find myself quite as much on wavelength as many commenters, but I was coming to it at intervals of invigilating mock exams, so attention was necessarily divided. CLOSE ENCOUNTER and HIT PARADE were problematic as I kept trying to bifd the relevant answer from crossers instead of relying on the cryptic. Liked OB SCENE and LETTERHEAD.
My thanks to ulaca and setter.
Lots of too many accesses lockouts.
10a COD Penpusher for just going on and on.
15a Hit Parade, bye-bye David Jacobs. Oh no, that was Juke Box Jury.
25a Drove, usually only met in the plural but fair dos, it works (occasionally) in the singular. As pointed out by ChrisLutton.
13d LOI Letterhead, until I read the blog I just thought this was very weak; but NO.
19d Obscene=inappropriate?
Only my third ever sub ten min i think and my first in months. Thanks for giving a sucker an even break just once in a while; 9:57.
There seem to be quite a few PBs today, so I suppose it was even easier than I made it. Nowhere near a PB, but a respectable 24.48 for me.
This one took me a leisurely 26 mins as I was doing other things at the same time. Enjoyable puzzle – no complaints. Favourite clues, to PEN-PUSHER and LETTERHEAD. Thank you to Setter and Blogger.
14:32 – definitely a PB! unusually for me, I think I managed to parse all of the answers (although still post-biffing in many cases). Not sure to do with all the spare time this has created!
Thought I was in for an under-tenner, but slowed pathetically for the last quarter. 16’03” all up, which I don’t think was a very good time. Felt like it was easy and I was being thick. Now back to finish the last few clues on Friday’s stinker. Clock on two hours something.
17:34, with ENTREATY my LOI.
Thanks U and setter
14:00.
COD: HIT PARADE
Thanks to ulaca and our setter.
10.25. My fastest for a while so I’m guessing a low degree of difficulty.
28:02 to go from IMPACT to LOI LETTERHEAD, including some sticky moments. Nice puzzle
You’ll never normally see me here as I dwell in the lower reaches of QC land. However, this was recommended in the QC blog and I almost finished it (gave up on 13d) and enjoyed it. Did struggle in places but satisfying to see the grid filled in.