Times Crossword 25,649 – Statistics Show…

Author   JerryWPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
Solving Time: Just under 30 minutes, so somewhat harder than average, but with several of those minutes spent on 28dn. Also I have several not fully parsed and one error, which I suspect might in fact be 28dn.. still, let’s see how the blog goes

This crossword does have some really excellent clues in it, for example 13dn, 18dn. On edit: I often find it very hard to assess a puzzle’s merit and its difficulty, under blogging conditions, ie after midnight and under some pressure. In the morning light this particular one is now looking an especially good effort. Thank you, setter!

cd = cryptic definition, dd = double definition, rev = reversed, anagrams are *(–), homophones indicated in “”

ODO means the Oxford Dictionaries Online

Across

1 muscle – that is = SCilicet in cross = MULE. Not sure where the def. is, is it an &lit perhaps?
4 emoticon – GeorgE + spy chief = M + OT + I + CON, for that bane of the internet 🙂
10 freewheel – Following + *(WHERE) + fish = EEL
11 envoy – delight in = ENJOY, with the J replaced by a V
12 Kaliningrad – Area + inside of = LINING, all inside backward unlit = KRAD. I had heard of Kaliningrad, vaguely, it is the headquarters of Russia’s Baltic fleet..
14 cha – coffee = MOCHA, without the MO (instant)..
15 newsman – Son in NEW MAN, what we all are nowadays apparently
17 dyeing – sounds like longing = “dying.”
19 Anselm – *(NAMES + Lucifer). There are at least three of these, and I choose this one.. clearly, being Archbishop of Canterbury has never been a straightforward job!
21 bitumen – scrap = BIT + list of courses = MENU, with the U brought forward to make BIT U MEN, or asphalt; not to be confused with tarmacadam
23 tom – volume = book = TOMe. Tom Thumb is a folk character, hero of the first fairy story printed in English. Though some may be more familiar with his namesake, General Tom Thumb
24 slave-driver – L in stopped = SAVED + large flower = RIVER. I was all set to complain that slave-drivers are more concerned about how hard others work than themselves, but I now see a “hard worker” can indeed “work” others hard…
26 pukka – “pucker” .. a word indelibly linked with Our Jamie these days. I’m not interested in his cooking particularly, but can’t help but admire his crusading zeal to (for example) improve school nutrition, god knows it needed it
27 Who Was Who – doctor = WHO + W + A + *(SHOW). An offshoot of the better known “Who’s Who”
29 portends – side on board = PORT + extremes = ENDS
30 stylus – hidden, rev., in iS bUlLy YeT iS

Down

1 Mafeking – FencE in forcing = MAKING. The Siege of Mafeking was a Boer War incident that made a national hero of Robert Baden-Powell. Anyone able to publish a book called “Scouting for Boys” and get away with it, must surely have been a force to be reckoned with..
2 spell – a dd. Is this my error? Nothing better comes to mind and it fits well enough, so I guess not (and see 28dn)
3 low – exhortation to watch = LO, + Weight. Lo as in “And Lo! the Hunter of the East has caught The Sultan’s Turret in a Noose of Light” (Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam)
5 Mildred – easy = MILD + claret = RED.
6 trendsetter – right up = TR (rt, rev) + close = END, + I = (the) SETTER. A neat clue this, fully deserving of its exclamation mark..
7 cave canem – danger = MENACE + holiday = VAC. Cave canem, “Beware of the dog” in latin, is still occasionally seen on the gates of snobbish (and presumably, incompetent) dog owners.. like “beware of the dog” itself, or “trespassers will be prosecuted,” it is a nonsensical sign with no legal validity, don’t get me started..
8 naysay – another hidden, rev. clue: dinghY AS YANgtze’s
9 lean on – spare = LEAN, ON = leg in the cricketing reference du jour
13 numbers game – *(SUMMER BEGAN) looking at this clue again, I think it is perhaps one of the best clues I’ve seen in a very long time. Such a beautiful surface, topical, all very neat and slick. A work of art. I suppose if it has a fault, numbers games themselves are not as common as once they were; but the phrase is still in frequent use. ODO: “The use or manipulation of statistics or figures, especially in support of an argument: ‘MPs were today playing the numbers game as the vote drew closer'”
16 winemaker – *(MINE) in stirrer = WAKER
18 enormous – the evil doctor NO in ER, + MOUSe, ie a mouse with its tail cut off, by the farmer’s wife in question.. another very neat clue except we have A&E, not ERs
20 miaowed – only now, do I properly parse this: train turned up = AIM, rev, + no one = O + joined = WED; the def. being what queens do, if they are cats..
21 Breton – Runs in back in race = BET ON
22 step up – so, STEP UP could be pets = favourites..
25 vowel – pledge = VOW + finaL chancE rev.
28 apt – this is T{ime} + “a year” = Per Annum, all reversed. This is the little s*d that has given me my error. I put art, for no obvious reason that I can now see. The def. is “given,” as in “he was apt/given to drink a lot.” hmff. I’d like to claim a foul, but I can’t, it’s a perfectly valid clue. Silly me

Author: JerryW

I love The Times crosswords..

58 comments on “Times Crossword 25,649 – Statistics Show…”

  1. A fine crossword marred for me by 1 across. I suppose the reference must be to a criminal (or even Jesus perhaps – or his cross-bearer) in Roman times, but it’s far too oblique for my taste and out of sympathy with the excellence that characterises the rest of the puzzle. Or is there something else going on?

    Edited at 2013-12-04 02:37 am (UTC)

  2. The numbers game clue reminded me of the saying attributed to Churchill by Goebbels: ‘I only believe in statistics that I have invented myself.’
  3. I stuck with this one well past my usual giving-up-and resorting-to-aids stage but was still unable to complete it. Solving 1ac and 12ac would have made all the difference and I was distracted throughout by having the middle letter of 28dn outstanding. If one can’t solve a three letter answer with two checkers in place it destroys one’s confidence completely. And it had all started out so well!
  4. 29:32 .. with fingers well and truly crossed on submitting. MUSCLE and MIAOWED both went in on the basis of checkers and surface meaning, with zero understanding of the parsing.

    COD .. a very nice spot with George Smiley, even if Smiley himself would likely send the Scalphunters for whichever wretch invented the EMOTICON.

  5. I think 28 down is apt. It’s Time (T), a year (PA _ per annum)reflected or backwards. If something is a given, it’s apt.

    David.

    2. >…
      >If something is a given, it’s apt.

      Surely not! I think Jerry’s explanation (“given” (to) = “inclined” (to) = APT (to), if I’ve understood it correctly) is much better.

  6. Loved loved loved that. Particularly the little four legged victim of the farmer’s wife. Still cannot see how PUKKA works. I get the pucker, but cannot see the rest. Of course it is early in the morning and I am a bit slow!
    1. Pukka means authentic, so real and not mock. Has Jamie ever cooked pukka turtle soup, I wonder?

      Edited at 2013-12-04 09:13 am (UTC)

  7. 29 minutes for one at the top of the hardness scale for me. I have SWELL for 2d – given the obliqueness of much of the cluing, I’ll defend it thusly: a swell is a bigwig, “member of the governing class” (BRB), or person of influence, and a balloon (among other things) will stretch as it swells. Please sir, can I have a ruling? Preferably in my favour?
    Of numerous quite excellently devious clues, my favourite just about goes to ENORMOUS for the farmer’s wife bit. I needed the saint’s crossing M before I could work our what to put in ??A?W?D. Must remember, Queen sometimes=cat.
    Brilliant blogging, Jerry, to match the clues today. I suspect there will be many coming for enlightenment.
    1. I also toyed with SWELL but had to rule it out. A person of influence maybe, but it’s too much of a stretch for influence alone.
      1. I was so happy to light on SWELL as a plausible answer, I didn’t look any further, though I also was thinking of coming here to complain that it was, indeed, a bit of a stretch. Glad it wasn’t my blog!
  8. ” “Beware of the dog” in latin, is still occasionally seen on the gates of snobbish (and presumably, incompetent) dog owners.. like “beware of the dog” itself, or “trespassers will be prosecuted,” it is a nonsensical sign with no legal validity, don’t get me started..”

    There’s a sign on a gate near us which states: “Don’t even think of parking here”. Naturally I used to do just that every time I passed by, revelling in my thought crime …

    1. I believe the “don’t even think” signs originated in NYC under Mayor Ed Koch. When I was a kid I thought the no trespassing signs said trespassers would be persecuted, which seemed rather mean.

      We’ve had pucker/pukka before. I caught on ok to “apt”, it was the “muscle” corner that gave me the most trouble. 27.45 Very good one and nice blog.

  9. Surely a mule is a cross ( ie cross-breed ) but it is also a beast of burden. Hence the mule is a cross-for-bearing. ‘Sc’ is as the blogger says, Scilicet, which needs the Cross-For-Bearing around itself to give the answer.
  10. It never occurred to me that this phrase, or its English equivalent was other than a mere courtesy, rather than an attempt to forestall litigation.
    1. Surely if they wanted to be courteous they would simply control their dog and forgo the sign? No, it is just another way of saying “Get lost, if you know what’s good for you.” Anonymity not overly courteous, either..
      1. I was told once that if you put up a sign saying ‘beware of the dog’ you are admitting that your dog is dangerous, and that if it subsequently bites someone, you are open to being sued. Not sure if it’s true, but seems to make sense.
        1. Legally you are responsible for whatever your dog does, and that’s it..

          Whatever sign you put up is irrelevent. They serve only to show the owner’s ignorance, either of legal issues or of dog management issues, or of human nature, take your pick..

          1. Curiously, your cat can do as it likes. Including killing all the songbirds in the area, and defecating in your neighbours garden. Just to balance out the silly anti-dog rhetoric
            1. Are you sure you’re in the right place?
              Please note I said not one thing against dogs, which I love, only against dog owners who heaven knows cannot in all cases claim perfection.
              And I repeat, anonymity is discourteous
  11. A difficult and inventive puzzle that kept me head scratching for 30 minutes. Most of it is first class (loved the farmer’s wife device) but I do have some reservations.

    At 1A I think the setter is trying a bit too hard to pruduce an “& lit” and I don’t think it quite works. It crosses with 2D which has several possible answers – “reach” for example – and that makes for added difficulty.

    At 13D statistics is no more a numbers game than any other branch of maths, the game is the manipulation of statistics.

    At 28D surely “pa” is “per annum” meaning “each year” rather than “a year”

    Great effort Jerry – well done sir.

    1. Morning, Jim!
      I am forced to agree re 1ac.. I like a good surface reading as much as anyone, but I do tend to be a bit more forgiving with attempted &lits as they look so hard to clue
      Many would say that all statistics by definition involve manipulation of raw data. Humans being what they are it is seldom disinterested and scientists by no means immune
      Not sure of the issue with 28dn? He earns 100k a year/pa seem interchangeable to me
      Just fancied a little devil’s advocacy 🙂
      1. Hi Jerry

        I think we have to distinguish between “statistics” which is a branch of maths like “algebra” or “geometry” and the “use and mis-use of statistics” which is indeed a numbers game that all walks of life are prone to indulge in.

        If the clue said “Statistics manipulated to show….” it would be fine

    2. I took the definition as “statistics show” rather than “statistics”, but even so I thought it was a stretch.
  12. … was in a recent Rufus puzzle. (26dn in 26108).

    Untimed today. Thanks to Jerry for taking over while I was consulting the medics. Just the sort of puzzle for waiting rooms! And glad it wasn’t my blog.

    Equally puzzled as others, at the end, with APT. We all have our crosses to bear. No?

  13. 27 mins with the MUSCLE/SPELL crossers my last ones in. I also toyed with “swell” but decided against it.

    I agree that 1ac looks like an attempt at an &lit that doesn’t quite come off, IMHO at least. However, I really enjoyed this puzzle and the majority of it contained some very devious wordplay and definitions. To quote Blackadder it was “as cunning as a fox that used to be Professor of Cunning at Oxford University but has moved on and is now working for the U.N. at the High Commission of International Cunning Planning”.

  14. 32 minutes, so glad to see the troubles I had were clearly not mine alone. I will simply add my own “ouch”, and agree that while there was the odd place where I was dubious, the good bits were definitely good, my favourite being the definition for WHO WAS WHO.

  15. Took an age, but I did enjoy this one, especially MIAOWED, EMOTICON and ENORMOUS.

    Lots went in correct, but unparsed, so thanks for explaining TRENDSETTER and WINEMAKER, amongst others. I wasn’t helped by having ‘number games’ in for a short while. Note to self to double check enumeration…

    However, I too had ‘swell’ in at the top, and, sadly, my LOI, ‘myself’ at 1ac, for no other reason than it was the first I thought of that fit, and I hadn’t the will to look for any more. Ho hum.

  16. You are not alone – only the impossibility of the crossing answers made me look again. Curse these multiple anagrams. SWELL’s quite a decent answer, don’t you think?!
  17. Worst ever – submitted hastily without having made much sense of SE to get in under an hour. Didn’t see a typo giving a couple of errors elsewhere, or that I’d put VOWER at 25d (which almost satisfies clue),
    Consequently, I thought 30a might be HARRIS (derived somehow from ‘harass’?) or 28d AGE (e.g. a, rev.?).

    I found the whole puzzle pretty tough going, having done only the SW corner and a couple of others in the first half-hour: MIAOWED was last correct entry.

  18. I was held up, as if by an enormous bicep, in muscle corner as I see others were. I’m not quite sure about it, despite (anonymous) pleadings. I hope that chap or chapess isn’t the setter, who should be congratulated in general for having produced a largely fine puzzle.

    Chris G.

  20. 27:55, which at the moment is good enough for the front page of the leaderboard (sorry vallaw!), which confirms that this was a real toughie. Some of it was a little bit dodgy, as others have noted, but it was very inventive so I think we can cut the setter a bit of slack. Super puzzle. Now I need a lie down.
    1. At the time of writing you and Olivia are still on the front page. Well done, you.

      Magoo, Jason and andygilham were all stretched to double figures by this one (but only just), and sit in their rightful places at the top of the leader board. This does rather suggest that the neutrinos solve on paper (or fail to) before turning to the online version, rather than just cribbing from here.

  21. A glorious DNF here after an hour so very glad to have the informative blog. I still don’t see the cat/queen connection and never got near 1ac which made 2 d impossible as so many options which made …. Undsoweiter! Did enjoy the ones I could do however!
  22. Late in the day, as I had yesterday’s easier one to do first, and took 40 minutes to unravel some great clues and a few written in unparsed but apparently correct… was not sure about MUSCLE and SPELL and still am not 100% convinced. Agree with Jim about the numbers game = manipulated statistics. Nice blog jerry.
  23. Great puzzle. Time probably about an hour but got there. I think 1.ac. works fine as an £lit (stumped by the keyboard here). The surface works separately (a muscle is after all for bearing around) and as one. But not keen on spell for 2 down.
      1. because joekobi’s message includes a link (that livejournal seems to have stripped out now) to an internet company called icuc
      2. Thanks. (I’ve had trouble recently getting my comments anywhere near the blog and have tended to just leave it..)
  24. Took a while to get through this, most of my lunch break in fact – didn’t help myself by confidently writing REACH in for 2 down. Good one for wordplay fans, I did not know KALININGRAD, CAVE CANEM or WHO WAS WHO, but it was wordplay to the rescue. On the other hand I couldn’t see the wordplay for MIAOWED at all. Very fun challenge.
  25. Though I suppose spell as in she cast her spell over… is as near to influence as need be. Not longer quite sure about muscle though…
  26. Hugely enjoyable, done in dribs and drabs throughout the day, just under an hour, but a DNF as I had no idea why MUSCLE, MIAOWED, and PUKKA were right, and just gave up on APT. LOI, unparsed, MUSCLE. Even after reading all the wise words (well done, blogger) I’m still shaking my head over MUSCLE and APT …

    Eclectic range of GK, from Latin phrases via obscure reference works to Cold War geography.

    Lots of very inventive clueing. Enjoyed ENORMOUSly!

  27. “Ouch” was the marginal comment I wrote after finally finishing this helluva puzzle, which ended with an ‘unconvinced, but couldn’t see a better alternative’ MUSCLE. My FOI was REACH at 2D, so you can tell I was in for hard going. Eventually got it all in 45 minutes or so. I’d like to point out the brilliant MILDRED for a COD nod, although there are a lot of very good ones. Thanks to the setter for this considerable effort, and Jerry for the fine parsing display. Regards to all.
  28. I’m with Kevin. Ouch! Didn’t know a couple answers (Mafeking, cave canem, who was who), and didn’t know some of the clues (given = apt, queen = cat), so progress was slow until aids came into play. I do wish I had know those several, as the ones I did properly solve were very good fun. I especially liked the mous.
  29. Unlike others, I not only found this tough but I didn’t really enjoy it. Perhaps if I’d tried earlier in the day.
  30. I’m relieved to see I wasn’t the only one who found this tough. I went reasonably quickly through the SW and NE quarters, but the NW and SE quarters both gave me an exceptionally hard time (KALININGRAD and WHO WAS WHO eventually opened them up).

    I agonised for ages over 2dn. I couldn’t see how the answer could be SWELL (my first thought), but was worried that there might be a better alternative to SPELL.

    Once I had the crossing letters, I was fairly confident from the wordplay that 28dn had to be APT, but couldn’t see how APT = “given” until I came here (while I think of it: great blogging, Jerry).

    I agree that 13dn (NUMBERS GAME) is a very fine clue, but there’s been a recent one which I’ve liked even more (which I’ll reveal next Sunday :-).

  31. Just a footnote to say that the celebrations following the relief of the siege of Mafeking gave rise to one of the more amusing back-formations in English:

    MAFFICK, v. “To celebrate uproariously, rejoice extravagantly, esp. on an occasion of national celebration (originally the relief of the British garrison besieged in Mafeking (now Mafikeng), South Africa, in May 1900). In later use usu. with pejorative connotations.” (OED)

    1. It means “and literally so” and is an “all in one” if you will, where the entire clue is the definition but is also the wordplay. Crossowrd Unclued gives these examples:

      Cop in male form (9) POLICEMAN

      The entire clue is the definition – a POLICEMAN is a “Cop in male form”. The entire clue is also its wordplay – the answer is an anagram of (COP IN MALE) with “form” as the anagram indicator.

      Guardian 23892 (Rufus): I’m a leader of Muslims (4) IMAM
      I’M A M[uslims]

      Times 23986: This means getting excited about start of undertaking (10) ENTHUSIASM
      (THIS MEANS)* around U[ndertaking]

      Guardian 23911 (Orlando): One’s cold to walk over (6) ICECAP
      I (one) has C (cold), PACE (walk) reversed

Comments are closed.