Times Cryptic 26468

Author   jackktPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
This one took me 25 minutes so I expect some very fast times from the regular hares. Whilst solving I made a note that the bird at 8dn was unknown but I checked later and found I had claimed that on at least three previous occasions over the past four years. It’s funny how some words won’t stick in the brain! And some spellings too. One thing learnt today though is a new expression for “drunk” (at 23dn). And I thought I knew them all. Here’s my blog…

 As usual definitions are underlined in bold italics, {deletions are in curly brackets} and [anagrinds, containment, reversal and other indicators in square ones]

Across
1 Stole money, carrying paintings back in coast-bound transport (4,5)
BOAT TRAIN – BOA (stole), TIN (money) containing [carrying] ART (paintings) reversed [back]. BOA came up as “neckwear” recently and caught me out, so it was fresh in my mind today.
6 Broke cover, pursued by stoat finally (5)
SKINT – SKIN (cover), {stoa}T [finally]. The slang for having no money was derived from “skinned” apparenty. It also gave rise to the rhymning slang “boracic lint” which colloquially gets reduced simply to “brassic”.
9 Tom can smell this — Tim can’t, unfortunately (7)
CATMINT – Anagram [unfortunately] of TIM CAN’T. Neither of the cats I had most recently reacted to catmint, but one I had years ago lost all reason when in contact with it.
10 Conspirator Harry Lime originally arrested? (7)
PLOTTER – L{ime} [originally] contained [arrested] by POTTER (Harry)
11 Seductive woman’s name associated with father (5)
SIREN – SIRE (father), N (name)
12 Desolate character is magistrate, circling large loch (9)
BLEAKNESS – BEAK (magistrate) contains [circling] L (large), NESS (loch)
13 Surreptitious way able-bodied husband’s abandoned (8)
STEALTHY – ST (way – street), {h}EALTHY (able-bodied) [husband’s abandoned]
14 Stars missing opening of revue in Spanish port (4)
VIGO – VI{r}GO (stars) [missing opening of revue)
17 Nervous director general stopping the old retiring (4)
EDGY – DG (Director General – e.g. head of the BBC) inside [stopping] YE (the, old) reversed [retiring]
18 Brave Nordic hero keeping near the centre (8)
CHEROKEE – Hidden [near the centre] in {Nordi}C HERO KEE{ping}
21 Married woman, one of five, becomes model (9)
MANNEQUIN – M (married), ANNE (woman), QUIN (one of five – quintuplet)
22 Judge the aforementioned renovation? (5)
REFIT – REF (judge), IT (the aforementioned)
24 Birds’ breeding-place identified by woman in train? (7)
HERONRY – HER (woman), ON RY (in train – on railway)
25 Inclination Republican has to abandon education (7)
LEANING – LEA{r}NING (education) [Republican has to abandon]
26 Fork out about two pounds, like a friend (5)
PALLY – PAY (fork out) contains [about] LL (two pounds – UK currency)
27 Point we accepted in old PM’s time (5-4)
NORTH-WEST – WE contained by [accepted in ] NORTH’S (old PM’s), T (time). Frederick, Lord North was Prime Minister 1770-1782.
Down
1 Supports strikebreaker over accepting sack at last (5)
BACKS – SCAB (strikebreaker) reversed [over] containing [accepting] {sac}K [at last]
2 Working near Leyton, great government legal adviser (8,7)
ATTORNEY GENERAL – Anagram [working] of NEAR LEYTON GREAT
3 Embroilment involving Rhode Island figure (8)
TRIANGLE – TANGLE (embroilment) containing [involving] RI (Rhode Island)
4 Not a hub, a foreign motorway (8)
AUTOBAHN – Anagram [foreign] of NOT A HUB A
5 Relative’s record upheld by ambassador in 27 (6)
NEPHEW – EP (record – Extended Play) + HE (ambassador – His Excellency) contained by [in] NW (27 – the Across answer abbreviated)
6 Ghostly appearance of tailless bear in the heavens (6)
SPOOKY – POO{h} (bear) [tailless) contained by [in] SKY (heavens)
7 Imprisoned by the enemy at the last possible moment? (2,3,4,2,4)
IN THE NICK OF TIME – IN THE NICK OF (imprisoned by), TIME (the enemy). There are various sayings about time being an enemy but I haven’t been able determine the original source.
8 Wader sets about work on Tyneside (9)
TURNSTONE – TURNS TO (sets about work on), NE (Tyneside). Once seen never remembered!
13 Powered vessel? Sons must accept crew with it (9)
STEAMSHIP – SS (sons) contain [accept] TEAM (crew), HIP (with it)
15 Dealer’s name protected by creditor (8)
CHANDLER – HANDLE (name) contained [protected] by CR (creditor)
16 Painter upset soup going round a Scottish port (8)
ARBROATH –  RA (painter – Royal Academician) reversed [upset], BROTH (soup) containing [going round] A
19 Like edible grain knight concealed in miserly way (6)
MEANLY – N (knight – chess) contained [concealed] by MEALY (like edible grain)
20 Trouble afoot, do we hear, for a writer and preacher? (6)
BUNYAN – Sounds like [do we hear] “bunion” (trouble afoot)
23 How we’re urged to sleep, being half seas over? (5)
TIGHT – Two definitions, the second meaning “drunk” was unknown to me – the term that is, not the condition.

74 comments on “Times Cryptic 26468”

  1. Zoomed through this until I became stuck on 4 clues and ended up missing VIGO and HERONRY. Yes, I come across “previously unknown unknowns” quite often, but I don’t remember having seen TURNSTONE before – a nice term for what these waders presumably do. I liked ARBROATH too – have no idea where it is in Scotland, but brought back memories of the Scottish football results being read out on Sunday evenings along with Cowdenbeath, Stranraer, Hamilton Academical et al.

    Thanks to setter and blogger.

    1. Arbroath is on North Sea coast of Scotland in Angus. Famous for smoked haddock.

      Edited at 2016-07-19 07:10 am (UTC)

    2. I do hope you realise that those Scottish places only exist, Brigadoon-like, when Charlotte Green mentions them in her reading of the football results. 🙂
  2. In the same league as yesterday’s puzzle with a low degree of difficulty.

    I managed just over 17 minutes with 1dn BACKS in before I’d started!

    Then filled it in from top down – LOI 19dn MEANLY

    COD 18ac CHEROKEE WOD ARBROATH if one adds SMOKIE!

    I wager thet tomorrow’s 15×15 will be a stinker.

    horryd Shanghai

  3. I think 6′ of that time was devoted to playing with the alphabet to get VIGO, my LOI. I actually remembered TURNSTONE–finally. I just now realized that I biffed CHEROKEE without spotting the hidden; I could do without ‘brave’=Indian, by the way. I don’t think I knew CATMINT; I just assumed (wrongly, I gather) that it was Britspeak for catnip.
    1. I think you’ll have to put up with it for at least 20 more years before the next generation of British setters comes through. Just how PC they will be remains to be seen, of course.

      Edited at 2016-07-19 02:14 am (UTC)

      1. Chambers defines ‘brave’ as “a brave soldier esp. a Native American warrior”. Is there really something offensive about that?

        Incidentally the setter didn’t even mention Indians.

        Edited at 2016-07-19 05:39 am (UTC)

        1. The setter didn’t mention Indians, but the definition is ‘brave’ and the solution is CHEROKEE. The term (which was used to refer to a male Indian warrior, whether brave or not) isn’t derogatory, but then the same could probably be said of ‘squaw’ and ‘papoose’. I can’t imagine anyone today (well I can, of course; some of them are holding a convention now) using any of those words.
          1. Apart the Atlanta Braves, perhaps? Are papoose and squaw really on the endangered list?
            1. I would think past endangered; I would certainly hope so. As for the Atlanta team, and fans, the less said the better.
              1. For the life of me, I can’t think why perfectly innocent words that magpie English has nicked should become offensive. I can’t think of situations where I might use “papoose” or “squaw”, but there’s something sad in discovering that I can’t.
                1. That’s easy: they become offensive if they’re used offensively, sufficiently often and widely. Stuff happens.
                  1. Almost true. They become offensive if someone hears them as offensive. At White Hart Lane, the terms Yid and Yiddo are used as terms of approbation and affection. It’s died down now, but for a while, Spurs fans were on notice that use of the term would lead to arrest.
                  2. I’m of the age now when I daren’t open my mouth without offending someone unwittingly. I’ve always thought the best way to counter offensive terms is to actually adopt them as your own, ideally with as a badge of pride (e.g. see z8’s comment about Spurs fans). If the perpetrator sees that using such a word has no derogatory effect on you then it loses its power to offend and so withers. Otherwise we have an ever expanding catalogue of prohibited words and a consequential minefield of potential social gaffes.
                    BTW, what term can we now safely use to call the women and young of Native Americans/First Nation then?
                    1. You make useful points, deezza.

                      Getting back to the original point (CHEROKEE clued here as “brave”). Given that CHEROKEE is a noble and historic name of a people, and has a perfectly valid place in any crossword grid, would someone like to suggest another one or two word definition that would not cause offence to those determined to take it, presumably on other peoples’ behalf?

                      Edited at 2016-07-19 12:55 pm (UTC)

                      1. Papoose has become a generic term for a child / baby carrier worn on the body.
                      2. Well, “Indian epic hero …” might work. Anyway, I was not offended by the term, let alone determined to take offence. What I said, and say, is that “I could do without ‘brave’=Indian”.
                  3. I’ve found some light shed on this by ODO, worth quoting:
                    “Until relatively recently, the word squaw was used neutrally in anthropological and other contexts to mean ‘an American Indian woman or wife’. With changes in the political climate in the second half of the 20th century, however, the derogatory attitudes of the past towards American Indian women have meant that, in modern North American English, the word cannot be used in any sense without being offensive. In British English the word has not acquired offensive connotations to the same extent, but it is nevertheless uncommon and now regarded as old-fashioned.”
                    “Uncommon”, perhaps because we don’t have many opportunities to use such words, though I’ll bet there are still educational books which will teach children the proper words for a native American baby and wife.
                    1. I must concur with the other Kevin, in that over here, the use of ‘brave’ by itself to suggest ‘Cherokee’ would certainly be avoided, no matter how innocently conceived by the speaker/writer. It may fall short of the overtly offensive, but it’s certainly so unnecessarily insensitive that any sane person would avoid it. Bear in mind, we have a lot more experience over here with the Amerindian population, so the sensitivities of that group are more closely observed in the US. But, I note for the UK folks that while we have the aforementioned Atlanta baseball team, it draws far less criticism over here than the American football Washington Redskins. I don’t think we’ve seen that term in a Times puzzle, and I’d rather we don’t.
                      1. Re: Brave Indians
                        I’m OK with that – it had not occurred to me that any of the terms used above in reference to Native Americans would be found offensive: aside from the movies, it’s not exactly a field of conversation that gets batted around a lot. Consequently, I don’t have the filter in place that I do with (say) n****r, and to find that there are a whole series of terms that I need to develop a filter for was a genuine surprise. So much so I think I need a fag to calm down.
                  4. I agree, Kevin. I also think they become offensive if the people referred to find them offensive. In Britain, there was a popular child’s toy called a golliwog (see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golliwog) It was used as a symbol by the British company Robertsons for its jam. Robertson’s even registered an executive aircraft and hot-air balloon G-OLLY and G-OLLI respectively. Eventually the term was deemed too offensive. I don’t know if Robertsons still have the plane or balloon. Interestingly, in performing in-depth (!) research for this, I learnt that the original name of Creedence Clearwater Revival was The Golliwoggs!
                    2. There’s still a thriving trade in Gollies (sometimes even with the -wog suffix) in many, many picturesque tourist places outside London. Last time I saw range for sale was in Goathland, on the North York Moors, the setting for rural police series Heartbeat, which has retained much of the sixties feel of the programme. Nostalgia? That frisson of naughtiness? Latent or casual racism? Actual racism? Search me, but the shopkeepers said they were their best sellers. Goodness knows what purchasers did with them when they got home.
                      1. Thanks for that! I’m pretty sure I had a collection Golliwog badges when I was a lad.
          2. The examples you’ve quoted are widely acknowledged and documented as being offensive.
    2. Catmint and catnip are the same. According to COED ‘catnip’ was originally a US term (18th century). [later edit: Please see further discussion below]

      Edited at 2016-07-19 08:07 am (UTC)

  4. 38 minutes, delaying myself with a customary typo, which occurred on a crossing letter so at least I was able to spot it to finish all correct.

    Like many others, I suspect, finished with MEANLY – looking for the definition at the wrong end of the clue – which misdirection is enough to make it COD.

    Like Bletchley Reject, another thumbs up to James Alexander Gordon. Talking of voice talents, what a pity the R&A picked that dull Englishman to succeed the peerless Ivor to announce the starters at the Open. And as an Englishman, to say that really hurts me. I’ll have to go and re-read Marmion to restore my equilibrium…

    1. Reminds me of a bored friend on a bus in London in the 80’s. As we passed a large cinema he read the “now showing” sign in his best J.A.G. voice…

      “Rambo Three, Crocodile Dundee Two”.

      1. The 3-screen Cinema at Marble Arch once indicated that it was showing
        10
        MEATBALLS
        ESCAPE FROM ALCATRAZ

        Edited at 2016-07-19 08:13 am (UTC)

      2. Talking of Angus puts me in mind of the schoolboy football fan’s dream, to tune in to the results, wait for Gordon to get to the Scottish Second Division and pray for an East Fife 4 Forfar 5.
  5. 16 minutes again, which now seems to be my usual “fast” time. ARBROATH was my last hold-up, mostly because I was looking for a painter not a port. As is often the case, got it when I wrote the letters out in the horizontal.
    I got 27 NORTHWEST from its mention in 5d, not the wordplay.
  6. Was powering through this one until I came a cropper in the NE. Settled on OION for the port after discarding LIBA. If I took my time I’m sure I would have opted for VIGO. (Turns out there is an Oion in Spain. Not that I knew that of course).

    Anyway, that led to an unlikely TURNSONNE at 8dn, and I clicked submit in an attempt to sneak in under 20 minutes. Serves me right, really.

    Enjoyed CHANDLER, where I assumed for a long time that “name” was just clueing the “n”.

    Thanks setter and Jack.

  7. No problems with this one but pleased to be able to solve in time to male a blog entry!

    If you haven’t visited Arbroath and eaten a smokie try and fit it in sometime. Lovely countryside and the fish is delicious

  8. Down to my last three in 45 minutes, then stared at them for a quarter of an hour more with no light dawning. Well, I say no light, but I thought of CHANDLER about five times but couldn’t make the wordplay work so didn’t bung it in, sadly.

    My other two were the crossing unknowns of TURNSTONE and VIGO. Might have got VIGO if my mental list of constellations and astrological signs had been a bit more complete, which at least would have dismissed 8d as being an anagram of “wader sets” and helped me narrow down the options…

    Ah well, not too bad. Thanks as ever for the mental work-out and the explanations…

  9. 11:54 … this all came together very nicely. Some very slick surfaces.

    We’ve grown both catmint and catnip for the benefit of our spoilt felines. They love being around both but the mint lacks the pupil-dilating, lunacy-inducing entertainment factor for the caterers. It’s the catnip equivalent of alcohol-free beer.

    1. That’s interesting, Sotira, and it seems I was misled (above)by the usual sources which make no distinction between -mint and -nip. It now appears that the magic ingredient is nepetalactone which is present in all varieties of -nip but mostly not in -mint.

      Edited at 2016-07-19 08:13 am (UTC)

  10. 25 mins. For some reason I couldn’t get on the same wavelength as the setter.
  11. The News Chronicle Daily Dispatch Football Annual was my favoured reading in the mid fifties. I believe this is the highest score in British first class football. I was resonating on frequency, right on wavelength today and beat yesterday’s at just over 10 minutes. FOI The Attorney General just fell into place as I picked up the newspaper. LOI TURNSTONE.
  12. Just under double yesterday’s time but still a pleasant solve. We do not know much about cats in this house so I learn about catmint/nip. COD IN THE NICK OF TIME for the whimsical image it brings up.
  13. No real delays today, thanks for the parsing of 23ac. Got VIGO from playing Civ2. Thanks setter and blogger.
  14. re Ulaca’s comment-

    In a 1976 Hamlet commercial starring Brian Glover, a man who thinks he’s won the football pools – a ‘James Alexander Gordon’ type can be heard giving the last scoreline from Scottish League Division Two which gives Glover his last and eighth draw!

    ‘East Fife five, Forfar Athleic five! So with eight draws on the coupon its Manchester United who go top, after a 2-0 win over Arsenal!’

    Glover goes to his pocket to celebrate with a Hamlet cigar – only to reaveal that the Littlewoods coupon in still in his pocket with his pack of mild cigars.

    He has forgotten to post his coupon!

    Cue Hamlet music! (Air on a G-string,Jacques Loussier arr.)

    horryd Shanghai

  15. Fairly buzzed through this one, so two good times in a row. Think I’d better lie down in case I get a nosebleed.
  16. Very fast for me on the one day I have 2 hours to spare drinking beer in a beer garden in Kent. A gently elegant crossword. If you want to see Turnstones they have migrated from the beach in Padstow (Cornwall) to the pavement where they turn over the dropped burgers.
  17. 9m, lots of biffing today.
    I don’t think I’ve come across CATMINT before, and I assumed it was just another word for catnip. Our cat goes completely nuts for the latter: it’s very amusing to watch. Almost as amusing as the cucumber effect (google it if you don’t know what I’m talking about), but I haven’t been allowed to try that one because my daughter thinks it would be too traumatic.
    I also lacked the bird knowledge today: I had forgotten TURNSTONE since it last came up, HERONRY doesn’t really look like a word.
    Tiny point but at 6dn I think the definition has to be ‘ghostly’, with ‘appearance’ as filler.
  18. This must be one for the quickie solvers to try as I completed it in under half an hour which is unusually fast for me. Over half went in at the first read through. My only hold up was the bird as it took me ages to think of turn for work even with all the other letters. 5 down only came once the checkers were in and it couldn’t be anything else. My COD was 12 across.
    1. In this instance turn isn’t a direct substitution for work, as Jack’s blog has it, it’s sets about work [on] leading to turns to.
  19. 21:03. Thankfully no Latin songs today! Took me an age to come up with my LOI, VIGO, otherwise I’d have been in quick territory by my standard. As mentioned above we must be due a stinker!
  20. 11:55 with a bit of a mess caused by ADVOCATE GENERAL and the unexpected appearance of the Latvian capital Riga on the coast of Spain.

    Other hold ups were failing to spot the excellent hidden Cherokee, treating the name in CHANDLER as just N, and looking for an artist at 16 (glad to see I wasn’t alone in the latter two cases).

  21. Fairly rattled through this in 14 mins despite the lethargy induced by a scorchio day in the south of France. After yesterday’s stroll I could easily be deluded into thinking I am improving. I have relatives in ARBROATH, have a UK house near BUNYAN’s birthplace in Bedfordshire, and have an interest in birds so the wader and nesting place were write-ins. Bound to be loads of plants tomorrow!
  22. In my train-spotting early teens, my pals and I used to stand on the platform at Tonbridge station from time to time to watch the magnificent boat train, the Golden Arrow, steam through on its way to the coast.
    I was led up a couple of garden paths today: in 10ac I was thinking of HARRY as PESTER so I spent a few minutes looking for a conspirator called PLESTER. In 6d, initially, I thought the setter was being clever and so equated BEAR with PUT UP WITH’.
    Is this some sort of record? I counted 6 solutions ending with the letter Y.
    34m 20s
  23. Whizzing through, then took as long again for CHEROKEE, one of the best hidden clues I have seen for ages, CHANTLER, biffed this, needed Jack to show me the way and MEANLY, just put that one down to the heat.
  24. 36mins in two settings… dnk TURNSTONE, dnp CHANDLER or CHEROKEE (those pesky hidden words, so are just so darned well hidden…). Many thanks for sorting those out.
  25. No time but I finished it which I thinkis a first for me so felt relatively easy.
    Thanks Jackkt on illuminating the ones I’d biffed – Boat train in particular. I liked Bunyan, a chuckle of a clue.
    1. Many congratulations, and may it be the first of many successful completions and contributions to the blog.
  26. 8 mins, alert, and definitely on the setter’s wavelength. I should have suspected I would be in for a fast time when I got BOAT TRAIN straight away by deciphering the wordplay as I read the clue and getting it confirmed by the definition at the end. I had a couple of the same hold-ups as others, such as thinking the “name” in the clue for 15dn was N and the “HANDLE” penny only dropped when I had all the checkers, and I needed the wordplay and checkers for TURNSTONE because it was only dimly remembered. MEANLY was my LOI because, again like others, I had been looking for the definition at the wrong end of the clue.
  27. Not so tough, about 15 minutes. Most went in quickly, but held up at the end by the same ‘N’ as ‘name’ that caught a few others. I finally parsed CHANDLER correctly, but my LOI’s were MEANLY and finally, BUNYAN. Trouble afoot, indeed. Regards.
  28. DNF. A few short at the 60 min cut-off, TURNSTONE, a new word for me and didn’t see that Tyneside =”NE”. Isn’t a ‘tern’ a wader? that’s what I had at the start of the clue. Not heard of Vigo either. Should have got Bunyan, nice clue.

    Edited at 2016-07-19 05:07 pm (UTC)

    1. I’m not sure whether terns are waders (are their legs long enough?) but I certainly considered TERN as part of the answer for a while. However TERNS TO doesn’t fit the wordplay (sets about work) so the answer had to be something else. Good to see you at the 15×15, Merlin!
  29. Funny how it goes, everyone is talking about this one being easy, but I struggled to get TURNSTONE and ARBROATH from the wordplay and had to put it aside for a moment and come back after lunch.
    1. Birders will have experienced no problems with turnstone and heronry, and also know that the long-tailed duck is no longer known as the oldsquaw in North America…
  30. Oh dear. This is not turning into a great week for me.

    My problems started when I assumed that the desolate character of 12ac had to be a fictional person. Given my profound, hard-won and far-ranging ignorance of literature in general, I was happy to assume that there was such a person, famed for being desolate. I was even happier to work out that his (or her) name could only be “Bleakmere”.

    I was then left staring at 8d, and eventually realized that it could not possibly be an anagram of “wader sets”, except in Polish. I did not, however, get much further before giving in and asking the internet to tell me all the British waders. Only then did the proverbial coin do the proverbial thing.

    I’m giving serious thought to just starting this week over, even though doing so would entail having another Monday.

  32. 8:36 here, another slow-but-steady time for another pleasant, straightforward puzzle.

    I’d have been faster if I’d done a bit more biffing, particularly with TURNSTONE, which I thought of straight away but spent far too long trying and failing to justify (though I did get there in the end).

  33. For me “COD IN THE NICK OF TIME” brings up an even more whimsical image.
  34. Just finished (in just under an hour’s active solving time), but I needed a night’s sleep to get BUNYAN and TURNSTONE. Those pennies dropped very slowly.

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