Times Cryptic 27920

73 comments on “Times Cryptic 27920”

1. I was held up by a hazily biffed BILL for SWAN. Somehow conflating beaks with birds, or something like that. A thought-provoking puzzle but the pink squares were a surprise.
2. I’d never heard of OBLATION as a sacrifice, nor TABLELAND, so I was half-expecting a pink square. But I was not expecting it at 2D. I also went over to the non-club version of the crossword and revealed the answer, to find the nonsensical RICH.

   Trivia fact of the day: the French equivalent of “cheese” for getting someone to smile for a photo is “ouistiti” which means a marmoset. Does a similar word get used in other languages?

   Edited at 2021-03-09 02:15 am (UTC)

   1. Cantonese has ‘siu’, which actually means ‘smile’, but gets the mouth and face moving in the desired way.

      Of course, photo-taking here (in contradistinction to the west) is a painless, nay, enjoyable activity. In group photos, it is invariably I who end up looking grumpy or confused.

      Edited at 2021-03-09 03:37 am (UTC)

   2. The word ‘oblation’ is part of the Anglican Eucharistic liturgy, I had to look it up the first time I saw it written down.
   3. Here in Patagonia, we say “Whisky”, but with a silent S. It seems to work well!
   4. Koreans say “kimchi” – the name of a popular pickled vegetable dish.
3. Did not submit because I couldn’t parse THIGH and, having made a silly error on the Quickie today, had no intentions of risking another error. (I didn’t completely trust TABLELAND, LOCAL DERBY, or even ROCK for that matter.)

   My slow time came from the lower-left corner, and not trusting myself on many of the clues. For example, I had STATISTICS right away, but I couldn’t make the wordplay work, so I set about rethinking it entirely. It didn’t help that I had S+PAR (=typical) instead of SAND, assuming SPAR was some sort of desert flower.

4. Its just gone 3am GMT, and the Leaderboard has no entries or data, which I think means someone is busy fixing Rock.
   I liked a lot of the fill (Superhero, Hard Cheese, Pawn Ticket), and a good deal of the wordplay, too. I thought Ricer might refer to a rice grower (I’ve heard them called that in Texas) rather than to the tool used to make riced / mashed / whipped potatoes, and while I saw the connection between high and going off, I thought it was a stretch.

   Edited at 2021-03-09 03:09 am (UTC)

   1. Noun
      ricer (plural ricers)
      1) (US) A person, especially a Native American, who cultivates and harvests rice.
      Wik took its original input from Mirriam Webster 1913 I think.
      Andyf
5. No time due to a few interruptions (= I nodded off). I was v. surprised to se the pink squares for 2d. Disappointing that this happened, especially in The Times.

   Never would have been able to parse SWAN which went in from the ‘pen, maybe’ def and missed the ‘bone, of sorts’ for T in THIGH. No problem with TABLELAND but I wasn’t so sure about the OBLATION bit of 14d.

   I liked the IMPREGNATE cryptic def and the spoonerism at 12a.

   Thanks to setter and Jack

6. The leaderboard is up here, and my puzzle shows the error still. A relief to come here and find that ROCK was right; I had no idea what comes from Blackpool, but guessed there was a Blackpool Rock as well as a Brighton. Also DNK LOCAL DERBY. TABLELAND looks to be an Americanism; it’s not in ODE but is in Oxford American.
   1. There are the Atherton Tablelands in Queensland, Australia; a plateau area, part of the Great Dividing Range.
7. 3 1/2 hours after midnight and not a single reference solver on the snitch, sitting forlornly at 0.

   Quite liked this, some interesting and tricky stuff including a never-before-seen containment indicator and a few unusual anagram indicators like desperately and recycling. Usually not a fan of Spoonerisms, but liked Buster Keaton.
   Are ricers unknown in UK? I first heard of them from Heston Blumenthal.
   Didn’t know Bill as a Swan, or LOI that oblates were sacrificed, but no problems. Also misparsed superhero, thinking I remembered Hero as someone’s ladylove in past puzzles – Leander, Google tells me.

   Edited at 2021-03-09 03:37 am (UTC)

   1. I parsed it via Leander too.
   2. not a single reference solver on the snitch but 15 excluded with errors. It’s a bit of a sign, I think.
      1. It will be intriguing to see if neutrinos solve and transcribe, whence they’ll all have errors; or if they get the correct answers from the paper’s website, and transcribe, giving good results. Can you do that? If you solve via the paper’s website is your time separate from the club leaderboard?
         1. A good question. I only track the club leaderboard, so if they only solve on the paper’s site (if, indeed, that’s even an option*), the SNITCH won’t see them.

            But the neutrinos type in their answers on the club board (presumably because they like seeing their name towards the top of the leaderboard), so we should see them there. As you say, it will be interesting to see if they post solutions with no errors. At present there are none and all the top solvers have 1 error.

            * Note: I think that the club site and the paper’s crossword site merged some time ago, so there is only one online place to solve. But perhaps I’m wrong and there’s an alternative way to solve online.

            Edited at 2021-03-09 06:03 am (UTC)

            1. I only solve on the paper site itself and not on the club site. No idea if I’m on a leaderboard or not.
               1. Ah, yes, thanks. I see that the paper version still exists. I used to use this all the time, as it was the only one that supported the iPad, but I moved across when the Club site was upgraded. It looks like there is no leaderboard for the paper site. I guess they assume those who want to participate on the leaderboard use the Club site now, as the subscription is the same.
      2. Has this episode broken the SNITCH? I solved over an hour ago, am on the club leaderboard but haven’t appeared on the SNITCH. I can see that 7dPenguin appears to be similarly affected.
         1. Yes, there were a couple of issues. I had a failure when the SNITCH was 0, since I didn’t check for division by 0 when posting a WITCH value for the blog solvers. [I’m blaming you for this, of course, for suggesting the WITCH ;-).] Now fixed.

            The bigger problem was that I only list reference and tracked solvers with 0 errors, so when the club leaderboard had everyone with 1 error, they were excluded from the display and the SNITCH calculation. Fortunately, the team at the Times rescored everyone during the day and we were all then picked up on the next pass.

   3. I have a potato ricer. I even used it once, many years ago .. it gives the potato a strange, dry texture and nowadays I prefer my vegetables to retain the texture they come with, so far as is practical
      1. More butter!
         1. That’s what Heston said: for 1 kg potatoes 250 g butter, which for non-cooks like me seemed like about 5 times too much.
            1. Yes that’s more or less how I do it (sometimes a bit less butter), and I also add milk.
8. …you won’t get any pink squares, even if you’re wrong! Fortunately, I was all correct, even if it did take 45 minutes and I left half, elect, and thigh unparsed.

   This was the sort of puzzle where if you could just get one more answer, vast tracts would fall, but for a long time I just couldn’t get one more answer. I had to squeeze out the top downs at the end, but managed to struggle home.

   I did like the Buster Keaton clue, but I think it’s been used at least once before. Alms and oblations, anyone?

9. I had a lot of problems with the NW corner.
   I’m still having problems equating “ham” with THIGH.
   Like everyone, I put ROCK. That was my FOI.
   1. SOED has: ham – the thigh of an animal (now usu. a pig) used as food; esp. (the meat from) a cured pig’s thigh. Also, the hock of an animal. L15.
      1. Thanks!
10. Great crossword. BUSTER KEATON, IMPREGNATE, SWAN and SUPERHERO all clever clues.
11. I’m glad I didn’t check the SNITCH beforehand as a rating of 0 might have thrown me.

    I enjoyed this puzzle, HALF and SEARCH ENGINE being two of the stand outs for me. However, IMPREGNATE is COY (clue of the year) so far for me. Beautifully succinct and just a little risqué. What more could you ask for?

12. Half sunk a shattered visage lies,…

    After 30 mins pre-brekker I had it complete but was still trying to parse Thigh. T-bone, of course.
    Some original stuff in this. Nice. I am a sucker for a good Spoonerism and Impregnate is top notch.
    Thanks setter and J.

13. I’m clearly not shouting hooray
    A grid with two birds in today
    Not sure about RICER
    IMPREGNATE was nicer
    BUSTER KEATON the best, I would say
14. 32 minutes with LOI THIGH. BUSTER KEATON ranks as one of the great Spooner clues and has to be COD. I was puzzled at SPUD but then I never reckon much to vegetables on a side plate. They fall off the fork on the way to the mouth. Thank you for the George Formby, Jack, which was going to be my headline until I saw your blog. So from the ridiculous to the sublime, I’ve offered up the words from the BCP, perpetually in my memory, making OBLIGATION no problem. Decent challenge. Thank you Jack and setter.
15. Just under 20 minutes with one error and 18th on the Board… best result ever with a mistake! Perhaps the setter was having a joke saying 1ac to us all. A bit rich but I wont rock the boat.
16. Great puzzle. Slowed down by THIGH / OBLIGATION as originally thinking of TIBIA (well it’s a bone and has the letters of A BIT in it) and LIBATION for the sacrifice.

    Thanks setter and jack

17. 64:12 for an enjoyably chewy solve. I thought the same as Paul_in_London on RICER. Wiktionary has the definition “a Native American, who cultivates and harvests rice”, and I don’t want my mashed potato to be granular. I liked the George Formby song, and the Spoonerism and SUPERHERO which took me longer than it should have
18. 17:09. Solved on paper so no dramas for me. FOI HARD CHEESE, LOI THIGH. I liked the Spoonerism best.

    Edited at 2021-03-09 02:57 pm (UTC)

19. I thought 27A was also quite a clever &lit? You could impregnate something with a permeating fluid.
20. I mean people are praising that clue and justifiably, and pootle73 even called it Clue of the Year. I agree with that but the element that clinches it for me is the &lit.
21. COD undoubtedly to BUSTER KEATON.

    I think RICER has come up before, or it may have been absorbed through half hearing the cooking programmes watched by my wife.

    Now if all the neutrinos drop some points perhaps I’ll get back in the top 100….

22. 18.50 which is quicker than I thought I was as I stuttered to the finish. FOI hard cheese, LOI statistics. Biffed the latter so glad to receive enlightenment from the blogger.

    Spoonerisms are quite often my downfall so glad to get buster keaton and thought it a cracking clue.

    All the rest well clued and a rewarding puzzle. Thanks setter and blogger.

    1. Just put my entry into the Crossword Club grid and rock is still being rejected as the wrong answer to 2 dn. 09.23 GMT.

23. With the same error as everyone else.

    COD: BUSTER KEATON.

    Re 2 down. The Beggar’s Opera written by John Gay and directed by John Rich, was said to have “made Gay Rich and Rich Gay”.

24. ROCK not fixed yet at 9.30 GMT!!

    Not sure why VIVA = exam. Otherwise not too bad apart from the SE where I needed GONER to open up everything else. HEART-RENDING was somewhat convoluted…

    1. A viva is an oral exam for a PhD or equivalent?

       Probably the most famous viva was Wittgenstein’s at Cambridge for his Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus. At the end the panel (including Bertrand Russell apparently) appeared to be completely nonplussed, so Wittgenstein got up and left remarking something along the lines of “don’t worry, it’ll probably take you some time to understand it”.

       That is my memory of the anecdote that I heard but I don’t have time to check my facts and anybody with a more accurate version (such as “complete load of apocryphal rubbish!”) do please chip in and correct me!

25. Do we assume The Times will be aware of this morning’s slip up? Any way of asking them?
    1. It’s been mentioned a dozen times in the Crossword Club forum which is allegedly monitored by the crossword staff.
26. At the time of writing, Clarkini has the one all correct on the Board, and the average time for solving is therefore his 3.38. That makes my 22.01 look rather slow, which is a shame, because I rather liked this as a decent contest. Very little (apart from ROCK, of course) went in without hesitation, and although didn’t think much to side dish for SPUD and thought RICER was a crop grower (despite seeing the kitchen device in action), the rest was delightful when solved. Great Spoonerism, spectacular &lit anagram.

    I thought GOFER was a decent answer for 21d until it wasn’t, though unsure as to where the FER came from.

    Once the editor spots the CULTURE SHOCK amongst the ELECT, and its HEART-RENDING impact, I’m sure, as he IDENTIFIES the GONER (and has SOBERED UP, obviously) the STATISTICS will be amended. VIVA our SUPERHERO!

    Hang on, do you think there was a theme?

27. Rock still not fixed.
    Thanks jack.
28. Found this a bit chewy but got there in the end. Didn’t like SPUD at all.
    Some excellent clues mixed in with decidedly dodgy ones. Particularly liked the ones that I biffed and had to come here for the cryptic, including THIGH, HALF (forgot about HAL) and SWAN.
    Editor not the rock he thought he was. A bit rich….
29. A. Between a Rock and a Hard Cheese.
30. The ROCK has been fixed as of 11.20 UK time. Good puzzle this. I knew “oblation” from singing in the school choir (I didn’t have much of a voice but was press-ganged into it because I (a)could read music and (b) was an alto. The hymn I remember is “brightest and best of the sons of the morning” – vainly we offer each ample oblation, vainly with gifts would his favour secure. 21.31
    1. Many apologies for the confusion over 2D this morning. The answer has now been updated to ROCK and the leaderboard rescored.
31. 18:54. A toughie, but very satisfying to solve. No out-and-out unknowns, although I wouldn’t have been able to define ‘oblation’ and I’m not sure I’ve ever come across the term PAWN TICKET before.
    The definition of RICER is doubly odd: I’ve been using one for donkey’s years (I swear by it for mash – it gives a lovely fluffy texture) so ‘American’ surprised me. Also anyone who’s ever used one will know that it doesn’t produce ‘grains’. However all the usual dictionaries define it that way so I guess I’ll have to take it up with them.

    Edited at 2021-03-09 11:47 am (UTC)

32. Apologies Z, I missed your heading the first time round so my comment infra is a bit deja vu.
    1. No problems at all: it’s good someone els remembers! It usually only got sung at Epiphany, which is a shame, as the metre is rather special.
33. About 60m but the online paper still wants ‘rich’ for ‘rock’ so I didn’t get my exact time. As Jack said, difficult but an enjoyable struggle. I was marooned in the south west for long enough and just about to give up, thinking my allotted hour was over, when STATISTICS came and 30 seconds later the final 3 fell as well. How strange is the (my?) mind, as looking at them now I can’t understand why I looked, for example, at what turned out to be IBIS for so long and not parse the clue to see it. Hey ho the wind and the rain! Thanks to Jack and setter today.
34. It appears I started the puzzle just after the problem with 2d was fixed, so my first effort was all green. HALF and ROCK were my first 2 in, followed by HARD CHEESE. No particular problems, except I failed to parse THIGH and relied on the definition and crossers. Liked the Spoonerism. LOI was HEART RENDING. 28:42. Thanks setter and Jack.
35. Presumably a ‘neutrino’ reveals the answers on the Times’ site and then types them in as fast as possible. Today before the correction, therefore, there should only be neutrinos on the leaderboard? All serious solvers should have a single ‘wrong’ answer.
    Clarkini is a mystery unless he/she is a great solver but a very bad typist?
36. Another knotty one. Couldn’t parse ELECT but in it went anyway. Liked BUSTER KEATON and impressed by IMPREGNATE. Plenty of other good stuff to admire along the way. 31m
37. Needed two goes to get this one out. Couldn’t see THIGH until the checkers were in place, and even then I wasn’t sure how it worked (I don’t think I’ve come across that meaning of high before), and it took a while before oblation occurred to me to give OBLIGATION for 14d. SWAN, PAWN TICKET and TABLELAND were all constructed from the wordplay rather than general knowledge.

    FOI Sand
    LOI Thigh
    COD Buster Keaton

38. Solved too late in the day for ROCK to have been an issue. My last two in, OBLIGATION and THIGH took what felt like an age at the end. I could see what was required for the former, including a probable upside-down GI, but couldn’t think of the requisite compulsion or sacrifice. I had no idea what was going on with THIGH until I had the middle letter.

    I agree that IMPREGNATE was brilliant and was also impressed with the (presumably intentional) misdirection in the clue for HEART-RENDING where I wanted to anagram (bitter judge {deal}T) to get a conclusion of some kind.

    Edit to add that I liked the spoonerism too.

    Edited at 2021-03-09 02:49 pm (UTC)

39. Thanks for the parsing on thigh would never have seen that.

    Fortunately leader board fixed by the time I submitted.

    24:08 held up for a long time in SW corner until statistics revealed itself which I’ll give COD to.

    Very enjoyable puzzle — thanks Jack and setter.

40. Arrived late and missed the error, which was good, as I would have been somewhat put out to have found an unexpected error in today’s solve. All I can say is that this setter should obviously be put on full-time Times duty, given how much he or she represents my wavelength. Still found time to thoroughly enjoy the elegance of IMPREGNATE.
41. Very enjoyable. A fine spoonerism and plenty else to enjoy.

    Holidays of Obligation are a distant memory from (RC) school days. Referred to by us guttersnipes as Obbly-Gobbly days

    Thanks to setter and blogger.

42. Unfortunately had “hale” at 1D — I didn’t come back to it after (not surprisingly) failing to parse it.

    COD BUSTER KEATON

43. A lot quicker than yesterday, but unfortunately I hit a brick wall with two to go: Tableland and Thigh. Not overly sure I would have got either with more effort, so I’ll just have to try and remember them for next time. Otherwise, I quite enjoyed this, with satisfying pdms for Local Derby and Obligation. Invariant
44. 29.02, which was good enough to squeeze onto the top 100 on the leader board when I solved at lunchtime, I am now much further down but alas the SNITCH seems to have given up the ghost and stopped taking names at 11.35am today, so I haven’t made it on there. A diverting solve which had me fully engaged. Didn’t know that meaning of ham. I liked culture shock. Loved the definition ‘selecting application’ when I saw it. Impregnate another excellent clue.
45. .. the dreaded typo/pink square. Really must check.

    Much to like but not much new to say.

    Chestnut maybe but I’ve not seen it before so big thumbs up to BUSTER KEATON

    Thanks Jackkt and setter

46. Wait, sorry for the late post, but does HIGH really mean beginning to smell? I thought it was a pun on being high, “de-composed”.
47. Ah no, now I see it is merely definition 39 in Chambers.
48. 24 hours late!

    FOI 1dn HALF

    LOI 18ac THIGH

    COD 12ac BUSTER KEATON

    WOD 2dn ROCK – Skeggy over Blackpool

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