Solving time: 30 minutes
An interesting puzzle that didn’t present any major problems in the solving. How did you do?
As usual definitions are underlined in bold italics, {deletions and substitutions are in curly brackets} and [anagrinds, containment, reversal and other indicators in square ones]. I usually omit all reference to positional indicators unless there is a specific point that requires clarification.
 Across |
|
| 1 | African doctor is able to accommodate gigantic bird (8) |
| MOROCCAN | |
| MO (doctor) + CAN (is able) containing [to accommodate] ROC (gigantic bird) | |
| 5 | Item left in car with sloping roof (6) |
| COUPLE | |
| L (left) contained by [in] COUPÉ (car with sloping roof). ‘Item’ as in a courting couple. A little research reveals that the type of car comes from the French carrosse coupé which translates literally as ‘cut carriage’. | |
| 10 | Reliability of management line about spare points (15) |
| TRUSTWORTHINESS | |
| TRUST (management), then ROW (line) reversed [about], THIN (spare), E S S (random points of the compass). The interesting wordplay falls a bit flat at the end, I think. | |
| 11 | Methodical male hospital attendant … (7) |
| ORDERLY | |
| Two meanings. I checked all the usual sources and found ‘male’ specified only in the American listings in Collins. | |
| 12 | … dashed into Cooper’s Farm Feed Store? (7) |
| GRANARY | |
| RAN (dashed) contained by [into] GARY (Cooper) | |
| 13 | Chapel keys regularly kept by woman attorney (8) |
| BETHESDA | |
| {k}E{y}S [regularly] contained [kept] by BETH (woman) + DA (district attorney). Fortunately for me this has come up before and I remembered it. It’s a chapel as used by some nonconformist Christian sects and is named after a pool in Jerusalem that’s supposed to have healing powers and where a paralysed man is said to have been healed by Jesus. There’s a Bethesda fountain in Central Park, NYC. | |
| 15 | Nice time for casual workers! (5) |
| TEMPS | |
| A cryptic definition based on the French [Nice] word for time precedes the literal straight one |
|
| 18 | Gaseous element identified by academy teacher (5) |
| RADON | |
| RA (Royal Academy), DON (teacher) | |
| 20 | Polish member enters spiritualist meeting, missing start (8) |
| ELEGANCE | |
| LEG (member) is contained by [enters] {s}EANCE (spiritualist meeting) [missing start] | |
| 23 | Right inside baptismal bowl, a large hanging drapery (7) |
| FRONTAL | |
| R (right) contained by [inside] FONT (baptismal bowl), A, L (large). I didn’t know this word for the cloth that hangs across the front of an altar. | |
| 25 | Part of plant greeting Zulu in European capital (7) |
| RHIZOME | |
| HI (greeting) + Z (Zulu – NATO alphabet) contained by [in] ROME (European capital). One of the main parts of the stem of a plant. | |
| 26 | After university we’d threaten her appallingly? That’s a bit sick! (5,3,7) |
| UNDER THE WEATHER | |
| U (university), anagram [appallingly] of WE’D THREATEN HER | |
| 27 | Travel on river — seriously (6) |
| DEEPLY | |
| DEE (river), PLY (travel) | |
| 28 | Not having worried, put in for global police force (8) |
| INTERPOL | |
| INTERPOL{ate} (put in) [not having worried – ate). The answer was a write-in but the wordplay needed more thought. | |
| Down |
|
| 1 | Chap carrying leftover food up for head nurse (6) |
| MATRON | |
| MAN (chap) containing [carrying] ORT (leftover food) reversed [up]. ‘Ort’ was unknown to me until it appeared in a crossword several months ago. Dictionaries advise that it’s most commonly used in the plural. | |
| 2 | Parliamentarian leader holding up circular (9) |
| ROUNDHEAD | |
| ROUND (circular), HEAD (leader). ‘Roundheads’ were the supporters of Cromwell in the English Civil War. | |
| 3 | Discharge sailor picked up by vehicle at hospital (7) |
| CATARRH | |
| TAR (sailor) contained [picked up] by CAR (vehicle), H (hospital) | |
| 4 | Extreme suffering of some collecting game (5) |
| AGONY | |
| ANY (some) containing [collecting] GO (game) | |
| 6 | Substance producing rust in west, reportedly (7) |
| OXIDANT | |
| Sounds like [reportedly] “Occident” (west) | |
| 7 | Art work created by two characters in Thessaloniki (5) |
| PIETA | |
| PI + ETA (two characters in Thessaloniki – Greek alphabet). SOED: A painting or sculpture representing the Virgin Mary holding the dead body of Jesus on her lap or in her arms. | |
| 8 | Writer for example visiting little sibling in film (8) |
| ESSAYIST | |
| SAY (for example) contained by [visiting] SIS (little sibling), all contained by [in] ET (film) | |
| 9 | Go to seed, having originally served this old family member (8) |
| STAGNATE | |
| S{erved} + T{his} [originally], AGNATE (old family member). I knew the word ‘agnate’ but not its meaning. Chambers has it as a person related to another on their father’s side or through a male ancestor. | |
| 14 | Furtive way with money? Not wife! (8) |
| STEALTHY | |
| ST (way – street), {w}EALTHY (with money) [not wife] | |
| 16 | Piece of silicon Greek character found in farmer’s yield by motorway (9) |
| MICROCHIP | |
| M1 (moroway), then CHI (another Greek character) contained by [found in] CROP (farmer’s yield) | |
| 17 | Erudite academic, old, and German (8) |
| PROFOUND | |
| PROF (academic), O (old), UND (and in German) | |
| 19 | Unpretentious character on the staff (7) |
| NATURAL | |
| Two meanings. The second is found in musical notation, the staff or stave being the set of 5 lines on which music is written. A natural sign indicates a return to natural pitch after a previous sharp or flat. | |
| 21 | Make a fuss, getting it set in stone (7) |
| AGITATE | |
| IT contained by [set in] AGATE (stone) | |
| 22 | Shearwater, say, found by domestic animal on lake (6) |
| PETREL | |
| PET (domestic animal), RE (on) L (lake). Shearwater is one of many types of this sea bird. | |
| 24 | Mature person shaving member of fighting force? (5) |
| OLDIE | |
| {s}OLDIE{r} (member of fighting force) [shaving] | |
| 25 | Horse, possibly, nibbling root of willow tree (5) |
| ROWAN | |
| ROAN (horse, possibly) containing [nibbling] W{illow} [root] | |
A bit of biffing here, though I later parsed my guesses. LOI COUPE, which was miles easier than lots of other clues but baffled me for ages. Liked OXIDANT, CATARRH and BETHESDA, which happily I knew.
Started very slowly; after going through the A clues I had only ELEGANCE and happily, UNDER THE WEATHER. The downs began to fall with the aid of the crossers and soon I had only 5A, 8D, and 22D, 28A crossers left, as I’d forgotten that shearwaters were petrels and was convinced that global police force referred to UN. DNK or care what the shape of a coupe was, so was looking for a sloping roof term until ESSAYIST got teased into submission and I realised that item could mean COUPLE. As above, NHO AGNATE and ORT only vaguely recalled from previous crosswords. Did not parse TRUSTWORTHINESS – I would never equate trust with management, although I did see THIN and the random spare points.
Found this very straightforward, 17:01. But! A pink square caused by my fat fingers trying to solve the puzzle on my phone in a coffee shop in Blackpool. Can’t really blame Blackpool I suppose.
30 minutes for me. Didn’t parse TRUSTWORTHINESS or TEMPS but will try to remember about Nice/Nancy for when the answer isn’t so obvious. Ditto new words ort and agnate. I fully expected to hit my usual buffers with the last few clues but no, straight on to morning…
Thanks setter and Jackkt
20:59
Straightforward but nicely clued I thought. Got TRUSTWORTHINESS just from the letter count. Liked GRANARY, TEMPS and NATURAL and now I know what RHIZOMEs and ORTs are .
Thanks to Jack and the setter.
Consecutive days solving without aids. Something to cheer about.
13a my favourite, having lived in Wales for years , chapel names are part of the vocabulary. Beautiful old biblical names adorn them in most villages, Beulah, Sion, Ebenezer, Tabernacle, although many have been converted into homes.
It used to be said that chapel goers would refer to ‘my chapel ‘ or ‘the one I don’t go to’.
I liked 25a and 18a.
Thank you to blogger and setter.
I got stuck in the NE, with COUPLE and PIETA the last to fall. Quite a few biffed in with fingers crossed. ORT and AGNATE are new knowledge to be squirrelled away.
Thanks for the blog again, Jack
Not too difficult this. I struggled more with the QC today.
LOI DEEPLY having tried to justify DARKLY having biffed OLDER -careless.
NHO ORT.
Some good clues. I liked STEALTHY.
David
Mostly straightforward, though with a couple unparsed – so thanks to our blogger for filling the gaps. Sadly, I couldn’t find PETREL, so a DNF for me in just under 20 minutes.
I found this much easier than the QC where I got a little bogged down. Only held up slightly in the north east corner with PIETA and COUPLE, otherwise a speedy solve. Finished in 21.45 with all correct but two unparsed, TEMPS and INTERPOL, although clearly in both cases the right answers.
34 minutes. I never knew ‘ply’ could mean ‘travel’. Didn’t know ‘agnate’. And I always thought a coupe was simply a car with a roof you could fold down. So a fun yet educational time.
That’s a ‘drop-top!’ or ‘soft-top’, innit!?
Meldrew
Managed to finish without aids, but found it much more of a struggle than yesterday’s – and I knew Rhizome, Pieta and Bethesda. Ort and Agnate on the other hand were totally unknown and only accompanied Matron and Stagnate when I was happy that nothing else would fit. So that’s three new words in one day (the other one was Ascot from the QC). I’m of an age where my stock of neurones is running down, so not too sure I can afford such extravagance! Invariant
Completed in several sittings but not all parsed and several new words for me including ort, agnate, frontal and petrel. Liked PIETA and GRANARY. Many thanks for the much-needed blog!
12.36. Once I got started this fell pretty quickly.
Well I’m definitely in the minority but found this tricky, 40 minutes, was about to give up as it’s getting late but then COUPLE, OXIDANT and PETREL all came in a rush.
I’m sure that our setters intend
To drive this poor Nowt round the bend
They can write super clues
Other words they could choose
But they stick PETREL in at the end
NHO ORT but MATRON was gettable from the definition.
If only all 15×15 crosswords were this easy I’d make the journey over from QC land more often.
I remember Bethesda as a chapel name. There used to be lots of them in South Wales when I was growing up many decades ago.
Thanks
Easiest 15 X 15 ever for me. Usually takes me hours.Polished this off in about 15 mins.
Like Simjit and Ianmac, I found (once I got a toe-hold in the south) this to be far easier than the norm: finished it off with my breakfast cuppa with glee, having stared at the top few with nothing clicking at all until BETHESDA forced me to slowly parse (on paper) and the rest of the lower half of the puzzle completed before I looked at the top with ‘new eyes’. Once MOROCCAN hove into view it was plain sailing from there – I didn’t worry that certain words were new; that’s to be expected in a Times. So Yay! On the wavelength at last!