Solving time: 50 minutes but a technical DNF as I used aids for my LOI at 28ac. Elsewhere I had a wrong answer that slowed me down considerably until corrected and I think by the time I got to 28ac and tried a couple of unsuccessful alphabet trawls I’d simply run out of energy.
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]. “Aural wordplay” is in quotation marks. I usually omit all reference to juxtaposition indicators unless there is a specific point that requires clarification.
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1 | Vehicle one’s taken into allotment? I’m not driving on this (9) |
AUTOPILOT | |
AUTO (vehicle), then I (one) contained by [taken into] PLOT (allotment) | |
6 | Delta split coast (5) |
DRIFT | |
D (delta – NATO alphabet), RIFT (split). For much of the time I had DRIVE here which works perfectly with the wordplay and seemed close enough for the definition. I had a slight feeling of doubt as I wrote it in but only thought of reconsidering after I had been battling for ages later to find an answer at 8dn beginning with an E. | |
9 | Figure in great pain, not unknown following year-end (7) |
DECAGON | |
DEC (year-end), AGON{y} (great pain) [not unknown] | |
10 | Firmly held resistance I half-heartedly checked (7) |
RIVETED | |
R (resistance), I, VET{t}ED (checked) [half-heartedly] | |
11 | Not in any way practical knowledge being voiced (5) |
NOHOW | |
Aural wordplay [being voiced) NOHOW / “know-how” (practical knowledge) | |
13 | Familiarise upper class after a while with a veneer of loathing (9) |
HABITUATE | |
A BIT (a while) + U (upper class] contained by [with a veneer of] HATE (loathing) | |
14 | Let more names incorrectly in register (9) |
ENROLMENT | |
Anagram [incorrectly] of LET MORE N N (names) | |
16 | Every MP has one small worry (4) |
SEAT | |
S (small), EAT(worry). In this context a seat is a place in the membership of the House of Commons and also refers to the parliamentary constituency to which an MP has been elected. | |
18 | Blank verse poet puts first (4) |
VOID | |
OVID (poet) becomes VOID when V (verse) is put first | |
19 | Wanting bachelor, dated with scepticism and swooned (6,3) |
PASSED OUT | |
PASSÊ (dated), DOU{b}T (scepticism ) [wanting bachelor] | |
22 | Nasty argument on appeal that will suit you well (6,3) |
SAVILE ROW | |
SA (sex appeal), VILE (nasty), ROW (argument). Savile Row in Mayfair is famous for its high-end traditional tailoring. | |
24 | Fleeting little thing thus captured by people (5) |
MESON | |
SO (thus) contained [captured] by MEN (people). Something in particle physics, I believe. | |
25 | Very ardent to convert to green (7) |
VERDANT | |
V (very), then anagram [convert] of ARDENT | |
26 | Rich filling finally causing a pain (7) |
GANACHE | |
{causin}G [finally], AN (a), ACHE (pain). Delicious! | |
28 | Fatty’s right to avoid one standing bail (5) |
SUETY | |
SU{r}ETY (one standing bail) [right – r – to avoid]. This was the clue I gave up on and resorted to aids. I got nowhere with ‘fatty’ and having thought of ‘guarantor’ I just couldn’t come up with another synonym for one standing bail. | |
29 | One in a suit apparently wearing a vest (9) |
SINGLETON | |
SINGLET ON (apparently wearing a vest). In bridge and other card games a singleton is the only card of a suit in a hand. |
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1 | Not so fast with stake (7) |
ANDANTE | |
AND (with), ANTE (stake – bet). As a musical direction this is usually translated as ‘moderately slow’ or ‘at walking pace’. | |
2 | Regularly observed twitch (3) |
TIC | |
T{w}I{t}C{h} [regularly observed] | |
3 | Greedy types desire what everyone else has left? (8) |
PIGSWILL | |
PIGS (greedy types), WILL (desire) | |
4 | Pleasure boat avoiding area that may be packed (5) |
LUNCH | |
L{a}UNCH (pleasure boat) [avoiding area] | |
5 | Told of panic, tears into masses of data (9) |
TERABYTES | |
Aural wordplay [told of]: TERA / “terror” (panic), BYTES / “bites” [tears into] | |
6 | Set aside deed poll avoided by editor (6) |
DEVOTE | |
DE{ed} + VOTE (poll) [avoided by editor] | |
7 | Commonly suggest, very hungry, such feeding (11) |
INTRAVENOUS | |
{h}INT (suggest) [commonly], RAVENOUS (very hungry) | |
8 | Superlatively neat, is very keen to stuff bird (7) |
TIDIEST | |
DIES (is very keen) contained by [to stuff] TIT (bird) | |
12 | Voices here beginning to resound, organised in epic style (6,5) |
HEROIC VERSE | |
Anagram [organised] of VOICES HERE R{esound} [beginning to…] | |
15 | Sure path winds around European river (9) |
EUPHRATES | |
Anagram [winds] of SURE PATH containing [around] E (European) | |
17 | Period in a hospital at the end, being this? (8) |
TERMINAL | |
TERM (period), IN, A, then {hospita}L [at the end]. A gloomy thought at the start of the day! | |
18 | With regard to Victor, is travel permit coming over? (3-1-3) |
VIS-A-VIS | |
VISA (travel permit), V (Victor – NATO alphabet), IS | |
20 | One putting a little colour on new abbey (7) |
TINTERN | |
TINTER (one putting a little colour on), N (new). A famous ruined abbey in Monmouthshire. | |
21 | Dull with sleep, past taking in half a play (6) |
BLEARY | |
BY (past) containing [taking in] {King} LEAR (play) [half] | |
23 | One accompanying touring team on trailer (5) |
WAGON | |
WAG (one accompanying touring team), ON. Collins: Wag – informal – the wife or girlfriend of a famous sportsman. | |
27 | Reduced share (3) |
CUT | |
Two meanings |
Exactly the same experience for me on DRIFT/DRIVE, though I remember thinking that defining coast as drive was stretching it. 25.45 with everything except BLEARY and SUETY done in about 20. I’m still not sure how I figured out the latter, and I’m not exactly convinced that it and NOHOW are actual words. Was pleased to put yesterday’s knowledge to good use by instantly getting the suffix of DECAGON. Thanks to Jack for explaining what was going on with SINGLETON and PASSED OUT.
From Idiot Wind:
Someone’s got it in for me, they’re planting stories in the press
Whoever it is I wish they’d CUT it out quick, but when they will I can only guess
They say I shot a man named Gray and took his wife to Italy
She inherited a million bucks and when she died it came to me
I can’t help it if I’m lucky
SOED dates SUETY from the mid-18th century and NOHOW from the late 18th. I thought the latter might have been fairly recent and possibly American in origin, but not so, as the example they cite is from the English poet and writer Walter Savage Landor who died aged 89 in 1864.
Thank you Jack. I’m not surprised that they are real words,they just don’t sound like they are.
American usage and spelling of course often reflects English as it used to be in England way back when.
Around 70 minutes. Quite enjoyable. NHO GANACHE and TINTERN but the wordplay in both is quite clear once the definition is seen. These two were the last to be put in. Slowed with 4D trying to find a boat to fill L?N?? as LINER is clearly wrong. Finally saw LAUNCH to LUNCH.
Thanks Jack
Slow going. DEVOTE took a long time, even with all the checkers; SUETY too, until I had the checkers. WAGON had to be, but I could make no sense of it; it was only when I came here that I remembered ‘wag’ coming up once here.
DNF for me having to resort to aids for LOI RIVETED- 39 minutes up to that point. A nice puzzle though. I thought it was going to be a no-hoper having only really leapt on TIC (does that count as an &lit, dons tin hat- I’m new to all of this) but then got stuck into SE corner and solved my way way clockwise back up and round the board.
TERABYTES held me up as tried all sorts of nanos, gigas, kilos and megas before only getting it once AUTOPILOT had gone in.
Thanks Jack for the clear explanations (albeit I think it was fully parsed for me in the end),
Cheers
Horners
I learnt never to have claimed to have seen an &lit.
TIC is an &lit. Every bit is essential to both definition and wordplay.
Yes I guess this is what you would call a ‘proper’ &Lit, since there is nothing superfluous in the definition (which is often not the case).
Don’t worry about the tin hat, Horners. I’ve been doing the Times cryptics for over 20 years and I still have great difficulty identifying &lits!
37 minutes of steady, almost plodding, solve. SUETY last in and a fitting testimony to the power of an alphabet trawl.
Never heard of HEROIC VERSE as such, unlike, say, heroic couplets. We had TERA-something or other recently, which definitely helped.
HEROIC VERSE is in both ODE and Collins; Collins dates it to the early 17th century. I’m not sure I’ve ever heard of it myself, though.
Heroic Verse is in my Cheating Machine and so almost certainly has come up before.
I solved this one OK, but I was worried as I couldn’t parse void and wagon. I was able to parse wagon after stopping the clock, but had no idea of void and had to look at the blog. Suety went right in, and I left drift until I had all the checking letters. I didn’t know ganache, but of course I knew Tintern Abbey.
Time: 27:28
Pulled stumps at the one hour mark with BLEARY/SURETY. I tried to think of schoolboy names for “fatty” to drop the R from. The “half a play” made no sense, see it now.
COD PIGSWILL
I got hung up in the SE. MESON went in early, after TERMINAL, but it took a while to see WAGON, after getting SINGLETON, not remembering the relevant sense of WAG. The rest came quickly then: I knew GANACHE, and slapped my forehead (figuratively) when I finally got my LOI, CUT. Which seems obvious now, of course.
10:26, with a bit of a pause at the end over SUETY. Like ulaca I’m familiar with heroic couplets but not HEROIC VERSE as such.
Good puzzle.
24:28. My FOI was DRIVE but I then deleted it as I thought it didn’t quite fit the definition, thankfully thus avoiding confusion later. It took me an age to finish with SUETY and BLEARY. I’d thought of SUETY several minutes before but not put it in then when I finally did “surety” leapt out at me whereas it hadn’t when just considering SUETY mentally.
29m 33s but at least 3-4mins of that was taken up with stopping to feed Chauncey the cat his supper and forgetting to pause the puzzle.
Definitely one on my wavelength.
25ac: VERDANT. Connoisseurs of the humour of Peter Sellers will remember “Bal-ham, Gateway to the South”, in which he refers to the ‘VERDANT grasslands of Battersea Park’.
7d INTRAVENOUS. I misunderstood ‘commonly suggest’ and thought the setter had made a mistake by putting ‘INT’ instead of ‘INNIT’. (h)INT only occurred to me when I came here.
26 mins
COD – SUETY
An enriching puzzle this morning, despite my nho GANACHE.
I knew TERABYTES because I paid money for extra data storage (I do a lot of family history research). A couple of years later, I find I’ve used about 1% of it. Terabytes are big.
SUETY, inevitably, was LOI, I remember the packets of it, when it was regularly bought.
I really liked OVID / VOID and PASSED OUT. And I was reminded of a walk I once did, where I actually stood above TINTERN Abbey and failed to come up with any verse.
12’47”, thanks jack and setter.
Yes, my PC has 2 Terabytes storage of which only about 2% has been used after 10 years.
22.33 with LOI the clever nohow. Originally I had nouse but eventually scrubbed it in light of so many other clues being impossible as a result. I liked this puzzle a lot with habituate my COD.
Thx setter and blogger.
Another ‘nouse’
28 minutes with LOI DEVOTE. A steady solve. COD to PIGSWILL. Early in my finance career, the chart of accounts at my place of employment, called less grandly the cost code in those days, had an account called ‘cash received from pigswill’. Sadly, there were never any entries against it despite the quality of the food in the canteen. Pigs are discerning eaters.
Thank you Jack and setter.
For some reason I flew through this in 23 mins which is very fast for me. Easier than yesterday which I made heavy weather of. Definitely a wavelength thing.
FOI DRIFT
LOI SEAT
COD WAGON
15.00
Slowed down by GANACHE and SUETY, but both responded to alphabet trawls. Pleased to see the Fast Show catchphrase “suit you” correctly applied (it’s almost always rendered with a supernumerary “s”).
LOI SUETY
COD INTRAVENOUS
About 15 minutes. The only unfamiliarity was NOHOW, but the checkers made it obvious, and I avoided the drive/DRIFT trap.
Thanks Jack and setter.
FOI Drift
LOI Suety
COD Savile Row
23.58, helped by getting VIS A VIS early which unlocked most of the SW corner, including SUETY.
32 minutes. Not much trouble until I hit the crossing BLEARY and SUETY at the end. Same thoughts about NOHOW as Lindsay, though I note Jack’s helpful reply. I liked the def for SAVILE ROW.
Quickish today, though I didn’t much like nohow.
Ganache no problem for this fan of Leonidas chocolates..
Same experience as jackkt, all done happily in 15 minutes except for S*E*Y at 28a for which even resorting to an aid didn’t aid me. I suppose if fatty means like fat then suety means like suet, but it sits uncomfortably with me as a real word. Although the wordplay was clear enough.
INTRAVENOUS and WAGON were nice.
I learned of heroic couplets at school, so HEROIC VERSE seemed a logical extension. I only parsed TIC afterwards.
FOI RIVETED
LOI SUETY
COD VOID
TIME 10:24
30:18
Thanks, jack.
On that best portion of a good man’s life;
His little, nameless, unremembered acts
Of kindness and of love.
(Lines written a few miles above Tintern Abbey, Wordsworth)
40 mins with brekker on IPad. Suety, really?
Ta setter and J.
15.16
SUETY and BLEARY last two in. Thought they would long delay me but they appeared out of nowhere.
Thanks Jackkt and setter
I don’t imagine anything suety would be nice to chew on! Got there though. Thanks for the blog!
BLEARY and SUETY took me a good 6 to 8 minutes at the end, pushing the clock to 22.18. “Half a play” is genuinely beastly wordplay: that’s either PL or AY or, at a push, LA, and since I had no clue on SUETY (I don’t count the one marked as 28 across) nothing emerged from the mist.
Having checked Chambers, I see SUETY has a specific definition as “(of a person’s face or complexion) fatty and having a pallor resembling suet”, and rather sounds like a Wodehouse/Wooster expression that I almost remember.
The rest of this was congenial, except the usual challenge of how to spell SAVILE ROW.
The best of the bunch for me was SEAT: neat and amusing, like today’s honest blog.
I too thought the blog was excellent.
So I’m the only one who gave up and went for the ‘seedy’ fatty. Tucking SUrETY away in the memory bank now.
Thanks Jack
39 minutes held up by having DRIVE for 6ac. Once this was corrected 8dn became a Homer Simpson “Doh” moment.
RIVETED looks wrong to me – I would write RIVETTED. But I see that Chambers suggests that this is obsolete (‘formerly often rivetting and rivetted’), so I may just be old-fashioned.
I agree with you. I had to check (this is cheating).
Both spellings were already in the Cheating Machine.
For 6A I used Slipt (change split- to cause to move, pass, go, etc., with a smooth, easy, or sliding motion) thinking this was close enough to coast – given two of the three cross letters matched it held me up for ages
I also had DRIVE at first, with the same delaying consequence, though 8d could only be TIDIEST, so clearly it needed revisiting. Was lucky to think of ‘surety’ and thus get SUETY almost immediately, though on another day it could have stumped me. Finished in 44 mins, with PIGSWILL my LOI, simply because I’m not too sure why it obviously defines ‘what everyone else has left’. Hey ho. COD to WAGON, which made me laugh.
“I’m not too sure why it obviously defines ‘what everyone else has left’.”
We used to have pigswill bins at school in the ’70s into which would be scraped any leftover food which was then presumably used to feed pigs.
I used to pity the poor creatures as I was a fussy eater and didn’t fancy most of my school lunch even when it was hot and reasonably tidy on my plate.
12:11. Made heavy weather of this. Wasn’t helped by drive instead of DRIFT, hogswill instead of PIGSWILL. More of a challenge than yesterday.
Wasn’t a fan of VERSE being used in the clue for 18ac and the answer for 12, probably because I solved them one after the other.
Liked SUETY.
30 mins. As our esteemed blogger, my patience ran out at the end and I used help to get BLEARY. However that still didn’t resolve SUETY, so had to get help for that too.
I also had DRIVE for a while despite sensing it was wrong because drive = coast is no good really. Tweedledum says ‘Nohow’ in Alice in Wonderland (and I think it appears in other places too in Lewis Carroll). For no good reason I had trouble seeing desire = will in the PIGSWILL clue and used an aid here, but otherwise 44 minutes. SUETY indeed.
6a POI Seat. Every MP has a seat in the country, but ironically has no allocated seat in the House. Only the Speaker has a dedicated seat.
18a Void, semi-parsed. I could see a relationship with Ovid but didn’t “get” the Yoda-speak.
26a NHO Ganache. I probably say this every time it comes up.
5d Terabytes. MER at tears into=bites.
21d Bleary. Stupidly never thought of the full title of the play, and thought the whole of Lear is here, what’s he on about?
28a Suety. Surprised to find this in Cheating Machine; I added it ages ago, so I guess it has come up before. I didn’t believe in it either LindsayO. Nor did I believe in 11a Nohow but it was in CM ab initio. However knowhow as one word wasn’t, so I added it. As 2 words it was already in, added by me as all the multiples are.
11.09
I came alarmingly close to inventing a type of verse (HORRIC, anyone?), but for once managed to count the vowels then smack my forehead. I liked SUETY!
I was interested to spot the anagram for ENROLMENT included an abbreviation as part of the fodder. I don’t at all mind this, but I understand not all outlets do – and I generally think of the Times as the strictest of the dailies.
Thanks both.
16:06. Held up by not knowing how Savile Row was spelt, SEAT and the neat GANACHE. I liked the &lit TIC and the “half a play”. SUETY was a new word to me. Thanks Jackkt and setter. Is this today’s QC setter Oink in 15×15 form, I wonder?
22:09 – NOHOW needed the crossing H to kick out the hastily and not understood NOUSE/NO USE. No excuses for that. I also had rive for rift at 6ac but I found the rest was pretty painless.
52 minutes, with quite a lot of that time on my last two in, BLEARY and SUETY. One you think of BLEARY it is obvious what “half a play” is about, but hard to put the right answer together from the wordplay. Once I thought of SUETY I wasn’t sure it was a word until I confirmed the final Y with BLEARY.
51.19 held up by 1 Across as a result of entering HOGSWILL for 3 down. After getting my swine sorted it took another age to come up with BLEARY and SUETY.
Started with TIC and ANDANTE, then carried on anticlockwise, finishing with TERABYTES and AUTOPILOT. I knew SURETY but thought it was the bail put up rather than the person providing it. Every day’s a schoolday! Enjoyable puzzle. 17: 12. Thanks setter and Jack.
A pigheaded DRIVE did for me as it made 8d impossible. I had areal problem with some of the clues today. Shouldn’t AUTOPILOT be flying? Does ENROLMENT =register (verb/noun?)
Anyway, apart from that, there were a few excellent clues. I liked SINGLET ON & SAVILE ROW.
Thanks Jack and setter.
Completed either side of lunch and no specific time to record, but I would guess a little under thirty minutes with no real hold ups. Even SUETY , which seems to have caused a problem for some, came quickly to me. Perhaps I was remembering from childhood the delicious suet puddings with raspberry jam that my mother used to regularly make.
Yes, let’s hear it for the jam roly-poly. As a kid, in the time of rationing my favourite meal was suet crust, which had a meat (if not much) and potato filling accompanied by a sliced onion soaked in vinegar and some tinned peas. A feast for the Gods.
This reminds me of a song my father used to sing to me:
Oh for the roly-poly Mother used to make,
Roly-poly, treacle duff
Roly-poly that’s the stuff!
Just to think of roly makes my tummy ache,
Oh cor lumme, I love my mummy and the puddin’ she used to make!
27:23 – no especial difficulties for me today but I really enjoyed the puzzle overall despite a bit of not being on the ‘wavelength’. I think I got a bit lucky on TINTERN, as otherwise that could have taken ages.
lots of excellent clues, I particularly liked INTRAVENOUS. thank you setter and Jack
Completed all bar two in 30 minutes. Then, additional 20 minutes required before I finally got Bleary and Suety. Suety is one of those words that are surely hardly ever used in conversation.
Good crossword, though, with my COD going to Intravenous.
34:51
Very slow to get going – three in the first nine minutes or so. Another here with DRIVE which held up completion of NE corner. Also had the not-entirely-parsed BOSON for a while at 24a. Happily have heard of both GANACHE and AOI SUETY (or at least aware of suet puddings) but failed to parse BLEARY. Liked PIGSWILL.
Thanks Jack and setter
Took a while to get a hold on this puzzle, especially SE corner, where I’d put BIT instead of CUT. Once I’d sorted that out, and got some of the longer answers, it started to come together. LOI was SUETY- we had plenty of duet dumplings in our stews growing up. INTRAVENOUS took me back to putting in total parenteral nutrition lines for ICU patients.
Thank you for the erudite blog, and thanks for an interesting puzzle Mr Setter.
DNF after about 30-35′ with the same one missing as our blogger – I had gone past SU twice on an alphabet search and not seen it.
To compound my problem, I have up to now believed that a surety is a synonym for guarantee, and that the guarantor providing the surety is a suretor. As such I was never going to see the wordplay. (I see that the dictionaries are unanimous in contradicting me and defining surety in a way that fits the wordplay… funny that they are all wrong.)