Times Cryptic No 27192 – Saturday, 10 November 2018. Off the wavelength.

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On a hectic Saturday, I found this a struggle. I was slow to get the sailor, and slow to recognise the music. Pity, as there were many delightful definitions and wordplays. I hope others had more success. My clue of the day was the delightful 23ac! Thanks to the setter for a very enjoyable puzzle.

Clues are in blue, with definitions underlined. Answers are in BOLD CAPS, then wordplay. (ABC*) means ‘anagram of ABC’, with the anagram indicator in bold italics. Deletions are in [square brackets].

Across
1 Rail transport on the rise? (unfair clue almost rewritten) (9)
FUNICULAR: (UNFAIR CLU-*). I like the definition. “Almost” tells you to drop the last letter of “clue”.

6 Round-up of stock was carried over (5)
RODEO: RODE (was carried) / O (over). “Was carried” might need a “by” to exactly fit “rode”, but clear enough.

9 Like relay teams in the home straight, close to defeat? (2,5,4,4)
ON THEIR LAST LEGS: jocular double definition.

10 Manage desperate case for client (6)
DIRECT: DIRE (desperate) / C[lien]T.

11 One submits puzzle on paper, dropping copy round (8)
PROPOSER: P[ape]R (dropping “ape” meaning “copy”) / O (round) / POSER (puzzle). Challenging but elegant clue.

13 Mental image not showing right plant (6,4)
CUCKOO PINT: CUCKOO / P[r]INT. Oh good – another unknown plant. With a strange name, too.

14 Small drink for pet (4)
SNOG: S / NOG. That sort of petting.

16 Retiring Church Times editor’s first boss (4)
EXEC: CE (church) / X (by) / E[ditor], all written backwards (retiring). I saw the first letter was an E, then fixated on looking for words starting EC??. Silly me!

17 Guided by queen, clubs abandoning selected traditional shorts (10)
LEDERHOSEN: LED / ER / [c]HOSEN (selected).

19 Old man’s equivalent of jet adequate? (8)
PASSABLE: PA’S / SABLE.

20 Skier’s first collision happened unexpectedly (6)
SPRANG: S[kier] / PRANG.

23 It’s a quality iron horse should possess? (6,9)
ANIMAL MAGNETISM: cryptic definition. Cute, I thought.

24 Knight drinking in hell regularly went on a bender (5)
KNELT: KT (Knight) holding (drinking in) the even letters of “iN hElL”. On bended knee, that is.

25 King seized by drunken fool, closely bound (9)
TIGHTKNIT: TIGHT NIT “seizing” K.

Down
1 Sound judge brought in by former president (5)
FJORD: J in FORD.

2 Music teachers’ group out to lunch, entirely lacking capital (10,5)
NUTCRACKER SUITE: NUT (teachers’ group/union) / CRACKERS / [q]UITE (entirely, missing the first/capital letter). Far from obvious that “capital” means “first”, but I guess it works. “Entirely” is “quite” as in “quite right”. Took me ages to see this. No doubt vinyl1 got it in a nanosecond.

3 Cicero’s wrong about government by force (8)
COERCION: (CICERO*) / ON (about).

4 Expressed praise for God (4)
LORD: sounds like LAUD.

5 Cultivate grazing lands in US, making amends (10)
REARRANGES: REAR (cultivate) / RANGES (grazing lands). Again, not obvious to me that “rearrange” means “make amends”, but I think it works in the sense of amending a document, say.

6 Passage in entirety periodically input again (6)
RETYPE: hidden answer. “Passage in” is a very nice indicator of the clue type.

7 First aid post getting into gear before Waterloo? (8,7)
DRESSING STATION: needs no explanation? You found these just behind the battle lines, apparently.

8 Largely female production bruised tenor’s ego (9)
OESTROGEN: (TENORS EGO*).

12 Simple diet somehow a restriction on travellers (5,5)
SPEED LIMIT: (SIMPLE DIET*)

13 Fellow sailor holding English to be third rate (5-4)
CHEAP-JACK: CHAP holding E, then JACK (sailor, as in “Jack Tar”).

15 Cargo of hemp isn’t shifted (8)
SHIPMENT: (HEMP ISNT*).

18 When there’s no teaching, a set of books is available (6)
VACANT: VAC (not teaching time) / A / NT (New Testament: the usual collection of books).

21 Graduate aboard boat mounting compass (5)
GAMUT: MA (graduate) in TUG, all backwards (mounting).

22 Curious golf supports in the past (4)
AGOG: AGO (past) / G (golf, in the phonetic alphabet).

30 comments on “Times Cryptic No 27192 – Saturday, 10 November 2018. Off the wavelength.”

  1. 35 minutes but with a stupid error on my LOI at 25ac where I went for the unknown TIGHT,K,NUT instead of taking time to consider alternatives for fool = N?T. Not sure I ever knew the meaning of RODEO that’s required here as when I see the word I think only of the display of skills involved in riding, roping and wrestling steers. As far as I can remember, in all the Westerns I ever saw rounding-up cattle was called a ’round-up’.

    Edited at 2018-11-17 06:15 am (UTC)

  2. 39 minutes of steady progress, so of middle difficulty for me. Liked ANIMAL MAGNETISM but COD to ON THEIR LAST LEGS. Not sure if I knew DRESSING STATION but the crossers gave it away. LOI CUCKOO PINT, which I vaguely knew. EXEC is clued perfectly fairly by boss, but I’ve used it for so long only in the context of “as opposed to the non -Execs” that I took a long time to see it. You know the difference between a non-exec director and a shopping trolley? The trolley had a mind of its own but you can fit more food and drink into the non-exec. Happy days! Thank you B and setter.
      1. I don’t think it’s the first time I’ve told it here. I always try to greet people with a smile and a joke and it’s the only one I know.
  3. Found this easier than usual Saturday, my print out says 17 minutes which could be a PB for Sat. Lots of cryptic definitions you either saw quickly or not.
  4. I think I was on the wavelength for this as I managed to finish it crossing my fingers that Cuckoo Pint might be a plant. I recall my dictionary had it as one word.Dressing Station another unknown but gettable as BW mentions.
    I got 1a and 1d almost immediately and Nutcracker opened things up.
    Same as Jackkt,I had a major doubt about RODEO as I thought it meant a cowboy show. Also I did not see Rode=Was Carried. Happily nothing else would fit.
    I liked the Iron Horse. David
  5. No particular problems with this puzzle which took me 34:02. Liked ON THEIR LAST LEGS and ANIMAL MAGNETISM. TIGHT KNIT and FJORD were my last 2 in and took a while. Thanks Bruce and setter.
  6. Nothing unknown here. Having been brought up in the country I was at least aware of the Cuckoo Pint although I’m not sure I could point one out in a line up. For some reason I started in the SE at 15d – I think my eye fell on the “hemp isn’t shifted” when scanning the clues for a quick start. No solving time but a clue is that my paper copy is unfolded so it may have been done in one go.

    Thanks to Brian and setter.

  7. An uneventful 17 minutes, also liking ANIMAL MAGNETISM.
    I have to admit to being slightly confused by “largely” female production, as OESTROGEN is definitely something the distaff side produces, and remains so even if there are other mechanisms. I’d be happy with “Swiss made timepiece” for cuckoo clock even if most of them are really made in Taiwan.
    By the by, is anyone else getting an occasional fake “windows out of date” pop up while using LJ? It’s easy to get round (close and reopen) but a minor irritation.
    1. I think the “largely” refers to the fact that, although most oestrogen is produced by females, some is produced by males.
      1. I’m quite sure the same applies (in reverse) to testosterone, such is the fluidity of gender dynamics (to use what is unashamedly an imprecise phrase). I stand by my cuckoo clock analogy, with the observation that Vinyl’s comment on setters bowing to the precision of technical experts is probably true.
        And again “occasionally male production” surely wouldn’t work for OESTROGEN, even though technically true. I think I remain in favour of cutting our hard pressed setters a bit of slack.
  9. Sorry to butt in off topic but did anyone else have trouble with filling in the grid on the Club site? Once I’d filled in 1A and tried to move to 1D it would just stick on the same light instead of moving to the next when filled. If you try to shove it along manually it just erases the last letter you entered. Quite maddening – I gave up.

    P.S. Just went to see what would happen with the jumbo and no grid appeared at all – and no clues. Same with the concise. I left a message on the general forum.

    Edited at 2018-11-17 11:48 am (UTC)

    1. Sorry, Olivia, I still use treeware. I hope you get it because it’s a toughie. I was well over the hour with it.
    2. I just submitted today’s fine, so whatever’s wrong might be fixed now. Popped along to the Jumbo to check and I got the grid, and clues.

      Edited at 2018-11-17 03:48 pm (UTC)

    3. Hi Olivia – it may be a different thing, but I regularly have that sort of problem if I try to use Firefox browser, but Microsoft Edge works fine.
      1. Thanks Bruce. Some gremlin got in the system – my husband was shut out of his email too. All fixed now. Sorry for the false alarm. P.S. Nice blog!
    4. Strange; I had exactly this problem on my wife’s mac a couple of weeks ago. I had to switch to my own computer. The problem has since disappeared.
  10. 36 mins. Very nice puzzle. FOI 1ac. I had some trouble with my LOI 13ac but did faintly recall it from a previous outing somewhere in crosswordland. 2dn, 6ac and 8dn also defied my understanding for some time and I had trouble convincing myself that putting a j in the middle of president XXXVIII was going to produce a noise or something valid at 1dn until all became clear. I liked 17ac, 23ac and 12dn.
  11. 13:42. Unusually, I have no annotations on my paper copy apart from writing out a couple of anagrinds and underlining a third. But I remember liking EXEC and ON THEIR LAST LEGS. Nice puzzle and thaks for the blog.
    1. It’s a cryptic definition, not double definition. That is, it’s just an obscure description of what you’re looking for.
  13. I’m puzzled by 5d where the definition doesn’t seem to match the answer. One is a third person singular and the other a present participle or somesuch. Can anyone suggest a sentence where “making amends” and REARRANGES are equivalent? Should it be “makes amends”?

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