43:39. Well, that’s how I felt solving this puzzle anyway. Don’t get me wrong, there were a lot of absolutely delightful clues here (meaning surface reading, wordplay, word choice, etc), but I felt that a fair amount of the difficulty for me stemmed from using very uncommon synonyms or abbreviations. But let me parse the clues and I’ll get back to you.
Upon reflection, yeah, I still feel that way. But gosh darn there were some gems in here.
| Across | |
| 1 | Friend from Eastern Europe reported fall of King (9) |
| CHECKMATE – homophone of CZECH MATE | |
| 6 | Part of leg somewhat laid back nurses start to ice (5) |
| TIBIA – A BIT reversed around I | |
| 9 | Root cut, following usual number of strokes (7) |
| PARSNIP – SNIP after PAR | |
| 10 | Looking for enlightenment they quickly run through plot (7) |
| BEMUSED – EMUS (they quickly run) in BED | |
| 11 | No place for carriage in mighty caper (5) |
| ANTIC – GIGANTIC minus GIG (carriage)
Ah, GIG, was it. Fortunately I didn’t need to figure out that part during the solve. |
|
| 12 | I will not run out of highway (9) |
| INTESTATE – INTERSTATE minus R
Should have gotten this sooner! |
|
| 14 | Priest is missing a beat (3) |
| LAM – LAMA minus A | |
| 15 | Nervous feeling, say, associated with Burton’s debut theatre part (11) |
| BUTTERFLIES – UTTER with B + FLIES (theatre part)
The FLIES are where the scenery are hung from, etc. |
|
| 17 | Waterproof, this is instinctive: spill tea! (5-6) |
| GUTTA-PERCHA – GUT + TAPER + CHA
Having understood GUT and CHA, and needing to fill in _A_E_ with reasonable letters, I thought I would try to find a synonym of ‘spill’. This wasn’t the right strategy. Eventually I thought of GUTTA-PERCHA, and TAPER at least is a word, so I went with it. Now, look. Is ‘spill tea’ a nice phrase to work into a clue? Sure. Is ‘spill’ a nice synonym for a thin strip of paper used to light a candle? Undoubtedly. Wish I’d known it. I don’t know, something about this one rubbed me the wrong way. |
|
| 19 | Introduction to Götterdämmerung that surprises me! (3) |
| GEE – G | |
| 20 | Unsteadily take aim at Balmoral boiler (3,6) |
| TEA KETTLE – anagram of TAKE + ETTLE (Scots word for ‘aim’)
I count myself among those who tried to make TEA KIMITA or somesuch work. Eventually I just went with my gut and assumed ETTLE was a word I didn’t know. |
|
| 22 | Cryptic pictures on public transport (5) |
| REBUS – RE + BUS | |
| 24 | Chinese agent engaged in Washington diversion (7) |
| HANGMAN – HAN (Chinese) + G-MAN (agent engaged in Washington) | |
| 26 | Why writer stops working? Good you hear this about pen (7) |
| OINKING – O INK IN (why writer stops working?) + G
I mean, this is just brilliant. |
|
| 27 | Counterintuitively best fare from Bavaria — zilch for you in the end (5) |
| WORST – WURST (fare from Bavaria) with O replacing U (you in the end) | |
| 28 | Church reader, fast one, keeps time (9) |
| GOSPELLER – GOER (fast one) around SPELL
Do not like GOER. |
|
| Down | |
| 1 | Drinking this, the reverse of cappuccino? (5) |
| CUPPA – hidden reversed in CAPPUCCINO
Partial &lit, with the definition being ‘the reverse of cappuccino’. |
|
| 2 | “Sinner” for “sinker”? I’m not sure — “singer”? Let me think (7) |
| ERRATUM – ER (I’m not sure) + RAT (singer) + UM (let me think)
RAT as in ‘one who turns informer’. A charming surface. |
|
| 3 | Dangerous animal caught, nothing retarding cycles (4,5) |
| KING COBRA – C (caught) + O (nothing) + BRAKING (retarding) with the letters cycled
I simply cannot wait for the commentary on this one. It’s almost as if someone wanted to find the most extreme use of this wordplay device just to rag some of the commenters here. 😉 Nevertheless, well found, setter! |
|
| 4 | Post a couple of applications (11) |
| APPOINTMENT – APP + OINTMENT
Two very different kinds of applications! Once again, a hat tip to you, setter. |
|
| 5 | Periodically, new baby will want a drop of water (3) |
| EBB – every other letter in NEW BABY
Brilliant again. |
|
| 6 | Numbers clocked / by / my employer (5) |
| TIMES – ‘Numbers clocked’. Perhaps some will hate it, but I love it. |
|
| 7 | A bit miffed receiving only half as much rice (7) |
| BASMATI – anagram of A BIT around the first half of AS MUCH | |
| 8 | Append residence, look, beneath this? (9) |
| ADDRESSEE – ADD (append) + RES (residence) + SEE (look)
When filling out an envelope, the residence goes after the addressee. A nice clue, provided you don’t look too closely at ‘look’. |
|
| 13 | Child’s character we think encapsulates “untrustworthy” (11) |
| TREACHEROUS – REACHER (Child’s character) in TO US (we think)
Thankfully I was able to get this one because I needed vinyl to parse this one for me. I did not know the Jack Reacher series by Lee Child, aka Jim Grant. |
|
| 14 | The method underpinning entries in Crossword Championship spectacle (5,4) |
| LIGHT SHOW – HOW (the method) under LIGHTS (entries in Crossword Championship)
LIGHT is the answer to a crossword clue — I assume stemming from something like shining a light on the mystery? I did know this one. |
|
| 16 | Its influence is Sweet Charity in the setting for Les Misérables (9) |
| FRAGRANCE – RAG (charity) in FRANCE (the setting for Les Misérables)
vinyl parsed this one for me too. I see ‘rag day’ and ‘rag week’, but I don’t actually see RAG as being a synonym for ‘charity’. But FYI, AGR (Amanah Global Fund) is a UK-based charity, so we could very well parse this as AGR in FRANCE as well. |
|
| 18 | One pushing athlete, European, right to the very south of ground (7) |
| TRAINER – TERRAIN with E+R moved to the bottom | |
| 19 | Being divine, cheese is tucked away by girl (7) |
| GABRIEL – BRIE in GAL | |
| 21 | Eve and Adam finally ran into someone doing the Eden Project? (5) |
| EMMET – last lettetrs of EVE and ADAM + MET (ran into)
EMMET is a Cornish word for a tourist |
|
| 23 | Ridicule the people here about money (5) |
| SUGAR – RAG US reversed | |
| 25 | Pain / riding horse (3) |
| NAG – double definition | |
DNF, defeated by GUTTA-PERCHA, which I’ve never heard of (I also didn’t know taper=spill). ‘Spill the tea’ can also mean to share gossip, which didn’t help.
– Failed to parse ANTIC
– Didn’t know flies as part of a theatre for BUTTERFLIES
– NHO lights=crossword clue answers so LIGHT SHOW went in with a shrug
– Had no idea what was going on with TRAINER beyond seeing the definition
Very tough. Thanks Jeremy and setter.
COD Intestate
Yes: my thoughts, except that I knew ‘spill’ for taper, as had a discussion with one of my students (a 91-year-old) on that very definition earlier this week. I have memories of lighting our geyser with tapers we called spills.
87:26
The time speaks for itself. Very tough. Glad to get through it.
Thanks, pj.
45:10 – tough and ingenious, but like all the best puzzles no doubt about the answers once you finally teased them out. Lovely.
DNF
Self-imposed time limit of 60 minutes left me with still over half to do. Chapeau to the sub-30 minute brigade.
Thanks to Jeremy and the setter
12:20. Tricky but no long hold-ups. This was one of the best Times puzzles I’ve done in a while.
46:55
So much to enjoy with this puzzle, though I’m certain I missed a load!
BEMUSED – saw the BED but didn’t get why a MUSE would quickly run – doh!
GUTTA PERCHA – from enumeration and checkers, don’t know why this was in my head. Only saw the CHA bit.
ETTLE – NHO
HANGMAN – I simply had HANG as the Chinese and MAN as the agent
TREACHEROUS – missed the parsing altogether
FRAGRANCE – didn’t understand RAG = charity
All far outweighed by the penny drop moments though!
Thanks PJ and setter
Very hard. Cheated throughout.
11a Antic biffed. Clever. Came here to check; DOH!
20a Tea Kettle. I was thinking of adding “ettle” “to take aim” into the Cheating Machine, but decided against. Just too damn rare and dialectical for me. So there! Was biffing this but didn’t believe it, so came here to check.
6d Times.Biffed. Thanks to RodB above for the triple def spot. I had been assuming that multiplication was related to clocking numbers somehow; glad I was wrong.
7d OWL club, bIsmati because I can’t spell and was lazy.
13d NHO Jack Reacher, not sure about to us=we think, so biffed. Added Jack R to C.M.
16d Fragrance. Biffed from NHO AGR in France, then spotted the RAG (week) which I thought was very vague but HHO.
18d Trainer. I was proud to parse this.
21d Emmet HHO. It took a while but was fun.
23d Sugar, DNK sugar=money.
GUTTA PERCHA was a write in from G?T and the enumeration for some reason – I can only think I’ve seen it here before. Many many unparsed – thankfully my biffing hat was firmly on today. HANGMAN was LOI and was a complete guess – NHO G-MAN, and still none the wiser after googling.
Pretty unsatisfying despite all correct as there were so many my tiny brain didn’t get. Bravo setter & thanks to Jeremy for the blog.
28:05
31.22, but no idea about a lot of the parsing, so not very enjoyable, and I continue to much regret the decision to allow living persons to feature in the puzzles.
As a QC person who has had some success with the Cryptic of late, I had a look at this having finished the QC quickly today. Way, way above my head – could only solve 3! Looking at the answers, EMMET, GUTTA-PERCHA, (k)ETTLE, G-MAN all NHO, nor SUGAR = money or NG = pain. Dispiriting.
To be fair many of the hard answers I’ve never heard of either! You learn how to piece them together from the wordplay. However GUTTA-PERCHA might be hard to do that with.
61’50”
This ancient plater/nag had no ambitions other than to complete in one piece.
However, all were parsed and only ‘ettle’ was taken on trust.
This reminded me of a book on Patience*, perhaps penned by a lady who had run out of sufficient companions for Whist, or even Bezique. She categorised each version using The Three M s.
Mystery: the extent of the face down cards. Must-ery: the extent to which your hand was forced. Mastery: the element of skill required.
This had all three; mystery (what’s going on here?), mustery (that must be, ……oh no it isn’t [20a]), mastery (the setter’s skill, not mine).
Bravissimo to both setter and Jeremy.
PS * If anyone can recall this book’s title or author, I’d be very grateful, having misplaced mine.
Ruth Botterill’s “The New Book of Patience Games: Mystery, Mustery, Mastery and some Jiggery-Pokery”?
Many thanks James; I’d completely forgotten about the Jiggery-Pokery !
38 WTE
Or rather one unfilled and one momble. That one and HANGMAN where I desperately inked in HANUMAN which is a thing but not the right thing
Absolutely kippered by TREACHEROUS and TRAINER though the punts were correct. The Child thing was very clever even though I’ve never read any of his stuff.
Agree borderline obscure in places but I like Friday to stretch the boundaries
Shout out to Jeremy for a tough blogging day
Brilliant crossword – as Fred Trueman was fond of saying to a batsman that had missed a ball “it were too good for thee” and this was far too good for me. South West corner mystified me. NHO gotta percha and could not have got anywhere with it, other than cha. Lights for clues was completely new to me and I’ve been doing these for 8 years now. Also missed the REACHER reference and missed oinking even though I’d thought of noink.
Bravo setter, I retire chastened until tomorrow.
Thx for the blog Jeremy
23:44. A lovely puzzle where I had to eke out the answers one by one, finishing with OINKING and SUGAR. DNK the character Reacher or the word “ettle” so those two went in on trust. I failed to parse ANTIC and TRAINER so thanks for explaining them Jeremy. Too many good clues to pick a favourite. Thank-you Jeremy and setter.
LIGHTS are called that because they’re not the black squares. Can refer to whole answers or the squares that make them up.
In Listener puzzles the light is often different from the answer to the clue.
What is it then, instead?
Thanks, I just mean that once the clue has been solved some further manipulation may have to take place to produce the letter sequence entered in the diagram. Difficult to be specific because the Listener puzzles are so diverse in theme. I rarely undertake them, other than the occasional maths ones, because the time commitment can be quite substantial and difficult to anticipate, but I do peruse the solution published 3 weeks later.
74:08. I nearly gave up several times. Pleased with myself for persevering.
COD: APPOINTMENT
A shade over an hour (on paper, on a train, with distractions). A hard but satisfying solve. LOI GOSPELLER and several unparsed until coming here.
Thanks setter and blogger!
61 mins with trainer and hangman unparsed – I too flirted with ‘Hanuman’, but remembered playing the diverting Hangman game. Hadn’t heard of ettle but assumed it must be a Scottish word for aim, which turned out to be the case. Some great hidden definitions!
Horrible!- must have lived a sheltered life as the unlikely looking gutta percha was a complete unknown.
58:31 – Really pleased to finish a puzzle with such a high SNITCH rating without aids in under an hour (just). Several answers did get thrown in without full understanding though, including 26 my LOI. Lots to love here – INTESTATE has to be my COD. No problem with Reacher – I have a complete set of all Lee Child’s Jack Reacher books. There were a couple of words I didn’t know though – ETTLE & FLIES (as part of a theatre). Also, I’m still not sure what the word Championship is doing in 14d.
After nearly an hour I had completed 51% of this, so I went off to watch the news. Another half hour and I actually managed to finish it correctly, despite the many, many obscurities and having to take things like EMMET and ..ETTLE on faith. But I do agree with Jeremy and Jack’s comments on the lines of “I’m torn between the high quality of some clues and the downright obscurity of rather too many”. Still, it was indeed a lot of fun. The one clue I didn’t like was INTESTATE, since I doubt there are interstate highways in Britain. But ERRATUM and especially OINKING were superb! Incidentally, pronouncing the introduction to Götterdämmerung in its language would not yield “gee”, so it would surprise me!
Must have taken an hour at least, I put it down and started again. Finished it in the end with a couple of biffs. My Scottish wife has never heard of “ettle”.
I liked cuppa, but I don’t think the clue quite works.
COD: appointment.
Ettle? Hmmm..
Still, I got there.
Are emus noted for speed? Had no idea.
I completed most of this early afternoon, but then went out for dinner. Alas, that was the end of the lightbulb moments. Subsequent solves were painfully slow and eventually I had to resort to aids for the NHO GUTTA-PERCHA and OINKING. TREACHEROUS, LIGHT SHOW, HANGMAN and TRAINER were unparsed, though no problem with the KING COBRA cycling device. LOI was EMMET, which I should have got sooner, as a regular visitor to Cornwall. A brilliant crossword and beyond my ability and GK, but I’ll certainly remember the waterproofing for a subsequent occasion.
As a still fairly new QC’er, I sometimes attempt the Big One. Usually I check the snitch and only try the easier ones but today I just went for it. OMG it was hard. After 90 minutes of biffing and occasionally parsing I was so exhausted I just revealed the remaining LIGHTS (BEMUSED, TIMES, OINKING, SUGAR) and came here to get the lowdown on the very large number of unparsed answers. You people are tough, that’s all I have to say.
DNF
Gave up 44 minutes, with OINKING still not found, and with WURST in place of WORST. I struggle to get which why round A for B clues are meant to be.
OINKING definitely COD.
Just did this on Saturday morning. Took 59:19. some very good clues indeed, for me let down a tiny bit by EMMET and ETTLE which were words I had to take on trust. (If I had believed in emmet as a word, I would have finished significantly faster!!!)
I was really stupidly slow to get INTESTATE, very good clue
Also for SUGAR it took me ages to think of RAG, and not having heard of sugar for money I was trying to think of obscure currencies starting SU
OINKING also very good and I got it by luck, thinking it was INK inside something and then seeing OINKING and realising how the clue really worked
Thanks setter and blogger
Too difficult for me. I enjoyed watching Simon Anthony solve it on “Cracking the cryptic”.
Agree with all the above comments : a brilliant but really tough puzzle that deserves its high Snitch rating ! Way too hard for me, and I was cheating before I’d hardly started. FOI EBB (very clever definition, so I knew then I was in for some hard work). But, being distracted (by life, as we females so often are, and the reason we don’t often indulge in crossword solving or compiling!) I scrolled through the clues ,trying find a foothold, but they were too few to help much(GEE and WORST and PARSNIP). Started looking up, and realised that the parsing was needed to even understand the answers, so I gave up the fight. Pity, as it was so good, and deserved of my complete attention! CODs to INTESTATE and OINKING, but many more.