34:10. After a not-particularly-strenuous week, I wondered if we might be in for a very difficult puzzle. As I started my solve, it seemed at first that the puzzle was on the easier side, but something was…. strange. The easy stuff here wasn’t normal-easy and the hard stuff here wasn’t normal-hard. The whole puzzle had a bit of a feel like it came from a different universe. That’s not the say it made the puzzle good or bad — I quite liked a lot of the vocabulary and clueing here. But like I say, just a bit odd. I wonder if you felt the same.
| Across | |
| 1 | Card cutter to double up (9) |
| JACKKNIFE – JACK (card) KNIFE (cutter) | |
| 6 | Slide down off leaking old boat (5) |
| SKIFF – SKI (slide down) OFF – (leaking) O (old) | |
| 9 | Lady driving cattle truck about to open bonnet (7) |
| COWGIRL – RIG (truck) reversed (about) in (to open) COWL (bonnet) | |
| 10 | Adequate to shed a couple of layers to run — it’s a constant zero degrees (7) |
| EQUATOR – {ad}EQUA{te} (to shed a couple of layers) TO R (run) | |
| 11 | Nothing in Brazil changes (5) |
| ZILCH – hidden | |
| 13 | Ravel again occupied by concerto’s opening figure (9) |
| RECTANGLE – RETANGLE (ravel again) around (occupied by) first letter of CONCERTO (concerto’s opening) | |
| 14 | Swells are contracted to wear fashionable suits? (9) |
| INCREASES – ‘RE (are contracted) in (to wear) IN (fashionable) CASES (suits?)
Question mark indeed. |
|
| 16 | Hamburgers’ rather depleted buns [in] boxes (4) |
| JABS – JA (Hamburgers’ rather) + B{un}S (depleted)
I mean this clue possibly took me 8 minutes. Part of the problem here may be that, as an American, I don’t really think of ‘rather’ as meaning ‘yes’. And just to spell it out, the first part of this clue refers to how people in Hamburg would say ‘rather’ (in German). |
|
| 18 | Influence introduction of welfare state checks (4) |
| SWAY – SAY (state) goes around (checks) first letter (introduction) of WELFARE | |
| 19 | One spiked long drinks in gold vessel (9) |
| PORCUPINE – PINE (long) around (drinks in) OR (gold) CUP (vessel) | |
| 22 | Antiques — British Isles to return a couple shortly (4-1-4) |
| BRIC-A-BRAC – BR (British) CI (isles) reversed (to return) + A + BRAC{e} (shortly) | |
| 24 | Charlie[’s] parking by Barbican perhaps after pulling over (5) |
| TWERP – P (parking) next to (by) TOWER (Barbican perhaps) – (after pulling) O (over) | |
| 25 | Give a lift to visiting French student nurses (7) |
| ELEVATE – ÉLÈVE (French student) around (nurses) AT (visiting) | |
| 26 | Pop round to get cheese, forgetting ‘thank you’ [for] fruit (7) |
| APRICOT – PA (pop) reversed (round) + (to get) RICOTTA (cheese) – (forgetting) TA (thank you) | |
| 28 | Your old dear [is] like Herb (5) |
| THYMY – THY (your, old) MY (dear!)
A word I did not know existed! |
|
| 29 | Former president scheming with specific intent (9) |
| EXPRESSLY – EX (former) PRES (president) SLY (scheming) | |
| Down | |
| 1 | Music ringing so long on the phone before one[’s] bath (7) |
| JACUZZI – JAZZ (music) around (ringing) CU (so long, on the phone) + (before) I (one) | |
| 2 | Cry when putting up with a cold (3) |
| CAW – reversing (when putting up) W (with) A C (cold) | |
| 3 | The King departs after broadcast [is] dubbed (8) |
| KNIGHTED – THE KING D (departs) anagrammed (after broadcast) | |
| 4 | Turning 50, detective retired on being unwilling to work (5) |
| IDLER – reversal of (turning) L (50) DI (detective) + reversal of RE (on) | |
| 5 | Cut out boxing casualty stateside with right training equipment (9) |
| EXERCISER – EXCISE (cut out) around (boxing) ER (casualty, stateside) + (with) R (right)
Only on solving did I discover that ‘casualty’ is what y’all call the ER. |
|
| 6 | Sell out second match with English going two down (6) |
| SQUEAL – S (second) EQUAL (match) with E (English) going two [places] down | |
| 7 | Tending to mix vinaigrette in buffet (11) |
| INTEGRATIVE – VINAIGRETTE anagrammed (in buffet) | |
| 8 | Aid for delivery rider under duress (7) |
| FORCEPS – PS (rider) under FORCE (duress) | |
| 12 | Regularly-screened live reality reels bringing in capital with profit (11) |
| LUCRATIVELY – L{i}V{e} (regularly-screened) REALITY anagrammed (reels) around (bringing in) UC (capital)
As in Upper Case. Did not understand this at the time. |
|
| 15 | Crack user with speed set aside (9) |
| SUPERSEDE – anagram (crack) USER + (with) SPEED | |
| 17 | Fourteen points for Piquet [and] reportedly Jaguar with eight? (8) |
| QUATORZE – homophone of CAT (jaguar?) + (with) OARS (eight?)
I confess to having learned to play Piquet decades ago, so this was a biff. |
|
| 18 | Field reserve clubs wearing black (7) |
| SUBJECT – SUB (reserve) + C (clubs) in (wearing) JET (black)
Got held up for awhile, thinking this was going to involve SABLE. |
|
| 20 | Fellow feeling extremely happy after lunch drinks served up past noon (7) |
| EMPATHY – H{app}Y (extremely) after EAT (lunch) around (drinks) reversal of (served up) PM (past noon) | |
| 21 | Jolly permissive parts [for] array of stars (6) |
| GALAXY – LAX (permissive) in (parts) GAY (jolly) | |
| 23 | Munch hot party sandwiches (5) |
| CHAMP – CAMP (party) around (sandwiches) H (hot) | |
| 27 | Chief of Staff / leaves / function (3) |
| COS – triple definition | |
Tttrrriiipppllleee Pppaaannngggrrraaammm. Nice.
I missed that, but perhaps that explains why I found this one odd.
I didn’t notice, as always (even with a single), though there was a Z or two in my very first two answers.
Please explain as I have no idea what it says or relates to.
A pangram is when every letter of the alphabet is used, and in this case (we’ll have to take their word for it) every letter is used three times, quite some feat.
Or you could count.
(No, I’m not gonna bother either.)
I checked. 160 letters total with all letters at least three times.
…which was very helpful for getting JABS!
With jackknife and jacuzzi in on first read, I said to myself it’s gunna be a double pangram. Then forgot all about it. So it goes. Nice collection of “normal” words for the triple.
I thought, pangram deffers, but triple!!!!!!
Eventually finished in 35:33 after unapologetically resorting to Google translate at the end. Not enough time spent with French students teaching me to count to fourteen.
Thanks Jeremy and setter. (Jeremy you’re missing a J in your parsing of 17ac).
Is this a joke? There is no 17ac…
17dn.
Of course I had checked 17dn but was confused again because there is no J in that answer… but then I saw “jaguar” in the parsing. Thanks for the catch!
(I needed to distribute the ? to jaguar anyway.)
I had a pink square because, despite it being an anagram, I carelessly put SUPERCEDE for 15D. I also took a long time on JABS but my LOI was THYMY correcting my biffed THYME which slowed me up on getting GALAXY and realizing THYMY must actually be a word. A lot of very complicated wordplay today.
Snap!
I, too, was stuck for a while on JABS, my LOI, but eventually I remembered the German expression “Ja wohl!” Also took a minute to see why ORZE, and to parse the evident answer EMPATHY. Hardest of the week, but no stinker, and I’m glad of that because I have other things to do!
DNF Wiped out by NE corner. Put ADDRESS for 8dn reasoning that it was an aid for delivery rider who would certainly be under duress he lost it or found he didn’t have it. I couldn’t see past this. I also had BETRAY for 6dn, a guess with no idea of the parsing. I used aids in a vain attempt to get a boat with B_I_A. Putting constant in “a constant zero degrees” making me think of temperature and to me is completely misleading. The equator is simply zero degrees latitude and not a “constant” zero degrees latitude. FORCEPS is clearly COD which I may have got with the R from EQUATOR.
Thanks Jeremy.
40ish. I’m with Jeremy, this had a strange feel to it but I wonder if that was the result of trying too hard pangram-wise. Biffed many and would not have got the parsing of EMPATHY, TWERP and QUATORZE in a thousand years. I’m thinking of a Dan Hicks song from a while ago, My Old-Thymy Baby…
From Black Diamond Bay:
And as the yellow fog is lifting
The Greek is quickly heading for the second floor
She passes him on the spiral staircase
Thinking he’s the Soviet Ambassador
She starts to speak, but he walks away
As the storm clouds rise and the palm branches SWAY
On Black Diamond Bay
Quite enjoyed this, I managed to maintain my long-standing record of failing to notice the pangram..
I did think “THYMY” was a bit odd..
You don’t remember the song, Thymy kangaroo down, sport?
One hour exactly, right at my limit of time available so I left it with 6 clues not fully parsed, one of which turned out to be a wrong answer. I was sure of the other 5 but 16ac had me baffled and I knew my last ditch throw of the dice, BAPS, was very dodgy. It was based on no more than BAP being a type of bun sometimes associated with hamburgers and a hope that BAP might be variation on ‘bop’ as a word meaning hit or box. I had considered Hamburgers’ perhaps being an indicator for a German word but since I’d never have thought of ‘rather’ meaning ‘yes’ in English I wasn’t going to get anywhere with that idea.
I had no problem thinking of COWGIRL at 9ac but the parsing was beyond me. I note that the dictionaries are unanimous that RIG for ‘truck’ is North American. The transport I’d associate it with on this side of the pond would be nautical.
THYMY is a ridiculous word even if it is in the books.
Over an hour, but ditto.
Odd puzzle indeed, had three wrong, not parsed. No idea re JABS and didn’t get GALAXY. Didn’t check my answer of ‘thyme’ either.
Thanks jeremy and setter.
Snap!
Transitioning to retirement, I no longer work Tuesdays and Fridays, now have the time for a full-on effort to do my solving on those days. Found this one quite enjoyable after initially thinking it was far too difficult …but slipped into my old impatient ways for LOI 16a and entered BAPS, knowing it was wrong…
…it’s not just my solving chops that need a refresh – it’s the discipline too. 44:04, thanks PJ and setter
A triple pangram. I didn’t notice while doing it, but hats off to the setter. That is truly amazing.
47 minutes but with JABS still missing. RATHER hasn’t meant YES to this Englishman since reading Jennings in the fifties and TRUCK has never meant RIG. I didn’t know the French student either so ELEVATE was a biff, but I did get QUATORZE courtesy of the Sun King. COD to JACUZZI, not that I fancy having a bath in one. A quirky puzzle. Thank you Jeremy and setter.
So, turns out CATTCRUE is not a score in Piquet. I must learn that game.
As our blogger has said, a very odd puzzle. I too wasn’t keen on JA for rather and put in THYME simply because I didn’t believe THYMY was a word. A bit of an Uxbridge invention, at best. But there were some very good bits as well. I wasn’t sure if QUATORZE was just a reference to French because Piquet is a French name (Nelson notwithstanding) as I’ve never played the game. My Piquet handle was simply a homophone for my initials when I was at the IOM companies registry setting up a consultancy business (in the eighties) and they turned down all the names on my prospect list. And Nelson Piquet was a hero at the time.
Does anyone recall having seen a triple pangram before?
There’s a link in the TfTT Glossary (under Pangram) to a Triple that appeared as a Club Monthly in May 2016. Also to a Quintuple, but that was in The Independent.
Thank you
I will add this one to the entry ..
I’m biased because I managed to solve this (helped by spotting early that it might be a pangram, then realising towards the end that it was going to be a triple pangram), but I thought this was an absolutely wonderful puzzle.
– Didn’t know rig=truck so wasn’t completely sure about COWGIRL
– Couldn’t parse INCREASES
– Didn’t figure out the ‘twer’ part of TWERP
– Had to trust that élève is a French student to get ELEVATE
– Biffed EXERCISER once I had enough checkers
– Misparsed SUPERSEDE as I thought ‘crack’ was the definition with ‘set aside’ as the anagrind
– Hadn’t heard of Piquet as a game so assumed 17d was just pointing towards the answer being the French word for fourteen. French isn’t one of my languages but I luckily I remember QUATORZE
A hugely enjoyable solve. Thanks Jeremy and bravo setter!
FOI Zilch
LOI Jabs
COD Apricot
I’m going to say it: this is a tour de force of setter’s art, a full-on triple pangram with none of the entries particularly weird, though since I don’t know the scoring in piquet (and because it was capital P Piquet) I assumed it was just a French reference. The German “rather” I twigged because it was my last in and I needed the third J.
In addition, the actual clues were uniformly top class, each making perfect sense if read without your parsing specs on, none of them a crossword veteran’s giveaway.
Happy to complete in a little over 30 minutes.
Enjoyed that – thanks setter.
Also enjoying the names of the people at the top of the leaderboard:
“That’s T in the corner” took 40 seconds, which is impressive typing speed
“Look ma, I’m on C-t-C” obviously thinks the site has greater status than is the case
I, on the other hand, really wish the Times would put something in place to stop people brazenly cheating the leaderboard system. It’s simply pathetic attention-seeking.
First time I’ve ever beaten 20 minutes on a Friday, 19.16. I must have been on the wavelength today, from seeing JACKKNIFE straight away through some delightful clues (INTEGRATIVE, QUATORZE, THYMY…the list goes on) until finishing on JABS. Thank you Jeremy and congratulations to the setter.
2 errors after 49 mins with SUPERCEDE (did not spot it was an anagram) and a totally guesssed BAPS. That clueing for JA is about as nasty as it gets.
NHO Barbican Tower so TWERP was LOI, last correct one anyway.
Enjoyable puzzle on the whole, interestingly different. Steady if slow progress and nice penny-drop moments. Thanks both.
One hour, but a DNF as, like Jack I bunged in BAPS in desperation. POI QUATORZE as I could only see Nelson Piquet and I was getting annoyed as I knew he is Brazilian! Never heard of the card game, of course.
Yes, congrats to the setter for the triple pangram which, for once, I saw early. BUT… I got very weary of the amount of inclusion clues. I counted 12, which included (‘scuse the pun) open, in, occupied, checks, drinks, nurses,ringing,boxing, bringing in, wearing, parts, and sandwiches. Phew.
Thanks pj for the blog.
Well I was delighted to finish it, because this was indeed a weird one. Nothing about it felt ‘standard’, and I found myself having to abandon my usual assumptions and genuinely think differently to see what the setter was getting at. Very much enjoyed it, though it was a challenge.
DNF
Thanks, pj.
I too had that weird sensation. There was a mad pangram season 5 years approx ago, with two 3x and a 4x appearing in the Indy, FT and Indy again, IIRC. Funnily enough I think the 4x was the least egregious of the three, as the fill included no particularly odd words. They all loved a slice of jazz at the Pizza Express, nonetheless. With Xerxes.
Anyway, impressive muscle-flexing from the setter, and thanks PJ.
DNF. Completely lost most of the time. Took an age.
16a Jabs. No idea, not solved. WTF?
24a Twerp. Missed that, but should have got it. I think of a barbican as a gate but I guess it is a tower as well.
28a Thymy, bunged in Thyme not having read the clue properly. Eventually had to go back to read the clue. Surprised to find it and thymey and thymier and thymiest in Cheating Machine; didn’t think they were words.
12d Lucrative biffed, not a clue how it worked. Note to self, add capital=UC.
17d Quatorze. Looked up piquet to find that fourteen is in Portugese or something. Cat??? Oars???? WTF?
18d Subject. I too was fixated on Sable.
27d Cos. Missed the second def so was rather foxed by the clue, but then I was foxed by nearly all of them so thought nothing about it.
Many thanks plusjeremy for slogging through all of that.
Congrats to the setter for a comprehensive victory and the triple pangram which of course I totally missed.
All but 16a in 25m but just could not see what was going on with that one. I thought I was past the curse of the four-letter words. Depleted for emptied shouldn’t have been a problem but…
Congratulations to the setter for the triple. If I had spotted it that missing J would have been useful!
22:34, and enjoyed it, especially once I realised I was probably going to be looking for some odd letters / combinations. A tour de force, anyway, and to my mind, mostly unforced (apart from THYMY, which really isn’t a word in my head, even if the dictionary insists otherwise).
Thankfully, got JACKKNIFE and JACUZZI immediately which put the idea of a double pangram straight into my mind. I think this was a huge help as I found it slightly below par difficulty for Friday.
It certainly helped with QUATORZE. I was a bit unsure what the ‘points’ was doing in that clue thinking Piquet was a Frenchman which led to some post solve reading on the previously NHO card game.
Some hold ups with needlessly going through my mental list of old presidents and far too slow to spot my LOI LUCRATIVELY despite realising the word play and knowing I needed a V. I really must brush up on my printing terms.
A late change from BAPS to JABS when the correct type of Hamburger clicked (again helped by realising a triple pangram was coming).
Fingers crossed that THYMY was a word but I wasn’t coming up with anything better.
COD: FORCEPS
Agree with others this seemed a little odd but don’t think I’ve ever done a double let alone a triple that didn’t.
And pleased to report a full week of completions with not so much as a typo. I’m feeling that next week will be mean.
Thanks blogger and setter
1h:05 – never spotted the pangram(s) but I never do and was glad to crawl away relatively unharmed after a long wrestle with almost every clue.
Unlike Jeremy I was very slow to get started and feared we were in for one like that incredible one a few Fridays ago, but no, a SNITCH of 140 now seems easy enough. Much the same problems as have been mentioned — THYMY seems a crazy word and of course I entered thyme without understanding, as I did BAPS at first. The clue for that was one of the toughest I’ve ever seen. Truck = rig indeed. And not following F1 I assumed Nelson Piquet was French and couldn’t account for ‘points’. Surely not a rugby player. I took over an hour and eventually looked up JABS. And is BRIC-A-BRAC antiques? (Probably yes according to the dictionaries, but I’d have equated bric-a-brac to tat, not quite antiques.)
I seem to remember a (possibly apocryphal) shop whose sign read “WE BUY JUNK AND SELL ANTIQUES”, so I feel it’s in the eye of the beholder 🙂
DNF. Try as I might, I couldn’t manage JABS. THYMY put me in mind of Rolf Harris and that Australian delicacy, thymy kangaroo.
Like it!
11:32, but I can’t spell SUPERSEDE. I didn’t notice the pangram (never do) but this did feel a bit quirky. Another MER at THYMY. LOI JABS, which reminded me of Bertie Wooster.
I remember SUPERSEDE as being spelt the way that always looks wrong to me.
I checked in Chambers and the etymology is from super (above) and sedere, to sit, as in ‘sedentary’. So something that supersedes ‘sits above’. That makes little sense but perhaps it will help me to remember!
46:25
I found this quite hardgoing towards the end. Didn’t notice the triple pangram either. The only things I didn’t know were: the French for student, nor what a barbican is – had in mind it was something to do with castles. QUATORZE guessed as it’s French for 14 and I was aware of the game, though have not played – that gave me the final checker required for another guess TWERP. LOI was the unlikely THYMY for which I needed all checkers.
Thanks PJ and setter
A fail after almost 40 minutes. Couldn’t get JABS and put in a despairing MACS as I coudn’t parse BAPS either. Wouldn’t have mattered if I had got it as I had a typo at 6d anyway; SQUEAK. Managed QUATORZE although I had no knowledge of the game, but it does come after onze, douze, treize, and sounds like Cat Oars. Totally missed the pangram as usual. Thanks setter and Jeremy.
Come to think about it, quatorze said in French doesn’t sound anything like “cat oars” unless you’re in East London, of course!.
Interesting- I would have thought quatorze in French was pronounced like English “cat oars”?
Strange, to our English ears it sounds pretty close!
Quite a few biffable clues I thought. I didn’t need to look too hard at lucrative or elevate, which may be just as well.
I thought empathy was a bit chewy, but thoroughly enjoyed the puzzle nonetheless and all hail the triple pangram.
Wondered about thymy, But then thought lemony, peppery, salty all okay, so why not?
No problem with using rather in place of yes, we Scousers do it all the time!
Having failed on the QC, I refused to give up on this one, and finally crossed the line in 55:31. I spotted the triple pangram, and made use of it on my LOI JABS, where I spotted we were a J short, and only then realised that rather could mean yes.
Thanks Jeremy and setter
36.43 DNF
A horrible QUATCRUE. Thought I was looking for a strange name for a score at the game rather than the obvious answer.
Quite understand the MER at THYMY but I rather liked the nonsense of it (and presumably that third y was needed).
Noticed it was a pangram but it needed a triple for me to do so. Bravo Setter and thanks Jeremy.
28:16. Seemed to be on the wavelength early on, unusually for me, with FOI JACKKNIFE. JABS also came to me fairly quickly, with LOI INCREASES which I don’t think I really parsed correctly. Lovely stuff.
Fiendish! Certainly took me well over an hour. BUT all parsed. LOI jabs. The pangram thing completely passed me by!
DNF. Despite getting JACKKNIFE and JACUZZI at an early stage I only realised we were dealing with a pangram when I had about three clues left to solve. And if I had bothered to count to three I would perhaps have revisited BAPS at 16ac to see if I could force in a third J. No definite time as I had a rest in the middle to listen to some Schubert, but it must have taken me over an hour. But I enjoyed it and decided to stick it out.
COD – FORCEPS
Thanks to jeremy and other contributors.
77 mins. Pleased with that as it felt like a tough one. I mean, THYMY?
46:16
Not for me but an impressive feat of setting. . Almost gave up when I guessed it must be THYMY.
Thanks to Jeremy and the setter.
Exactly an hour (plus a few minutes to proofread for safety’s sake). Indeed a strange puzzle, but I agree with all of the nice things said about it above. The clues are good and cleverly misleading (and in fact a brief break to watch the news helped in rearranging the unsolved ones a bit in my mind to let me understand them better when I came back). And, very important for my appreciation of their elegance, the surface readings all made sense. I also cannot spell SUPERSEDE, but the anagrist had two S’s and no C, so I didn’t fall into that trap. COD to JABS, once I understood which Hamburgers the clue was talking about. Of course I didn’t notice the triple pangram — I don’t even notice single ones — but how superb!
I was watching a cricket match while doing this puzzle (Notts vs Essex at Trent Bridge since you ask) so my time of 38 mins was unreliable. I only notice the pangram with about 2 answers to go, so it didn’t help. QUATORZE was a bit cheeky though I suppose it helped with the pangram. Nice puzzle.
78:48. fantastic puzzle, nearly gave up but glad I didn’t!
Was doing well until -A-S. Could have been anything, late in the evening so I cheated and came here.
Really enjoyed this. Surprised myself in almost successfully finishing it. Realised early doors that it was panagramatic but forgot by the time I got to JABS so lost on points. Vague memories of esoteric card games helped with the cat oars as I didn’t really get the homophonic help with the eight.
Sincere thanks to setter and Jeremy.