66:52. At 41 minutes I texted vinyl, “Three left.” At 64 minutes I texted him, “Two left.” I’m good at getting stuck at the end of puzzles.
I confess this was not my favorite puzzle. The clues that were hard were mainly hard because of words I’d never heard of, and so I doubted myself. The rest were rather straightforward, I felt.
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | Cameron is bonkers taking on international federation (10) |
| MICRONESIA – anagram of CAMERON IS around I
Straightforward anagram. |
|
| 7 | Initially panicky at security, holding thing for someone else (4) |
| PASH – first letters of PANICKY AT SECURITY HOLDING
The only question here is whether PASH is a word, and it is. |
|
| 9 | Is jog in onset of high winds blustery? (8) |
| JINGOISH – anagram (winds) of IS JOG IN + H{igh}
Another straightforward anagram. |
|
| 10 | Sibling’s issue when PE goes awry (6) |
| NEPHEW – anagram of WHEN PE
Etc. |
|
| 11 | Scene of miraculous delivery and end of openers’ stand (6) |
| STABLE – {opener}S + TABLE | |
| 13 | Totally preoccupied with scrap upset stewardesses’ boss has (8) |
| OBSESSED – hidden reversed (scrap upset … has) in STEWARDESSES BOSS | |
| 14 | Rowdy spree with leader delayed after policeman finally finished striking individual (5-7) |
| BOBBY-DAZZLER – RAZZLE (rowdy spree) with R moved to the end, after BOBBY + {finishe}D
After the previous six straightforward clues, here we have the difficulty of the puzzle in a nutshell. Okay, BOBBY is easy enough, but if you haven’t heard of the answer and you don’t know of RAZZLE as a rowdy spree, this is just a slog. |
|
| 17 | Virgin queen lacks extremes of all-day cavorting (7-5) |
| SQUEAKY-CLEAN – anagram of QUEEN LACKS A{ll-da}Y
Back to anagrams. |
|
| 20 | Little protects tragic little girl actress (8) |
| MINNELLI – MINI around NELL
When I saw ‘tragic little girl’ I thought… MIGNON? Never heard of Nell Trent. |
|
| 21 | Cleaner’s rent changing hands (6) |
| BLEACH – BREACH with R changed to L
How does ‘rent’ = BREACH? I guess I’m used to thinking of ‘rent’ as the past (participle) of ‘rend’, but apparently it can also be a fissure. I’ve never heard it used this way in American English. |
|
| 22 | Tax collector no longer charges double for drink (6) |
| SPIRIT – IR (tax collector no longer) in SPIT (double)
This was one of my last two in. It is safe to say I worked on this clue for the better part of 20 minutes. I was pretty sure I understood the wordplay, but I was only sort of sure about IR (we have IRS here, and this has come up before), but I couldn’t think of a synonym of ‘double’ for the life of me. I tried DUET, leading to DUIRET, but that didn’t look like anything. Finally I saw SPIRIT, and worked my way back to SPIT. Okay, well I know ‘spitting image’, so I guess this is a related usage. |
|
| 23 | Fielding man’s instructed to go back, covering spell with early duck (3,5) |
| TOM JONES – SENT (instructed) reversed around MOJO (spell) with one O (duck) moved earlier
SENT = ‘instructed’, I suppose? In any case, fortunately I’d heard of the character in question. |
|
| 25 | Where consumers may be served / pickle (4) |
| MESS – double definition | |
| 26 | Skins of dry hands, not his ultimately (10) |
| PARCHMENTS – PARCH (dry) MEN (hands) + last letters of NOT HIS
This was my third-to-last in. I feel embarrassed to have not seen it sooner. PARCH means ‘to make dry’, and obviously ‘dry’ means ‘to make dry’, but somehow I don’t think of these meanings as synonymous. I think of PARCH as ‘to dry out’, whereas ‘dry’ means ‘to un-wet something’. Am I crazy? Perhaps. |
|
| Down | |
|---|---|
| 2 | Union agreement to limit current oxygen consumption by screening apparatus (5,3) |
| IDIOT BOX – I DO (union agreement) around I + O + TB (consumption) | |
| 3 | Having no end of superego, or ego, driving identity (3) |
| REG – OR EGO with all occurrences of the last letter of SUPEREGO removed
This is probably a driver’s license (licence) of some sort? |
|
| 4 | What one with hooter outside might make (5) |
| NOISE – I in NOSE (hooter) | |
| 5 | Meet online about supporting school gossip (7) |
| SCHMOOZ – ZOOM (meet online) reversed under SCH
Surprisingly, it took me a long time to think of ZOOM! It’s a part of our lives now, but I still don’t really think of it as such. |
|
| 6 | Band together to trail crows — not very fair game! (4,5) |
| AUNT SALLY – ALLY after {v}AUNTS (crows)
Haven’t heard of this, but it took me quite some time to think of VAUNTS. |
|
| 7 | Defeat? Odds of it’s at about 50-50, then Zimbabwe’s tail bat (11) |
| PIPISTRELLE – PIP (defeat) + odd-numbered letters of IT’S AT + RE + L L (50-50) + {zimbabw}E
Here was an annoying one. If you didn’t know the word, there’s a lot of ways the end of the wordplay could be interpreted. |
|
| 8 | Run through small garden here, starkers (6) |
| SKEWER – S + KEW (garden) + {h}ER{e} | |
| 12 | Windsor, for example, commonly incarcerates marines scattering people’s litter? (5,2,4) |
| BABES IN ARMS – BABS (Windsor, for example, commonly) around anagram of MARINES
Read about Babs here. |
|
| 15 | It’s one way to finish Twin Peaks (6,3) |
| DOUBLE TOP – TOP = peak, DOUBLE TOP = twin peaks
This is double 20 on a dartboard. |
|
| 16 | Most cunning bears beginning to want reserves (3,5) |
| WAR CHEST – ARCHEST under W{ant} | |
| 18 | Hurricane expert, possibly advanced by dint of overturning bunkum (7) |
| AVIATOR – A + VIA + ROT reversed | |
| 19 | Fruit pastry he’s adorned with flowers? (6) |
| HIPPIE – HIP (fruit) PIE (pastry)
My last in. |
|
| 21 | Hard to follow profile of one expecting papers (5) |
| BUMPH – BUMP (profile of one expecting) + H | |
| 24 | Depression following husband’s departure to make whoopee in Ibiza (3) |
| OLE – {h}OLE
Probably my favorite clue of the puzzle. |
|
DNF due to guessed FIGPIE for HIPPIE. Much like Jeremy, all but 3 in at 20′ (good start) and then 20′ more to get 3 with one wrong (bad finish). I agree that this felt like the vocab was what made it hard.
TOM JONES was one of the three holdouts, which should have come quicker as I knew it would be something novel-protagonist-related, but SENT was too far from ‘instructed’ to bring to mind, as you imply. I would have thought ‘BUMF’ and ‘SCHMOOZE’ are the more common spellings.
agree about SCHMOOZE, but I guess we have to lump it. BUMPH sounds more right to me than BUMF, though. Maybe because we have things like OOMPH and GALUMPH?
Interesting, yeah. I’ll hold my hands up on BUMF and say that a small sample size of actually encountered examples should not have led me to dismiss the other spelling.
Bumf is short for “bum fodder”, isn’t it?
Sent is “instructed to go” back(wards).
Fridays are fast becoming a no-go area.
We were not amused Sawbill.
14 minutes – steady progress with some time at the end to work out the Fielding character, who I’m sure I’ve heard of, but not sufficiently to come to mind. I’d have got the singer quicker – and I even wondered for a while if we were looking for one of Bridget Jones’ beaus (written by Helen Fielding!). Quite pleased with myself for getting the parse for it (initially via a dodgy ‘set’ for ‘instructed’), as it was the only way I was going to finish.
It’s almost a pangram, but no F.
Thanks both.
With three clues to go, I was determined to get an F in there somehow… “At last, noticing that it’s a pangram will be a help to me,” I thought … hmff!
There’s no F in pangram!
😀
Got there in the end but with several clues where I did not understand the wordplay. My LOI was SPIRIT, partially because I don’t remember what the UK tax collector was called. HIPPIE, which is obvious once you see it, took way to long as my previous answer. Great clue.
Our esteemed blogger illustrates the difficulty sometimes of doing a foreign crossword! I didn’t find it too hard, but it is idiosyncratic in places.
A pash is rather a Boys-own-paper sort of word, but I’ve seen it somewhere else recently, which helped.
No problems with Little Nell*, or with Tom Jones, or Barbara Windsor, or the bobby-dazzler, all quintessentially English. A reg. is just a number plate.
Didn’t realise there were two Ns in Minnelli, or you could spell SCHMOOZ without the E.
*As Oscar Wilde said: “One must have a heart of stone to read the death of little Nell without laughing.”
Happy to have finished in 48:51 on what seems to have been a tricky puzzle for many. I particularly liked HIPPIE and BUMPH.
REG is a common British shortening for a car’s Registration Number, i.e. the number on the numberplate which I think our friends on the other side of the pond refer to as a license plate.
65 minutes with one use of aids midway because I needed a kick-start to get me going again. That was for SCHMOOZ which I really should have thought of as I already had the first three letters.
I also NHO Nell Trent, but I knew Little Nell.
I left far too many clues not fully parsed but I was focused on finishing and glad to put this puzzle behind me.
Although I saw the answer right away, I’m not entirely convinced by the plural ‘peaks’ clueing the singular TOP. Thoughts, anyone?
I think the idea is you read “twin peaks” as a phrase to give DOUBLE TOP, rather than “twin” = DOUBLE then “peaks” = TOP.
I rather enjoyed this, even if it took me 50 minutes. SCHMOOZ was clever.
30 mins. Much easier than yesterday. Found myself twigging the setters meaning first time mostly rather than everything but as often happens.
LOI HIPPIE which I would spell with a Y.
A real Bobby Dazzler of a puzzle. I enjoy watching the Pipistrelles on a summer evening but COD to TOM JONES for being not cricket.
Thanks and sympathy to Jeremy and more of this setter please.
PS isn’t Sent = “Instructed to go”?
Cor blimey, what a trial, 95 mins. I very nearly gave up at one point, then, like Jack, I looked up the a NHO PIPISTRELLE which helped clean up the NE. Like others, my last 2 in were also SPIRIT & HIPPIE.
No idea about TOM JONES which I finally parsed long after I’d bunged it in. Green, green grass of home, anyone? Oh, not that one then.
Sawbill’s comment may soon ring true for me too!
Thanks pj for the blog.
Old Tom Jones joke:
Doctor, I can’t stop singing ‘The Green Green Grass of Home’
Doctor: Ot seems you’ve got Tom Jones sydrome.
Oh, it’s quite common then?
Well, it’s not unusual.
😂
48:01 finishing with HIPPIE. Lots of clever clues that had me scratching my head a lot. I finished the top half first, but slower in the bottom where I thought until the L came from DOUBLE TOP we were looking for orphan ANNIE in 20A. Great stuff. Thanks Jeremy and setter.
Retired hurt
20:24. Not really my kind of puzzle, this. The solving process consisted mostly of identifying a word that would fit the checking letters, spotting something akin to a definition (or not – blustery? Skins?) and then reverse engineering the often over-elaborate wordplay. More ‘oh right I suppose so’ than ‘eureka!’
I had DOUBLE TAP initially, which fits the definition. Fortunately I reconsidered it.
35 mins.
Solved this steadily and was surprised to see the snitch so high.
Thanks, pj.
38.31 in two spells, the first working under time pressure because I had an appointment struggling to get much over 3o+minutes. Returning, no pressure, rattled in the remaining half in about 5 minutes. Not sure that’s because the answers were marinading, though for most of them I was nowhere near in that stodgy first spell.
Surprised by SWCHMOOZ with no E, and Liza with a Zee having two Ns. The STABLE was a late entry because I was trying to think of miracle sites – there were several involving deliveries, including cricket grounds with fiendish spinners – but didn’t think, even at this time of year, of The Big One. Anyway, it wasn’t a stable….
Marinading – not a usage I’ve seen here before, but good to have a word for that mysterious process. I need marination to get TOM JONES, HIPPIE and SPIRIT.
47 minutes. A fair bit of parsing after the fact and for TOM JONES, which I read a long time ago, biffing without ever properly parsing. I had trouble with HIPPIE as my LOI as well as SPIRIT and MESS earlier. REG was easily gettable even though in this part of the world it’s known as REGO.
Gave up on the hour with the SPIRIT/HIPPIE crosser missing. But pleased to have done as well as I did. As blogger says, lots of this was quite easy but with some very tough ones thrown in. Knowing the PIPISTRELLE bat and seeing the Fielding trick early on hugely helped. I always hate unusual, dictionary-only spellings of common words, but at least SCHMOOZ couldn’t be anything else once BOBBY-DAZZLER was in. Liked BABES IN ARMS.
Well SCHMOOZ was a complete mystery since I’ve never heard of it, although it was obviously something to do with schmoozing and some weird spelling, so I looked it up. Much here that was very difficult, took me ages, 87 minutes.
Unlike Jeremy, I was the overseas solver who had nearly all the UK knowledge – reg, bobby-dazzler, pash. It was pipistrelle that I had never heard of, but the wordplay is pretty clear. I saw Fielding man, and 3,5, and wrote in Tom Jones without reading the rest of the clue – that was easy. My big problem was having tumid for 21 down – tum + ID, it does work. I wonder if the setter had thought of it?
Time: 82:12
When does a challenge become an ordeal ? Today, I would suggest. I don’t recognise SChMOOZ as meaning gossip, rather to flatter or manipulate someone and BOBBY DAZZLER is so archaic I doubt whether my grandfather would have used it.
I thought that but the first definition in Collins is ‘to chat or gossip’, so we’ll have to blame them.
I won’t post my time. A personal worst almost undoubtedly but completed without any aids. I think a mixture of not being on form and very hard clues.
MICRONESIA was entered halfway through despite seeing immediately how the clue worked.
OBSESSED was the penultimate one in which when hiddens are doing that it’s a good hint that the difficulties are at my end. The SNITCH surprised me as well, I was sure this was going to be around the 200 mark.
Thankfully TOM JONES was the only Fielding protagonist I could bring to mind and after I convinced myself it wasn’t something cover for a cricketing position I BIFF’d it. That was some tough wordplay so that’s one of the few bright lights from this solve.
Liked SPIRIT and STABLE
Thanks blogger (I had to confirm a few of my workings but almost all parsed today) and setter.
This took such a toll on me I posted it to yesterday’s puzzle.
A bit of a struggle yet again. From NOISE to TOM JONES, which needed the teeniest bit of help, in just under five minutes less than an hour (trying to avoid the SNITCH picking up a false time here!). Sadly I’d fat fingered either OLS or PARCHMSNTS long before submitting, and was too browbeaten to do a proof read. I’d been blocked in the NW until I managed to assemble the unlikely SCHMOOZ, which I’ve never seen without the E. That was the key to a rapid fire, BOBBY DAZZLER, AUNT SALLY, MICRONESIA, REG and JINGOISH, which left me with only the aforementioned TOM JONES to finish. Thanks Jeremy.
Well clearly as I zipped through this in 25:20, I thought it a fantastic puzzle. I did make a very good tactical decision to pause the puzzle around the 20 minute mark with 80% done and take a 10 minute break. I’ve noticed with these tougher puzzles that my attention starts to wander around that time, fixating meanwhile on the same one or two (incorrect) synonyms or ways in to a clue. Certainly worked this time, with a few in the SE and the HIPPIE-SPIRIT pair all being seen afresh. I was also rather pleased with myself for knowing that a PIPISTRELLE is a fancy, possibly Italian word for a maestro’s baton (or something like that).
Btw, I’m just going to completely ignore the fact I lost track of all the S’s and confidently entered OBSESSES.
Spent a long and indeterminate time on this between breaks and was resolved to complete it. However the SW corner of HIPPIE and SPIRIT finally broke me for a DNF.
Thanks Jeremy and setter
63 minutes, although it felt quicker somehow. I had TORNADO which made getting MINNELLI hard even though I’d spotted the Little Nell ref. Loved the BUMP def in BUMPH and TOM JONES turning out not to be a cricketer for once! Lovely Friday stuff 🙂
I took a bit of time to get properly going with this, but I had all necessary GK and it was a steady solve after I did. I didn’t parse SPIRIT, although I think I’d have got there with a little more persistence. I found some of the cryptics convoluted, and there was a lot of getting the answers from the definitions and checking letters and then parsing afterwards. A little of that is fine, there can be a satisfying click when you see how the cryptic fits, but you can have too much of a goodish thing.
DNF after multiple goes, defeated by HIPPIE and TOM JONES (I thought Fielding might be referring to a particular author but didn’t know who or what it was, and keep forgetting spell=mojo).
– Can’t recall seeing JINGOISH before
– I’ve heard of BOBBY-DAZZLER, but wouldn’t have got near it without the Z checker
– Only vaguely knew of a tragic girl called Nell for MINNELLI
– Didn’t know IR as the old tax collectors for SPIRIT
– Had no idea how REG worked
– Like others, not familiar with that spelling (or meaning) of SCHMOOZ
– Was tempted to biff STREAK for 8d, and ended up glad that I didn’t
– More familiar with bumf, rather than BUMPH – I think because bumf is a shortening of ‘bum-fodder’ as in toilet paper
Thanks Jeremy and setter.
COD Micronesia
I very much enjoyed this, probably because I found it difficult but still managed to finish it correctly.
LOI’s were hippie and spirit, both of which I thought were very good.
COD to REG because in my simple way, I thought it’d rather clever.
Thanks to PJ and Setter
Some odd spellings here that have already been commented on but I’m surprised no one has mentioned ‘hippie’, which I would spell ‘hippy’. Too tricky in general for me today though.
Just couldn’t bring TOM JONES to mind in anything like a reasonable time. The rest had to be slotted painstakingly into place, some doubts persisting even after stumbling at length on the right answer. Never a good sign.
I’m curious where the “x” comes from in 2 down.
X is from BY: eg timber, 2 by 2 or 2 x 2, also 3 x 3 / 3 by 3 = 9.
Oops! That’s a hint perhaps to how deeply I thought about the clue when solving…
Got up early to watch cricket, so kept dropping off, so took hours to complete.
Put in TORNADO originally, but Fielding’s man had to be Tom Jones. Couldn’t parse spirit, could have put in claret, but eventually got HIPPIE, so spirit it had to be.
Tragic little girl was going to be either Little Nell or Little Emily ( the third member of this triumvirate, or trimulierate, Little Dorrit, didn’t register). Curiosity Shop is Dickens’ weakest novel imho.
Hard but not impossible, some nice clues.
43.36
I started this none too impressed with the sort of wordy clues that can be rather trying but ended up loving it, after the marvellous BOBBY DAZZLER appeared. Managed to work out SPIRIT and HIPPIE which were ace and knew the bat. LOI TOM JONES where I couldn’t understand how TOM BROWN didn’t fit. Not all parsed and I even missed the reverse hidden so very far from a smooth solve but as I say I liked.
Thanks setter and well done Jeremy.
70 minutes. I don’t think I’ve ever heard of an Idiot Box, nor Jingoish. Pretty tough puzzle.
Thanks for the blog, I gave up on this one long before the end.
Re: IDIOT BOX, the parsing doesn’t explain the “X”, after staring for a good while longer I’m assuming this is the (often missed by me) X = “by” as in 4×4 “four by four” ?
If 25A was FENS, then a pangram. Good puzzle all the same. In Australia we say REGO for registration of car number plate.
I don’t mean to be crude but for ages I had SAG after removing H from SHAG for 24D…
I had all of the GK, except for the bat.
I didn’t have many of the somewhat allusive synonyms, and that was before the setter’s intentional misdirection got me going in the wrong direction again and again.
54:57
Catching up following a couple of busy days. I enjoyed this puzzle, which was a little surprising as there was a fair bit I didn’t get whilst in flight:
PASH – seen it somewhere here recently, so was fresh in mind
BOBBY DAZZLER – from definition and checkers of the second word – saw BOBBY but didn’t work out the rest until completed
SQUEAKY CLEAN – once I’d put a Q in front of the U, the rest fell into place, but didn’t parse before coming here
SPIRIT – LOI – failed to parse
TOM JONES – the only thing I know of Henry Fielding’s. Good job Helen Fielding didn’t spring to mind first…
IDIOT BOX – got the I DO with an I in it, the rest was a bit convoluted
HIPPIE – spent a long time looking at this, before thinking, “What if PIE goes at the end?”
BABES IN ARMS – bunged in from checkers – forgotten about Babs and was thinking RM for ‘marines’
SCHMOOZ – bit of a stretch not including the E
PIPISTRELLE – got as far as PIP and wrote in the rest
SKEWER – nearly tempted by SWEDEN but just couldn’t justify the W
Thanks PJ and setter
62’42” but ruined it with a misprinted HIPPIE (HIIPIE). Up till that moment, I thought it was the perfect puzzle. A real toughie, but enough chewing and you got ’em. Many thanks. My last three were in the bottom left. I had DOUBLE DIP, which messed things up rather, until it occurred to me there might be another possibility – and what had DOUBLE DIP got to do with it anyway? But then CLARET wouldn’t leave me alone. Finally I recalled the Inland Revenue. Then HIPPIE, which I failed to enter correctly.