Times Jumbo 1301

Author   PenfoldPosted on Categories Jumbo Cryptic

I spent over an hour wrestling with this puzzle that appeared during Twixtmas, so I guess it gave me something to do.  My time suggests it was on the trickier side of average and it was nicely put together with a couple of “new” words to file away for future use and forget.

First in was the seasonal STOLLEN, last was CAXTON.

Although I’ve been sent details of the script that should enable me to turn out a shiny blog with all the clues reproduced and that, the instructions don’t include how to do it in Safari and I’m not brave enough to fly solo.  Which means that I won’t explain all the clues so if one of my omissions was your undoing let me know.


Across

1
CARBON FIBRE – Neat construction here, with two B[ook]s tossed into CAR ON FIRE.  As I don’t go fishing, golfing or kayaking I don’t think I own anything made of the stuff.

7
GYTTJA – Thankfully straightforward wordplay (initial letters) for “a deposit full of nutrients that is found at the bottom of a body of water”.  I only knew it as the Chas and Dave song.

13
A FEW – Hidden in cybercAFE Widescreen.  This should have been my first in but I read the enumeration as 13 rather than 1,3 and didn’t look at the light.

14
AMATEUR – AM ATE UR.  Ugh.  Txt spk.

15
PRELUDE – P.R. ELUDE

16
STOLLEN – L[arge] in STOLEN

17 
SWANEE WHISTLE – (what else is new)* for the instrument well known to fans of ISIHAC

18
IN-PATIENT – IN the I in PATENT.  “Overnight case” was the definition, woven seamlessly into the surface reading, coming, as it did, immediately after “pack”.

19
STORM – iSiTsOgRiM

21
LAMPOONIST – (main plot so)*

23 
SIXAIN – N[ote] I AXIS reversed.  It’s a stanza or peom with, wait for it, six lines.  Knowing this came in handy when in cropped up again in the daily cryptic on 11 Jan.

25
TAIL LAMP – TAMP (pack, as in tobacco into a pipe) around A ILL

26
PENNY FOR THE GUY – PENNY FORT HE GUY.  This must have been a complete mystery for anyone under about 30 or from overseas.  Years ago, before trick or effing treat invaded our shores and toddlers could buy fireworks and light fires in the street, British children would make effigies of Guy Fawkes by stuffing screwed up newspaper into Mum & Dad’s old clothes, add a balloon head with a bought mask, and sit with said effigy on the street begging for money to buy fireworks and sweets.  “Penny for the guy” was the hopeful shout to passers by, or was scrawled onto a scrap of cardboard.  Happy days.

29
UPSKILL – UPS KILL

30
AIRSTREAM – Ooh, an instance of “flower” not defining a river or bloomer.  AIRS (pu)T RE A.M.

31
CELEB – ELEC{t} reversed then B[atchelor]

32
IN FUN – I then NUN around F[orte]

34
VIEWPOINT – (townvip)* around I.E.

37
SOPRANI – SOP, then RAN I (was Editor of The I newspaper)

39
GOLDEN LABRADOR – GOLDEN LAB then R[ight] R[everend] around A DO

41
INFOTECH – (ofethnic)*

43
SKIVVY– V (five) Y[ears] after SKIV{e}

44
STEEL PLATE – TEE L.P. in SLATE

45
STIFF – DD that made me smile

48
LEGISLATE – LEG (on as in cricket side) then IS (ones) LATE

49
BIRD OF PASSAGE – BIRD OF PA’S (girlfriend dad has) then SAGE

52
EQUATOR – (twic)E QUA TOR.  Is the high/tor equivalence a bit, er, rocky?

53
REOCCUR – (core ruc)*

54
NERO – Homophone for KNEE RHO.  Does anyone actually pronounce NERO like that?  I’m more of a NEAR OH man myself but as a non-classicist maybe I’ve been saying it wrong all these years, not that I’ve had to say it a lot mind.

55
UNCLAD – UNCL{e} AD

56
SIDESTEPPED – SIDE STEPPE D[aughters]


Down

1
CHASSIS – HAS SIS(ster) after C(limbing), nice bit of lift & separate (climbing frame) to hide the def.

2
REAGANOMICS – (song america)*.  Money’s Too Tight To Mention earworm anyone?

3
OXEYE – X and Y (axes on a graph) slotted regularly into O{p}E{n}E{d}

4
FAREWELL MY LOVELY – straightforward charade for one of the brilliant Philip Marlowe crime novels by Raymond Chandler. “It was a blonde. A blonde to make a bishop kick a hole in a stained-glass window.”

5
BAPTISMS – I can’t account for one of the esses here.  The clue reads: “They use fonts, fitting one into second-rate text”.  I make that APT I in B (second rate) MS (manuscript = text).  BAPTIMS.  Anyone care to put me right?

6
ELECTIONEER – E[uropean] + I[sland] ONE in LECTER (Hannibal the cannibal, not the elephants over the Alps geezer).

7
GAUZE – GAZE around U(rsula).  One of those nasty words like gauge and seize that you have to write down several times with the vowels both ways round before you’re reasonably happy that you’ve probably got it right.

8
THE KISS OF DEATH – It took me a while to get my head round this CD, but I think the idea is that if you’re given the kiss of death (e.g. Kevin Keegan saying that only one team is going to win the match now) then you “blow it” as in mess things up.

9
JOSEPH – JOSH around P.E. reversed

11
FALLEN ANGEL  – F[ollowing] ALL EN (French for in) GEL

12
WINSTON – WIN ST[reet] ON.  Defining him (Winston Smith) as “fan of Big Brother finally” is a bit of a spoiler alert if you haven’t finished the book.

13
FORTYISH – Anagram of SHIRT OF Y[ankee] with “XL, it would appear” the imaginative and well-disguised definition

20
MULLION – MUL{e} (donkey/horse cross breed) + LION (as in international RU side the British & Irish Lions)

22
NONET – If there’s only gross then there’s NO NET, perhaps

24
PRIMUS INTER PARES – My lack of the necessary education meant I had to guess this from the wordplay which is a fairly straightforward job of bolting together other meanings of PRIMUS INTER and PARES 

28
SAVED BY THE BELL – Boxing CD disguised as a parcel delivery

31
COPIOUS – I.O.U. in COPS

33
FOLDING DOOR – Origami-based CD which doesn’t really work for me.

35
PLANE – sounds like plain (not cryptic)

36
IRON PYRITES – P[iano] in IRONY + RITES

38
AMERICAS CUP – (campus race i)* 

40
ENVISAGE – ENVIE{d} around SAG

42
FAVOURED – (dove fur a)*

43
SPLIT ON – LIT ON after SP (presumably as in starting price but I can’t see the direct equivalence with betting).  The definition is SHOP as in to grass up.

46
FUEL ROD – Homophone for few’ll + ROD

49
BOUND – Triple def with the “march” part, I think, equating to boundary.

50
SWORE – S[on] WORE

 

12 comments on “Times Jumbo 1301”

  1. I think it’s SMS that is being used here. Thanks for the excellent blog on what I found was quite a tough puzzle with some very good clues.
  3. Collins has HIGH as a high place or level with TOR as as a high hill so I think they are equivalent though high much better known as adjective of course.
  4. I seem to remember quite enjoying this, bar 7a which had me baffled and I had to look it up. What a strange word! I was quite pleased my schoolboy latin was good enough to get PRIMUS INTER PARES. BIRD OF PASSAGE my favourite.
  5. Also got PENNY FOR THE GUY despite being a Kenyan .This and 1302 were very tough.
    Ong’ara,
    Nairobi.
  6. 51:28. Quite hard. Even with the very clear wordplay and checkers it was quite hard to believe that GYTTJA could possibly be a word.
    I haven’t been to a bonfire night for years: my kids just aren’t interested, whereas Halloween is a big deal.
  7. This one was quite tricky and had some excellent clues with nice surfaces – enjoyed the smooth anagram in SWANEE WHISTLE (a classic Carry On film sound) in particular. Can’t say I’d ever heard of a GOLDEN LABRADOR, and neither have any of the usual sources, but it didn’t seem unreasonable at the time.

    I don’t know what instructions you were sent for creating a blog that includes the clues, but I’ve updated my original post on that subject to include some Safari comments: https://mohn2.livejournal.com/2201.html If you decide to have a go at using it and you run into any problems, just send me an e-mail or LJ message. I don’t generally use Safari but the method worked on the version on my iMac (9.0.2), however I see that that’s a couple of years old now.

  8. I do not understand this – in particular the “ATE”.
    The clue is:
    Yours truly is worried you are not getting paid (7)

    I finally understand this. The “worried” = ATE is NOT txt spk.

    Edited at 2018-03-16 06:13 pm (UTC)

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