Phew what a scorcher, the temperature this weekend, not my time, which was a respectable 9:52. Stay cool, everyone.
Juji has a series of great surfaces which read like normal phrases.
Definitions are underlined in bold italics, {deletions in curly brackets}, [directions in square ones], anagrams like this (anagrist)*. The caret ^ shows an insertion point in containment clues. Hidden words are bold and underlined. Parentheses are used for synonyms.
Across
| 1 | Section of road unusable without first being fixed (3,4) |
| BUS LANE – ({U}NUSABLE )* [being fixed]
Tricky one for 1A, needing an operation on the anagrist first. And “unusable” looked like an anagram indicator as well. |
|
| 5 | Shape aluminium on old anvil’s centre (4) |
| OVAL – O (old) + {an}V{il} (anvil’s centre) + AL (aluminium)
We mathematicians go on about ellipses which are well defined, but there is no mathematical definition of an Oval. Shape of a cricket ground works for me. |
|
| 7 | In burrow, start to obtain shade (6) |
| INDIGO – IN (In) + DIG (burrow) + O{btain}
The only time I ever heard this colour is the “I” in rainbow. It was Newton who decided that there must be seven colours in a spectrun, one of his weird alchemy beliefs. Apparently our modern definition of “blue” and “indigo” has shifted. what Newton called “blue” was likely closer to what we call cyan or a light sky blue. Therefore, what he called “indigo” was actually just standard, deep navy blue. |
|
| 8 | Season some sauerkraut? Um, no! (6) |
| AUTUMN – Hidden in “sauerkraut um no” [some] | |
| 9 | App, number one in recruitment, draws in those learning trades (11) |
| APPRENTICES – APP (App) + R{ecruitment} (number one in) + ENTICES (draws in) | |
| 10 | Poet turned to actress (6) |
| BARDOT – BARD (Poet) + TO reversed [turned]
Brigitte Bardot of course. |
|
| 12 | Game chat (6) |
| RABBIT – double definition (Game / chat)
This is the slang “rabbit” for chatting, generally somewhat dismissive, as a teacher might stay to their pupils. And of course there isn’t a game called “rabbit”, it’s the other meaning of “game”, meat that is not farmed. I had it for the first time in Malta last month. Not a fan of hacking up another mammal on the plate. |
|
| 14 | African lion mauled American (11) |
| Nice surface and nice anagram.
CALIFORNIAN – (AFRICAN LION)* [mauled] |
|
| 17 | Provided backing, established a carnival (6) |
| FIESTA – IF (Provided) reversed [backing] + EST. (established) + A | |
| 18 | At home, kid told to eat (6) |
| INGEST – IN (At home) + GEST (homophone of ‘jest’ (kid)), with “told” the indicator | |
| 20 | Move around prison (4) |
| STIR – double definition
Comes up a lot in crosswords, but I think not actually in use so much these days. Like much crim argot it comes from Romany. As do nark, chav, shiv, cosh, barney and gaff. And of course “posh”. |
|
| 21 | Longed to have new editor after period of time (7) |
| YEARNED – YEAR (period of time) + N (new) + ED (editor) |
Down
| 1 | Outlaw runs out of farm building (3) |
| BAN – BA{r}N (farm building) | |
| 2 | Slept after last of classes is missed (7) |
| SKIPPED – S (last of classeS) + KIPPED (Slept)
This was my LOI. There were so many words that fitted the framework. S/NAPPED, S/LIPPED, S/HIPPED, S/TAMPED etc |
|
| 3 | Love superhero darning up masks (5) |
| ADORE – Hidden in “superhero darning” reversed [up]
This is the only surface that falls below the high standard. Although “up” can follow just about any verb, I’m not sure “darning up” works. |
|
| 4 | Cast care not for performer (7) |
| ENACTOR – (CARE NOT)* [Cast]
This caused trouble, I thought an ENACTOR is someone who officially puts a law, decree, system, or process into action. So, not really a “performer”, which is why we have separate words for ACTOR and ENACTOR. |
|
| 5 | Work on regularly observed twitch of eye (5) |
| OPTIC – OP (Work) + T{w}I{t}C{h} (regularly observed)
Clever, that “of” is what makes this an adjective. |
|
| 6 | Disclosure of commercial assignment (9) |
| ADMISSION – AD (commercial) + MISSION (assignment) | |
| 9 | Revolutionary mistaken in rash act (9) |
| ANARCHIST – (IN RASH ACT)* [mistaken]
I guess if a country was already an Anarchy, then an Anarchist wouldn’t really be a revolutionary, they’d be the “continuity candidate”. At my University, the Anarchist Society had to have elections and an AGM to receive Union funding, which they duly did. |
|
| 11 | Quarrel with an unknown woman (7) |
| TIFFANY – TIFF (Quarrel) + AN + Y (unknown)
By the late 1980s, Tiffany cracked the Top 20 most popular names in England and Wales, but it crashed out of the top 1000 recently. So If you randomly run into someone named TIFFANY in England today, there is a massive statistical probability that she will be in her 30s or 40s (a Millennial). So a “woman”, not a “girl”. |
|
| 13 | Induce good Parisian to pinch jewellery (5,2) |
| BRING ON – B^ON (“good” in French, hence Parisian) contains RING (jewellery) | |
| 15 | Left two notes on the counter for unsuccessful person (5) |
| LOSER – L (Left) + (RE (note) + SO (note)) reversed [on the counter]
These sol-fa notes are a pain to remember, especially as many of them have variant spellings. I though “lo” and “se” looked plausible before I clocked that “on the counter” was a reversal indicator. And of course ABCDEFG can be notes as well. |
|
| 16 | Shelled crab vital for side dish (5) |
| This is my favourite surface for today.
RAITA – {c}RA{b} + {v}ITA{l} [Shelled] |
|
| 19 | Nearly all leaves in salad pitiful (3) |
| SAD – SALAD (salad) minus AL (Nearly all)
That “in” bothers me a bit, I think it is superfluous to the wordplay and is just misdirection, since IN often indicates containment. |
9.12 with some very similar experiences to Merlin: head-scratching over LOI SKIPPED, a question mark over ENACTOR and a bit of a shrug over ‘darned up’. But all told a stylish and enjoyable crossie with some admirable surfaces. Merlin I will offer Duke Ellington’s Mood Indigo and Dylan’s Hurricane (‘we wanna put his ass in stir’). I suppose of all the things Bardot was known for, actress was probably one. Nice work Juju and great blog M, fascinating information about Newton about whom I clearly know too little.
Considering that I found this easy I was a little surprised to find 14 minutes on the clock when I had finished, but my timings always include parsings and I may have lost a moment or two seeing how OPTIC and APPRENTICES worked.
I forgot to mention that today, like yesterday, most of the clues in the 15×15 are not too obscure so it’s worth having a crack if you don’t usually go there…
Thank you, Lindsay, I’ll have a go.
Always appreciate this info about the 15x 15. Thanks
Enjoyed this puzzle, though admit to biffing in answers without parsing till the end. Very happy with 10.38. Must be the pleasant cool of the early morning…
Thanks Juji and Merlin
Attacked this early to enjoy the cool of the morning after yesterday’s scorcher, and was rewarded with a sparkling 8:11 finish.
On INDIGO, it is apparently a quirk of the English speaking world to think there are 7 colours in the rainbow, and most of Continental Europe considers there to be just 6. One of the questions asked of suspected British spies in the War was “How many colours are there in a rainbow?”, and the kneejerk answer of “Seven” gave one away immediately.
A most enjoyable puzzle all round, and an excellent blog to accompany it. Many thanks Merlin and Juji.
Russian has no word for ‘blue’; it has one word for light blue and a different word for dark blue. I wonder what their rainbow looks like. Some languages have only 5, or 6 basic color terms (English has 11; I think that’s the most that’s been found); I wonder etc.
The bands in a rainbow are purly due to the functioning of the human eye. To a spectrometer, or an animal that only sees in b&w there are no bands.
08:20. Fairly smooth solve, but definitely not sailing through (like yesterday’s) – BUS LANE I found particularly tricky. v enjoyable. thanks!
What is ‘crim argot’ please. (Supporting notes for 20a above)
Slang used by a criminal underclass.
Fairly easy going this morning.
I briefly chucked ‘snapped’ in at 2d but couldn’t see how it meant missed and ENACTOR went in with a shrug.
Started with OVAL and finished with RABBIT in 6.26.
Thanks to Merlin and Juji
4:21 – a straightforward solve of a very smooth set of clues. Very enjoyable. COD to CALIFORNIAN.
Super crossword
Saw bus lane straight off which helped an enjoyable leisurely solve, while also entertaining our 5 year old grandson, so probably would have finished in less than the 19.10 on the clock.
As said by Merlin, some very smooth surfaces with Californian our favourite.
Thanks Juji and Merlin. Interesting stuff about Newton and I’m intrigued by Cedric’s info on continental rainbows. All part of the rich tapestry we so enjoy in this community 😀
Ah but our tapestry has more colours in it.😀
12 mins…
Fairly straightforward for Juji – although I confess to not really parsing 15dn “Loser”. Thankfully, 10ac “Bardot” came to me quickly and I didn’t have to resort to some kind of alphabetic actress trawl.
FOI – 1dn “Ban”
LOI – 3dn “Adore”
COD – 13dn “Bring On”
Thanks as usual!
10 minutes. I couldn’t work out BUS LANE until near the end and then only with the crossing letters but the rest went in at about my usual leisurely pace. I liked the surface of the AUTUMN hidden and the American mauled by the African lion for CALIFORNIAN.
Thanks to Merlin for explaining the parsing and for the extra information on INDIGO, STIR and TIFFANY and to Juji
I found this quite hard today… thanks to setter and blogger!
Just a couple of points:
– I took ENACTORS to be those who PERFORM reconstructions of historical events, such as the Sealed Knot society, who like dressing up to re-enact English Civil War battles: https://www.thesealedknot.org.uk/.
– If you’re interested in the way different colours are perceived, and haven’t yet come across it, the debate about what Homer’s ‘wine-dark sea’ actually looked like is fun: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wine-dark_sea.
I thought those Sealed Knots guys were reenactors.
Oh, certainly, and that’s what they call themselves. But that’s how I took perform to be derived in the clue (especially as re-enacting is often hyphenated)
Really interesting link about the wine-dark sea, thank you!
It is, isn’t! And William Gladstone starting the debate off, too…
That’s my understanding of the word Enactors, too.
Chambers has:
1. A person who practises or performs anything
So I think all this talk of historical re-enactments, while absolutely correct, is a bit by the by.
A relaxed pace through an enjoyable puzzle. 15:02
Pi ❤️
Enjoyable puzzle, solved at a medium pace while thinking about the parsing. A little slower in the NW until PDM with BUS LANE. LOI ENACTOR.
I liked INDIGO, BRING ON, BARDOT and FIESTA, among others. Oh, and SKIPPED.
Biffed APPRENTICES and LOSER.
Thanks to Merlin for informative blog and to others above for input.
4:49. Held up by SKIPPED at the end. Nice puzzle. I enjoyed BAN and CALIFORNIAN most. Thank-you Juji for that and thanks Merlin for the blog.
Enjoyable and uncharacteristically straightforward for a Juji QC. My last few Jujis took me 2 or 3 times as long as my 10.56 today. A good night’s sleep helped, perhaps, but I just felt I was ‘on wavelength’ for a change. The anagrams dropped out very quickly.
My likes and semi-biffs seemed to chime with those of Countrywoman (above) apart from my LOI, FIESTA.
Thanks to Juji and Merlin.
A lovely puzzle, though I didn’t care much for ENACTOR. BARDOT was excellent and my LOI (first up I thought the reversed “to” for “ot” meant that this was going to involve TS Eliot).
I don’t agree with Merlin’s arbitrary attempt to impose age limits on who can be a girl. As Collins says of “girl” – “4. (informal) a woman of any age”. Don’t listen to him, Tiffany – you go, girl!
All done in a brisk 05:46 in a lovely air conditioned train for an Excellent Day. Many thanks Merlin and Juji.
Denim jeans are traditionally dyed with indigo
Indigo dye was first made thousands of years ago in ancient India, Peru, and China by extracting and fermenting the leaves of plants from the Indigofera genus (primarily Indigofera tinctoria)
Now, of course it is synthetic
Can you supply the structural formula please? Actually, I guess I can ask AI for that.
The system would not let me post a direct link. Just search for ‘indigo dye structure’; the Wiki link is helpful
An interesting structure. Synthesised in the lab in 1882. First commercial synthesis in 1901.
Not just those exotic countries. We had our own plants too from which we extracted the same blue dye. But we didn’t call it indigo, we called it woad
(and we painted it on our legs and went round asking people if they liked our new jeans)
The “painted on” look is still popular: Plymouth today… 🌞😅
But not “darned on”?
Well, some items are barely held up by the thinnest of threads…
8:50
LOI was RAITA, arguably a harder clue than the one in yesterday’s 15×15.
I share the doubts about ENACTOR.
Thanks Merlin and Juji
Yes, but spelling it was a breeze today 😉
Far from Q, but did get there in the end. Unimpressed by App = APP; many seemed somehow perverse but we all have differently-functioning brains. Thanks, Merlin: of course, that kind of game; and I biffed ADORE without seeing the reverse (up) hidden.
10:34 enjoyable TYTBAS
Did anyone else part OPTIC with TIC = “regularly observed twitch” making it a nice potential future &lit clue?
I thought skipped was a write-in even without any crossers but I missed six that I should have seen. I tend to stop if I haven’t seen anything for ten minutes.
Thanks M and J
Enjoyed on the train – probably around 17-18 minutes given interruptions for welcome coffee (and porridge for himself). Needed the blog to explain LOSER and ADORE.
Always learn something from the comments and today’s gains were on the subject of INDIGO, plus the mathematics (or lack of )regarding the oval shape. Our son-in-law assures us that ‘everything’ can be explained by mathematics. I will put the humble egg before him.
Thank you Merlin and Juji
Leisurely cruise through, very pleasent thanks to Juji and Merlin. I did wonder what Todrab had written, but otherwise all parsed on the fly. All ellipses are ovals, but not all ovals are ellipses. Ellipses are perfectly symmetrical around their centre point and the curve changes smoothly according to a mathematical formula. Eggs and rugby balls shapes are sometimes mentioned in dictionaries as exambles of ovals, but neither are ellipses; the rugby ball’s ends are too pointy, and the egg is not fully symmetrical.
Quick check of the cricket ground – mmm pretty close to an ellipse, would need a tape measure to tell if it’s spot on.
A mathematician would say a circle is an ellipse (the limit of when the two foci get closer and closer together) But a circle is not an oval.
Quick at first and then got bogged down in the NW at the end; a bottom up solve today.
So most done in 10 minutes but 15 in total after LOI ADORE ( the darn darning fooled me).
I too had SNAPPED and struggled to parse it; and I needed SKIPPED to get INDIGO I had PIT for Burrow initially.
But a lovely crossword overall. COD to BUS LANE; also liked BARDOT.
David
I made much harder work of this than perhaps I should have done, finishing outside target at 10.57. The north west corner was my problem area where I didn’t help myself by biffing SNAPPED for 2dn. Once I put my parsing hat back on, SKIPPED then followed. My LOI was BUS LANE which I really should have solved more easily.
12:56 & probably par for Juji. Spent far too long trying to be clever on SKIPPED, ENACTOR & LOSER: realise now that OS & ER are not defunct currencies.
A few days off so treating myself to morning solves but I doubt I’ll be any quicker- I shall blame the heat! Thanks to Juji & Merlin, and everyone for the interesting new GK!
Blimey! Just 13-14 minutes, which really is fast for me. I was never quite on for a PB, but I sensed all was going well and just hoped I wouldn’t be breeze-blocked at the end.
My FOI was OVAL (I had to come back to BUS LANE) and, for once, all of the early Down clues went in without too much thought.
I was fortunate to see both ANARCHIST and CALIFORNIAN with no checkers as they opened up the lower half of the grid for me. LOSER had to go in complexly unparsed, but it really couldn’t be anything else.
My L2I, BRING ON and RABBIT, required a little more thought, but didn’t delay me much.
Can anyone suggest an American they would like to be mauled by an African lion?
Thanks to Merlin and Juji.
You asked: ‘Can anyone suggest an American they would like to be mauled by an African lion?’
Just replace ‘they’ with ‘I’ and my answer is Donald T. Rump.
8:16 with one error, making it 0 for 2 so far this week. Had SNAPPED at first, but then in went INDIGO and I very carelessly switched to SNIPPED, extremely sloppy. Nice solve otherwise.
I didn’t find it as easy as some on the leaderboard. I finished in 7:46 and mislaid my anagram hat again when trying to work out ENACTOR and ANARCHIST. My favourites today are however anagram based clues – BUS LANE and CALIFORNIAN. Thanks Merlin
I found this on the hard side; wasn’t really on Juji’s wavelength today, but got there in the end. Must be the heat! I biffed a few, so thanks to Merlin for explaining some of the parsings. Loved the African lion clue.
Nice gentle solve on a very hot day. Slow to see CALIFORNIAN otherwise all went in very smoothly. Interesting discussion above about the colours of the rainbow – well I never! Thanks all, and special thanks to Merlin for a great blog with lots of extra information. Re: girl/woman, I go ‘out with the girls’ and we are all in our 60s 😁
That felt quite hard at the time but took me 11:06, which is below my average. Perhaps I biffed more than I usually do.
Thank you for the blog!
Good 15m for me with loi BUS LANE once SKIPPED suddenly dawned on me: I was fixated on synonyms for slept for far too long! Liked RAITA and the good Parisian had to be bon… but the ring took a moment or two. The hidden at 8a was very neat! But my cod was BARDOT who 20d what I often 21d as a teenager in the 1960s!
I learned a couple of late life lessons yesterday. We held a barbecue at my housing scheme, and the price for reasonably unlimited food (2 cheeseburgers and a hot dog in my case) included a shot of Jack Daniel’s.
Lesson 1 : If you know there will be spirits in the offing, DON’T drink half a bottle of white wine first.
Lesson 2 : Don’t share your table with 3 people who never drink whisky. There’s only one place those extra shorts are going to end up.
Thanks to black coffee, I’d recovered from my self-inflicted sluggishness by lunchtime. I found this puzzle very straightforward, and only 3 clues survived the first pass.
However, I really didn’t expect to be equal third on the leaderboard (ahead of Verlaine!) so late in the day.
FOI BUS LANE
LOI INGEST
COD CALIFORNIAN
TIME 2:14 (SNITCH says my equal 6th fastest 😊)
Wow that’s fast! Well done Phil!
A nice start to the week, which I fully parsed as I went along. I agree that the surface for ADORE stuck out a bit in an otherwise excellent selection. Particular favourites were BUS LANE (my POI), AUTUMN, and ANARCHIST.
8:17 FOI Oval LOI Skipped COD Californian (not a Minnesotan dentist then. I hesitate to mention the orange one’s latest contribution to saving protected species, but you can read about it in today’s Times world pages)
Thanks Juji and Merlin – another very interesting blog – and thanks to all for the extra GK 😊
From BAN to RABBIT in 7:29. Liked CALIFORNIAN. Took a while to see SKIPPED. Thanks Juji and Merlin.
Four solutions short! Don’t get why in 7ac Obtain becomes ‘o’? and 11dn In maths Y is not an unknown, X is!
“Start to” OBTAIN, means the initial letter, hence O. I was going to elaborate in my parsing, but the parsing was looking a bit complicated at that point. It’s a tough balance.
In crosswords “unknown” can be X, Y or Z, even though of course any letter can be used in algebra. Constant is c, any “any number” is n. There is no logic about this .
16:26 – fairly quick for me, but minutes taken with an alphabet trawl to discover the NHO RAITA. I must lead a sheltered life. Otherwise no real problems at all.
8.12 I liked AUTUMN. LOI STIR. It’s still hot. Thanks Merlin and Juji.
Awful lot of biffing. ADORE eminently biffable, but could’nt parse, thanks to Merlin for elucidation
6:09
No issues though took a while to spot ENACTOR. There was a TIFFANY in Eastenders in the late 1990s which may have given the name an additional fillip.
Thanks Merlin and Juji
Really nice crossword, and indeed, blog – thanks to both. 7:11.
A return to form today for me. That form being managing to solve the whole thing by the skin of my teeth, struggling all the way, for obscenely long times.
Didn’t know Kip meant kiss so SKIPPED was my second last and only put in because I couldn’t think of anything better (considered lip to mean kiss briefly as slipped would also work but decided against it). LOI was FIESTA, I still didn’t understand when it was done until reading here. Some of the shorter synonyms do not yet come to me immediately. COD was BRING ON. It came relatively easily and I enjoyed the smoothness of the surface.
Thanks to the setter and the blogger for confounding and elucidating me respectively.
Time: 37:23
Where have you got Kiss from in 2d ?
19 mins. Typeod Raita as Raiti, which held me up on 21ac, as I couldn’t dredge a time period that would fit. The y in Tiffany sorted that mess out.
FOI Ban
LOI Bardot
COD Bus Lane
Thanks Juji and Merlin
I never seem to get on well with Juji puzzles and today was no exception. Not easy as far as I was concerned and I booked my seat in the Club with a finishing time of 21 minutes. Couldn’t parse APPRENTICES or LOSER and my anagram hat seemed to have gone missing. Wanted 2dn to be slipped at first but it didn’t parse. MERs at 3dn (for the contrived surface) and 4dn.
FOI – 5ac OVAL
LOI – 2dn SKIPPED
COD – 16dn RAITA
Thanks to Juji and Merlin