Oh my goodness I spotted a Nina. Wonders will never cease. I’ll put it at the very end of this introduction in case anyone wants to go back to the puzzle and have a look.
After DNFing yesterday I faced an Asp with some trepidation, but this one turned out to be very approachable and I finished in regulation 07:47. Some brilliant clues in here, with my COD going to 23a.
Definitions underlined in bold.
Nina – look at the unchecked letters running down the left and right edges, combined with AND in the middle. Maybe Asp is in the middle of moving house.
| Across | |
| 4 | Part of girl is so mobile and nimble (6) |
| LISSOM – hidden. I always thought it was “lissome” but I now learn that they are alternatives. | |
| 7 | Gave beer out for something to drink (8) |
| BEVERAGE – anagram [out] of “gave beer”. | |
| 8 | Unusually white individual moving over from England once (6) |
| ALBINO – I could see that this was either albino [unusually white individual] or Albion [England once], in either case with the O shifting [moving over] one place. But since the “moving over” direction was in the middle, I couldn’t tell which one it was until I got the N from ORNAMENT. Both albino and Albion derive from the Latin albus (white), in Albion’s case probably because of the white cliffs. | |
| 9 | Preparation for exam on sight (8) |
| REVISION – RE [on] + VISION [sight]. I over-complicated this, trying to work in “test” or “oral”. | |
| 10 | Key passage in speech (4) |
| ISLE – my LOI because although KEY does of course mean island (think the Florida Keys) that wasn’t the first thing that sprang to mind, or indeed the third. Sounds like [in speech] “aisle” [passage]. | |
| 12 | This employee ran edger around? (8) |
| GARDENER – anagram (around) of “ran edger”. It’s an &Lit, since a GARDENER is the type of employee likely to run an edger around (eg) a flowerbed or lawn. | |
| 15 | Nurse involved in prisoner’s struggles (8) |
| CONTENDS -TEND [nurse] inside [involved in] CONS [prisoner’s, silent apostrophe]. | |
| 18 | Place by tee to play shot (4) |
| PUTT – PUT [place] + T [tee]. | |
| 20 | Personal magnetism is seen in allure and attraction primarily (8) |
| CHARISMA – IS [is] going inside [seen in] CHARM [allure] + A [attraction primarily]. | |
| 22 | Inspire the French by showing consideration (6) |
| KINDLE – LE [the French] on the end of [by] KIND [showing consideration]. | |
| 23 | I’m stopping racist waving around weapon (8) |
| SCIMITAR – IM [I’m] inside an anagram [waving around] of “racist”. Brilliant surface. | |
| 24 | Broadcast outspoken channel (6) |
| STRAIT – sounds like [broadcast] “straight” [outspoken – I looked a bit sideways at this but Collins does have “outspoken” in its list of US meanings so Asp is covered]. | |
| Down | |
| 1 | Mother Earth embodies this place (4) |
| HERE – hidden [embodies]. | |
| 2 | Citizen stripping head of state’s power (8) |
| RESIDENT – a head of state could be a president; remove the P [stripping power]. | |
| 3 | Sailor’s appraisal (6) |
| RATING – double definition. | |
| 4 | Supported person in possession of fewer pounds (6) |
| LEANER – definition with a cryptic hint (if I was leaning on a wall I would be being supported by it and thus a leaner/a supported person). | |
| 5 | New boss turns on the waterworks (4) |
| SOBS – anagram [new] of “boss”. | |
| 6 | Musical embellishment uplifted man captivated by fantastic tenor (8) |
| ORNAMENT – NAM [uplifted man] inside [captivated by] anagram [fantastic] of “tenor”. | |
| 11 | Perpetrate crime that promotes retail outlet? (8) |
| SHOPLIFT – SHOP = retail outlet, LIFT = promote. | |
| 13 | Joiner starts to assemble new desk (3) |
| AND – first letters [starts to] of “assemble new desk”. AND is of course a conjunction or joining word. What a neat clue, bravo. It reads so naturally. | |
| 14 | Unreserved former partner allowed to keep quiet (8) |
| EXPLICIT – EX [former partner] + LICIT [allowed] with P [quiet] inside [to keep]. | |
| 16 | Most pleasant spot on vacation, south of French city (6) |
| NICEST – ST [spot “on vacation”, i.e. the first and last letters] below [south, in a down clue] of NICE [French city]. | |
| 17 | Two thirds of statistic having zero variation (6) |
| STATIC – could it really be as simple as having 6 of the 9 letters of “statistic”? Reader, it could. | |
| 19 | Liberal abandons perfect scheme (4) |
| IDEA – “ideal” [perfect] without the L [Liberal abandons]. | |
| 21 | Complaint upset first couple in Arab state (4) |
| MOAN – switch over the first two letters [upset first couple] in Oman [Arab state]. | |
Good spot on the Nina
17:07, so a tough one.
Last three in were the homophonic AISLE and STRAIT, both chestnuts to be fair. I couldn’t make SHOPLIFT work, although I suspected it. I had misread “perpetrate” as “perpetuate”.
Not a fan of TEE=T, maybe AITCH is OK, but can we expect SEE=C, ARR=R etc?
COD STATIC
I saw TEE=T as in Tee Shirt / T-Shirt, but I am not sure if that is the intended link. Perhaps ‘To a T’ / ‘To a tee’?
I can see the TEE=T link goes back at least to QC 312 (by Rongo) which had the clue ‘Tee is cut from thin piece of wood, not well (4)’.
I finished in 14 minutes but found this quite hard. I struggled to get any sort of flow going so it was an untidy solve with gaps all around the grid until it suddenly came together at the end. I missed the Nina, but since Richard’s puzzles stopped I rarely think to look.
MOAN, STRAIT, ISLE and KINDLE all caused me problems. But the main wound was self-inflicted – going the wrong way round with ALBINO – Albion made ORNAMENT very hard because I suspected some musical knowledge I don’t have was going to be necessary. All green in 18.27.
We found this quite tough, and like Jack, ended up with bits here and there. Isle also our LOI was about 3 of the 24.04. We also put in Albion, not spotting it could go the other way around.
Thanks Mr T, especially for parsing of moan, which probably took up 4 minutes on its own of alphatrawling
Didn’t spot the Nina, although we never do, but not helped by the recent changes in the iPad app that means we have to scroll now to see the bottom of the enlarged puzzle ( and the setter). Has anyone found a fix for this?
Thanks Asp
I also struggle with the iPad view, annoying. Various twiddling with settings haven’t helped so I am constantly flicking up and down.
Have you turned the iPad itself?
Because we solve together we have a case with built in stand for landscape so not easy to do that 😕
Tap on ‘Aa’ in the top right hand corner of the puzzle to adjust the grid size so you won’t have to scroll up and down.
Thanks for the suggestion. We’ve done that and have everything set to show the smallest grid and text but lose the bottom two rows of the puzzle
I share your experiences (forgive me repeating earlier comments on iPad layouts). With everything possible made smaller, the lower part of the puzzle is still off the page in landscape mode for me, too. Trouble is, if I move from the page for any reason, the down clues are missing when I return and I have to reload the page.
So I use the iPad on my stand but in portrait mode. That means more scrolling up and down the clues at the side because they are all in a single column.
Can’t win.
I would not have stepped into the SCC today if I had not lost time faffing about with layout.
I have the same problem since the “improvement”, ugly typeface and the puzzle doesn’t fit the page anymore, no matter what you do. Mystifies me that the Times employs such poor quality developers when they are pushing digital. There is an option in the app to provide feedback, I am too old and cynical to expect it to result in change, but at least it makes me feel slightly better for having complained.
The new format seems to work fine on an android phone, with the full grid showing. There’s only one clue visible at a time but it’s easy to jump around from one to wherever you want to go next. But it’s a faff to do it on a laptop — presumably similar problems to those mentioned about iPads. Seems to be a bit easier if you change the view from 100% to 90% but then the type is smaller (obviously) so may not suit everyone.
Yes, that’s the one we’re using. I’m guessing it’s something to do with different iPads having different resolution/pixel sizes. Thanks for the suggestion.
Wandered into the SCC as the last couple, MOAN and ISLE fell into place. RATING eluded me for too long, especially as this area was full of them years ago, much less so now.
A nice puzzle with a bit of a false start as I couldn’t fit an ‘e’ on the end of LISSOM, but every day’s a school day as they say. After that I made swift progress before being breezeblocked by KINDLE and RATING.
Finished in 7.15
Thanks to Templar and Asp
43 minutes to get 19. I should have probably persevered as the ones I was missing were relatively easy to parse given the right amount of background thinking time.
Does dyslexia help with anagrams? Probably.
Thanks T and A
Dyslexia is an anagram of daily sex. A nugget from the Classics master who would occasionally enliven Saturday morning lessons with crossword stuff.
ISLE and KINDLE held me up, otherwise a steady enough solve in 18:30. Didn’t see the Nina – I very rarely do!
Usually find Asp hard; this started smoothly enough, but problems were intractable and I ended five to the bad (PUTT, KINDLE, STRAIT, SHOPLIFT, EXPLICIT). Thanks, Templar.
Is unreserved = EXPLICIT? If the dictionary says so ….
Grr I did wonder whether there was such a thing as STATIS – there was no indication of having to jump two letters. So that’s six.
So far this year is worse than last, but I suppose I’m a year closer to dementia …
While it’s valid to jump two, I’d say it’s more a case of split the clue into thirds then take the first and last two-thirds (STA – TIS – TIC).
Anyway I fell for for STATIS trap. Sometimes with a tougher setter I assume they know more than me and my mind was trying to sort between that and staSis and never got to static.
Well, I put static but it didn’t help much as I’d misread the clue. For the life of me I couldn’t work out why static = of zero valuation!
A very good puzzle I thought, although I simply was not on the wavelength. Nine minutes, so nearly twice my target. Many nice devices, but COD to Albino.
Fairly straightforward for Asp. Do people normally solve top to bottom of the grid? Am interested, because like Jackkt today I always just dart around the grid randomly, looking for the low-hanging fruit. It often means I have a corner barely started when the rest is done, but each clue leads to a crosser and spreads out from there.
My habits depend on the grid.
With a standard grid, I always start with 1a. If I get it, I move on to the next across clue. If I get that too, then I generally proceed to work my through all the acrosses before turning to the downs. But if I don’t get all three of the first across clues, I go back to one I did get and try downs from it, then work my way around.
With a portcullis grid, though, I just try all the acrosses and then all the downs, because solved clues tend not to give me first letters.
And where the grid has one enormous across along the top and one enormous down on the left side, I always try to get those first.
I usually start with 1a and 1d – though not today, because it’s a cursed grid – and then go from there if I get some checking letters. If I’m not getting anywhere (as today) I’ll just try all the clues in sequence and then see how the grid looks after a first pass.
I should add that I’m no exemplar, you’re probably better off doing the opposite of whatever I do!
I always start by going through the clues in order but quickly. If I read a clue and can’t immediately see it I move on to the next. Once I have read every clue (my first lap) I then look at the grid to see where I have the most fillers and try to answer those first. Then I tend to take the remaining clues in order.
From BEVERAGE to RESIDENT in 7:07. Didn’t spot the nina until Templar mentioned it, mainly because I wasn’t looking for one. Thanks Asp and Templar.
Tough but it offered many rewarding tussles with clever clues. I jumped around and will admit to biffing one or two, given crossers, prior to parsing.
Asp normally sends me deep into the SCC (as his last one) or hovering in the high teens. This time, I stepped into the SCC by a minute, held up by REVISION, KINDLE, IDEA, and ISLE, all of which were good clues when the pennies dropped.
I share many of the experiences above, not least my COD ALBINO which I only parsed after writing it in.
Thanks to Asp for a test and Templar for a good blog.
Not on Asp’s wavelength today, with a 15:31 solve. Once again undone by some definitions I found hard to justify or understand, such as Broadcast = STRAIT (NHO), Citizen = RESIDENT (absolutely not the same, as any immigration lawyer will tell you), Unreserved = EXPLICIT (again I’d say two different concepts; to me explicit means stated clearly). It seems setters have a much wider tolerance for what are close enough synonyms than I am expecting!
That apart, my main hold-up was on the ALBINO/ORNAMENT pair, where I started with Albion until I realised that the answer to 6D couldn’t start O-O. The ambiguity in the clue for 8A is perhaps not ideal – it would be a disaster in the Quintagram – but the great advantage in Crosswordland is that the crossing clue and the shared checker help one out! In passing though, why is Ornament clued as Musical embellishment specifically – would not just Embellishment be sufficient?
A day where I needed the blog – for which many thanks Templar.
Morning Cedric!
Broadcast does not = STRAIT; have another look at the blog to see how the clue works. (And you must have heard eg of the Straits of Gibraltar?)
There are many more meanings to what a citizen/resident is than the narrow views of immigration lawyers! Collins second and third definitions of citizen show how broad it is (“2. an inhabitant of a city or town; 3. a native or inhabitant of any place”).
Collins for EXPLICIT: “3. openly expressed without reservations; unreserved”
As for 8a, although I couldn’t work it out either at the time looking back I think Asp has actually indicated which was which – the clue says “moving over from England once”, which in hindsight I think indicates where the moving has to take place.
I thought the addition of “musical” was designed to make the answer more obvious – in the 15 I suspect he’d just have put “embellishment”, which would have been harder.
On that last point: each to their own, but the inclusion of “musical” had me fruitlessly rummaging through forty-year-old, half-remembered Italian music terms.
Thank you. Yes, that must be Asp’s intention with the Albion/Albino clue – that little word “from” perhaps gives it away. But in general, given how often I seem to be misreading clues and stumbling over second tier definitions, it’s a miracle how often I finish these puzzles. I have developed a fine line in guessing and saying “well I’m not sure myself but perhaps the setter is giving himself room here”.
I got timed out by the first meeting of the day after about 12 minutes with REVISION and RESIDENT still not there and having held me up for several minutes. After the round of morning meetings was done, it took all of about 5 seconds to get those last two, and that included the head-scratching time while thinking “why could I not get these instantly before the working day started?”
I never see the Nina. The closest I ever got to such hidden stuff was a few months back when I spotted a possible pangram with a couple of niggly clues outstanding. I spent ages trying to get the last two needing (IIRC) a Z and an F. It turned out it wasn’t a Pangram after all. So I’m still 0 / N with N getting ever larger.
Not the easiest again, and I won’t beat myself up for finishing outside target at 11.55. The sw corner held me up a fair bit with SHOPLIFT and my LOI KINDLE being the main culprits. Well done Templar on seeing the Nina, which as usual I was no way near spotting.
Hard work, made worse by trying to find an anagram of ran edgAr for ages. Didnt get 10a or 11d, but nothing wrong with either of them. Cant see the problem with Tee = T, we have homophones for whole words all the time, so why not for individual letters? Thanks Asp and Templar.
12:56, which is pretty good by my standards, but I had more unparsed than usual – ALBINO and STRAIT both needed Templar’s explanation, along with KINDLE (though I really should have got that one).
Thank you for the blog!
I started off slow on this one and by the time I had completed my first lap I was somewhat dubious as to whether I’d finish it. However, I persevered and was pleased that I did.
I found a lot of the clues to be very good, even the ones that I just couldn’t see until I got a few extra hints. Several times I groaned as I saw the answer and thought “Of course!”
Isle was my last clue to answer. I did have Isle but wasn’t entirely convinced until I thought it over. It had to be Isle, I thought. So in it went. I then held my breath as I pressed submit and waited for what seemed like an eternity for the result to show. Candy well deserved today.
First lap: 5
Answered:20
Answered with help: 4
DNF: Nil
Time: 32:10
An enjoyable crossword. Held up by about five – including ISLE (never did work out why ISLE = Key until I read the blog).and STRAIT. Annoyingly I too wrote in STASIS, which seemed to fit the definition.
I agree RESIDENT is not the same as citizen – took me some time to see the answer when I had all the checkers. Completed in 20.51.
DNF. Not on the wavelength. Reading through the blog, I saw I had put Note instead of ISLE but that enabled me to solve unfinished LOI/COD SHOPLIFT.
I fared worse than most today as I needed CCD help with other clues, like EXPLICIT.
Admired CHARISMA, KINDLE, STRAIT.
Thanks for vital blog, Templar.
9:07
Came to a grinding halt with about half done, then finally worked out the 12a anagram and picked back up to normal speed, before completing with IDEA and KINDLE. Quitch currently 108 which I think is a fair score for this puzzle. For once, I spotted the nina…
Thanks T and A
I didn’t know what the word “Quitch” meant so I looked it up in the glossary (which is a very helpful resource, thank you to whoever created that!). I now know what the quitch is but I am a bit lost on exactly how the score is worked out. I see that today’s puzzle has a current score of 108. How is the score of a puzzle determined?
Go here https://quick.xwdsnitch.link/crosswords and click on the “learn more” button, PW. Well done on your solve today!
Thank you Templar. I did look at that page but missed the Learn More button. Now I know the answer!
Thanks again.
11 minutes. Very enjoyable and as a bonus the Nina helped me to get REVISION. The surface for CHARISMA was my favourite with GARDENER not far behind.
Thanks to Asp and Templar
DNF, with stumps pulled at the 30min mark. Having belatedly changed Oman into Moan to finally ‘see’ (feel with gloved hands, more like) Charisma, the idea that I had a second answer (Albion) back to front was simply beyond the pale, and therefore the unknown musical term must be one of dozens(?) beyond my O-level knowledge. Invariant
6.44 Very much on the wavelength today though I missed the nina as ever. I had to come back to the chestnut RATING and EXPLICIT was LOI. Thanks Templar and Asp.
11 clues solved in 20 minutes! Don’t understand the solution to 16d. Why does ‘on vacation’ mean remove the middle letters of ‘spot’?
Sorry, I should have explained that a bit more. If you “vacate” something, you empty it: Collins definition 1 for vacate is “1. to cause (something) to be empty, esp by departing from or abandoning it”. So if you “vacate” a word you empty it out, thus leaving only the first and last letters.
“On vacation” is a standard bit of setting code, so try to remember it because it’ll crop up again!
21 mins…
Made steady progress on this, but had to change 12ac a number of times before I got to “Gardener” (who knew there were so many possible combinations of ‘ran edgar’?) and then got held up with 14dn “Explicit”.
FOI – 1dn “Here”
LOI – 14dn “Explicit”
COD – 11dn “Shoplift”
Thanks as usual!
More combinations than you want to look at, you can bet!
Nice from Asp.
10:03 for me.
Nice work on the Nina Templar.
I CONTENDED with this but finally finished. I have never used contend to mean struggle but the dictionaries say it does so who am I to argue.
Apart from that minor quibble I found this an entertainingly tricky puzzle with some lovely clues.
Had to change OMAN to MOAN as it can be read either way.
Many thanks to Asp and Templar.
I came here for help as I was stuck. Read there was a Nina and went back and found it. It provided 2 first letters that I was missing. And then finished the puzzle. Thanks for the blog. I love reading it and the comments.
Well done and I bet that was a fun experience.
Gave up on 30 minutes with two outstanding (KINDLE and IDEA). So two DNFs in a row this week – I’d like to think things can only get better.
FOI – 4ac LISSOM
LOI – DNF
COD – 6dn ORNAMENT
Thanks to Asp and Templar
Templar, Well done on the Nina. I didn’t even consider looking for one. I started the QC very quickly with LISSOM, BEVERAGE and ALBINO and then moved clockwise from the NE. My only real hold ups were MOAN, SHOPLIFT and my LOI ISLE. 7:52
14:55, an average-ish time for me so I felt it was an honorable though slightly laborious finish. ALBINO was a good example of a problem that’s been slowing me down lately – too much, or too-rigid, lifting and separating, so I didn’t even consider “unusually white individual” as a phrase until the crossers gave it to me (also I couldn’t remember Albion). LOI was REVISION, not in my dialect though heard of it. Liked GARDENER, ORNAMENT, and PUTT. The clue for SOBS evoked the memory of a most unfortunate, though funny in retrospect, real-life incident, setting me musing instead of solving for a little while.
Thanks to Asp and Templar. Of course I didn’t see the Nina – well spotted!
DNF. After some easy hits in the top right corner: Lissom, Sobs, Albino. Dried up on the crosses until Charisma. Thankfully the downs prevented a very empty grid. Thanks all
20:16 for me, with my last 4 taking 10 minutes to unravel. Didn’t get the “supported person” part of LEANER, and still think it’s a bit dodgy. My COD goes to ISLE for the sneaky definition.
Thanks to Asp and Templar.
Many interruptions (6 grandchildren about) yet still managed just over 15 minutes (faster than our average solve).
When many say ‘easy’ we find not so for us, yet today, many found tricky and we did not.
Would be fascinating to know/understand the difference between solvers brains.
Wonderful NINA (once pointed out to us).
Thank you ASP and Templar.
DNF
Kicking myself. Missed ISLE and it’s not as if we haven’t had that meaning of key before. Would have helped had I spotted the Nina.
DNF but feeling pleased as there were only two I didn’t get, my best showing on an Asp puzzle so far.
ISLE for key was beyond me as was LIFT for promote . . . I thought of SHOP_I_T but the lift bit passed me by.
Woe is me. A silly DNF in 19:40. Already very slow with LOI MOAN (not having got the parsing) only to reveal the error with ALBANY which I’d also biffed having thought I remembered it as ‘England once’. That’s two this week. The whole had a feel of one of the newer setters. Thank you both, Templar and Asp.
30 mins
Flew through the top half, but dragged back to earth with the SW corner proving very resistant til I took a punt on isle to unlock it. Managed to resist the tempatation to assume statis was a word.
FOI Lissom
LOI Strait
COD Gardener
Thanks Asp and Templar
Completed in two sittings. Didn’t get very far this morning but this afternoon’s session was much more productive. Found this quite challenging in parts but all fair and very enjoyable. COD ISLE for making me work hard, although LEANER was a close second. Took ages to understand HERE (dear oh dear). LOI SHOPLIFT – fabulous. Many thanks T and Asp.
23 clues in 23 minutes (fast for me), but my final two took nearly the same time again. Not sure why I persevered, but I did and after an eternity SHOPLIFT appeared. A minute or so later I found ISLE and my grid was complete. Total time ~40 minutes. Poor, in the end.
I never parsed ALBINO, MOAN and (my LOI) ISLE, but just reaching the line at all is a rarity for me with Asp.
On Edit: Oh dear! Having just read the blog and comments above, I must own up to having put STAsIs at 17d. So, my marathon struggle to solve my L2I was all in vain. DNF (yet again with Asp)!
Many thanks to Templar and Asp.
Some great clues. Too many to mention. I bunged ORNAMENT in but I’ve never heard of it with a musical connection. Thanks for the NINA – this is a new thing for me – brilliant 👏
11.18.
Not a day for me, and as I’m logged in as ‘agardener’ and couldn’t do anagram GARDENER, maybe I’d better stay in the garden! Just bought more plants so that will be restful for the brain. I’ll come back here another day.
37 minute DNF.
Didn’t understand 21 down.
3 consecutive fails. My incompetence knows no bounds.
I am singularly incapable of improving and instead am going backwards. No doubt the boffins found this easy, but I haven’t got the desire to read any other comments today. I feel bad enough as it is without having to read about all those fast times.
All that effort and I’m still so bad at this.
PS Unable to even get a start on 15 x 15. Dreadful.
So where’s the Nina?
You’ll find details in Templar’s intro to his blog.