Times 27121 – Shakira and Me Ain’t Finished Yet Amigos

Author   ulacaPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
36’50” for this, which is bang on my own personal NITCH. However, if you were to think that this was my average solving time, you would, I’m afraid, be gravely mistaken, as the SNITCH counts only correctly completed entries ‘submitted with leaderboard’ on the Times crossword website. So, given that I often go over my SNITCH average on tougher crosswords, where I am more likely to get one or two wrong or to have to look up one or two and therefore (rather happily, if the truth be told) disqualify myself from submitting with leaderboard, I would hazard that my real average is in the 40-45 minute range. And, then I cast my mind back and wonder, has there ever been a time since the invention of the SNITCH that I have taken forever and looked none up and got none wrong, but have decided nonetheless to submit without leaderboard to save face. Perish the thought!

I reckon this was a little easier than average but rather tougher than your average Monday puzzle. Having lived out of Blighty for so long, BARISTA is a word that came up on me unawares only a few years ago. I was intrigued at first, thinking that the men and women so named had taken a degree (or at least a diploma) in coffee-making, travelling to Costa Rica and Mexico and perhaps doing an elective or two in fair trade, organics, and mindfulness and compassion. Sadly, as in so much else in my life, I was disappointed when I discovered that every Tomasz, Dirk and Henryk working at Starbucks at Heathrow was called a barrista. How those ladies who used to serve up coffee and chicory at Lyons’ Corner Houses must be turning in their graves!

On review, this setter likes his/her question marks as much as I love my exclamation marks!

ACROSS

1 Frequently pressure will be absorbed by broadcaster gaining influence (4,5)
SOFT POWER – OFT P in SOWER (broadcaster); a silly phrase meaning the ability to manipulate through culture, coffee etc. Apparently, the UK is the top peddler of SOFT POWER in the world, which means the laugh is on them, I reckon.
6 US lawyer impounding most of long rural residence (5)
DACHA -ACH[e] in DA; every Russian novel has a dacha and a samovar. Me, excepting War and Peace and anything by Dostoevsky, I prefer your French novels. The Red and the Black by Stendhal (who I thought was Scandinavian until recently) is particularly racy…
9 Café worker? A man filling bill is recalled (7)
BARISTA -reversal of A (SIR [man] in TAB [bill])
10 I guarantee I rejected further broadcast about son (7)
INSURER – similar device to the previous clue: I (S in reversal or RERUN [further broadcast])
11 Closer and closer to ritual at church (5)
LATCH – [ritua]L AT CH
12 Intimidating male taken to court over cartel (9)
HECTORING – HE CT O RING. An excuse (as if I need one) to plug CS Lewis’s magnificent oration warning against 1ac
13 Huge energy sustaining Republican bodyguard (5)
GROSS – R in GO SS
14 It’ll have a drop of arsenic in various portions, perhaps (3-6)
RAT-POISON – A (drop/first letter of Arsenic) in PORTIONS*
17 The writer’s recalled nineteen characters around Northern American state (9)
MINNESOTA – N (north) in MINE reversal of A TO S (first 19 letters of the alphabet)
18 Ecstatic state offering no new suggestion (5)
TRACE – TRA[n]CE
19 Get program to stop after girl’s taken aback (9)
APPREHEND – REH (HER reversed)in APP END
22 Inlet having run in a fraction, not loudly (5)
FIRTH – R in FI[f]TH
24 Alcoholic drink: writer, a bit cut, will get stuck into brew (7)
TEQUILA – QUIL[l] in TEA
25 Odd bits of opal and blue interrupted by marks in pale brown (7)
OATMEAL – O[p]A[l] M (marks) in TEAL (blue); a colour
26 Spider perhaps found behind cold hilltop (5)
CREST – C REST (a spider is a stick used in snooker to enable a player to strike over a ball)
27 International game? Plan to include one high-flier (4,5)
TEST PILOT – TEST I in PLOT

DOWN

1 Forecaster is upset over Times line (5)
SIBYL – reversal of IS BY L (line)
2 Eldest child initially ready to tuck into left half of bonbon? (5-4)
FIRST-BORN – R[eady] in FIRST BON (left half of BONBON)
3 Immediately make online comments over animosity surrounding society (4-5)
POST-HASTE – POST S in HATE
4 Newspaper feature teacher edited with software (7,8)
WEATHER FORECAST – TEACHER SOFTWARE*
5 Exhibit mammalian consequences of the foregoing? (4,4,3,4)
RAIN CATS AND DOGS – um, yes, well this is a somewhat strained cryptic definition of a quirky nature, where it has to be said that rain being as it were equivalent to a weather forecast is a bit of a stretch, even in Blighty. ‘The foregoing’ refers to the previous clue, of course.
6 Dancing talent that’s new? Not very (5)
DISCO – DISCO[very]; Susan Boyle was discovered on Britain’s Got Talent; Screamer Easton on Esther Rantzen’s The Big Time
7 Garment I’d picked up after a lot of consideration (5)
CARDI – CAR[e] ID reversed
8 Superior approach in developing organ care (9)
ARROGANCE – ORGAN CARE*
13 My acting’s pulled apart as sort of vigorous (9)
GYMNASTIC – MY ACTINGS*; perhaps the literal is ‘vigorous’. I am open to offers
15 Not agreeing how you might get pets? (3,2,4)
OUT OF STEP – an anagram of PETS is STEP, so you can get pets OUT OF STEP
16 Place for flights? Primarily soaring through atmosphere successfully (9)
STAIRWELL – S[oaring] T[hrough] AIR WELL
20 Anger? Private investigator quite expressing it (5)
PIQUE – PI QU[it]E getting rid of (expressing) IT
21 Throw out online winner having no alternative (5)
EVICT – similar device to the previous clue: E VICT[or] getting rid of OR (alternative)
23 Entertainer bringing in latest from musical composer (5)
HOLST – [musica]L in HOST

84 comments on “Times 27121 – Shakira and Me Ain’t Finished Yet Amigos”

  1. 29 minutes. Is ‘first’ doing double duty in 2dn? Intrigued by the hidden answer not clued as such in 11ac.
      1. I wasn’t criticising, ulaca, only thinking that if ‘first’ is not doing double-duty (which is frowned upon) ‘r’ has to be taken as an abbreviation for ‘ready’ and I can’t find any justification for that in the usual sources.

        Edited at 2018-08-20 06:09 am (UTC)

        1. Isn’t it just R (initially ready) in FIRST BON i.e. the left half of BONBON?
    2. Perhaps because it is not forced to be a hidden? It could be read as (RITUA)L + AT + CH(URCH).. it’s not a complicated clue, either way!
      1. Yes, that’s the way I was reading it. It could have been clued as a hidden answer but the setter chose not to do so. A little unusual in that respect so I thought it worth commenting on.
    3. Interesting case of two separate uses of the word ‘first’ rather than double duty, I’d say.
  2. Shouldn’t that be [ritua]L? Never noticed the hidden, but then not notice hiddens is what I do best.
    1. Thanks. I remain in awe of those who read my blogs. They should be paid as proofreaders.

      Edited at 2018-08-20 01:11 am (UTC)

  3. DNK CARDI, so I took some time wondering if there were some obscure garment I didn’t know. Didn’t parse MINNESOTA, so thanks for that. My last two in were CREST and GROSS; particularly frustrating, as I had them fairly early on, but couldn’t figure out how either worked. Finally remembered the snooker sense of spider, and then saw how to parse GROSS.
  4. Fast, but messed up by putting in SYBIL without paying enough attention to the wordplay, So DNF
  5. I tried to find this in Paris and London but have failed. Where might this still be available or have those days passed me by? Baristas are a law unto themselves but I do admire their ability to create delightful images from milk froth and cocoa powder. It’s art, innit!?

    FOI 2dn FIRST BORN

    LOI 26ac CREST

    COD 14ac RAT POISON

    WOD 7dn CARDI (CARDIGAN short form)
    Americans will not understand the Bennettian expression ‘a sensible cardi’ from M&S – whilst they trog round the greens in those dreadful fifties ‘diamond’ sweaters.

    Please! A ‘spider’ is not a stick! It is a special ‘cue’.

    1. A spider is not a cue – the cue is what is placed on the spider. I speak with the authority of a youth misspent in snooker halls!
  6. That’s the state motto of MINNESOTA… I saw the answer very early on but couldn’t parse, as I was stuck on seeing “The writer’s rejected” as IM <–, and then couldn’t fathom what “nineteen characters” was doing in there. All the characters in “nineteen” are there (as a letter bank, it holds only N, I, E and T), but that would overlap with MI. It’s a pretty devious way to clue A TO S, I gotta hand it to our anonymous setter. I also didn’t parse DISCO, but have no excuses there. The clue for 5 down is indeed passing strange.

    Edited at 2018-08-20 03:02 am (UTC)

  7. … so pretty happy with this time for me, given the other times so far. I also didn’t properly parse MINNESOTA, so my thanks also.

    There seemed to be some more complex substitutions, e.g. longer deletions (e.g. 6, 20 and 21d) and add/subtract separately in 22a, and the 19 letter reference in 17a, which we’ve seen before but I missed this time. Thanks to the setter.

    Thanks, U, for the blog. Your NITCH, by the way, just keeps you on your toes 😉

  8. I have discovered that the failing NY Times crossword is FAKE!! Not even cryptic. No surprises there! So I am switching to the London Times Crossword. I am told Monday is an easy one so my 3m 19s looks to be just fine from this stable genius!
    As Don McGahn (SAD!) will tell you I’m not happy about the SNITCH!(FAKE TIMES!) So look out McGoo, Jason et al! – potus is now the new sheriff in the clubhouse! Not fond of 1ac SOFT POWER (SAD!) or 19ac MINNESOTA uber-liberals (SAD!).
    Liked 6ac DACHA – 12ac HECTORING – 8dn ARROGANCE – 2dn FIRST BORN and 13ac GROSS.

    Melania – spellcheck.

    Edited at 2018-08-20 04:30 am (UTC)

    1. Хорошая попытка, но недостаточно орфографических ошибок. Мелания не так хороша. Ваш друг, Владимир
        2. Khoroshaya popytka, no nedostatochno orfograficheskikh oshibok. Melaniya ne tak khorosha. Vash drug, Vladimir?

          Champagne humour, I wish to send you a bottle of fizz. Melaniya sends champagne too. Vladimir asks What drugs are you on?

  10. In London with no printer; so tried solving on line for the first time and what a mess, having to retype answers as cursor skipped over here and there. But puzzle was entertaining; thank you, setter and ulaca for the excellent blog
      1. But be warned that the cursor will still skip the first square(s) if it’s/they’re filled.
    2. It’s good to see you contributing again, Uncle Yap! Hope you have a good time in London.
  11. Yup. SYBIL, which my Chambers allows but the wordplay doesn’t. Familiar from the Dies Irae so beloved of really noisy composers (including HOLST, who uses the ancient tune in “Saturn”):
    Dies iræ, dies illa
    Solvet sæclum in favilla,
    Teste David cum Sibylla.
    Which was translated in my sleeve notes to Berlioz’ version:
    Day of wrath and doom impending
    Heaven and earth in ashes ending
    David’s word with Sybil’s (sic) blending
    So that’s my other excuse.
    Otherwise easy enough, even with the weird 5d. Rain is surely not a consequence of weather forecasting, unless, I suppose, the forecasters are David and Sibyl.
    I liked the answer-as-clue OUT OF STEP.
  12. Zipped through this in about 12 minutes but with a coupla Monday morning mistakes, including the same SYBIL as paulmci,

    I’d never knowingly heard the phrase SOFT POWER before and I’m still not 100% clear what it is, but presumably something like sending Sting instead of a gunboat.

  13. 30 mins with toast and home-made orange marmalade (not our home). Delicious.
    Straightforwardish – except parsing nineteen characters.
    Most I liked: Rat-poison (is it really hyphenated?) and COD to the reverse engineering Out of Step.
    Thanks setter and U.
  14. Michelangelo depicts five Sibyls on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel – Delphic, Erythraean etc.
  15. This seemed pretty Mondayish to me, with my time much quicker than any I managed last week. I liked seeing a snooker reference in place of the usual cricket reference, and hope the setter sees fit to progress from the spider to the swan neck (a sort of extended spider).
  16. ….with TEQUILA and OATMEAL. Well, actually it was tea, and oat muesli with fresh raspberries.

    FOI LATCH, after which I turned the biff machine up to full power and went for it. After completion, I successfully parsed three of my four biffs, so thanks to Ulaca for LOI PIQUE, which couldn’t be anything else but I couldn’t see the mechanics of “que”.

    DNK SOFT POWER (“Jaw jaw, not war war” ?)

    I tend to spell the garment “cardie”, and note that Chambers gives both that and “cardy”. Since CARDI is the main entry, I must try to mend my ways. Not an item found in my limited wardrobe.

    COD STAIRWELL (sounds like a recipe instruction if you’re a Scouser).

    1. Let’s be honest – Chambers allows just about anything. I think they hunt out bizarre spellings – maybe even hire people to use them in print, so they get into their corpora of choice and thence, via concordancing, into the BRB.
  17. Under seventeen minutes, so pleasing. Did not parse MINNESOTA, so thanks. Agree that the domestic pets are rather a strained answer and clue.

    Can I please recommend today’s QC?

    Thanks ulaca and setter.

  18. Back to solving after a week in Northumbria. The holiday was good, and I’ve probably learned a few things that might help me with future puzzles, like the names of coastal resorts and castles, but I definitely don’t do well with crosswords when there’s company at the breakfast table…

    About three quarters of an hour today, with FOI 1d SIBYL (luckily put in from the wordplay, so with the letters in the right order!) and LOI 6d DISCO.

    There’s a cafe called Baristas in Bristol, near a few legal chambers, and the sign on the tip jar says, “Please give generously. My mum thinks I’m a barrister!”

    1. The BARISTA joke is well deserving of a place the Edinburgh Festival’s top ten jokes (Dave Awards):-

      1. Working at the JobCentre has to be a tense job – knowing that if you get fired, you still have to come back the next day! (Adam Rowe)

      5. What do the colour-blind do when they are told to eat their greens? (Flo & Joan)

    2. These days for those in the junior ranks of the criminal bar BARISTA would be a more lucrative profession.
      1. I was always under the impression that the entire bar was criminal. Perhaps, only in Hong Kong?
  19. …or hell on earth? 17 minutes on this, a welcome change from recent tortoise times. Since I first became aware of the term BARISTA a few years ago, I’ve wondered if pouring hot water on to Nescafé qualifies me for the honour. You all told me I was a philistine last time I wrote something similar, a badge I wear proudly. I’ve spent a few minutes trying to find something I remember George Harrison saying (frequently a man after my own heart) that all DISCO music was crap. Can’t find it but he seems to have said something similar about rap. COD to GROSS. Thank you U and setter.

    Edited at 2018-08-20 08:37 am (UTC)

  20. Straightforward but not too much so, just as esteemed blogger says. Enjoyed the AtoS bit and the comforting cruciverbal cliches, eg flight = stairs, US lawyer = DA, Times = by etc etc.
    I would spell it cardie, as in “She’s so old she still wears cardies.” And I am bemused by the ability of baristas to successfully pretend theirs is not the most menial of jobs
  21. No problems, 21 minutes, in comfort, no more tedious taxi mornings. LOI was FIRTH FOI SIBYL.
  22. 8:08. Lots of biffing today.
    Sadly the UK’s SOFT POWER status is a thing of the past. These days we are an object of bemusement and pity. Even the French will sympathetically change the subject.
  23. 11:04.

    COD First Born.

    I didn’t manage to parse Gross. I don’t recall coming across sustaining as an inclusion indicator before. Nor SS for bodyguard.

  24. 20’23. Surprised at cardi spelling. As for UK soft power, it’s by no means a thing of the past (keriothe above). The possibilities outside the Continent are massive. Within too it’s not exactly extinct.
  25. Gentle Monday offering, with Sybil unknown. Nothing to frighten the horses here, but I did stick with an unparsed DHOTI for a while as the only clothing I could think of ending in I. I also queried the double duty ‘first’- didn’t seem right.
  26. 7m 21s and felt a bit longer. Nothing too tricky today, although I don’t think I knew SIBYL before, and briefly threw myself with the nonsensical GYMNATICS – fortunately CREST put me back on track.
  27. Nobody else here appears to have committed my howler, which was thinking idly of the FIRTH of FORTH and mixing up which one is the river and which one the inlet. I wasn’t helped by the fact that when you’re getting there from FI(f)TH, FO(u)RTH is not very far away. I’m also guessing that the regular solvers who are also down there with me on 1 error did the same thing. D’oh!
    1. SYBIL seems to have been the main culprit. I was helped there by being a sufficiently poor speller to have no firm preconceived idea about where the Y should go.
      1. Ah, yes, you may be right. Obviously, as a smug classicist, I overlooked the possibility of that other elephant trap 🙂
        1. If I were a smug classsicist I’d probably have got it wrong: I generally make mistakes when I think I know how to spell things.
    2. Somebody else did just that (and I’m glad I’m not alone). Just not thinking hard enough, and jumping to conclusions about inlet, fraction and loudly=homophone. Oh well.
  29. Back in the saddle after a couple of weeks in Crete, 13:37.

    Re the FIRTH clue, a pedant would point out the the wordplay is somewhat imprecise in that it doesn’t indicate which F should be removed from FIFTH, although there are certain problems with IFRTH, IRFTH and IFTRH as possible answers.

    No problems with SIBYL, probably because an hour spent at Knossos last week means my knowledge of the classics is pretty much where it would have been had I got a double first at Oxford or the other one.

    Yamas!

    Edited at 2018-08-20 12:09 pm (UTC)

    1. Another pedant might reply that to indicate which f could be taken as a precision too far: the clue is no less accurate as it is. (In addition, there’s a hint of the missing one being replaced by ‘run’.)

      Edited at 2018-08-20 12:39 pm (UTC)

  30. 16:04. I took a while to work out the parsing of BARISTA and INSURER, which delayed me a bit. I liked the A to S at 17a. As for 5d, I did wonder about it being a consequence of the WEATHER FORECAST. May the forecaster was a rain-dancer?
  31. A pleasant 21:09 with SOFT POWER FOI and INSURER LOI. I followed the wordplay for SIBYL and removed the biffed FJORD at 22a when STAIRWELL forced me to read the clue properly. A quick consideration of Firth of Forth settled which was the inlet and which the river. It took a minute or two to parse GROSS, and I never did get round to parsing the nineteen in MINNESOTA, so thanks to U for that. I particularly liked RAT POISON. I put in RAIN CATS AND DOGS with a shrug. Nice puzzle. Thanks setter and U.
  32. 18 mins. Didn’t parse Minnesota. Threw in staircase, but realised the error after a minute or so. 4dn an odd clue. Great blog, thanks.
  34. Dashed through this quickly but couldn’t (didn’t) parse Insurer, Gross, Minnesota, Disco and I also had “Sybil’.
    Rather surprised at SS for bodyguard.
      1. Thanks for the link to “Crossword Unclued”, of which I was not aware – could be handy in future!
  35. I knew I should not have investigated – SNITCH!
    Before I understood the methodology – and the score for today’s puzzle- I was congratulating myself on one of my best solves since taking up the TC (sub 40 mins – no chuckling), only to find it was more a reflection of the puzzle difficulty.
    Still at least a High SNITCH gives me more excuses going forward.
  36. Not very taxing, but that was OK with me. Around 15 minutes, and I can’t remember any real hold ups, except that I didn’t really know how to define SOFT POWER. Regards.
  37. Ok, I have now used up both hands and will be moving onto toes next time I successfully finish one of these. Invariant
  38. 14:06. After some sluggish solving times last week I was thrilled to stop the clock on this one and find that not only had I recorded a PB but I had also gone under the magic 15 minute mark for the first time, quite a thrill. As for the puzzle, well I ripped through it like it was a fragile England middle order batting line up. No hold ups. I thought the use of forecaster in the clue to 1dn and forecast in the solution to 4dn might have been better avoided. As for 9ac, I’m reading a collection of AA Gill’s writing at the moment. The last entry before I got off the train was on Starbucks. It is, needless to say, merciless, coruscating and very funny.
  39. 40 minutes on this, not too bad. A number of entries like BARISTA and INSURER were easy to biff, checking the wordplay only afterwards (MINNESOTA is in this category, too, although I did actually understand the wordplay right away). GROSS took me a long while to understand and I stared at CREST for a while trying to figure out what the spider had to do with it (not being a snooker player). COD to RAT-POISON for the superb surface.

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