Times Cryptic 27458

Author   jackktPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic

I’ve no solving time to offer for this one as I was interrupted and lost track of it, but somewhere between 40 minutes and an hour.

As usual definitions are underlined in bold italics, {deletions and substitutions are in curly brackets} and [anagrinds, containment, reversal and other indicators in square ones]

Across
1 Shimmering in image around retina’s start – of one perhaps (8)
MIGRAINE : Anagram (shimmering) of IN IMAGE containing [around] R{etina} [start]. Disturbed vision is one of the symptoms of  migraine. Take as much or as little as you need of the clue as the definition.
5 Party with great chat (6)
CONFAB : CON (party), FAB (great). I’ve always preferred ‘conflab’ myself, but both are valid.
9 Knitted cashmere? I don’t know (6,2)
SEARCH ME : Anagram [knitted] of CASHMERE
10 Screen employees coming back into agency (6)
CINEMA : MEN (employees) reversed [coming back] and contained by [into] CIA (agency)
12 Hate crime, alternatively (5)
ABHOR : ABH (crime – Actual Bodily Harm), OR (alternatively)
13 Disgusted after losing rugby, Pacific nation gets sedentary (9)
NAUSEATED : NAU{ru} (Pacific nation) [after losing rugby – Rugby Union], SEATED (sedentary). I didn’t know this country in Oceania.
14 Pitch drink containers in bins (5,7)
FIELD GLASSES : FIELD (pitch – sport), GLASSES (drink containers). ‘Bins’ is short for ‘binoculars’.
18 Chippendale, say, for PM? (7-5)
CABINET-MAKER : Two definitions of sorts, the second referring to the Prime Minister’s role of appointing (and sacking) Cabinet ministers.
21 The opposite of bad poet being listened to (4,5)
VICE VERSA : VICE (bad), then VERSA sounds like [being listened to] “verser” (poet). I thought this was a made-up word, but it’s genuine!
23 Doctor welcoming green colour scheme (5)
DECOR : DR (doctor) containing [welcoming] ECO (green)
24 Cross Noah initially put in his boat? (6)
NARKED : N{oah} [initially], ARKED (put in his boat?) –  the second part tongue-in-cheek as indicated by the question mark
25 Depressed players dropped (4,4)
CAST DOWN : CAST (players), DOWN (dropped)
26 Tip remains of cigarette in a line on page (2,4)
EN DASH : END (tip), ASH (remains of cigarette). This is the shorter of the two dashes often seen in printing, the other being the ’em dash’.
27 Tiresome letters featuring what one had for lunch? (8)
OMELETTE : Hidden in [featuring] {tires}OME LETTE{rs}
Down
1 Model cut after motorway accident (6)
MISHAP : M1 (motorway), SHAP{e} (model) [cut]
2 They use axes: fruit chopped has to be hollowed out (6)
GRAPHS : GRAP{e} (fruit) [chopped], H{a}S [hollowed out]
3 Backing off, agreeing to accept nothing – that’ll produce noise from squeezed middle (9)
ACCORDION : ACCORDIN{g} (agreeing) [backing off] containing [to accept] 0 (nothing)
4 Toilet in all-female preserve being given handle? (12)
NOMENCLATURE : LAT (toilet) contained by [in] NO MEN (all-female) + CURE (preserve). ‘Handle’ is slang for ‘name’. ‘Lat’ is short for ‘latrine’, more usually appearing in the plural form as ‘lats’.
6 Old climber like Jacob? (5)
OVINE : O (old), VINE (climber). ‘Jacob’ is a breed of sheep.
7 Escape exam as fast as possible (8)
FLEETEST : FLEE (escape), TEST (exam). I can’t find confirmation that this is a word but it sounds vaguely familiar in the context of someone being ‘fleetest of foot’. Having said that, I think it would mean the fastest of a particular group rather than as fast as possible.
8 Rather dull, getting flatter (8)
BLANDISH : Two meanings of sorts
11 What’s disturbed rural blag with weapon? (7,5)
BURGLAR ALARM : Anagram [disturbed] of RURAL BLAG, then ARM [weapon]
15 Reported cane toad swimming on top of lake (9)
ANECDOTAL : Anagram [swimming] of CANE TOAD, L (lake) or L{ake} [top of] – either would work in a Down clue
16 Shilling and cents repay search through rubbish (8)
SCAVENGE : S (shilling), C (cents),  AVENGE (repay)
17 Outside broadcasts restored in secret? (8)
OBSCURED : OBS (Outside Broadcasts), CURED (restored)
19 Approach from company’s restricted by legislation (6)
ACCOST : COS (company’s) contained [restricted] by ACT (legislation)
20 British football team in Lyon getting medal (6)
BRONZE : BR (British), ONZE (football team in Lyon – French for 11)
22 Opinions on western society are competing (5)
VIEWS : VIE (are competing), W (western), S (society)

43 comments on “Times Cryptic 27458”

  1. This was a nice steady solve done in the background while also doing various other things. I would guess I would have taken 20-25 minutes if I’d not been replying to emails and stuff at the same time. I just felt on the right wavelength. For example, I read “They use axes..” and almost wrote in GRAPHS without bothering to read the wordplay. Some days are like that. Some…not so much.
  2. Like Vinyl, I could make nothing of ABHOR, and now I know why: NHO ABH. I biffed ACCORDION & NOMENCLATURE; returning to them later, I parsed the former, but couldn’t get past NOMEN. And as it turned out, that and FIELD GLASSES occupied the last 6 minutes of my time. And now I know why: DNH LAT, BINS (although I finally guessed the latter). I assumed that there’s a kind of sheep named Jacob, and it seems I was correct. No problem with FLEETEST: He ran his fleetest, but the bear ran faster. I don’t have empirical data, but ANECDOTAL seems to have become quite popular among setters.
    1. My intial problem with FLEETEST was that it’s not in any of the usual sources. I’ve since tracked it down in a couple of obscure on-line dictionaries and the mainstream American-based dictionary.com.
      1. But I wouldn’t expect FLEETEST to be in any source, anymore than I’d expect OLDEST to be; ‘fleet’ (fleet 2 in ODE) is an adjective, and being monosyllabic would likely take -er and -est. Regular inflected forms are never given. Or am I missing something?
  3. This was fun. I had a vague memory of ABH, gotta be from here, but OBSCURED, though rather obvious at that point, was my LOI, because I didn’t know (or recall) Outside Broadcasts.
  4. MIRAGING at 1ac went in early, but later did not accord with 3dn. It was of course not much of a headache as MIGRAINE followed soon after.

    FOI 18ac CABINET MAKER – the wood used must be mainly chestnut.

    LOI 14ac FIELD (GLASSES) bins a semi-&Lit?

    COD 12ac ABHOR – very neat – made me think of the deliciously dangerous Zsa-Zsa (but that would include GBH). Talking of which I also liked 10ac CINEMA

    WOD 4dn NOMENCLATURE

    Not too demanding and 35 minutes was my time.

    Edited at 2019-09-17 04:11 am (UTC)

  5. I spent 10-15 minutes on FIELD GLASSES, my LOI, to finish in 40 minutes. The only abbreviation I’ve heard is ‘binos’, but I see that ‘bins’ is in Chambers. I couldn’t work out how LAT stood for ‘Toilet’ (‘lavatory’, please!) in 4d, so now one more option to add to the ‘lav, can’ etc list.

    Taking the whole clue as the def., MIGRAINE was my favourite.

    Thanks to setter and blogger

  6. 31 minutes, so similar to yesterday.

    I’ve never heard of ‘bins’ used for anything but eyeglasses, and, though one can hardly doubt the derivation from ‘binoculars’, a part of me hopes that it is co-derived from CRS ‘bins and receptacles’. Hopefully, this post will help enhance that particular urban legend (or ‘myth’, with a tip of the hat to our blogger) – if indeed it is one.

  7. 11:49 … some neat clues that weren’t necessarily appreciated by a solver attempting to achieve. ‘flow state’.

    I really like the idea of Noah being ‘arked’.

    Ninja Turtling is all very well until it makes a solver waste a lot of time trying to turn a prime minister into a male stripper at 18a

    1. A news story still to come perhaps? After previous revelations about things that went on amongst the 1980s Bullingdon set involving a previous PM and a dead pig nothing would surprise me!
  8. A nice quick 30 minutes for me, pretty much top-to-bottom, though I had to come back to 21a VICE VERSA and LOI 16d SCAVENGE once I got to the end. Enjoyed 24a NARKED. Bought a pair of bins this year, which probably helped them spring to mind, though I’d probably have to go back to the Famous Five books to find them called FIELD GLASSES…

    The only thing I really take objection to is the image being cast in my mind of our current PM as a male stripper. Almost as bad as having Piers Morgan brought to mind yesterday.

    Edited at 2019-09-17 06:07 am (UTC)

    2. The Famous Five was the first thing I thought of when I saw field glasses appear in the grid!
  9. Same problem as others with FIELD GLASSES pushed my time to a still-sprightly 16.51. I was looking for the more likely spectacles (in my version of bins) and put off by the toilet in NOMENCLATURE not being lav or loo, and consequently not trusting the L in the pitch word – tar, throw, dark? So are we entertained.
    FLEETEST went in without a qualm, as I couldn’t think why fleet wouldn’t have comparative forms.
    I wonder how much longer we’ll be able to use the non-inclusive “men” as “employees”?
    Liked Jack’s chatty commentary.
  10. 14:18. Odd to see the same word as an answer in both the QC and 15×15. In enjoyed this. LOI EN DASH. I liked FIELD GLASSES, BRONZE and NARKED.
  11. 16 minutes, with the NE and CINEMA last to fall, and hesitating for a while over MIGRAINE. COD to NARKED. I liked NOMENCLATURE too. You can make an OMELETTE without breaking letters. It’s the start of major dental work for me this affo with a three hour appointment. I feel NAUSEATED and CAST DOWN already. Thank you Jack and setter.
  12. Not actually hard from a cryptic bit perspective, but some extra toughness ladled into the definitions, for me.

    I’ve heard ‘bins’ used to mean spectacles too, in your common parlance.

    1. I think Terry Wogan used to refer to his ‘bins’ on the radio, something which baffled me when I first heard it.
  14. A gentle write-in. Knew all of the vocab including ‘bins’. COD to ABHOR or. possibly, to Walpole dancing?
  15. I also thought bins were eyes, but having got GLASSES it became clearer. Really liked NARKED. Dnk LAT. Jacob reasonably well-known. Had to work out EN DASH.

    10’45” thanks jack and setter.

  17. ….an OMELETTE for my lunch, it was nothing to write home about. Had it been Stilton and mushroom however….

    NHO EN DASH but it was fairly obvious. No other problems.

    FOI SEARCH ME
    LOI NAUSEATED
    COD ABHOR
    TIME 10:11

  18. I was flying with this, the NW almost installing itself, until I was left with the NE corner, where 5a, 10a, 6d and 8d stymied me for a good 10 minutes until CINEMA finally hove into view, after which BLANDISH, CONFAB and OVINE fell quickly. I guessed LAT was short for latrine and knew ABH. I managed to spell ACCORDION correctly this time by following the wordplay meticulously. Liked BRONZE. I was saved from disaster by a thorough proof read, where I discovered that my biffed CABINET TABLE had messed up ANLCDOTAL. Phew! No problem with FIELD GLASSES once I’d got rid of the posited DING ending for BLANDISH. Nice puzzle. 37:00. Thanks setter and Jack.
  19. 8:26. No problems. CONFAB is short for ‘confabulation’, so ‘conflab’ is a linguistic mutation, dating from the late 19th century according to Lexico. Nothing wrong with that, of course.
    I didn’t know ‘bins’ as either spectacles or binoculars. To me they’re more likely to be speakers.
  20. Same as others petering out halfway through NOMENCLATURE. I did just about remember ABH and GBH from first year law but that’s an awful long time ago. Ditto on FIELD GLASSES – we’d always called them binos. There’s a rather good spooky M.R. James story called A View From A Hill that features some sinister ones. I thought MIGRAINE was very nicely done and paired with NAUSEATED was a spot-on description. I wonder if the setter is a sufferer. 15.41
  21. Pleasant, none too hard, but, like yesterday’s, still interesting. The only NHO was the abbreviated ‘lat’, so nothing to prevent a smooth solve.
  22. Eighteen minutes and all parsed apart from NOMENCLATURE, where I seem not to be the only one whoI got no further than NO MEN. I spent a while wondering why 1ac wasn’t something to do with mirages; otherwise all downhill sailing.
  23. Would have been more straightforward had I not initially put DOWN CAST instead of CAST DOWN, and then tried to make the crossing clues fit. But both BRONZE and BLANDISH were amusing.
  24. As usual baffled by the last 2. In this case, ABHOR (knew GBH….) and the unknown EN DASH, for which I should have seen the cryptic straight away but didn’t.
    Otherwise very friendly. COD NARKED.
    My ONZE are playing in Napoli tonight, let’s hope they stay as an ONZE.
  25. I liked Narked. Otherwise, I was multiples of lambda away from the wavelength, and mega minutes past a reportable time.

    Edited at 2019-09-17 03:34 pm (UTC)

  26. I can’t find any references to lat or lats as an abbreviation for latrine(s). Perhaps the setter’s personal usage? Nicky
  27. At guide camp in the sixties the lavatory trenches were always referred to as the lats, so no problem for me.
    They were very unpleasant!
    Caro

    1. You may well be right, and that’s actually how I annotated the clue on my printout, but I changed my mind when writing the blog on a whim that in retrospect is not quite clear to me now. I had rather expected some debate about this but you are the first to query it.
  29. 24:36. I had a bit of a struggle to remember the word ovine but nothing too difficult.
  30. Did anyone else note the choice of Lyon as the French reference in 20d? Our very own England footballer Lucy BRONZE plays for Lyon.

    42:36

  31. If you don’t know the abbreviation you are not followers of Simon Barnes in naturalist mode. He uses it a lot.

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