Times Quick Cryptic No 3014 by Teazel

104 comments on “Times Quick Cryptic No 3014 by Teazel”

1. 11:43. Took several alphabet trawls to get to LOI SIGNALLY.

2. There were two things I didn’t know – the snooker clue, and Coniston Water, which held me up considerably. All Blacks had to be right, and Coniston Water was the only reasonable arrangement of the anagram letters, so I did finish. The rest was not terribly difficult, although I can never remember how to spell elegiast.

   Time: 10:45

   1. Being 80, Elegiast was the first one I got …

3. Lots of GK in this puzzle (ALL BLACKS, CONISTON WATER, NEWGATE, PHOBOS, ELEGIAST). Some of these were clued pretty easily, and I knew most of them, but ELEGIAST beat me–I’ve never heard of it and it doesn’t look likely to be a word. Add in SIGNALLY and this feels like a classic Teazel showing-off-how-much-they-know puzzle, rather than a genuine attempt at setting a good QC.
   I know all the old people will tell me about how they learned about ELEGIAST at school, but it’s not really the point, this kind of clue alienates so many potential new solvers that it defeats the purpose of having a QC in the first place.

   1. +1

   2. Agreed, too many esoteric clues. This puzzle felt prohibitively tricky for a relative newcomer to cryptics and was quite frustrating.

   3. You don’t have to look back too many days to find me saying there are words which I expect to find in the 15×15 and not the QC.

      But whether it is showing off or the setter backing themselves into a corner with their choice of crossing words is open to debate.

      It seems to me it would be time consuming to rework today’s grid to remove ELEGIAST or SIGNALLY which suggests Teazel backed themselves into a corner.

   4. I think that’s a little harsh. As New Driver has said, in the 15×15 you will regularly come across words you don’t know that you have to construct from the wordplay and this is a practice clue for that. I thought “elegy” when I saw “lamenting” and saw “leg” for “stage”, added the I and then thought of the “particular direction” E_A_. As it happens ELEGIAST is the only word in the usual dictionaries that fits E_E_I_S_, so I doubt our setter was showing off – he just had to use the word or rebuild the NW corner in his grid to avoid it. As for SIGNALLY it’s a perfectly good word and has as it’s definition in the clue exactly the first definition in Collins, so I don’t think that’s at all unfair or unreasonable.

      1. My opinion would be that I’m no fan of such clues in the 15×15 either.
         The point with SIGNALLY has nothing to do with correctness, just obscurity.

      2. I agree. Thanks for the comment.

   5. I’m 74 and I don’t recall learning about elegiast….mind you, I was in the S stream, S for science, not A for academic. T as in technical for those that didn’t suit A or S.

      1. Me too and me neither. I just read.

   6. I can’t agree with that at all. Surely the first three are the commonest of general knowledge, you would have had to live in a cave all of your life not to know them. Phobos a little more obscure but very clear from the wordplay. Elegiast was my last but one in and the mangled vowel order troubled me for a while, but Elegy as a lamenting poem is surely commonplace and then the word play could be nothing else. If you don’t want any sort of challenge at all why not see how fast you can write down your own name and address each morning?

      1. If the main challenge of a clue is knowing certain specific facts, I think it’s a weak clue. For someone who knows the fact, the clue is trivial. For someone who doesn’t know it, it’s much harder and impossible to verify completely. (I want a word puzzle, not a test of ancient poets). A clever bit of wordplay using commonplace words is always my favorite kind of clue.
         I think this is true of any kind of puzzle actually, not just cryptic crosswords. If the main difficulty of a puzzle is obscurity (eg very uncommon words, domain-specific knowledge, lots of jigsaw pieces that look the same, whatever it is) then I don’t think it’s very interesting.

   7. I concur, several defeated me in time. The worst was All Blacks, the clue being just plain nasty. Neither satisfying nor neat.

      1. Name three sports teams that are more famous world-wide than the all blacks? Or is sport just beneath you?

         If East split by Leg I is not clear enough wordplay, then I am not sure what is.

         1. I got elegiast ok after a while. The ones that got me were All Blacks , Signally, Crocodile and Loll in Lollipop. Nothing wrong with Football, Cricket , Tennis. I am just a common , “jealous” guy.

         2. So I have to translate STAGE to LEG and decide that CERTAIN DIRECTION means EAST? Those bits are not straightforward. Added to which I ws assuming an answer of a poet (given assorted GK required elsewhere). No not at all straightforward!

   8. I am in complete agreement. Once again, too many inappropriate clues for a QC

4. 11 minutes for the third consecutive day.

   PHOBOS from wordplay, although it rang a faint bell. I am very bad on moons of planets apart from IO which I learnt from crosswords and have never forgotten.

   The streets on the housing development where I live are named after places in the Lake District so CONISTON WATER was no problem for me.

   I don’t think QC setters ever seek to show off how much they know but I understand that sometimes they are perceived to misjudge the target audience.

   My only problem today was having to wait for checkers before entering ELEGIAST as although I knew the word that was required I can never remember how to spell this alternative to the much more sensible ‘elegist’. I’m rather surprised a search of the archive suggests that ELEGIAST is making only its second appearance in the TfTT era, the last time being in a 15×15 7 years ago, a puzzle described by Verlaine (of all people) as ‘a stinker’. That must have been a tough day as he needed ‘in the region of 20 minutes’! I needed 80.

   1. With a few exceptions, the streets in my retirement community were named after Indian tribes. Not very PC, but it was 1972. This is sometimes helpful with the puzzles.

      1. The roads in our estate are all named after reservoirs – very prosaic! The Lake District had already been taken 😂

         1. It was many years before I discovered nearby Stephen Langton Drive wasn’t named after an egotistical councillor 🤣 but fitted in with the King John, Richard, Eleanor, Knights, Crusader, Runnymede, Plantagenets theme where I live.

            1. We do also have roads named after local BIG SHOTS, although some do genuinely deserve the honour!

               1. I live on the ‘golf course’ estate, where the following courses are represented by road-names: Gleneagles, Lytham, St Andrews and Wentworth.

                  Nearby, we have the ‘racecourse’ estate, where the following are represented: Ascot, Goodwood, Haydock, Kempton, Lingfield, Newmarket, Redcar, Sandown, Thirsk

                  And just down the road, we have a very extensive set of Lake District-related streets, referencing lakes, dales, towns and villages: Ambleside, Bowness, Cartmel, Coniston, Derwent, Elterwater, Ennerdale, Esthwaite, Firbank, Grasmere, Grizedale, Honister, Kentmere, Keswick, Langdale, Lingmoor, Lowther, Lyth, Mardale, Patterdale, Rydal, Scafell, Skiddaw, Troutbeck, Ullswater and Windermere.

5. Got myself into a real tangle at the intersection of ELEGIAST and LOLLYPOP, where my erroneous spelling of one forced something even more unlikely on the other. By the time I’d sorted that out it was 8.40. Good QC I thought, thanks Teazel and John. Best wishes to all at The George!

6. Not noticing my laptop was unplugged and low on battery added considerably to my time. No records were going to be broken but a final time of 27.28 isn’t a fair reflection of my efforts! SIGNALLY was harder than in should have been for a football fan and ELEGIAST tested me too. Lost time trying to force ‘trunk road’ in to the space where CARRY AWAY ended up because it fitted even though ‘a road’ was most unlikely to clue it. All green and with a updated computer too – an efficient start to the day.

7. 13:45
   I’d merely fib if I said All Blacks were signally banal
   Mind you Argentinians might disagree
   Cheers Teazel and John

   1. Chapeau!

8. Felt a bit sluggish today, probably due to some clever misdirection by setter combined with a careless biff of ‘news’ at 5d.
   I had one of those moments for LOI MERELY where I had both components (me & rely) in mind but couldn’t see how they fitted together to make a sensible word. Cue palm to face when the penny dropped 🤦‍♂️😂.
   Finished in 9.04 with COD to LILLE.
   Thanks to John and Teazel.

9. 6.01

   Knew the GK though ALL BLACKS was near my LOI. And remembered that the poet is spelled oddly so checked the w/p carefully.

   Thanks John/Teazel

10. 13:43. Like Plett11 above, I bunged in NEWS which messed up the ALL BLACKS for too long. LOI SIGNALLY. I liked AMBLED and PHOBOS

11. 9:58 for the solve. Fingers crossed for ELEGIAST and SIGNALLY (LOI). Rather liked the latter once I could fully justify sign=recruit in a football context. I certainly thought this was a tougher puzzle but noted a couple of gimmes were offered up with railway=ry and me=me. Fortunately I checked the anagrist for CONISTON-WATER and spotted I needed a second O, not A – only knowing of it because I think it was where Donald Campbell died attempting to break the waterspeed record in Bluebird in the 60s.

    The week coming in at a smidge over 46mins albeit with Monday’s DNF which would have added a minute or two if I’d been alphatrawling my final answer instead of bunging something in hoping for a PB.

    Have a good weekend everybody; and thanks to JohnI and Teazel.

    Edit: 8:40 for the Weekend Special – thanks to Phil – slowed in the NW.

12. 12:04 for a satisfying Friday solve, with the main hold-ups being SIGNALLY (needed a letter search, but so clear when I saw it) and ELEGIAST, which I am not sure I have ever seen before but had to be. PHOBOS a splendid clue – was sent wondering what the synonyms for satellite phones were. I hesitated over BIG SHOT; it doesn’t look right for some reason and anyway I was trying to fit a P in there. But all done and parsed in regulation time at the end.

    Many thanks John for the blog and the Sunday Special, and I will see you tomorrow – mid afternoon at the earliest though as I have a lunch to attend for a friend’s 75th.

13. 13:33
    Needed a dictionary to check that ELEGIAST was a real alternative spelling of elegist, and a thesaurus to find sign=recruit for my LOI SIGNALLY.

    Having recently read Kim Stanley Robinson’s Mars trilogy helped with PHOBOS.

    Thanks John and Teazel

14. Phew. Quite difficult but got there in the end. LOsI SIGNALLY, PHOBOS. SW seemed tricky in general. Finished RHS first helped by CONISTON WATER.
    Liked NEWGATE, FEATURE, LANCE.
    I entered ELEGIAST but it looked so odd I tried to check the spelling, but twas not to be found in a large Times paper dictionary, just Elegist.
    Started at the bottom so LILLE was an early solve.
    Thanks, John. CNP FIB – oh dear.
    Have a good time tomorrow, all of you!

15. Somehow got all this right though didn’t deserve to, NHO PHOBOS (had to be) ELEGIAST (bunged in, nearly anagram of “stage I” but what about the L? – just hoped for the best) or LANCE corporal (biffed a weapon beginning with L). Thank you, John, for explaining it all. Liked SWAN LAKE.

    1. The moons of Mars are Phobos and Deimos, which mean fear and panic. This was thought fitting for a planet named after the god of war.

16. 15:38, LOI SIGNALLY. ELEGIAST is a pretty arcane word for a QC, I ruled out “elegist” as it didn’t fit. Where does that A come from?

    COD ALL BLACKS

    1. LEG (stage) I in EAST

       1. It was the A in the actual word ELEGIAST that I was querying. In English the suffix is IST, for Novelist, Classicist etc. Why not Elegyist, or if hard to pronounce, Elegist?

          1. It is an old spelling from the 18th century seen primarily in Oliver Goldsmith’s The Vicar of Wakefield (1766) Chapter 17. The suffix “-ast” is commonly used to mean “one connected with”, e.g. “ecdysiast”.

             1. Interesting. Ecdysiast is not commonly used in these parts. I am sure I am not the only one who had to look it up.
                I won’t spoil the fun by defining it here…..😄

                1. I think the dictionary compiler was having a bit of fun using that example.

                   1. Indeed. 😉

                2. Next time I’m in B&Q I will ask in which aisle I might find paint ecdysiast.

                   1. 👍😂

17. I got Elegiast right for the wrong reason. I word I had not heard of. Thought it was an anagram of Stage I…..

18. The usual frustrating but occasionally satisfying mix of clever clues. I couldn’t start in the NW corner so filled in the rest, steadily, and worked my way back to finish slowly. I spent too long on ALL BLACKS, AMBLED, ELEGIAST, but worked them out and biffed LANCE before parsing it.
    I appreciate Teazel’s imagination and skill but almost always feel he is closer to the 15×15 in standard. He can’t bring himself to set a QC at my level but I keep trying and I always get there in the end.
    Thanks to both.

19. From AMBLE to SOD in 7:56. Spotted the snooker reference straight away after AMBLE and LANCE were in place. Thanks Teazel and John.

20. After the first run through of the acrosses the top half was SIGNALLY blank. Fortunately a run through of the downs CHANGED all that and enabled me to get a good foothold. I had to stop myself biffing news at 5dn as it didn’t seem to work. I couldn’t parse CROCODILE wondering what the children were doing (doh!). NHO ELEGIAST as opposed to elegist and couldn’t parse it. A bit of a struggle as befits a Friday but I eventually sidled through the door of the SCC on 21 minutes.

    FOI – 11ac BUOY
    LOI – 10ac ELEGIAST
    COD – too many candidates to pick a winner. CROCODILE (now I understand it), ALL BLACKS and PHOBOS stood out.

    Thanks to Teazel and John

21. Quite tough today but some excellent clues I thought.
    20 minutes in all with much time spent on LOI SIGNALLY- a PDM once spotted and a good clue which seems to have troubled many of us.
    MERELY also held me up. NHO PHOBOS, clearly clued I thought.
    COD to MERELY; near miss to ALL BLACKS.
    David

22. Surprised others found this reasonably doable. 14:02 DNF, NHO CONISTON WATER.

    I probably sound dim asking this, but how is CROCODILE related to ‘children go in pairs’?

    1. Maybe it’s just a UK thing and maybe they don’t do it any more, but it is how a teacher asks (primary school) children to walk safely as a group on an outing, in a “crocodile” of children walking two-by-two.

       1. “In an old house in Paris
          That was covered in vines
          Lived twelve little girls
          In two straight lines.”

          (Madeline, written by an Austrian/American in 1939 about children in Paris.)

23. Nicely pitched QC. Liked 1 ac, being a rugby and snooker fan. Had no problems with SIGNALLY or ELEGIAST.

    Thanks Teazel and John. Hope you all have an enjoyable get- together. I shall be spending all weekend at an Advanced Association Croquet tournament

24. Finished correctly in 90 minutes. A good result for me.
    Five out of five for the week. A long time since I managed that.

    1. Good stuff!

    2. Well done Gordon 😊

    3. 👏

25. A good workout from Teazel meant I finished well over target at 14.22. My main problem was sorting out the top half of the puzzle where I rather carelessly bunged in NEWS for 5dn, and put a Y instead of an I in the middle of ELEGIAST. As a result my LOI ALL BLACKS took some time, and I was then able to rectify my mistakes. This is particularly annoying as my mind immediately went to snooker on seeing ‘maximum break’, but the correlation with all blacks being required for a 147 never came to mind.
    My total time for the week was 45.35, rather ruined by today’s time, giving me a daily average of 9.07. So all in all a good week.

26. I parsed 10, missed all blacks and byebye.
    CoD buOy, boo ie if you are from the other side of the pond.

27. My thanks to Johninterred and Teazel.
    I took a long time to find 1a All Blacks, then PDM.
    10a Elegiast is indeed the unique solution to those letters according to my Cheating Machine, and is marked by Wiktionary as archaic. But not hard to find IMO.
    16a Heat. Took a while to find Heath as the scrubland.
    23a Carry Away, no objections, but it is “green paint-ish.”

28. Enjoyed this well enough – DNK that spelling of ELEGIAST, but I like learning new words and it was very fairly clued. 8 mins plus change.
    Thanks Teasel, and John for the blog. Also Phil for the super weekender – one clue in particular made me chuckle!

29. 13.53 Slow throughout. I’d tried a biff of ALL ACCESS to see how it looked, which broke the top of CONISTON, making LOI ALL BLACKS unnecessarily difficult. Thanks John and Teazel.

30. Another lovely crossword ending in a DNF, fourth one this week. I didn’t get signally, even with the “ally” bit being clear, despite an alphabet trawl ( Sigh – nally not being a word).
    Put off looking for the anagram of Stage I, but at least managed to spell BUOY correctly (unlike last time it was out). Nice misdirection for Lance, but I am still not sure how bye-bye = cheers.
    Carry away was a write-in, so it didn’t occur to me while solving, but I agree that 23a is lime-coloured varnish.
    Thanks to Teazel and John.

    1. Cheers / Bye bye – two different forms of farewell 👋

31. 31:44

    Nearly escaped the SCC, biffing CROCODILE certainly helped but was then stuck for an eternity on ELEGIAST and LOI MERELY.

32. After yesterday’s shambles (a thumping DNF), I was pleased to cross the line in 35 minutes – especially as, when I kept records, Teazel (along with Wurm) always topped my list of the most challenging setters. And, what’s more, I fully parsed every clue as I went along – a rarity for me.

    My FOsI were BANAL, BUOY and CROCODILE and my LOSI were CARRY AWAY, MERELY and (the NHO) ELEGIAST. I won’t remember that word, but I may now remember what an elegy is.

    Many thanks to John and Teazel.

33. Teazel stretched but did not break me today, providing a 14:24 solve with plenty to enjoy. Thank goodness I’ve vaguely heard of the ALL BLACKS; when I had enough crossers it went in with the comment “must have something to do with snooker then” which is as close as I expect I’ll ever get to this sort of clue. ELEGIAST had me snookered too as I thought the grist was STAGE + I + ????????. I’ve learned CROCODILE at last so it went straight in, well not quite, as I always have to wonder if it might be alligator. And didn’t think of SWANK for swagger.

    CsOD were BIG SHOT, LILLE, and PHOBOS.

    Thanks to TEAZEL and what would I do without you bloggers! specifically, thanks to John today.

34. As others have said a stiff test in places with time spent on LOLLIPOP, MERELY, CROCODILE and the LOI SIGNALLY. About 40 minutes off and on but enjoyable and still a proper QC as far as I am concerned. It’s been a good week for QC puzzles.

    Thanks Teazel and John. Looking forward to Phil’s puzzle. Have a good get together at The George tomorrow; sorry not to be joining you.

35. I really enjoyed this and thought it was right on target for a Friday QC – snitch at 100 – and I escaped the SCC by a good margin which is always a pleasant surprise. Lots of smiles at the PDMs for ALL BLACKS, SIGNALLY, PHOBOS. LOI was ELEGIAST which I couldn’t spell and never parsed; once I had all the crossers I got lucky with the nanagram (near anagram) of STAGE I. Thank you John and Teasel. And thanks to Phil!

    1. nanagram, very good!

36. Dnf…

    As usual things come in groups, and I have another puzzle where the majority was finished in 18 mins but I just couldn’t get 12dn “Signally”. Personally, it felt a little clunky, but that’s probably because I’m just annoyed with myself, especially as I did a brief alphabet trawl and still didn’t see it.

    The rest was a good challenge though and it was nice to see Coniston Water as an answer.

    FOI – 1dn “Ambled”
    LOI – Dnf
    COD – 21ac “Lille”

    Thanks as usual!

    1. Saw Coniston Water and thought it would be safely stowed in your GK rucksack!

37. In a rush – maybe that explains why I got through this tricky puzzle in only slightly above average at 09:00 dead. Agonised over the vowels in ELEGIAST.

    Don’t agree with the criticisms about GK above – having to know odd stuff and odd words is all part of the fun.

    Many thanks John and Teazel.

    1. As you know, I feel the same as you on this subject. Learning new stuff and new words is also part of the fun! I never knew what litotes was until I did a 15×15 – not surprisingly, I find examples all over the place now 😅

       1. litotes are next to the bigtotes on your feet right? 🤣

          1. 😂😂😂🤣🤣🤣

          2. 😂😂😂

38. I got a bit lucky with the GK today and didn’t have too many problems, though SIGNALLY contributed significantly to my 14:31. Nice to have a day trip out of the SCC.

    Thank you for the blog!

39. 11:22

    Yes, at the tougher end of the scale, but surely not beyond it.

    LOI HEAT was my biggest problem.

    I enjoyed it, thanks all.

40. I really like Teazel puzzles and this was no exception. I didn’t have any particular problem with ELEGIAST as I’ve heard of an elegy and the wordplay was very kind. Great to learn a new word with an awkward spelling. Realise I didn’t properly parse SWAN LAKE, thinking it was ‘swan about’ for swagger and just moving on. Just got back from the Lakes so Coniston Water not a problem! The two that held me up were CHANGED (doh) and LOI SIGNALLY which required an alphabet trawl (and gets COD). Many thanks John and Teazel.

41. PHOBOS and ELEGIAST were correctly derived from the wordplay but I struggled with my LOI SIGNALLY. Otherwise it was an enjoyable solve with my favourites being CHANGED and MERELY. 6:47 Thanks John

42. Sorry to post late in the day but I did enjoy this. Only reservation was cheers for bye bye. I expect there are references to cheers being short for cheerio but the vast majority of people who say this mean thank you . Cheers though, but I don’t mean farewell 🙂

43. 13:08 to go from FIB to SIGNALLY. As Plett11 said above, held up by not seeing that “me” + “rely” is a real word (I was trying to pronounce it with three syllables, d’oh). That gets my COD today. And I never quite parsed ELEGIAST: after spotting that all the letters of STAGE were in there, I bunged it in with a mental shrug.

    Thanks to John and Teazel.

44. Needed some help to finish this, but overall an interesting and enjoyable puzzle.

45. Not a criticism and always willing to learn, but nobody seems to have an answer to why cheers = bye-bye.
    I will be in London tomorrow and look forward to meeting as many of you as possible.

    1. This was a MER for me as well.

    2. ODE has “(British English) expressing good wishes on parting or ending a conversation: ‘Cheers, Jack, see you later.’.” I have used that meaning on parting with someone myself.

    3. See gcook52, which is about 3 messages above this.

46. Trickier than normal for us and happy to come in at 14:47. I’ve come across elegiac at least a couple of times before but it’s always caught me out because elegaic always seems a more natural spelling. Fortunately, LOLLIPOP was there to help out. No problems with the GK other than Mrs T being much faster on the ALL BLACKS even though I’m the more frequent snooker player. She was also faster with the lake. We’ve cycled together around CONISTON WATER perhaps three times and she’s now faster there as well! Thanks, John and Teazel.

47. 9:14 today but I count myself fortunate that I spotted CONISTON WATER immediately and that PHOBOS was one of the few astronomical names I knew. I remember watching a documentary where it was mentioned and I remember thinking at the time that I’d never use the information in real life. (I happily count crosswords as being part of real life!)
    Thanks to Teazel and John.

48. Trickier than I usually like, but still doable – with diligence. Thought it a tad anglo-centric ire Coniston Water/Bye Bye.
    FOI11a Buoy
    LOI 15d Merely – I saw the elements of it earlier but needed to be sure
    COD 17a Swan Lake
    Will be looking forward to the weekend extra on Sunday.

49. No problem with ELEGIAST – even though I’ve never read it, I’m fully aware of Gray’s Elegy. One of these days… I’m sure I’ve said that before here as well 😅
    We had a lovely week in Coniston a couple of years ago, overdosing on Arts & Crafts and rounded off with a trip on the beautiful old steam gondola – highly recommended.
    Apart from my LOI which slowed me down, I thought this was quite straightforward and clawed back a couple of minutes from yesterday’s time. Perhaps ND was right! NEWGATE and BIG SHOT got ticks.
    11:29 FOI Ambled LOI Signally COD Coniston Water
    Thanks Teazel and John

    Hope you all have a good day tomorrow 🍻

50. DNF today, so did the same as yesterday and tried to work backwards from the answers to figure out the clues. A few of them still confused me, so thank you for the blog explaining those ones. 😁

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