Times Quick Cryptic No 1539 by Breadman

Author   JohninterredPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic

A medium difficulty puzzle from Breadman to finish the week, I feel, taking me just under my average time. Some eclectic general knowledge needed, although nothing too obscure – A famous boxer, Baltic geography, a type of wine, a children’s disease, a type of knitwear, an electrical weapon and a Scottish golf course. All readily gettable from the wordplay. COD to 4D for the nice surface. Thank-you Breadman. How did you all get on?

Definitions underlined in bold italics, (Abc)* indicating anagram of Abc, deletions and [] other indicators.

Across
1 Former boxer hurt Scotsman in company (8)
MARCIANO – MAR (hurt; injure) IAN (Scotsman) [in] CO (company). Nice to see Rocky for a change instead of “The Greatest“
5 Awkward situation moderate conservatives reversed (4)
STEW – Moderate conservatives are WETS. [Reversed] -> STEW.
8 Award winner is carrying Oscar shakily (8,5)
VICTORIA CROSS – VICTOR (winner) and IS outside [carrying] (Oscar)* [shakily]. Did anyone else try an anagram of “carrying Oscar” at first?
10 Former bailiff concerned about first female (5)
REEVE – RE (concerned about) EVE (first female).
11 One not returning into rough sea somewhere on the Baltic (7)
ESTONIA – I (one) NOT [returning]-> TONI [into] [rough] (sea)*.
12 Kitty, after quantity of money, brought back wine (6).
MUSCAT – CAT (Kitty) [after] SUM (quantity of money) [brought back] -> MUS. Muscat wine is mostly sweet, but I quite like it in the drier style of Alsace.
13 Expert training learner to drive forward (6)
PROPEL – PRO (expert) P.E. (training) L (learner).
16 More boisterous argument with the German and Republican (7)
ROWDIER – ROW (argument) [with] DIE (the, in German) [and] R (Republican).
18 Pub having the wow factor, don’t you think? (5)
INNIT – INN (pub) IT (the wow factor).
20 Where novices ski, carer with line’s adapted poles (7,6)
NURSERY SLOPES – Eminently biffable, NURSE (carer) RY’S (line’s; railway’s) [adapted] (poles)*.
21 From Truro, Denis travelled by horse (4)
RODE – Hidden in [From] TruRO DEnis.
22 Perhaps salver coated in ale and grass (8)
BETRAYER – TRAY (perhaps salver) [coated in] BEER (ale).
Down
1 Marriage completed, one changing residence? (5)
MOVER – M (Marriage) OVER (completed).
2 Richard set out children’s disease (7)
RICKETS – RICK (Richard) (set)* [out]. Caused by a lack of Vitamin D or Calcium, rickets has largely been eradicated in the Western world.
3 Special invite including musical drama producing no effect (11)
INOPERATIVE – [Special] (invite)* [including] OPERA (musical drama).
4 Caught infection in the end and felt sick (6)
NAILED – infectioN [in the end] AILED (felt sick). With the N and E in place when I got to this clue, my first thought was “netted”, but that clearly didn’t fit the wordplay.
6 Star won regularly on Scottish golf course (5)
TROON – Alternate letters [regularly] of STaR wOn and ON. Royal Troon has hosted the Open Championship 9 times, most recently in 2016.
7 Festive occasion used to be on part of boat (7)
WASSAIL – WAS (used to be) [on] SAIL (part of boat).
9 Insect larva to provide food on tall upright rock (11)
CATERPILLAR – CATER (provide food) [on] PILLAR (tall upright rock).
12 Sailor runs into sea, outwardly eager (7)
MARINER – R (runs) inside [into] MAIN (sea) and outside letters of [outwardly] EageR.
14 Criticise novel ploy for full suit of armour (7)
PANOPLY – I knew the word, but not what it meant. But I do now. PAN (criticise) [novel] (ploy)*
15 Patterned knitwear dear — fogy able to get half off repeatedly (6)
ARGYLE – Second half of each of deAR foGY abLE [to get half off repepeatedly].
17 Women’s Institute radical connected to the internet? (5)
WIRED – WI (Women’s Institute) RED (radical).
19 Stunner modelled again, maybe, on return (5)
TASER – If you modelled for an artist you would have SAT. If you did it again you would have RESAT. Reverse [on return} -> TASER.The “maybe” indicating you might resit for other reasons…. like my son with his driving test.

43 comments on “Times Quick Cryptic No 1539 by Breadman”

  1. Biffed 8ac and 11ac. I knew PANOPLY in its current sense but not in the archaic, intended sense, but it was easy enough to get. I was trying to do something with EX ALI at 1ac, finally gave it up as a bad idea. LOI MUSCAT. 7:41.
  3. It took me about 13 minutes to get to LOI 15d but I assumed the parsing was DR plus half of the two other words; so being weak on patterned knitwear I submitted. So one wrong in the end.Like yesterday there were a few harder clues and some easy stuff. FOI REEVE now learnt as a crossword staple. COD to ESTONIA where I was looking for a city. David

  4. Like yesterdays offering from Tracy, this proved too tricky for me.

    NURSERY SLOPES went in straight away as FOI. Although I don’t spend much time on them any more, I have recently returned from the white stuff.

    I spent far too long looking for an anagram for both ‘carrying oscar’ and ‘richard’ for 8dn and 2dn respectively.

    DNK MARCIANO and stuck in MOHAMMED which didn’t help in the NW corner.

    Otherwise I failed to see REEVE, PANOPLY, NAILED, INOPERATIVE, BETRAYER.

    Thanks to Breadman for the puzzle and John for the blog.

    Have a nice weekend!

  5. Enjoyable work out for 1.3 Kevins and a Very Good Day. Like Kevin I spent some time trying to work ALI into 1ac but got there in the end. My first thought at 8ac was indeed an anagram of “carrying Oscar” but fortunately I already had the V so didn’t waste time on it. NAILED was a smooth surface but a slightly iffy definition to my mind so COD to MARINER.

    Thanks Breadman and John. (Do try Muscat de Beaumes de Venise from Domaines des Bernadins, John, it’s a wonderful pudding wine.)

    Templar

    Edited at 2020-01-31 09:14 am (UTC)

  6. All over in 1.21130551817 Kevins and a lovely day here too.

    FOI 1ac Rocco MARCIANO 49-0

    LOI 13ac PROPEL

    COD 18ac INNIT yer modern English, innit!?

    WOD 12ac MUSCAT de Beaumes de Venise

    Edited at 2020-01-31 09:51 am (UTC)

  7. Outside my target at 17 minutes, but not sure why. I must be jaded after a rough and sleepless night. LOI ARGYLE where I couldn’t see what was going on for a goodly while. With WASSAIL, PANOPLY, MARCIANO and RICKETS, there’s a bit of a historic theme here.
  8. A nice end to the week.

    The parsing of Nursery Slopes should include “RYS” for the plural lines.

  9. No problems for me with MOVER in first, swiftly followed by MARCIANO and VICTORIA CROSS. Then a steady plod to LOI, INOPERATIVE. 7:56. Thanks Breadman and John.
  10. Lots of biffing again today (VICTORIA CROSS, MARINER, ARGYLE and probably a few others). I’d forgotten the original meaning of PANOPLY – a fine word.

    My father used to work in Truro with a fellow architect called Denis, who would occasionally turn up at a site visit on horseback.

    Many thanks to John and Breadman.
    4’ or so.

  11. ….or, rather, I didn’t as I had to work my way back to MARCIANO almost at the end.

    I had all the required GK, and thus finished within my target.

    FOI STEW
    LOI NAILED
    COD PROPEL

  12. 20:29 another quickish one. Surprised INNIT is now a word, and strangely pleased with myself with the way 22a emerged, writing in TRAY against the Y and seeing it suddenly fall into place as the thought and the deed coincided. Didn’t know that’s what PANOPLY means. Thanks Breadman and John.
      1. It doesn’t mean ‘full suit of armour’ any longer? Chambers has that as the first definition but doesn’t mark that meaning as (obs.). Interestingly it doesn’t have the definition “A panoply of things is a wide range of them, especially one that is considered impressive.” that is in Collins COBUILD but does refer to “a full or brilliant covering or array”. Dictionaries, eh? But I don’t suppose there are many who wear a panoply at all these days except in historical re-enactments.

        Edited at 2020-01-31 03:06 pm (UTC)

  14. But not easy either.

    9:19. Liked the imagery of a salver bearing beer and grass. LOI was ARGYLE. Tried a few combinations of letters from dear/fogy/able before arriving at an acceptable answer.

  15. Thanks Breadman and johninterred

    I know that M is an abbreviation for Married. However, I haven’t been
    able to find its use given for Marriage in any of the usual sources.
    Can anyone help with this?

    mike04

  16. I was quite lucky with this in that I am just about old enough to remember when Marciano rather than Ali was the greatest, so that gave me a good start in the NW. After that it was a fairly steady solve, but with a pause at 14d, having never come across the full suit of armour meaning. Loi was 4d, Nailed, where wrong end of the clue issues pushed me just north of 20mins. Overall, I thought this was a little too specialised (Reeve, Troon, Muscat, Argyle) for a QC, though in each case Breadman was generous with the cluing. Invariant
  17. Very good puzzle – was on my way to my average (30 mins or so) until I got stuck on my LOI – 22ac “Betrayer”. Nothing special but when the penny dropped it made me smile (thank goodness it wasn’t some obscure pasture!).

    Some nice clues: “Marciano”, “Muscat”, “Mariner”, “Taser” come to mind. Wasn’t sure whether the “tall upright rock” specifically meant Pillar Rock in the Lake District or a vertical column, but either way it added to surface of 9dn “Caterpillar”.

    FOI – 12dn “Mariner”
    LOI – 22ac “Betrayer”
    COD – Either 1ac “Marciano” or the above mentioned 22ac.

    Thanks as usual.

  18. I was just glad to finish. My GK was tested and found wanting. In reverse order of difficulty I struggled over MUSCAT(not a wine I’ve tried), TROON, WASSAIL and PANOPLY the last two requiring all the checkers and a heavy reliance on wordplay. 21 minutes but that’s alright INNIT?
  19. Steady solve again – no problem with any of the words, probably shows our age. Very quick on 15d which is our surname.
  20. It’s definitely a wavelength thing. I found this easy, although I must admit to not fully parsing Victoria Cross, and finished in <1K for A Great Day!

    No difficult vocab for me, and a good range of GK – I think we’ve had Reeve quite a lot recently, usually clued as an old magistrate or something similar. Perhaps it was in the biggie. Estonia seems to pop up regularly too.

    I didn’t know the original meaning of panoply either but the clue was clear.

    FOI Stew
    LOI Inoperative
    COD Innit – not at all keen on the word but a very entertaining clue
    WOD Panoply
    Time Just about on the 7 minute mark

    1. Woo! Great time! At this rate of progress.. see you at the Championship some year soon!
      1. Thank you so much John 😀

        Maybe if they did a championship for the Quickie – otherwise not a chance in hell! Today’s biggie – hours!

        1. No I haven’t. But thanks for mentioning it… and I see my blogging handle has been decrypted. Yes I remember hearing about it being filmed locally. It will be good to watch and spot the local scenery.
          1. Sorry – is that against the rules? I just seem to remember someone mentioning it before.
            1. No. Not at all. I’m glad you remembered! We are all cruciverbalists and love to solve a clue. Anybody who wants can find my profile in the About this blog page anyway. It’s not meant to be a secret but just a cryptic hint.

              Edited at 2020-01-31 07:30 pm (UTC)

  21. Fairly smooth sailing until a brain fade on LOI BETRAYER where I couldn’t work out what was going on and spent a couple of minutes trying to think of obscure serving dishes (not one of my strong points). Fortunately I then twigged that I was looking at the wrong end of the clue and heard the clang of the penny. Finished in 11.06.
    Thanks to John
    1. I shared your pain…I swung from different types of obscure grass through to various platters, plates and other serving paraphernalia.
      1. Ah yes. I see now I neglected to flag the devious nature of the definition in this clue in the blog. It is a bit on the sneaky side for a QC!
  22. A bit tired today and apart from Troon and Rode didn’t like what I saw and was about to give up when I got Nursery Slopes – easy thank you setter – and slowly slowly worked through the lot.
    So an excellent test and I even got Panoply fairly quickly.
    NW trickiest first me with the last the three being Marciano, Nailed and Inoperative.
    Maybe around the 50 minute mark all done.
    Thanks all
    John George

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