Quick Cryptic 1504 by Joker

Author   CuraristPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic
A welcome 6-minute romp for me after a bit of a late night. Not too hard but very neatly clued and thoroughly enjoyable. Contains a few of the staple niche definitions found in crosswordland, that some newbies may not have encountered yet, e.g. LOW = MOO. COD 12dn, LOI 16dn

Across

1 Policeman in charge introduced to volunteer (7)
OFFICER – IC (in charge) inside OFFER
5 Feeling low key (4)
MOOD – MOO (low, as in ‘the catttle are lowing..’) + the key of D
7 Picture that is cut by magazine (5)
IMAGE – IE with MAG inside
8 Mostly trim and cut root vegetable (7)
PARSNIP – PAR[e] + SNIP
10 Take a number back (3)
NET – TEN backwards
11 What serves diners a feta-rice mix? (9)
CAFETERIA – anagram (‘mix’) of A FETA RICE
13 Broadcasting a current band (6)
AIRING – A + I (electrical current) + RING
14 Mob boa wriggling in grass (6)
BAMBOO – anagram (‘wriggling’) of MOB BOA
17 Ad lib is put in to make enhancement (9)
IMPROVISE – IS inside IMPROVE
19 Writing fluid colour lacks power (3)
INK – PINK minus P for power
20 Refuse space for car without key (7)
GARBAGE – GARAGE with the key of B inside
22 Stole line written by playwright (5)
SHAWL – George Bernard SHAW + L
23 Finest — and worst? (4)
BEST – double definition. As verbs, BEST and WORST are synonyms
24 To ease, go through again putting in English (7)
RELIEVE – RELIVE with E inside

Down
1 Determining one’s position flying into Tangier (11)
ORIENTATING – anagram (‘flying’) of INTO TANGIER
2 Say nice things to father holding milky coffee (7)
FLATTER – FR (father) with LATTE inside
3 Belief about timeless perfume being a high point (9)
CRESCENDO – CREDO with SCEN[t] inside
4 Not working after rent swindle (3-3)
RIP-OFF – RIP is rent, OFF is not working
5 What’s regularly used for impair? (3)
MAR – alternate letters of iMpApR. Neat
6 Who has first of weddings in Reno overturned (5)
OWNER – W inside RENO backwards
9 Colour of bird down (7,4)
PEACOCK BLUE – self explanatory
12 In tent, ravers all find trip over (9)
TRAVERSAL – hidden word – tenT RAVERS ALl. Note the nice definition, which suggests a verb (stumble) but is in fact a noun. The central diversionary tactic in crosswords is fooling you with the part of speech.
15 Body of troops with British equipment — nowadays European? (7)
BRIGADE – B + RIG + AD (nowadays) + E
16 Foolish king put outside home in a row (6)
LINEAR – LEAR is the foolish king, IN is home. Again, part of speech is neatly hidden – suggests noun or verb, but is in fact an adjective. LOI for me
18 Quiet desire for witch hunt? (5)
PURGE – P (quiet) + URGE
21 A court drama, in part (3)
ACT – A + CT

33 comments on “Quick Cryptic 1504 by Joker”

  1. I liked TRAVERSAL, partly because for once I spotted the hidden right away. Also liked LINEAR. LOI 22ac. 6:19.
  2. When will compilers understand that a crescendo is the journey towards the summit and not the summit itself?
    2. When will pendantic carpers discover what a dictionary is?
      For example Chambers : crescendo (music)
      adj and adv gradually increasing in loudness.
      n an increase of loudness; a passage of increasing loudness; a high point, a climax (fig).

      KPC

      1. Better yet, ODE gives, in its musical sense yet, “the loudest point reached in a gradually increasing sound”, as well as in its secondary sense, “a progressive increase in intensity; the most intense point reached”.
        1. Not often I say this, Kevin, but the dictionaries are wrong, musically speaking at least. If the meaning has been adapted figuratively through loose usage and found its way into the dictionaries then that’s something different, and of course I will concede the setter is justified in relying on that. In performance if you reach a crescendo you’re at the bottom of it, not the top.
          1. As one who often thinks the dictionaries are wrong, I’m happy to grant you this, with respect to the musical meaning–I’m more than happy to defer to your knowledge here (all the more so as I’m musically ignorant). But the word has spread beyond music, and the extended meaning clearly supports the setter; see e.g. the examples ODE provides.
          2. I’m in agreement with you and tutted when I saw it.

            If it’s in the dictionary then fine, but in its strict musical sense a crescendo is a gradual increase in loudness. So for me, it’s the journey to the top not the top itself.

  3. 11 minutes, so I missed my target 10, just. I had some problems with the two long answers, trying to fit ORIENTEERING at 1dn and being bamboozled by the word to put above BLUE at 9dn. Wasn’t sure I knew TRAVERSAL as a word but I now note it has come up several times before.

    Edited at 2019-12-13 08:55 am (UTC)

  4. A nice offering from Joker to take my mind off other things….. I thought I was doing well but found 3 on my K-clock when the last one (RELIEVE) went in. I quite liked parsing LINEAR, IMPROVISE, FLATTER, AIRING, CRESCENDO and BRIGADE and thought TRAVERSAL was well disguised. Many thanks to both for a pleasant end to the week. John M.

    Edited at 2019-12-13 09:33 am (UTC)

  5. I was not at my sharpest this morning evidenced by typing ORIENTEERING without even noticing that it does not fit the squares as well as being the wrong answer.That would not have happened on paper. As a result my last two were IMPROVISE and AIRING after the necessary corrections.
    COD to LINEAR. Some nice clues. Time was 18:20.
    David

    Edited at 2019-12-13 10:11 am (UTC)

  6. Oh my goodness I am jaded. Opening a bottle of the Croft 1982 seemed like a great idea in front of Huw at 2am.

    I’m blaming that for my steady but slow 3K time today, with a full K being spent on an alpha-trawl for my LOI AIRING for a Meh Day. It turned out I’d completely misconstrued the clue and was looking for a word meaning “band” which was a homophone of “a current”. This reading was confirmed when the first letter emerged as A. (That was a tough anagram at 1dn, wasn’t it? I too tried orienteering, then orientation, then I’ve forgotten what. Needed a lot of checkers.)

    FOI IMAGE, COD BEST (had to be the answer but puzzled for an age over the parsing, nice PDM).

    Thanks Joker and curarist.

    Templar

    Edited at 2019-12-13 10:59 am (UTC)

  7. Some lovely wordplay again today which did not hold me up unduly. My FOI was 7a IMAGE and my LOI was 16d LINEAR (not a synonym for ‘terrace’ then). I was caught out for a while by low = MOO in a lovely succinct clue and 23a BEST was a guess. My reasoning was flawed as I thought it was something to do with worsted yarn being worn as Sunday best! 1.7K and 1 jackkt so a good start to the day.

    Edited at 2019-12-13 11:09 am (UTC)

  8. ….CRESCENDO quite early, and was all clear inside my 5 minutes.

    FOI MOOD
    LOI LINEAR
    COD RIP-OFF

  10. 18:36 today.

    2 to 3 minutes of that spent trying to get PURGE and BEST – very annoying.

    But happy with sub 20 mins after a week of almost feeling like I want to give up on doing cryptic crosswords.

    Been learning/completing them since April 2018 and can complete the quick cryptic 95% of the time.

    I always try the 15×15, but disappointed to say I’ve only completed a handful of the big ones in over a year and a half – and after seeing the snitch rating in these two weeks gone as quite reasonable, it’s extremely demoralising to not have a 15×15 completion of late.

    I’ve watched a lot of Cracking The Cryptic, and also attempted some archived puzzles on the website.

    Can anyone give me some more advice on how I can progress more? Or an indication of how experienced you should be before you should be completing 15×15’s on a regular basis? Is it a ‘how long is a piece of string’ situation? Am I simply not clever enough, not well-read enough?

    Who knows…

    I’m about to attempt today’s 15×15 – wish me luck.

    Thanks for the blog,

    Raincloud

    1. Try reading the 15×15 blog each day, even when you don’t do it, so you can get a feel for how the answers are constructed. Perseverance also helps – put it down and come back to it later and you will be surprised how often you can then see an answer.
    2. I’d reinforce what Invariant says – read the blog, learn the tricks of the setter’s trade, use aids, take a break – but don’t feel bad if you don’t finish. I’m not sure when I started trying the biggie – maybe three years ago – but it has only been in the last few months that I regularly get anywhere near to completion. I nearly always end up with a DNF with two or three to go! And I’m happy if I can do that in less than hour.

      I certainly don’t think it’s because we’re not clever enough – it’s just that our brains work in a different way. Well, mine does! The answers rarely jump out at me – I mostly have to work quite hard to decode what’s going on, but I enjoy the challenge and don’t beat myself up if it all goes wrong 😊 So don’t despair, keeping plugging away – and don’t forget to enjoy yourself!

  11. A good end to the week and a nice puzzle from Joker. I completed it in about 45 mins which seems standard for me at the moment.

    Overall, was pleased I spotted a lot of the “niche definitions” noted above – particularly for 5ac “Mood”, 22ac “Shawl”.

    I also had an issue with “Crescendo”, but appreciate it can be interpreted slightly differently per the dictionary.

    I must ask about 20ac “Garbage” – if the space for the car is without the key, why is the key of “B” included? Surely, it would be a word with the “B” taken out. I didn’t understand that.

    FOI = 1ac “Officer”
    LOI = 24ac “Relieve”
    COD = 2dn “Flatter” – not the most complex clue but enjoyed the image the surface provided.

    Thanks as usual.

    1. It’s ‘without’ in the (rather archaic) sense of ‘outside’; happens a lot in cryptics. (The Scots still do say ‘outwith’, no?)
      1. Thanks both. Now makes sense.

        Also clears up a mystery to me regarding that hymn (apologies for my ignorance!)

    2. That’s without as in outside – a green hill far away without a city wall.

      On edit: I see Kevin is still quicker than me…

      Edited at 2019-12-13 12:45 pm (UTC)

  12. Yes,crescendo can be used in the ‘climax’ sense, but I have always hated the expression ‘building to a crescendo.’ So crude. I cringe every time I see it, which is often. Why can’t we just build to a climax for heaven’s sake!
  13. I had 1d straight away, which was an enormous help in opening the grid. However it still took me 25mins to finish due to problems spotting the colour and major wrong end of the clue issues with loi 16d, Linear. At one point I even considered whether Tiheer could be an old English word for foolish… I enjoyed parsing 3d, but my CoD vote goes to 15d, Brigade – it took me a while to see AD for nowadays. Invariant
  14. An enjoyable solve which fortunately didn’t tax my brain too much after a lack of sleep last night. I had a brief hold up at the end looking for synonyms of foolish at 16d but crossed the line in under 10 minutes for a good end to the week. A tip of the hat to TRAVERSAL.
    Thanks for the blog
  15. Sorry but we still fail to comprehend that best and worst are the same, as a verb. Can someone give an example of usage please?
    1. Granted it doesn’t exactly trip off the tongue, but how about:
      Bill bested/worsted Fred at cards.
      Both mean that Bill defeated Fred.
      1. Oh thank you. Still think it’s an incredibly awkward construction which would never slip off the tongue! However we’d put it in so got it right.
  16. Just under 10 minutes today when I finally got to it, so maintaining a sub 2K standard (just). LOI and COD for me was 22A, SHAWL. Kept thinking the Stole in the clue was the past tense of steal … must think more laterally.

    Thank you for the blog.

  17. Yes. I was flummoxed by this one until I realised Joker was using crescendo in the incorrect sense, unfortunately perpetrated by non-musical writers – a combination that often ends with foot in mouth. It means ‘growing’, not climax.

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