Times Quick Cryptic 1396 by Hurley

Author   ChrisPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic
There seemed to be a few unusual bits and pieces going on in this which all made it fun. It didn’t seem that easy so I was pleased to finish just inside 10 minutes. Loi 6dn.
As well as the fast timers, it’s always good to hear from others who may be taking a bit longer or just pleased to finish (or nearly finish, maybe). We love to hear from everyone on this site, especially if it gives encouragement to/sympathy with others going through similar experiences – a tip of the hat here to the justly famous SCC – self-styled slow coach club – where we all started at some time or other.

ACROSS

1. Initially seen as crazy, keep bringing up the old musical instrument (7)
SACKBUT – (S)een (A)s (C)razy (K)eep (B)ringing (U)p (T)he. I’d heard of sackbut – quite why I don’t know – but I didn’t know it was a medieval form of trombone.
5. Caught by publicity about group (5)
CADRE – caught (C), publicity (AD), about (RE).
8. A race star turn, on the move, dining here? (10,3)
RESTAURANT CAR – anagram (on the move) of A RACE STAR TURN. Doubly good as one dines here when on the move.
9. Gain control over law-enforcing group, extremely sedulous (7)
POSSESS – law-enforcing group (POSSE), (S)edulou(S).
10. Let in a Duke with German (5)
ADMIT – a (A), (D)uke, with in German (MIT). A level German swung smoothly into gear here – I hope everyone else was OK with this as it’s usually just ‘the’, ‘in’ and ‘a’ in French/German in Crosswordland.
11. Digress in law and err (6)
WANDER – in la(W AND ER)r.
13. After sleep, left in the morning uproar (6)
BEDLAM – sleep (BED), left (L), morning (AM). Whilst I would agree with anyone who thinks that going to bed can be different from going to sleep, Collins has bed = sleep or rest (as in time for bed).
15. Wild, hit out regularly? Silly (5)
IDIOT – w(I)l(D) h(I)t (O)u(T). Silly as a noun sounds a bit odd but a silly-billy or ‘you silly’ = and idiot.
16. He tries tips from Erasmus, say, with indication of hesitation (7)
ESSAYER – (E)rasmu(S), say (SAY), indication of hesitation (ER).
19. Government not in control of this soldier faction meeting other ranks (7,6)
PRIVATE SECTOR – soldier (PRIVATE), faction (SECT), other ranks (OR).
20. Stealing article, flees town at first (5)
THEFT – article (THE), (F)lees (T)own.
21. That will never happen, road men at work (5,2)
DREAM ON – anagram (at work) of ROAD MEN.

DOWN

1. Cancel fight (5)
SCRAP – double definition.
2. Touchy after legal proceedings seeing H and h as different? (4-9)
CASE-SENSITIVE – touchy (SENSITIVE) after legal proceedings (CASE). Good to see a rather different type of clue.
3. Splendid bachelor party (5)
BRAVE – bachelor (B), party (RAVE). Brave as in fine, splendid – a brave sight/attempt – or in the case of both teams at Lords on Sunday – a brave display/performance.
4. Nonsense about Henry’s beat (6)
THRASH – nonsense (TRASH) about Henry (H).
5. Conservative with word of warning referring to type of lens (7)
CONCAVE – conservative (CON), world of warning (CAVE). From Collins – Cave = watch out! Word origin of ‘cave’ from Latin cavē! beware! Anyone else try ‘contact lens’?
6. Ten at heart of it, my cadet smiles, enigmatically (7,6)
DECIMAL SYSTEM – anagram (enigmatically – cracking anagram indicator) of MY CADET SMILES, and an unusual definition.
7. This shows mistake was made — “maturer” is wrong (7)
ERRATUM – anagram (is wrong) of MATURER.
11. Wife greeting Papa with favourite dog (7)
WHIPPET – wife (W), greeting (HI), papa (P), favourite (PET).
12. Competitor in from France managed to get into Tourist Trophy (7)
ENTRANT – ‘in’ from France (EN), managed (RAN) to get inside TOURIST TROPHY (TT) – annual motorcycle races held in the Isle of Man.
14. Famous person’s stage of journey coming to close (6)
LEGEND – stage of journey (LEG), close (END).
17. Tantrum noticed by sound of it (5)
SCENE – homophone (by the sound of it) of noticed – seen.
18. Second showing somewhat nearer university (5)
RERUN – some of nea(RER UN)iversity.

37 comments on “Times Quick Cryptic 1396 by Hurley”

  1. Nothing particularly difficult today, although I started 11ac by missing the hidden, as usual. Biffed 6d, I think without looking at the clue. (It’s a pretty odd clue; what does it mean?) 5:05.
      1. Yes, I realize that; but what the clue says is “Ten at heart of it, my cadet smiles, enigmatically.” Nothing about that is clear to me.
        1. I know it’s only 15 syllables but if you write it like this:

          Ten at heart of it
          My cadet smiles
          Enigmatically

          it could be the sort of haiku that pretentious 14 year olds write in their secret diaries.

  2. Started fast but slowed to 15.31. NHO SACKBUT but trusted the clue and stuck it in but when it came to the downs couldn’t get any of the first four so started to doubt myself. Revisiting the top saw SCRAP, BRAVE and THRASH – don’t really associate brave with splendid but reckoned it was close enough (not always a good tactic) – and that left me with 2d, only solved when I stopped trying to make 11a an anagram and saw WANDER in front of my eyes. Anagrams and something to do with hydrogen then abandoned as it became clear. Bit quirky today, I liked it.
  3. Yesterday I solved in 7 minutes which is rare and nearly as fast things ever get for me (remembering I include parsing) so it was a surprise to repeat that time today.

    I justified 15ac by thinking of ‘idiot’ as an adjective. It’s valid (in Chambers, SOED and Collins on-line) but for some reason not in my printed edition of Collins, nor the Concise Oxford.

    Edited at 2019-07-16 04:39 am (UTC)

  4. Back at home today after a trip to Lytham St Annes yesterday. A confusing but attractive place. One minute you’re in St Annes,then you’re in Lytham and then you end up in Ansdell which no one’s ever heard of if you don’t live there.
    Anyway this puzzle took me exactly 15:00 with well over a minute at the end staring at 20a. Not difficult but sometimes that happens. Otherwise I solved pretty much top to bottom. I thought Sackbut might be a word just like our blogger and generally thought this a good challenge from Hurley. FOI Restaurant Car. COD to WHIPPET. David
  5. Yes, quirky is a fair description. A good, chewy QC from Hurley. I’m afraid I did this whilst half listening to ‘Today’ on R4 – my best excuse for a SCC performance** (ca. 4K). I liked the 13s but SECTOR took a little while to emerge for me. I confess that I wanted 13a to be napalm but it clearly didn’t fit. No problem with ADMIT; CONCAVE was pretty obvious but I hesitated over ‘cave’. FOI SACKBUT, LOI BRAVE and 2x COD: CASE-SENSITIVE and DECIMAL SYSTEM. John M.
    ** Yes, Chris. Most of us started there but some of us seem to be returning on occasions like this! Thanks for the blog.

    Edited at 2019-07-16 08:13 am (UTC)

  6. Off the pace today with 10:47 having biffed 5d CONCAVE and 12d ENTRANT from the available checkers. I got snarled up in the SE corner with my LOI 14d LEGEND. I particularly liked the surface of 21a. Thank you Hurley and Chris.

    Edited at 2019-07-16 08:19 am (UTC)

  7. 15:33, even faster than yesterday and under my target for two days in a row. I thought it was an excellent puzzle with many different types of clue. Once again my checkers were very helpful – it’s much easier when you have consonants and not vowels.
    COD was CASE SENSITIVE and LOI was RERUN.

    Brian

  8. I agree with the those who found it quirky. I wanted splendid to be ‘bravo’. Brave doesn’t work for me any more than idiot to mean silly. When I see these kind of things in a quick cryptic I find myself asking why? Feels a bit perverse. It’s a shame to me because for me they spoiled a very good puzzle!
    1. I agree with you. Brave meaning splendid not in my vocabulary not in the thesaurus or any dictionary that I have. Took me around 45 and did not get 2 of the clues Still making some progress.

      Tim

    2. I agree with you. Brave meaning splendid not in my vocabulary not in the thesaurus or any dictionary that I have. Took me around 45 and did not get 2 of the clues Still making some progress.

      Tim

  9. FOI, SCRAP, LOI, the CASE bit of 2d. Took a while to remember SACKBUT, but I did know it. LIKED WHIPPET. 8:35. Thanks Hurley and Chris.
  10. Quick for me at only 1.3 Kevins and thus a Very Good Day. An enjoyable puzzle (thanks Hurley) and blog (thanks Chris) – I particularly loved learning that the sackbut was a medieval trombone, because in my head it was a sort of big lyre! I thought “silly” for IDIOT was a bit dodgy.

    FOI SACKBUT, LOI DREAM ON, COD CASE-SENSITIVE.

    Templar

  11. An interesting puzzle today and a steady solve for me at 37:10, though I was held up by never having heard of sackbut. I’d written it in lightly and thought the sack bit had to be right, but wasn’t sure about the but. Thought the last part might be an anagram of ‘the’ to give a sacketh or something. Anyway, it was okay once I’d figured out my last ones in 3d and 4d. I didn’t see a problem with idiot for silly (an idiot thing to do or there’s that story about the three sillies which was always a favourite), but I don’t consider a brave performance to be a splendid one, rather more like a good effort that fell short or was just good enough. COD because I loved the surface was 21a.
  12. ….I remember SACKBUT appearing in a psalm (which also mentions a psaltery if I recall correctly) and it went straight in.

    I sometimes struggle when a clue is TOO obvious, and my LOI is an example of that. “Say” had me looking for alternatives that held me up. “Conservative” in 5D was another in that category.

    FOI SACKBUT
    LOI ESSAYER
    COD WHIPPET
    TIME 4:37

  13. I remember when Ernie, the device that awarded prizes for Premium Bonds, used to be based there, there was a saying “happiness is a letter postmarked Lytham St Annes”
  14. A *good day* for me at a shade under 5K – might even be a PB. It all went in pretty straightforwardly. FOI sackbut as I often watch live classical music here in Malvern and medieval instruments appear from time to time – I don’t remember seeing ‘theorbo’ in a crossword, but that’s another old instrument – as is ‘cornet’ but there’s a modern (and different) instrument of that name. I can’t remember ever having seen a psaltery (@philjordan) or even what one looks like – some form of stringed instrument, IIRC.

    You might have heard of an ensemble called “His Majesty’s Sackbuts and Cornets”, Chris? They pop up on the radio from time to time.
    I struggled with 21a, thinking that ‘on’ came from working and not spotting the anagram until after I’d got the checkers and biffed it.
    As has been said, having lots of consonants for checkers was a help.

    Thanks Chris & Hurley for reminding me that not evey QC is a real struggle

      1. Thanks – that sent me to Wikipedia to look for a list. I found one at this page…

        There’s a few there that are new to me and a some gaps (theorbo and serpent, for example).

    2. I’m sorry to say I’ve not come across them – having now looked them up, they seem a fine band of musicians.
      1. on checking, I see they call themselves “His Majestys Sagbutts & Cornetts” – so there are a couple of alternative spellings to watch out for in future!
    3. I’m sorry to say I’ve not come across them – having now looked them up, they seem a fine band of musicians.
  15. Well, I thought that was a good puzzle from Hurley, albeit Essayer seemed out of place in a QC – a good job I occasionally watch a Top 14 rugby match. Having spent far too long trying to make 1ac much harder than necessary (anyone else try to shoehorn Ye in?), I was relieved to cross the line just short of 30 mins. I particularly liked both of the long down clues, but my favourite today was 11d, Whippet. Invariant
  16. I sit down for 15 minutes with coffee and quick cryptic, and 1 hour later……! Mature Margaret
  17. A pleasing 17.59, which is one of my faster solves.

    There were several where I wasn’t sure of the meaning, but guessed they may be right. SACKBUT, CADRE come to mind. I didn’t do German at school, but have started learning since, so pleased that when I tried “MIT” for German “with”, lead nicely to ADMIT. I haven’t seen anything but articles used in foreign languages before, certainly not prepositions.

    I also didn’t know ESSAYER, but after plugging the wordplay in guessed it must be right. Whilst not doing German at school, I did do French, and remembered (just) that essayer meant to try.

    I have never come across “cave” meaning a warning, but it was either CONVEX or CONCAVE (maybe CONFOCAL), and only one fitted.

  18. Is it just a coincidence that Erasmus, after whom the invaluable European student ship soon presumably to be lost to british students with the dreaded Brexit, was also a renowned writer of scholastic essays? Or could this be a clever aspect of the clue to 16a?
  19. I was a bit worried after only getting a couple of across clues on the first run through, but then solved from the bottom up. I made life harder for myself by stopping looking at the first letters after SACK at 1a, which meant that the 2nd part of the unknown instrument took me a while to work out. Finished with CONCAVE in 13.26.
    Thanks to chris for the blog
    1. I often skip to the bottom of the grid when solving the 15×15 when it seems to be a stinker. You sometimes find that the setter has run out of venom by then 🙂
  20. Very enjoyable QC today. Would have finished in my target 20 minutes but had to do an alphabet trawl before I decided that 3d must be BRAVE. I was hoping to find something better! MM

    FOI 8a
    LOI 3d
    COD 21a this really made me laugh!!
    I very much liked 6d too.

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