Quick Cryptic 3124 by Oink

86 comments on “Quick Cryptic 3124 by Oink”

1. Would’ve been 7:10 if I hadn’t bunged in SPAT instead of SPAR, and not gone back to it. Otherwise, I felt it was on the gentle side, apart from the furrowed brow and pdm for HILTON. SIRI pops up again, she appeared only last week…

   Thanks Jack and Oink

   1. PDM?

      1. See the Glossary on the Help menu (top) or under Useful Links (right).

   2. I think spat is a more correct answer. A quarrel is a spat. Sparring is what boxers do or stags possibly at rutting. I’ve never heard a quarrel described as a spar. No checker and no obvious hint for the R over the T.

      1. But Spat does not sound like Spa, the “health resort reportedly”, so it does not fit the wordplay at all.

         1. You are right about the homophone of course but the word play doesn’t fit the definition imho.

2. 6:54
   It took me a while, and some checkers, to come up with HILTON. I somehow knew the name, although I couldn’t have told you who she was.

3. Hello everyone! I haven’t done a cryptic for what feels like years and I’m really rusty, but I have taken a sick day today and thought I’d give it a go. I’ve been awfully busy (I got a promotion!) and have missed you.
   I did recently end up in London (for one day) which made me think of you all.

   Anyway seems like I picked a good day to come back because good old Oink is today’s setter!

   I DNF because I gave up on HILTON. Even with the explanation I still don’t get it. Why would the hotel be *in* Paris? Why not *for* her? By her?

   EASTER took me a while. I saw ‘flower’ was was like, ‘oho! It’s a name of a river! You can’t trick me today!’ alas, they can and did trick me.

   I also put it ‘pocket’ for ‘arrest’ because you know.. Nick, snooker…

   Anyway, I took about 16 minutes before I gave up.

   1. Welcome back! I think the idea is that the answer defined as ‘hotel’ is to be found in the name Paris Hilton.

      1. I see. I don’t really like it – your surname isn’t in your name, imo.

         After I revealed the answer you should have seen me trying to parse it.. Like ‘ok, H is for Hotel.. Then..’Il Ton’ in my best French accent as if it was going to mean something 😂

         1. Lovely to read a Tina post! 14:10 Fiddle Off says it all. BIFD Hilton with checkers and agree with you Tina more of a MER than a PDM IMHO.
            Ta JAO

         2. Hilton is a chain of hotels, Hilton is also Paris’s surname. The phonetic alphabet is not in play.

         3. Paris Hilton is a sort of celeb / IT girl / often in the papers for no discernible reason! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_Hilton

         4. Paris Hilton is a minor celeb / IT girl / often in the papers for no discernible reason! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_Hilton

         5. Paris Hilton explanation here – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_Hilton

         6. Paris Whitney Hilton (born February 17, 1981)[3][4] is an American media personality, businesswoman, and socialite. Born in New York City, she is a great-granddaughter of Hilton Hotels founder Conrad Hilton. She first attracted tabloid attention in the late 1990s for her presence in New York City’s social scene, ventured into fashion modelling in 2000, and was proclaimed “New York’s leading It Girl” in 2001.

         7. Welcome back, Tina! Was worrying about your long absence! I realised it must be HILTON, but completely forgot about the silly little rich nepo-child with the handbag dogs… What a pity I have now had her brought back to my attention…

      2. I don’t think so – the ‘in’ is just doing the job of an equals sign in clue, its a straightforward double definition

   2. Hi. Congratulations on your promotion. We miss you ♥️

   3. Welcome back Tina. “in” in 12A is a link word between definition and wordplay (or in this case two definitions, the second a cryptic hint). Some purists disapprove of linking words and phrases, but most setters use them.

   4. Welcome back, and I also overthought flower=river.

   5. Ms. Hilton is a minor celeb / IT girl famous for errmmmm not quite sure! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_Hilton

   6. Google her – Paris Hilton. A sort of IT girl ..

   7. I’m catching up on the back catalogue after a trip, and normally wouldn’t comment, but just wanted to say that it’s a delight to “see” you again and know that all is well with you!

4. Like Tina (welcome back T!) I wasn’t too happy with the HILTON clue but bunged it in anyway. My only real problem was putting ruckus not RUMPUS, and convincing myself that in some universe ‘ruck’ could mean ‘back’. Once that was sorted I crossed the line in 6.01. Thanks Jack and Oink.

5. Loi was Camp- how is that ‘party’? I must be missing something

   1. Party can mean a group or team as can camp.

   2. “He’s in her camp/party”

      1. I thought those American Camps sounded like one big party, that was my justification . “This one time, at Band Camp…”

6. Well it’s obviously FIDDLE in retrospect but I put in ‘racket’ with 100% confidence. Finally saw sense when REBUFF went in and then LAS VEGAS. Finished with OFF which I’d stuggled to parse on about six visits to the clue. Nine on the first passs of acrosses, all green in 9.34. Congratulations on the promotiom, welcome back and get well soon, Tina – and thanks for Oink and Jack.

   1. Yes, get well, Tina, but try to take a sick day once in a while so we can hear from you!

7. Misery, discontent, grump. What was so hard about this? Our worst performance for weeks…took forever to get started let alone finish (DNF – Siri… can you believe?)
   Can only blame the ones in the mirror…scratching heads indeed.
   Can we have ‘woe is us?’ If so – it fits.
   A joy for the day is the hopefully not cameo appearance of Tina. : ) Hello.👋

   Thank you Oink and Jackkt.

   1. Agreed, this was a fight from start to finish, taking a dreadful 40 mins, some lovely clues, ‘though. LOI Islander. Getting used to doing the crossword on an ipad as no longer have hard copy delivered; it has its advantages, even if the clock does tick away in the corner..
      Looks as if Siri is becoming a regular personal assistant in crosswordland.
      Thanks All.

8. I was going very well until a few hold-ups in the NW corner slowed me down. I eventually realised that yes, CAMP could mean party and PECULIAR could be a synonym for characteristic, and that led to my LOI RUMPUS, where I had also played with Ruckus at first. Clock stopped at 8:35.

   Nice to hear from Tina again – welcome back – and thank you Jack for the blog and Oink for a very pleasant start to the week.

9. I found this a bit harder than the average Oink puzzle and collected a DPS for a careless ‘spat’, where I see I’m in good company with Mike.
   The NW caused most of my delays, with PECULIAR (NHO the characteristic definition)/RUMPUS/CAMP being a particular struggle.
   Thansks to Jackkt and Oink

10. It should have been quicker, but for some reason, I rather took my time, finishing this in 24m.

    I didn’t mind the HILTON clue, but I thought it could have been better as “Hotel De Paris, perhaps”.

    And welcome back, Tina.

    Pi ❤️

    1. QTPi 😉

       1. Very good! 🙂

    2. That’s rather good

       1. 🙏

11. Great to start the week with an Oink. A couple of minor holdups but generally a straight forward solve here in 13.35 Hilton LOI and also don’t like the in in the clue.

    Some good unusual synonyms to stretch the mind but some very helpful crossers eased the way.

    Thanks Oink and Jack

12. I can’t type for toffee this morning. I’m blaming youngest son, temporarily back at home, who wanted to catch an early train. Bleary eyed but downstairs and ready to give him a lift to the station, I eventually discovered that he’d overslept.

    Anyway my fat fingers typed ARRET and thus left me puzzling over L-T until eventually realising what I’d done, at which point LAS VEGAS wrote itself in.

    Other hold ups were HOG and LOI/COD HILTON, where the PDM caused an audible groan. I’d spent a while thinking “en” must be in there and rejected HILTON as having no French!

    Nice to see Tina again 👋🏻

    All done in 07:15 for a Could Have Been Better Day. Many thanks Oink and Jack.

13. 10:44. Some tricky definitions today, such as quarrel = SPAR, unload = CLEAR, party = CAMP. And I wasn’t sure about PECULIAR for a long while, thinking of PARTICULAR (Collins: the police officer took down her particulars) and I still think there’s something peculiar about it. I liked HILTON where I enjoyed the PDM without worrying about the syntax. Thanks to both Oink and jackkt

14. 4:37 when I stopped the clock, but then I looked again at LOI SPAT and changed it to the correct answer, SPAR, so probably more like 5 minutes. HILTON took a while to come too, otherwise no difficulties. ISLANDER, EASTER and SIRI are all chestnuts I think. Thanks Oink and Jackkt.

15. Enjoyable and not too difficult with exception of HILTON which took a while. 8:45.

16. 18 minutes, most of that stuck on HILTON and especially PECULIAR as my last two in. SIRI has been getting a good run lately, though not on my iOS devices; I should get with it.

    Great to have you back Tina. Hope your new work position now allows to be back again soon.

    Thanks to Jack and Oink

17. I am clearly out of step with most (but not all, thankfully) solvers above. This was unusually tough for an Oink puzzle, I thought.
    Most went in quickly but I was held up by HILTON and PECULIAR in the NW and by EASTER and SIRI (again) in the SE. I was unaccountably slow to see HOG (it is an Oink puzzle, dumbo!) and made life difficult by somehow mis-typing it as HOI.
    By the time I had sorted these, I was in the SCC so a very poor start to my week.
    Thanks to both, anyway.
    P.s. It was good to know that Tina is still thriving. I join others in missing her contributions.

    1. Dear Blighter,
       You’re in step with me. And the same clues defeated me for far too long.

       1. Great minds think alike……. 😄

18. 19:51. Mainly a steady solve, but struggled to see CAMP, PECULIAR and HILTON. SIRI and TATE becoming regular answers, and we also had CHAD recently too.

19. This felt more difficult than the average Oink, even though I was getting most of the clues quickly. There seemed a lot that I was only getting because I had seen similar clues before, so I’d imagine this might cause new solvers quite a few problems. Had RUCKUS for a while, thinking that the ruck in rucksack means back, but even when I changed it, giving me _AMP for 2d, it still took a while to work out CAMP. Finished with HILTON on 16:51. COD to HOG. Thanks Oink and Jack.

20. 17:14, But needed thesaurus to find PECULIAR, which led to LOI HILTON.

    Had RACKET, which also has strings attached.

21. I see one or two found this Oink to be tougher than usual, I found it to be completely the opposite finishing in a speedy 6.21. I guess as ever it’s a wavelength thing, and nothing held me up to any great extent, not even the Paris Hilton connection, although I haven’t a clue about who she is or what she does for that matter.

22. Think HILTON could have been clued as ‘Perhaps Paris hotel’ as the ‘in’ doesn’t make sense. Otherwise a chewy but satisfying puzzle. Thanks Jack and Oink.

23. 25 mins…

    I initially got waylaid by a number of clues: 9ac “Rumpus” and 18ac “Arrest”, where I put Ruckus and Pocket respectively. In hindsight, the latter is neither a piece of snooker equipment per se, nor an obvious homophone. Those aside, the rest went in fairly steadily.

    I see 22dn “Siri” has made another appearance. Perhaps not as annoying as the infamous Microsoft Clippy, but equally as useless sometimes.

    FOI – 8ac “Spar”
    LOI – 2dn “Camp”
    COD – 11ac “Off”

    Thanks as usual!

24. 26:29

    Well I found the last 4 exceedingly difficult. The rest were fine but I was completely fooled by EASTER. It never occurred to me that a flower might be a plant! I spent ages going through every river I know. No idea how SIRI worked but I got it wrong last week so biffed in hope this time. Didn’t equate CAMP with party but it was all that would fit then LOI PECULIAR just didn’t occur to me and I was forced into an alphabet trawl to finish the puzzle.

25. All green in 8:26 – might have got HOG earlier had I spotted it was an Oink. Nice puzzle nice blog. Hesitated over PECULIAR not to be confused with the Old Peculier of Masham which happily appeared on draught in my corner of SE London recently.

26. I found this tough and had to make several passes before getting enough crossers to get some tricky answers. HILTON took a while. Sadly I didn’t go back to SPAT so ended up with a pink square. 7,50 WOE. Thanks Oink and Jack.

27. 17:46
    Weird solve for me. Only got USAGE on the first across pass then slowly started to pick up the pace.
    Until, 13 mins in when I was left with two clues unsolved and drawing a complete blank.
    I was going to wait until I joined the SCC before calling it when I finally saw the English flower, which then revealed my LOI.
    Phew!
    FOI: USAGE
    LOI: SIRI
    COD: Nothing really stood out.

    Thanks to Oink and jackkt

28. Oh dear. Oh VERY dear!

    Was progressing at a reasonable rate through a jolly offering from Oink until I wrote the solution to 22d in the space intended for 20d Took quite a while for the penny to drop. Felt completely foolish and the cuppa was nearly cold when I saw the error of my ways. Got there eventually. Doh!

    Thanks Oink and Jack

29. Obviously on Oink’s wavelength today – 15:32
    Nothing unheard of and all parsed except SIRI (didn’t spot the Irish).
    Thank you Oink and Jackkt

30. My thanks to Oink and jackkt.
    LOI 12a Hilton. Oh, that Paris.
    1d Peculiar another late one, I was slow to see find the second def. From Wiki below (note spelt differently):
    “A Peculier is an ecclesiastical district, parish, chapel or church outside the jurisdiction of the bishop of the diocese in which it is situated.
    A Royal Peculier, an area including one or more places of worship under the jurisdiction of the British monarchy
    Old Peculier, is a beer brewed by Theakston Brewery, named in honour of the Peculier of Masham”

31. Defeated by two today: HILTON and PECULIAR.
    I’d taken 12 minutes to get back to these two and then ground to a halt. I took a break after 20 minutes in total but nothing occurred to me.
    When you’re stuck , you’re stuck!.
    David

32. DNF because of PECULIAR and HILTON. I should have got HILTON but not sure if I would have got PECULIAR. Thanks Jack.

33. Rattled through most of this, but then struggled to finish off a few hold-outs in the NW corner. Rumpus and Peculiar went in after a bit of thought, but I was reluctant to enter Hilton until I had exhausted other equally implausible options. Thrown in at the end in order to secure a seat, but really didn’t like the clue. Invariant

34. DNF. Forgot to go back and check on unanswered SIRI. Also needed CCD help on CAMP, PECULIAR and ARREST. Dim, I know.
    Biffed CLEAR and HILTON.
    Liked RUMPUS, HOG, REBUFF, among others.
    Thanks vm, Jack.
    And welcome back, Tina.

35. A slow crawl today, although not quite sure why. Last two in were PECULIAR/BREAST. I rather liked HILTON and just took it as a DD – what do I know. HOG took an embarrassingly long time to emerge. Liked working through the wordplay to find SIRI. Many thanks all.

36. 11.20 I was very slow in the NW where I also had RUCKUS for a good while. Rucksack is literally “back sack”. SIRI has rapidly become a tired chestnut. Thanks Jack and Oink.

    P.S. Hi Tina!

37. A gentle offering from our piggy friend, and only 4 clues were left after the first pass.

    FOI SEPARATE
    LOI PECULIAR
    COD RUMPUS
    TIME 3:21

38. Usual story here. Good progress for 80% of the puzzle, followed by 15+ minutes of increasing desperation over my final few clues. HILTON, SIRI and EASTER were my L3I and I was heartily glad to see the back of today’s QC by the end. Not sure how our more accomplished solvers never really struggle in the same way, even over just one or two clues.

    Many thanks to Jack and Oink.

39. Very late start. 20 plus spat.

    Thanks J & O

40. Started slowly and thought 8ac was spat but could not parse it so did not enter. Only three on first pass of the across clues. The down clues were more productive and steady progress and suddenly twigged spar. Finished with all clues parsed.

    FOI Separate
    LOI Breast
    COD Agenda

41. DNF. We’d already struggled for well over two minutes with CAMP and PECULIAR but Paris HILTON, who we have heard of, was beyond us today. The rest fell in quite smoothly however. Thanks, Jack and Oink.

42. 8.29

    Sub-10 is never bad but I was well above my average going down every blind alley including recalling every piece of snooker equipment apart from a rest; every word for polish apart from buff etc etc.

    Usual high quality fare from Oink – seems to have split opinions but I liked HILTON.

    Thanks Jackkt and Oink.

43. Enjoyed this. Had to alpha trawl for camp – fortunately not for long. OH came up with aster as his first response to a request for 5 letter flowers – annoying as they are blooming spectacularly in the border at the mo.

    FOI – spar
    LOI – siri
    COD – rumpus

    Thanks Oink and Jackkt.

44. Also started with RUCKUS and SPAT and wanted CUE to be in 18a. For a long time was convinced that 23a was LICE, Alice being the girl in, or through the mirror, remove or scratch the A leaving that well known cause of scratchy head!

45. 16:22 here, on the slow side on a Monday morning. Held up in the NW, with RUMPUS, CAMP and (eventually) PECULIAR my last three.

    Thanks to Oink and Jackkt.

46. Slow start, but picked up speed. we also had seri for. 22d, and spat for 8ac.

47. Brain fog today so I gave it 20 minutes and then left it for 3 or 4 hours. I had a very disturbed night and kept nodding off. On recommencing this afternoon I got most of the remaining clues quite quickly but was left with 3 outstanding – 7ac and 2dn in the NW and 24ac in the SE. While pondering these I nodded off again and when I awoke decided to give up. So no time and no finish. I wish I could say that the brain fog has now receded but it hasn’t.

    FOI – 8ac SPAR
    LOI – DNF
    COD – 9ac RUMPUS

    Thanks to Oink and Jack

48. I liked REBUFF and ISLANDER the most, joint cod.
    Had to be PASTOR or PARSON and seeing arson in the word, it went in. And being an Oink, there was only one possibility for 19a!

    Hesitated over CAMP for party, but with the wild rumpus started, it had to be. SCC again, and when I checked, had one wrong: SPAT instead of SPAR. Enjoyable albeit slow, methodical solve (nearly). Thanks Oink and Jak

49. Yanks only have spars in Massachusetts

50. Spar doesn’t work for me as a definition.

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