Category: Quick Cryptic

A delightful Friday puzzle from Teazel today with some elegant surfaces, witty wordplay and a modicum of trickiness in places, and great fun to blog. It helps if you know your Gilbert & Sullivan operettas, … Read more “Times Quick Cryptic No 1479 by Teazel”

Tough enough from Orpheus today – I found this on a par with Tuesday’s, which I did just before, each taking close to 12 minutes. I managed six of the acrosses on a first read … Read more “Times Quick Cryptic No 1478 by Orpheus”

Sluggish to get off the ground, but completed in an average time. I was slowed down by clues that ended up seeming rather simple in hindsight; so touché setter. I’m left wondering about ‘you’ in … Read more “Times Quick Cryptic 1477 by Mara”

Yet another 12 minute solve – but I’ll settle for that for an Izetti with many long answers. There’s plenty of tricky anagrams and so many silky surfaces that it’s hard to pick a COD. … Read more “Times Quick Cryptic 1476 by Izetti”

Too busy to write much again I’m afraid this week, plus I am also suffering from the inevitable cloud of depression that sets over me whenever I yet again see an England team fall short … Read more “QC 1475 by Breadman”

Well, the theme of today seems to be the compound anagram, 15ac, 3dn, 5dn, 16dn. Assuming that doesn’t throw you it’s a pretty straighforward offering today. I love the Dallas reference, who’s going to claim … Read more “Quick Cryptic 1474 by Felix”

An example of ‘the Don’ (Izetti) being up to his usual high standard, and taking me above 20m (just!) due mostly to some thorny parsing (which is invariably included in my quoted times).  Maybe I … Read more “Times Quick Cryptic No 1473 by Izetti”

Introduction 10 minutes to get all but the second letter of the Welshman’s name, but in the end a DNF as I had to look up the barn cart. A very enjoyable puzzle! There isn’t … Read more “Times Quick Cryptic No 1472 by Orpheus”

Another over-target 12 minutes today caused by longish holdups on clues around the grid where the definition wasn’t obvious to me – the best example being LOI 10ac. I’m not sure that this puzzle is … Read more “Times Quick Cryptic 1471 by Teazel”

My run of disastrous solves continues with this one that took me 18 minutes which is well into ‘red’ territory (15+ minutes) yet again. I haven’t achieved my 10 minute target since Tracy’s last appearance on 18th … Read more “Times Quick Cryptic 1470 by Tracy”