QC 1042 by Izetti

Author   nick_the_novicePosted on Categories Quick Cryptic
A gorgeous little QC from Izetti – the Grand Master of the elegant puzzle in my book. Nothing obscure but it made you think, and every clue was beautifully constructed.

I would guess this was of medium difficulty, but frankly I haven’t a clue – you either get Izetti’s stuff or you don’t!

Blog had to be thrown together quickly due to other commitments so apologies if it’s a bit terse. I probably will not have opportunity to field comments as I am currently in a locked down secure environment with highly controlled, minimal internet access (which is not to say I am in jail, but it kind of feels that way).

Anyway, here’s how I think it works…

Definitions underlined: DD = double definition: anagrams indicated by *(–): omitted letters indicated by {-}

Across
1 Meat dish: second thing you see in Chinese
restaurant (9)
CHOPSTICK – CHOPS (meat dish) + TICK (second)
6 Think about love as a timid person (5)
MOUSE – MUSE (think) goes around (about) O (love)
8 Sports official not totally nice, not one to get
testimonial (9)
REFERENCE – REFERE{E} (Sports official – but ‘not totally’) + N{I}CE (nice, ‘not one’- i.e without the I)
9 Some dramatic attempt backfiring, it’s understood (5)
TACIT – Reversed (backfiring) hidden (some) in dramaTIC ATtempt
10 Green team working in harmony (9)
AGREEMENT – *(GREEN TEAM) with “working” signalling the anagram
12 Mad home — son starts to annoy nearly everyone
(6)
INSANE – IN (home) + S (son) + first letters of (starts to) Annoy Nearly Everyone
13 Novelist supporting environmentalism in speech (6)
GREENE – Sounds like (in speech) GREEN (supporting environmentalism) giving us Graham – for my money one of the all time great novelists
16 Criticised innocent youngster when meeting old
rocker (9)
LAMBASTED – LAMB (innocent youngster) + AS (when) + TED (old rocker). I have a feeling newer solvers might not immediately see how ‘when’ gives us ‘as’: think “when / as the clock struck two…”
18 Dance beat given energy (5)
TANGO – TAN (beat) + (given) GO (energy)
19 Has funny new girl changed a blissful situation? (7-
2)
SHANGRI-LA – *(HAS) – with “funny” indicating the rearrangement – + N (new) + *(GIRL) – with “changed” pointing to the rearrangement – + A
21 Out-of-date permit unacceptable ultimately (5)
PASSE – PASS (permit – the noun rather than the verb) + E (unacceptablE ultimately)
22 Cup of tea missed in state of confusion (9)
DEMITASSE – *(TEA MISSED) with “in state of confusion” signposting the anagram
Down
1 Iran etc. in turmoil for sure (7)
CERTAIN – *(IRAN ETC) with “in turmoil” pointing to the anagram
2 One gathers wood for burning (2,4)
ON FIRE – FIR (wood) goes ‘inside ONE’ (one gathers)
3 Wait for action on tennis court (5)
SERVE – DD. As a former silver service waiter myself, it was straightforward to see that ‘to wait for’ someone meant to ‘serve’ them: those who spent university holidays doing more cerebral things might have found the reference a bit less obvious.
4 Wild animal beheaded? One is charged (3)
ION – {L}ION (wild animal beheaded) giving the “charged” particle
5 Was informed and could tell you the state of the
game? (4,3,5)
KNEW THE SCORE – DD
6 After meandering, limited areas came into view (12)
MATERIALISED – *(LIMITED AREAS) with “after meandering” signalling the anagram
7 Just the fellow for US! (5,3)
UNCLE SAM – Cryptic definition referencing the personification of the USA by this bloke
11 He is one of them in a chemistry set (8)
ELEMENTS – HE is indeed one of the elements (as in components) ‘in a cHEmistry set’, with the whole thing being an elegant and clever cryptic definition.
14 Looking embarrassed, volunteers given exercise in
bureaucracy (3,4)
RED TAPE – RED (looking embarrassed) + TA (volunteers) ‘given’ PE (exercise)
15 Steps laid down by good person with self-importance
(6)
STAIRS – ST (i.e. saint – ‘good person’) + (with) AIRS (self-importance)
17 Horrible giants, one departing in state of anxiety (5)
ANGST – *(G{I}ANTS) – with “horrible” suggesting the anagram and with the I going out of the mix (one departing)
20 Member in a fighting force (3)
ARM – A + RM (a fighting force – i.e the Royal Marines). For newcomers it’s worth remembering that ‘member’ can – and frequently does – mean a ‘limb’ (arm or leg)

37 comments on “QC 1042 by Izetti”

  1. In my overseas ignorance, I thought ARM could be just any branch of the military, but I can see Royal Marines is neater. Thanks for the blog, Nick.
  2. I wondered about ‘Just’ in 7d; was it really necessary? How long has it been since there was a Territorial Army so-called? Not as long, no doubt, as since people stopped talking about ‘SA’ or ‘it’. 4:32.
    1. A quick google tells me that the answer to “how long has it been since there was a Territorial Army so-called?” is perhaps not as long as you might think i.e. 6-7 years, since some time in 2011.

      It had started as TF (Territorial Force) in 1907 and became TA in 1920, a title that lasted until 1967 when it was replaced by TAVR (Territorial Army and Volunteer Reserve). However in 1979 the name TA was restored and was retained until 2011 when it became the Army Reserve (AR, one assumes, although I have only found it listed in one somewhat obscure source).

      I seem to have been banging on recently about historical references being indicated unnecessarily in my view so I’m quite happy with TA for ‘army’ even if it is no longer strictly the correct name of the organisation. I’d also argue that TA is still in current use amongst the population at large, so perfectly acceptable from that point of view. It may be of interest that MOT (Minisitry of Transport) still exists officially in the name of the annual test of roadworthinesss (MOT Test) even though the Ministry of Transport as such ceased to exist 48 years ago.

      As for SA and IT there’s hardly a week goes by without people here talking about one or other or both of them, so we are helping to keep their flags flying, so to speak.

      Edited at 2018-03-07 06:27 am (UTC)

      1. Thanks for this; I was indeed somehow under the impression that TA had disappeared some time ago. (I only knew it — aside from its repeated appearance in these cryptics — from Kenneth Widmerpool being an officer in it, back in the 30s.) Had no idea about MOT. When you say ‘people here’, I assume you mean ‘people who do these cryptics’?

        Edited at 2018-03-07 06:55 am (UTC)

    2. SA and IT ; two of my pet peeves. Military abbreviations : AB, TA, RE, OC, OR etc are up there as well

          1. Ah, of course, thanks. I knew it but it had slipped my mind for the moment. Anyway, I still I don’t really understand what there is to object to about military abbreviations.
  3. Is anyone else suddenly having to log-in every time they want to post here?

    I’m with vinyl1 thinking I was in for a long haul (judging by the time it took me to get started) so I was pleasantly surprised when it all came together and I scraped home, just, in 9 minutes and a few seconds.

    Like brnch, I wrote ARM at 20ac without thinking A,RM. I also failed to spot that HE is in ‘chemistry set’, thinking only that helium (HE) is one of the elements in the periodic table which itself may be described as a set of data. Perhaps if I’d been blogging I’d have thought of both these explanations, but perhaps not.

    Edited at 2018-03-07 05:53 am (UTC)

    1. Fortunately, ELEMENTS didn’t require a little thinking on my part; ‘He’ couldn’t be a pronoun, so it must be helium (having been suckered by ‘as’ and ‘he’ a few times each, I’ve become a bit wary). And ‘them’ must be ELEMENTS. If I’d thought any, I’d have started wondering about ‘chemistry set’, and then wondering about how the clue parses. It would have taken me a long while to get where Jack started, i.e. by taking ‘chemistry set’ in a different sense.
    2. My login cookie disappeared yesterday, but I haven’t had to log in again since then..
  4. 22 minutes but stupidly put keep the score (lack of second coffee).

    Very enjoyable, lots of great clues, favourites: Shangri la, chopstick, demitasse and COD on fire.

  5. Rather strange that today it should rain heavily here in Singapore so we had to retire indoors at the famous Shangri-La hotel. Unwisely showed the clue to our waiter and realised how difficult it was to explain it all to him.
  6. Whizzed through this and completed in under 20 minutes. As a newbie it’s interesting how varied I find the solving flow and completion rate in puzzles by different setters. This one worked for me. Cod. 4d
  8. Top half went in rapidly, so 1dn could be completed without reading clue. However was held up at bottom by having solved 26dn as ORC (one of Sauron’s army, hidden in fORCe).
  9. My reading of this was that HE meant Helium and the Chemistry Set I had when I was younger was a traditional one which contained lots of elements. Nowadays of course the modern Chemisry Sets are pretty sparse things and you don’t get what you used to get – all safety first – no glass test tubes, no paraffin filled flame and very few elements – no wonder there are so few kids taking up science these days.
  10. An enjoyable puzzle. I started with ION and finished with STAIRS. Some thinking required for lots of the clues which were nicelyconstructed. I interpreted He as one of a set of chemicals too. Did a bit of biffing along the way, eg LAMBASTED. 9.00 Thanks Izetti and Nick.
  11. Don’t know how not to be anonymous
    Am a beginner ie have been doing the quickie for just the three years – never attempt the main one – it’s the difference between Man City and ChelSea 🙁
    Izetti always gets me but I hadn’t noticed the setter until I finished and looked up the blog – but yes he/she did flummox me – probably my best time 20 BUT 11d I couldn’t get – plus didn’t parse 2d.
    Anyway what’s the relevance of the HE in cHEmisrty – don’t get it – doesn’t it parse without that ?
    Thanks for blogs –
    Malcolm
    1. Hi Malcolm. Top right hand corner of the TFT page lets you register a name. . . providing no one has chosen it first. You can make half an argument as you say for 11d, but I’m sure Nick is correct – Don Manley (Izetti) is too good a setter for it to be otherwise. Invariant
  12. 31 mins, but, like Flashman, with a very careless Keep the Score at 5d. I thought this was a good puzzle, even before reading Nick’s explanation of 11 and 20d, the subtleties of which I had completely missed. 16ac, Lambasted, is not a word you hear very often, (likewise 19 and 22ac), but the clue has a nice surface and so it gets my CoD vote. Invariant
  13. Quicker than average today. I am afraid I am not convinced by HE in a chemistry set. It is a very light gas, so how would one supply it in a chemistry set or use it if it were there? Or am I just being pedantic? I took ARM to simply be an Arm of the military, army navy etc. Each is an arm. Either seems to work for me.
    Good challenge as always with Izetti.
    PlayUpPompey
  14. I don’t rememeber writing these clues but suspect that I thought of helium as being within a set of elements, not an experimental package (though I may have been intending to mislead legitimately!), and I also suspect that the hiddenness of He in chemistry was fortuitous. Thanks anyway for appreciative comments! Izetti
      1. ‘In a locked down secure environment with highly controlled, minimal internet access’ – I hope it’s something mild like being caught in a nuclear or chemical leak rather than the far more serious having been caught by the wife browsing something you shouldn’t. Either way, I hope you’re released/forgiven soon.
        So to the puzzle which I thoroughly enjoyed whilst whizzing through – I give it 7/20 on my new difficulty scale. Thank you to the Grand Master of the elegant (yet still Q) puzzle and to Nick for coming up with such a splendid and appropriate term.
        1. Thanks for your concern Chris. Ironically Mrs. No Vice (the ultimate misnomer) regards crosswords as ‘Nick’s porn’ so that’s the only browsing activity where I have to exercise caution – everything else seems perfectly fine. No, the issue is that I’ve actually just scored a serious new job with a branch of Her Majesty’s government – a remarkable turn of events for a man of my age and personal habits. But it’s fun (so far) in a weird kind of way… (just been released for the night)
  15. Count me as another Izetti fan. As also a fan of all things chemistry, I remember another He clue either here or 15×15 in the last year since I’ve been doing QCs and attempting Big Brother, which made me smile:
    ‘He is second on the list’ for which the answer was Periodic Table.
    Hope Nick has managed to escape from lock-down.
    Thanks to Nick and, of course, Izetti.
  16. Late coming here as I was able to play golf this afternoon as the SE of England returns to some sort of normality after snow and cold.
    No hold ups in the puzzle until I got to 11d, my LOI. I had Elements but couldn’t parse it and after a number of recent errors through failing to parse, I got down to work. I tried to find any viable alternative to Elements, looking for the He part of the clue. There was nothing. Finally I remembered Helium and it added up.
    Good puzzle from Izetti. David
  17. Must’ve been on the wavelength; it’s not often I find myself in the top half of the results but I seem to be in position 51 of 156 today…

    Nice to come here and spend some time checking out the parsings for those I started bashing in when I realised I was going fast enough to make a race of things; thanks Nick and Izetti!

    Was I the only one who bunged in 20d on the grounds that ARM is simply literally in “army”?

  19. It’s a shame the setter didn’t give us the low-down on that one too whilst he was here, but as another solver who opted for the ARM explanation (merely because I never spotted the possibility of A, RM) I suspect if that’s what the setter had in mind he’d have clued it as ‘Member in fighting force’ omitting the ‘a’.
  20. As our blogger says, Izetti is invariably elegant and fair, being on of the few true Ximenean setters here.

    A host of candidates for COD, from which I have chosen 2d.

    treesparrow

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