I think that I found this about the most enjoyable QC that I have ever blogged. I did find it very straightforward, and it could nearly have been a PB, but as I have mentioned before I don’t really keep accurate times and there are a couple of reasons for that which I won’t go into here. Suffice it to say that I really enjoyed it and found two candidates for my COD where normally I find the choice very difficult because I don’t see much to differentiate between the clues in terms of difficulty or style, with the result that I normally end up plumping for the smoothest surface. So many thanks to Joker for an entertaining morning cuppa.
FOI was the obvious anagram at 1A as you might expect, and LOI was in fact 22D just as it should be (although progress was not exactly linear between the two). The two potential CODs for me were 10A and 4D. Both of these I thought could have sat quite happily at the easy end of the spectrum in a 15×15 and they were a pleasant surprise when they were served up at this table. Having said that I think they are both pretty much write-ins for the experienced solver as long as you are on the mysterious ‘wavelength’. Thankfully I was, with the definition leaping out at me in 10A and the cryptic doing the same in 4D. I think 10A gets my vote by a whisker.
Definitions are underlined in italics and everything else is explained just as I see it in the simplest language I can manage.
| Across | |
| 1 | Nice groom is upset, made to offer efficient service (9) |
| ERGONOMIC – straight anagram (‘is upset’) of NICE GROOM. | |
| 6 | Cause of obesity is mostly inevitable destiny (3) |
| FAT – ‘mostly’ FATe (inevitable destiny). | |
| 8 | New in constituency, old Republican politician (7) |
| SENATOR – N (new) in SEAT (constituency) + O (old) + R (Republican). | |
| 9 | Succulent fruit piece, half gone (5) |
| MANGO – MAN (a piece, as in Chess or Draughts) + GO (half GOne). | |
| 10 | Small joint development making packets? (12) |
| SHIPBUILDING – S (small) + HIP (joint) + BUILDING (development). The definition is a cryptic one (hence the question mark) as a packet is a type of small ship. | |
| 12 | Look endlessly for celebrity (4) |
| STAR – STARe (look ‘endlessly’). | |
| 13 | Female dog losing head in desire (4) |
| ITCH – similar to the last clue but chopped off at the other end: bITCH (female dog ‘losing head’). | |
| 17 | Crossroads into centre is under reconstruction (12) |
| INTERSECTION – straight anagram (‘under reconstruction’) of INTO CENTRE IS. | |
| 20 | Thousand pounds in good currency (5) |
| GRAND – G (good) + RAND (South African currency). | |
| 21 | Redoubt rebuilt to be more prominent (7) |
| OBTRUDE – straight anagram (‘rebuilt’) of REDOUBT. | |
| 23 | Himalayan ox is all right over going without oxygen (3) |
| YAK – oKAY (all right) reversed (‘over’) ‘going without’ O (oxygen). | |
| 24 | Opposing bridge players resist meeting (9) |
| ENCOUNTER – E + N (East and North, opposing bridge players) + COUNTER (resist). | |
| Down | |
| 1 | A lack of effort getting fifth grades, reportedly (4) |
| EASE – sounds like Es (fifth grades). | |
| 2 | Report weapon’s stolen (7) |
| GUNSHOT – GUN’S HOT (weapon’s stolen). | |
| 3 | Collar that has number turned up (3) |
| NET – TEN (number) ‘turned up’ (i.e. reversed in this down clue). | |
| 4 | Odd spirit raised for quiet talk (6) |
| MURMUR – RUM (odd) + RUM (spirit) ‘raised’ (again, reversed in this down clue). | |
| 5 | Illness having Mike clearly in bed (9) |
| COMPLAINT – M (Mike) + PLAIN (clearly) ‘in’ COT (bed). | |
| 6 | Growths initially found upsetting New Guinea islander (5) |
| FUNGI – initial letters of Found Upsetting New Guinea Islander. | |
| 7 | River in hard to cut channel (6) |
| TROUGH – R (river) ‘in’ TOUGH (hard to cut). | |
| 11 | Game bird from one area of mountain top (9) |
| PARTRIDGE – PART RIDGE (one area of mountain top). | |
| 14 | Empty Chaucer quote rubbished game played on grass (7) |
| CROQUET – CR (’empty’ ChauceR) + OQUET (anagram ‘rubbished’ of QUOTE). | |
| 15 | Hard getting into dirty-looking small boat (6) |
| DINGHY – another small boat. H (hard) ‘getting into’ DINGY (dirty-looking). | |
| 16 | Some ranchero I considered very brave (6) |
| HEROIC – hidden word (‘some’): rancHERO I Considered. | |
| 18 | Follow the movements of vehicle reversing kilometres (5) |
| TRACK – TRAC (CART (vehicle) ‘reversing’) + K (kilometres). | |
| 19 | Sustained campaign about European clothing (4) |
| WEAR – WAR (sustained campaign) ‘about’ E (European). | |
| 22 | Greek character well on the way to being tight (3) |
| TAU – TAU is ‘well on the way to being’ TAUt (tight). | |
No real holdups, last few were obtrude, encounter, wear and LOI tau.
Liked complaint and tau, COD to gunshot.
A very good test from Joker with some quite difficult parsing but most enjoyable.
My time was 17:22. David
NeilC
Templar
It is what’s written on the label – Times for the Times!
My time was a fully transparent 12 minutes. So far all eight respondents have given their times.
FOI 1ac ERGONOMIC
LOI 19dn WEAR
COD 19ac SHIPBUILDING Packets were generally large ships (Michael Rego)
WOD 5dn COMPLAINT
Edited at 2020-01-27 09:39 am (UTC)
“Re: Yardstick
OK, let me attempt to deal with this recurring observation from Horryd once and for all. There is a fair amount I want to say about this, so please bear with me.
When the QC first came out in March 2014, I had the privilege of being invited to be a blogger (I had recently discovered the TftT forum as a genuine novice attempting the 15×15, and the then site administrator – Linxit – thought it would be a good idea to have some newbies blogging the new QC). I blogged QC number 3, and have continued as a QC blogger ever since.
The original statement of intent with regard to the role of the QC (by Richard Rogan, then Times crossword editor) was as follows: “it will be reduced in size and hopefully in difficulty too [relative to the 15×15], the intention being to introduce new people to cryptic crosswords, and to encourage those solvers who’d like to have a go at the main puzzle but feel daunted by it, or who can perhaps only solve a handful of clues”.
What happened? In the first couple of months, some new solvers started contributing to the TftT QC blogs, which was great. However, the majority of comments on the QC were from seasoned 15×15 campaigners who (as per the convention on the traditional TftT 15×15 blog) published their completion times – some of which were around the 4 minute mark.
Not surprisingly, the genuine newbies (i.e. the target market) found this intimidating / dispiriting, and a number of them raised this as an issue in the forum. This seemed eminently reasonable to me. A newcomer who is thrilled to have completed a QC in, say, 45 minutes who then goes to the forum and finds that most people are claiming completion times of 5 minutes or so is probably going to feel like a complete failure – whereas in fact they should be congratulated on their achievement.
As a result of these comments, there was something of a “policy” debate around month 3 of the QC as to whether it was appropriate for people to post their QC completion times. Of course, as a purely for fun hobbyist’s forum, the outcome of the debate was never going to “bind” anyone to any particular future conduct. However, bloggers and commenters were (to a degree) galvanised into taking a stance.
My personal conclusion was very clear. Given the intent of the QC, it seemed to me entirely wrong in principle to intimidate newcomers by posting completion times. Others took a different view – and of course, that’s fine too. But I have to remain true to my view. If this is unacceptable to the majority of the commenters on the QC site then I will happily resign my blogging spot.
In addition to the overall “philosophical” viewpoint stated above, I would also make the following more specific points:
1. The “etymology” point seems to me a complete red herring. When the TftT site was set up, the QC did not exist. The QC is a totally different animal. It is a good thing that the TftT site embraces the QC: it would be a bad thing if traditional aspects of the TftT site (such as giving solution times) undermined the overall intent and purpose of the QC.
2. Individual completion times seem to me a complete irrelevance in terms of indicating the degree of difficulty of a puzzle. Some might regard a 30 minute solve as indicating an “easy” solve: for others “easy” might equate to 5 minutes. It all depends on your level of experience and overall capability.
3. I personally think an indicator of “degree of difficulty” is useful – hence my use of “quite tricky”, “fairly straightforward” etc. etc. This seems to me far more useful than a solving time, given the point made in 2. above.
4. Finally I’ve personally never understood the interest in completion times for crosswords anyway. I suppose if you are someone who enters the competitions then these things matter. However, I’ve always regarded crosswords as a fun recreation rather than a competitive thing (I get plenty of competitive adrenalin flowing in my ‘real’ life). Rather, one might (in a loose kind of way) equate doing a crossword with recreational sex: it’s fun, and the longer it goes on the better – do you set a stop watch?”
Nick the Novice – ‘The Anagrindiste’ and No Times for the Times! The blogger should set the standard.
If he must know the main reason is a visual problem which is becoming worse in my right eye but I didn’t really want to go on about it. He was the only named contributor (there was also a single anonymous skulker) to moan about the length of my blogs a few weeks back so presumably if I HAD mentioned it he would have moaned about that instead.
If it really matters to him I was just under 10 minutes but I don’t regard that as reliable. As I said I think I would have been near a PB if my vision was not being partially obscured by my floater and continually going in and out of focus.
I hope the focus issue is not permanent and will be largely ironed out by my next visit to my ophthalmologist. Unfortunately however the floater has been there for ages and will always be there unless I submit to a vitrectomy which I am very loth to do.
Not all bloggers give their times anyway, particularly for the QC. Our main function is to give guidance to those who may not understand how the clues work. There are enough people who post their times anyway in their comments for people to gauge how difficult the puzzle is.
In any event I do always make a comment on my perception of the ease or difficulty of the puzzle. How that plays out in my own subjective time scale seems largely irrelevant to me.
As are
horryd‘s negative comments. I am going to accentuate the positive and eliminate the negative from now on and leave his comments to wither in the airless tomb of blog history.
Don
Don
I don’t care if people post their times or not. I understand the thrust of Nick’s argument (don’t post your times because it intimidates new solvers), but can’t take it as gospel because when I was a new solver I found the fast times an inspiring target rather than a source of intimidation.
In the end I decided to adopt the Kevin Scale, which seemed to me to be a suitable compromise between the two positions! I rarely post my actual time – I did it today because Kevin hadn’t posted his.
I think it’s fine for people to do whatever they like.
Templar
I note your time as just under 10 minutes – over two minutes faster then mine! Now I have a reasonable idea of your ratings.Thank-you for your time.
Edited at 2020-01-27 10:57 am (UTC)
All’s well that ends well.
Edited at 2020-01-27 01:28 pm (UTC)
I don’t give times, for several of the reasons so comprehensively outlined above. But mainly because I find speed for the sake of it uninteresting
No time as interrupted half way through (yet another call claiming I have had a car accident – why are such people not banned?), but probably about 15 minutes so not my fastest. Not easy to see why as a very fair puzzle with some nice clues. LOI Shipbuilding but once in, I really like the clue so as well as LOI, also my COD.
Thanks to Astartedon for the blog.
Sorry if it wasn’t quite clear from the blog!
Edited at 2020-01-27 10:22 am (UTC)
Thanks for the blog
Thanks very much, Astartedon, for the blog. I am very happy not to know your solving time – pointless information which would be meaningless to me – but am very grateful that, in addition to however long that took, you have spent extra time providing guidance to us. Thanks, too, to Joker, for another great puzzle.
FOI ITCH (not sure why it wasn’t FAT !)
LOI ERGONOMIC (not a word I’d ever use)
COD SHIPBUILDING (tip of the titfer to Robert Wyatt)
Did anyone else raise an eyebrow over PLAIN being used as a synonym for ‘clearly’? Surely the synonym is ‘clear’. I can’t think of an example where ‘clearly’ and ‘plain’ have the same meaning.
My thanks as always to Joker and Don.
I’m posting my time 10:41 as a guide. After several years of attempting to solve the QC I find that there are regular contributors that post similar solving times to myself which I find an excellent gauge as to the degree of difficulty of the QC. Thank you astartedon for your detailed blog.
DNK the “Shipbuilding” reference to Packets and am still not sure about 2dn “Gunshot”. Is a gunshot a report or am I totally misreading this?
Of course, grade qualifications have moved on, so with the introduction of A* many years back, you could argue that an E is no longer a fifth grade.
FOI – 3dn “Net”
LOI – 19dn “Wear”
COD – 4dn “Murmur” (for the multiple uses of Rum)
Thanks as usual.
Yes, gunshot is one acceptable definition for a report. It has certainly been known to me for as long as I can remember but in fact all I can find in Chambers is ‘explosive noise’. That’s fine and it will do, although I thought there would be more about it.
As someone who started doing cryptic crosswords when the Quick Cryptic and who often takes ages to complete it, I am not interested in how long the experts who can also do the 15×15 take to do this one. If I get 5 right in the 15×15 I am doing well!
Personally, I rarely measure exactly how long either puzzle takes me – I know approximately by checking a clock and that’s that. As desdeeloeste says, I find it more interesting to see how I compare with people who started around the same time as me and / or who regularly post similar times. In fact, I’ve stopped trying to go fast – I like to savour the clues and, in any case, I usually have some toast in my hand, so that slows me down – can’t eat, think and write at the same time! That’s not to say that I don’t get a boost when I do a (rare) fast time, but it’s not the main issue for me.
I must admit I didn’t find this one as amazing as our esteemed blogger, but it was definitely enjoyable – as Joker’s puzzles usually are. A few easier ones to get going, a few to make you think, and a stinker – although it was clear to me that 21a was an anagram, like several others I was sure that it must end in -er, which made for some interesting near-mombles.
FOI Fat
LOI Complaint
COD Murmur
Time – well, approx 15 minutes
Edited at 2020-01-27 02:56 pm (UTC)
7:53.
Ah, did you once see Shelley plain,
And did he stop and speak to you?
And did you speak to him again?
How strange it seems, and new!
Edited at 2020-01-27 06:45 pm (UTC)
I do like the two-part clues Guns-hot and Part-ridge and was happy that the “Empty Chaucer” jumped out at me to enable a quick write in of Croquet.
Two LOIs Senator and Tau.
Glad that I stuck to it.
Time over three disturbed visits probably around 45 minutes.
Murmurations are very in at the moment. Especially after the hundreds of dead starlings the other week.
I look forward to that word being in a future QC!
Thanks all
John George
LIO/DNK OBTRUDE but guessed it was correct, somewhere between OBTUSE and INTRUDE!