QC 2783 by Pedro

104 comments on “QC 2783 by Pedro”

1. I remember BAY RUM from childhood: barbers used to sprinkle a bit on as the finishing touch of the haircut. I disliked the smell.

   1. I too remember Bay Rum. As a Saturday lad at Boots in the 70’s I used to stock the shelves and noticed it. I preferred the far more exotic Old Spice and Brut. Now nearly 50years later I have hung up my Boots (pun intended).

2. Never having heard of BAY RUM or WARHORSE they were my last in and stretched my time out to 12.33 after a promising start. Also never thought of MALAISE as uneasiness, but there we are. When I was about 4 my mother left me alone in the barber’s and did some shopping while I got a haircut. When she came to collect me we were walking down the street and I said mummy where was the man’s basket? And she said there wasn’t a basket, and I said but the man kept saying sit still on your little basket. I don’t know if it was bay rum but I do remember there was some kind of sweet-smelling aroma in all barber shops, so it was probably that. Thanks to Merlin and Pedro.

   1. ‘you little basket’ was a common disparaging term without using a worse word in place of basket.

3. Is gluten an allergen? I don’t think it is.

   1. I believe it is not in itself classed as an allergen, however as it a protein, some people can be sensitive to it causing bowel issues. (With thanks to my new friend, ChatGPT). Here’s a thought – I wonder if ChatGPT could help me with my clues, but that would be cheating. I am sure no one uses apps like Thesaurus’ and dictionaries with letter searching 😉

   2. The Food Standards Agency lists 14 allergens that must be declared as such in food labeling. https://www.food.gov.uk/business-guidance/allergen-guidance-for-food-businesses#allergens

      The list is: celery, cereals containing gluten (such as wheat, rye, barley, and oats), crustaceans (such as prawns, crabs and lobsters), eggs, fish, lupin, milk, molluscs (such as mussels and oysters), mustard, peanuts, sesame, soybeans, sulphur dioxide and sulphites (if the sulphur dioxide and sulphites are at a concentration of more than ten parts per million) and tree nuts (such as almonds, hazelnuts, walnuts, brazil nuts, cashews, pecans, pistachios and macadamia nuts).

      OK, so the list is talking about cereals containing gluten rather than gluten itself but I think it is pretty clear that gluten is an allergen. Certainly fair enough for a crossword.

      1. Yes, gluten can be an allergen. It is one of several proteins contained in wheat to which one can be allergic, a condition generally referred to as “wheat allergy”.

         This is a completely different phenomenon from coeliac disease, an autoimmune condition triggered by eating gluten, and from non-coeliac gluten intolerance, a poorly understood, but apparently common, condition that is neither allergic nor autoimmune.

4. While I got a lot of answers quickly, I ended up stuck at the end. Inchoate was a bit elusive, and not a word I would expect to find in a Quickie, and Wesley was also a surprise, although the wordplay hands it to you.

   Now about warhorse. I can’t tell if Merlin is pulling our leg in his explanation, but everyone probably knows that a warhorse is a frequently performed opera, play, or piece of classical music. I nearly biffed sawhorse, too, before seeing those weren’t the right letters.

   Time: 11 minutes

   1. Well, I got it from having seen the show, rather than the more generic usage, which I had forgotten!

      1. #metoo (except I didn’t know it, rather than forgot it!). I assumed this was just another example of the “updating” thing, using Warhorse instead of The Mousetrap.

   2. Um, no. The metaphorical uses I am familiar with are old soldier, old battleaxe (female) or any older experienced person. But yes, on checking, the OED has it as
      A play, song, piece of music, etc., which is frequently performed and has become very familiar, and (typically) enduringly popular. Also more generally: anything which is very familiar.

      So it is an even cleverer clue than I thought. But “everyone knows” is pushing it.

      1. Explains it being (8) and not (3,5).

5. 14 minutes as far as it went but DNF as I don’t recall meeting BAY RUM before, and whilst ‘odd / RUM’ was obvious, ‘howl / BAY’ would not come to mind. The TfTT archive reveals that BAY RUM appeared in 2021 when I commented on the puzzle but didn’t mention it, and in 2011 when I said I never heard of it.

   I’m not sure I’m happy about ‘pale colour / SOFT’, maybe ‘in a pale colour’, but even then I’m doubtful.

   With regard to ‘Queen’, it’s a rank or title – a proper noun, so in my view by conventions of English grammar it should always be capitalised when referring to a monarch past or present. Not in general terms though e.g. in chess. It may be a bit much to expect setters always to observe this so I wouldn’t have queried lower case in today’s clue, but there’s certainly nothing wrong with using upper case.

   1. Yes, and the capitalisation is there to improve the surface (by referencing the rock group).

6. DNF, as I NHO BAY RUM and despite eventually seeing how the clue worked, nothing came to mind.

   I thought a good number of the definitions here were questionable: so for very good, gluten as an allergen (I am allergic to chocolate; does this make chocolate an allergen?), pension as an allowance, fat as oily, etc. Add in some difficult vocabulary (inchoate for one) and I found this a slow trudge even before I failed at the last. Not a crossword I shall remember with any pleasure.

   Many thanks Merlin for the blog
   Cedric

   1. Allergic to chocolate? Are you sure this isn’t a rumour your parents started? ☺

      1. Absolutely genuine allergy – it makes me sick, and always has from when I was a small boy. Not a problem as I dislike the taste intensely (so would you if every time you ate it you were ill). Mrs S is delighted – every time well-meaning friends give us chocolates she knows they are all for her!

         1. I was allergic to cow’s milk as a small boy – it caused eczema, and one gruesome Christmas I ended up with impetigo. I soon grew out of it and can happily eat chocolate, but after being made to drink goat’s milk as an alternative for a few years, the smell of anything goaty makes me heave.

   2. I totally agree with your final comment. Too dense & obscure for mere mortals like me

7. Struggled in the SE but before that had been careless with GLUTEN, thinking the ‘in’ from the clue has ro be entered literally – might not have done it for an across clue but doubted myself in the heat of solving. Took a long time to get to ‘feta’ from the list of cheeses – ‘oily’ made it harder I think. A struggle.

8. Very glad to see from the other comments that never having heard of bay rum was not a lapse in my knowledge. Being in my 20s, and never having set foot in a barbers, it’s not something I’ve ever come across! Even odd = rum is slang I’ve only learnt through crosswords (and from checking with Dad).

   1. Glad to see that Sophie is taking out her frustration with the old fashioned clues on the wider community and not just on me.

      Proud of you, girl.

      Dad

      1. 😄

      2. 🙂

      3. Oho!

   2. If you have come across tin=money in “real life” you’ve done better than me, and I’m 3x your age!

      1. “I come down dah wid my hat caved in, Doo-dah! doo-dah!
         I go back home wid a pocket full of tin, Oh, doo-dah day!”

   3. Good to have someone else complaining of very dated clues/conventions. I have a list of pet peeves. And we now know that the puzzle editor reads our comments, from the recent articles in the Saturday paper. Maybe PI (for very good) and IT/SA (for sex) will be dispatched to the great grid in the sky, or left to Scrabble fans and their bizarre word lists.

      1. Publish, and damn! I’ll sign the petition. 🙂 Obviously U will be on it, and today’s Tin.
         Eton to be limited to no more than quarterly. And, of course, ban every 40s 50s actor or singer that I don’t know…

      2. Merlin, I don’t understand your problem with IT, which surely remains in common usage (for both sex appeal and the act itself). On the other hand, SA, PI, TIN etc. I wholeheartedly agree with you about!

   4. Great comment and my daughter would (and I do) agree. It’s always a teeny bit frustrating when it seems these things are aimed at a specific age group with knowledge about sometimes quite specific things. Here’s looking at you, cricket. Btw – I’d never heard of BAY RUM. 58 clearly isn’t in an old enough age bracket!

9. Very tough, very slow, very glad to have got through it. Several MERs as others have mentioned, but some clever, nearly too clever for me, stuff. Felt very 15x15ish in many places. Achievement rather than great enjoyment for me.

10. I didn’t find this as difficult as some despite some tricky vocabulary.
    Like our blogger I never knew what INCHOATE meant and had it not been for the checkers would have spelt it with the ‘o’ and ‘h’ transposed.
    NHO of BAY RUM but had a flash inspiration for the first part just before setting out on an unlikely looking alpha trawl.
    Started with IMPROPER and finished with BAY RUM in 7.19.
    Thanks to Merlin

11. I gave up after 13 minutes on 6dn.

12. Three groans, Adage, Tiny and my old friend Mar. Crossword familiarity shot Tin and Saw to the fore but, I suppose they are useful standbys in the setters toolkit. As for Inchoate, it brought back memories of embryology lectures which I found bewildering as my mind struggled to untangle the three dimensional contortions of the developing foetus. Now I struggle with the two dimensional puzzle of the QCC.
    Plus ça change. Found some cluing very challenging. 35 minutes.
    Thanks Merlin

13. I could pick a lot of holes in this, but others have done most of the heavy lifting already. BAY RUM remembered from childhood visits to the barber’s. The doormat was an advert for “Marcel Waving”. I didn’t ever find out who he was waving at, or why. I once enquired of my Mum why the barber never asked me if I wanted “something for the weekend” like he did the older male customers, but she abruptly changed the subject.

    FOI ADAGE
    LOI WESLEY
    COD PENSIONER
    TIME 4:25

    1. I still remember the shock of being asked that for the first time! Especially as it was Monday. A real rite of passage.

       1. Did you ask for a lawnmower?

          1. Some amusing comments today 🙂

          2. Excellent!

14. Would have been super fast had it not been for BAY RUM. Saw RUM but had to dredge around the memory’s outer edges for BAY … eventually found a dim memory of naff 70s male grooming products.

    I can’t get worked up about outdated usages like “tin” for money or “it” for sex appeal. It’s just a code, like “Eli” for priest or OT/NT for books. Learn it, use it.

    07:35 with a serious chunk of that spent on BAY RUM. Many thanks Pedro and Merlin.

    1. De minimis non curat lex. But some of us do 😁

       1. I’ve just searched De minimis non curat lex on Google Translate, and am thrilled to learn that it is from the Romanian! I could have sworn it was Latin – but I did fail my O level, so what do I know 🤣🤣🤣
          But I do get the joke really!

          1. It’s a law Latin phrase -Templar being a “Bar Man” – recollected from my law degree and never used since. Useful for judges who don’t want to sweat the details…

             1. Yep, I got the subtleties 🤣 And, as is often the way with something you didn’t previously see or know, the phrase re-appeared today (well, an adaptation of it) in a diary story about the Cerne Giant! I’ll never forget it now.

15. DNF BAY RUM, though I admit it rang a faint bell when I saw the answer. Struggled in NE corner with other LOsI like WARHORSE, INHERIT and LESION.
    Managed the rest slowly. Liked TAFFETA, TO DATE.
    Biffed INCHOATE, though did not know meaning.
    Those of you who say you have not seen WARHORSE should do so, but take a pack of tissues.
    Thanks, Merlin.

    1. Agreed about WAR HORSE (note two words, so not applicable to today’s clue in any case) but try to see the RNT stage production (or the recording of it) rather than the opened-0ut Spielberg film which is far less powerful in my view. The artistry of the staging was a major part of the enjoyment for me. By chance I found that it has just started on a 14 month UK tour visiting 21 theatres. Details and dates here.

       1. Thank you, Jack.
          I have spent the whole morning trying to alert the advertisers in our parish magazine about a fake company invoicing them.

          1. Sorry if I’m being dim, CW, but I don’t get the reference.

             1. Sorry. Just a random remark that has nothing to do with the QC.
                I just felt I should warn about the scam.

16. Struggle but got there; LOI RETRY (just didn’t see it). NHO BAY RUM (but had to be).
    I didn’t know what INCHOATE meant, either!
    Every so often we get “very” = SO; I wonder if maybe the setter meant “good financial paper” = FT? I can’t make “very good” (adjective) into SO (adverb).

17. Thanks Merlin and Pedro. I wish the setters would road test these puzzles with fellow setters. I think someone might have told Pedro that he was on his own planet today 🙂

    1. Yes!!

18. Must be harder than usual, as a relatively slow time leaves me higher up the leaderboard than I normally am. QUITCH confirms that at the time of writing my time was exactly as expected for the difficulty.

    I’m in the Templar camp regarding “archaisms” – learn it, use it, move on. Similar for school – Harrow, Winchester, Manchester Grammar, King Edward VI, Wimbledon High School, Scruffsworth Comprehensive – none of these are a neat collection of 4 commonly used letters that can form part of an answer, which is also then easy to insert in a clue with the code “school”. A cryptic crossword clue is a set of coded instructions to arrive at an answer, not a piece of social commentary.

    Back to the puzzle, LOI was BAY RUM, which I’ve never heard of, but once I remembered that hounds bay, it was easy enough. I liked INCHOATE best.

    8:00

    1. Well said, hopkinb. My only minor point of difference being that Harrow turns up a lot, though admittedly not as frequently as Eton. I notice it every time as I was born and bred in the borough and went to school on the Hill. Not that school, although we did share some of their facilities for speech and sports days.

       1. My grumble about archaisms is not that they should be banned but that it’s not then reasonable for folks to object to modern terms as well. I will now go and hide behind the sofa…

          1. I don’t mind the archaisms now I have learnt most of them. I confirm two of family knew the Ukrainian boxer, but whether their wives/gfs would have heard of him is another matter. My plea would be that if we are to have modern GK, then I reckon it should be unisex.

          2. Agreed. We learn as we solve.

19. Certainly tough as far as I was concerned with a finishing time of 14.04. I started quickly enough with about two thirds going in on first sight, but then the wheels fell off. Even relatively straightforward answers such as ROW had me scratching my head with just the R to go on. Eventually I regained my senses and the ending of W allowed me to solve my LOI which was WESLEY. INCHOATE was a word I knew, but if asked to define its meaning I would struggle. I fortunately thought of BAY for howl relatively quickly, but like many others didn’t know the definition of BAY RUM as a perfume.

20. DNF as I have NHO BAY RUM – if I had, my time might have been around 7 minutes – although RUM appeared obvious, I had no idea what to stick in front of it – for the record, I am 59, used to visit old-fashioned barbers in my earlier years, but I have never come across that term in all this time.

    WARHORSE – I only know of the modern stage show which I have never seen (and probably won’t – Michael Morpurgo and I don’t really get on).
    INCHOATE – didn’t know what it meant, but it fit, and having completed the grid, I have completely forgotten what it meant!

    Thanks Pedro and Merlin

21. I am relieved that Merlin thought that this was ‘on the hard side’. Other descriptions are available. At times I thought Pedro was determined to use up some of their spare 15×15 clues – the nho Inchoate being a prime example – but fortunately these were the exception. Even so, this was a slow solve, with loi Bay Rum (sounds awful as a hair dressing) offering stiff resistance. I was also delayed by Sawhorse as an unknown Americanism, until I spotted the extra ‘s’. Invariant

22. I found this much more straightforward than yesterday’s torture from Izetti (79 minutes!), despite not knowing that INCHOATE is a word and never having heard of BAY RUM. I was held up a little by those and MALAISE, but I still crossed the line in 25 minutes, which is quite fast for me and comfortably within my target.

    Many thanks to Pedro and Merlin.

23. I made very slow progress from beginning to end of this but eventually got there in 27 minutes with everything parsed. Count me amongst the number who knew the word INCHOATE but not what it means. BAY RUM rang a faint bell once I’d done a (thankfully short) alphabet trawl for the first word.

    FOI – 10ac RETRY
    LOI – 17dn WESLEY
    COD – 1dn IMPROPER

    Thanks to Pedro and Merlin

24. Very quick until defeated by SE corner where I was convinced that the answer to 22 down was PINK (= very good (in the pink), a financial paper and a pale colour).

    1. I tried to shoehorn PINK in as well. Better answer IMHO. I thought I had misunderstood the Stamp at 22a and the P would have to be at the front for the PINK. Hadn’t got 24a Taffeta at that point.

    2. Agreed, I prefer PINK to SOFT.

    3. I’m glad I didn’t think of that!

25. 15 minutes of hard work for this puzzle with a difficult grid.
    NHO BAY RUM but the baying of the hounds occurred to me quickly, which gave me the difficult bit.
    LOI WARHORSE with a thought that it seemed a bit unfair if it was referring to the play. However, enlightenment above makes it look much better.
    Having learned lots of crossword words like TIN for money, I’d rather keep them. And they do occur in Dickens and Trollope if anyone has the desire to read them.
    David

    1. Yes, and as pointed out in a later comment WARHORSE couldn’t be the play /film/ book because that’s WAR HORSE – two words.

26. Enjoyed this mixture of quick write-ins and slow, headscratching workings-out. TAFFETA took ages as I went through all the salad dressings I have ever consumed: quite a list! Suddenly saw the light (or the dress). The ADAGE/BAY RUM crosser took longest and were LOI. I paused over OVERT = obvious, but I suppose it works (just). WARHORSE well known to am dram enthusiasts and readers of the theatre critics – normally equated with money-spinner. 19 minutes so out of the SCC (first time in several days). Thanks Pedro and Merlin.

27. From TINY to WARHORSE in 12:14, so on the tougher end of the spectrum for me. I also can’t get worked up about the setters’ use of various rarely known words. Once you’ve learned them, they are a tool for you as well as the setter. With ADAGE and RUM in place, it didn’t take too long to think of BAY for howl. BAY RUM then tinkled a very faint bell somewhere in the depths. Thanks Pedro and Merlin.

28. I’ve heard of BAY RUM as my dad used to use it in the 70s – awful smell – but I still ended up revealing this clue as I didn’t see bay=howl, although entirely synonymous. POI was WARHORSE. I hadn’t spotted that it was an anagram so needed all the checkers. Didn’t know the ‘regularly-performed’ meaning though. Wasn’t sure about ‘so’ as ‘very good’, and still don’t really understand. Not many smiles along the way but always enjoy the solving process. Thanks Pedro and Merlin.

    Like Templar and hopkinb I’m not troubled by the ‘code words’. I’ve just had to learn them over time like everyone else.

29. Was going great with this, sub-10 sort of rate, but came completely unstuck with three left in the NE corner, 11a, 5d and 6d. I could see there was probably an anagram somewhere in 5d, but thought it might involve every other letter of performed. Anyway, I saw it eventually and once WARHORSE had gone in (the Morpurgo version as I had forgotten the more general usage), I got INHERIT, which confirmed -RUM. I’d never heard of BAY RUM though so it was only after two alphabet trawls, one for the first letter, one for the third, that I hit on the probable answer. Stopped the watch on 22:29.
    With regards the usage of Eton, tin etc, surely they make things easier rather than harder, especially if they crop up a lot. Okay, so you have to learn them, but that doesn’t take too long. It’s the use of dated things like Bay Rum that causes the real problems. Anyway, thanks to Merlin and Pedro.

30. Dnf…

    30 mins, but I couldn’t get the NHO of 6dn “Bay Rum” and 13dn “Inchoate”, the latter I ended up putting in as “Inceoath”. I would probably normally moan about the old clues, but as we have recently started having a few more modern ones, you could argue it evens out.

    FOI – 2dn “Gluten”
    LOI – Dnf
    COD – 24ac “Taffeta”

    Thanks as usual!

31. Not today – I think i had a good quarter of the clues as nho today 🙁

32. Having misspelt INCOHATE and put PINK for 22d I needed help to get going again but sorting these allowed me to finish in under an hour.
    Overall this was enjoyable despite being hard and with some dubious clues as noted elsewhere.
    One of the joys of the QC is learning new words and I now know what INCHOATE means and how to spell it and also what a ‘heteronym’ is.
    Thanks all.

    1. Here are 4 other examples of heteronyms that setters use:
       Wind: Rhymes with “pinned” (to turn) vs. Rhymes with “kind” (moving air).
       Lead: Rhymes with “seed” (to guide) vs. Rhymes with “bed” (a metal).
       Tear: Rhymes with “hair” (to rip) vs. Rhymes with “fear” (liquid from the eye).
       Bass: Rhymes with “face” (male voice) vs. Rhymes with “mass” (type of fish).

       1. Aren’t the rhymes for WIND reversed?

          1. I marvel at the ough endings:
             rough
             bough
             though
             through
             There are probably more but I can’t imagine what it would be like trying to learn English from scratch!

             1. “The tough coughed as he ploughed the dough.” I remember that from my childhood, no idea what the source is.

                1. Oh yeah, cough, forgot that one. That makes five different pronunciations. As I said, imagine as a non-English speaker trying to get your head around that!

33. I correctly guessed INCHOATE but I failed on BAY RUM. The best I could come up with was cAw RUM.

34. DNF in 10 not knowing BAY RUM

35. A stinker – even though I knew BAY RUM as my father used it. However, didn’t know that Saw = proverb or Tin = money (although answers biffed correctly) or Fat = oily in Crossword Land and thus spent ages trying to think of a (salad type) dressing for 24a. Not an enjoyable struggle.

    I am very much in the “ban Eton” corner, along with boy/girl names and the over use lately of MEGA. Not keen on the arrival of living persons’ names, either.

    This is obviously my Victor Meldrew day, despite the sunshine!

36. 14.28 DNF. I was completely stumped by the NHO BAY RUM and biffed an unlikely EAU RUM. SOFT, MALAISE and WARHORSE held me up, but it didn’t seem too tough otherwise. Thanks Merlin and Pedro.

37. DNF- gave up with about half completed – never come acrossBAY RUM before, plus contemplated SOFT, but couldn’t properly equate with pale colour

38. 15:47. Another who was well aware INCHOATE existed but couldn’t have given you its definition. I can only think whenever I encountered it in reading it didn’t hinder my understanding of the passage enough to make me consult the dictionary.

39. What a strange day – generally I don’t get on with Pedro so well. I find his clues very wordy, but today they were more concise and I finished in 10:29 (about average), having mostly enjoyed it – I must be on a different wavelength from everyone else 😅 The biggie however 😱 – a total disaster!
    I didn’t like SOFT for pale colour, did know BAY RUM (probably from old books) and had the same experience regarding INCHOATE as many others! But overall, I thought it was fine.
    We’re off to Lake Garda on Thursday, so will be relaxing by a large lake, so RESPOND got a tick.
    I am also in complete agreement with Templar, HB, John D and others about learning the code, which should include old and modern terms. And I’m not too fussed about the introduction of living people either, as long it doesn’t end up being like Wurm’s two most recent offerings!
    FOI Adage LOI and COD Gluten – a very good surface
    Thank Pedro and Merlin

40. My sense of satisfaction at completing this (yes well in the SCC) has been enhanced by reading the comments 😀. And being 71 is not old enough to have heard of BAY RUM 😂😂. I had no idea what the clue was going on about but it seemed a feasible guess

41. Is Mick Hodgkin’s column only on-line? I can’t find in the print edition of Saturday’s Times.

    1. I think you have to sign up for the puzzles newsletter and it comes via email.

42. Like Penny (in more ways than one) I had a different experience with this than most did, finishing in 20:38, not a great time for me but not a super long one either. On reviewing the puzzle I felt I could have done it a lot faster were I not so traumatized (ok, I exaggerate 🙂 ) by yesterday’s and Friday’s experiences.

    Did not remember BAY RUM but the wordplay made it clear and thus I suppose I must have seen it somewhere, somewhen over the years. Enjoyed MALAISE, raised an eyebrow at INHERIT, such a very, very remote synonym; an inheritor is passive, one who takes over is active. Raised the other eyebrow at TAFFETA, which is a cheap material. Liked WARHORSE best.

    Thanks commenters re: something for the weekend, a glimpse into a foreign world!

    Thanks Pedro and Merlin!

    1. 😊😊😊

43. 15:07, just outside my target time, but checking the parsing of WESLEY before submitting pushed me over.

    My take on the archaisms discussion is that I don’t have an issue with older usages just because they are old: I have no issue with TIN for money or even PI for good, for example. The ones I object to are those that invoke (or seem to assume) a public school “Kipling and Empire” view of the world, such as Eton being massively over-represented as a school and my particular dislike, U for posh. I will now go and join Dvynys behind the sofa.

    Thanks to Merlin and Pedro.

44. Add me to the list who tried for ages to make ‘pink’ the answer to 22d. Tough today but finished eventually.
    Thanks Pedro and entertaining blog Merlin. Recently adopted a dog called Merlin!

45. Shoved unceremoniously through the doors of the SCC by the crossing of SOFT and LOI STAMP, in at 22:11, took us about twice as long as yesterday’s Izetti which we didn’t do until late this morning. Found today’s quite hard much of the way through. Like Steel City we didn’t have TAFFETA as a ‘costly’ dressing either. On the other hand, unlike many others, INCHOATE and BAY RUM didn’t hold us up. Thanks Merlin and Pedro.

46. 35 minute DNF.

    NHO BAY RUM, put HAS RUM, H from Howl and AS for when. That’s how bad I am at this!

    How anyone other than the experts derived pleasure or satisfaction from this is beyond me.

    I simply cannot achieve anything close to respectability. Another week comprehensively blown. Doing this makes me realise how ignorant I am.

    Only 2 on Quintagram and just over half on the big crossword.

    You’ll be glad to know I won’t be commenting tomorrow. I need to have a day away from this torture. I honestly wish I had never started trying to solve cryptic crosswords! Having spent ages on the big crossword recently, I have realised that I simply don’t have the brain for this.

    ☹️☹️☹️

47. 26:42, with BAY RUM going in accompanied by a distinct sense of 8a. I enjoyed this one despite being firmly inside the SCC. LOI TAFFETA – I could see “feta” in there but was confused by the F being in the wrong place. COD INCHOATE, because now I can feel smug about having an idea of what it meant, before I return to my ground state of baffled humiliation tomorrow.

    Thank you for the blog!

48. hello all – today I have seen this trail for the first time, having Times Cryptic for years. I will now look at it every day. It’s comforting to see I am not alone with the clues I found difficult. Will someone please be kind enough to explain LOI, FOI and COI ? I assume L and F are last and first but would like to know the whole expression.

    1. Hello, Mary, and welcome!

       All the jargon is explained in our Glossary. There’s a link at the side of the page (under Useful Links) or on the Help drop-down menu at the top. The layout may vary according to the device you are viewing on.

    2. Welcome, Mary. Glad you’ve found us, we’re quite a welcoming lot, and hopefully you’ll visit and contribute often.
       LOI : Last One In
       FOI : First One In
       COD : Clue of the Day
       For the rest, see the blog Jack suggests.

    3. Welcome Mary – hope to see you again 😊 You’ve come to the right place for useful clarification and support – but also entertainment!

    4. Welcome! I love it here and hope you do too!

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