Quick Cryptic 1584 by Mara

Author   CuraristPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic
I took ages to get going with this, but it was reasonably starightforward after that. I seemed to do a lot of biffing. I’ll be interested to see how you all got on. 10 minutes for me.

Across

1 Carelessly omits a Chinese revolutionary (6)
MAOIST – anagram (‘carelessly’) of OMITS A
5 Kit back on vehicle for band (6)
STRIPE – STRIP is kit as in football kit, + E (back of vehiclE)
8 Careless type playing with fire gets burnt (13)
BUTTERFINGERS – anagram (‘playing with’) of FIRE GETS BURNT
9 Indicate average value (4)
MEAN – double definition
10 Drainage sorted for shrub (8)
GARDENIA – anagram (‘sorted’) of DRAINAGE
11 A southern bird to the rear (6)
ASTERN – A + S + TERN
13 That woman taken in by father, ruined (6)
DASHED – SHE inside DAD
15 Predator cooked, salty little thing (8)
TEARDROP – anagram (‘cooked’) of PREDATOR
17 Poultry and not a sausage for batsman? (4)
DUCK – A bird and a score of zero in cricket
19 Educator distributing her chocolates (13)
SCHOOLTEACHER – anagram (‘distributing’) of HER CHOCOLATES
21 Light cereal grass circled by insect (6)
FLOATY – OAT inside FLY
22 Lucrative job student won’t start (6)
EARNER – (L)EARNER
Down
2 A charming accent (5)
ACUTE – A + CUTE
3 Strong batting, perfect for example (7)
INTENSE – IN is batting, perfect is a an example of a TENSE
4 Something sticky in pie, unfinished (3)
TAR – TAR(T)
5 Supporter of jockey claims journalist provoked (7,2)
STIRRED UP – STIRRUP supports a jockey, with ED inside
6 Part of antihero, guess one’s villainous (5)
ROGUE – hidden word: antiheRO GUEss
7 Piggy beginning to crawl in, occupying hole (7)
PORCINE – C + IN inside PORE
10 Shockingly green friend, on the whole (9)
GENERALLY – anagram (‘shockingly’) of GREEN, plus ALLY for friend.
12 Insect ruined large sheet full of holes (7)
STENCIL – anagram (‘ruined’) of INSECT + L
14 Cocktail made with brandy, as cider awful (7)
SIDECAR – anagram (‘awful’) of AS CIDER
16 Wine I love in jar, drunk (5)
RIOJA – I + O inside anagram (‘drunk’) of JAR
18 Some pancake, perchance, served up? (5)
CREPE – reverse hidden word: pancakE PERChance, also an &lit, which is why the definition doesn’t seem to be at the beginning or end.
20 Organ that can go up or down? (3)
EYE – meaning it’s a palindrome

28 comments on “Quick Cryptic 1584 by Mara”

  1. Thanks! I didn’t know the football term and was just waiting for the blogger to explain that one. I understood everything in the 15×15, at least!
  2. Steady going today, finishing just inside my target. It took me a while to work out what was going on with STRIPE as I was looking for a reversal of some sort and was also held up by the anagram at 8a. The cocktail had to be dredged from the depths and OAT caught me by surprise because I’m not sure I’ve ever seen it in the singular before. Finished in 14.36 with LOI INTENSE and my COD being DUCK.
    Thanks to curarist
  3. Just over half an hour, but pleased to finish after nothing much at the top till the end. FOI MEAN, LOI MAOIST. Did this on phone so don’t see setter’s name (why??) so guessed wrong from 7d. Mara moving in on Oink’s territory. Thanks Mara and curarist.
  4. 30 minutes, for what I thought was a rather difficult QC. I had almost ground to a halt half way through when I spotted STIRRED UP, and spent the last five on alphabet trawls for FLOATY and then STRIPE. I never did parse stripe, so thanks to Curarist for explaining it and to Mara for the puzzle.

    Brian

  5. I will have to check with the doorman of the SCC if 15 minutes allows me entry, FOI 11ac and then the bottom half went in and I worked my way up. LOsI 1ac and 5ac. An odd sort of solve as nothing leapt out but nothing seemed too tricky.
  6. Once again a couple of minor distractions took me to 11 minutes, missing my target by 1. The parsing of PORCINE, whilst not in itself difficult, gave me longest pause for thought.
  7. I agree with chris about the ‘odd sort of solve’ and I, too, gained a foothold in the lower half and ended up back at the top with 1ac, 5ac, and 3d – it was easier after BUTTERFINGERS flashed before my eyes. Chris, you can’t join the likes of me in rhe SCC with a 15 min solve. You’ll need another 5 mins to qualify. I’m firmly in today with 8 on top of my target (and your score)…. I liked STIRRED UP, PORCINE, INTENSE, STENCIL, and my LOI MAOIST. A destabilising puzzle from Mara and a good blog from curarist. John M.

    Edited at 2020-04-03 08:47 am (UTC)

  8. I found this a bit tricky too. It took me over my target to 12:03, but all was in vain as I’d carelessly entered TAOIST at 1a. Thanks Mara and Curarist.
  9. 5:54. 13-letter single-word answers can often be a challenge. I saw that school was in the fodder for 19 (nice anagram spot by Mara) so firstly tried SCHOOLMASTER but ran out of letters, then SCHOOLMISTRESS but ran out of squares, so had to look at the letters properly.

    STIRRED UP and CREPE were very good clues. Thanks all.

  10. ….and paused for half term. I was all over the grid, but, despite my lack of structure, I was within my target.

    FOI MAOIST
    LOI STENCIL
    COD BUTTERFINGERS (had the fieldsman suffered from this, that DUCK might have been avoided !)

  11. 17 minutes today, so pointing to hard on the Rotterometer. Like Penfold, I tried school mistress and master before looking at the anagrist. Also slow to parse PORCINE, although the revolutionary and the kit went straight in. I liked DUCK – missing my cricket!
  12. Mara, and Friday to boot, so I expected a hard slog. However I managed to get both of the long anagrams early on, which helped, and I also remembered the name of the cocktail, so I had some good footholds. Duck, Stripe and especially loi Floaty were the main hold ups, but at 24mins for a tricky QC, I’m not complaining. CoD to 17ac, Duck. Invariant
  13. I did not find this easy. Kept going but had to write out the fodder for the long anagrams. COD to BUTTERFINGERS I think.
    With 17:30 on the clock I had to stop to go on the dog walk and my hour’s outdoor exercise. I had two left. I bunged in an unparsed STRIPE at 5a and FLEARY at 21a.
    So one wrong.
    A very clever puzzle from Mara. High standard QCs these days. Thanks for the blog. Must remember Strip for Kit. David
  14. … for a 14 minute solve, with the NE corner holding me up at the end.

    Did anyone else get nicely misled by 1A? I spent a little while looking for a 7-letter word meaning Carelessly from which I could drop an A before the penny dropped.

    FOI 9A Mean, LOI 5A Stripe, COD 17A Duck, rather too often my score in my cricketing days alas.

    Thanks to Curarist for the blog
    Cedric

    Edited at 2020-04-03 11:29 am (UTC)

  15. Struggled with this one, very slow, but failed to think of Learner (so obvious!) Otherwise managed to finish eventually.
    Liked Butterfingers.
    Thanks to all.
  16. I found this relatively straight forward although 1a MAOIST held out until all the checkers were in place. I had to work hard on the letters of predator to come up with my LOI TEARDROP but I still managed to submit with a green light in 8 mins. I did glance to see who the setter was when typing in PORCINE…not Oink! Thanks Mara and curarist.
  17. I found this OK. I got the two long anagrams straight off which helped. Struggled with 5a and ended up with straps which I didn’t think was right cos I couldn’t parse it but I was looking for a vehicle and a trap is one! Got PORCINE but not parsed. Favourite clue was 15a I was looking for something like an anchivy but unscrabbling lead me to TEARDROP! I am going to try the 15×15 but if its too hard will stop as I get depressed then! Thanks for the blog and all your comments.
  18. Thought this was pretty straightforward – quite a relief after yesterday’s struggle. Don’t have an accurate time (iPad reckoned it took us 4 plus hours 😂) but it was quick.

    FOI: Maoist
    LOI: Floaty
    COD: butterfingers

    Thanks to this week’s sitters and bloggers

  19. So. What goes on!? Took a break and there, in the record reviews, was the answer to 7d. Is this a regular occurrence? Bill70. And the group is Pigs x 7. Scary
  20. At one third of yesterday’s time, today can be classified as A Good Day – and it was a Mara to boot! Although I think some clues (mean, gardenia and astern, for example) were very generously clued, others definitely didn’t jump out immediately – floaty and stripe in particular. Never did parse stripe so thanks for the explanation curarist.

    Quite a few food and booze-related clues too – well it is Friday 😊 Some sauages to start, followed by chocolate pie and crepes, accompanied by a sidecar and some Rioja – not sure how good that would be for my digestion! Sounds quite yummy though.

    FOI Maoist
    LOI Duck
    COD Stirred up
    WOD Butterfingers
    Time 10:20
    Mood Positive 😉

    Thanks all – see you on Monday

  21. After total failure yesterday, I enjoyed today’s offering and was pleased to finish in under 20minutes. I got the two long anagrams quite quickly as well as the shorter ones which helped. I struggled over 5a looking for car backwards and considering strap but once I had porcine- yet another anagram! – I got it.
    FOI 4d
    LOI 22a
    COD 12a
    Thank you Mara and Curarist.
    Blue Stocking
  22. Seemed to be a lot of anagrams in this today, but maybe I just ended up solving a lot of them around the same time.

    I also thought this was tricky – and had to start in the bottom half before making my way back up to the top. However, a stupid error putting in “Rouge” rather than “Rogue” for 6dn meant I just couldn’t get 8ac “Butterfingers” so I DNF.

    Thought of every “Kit” there was apart from the obvious football connotation which meant 5ac “Stripe” also took longer than expected.

    FOI – 11ac “Astern”
    LOI – DNF
    COD – 7dn “Porcine” – almost an Oink clue.

    Thanks as usual

  23. That was a difficult puzzle for me for sure… thanks ever so much to the blogger for the education… kit for strip amongst others… Porcine, did not get this at all… read the answer above and a slap of the forehead ensued… hole = Pore.

    A proud member of the SCC, but I admitted defeat today.

    Have a wonderful weekend

  24. I never have much of a clue as to the difficulty of each setter, that’s Jack’s department; although I do wish The Times 15×15 would introduce the ‘names’ of the setters – it would be of more use thereabouts IMO!

    The Mighty Mara fell here in Maoland in a mere 9 mins and 30 seconds.

    FOI 1ac MAOIST naturally.

    LOI 12ac STENCIL which I thought was a fairly rotten clue!

    COD 8ac BUTTERFINGERS lovely word!

    WOD 21as FLOATY!

    Where’s the Knight Templarr. Where’s Kevin? Is 5ac perhaps the reason? Although my SOI, the surface and the answer don’t quite gel. Further I believe neither the words KIT nor STRIP are used in America for sporting attire. Anyone?

  25. For the first time in ages. Could not see BUTTERFINGERS or STRIPE inside 20 mins, so gave up.

    Well done to Mara and thanks to today’s blogger curarist!

  27. 25 mins, slow.

    Held up by floaty, gardenia, stripe, tart, and LOI maoist.

    COD schoolteacher.

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