Quick Cryptic 2780 by Asp

70 comments on “Quick Cryptic 2780 by Asp”

1. Yeovil is one part of Somerset that is not ETHEREAL. I got one across clue on the first pass – ERR – and thought I was in a lot of trouble until practically all the downs went straight in. All those checkers made things like DERVISH and INSUBORDINATE a lot easier and allowed me to bring UNCONDITIONAL to mind – a big annoying gap in my brain for that type of offer for the first trip round. Made things a bit hard by thinking I’d followed the cryptic to INTERMINAncE (ace not able, can’t explain the n in retrospect) – bit of time to unravel that once INSUBORDINATE went in and I was home, all green, in a surprisingly fast 16.26.

2. 9 minutes, but with a small MER over Are = Lives in 17A, which did not seem right (if lives is a verb then it should equate to is, if a noun I don’t see how it makes are). Otherwise straightforward, though I misparsed ARISTOCRATIC (did not include the “as” in the definition and so couldn’t quite link the meanings). FIDGETY LOI; I’m not good at spotting &lit clues and put this in unparsed.

   Many thanks Curarist for the blog.
   Cedric

   1. I live, therefore I am. You live, therefore you are. (with apologies to René Descartes).

      1. Yes but that is live not lives and should correspond to is not are. Or is that trying to be too precise?

         1. I’m with you on this one Cedric. It couldn’t be anything else, but it went in with a shrug.

         2. Try saying in a Zummerzet accent!

         3. It doesn’t work for me either but had to be what was meant.

            1. I put it in because what else could it be? But the clue doesn’t work.

               Also, for me, ‘worthless’ as a definition for BASE is too much of a stretch.

         4. FYI it looks like the clue has been changed, my version as of 1pm reads:
            17AC: ‘After retiring, live for some time’

            They must have seen the comments!

            1. Aside from misprints, it seems poor practice to change a clue after publication. What’s published in the printed edition should stand.

3. All but one answer in 10 minutes. Then I allowed myself to be daunted by the prospect of doing an alphabet trawl on ?A?E at 19dn and quickly ran out of steam. After another couple of minutes I spotted LAME as a possibility for ‘worthless’ and decided to go with it despite not being sure if there was a way to make ‘support’ work as the other definition. I didn’t have much hope but after the the ordeal of today’s 15×15 my brain was tired . Having seen the correct answer as BASE I’m not sure I’d ever have got there.

   1. Similar alpha trawl experience. I got PALE, being a support for a palisade, and worthless in the sense of ‘ a PALE imitation of a clue’. I didn’t get to first BASE.

   2. Same experience. 10 minutes for 97%. Then 10 minutes on -A-E. Went with LAME, wrong but a double alphabet trawl didn’t locate BASE. And 15×15 was exhausting.

      1. I’m delighted to see it wasn’t just me who had difficulty with this one. Although I can’t imagine many worse answers than my BARE.

   3. I put BASE in straight away and, reading the blog, wondered why anyone had a problem with it . However Base metals may not be precious but they do have a value and base characters maybe low in morals but maybe we should be reluctant to describe anybody as worthless , so maybe you’re all right 🙂

4. Nothing makes me feel more silly than missing a hidden. I missed GOURMAND though the definition is clear, the checkers were there, the wordplay was easy!

   Didn’t matter anyhow because I couldn’t get BASE and just couldn’t drag up the vocabulary. I knew it was a DD but just couldn’t find a word that fit the checkers.

5. Mainly easy going but with a number of breezeblocks (can you have more than 1?) towards the end – namely missing the hidden for GOURMAND, general doziness with HEARTY and not realising LOI dERVISH was an anagram.
   A very entertaining puzzle which I finished a smidge over average in 8.48 with CsOD to ABHOR and FIDGETY.
   Thanks to Curarist

6. I didn’t move an eyebrow at ‘lives’, but Cedric certainly has a point; I don’t see how ‘revolutionary lives’ can yield ARE. I didn’t care much for BASE=worthless, but shrugged and moved on. I learned ABH here a while back; couldn’t remember what it stood for, but at least remembered that it existed (or were, in the setter’s dialect). 5:22.

   1. No, surely it’s “lives = are” (which we can dispute/discuss), then “revolutionary” = backwards which yields ERA.

      1. Yes, of course. Thank you Martinů. That’s sneaky, but I cancel my MER

         on edit: er.. actually no. It still doesn’t work, does it?

   2. I knew Actual versus Grievous BH (not from personal experience), but forgot that OR = Other Ranks = men.

      1. Came here to understand the OR in abhor… relieved to see I’m not the only one!

         10:24 which is pretty good for me.

         LOI was gourmand, which was so well hidden I only parsed it several brain waves after completion

7. Very quick then stuck on LOI BASE. Had to seek inspiration in the CCD. Pity as I was doing so well. Maybe a bit slow on INTERMINABLE.
   Liked GOURMAND, DERVISH, HEARTY, PINPOINT , among others.
   Thanks vm, Curarist. I couldn’t parse ABHOR.

8. I found this a bit of a bind, and, as well as ERA discussed earlier, I thought “as nobleman” was loose. I started slowly and never really got into a pattern.

   FOI EMOTIVE
   LOI BASE
   COD FIDGETY
   TIME 5:35

9. 11:59. FOI 1ac GAME. Good start. At the end I settled down for a long alphabet trawl on ?A?E at 19dn, then straightaway there it was: BASE.
   Like Cedric a MER (or rather more than a MER) at “Revolutionary lives”. I liked PINPOINT

10. Well I liked it. EMIGRE (fantastic surface), FIDGETY, GOURMAND, TIFF and COD ABHOR all terrific clues. Thank you Asp! (Agree about “lives” though …)

    All done in 05:57, which would have been a Busman-beater had it not been for having to trawl for BASE. Thank goodness B is early on but it still took a while. So ended up with 1.2K and an Excellent Day.

    Many thanks Asp and curarist.

11. ARE (lives) didn’t bother me at the time – I put it down to crossword-speak – but of course Cedric is correct. My MER was with ‘wretch’, which to me means unlucky and/or miserable rather than unpleasant, but the answer was clear. Otherwise some nice clues in a 6 min solve – enjoyed FIDGETY most.

12. Yes, well, ok! LOI BASE difficult; both worthless and support can be so many things, so down to an ABC trawl, lucky B worked. MER at both UNCONDITIONAL and EMIGRE which are simple definitions, not cryptic at all. Liked FIDGETY, definition = anagrind very clever.
    Now I read the blog: surely “offer of university place” is not UNCONDITIONAL *unless* it is “with no qualifications”, hence surely simple (not double) definition?
    Thank you, Curarist, for explanation of ABHOR which I CNP (NHO ABH – not in that world, glad to say).
    EMIGRE: oh so it’s an anagram as well! Does that promote a simple definition to the status of ‘cryptic’ even though it is actually already the former?
    Wow – not often I’m one ahead (BASE) of the venerable jackkt – thank you, Asp!

13. Just couldn’t see beyond PINPRICK and ROUGH and BASE took a couple of minutes too. A rather sluggish 15:20. I hope I’ve woken up by the time I attempt the main fare later .

    At least the sun is shining in this corner of Somerset …

14. I’ve heard of GBH, but not ABH. I got ABHOR from the checkers, but couldn’t parse it.

    However, BASE had me stumped. Why are 4-letter answers with 2nd and 4th checkers just so darned difficult? (I know the technical reason, I’m just moaning rhetorically)

15. Failed on:
    BASE: despite alphabet trawls. Do people go through the alphabet on both missing letters? It takes a lot of time.
    RETCH: missed ‘recounted’ as a ‘sounds like’ indicator
    PINPOINT: made harder without the retch crosser.
    COD to EELS for the river fish lift and drop.

    1. Yes, I did on -A-E and missed it both times. 😲

16. As a bit of a grammatical pedant, I’m with others querying ARE = LIVES. Could not see BASE so first DNF for months. Also could not parse ABHOR, but so obvious once it’s explained. Thanks Curarist.

17. Didn’t find this as easy as our blogger, but eventually got there. LOI BASE, like several others.

18. LOI BASE but for me an alphabet trawl is a keyboard trawl so B is one of the last one attempted. I was tempted by “FAKE” and not 100% convinced of BASE = Worthless. I assume its in the same usage as “our baser instincts”?

    1. My thought was of base metal. Took ages anyway.

       1. Ah very good, withdrawn

    2. . . .turning base metal into pure Gold (or Green 😉) was the alchemist’s dream

19. Mostly fine, held up by HEARTY (saw it early, but wanted an “m”), ERA (shrugged a bit), LOI BASE (terrified by ?A?E, but saw it sooner than expected).

    Off to have a go at the very red 15×15 and fail miserably I expect.

    6:20

20. Finished eventually although LOI BASE involved an alphabet trawl. No surprise there as DDs are definitely one of my weaknesses. Failed to spot DERVISH was an anagram so this took a while and needed the initial H to solve HEARTY. Couldn’t parse ABHOR (thanks C, very obvious now). Helped by some of the longer clues being write-ins. A real mixed bag of clues – some very obvious and a sprinkling of slightly trickier ones. Many thanks Asp.

21. DNF
    Didn’t have time to trawl for base.
    Thanks, C.

22. Very sluggish this morning – it’s just possible last night’s calvados didn’t help – and consequently missed several sitters first time round, including what must be one of the easier clues on the grid: Unconditional. A second, post coffee, sitting cleared up most of the problems, but the result was still a DNF because I couldn’t see Base. CoD to 5d, Pinpoint. Invariant

23. 8:38

    Slow with interruptions, but held up at the end by an alphatrawl for BASE – sometimes the first letter is enough to think of the answer. This time, I needed to revisit words beginning with B.

    Thanks Curarist and Asp

24. 12:20. Mrs T spotted LOI BASE – I’d have been staring for ever and a day, flew straight past it on my mental alphabet trawl. EELS was a fortunate biff because I couldn’t parse it. Mrs T explained INTERMINABLE to me and I lean towards it as COD.

25. 28 minutes. As above, all points covered. Thanks Asp and Curarist (whose fellow skills I am shortly to engage).

26. I couldn’t make my mind up if this was tough or I was just having a bad day. I suspect a bit of both in fact, as my finishing time of 16.05 was well outside target. Strangely I didn’t have any problems with BASE which seems to be the problem answer for many, but my LOI GOURMAND certainly took a while, as I seem to have an unwavering ability to miss the hidden.
    A mixed week for me with some quick times and two slow times. My total time was 51.32, giving me a daily average of 10.18. So in the end not far off my ten minute target.

27. Thanks Curarist, thanks all. The duff clue to 17ac has been amended online. Apologies.

28. Technical DNF.
    Another mer at are / era but it went in. Got base only with aids.

    There are plenty of female soldiers so why clue with “men”?

    1. Probably because OR is a WWII abbreviation, used primarily at the front.

29. 6.30 WOE

    Another day another pink square. Too boring to explain but couldn’t parse the IVE in EMOTIVE so left the V blank planning to come back to it. Actually a bit confused by that clue as the “great” seems superflous, though noone else seems to have had any minor twitchings of the eyebrow

    1. Great in the sense of large. I think Asp was just trying to be helpful – a small paperback is still a book, but could it ever be described as a tome?

30. Took ages to see 8a as I’d typed EELS from the second square after entering EXAMPLE, ending up with EEES. Saw UNCONDITIONAL straight away when it was corrected. INTERMINAL the assumed its place as POI. BASE brought up the rear after a trawl. 7:46. Thanks Asp and Curarist.

31. That took me 17.02 and I’d describe it as an average to poor effort on my part. I should probably give credit to Asp for making me think it was harder than it actually was. My last two, GAME and MOCK, should have gone straight in and with HARASSED I mucked around for ages before realising that ‘asset’ was sitting in the clue right in front of me. Over the course of the week, from Monday to Friday, my finishing time increased every day until it has now more than doubled. Conversely on the 15×15 I had some very good times until today’s DNF, so maybe it was Fathead Friday for this dope. Thanks to both.

32. 12:20. INTERMINABLE was most fun for me to parse.

33. DNF, 19d Base. Finding 2 letters out of 4 isn’t exciting. My Cheating Machine gives 145 answers and even tho’ Base is an early one I couldn’t be bothered.
    Was delayed by misreading 12a and reversing No 1 Tome giving Emotion and mucking up the Somerset clue. Eventually (doh!) saw the hidden ethereal and fixed Emotive.

34. 14.01 Mostly quick in the top-right and slow in the bottom-left. GOURMAND and INTERMINABLE required all the checkers. LOI BASE needed a mercifully short trawl. I found it very enjoyable. Thanks Curarist and Asp.

35. I’m pleased with my time of 23 minutes, especially as there were several double definitions. I hate them with a vengeance and they’re not cryptic.

    My FOI was DERVISH, which came as a relief after getting nowhere with the first six across clues. Nothing really stood out, but the crossword as a whole sat well with me. Held up for 2-3 minutes at the end by _A_E. Alphabet trawls like this can be very tedious.

    Thanks to Asp and Curarist.

36. I too query ARE= LIVES, couldn’t figure second ‘IN’ in INTERMINABLE

37. I put base and era right in without a second thought, but I also biffed two wrong answers: emotion and empire. I meant to check later, but of course I didn’t. This really slowed me down.

    Time: 10 minutes

38. Very slow off the mark, getting only one of the across clues on first read through. Luckily the downs proved more accessible but even then progress was slow and halting and spread over three sessions during the course of the morning. Total time over the three was 24 minutes with everything parsed except ABHOR. Loved the two long anagrams at 4dn and 20ac. Held up by many others by the unpromising -A-E at 19dn.

    FOI – 8ac UNCONDITIONAL
    LOI – 19dn BASE
    COD – 3dn EMIGRE. Who knew that this could be anagrammed to get REGIME and what a superb surface.

    Thanks to Asp and Curarist

39. 15:13, the last few minutes of which were looking for BASE. I’m not generally a fan of DDs with useless checking letters, but otherwise I enjoyed the puzzle.

    Thank you for the blog!

40. 13:12 here, lucky to come to it after the “duff” clue for 17a had been corrected, so no issues there. Like others, I got very few of the acrosses on my first pass (3? 4?) but the downs were much more tractable. LOI and COD to DERVISH, once the penny dropped that it could be an anagram.

    Thanks to Asp and Curarist.

41. we seemed rather slow, change of room due to power cut probably did not help.

42. BASE defeated me, otherwise all flowed nicely including the clever hiddens GOURMAND and ETHEREAL. I liked FIDGETY. Put in ERA but agree that it’s an ungrammatical clue. Done on the train with several interruptions but definitely into the SCC if there’s room. About 25 minutes.

43. DNF

    Annoying. It seems BASE caused a lot of problems today. All done in 18 minutes but had BARE for the worthless support DD. Obviously the support would be spelt BEAR so I’ve only myself to blame. I saw the answer as soon as the pink square appeared. Which is, of course, no use whatsoever.

44. I just give up with this.

    I am beyond useless. 31 minute DNF.

    Thought 16dn was homophone and put RIFT, meaning that my answer to 21ac was gobbledygook. How can I miss such an easy clue?

    I only needed a 34 minute finish today to make my target and I am so incompetent that I couldn’t make it.

    What’s the point of this daily torture? Every time I think I’m improving, something like this happens.

    Every single week I have a disaster. I’ve spent ages trying to improve by doing the big crossword and yet my performance here gets steadily worse.

    Don’t reply. I’ve tried and failed, simple as that.

45. 27 mins…

    Based on most of this week, just happy to finish. Started off fairly slowly until I got the two long clues of 7dn “Interminable” and 20ac “Insubordinate”, the rest then went in steadily. Only one I wasn’t sure of was 14ac “Dervish”.

    FOI – 2dn “Mock”
    LOI – 21ac “Fidgety”
    COD – 21ac “Fidgety”

    Thanks as usual!

46. To add to my misery, I spent 90 mins on big crossword and still got only 3/4 right.
    What’s the point? This is meant to be enjoyable. Instead it’s 2 hours of toil, frustration and anxiety.

    1. To enjoy the process maybe?!

47. You’re right, but it feels like I’m doing an exam every day. It’s taken over my eye evening during the week.

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