Quick Cryptic 3069 by Rongo

Author   galsprayPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic

Parksolve time 35:10 (slow run, rapid solve).

I’d call this a standard Quickie from Rongo, but not at all in a bad way.

It may be more suited to the experienced solver for whom hints like river, railway, air, snake and broadcaster will quickly suggest OUSE, RY, SONG, BOA and SKY.

Similarly, some of the anagram indicators (we had work, fix, out, tailor and terribly) might be easier to spot after you have a few thousand of these puzzles under your belt.  But I still think it’s quite an accessible puzzle for the aspiring cruciverbalist.

As always, YMMV, and that’s one of the reasons we have a comments section.  Let ’em rip…

(In the clues, definitions are underlined and anagram indicators are in bold italics.  In the explanations (ABC)* indicates an anagram of abc.  Deletions and other devices are indicated accordingly, I hope).
Across
1 The two consuming starter of rich soup (5)
BROTH – BOTH (the two) “consuming” R (starter of Rich)
7 Work relaxed an ancient Macedonian hero (9)
ALEXANDER – (RELAXED AN)*

Alexander the G is the canonical Macedonian hero.  Unless you’re a follower of Australian Rules football in which case Alex would take second billing behind the mercurial Peter Daicos.
9 Roof support with no front behind (5)
AFTER – RAFTER (roof support) without the first letter (with no front)
10 Withdrawing air to help is for identification of a problem (9)
DIAGNOSIS – [SONG (air) + AID (help)] reversed (withdrawing) + IS
11 Woman never undressed (3)
EVE – nEVEr with the outside letters removed (undressed)
12 Hard time catching river snake in floating home (9)
HOUSEBOAT – H (hard) + T (time) “catching” OUSE (river) + BOA (snake)
14 Perhaps did butterfly scheme initially drain fen area? (9)
SWAMPLAND – SWAM (perhaps did butterfly) + PLAN (scheme) + D (Drain initially)

Perhaps did butterfly.  Very good.
16 Back equality in declamatory song style (3)
RAP – PAR (equality) reversed (back)

Declamatory: vehement or passionate in expression.  Checks out.  As a late-to-the-table appreciator of the genre, I’ve become quite a fan of Eminem in particular (and yes I realise that still leaves me a couple of decades behind, but I think I’ve left my run too late to catch up now).
18 Requirement to fix rot in rice (9)
CRITERION – (ROT IN RICE)*
20 Spirit of good party-giver (5)
GHOST – G (good) + HOST (party-giver)
21 Left the cumin out when midday meal is taken (9)
LUNCHTIME – L (left) + (THE CUMIN)*
22 Hazardous lead-in for Radio 1 broadcaster (5)
RISKY – R [first letter of (lead-in for) Radio] + I (1) + SKY (broadcaster)
Down
1 British bird dog (6)
BEAGLE – B (British) + EAGLE (bird)
2 Very old tailor in orange coat (12)
OCTOGENARIAN – (IN ORANGE COAT)*

A shout-out to the octo’s out there, some of whom remain amongst our slickest solvers.  Are you really very old?
3 Stern on vessel in difficulty (8)
HARDSHIP – HARD (stern) + SHIP (vessel)
4 Introductions to duke, earl, judge and viscount use sense of repetition (4,2)
DEJA VU – First letters of (introductions to) Duke Earl Judge And Viscount Use

Feels like we’ve seen this clue before…
5 New method to lift something boring (4)
YAWN – [N (new) + WAY (method)] reversed (to lift)
6 Name missing from gift arranged in advance (6)
PRESET – N (name) missing from PRESENT (gift)
8 Rude — too rude — I cuss terribly (12)
DISCOURTEOUS – (TOO RUDE I CUSS)*
13 Put at risk, stop rage (8)
ENDANGER – END (stop) + ANGER (rage)
14 Tool for cutting diseased edges of lucerne (6)
SICKLE – SICK (diseased) + LE (“edges” of LucernE)
15 A Liberal exists? They say one’s somewhere else (6)
ALIBIS – A + LIB (Liberal) + IS (exists)
17 Circle among favourite railway lines (6)
POETRY – O (circle) “among” PET (favourite) + RY (railway)
19 Repeat fifth word of radio series (4)
ECHO – The fifth word of the NATO alphabet (radio series)

Alfa, Bravo, Charlie, Delta….

71 comments on “Quick Cryptic 3069 by Rongo”

  1. I can’t believe I am the first to comment. Awake at five. Took me 45 minutes.

    20 with a high proportion of bifd. I see the anagram indicators and the anagrist and half the time just “write” the answer in, of you can write on a phone touch screen keyboard.

    I did miss criterion which is annoying.

    Didn’t see poetry at all, tough for a novice. Missed yawn. Also missed the NATO clue.

    Thanks G and R

  2. 10 minutes. Nice puzzle.

    Following Thursday’s QC discussion I have resolved to avoid citing the ‘NATO’ alphabet in my blogs and comments, perhaps using ‘phonetic alphabet’ or ‘radio alphabet’ instead. Whether I shall remember to do this is another matter…

    1. I smiled at the use of “radio series” to indicate what we used to call the NATO alphabet- but Galspray, perhaps you missed Kapietro’s impassioned plea a couple of days ago to call the first of the series Alfa.

      1. Cedric, what I took away from the discussion was that it’s our use of the term NATO that’s the problem as that alphabet specifies Alfa and Juliette. Other agencies use the conventional spellings which are also listed in the dictionaries for their use in radio communication. So in order to avoid complaints along these lines in the future I am planning to refer to ‘radio alphabet’ or ‘phonetic alphabet’, terms that are less restrictive in their application than ‘NATO alphabet’.

  3. 3:27, nice speedy Saturday but can somebody explain why it’s ALIBIS and not ALIBI given the definition in the clue? I also just realised I do not know what lucerne is, and so looked it up to find it is a synonym of alfalfa, which made me think ‘ah!’…before realising I also did not really know what alfalfa was. My take-home: it looks like watercress.

    The beautifully situated Lucerne is Luzern in German, as many probably know, but Lozärn in the local dialect, which is probably less known (though I’d love to see more Swiss German in the puzzles!)

    1. Tolli Ziit! Leider bin hüt im Slowcoach Club gsi. Ich ha vor dreissg Jahr es bitzli Schwiitzertüütsch in Züri glernt.

      1. Tolle Zeit! Leider bin heute im Slowcoach Club ???gelandet???. Ich habe vor dreißig Jahren ein bisschen Schwiitzertüütsch in Zürich gelernt

        Well this was just my try!

        1. With an English daughter who lives in the Swiss German part of Switzerland PLEASE don’t suggest putting a non-written language in the already difficult crosswords!!

      2. Haha nice! You’re braver than me to write it out, I’ll stick with reading.
        @SteveB nice idiomatic ‘gelandet’! ‘gsi’ = ‘gewesen’ in case you were unaware.

    2. It does say ‘THEY say that someone’s somewhere else’. I was only aware of Lake Lucerne in Switzerland

    3. Lucerne fodder is alfalfa in the USA, as I learnt from reading the Richard Scary books to my children. As for Swiss German, I vote we stay this side of the Rösti Line.

    4. With an English daughter who lives in the Swiss German part of Switzerland PLEASE don’t suggest putting a non-written language in the already difficult crosswords!!

      1. Yes, agreed, but fortunately here in the QC German clues seem to be limited to e.g. ‘der’ and ‘ein’. Written Swiss German follows High German, as you said. I found that when speaking the Switzerdeutch understood my schoolgirl German but I had no idea what they said in response.

  4. 13:14 for the solve, and I did not find this as easy as others (fantastic time by dr.shred …). I was bumbling along at average pace until my last three, OCTOGENARIAN (I’d like to claim that the hold-up was because I don’t think 80 is “very old”, but in truth it just took me ages to piece together the anagram, and the checkers were not very helpful) then the pair RAP/POETRY. It took the insight that we had to lift-and-separate railway and lines to break the impasse and having done so, appreciate the cleverness of the clue.

    Many thanks Galspray for the blog, and a good weekend to all.

  5. An enjoyable start to the weekend and not too difficult either.
    I made swift progress until hitting the buffers with OCTOGENARIAN where I missed the anagram indicator and POETRY, where I was just being dozy.
    Finished in 6.41.
    Thanks to galspray and Rongo

  6. I enjoyed this and was only just over 9. I keep having to correct the entries so it should be quicker. Anyway I thought this was well pitched so thanks Rongo and Galspray

  7. 7.56 WOE

    Can’t spell OCTOGENARIAN. Otherwise, nice puzzle and the usual amusing offering from Galspray.

  8. I biffed SWAMPLAND so g’day and thanks to Galspray.

    I doubt I will ever come to appreciate RAP. Somebody tried to persuade me recently that it’s a modern take on blues. I finished my pint and changed pubs. Thanks, but I’ll stick with Howlin’ Wolf since I can sing along with him and John Lee Hooker nowadays.

    Two passes left just my LOI outstanding – so not difficult, but a well pitched QC. Thanks Rongo.

    FOI BROTH
    LOI YAWN
    COD RISKY
    TIME 3:51

    1. I think we can win you over Phil. If I can just convince john_dun to do a rendition of Lose Yourself next time we’re at The George.

  9. Nice gentle 6:23 with best part of a minute to see LOI YAWN. Alas it won’t count as fat fingered typo . Thanks Rongo and Galspray

  10. Biffed SWAMPLAND, now appreciate very clever clue. Needed blog to parse DIAGNOSIS and ECHO – both obvious in hindsight. Thanks Rongo for great puzzle and Galspray for the blog.

  11. I didn’t find this as easy as many posters above. A steady solve took me close to the SCC with two to go and then I deduced POETRY. This gave me my LOI, RAP (of no interest to me as a ‘music’ style) and I just slipped into the club.
    I just did not find my rhythm. Not unusual for me with Rongo. I found my times for two of his earlier puzzles (quite some time ago) which were a couple of minutes either side of the SCC mark.
    Thanks, anyway and, like Yorkshirelass, I add my thanks to Galspray for parsing ECHO, DIAGNOSIS and SWAMPLAND for me (and I still can’t get my head around parkrun times!).

  12. “Can’t go wrong with Rongo…”. Oh yes you can! I confidently entered OCTAGENARIAN for 2d, being too sloppy to read the anagram fodder properly, for a DNF. Not good after a DNF yesterday with a typo.

    I didn’t have many troubles with this and wasn’t expecting to see the pink square. I liked the ‘undressed’ EVE and the parsing of DIAGNOSIS.

    Thanks to Rongo and Galspray

  13. 4:09. Nothing written on my copy other than to underline the anagram fodder and record my time. Nice puzzle. Thank-you Rongo and Galspray.

  14. Au contraire Galspray. One can go wrong with a Rongo! My biffed CORRECTION at 18a, which I didn’t notice become CORRECTIN due to the lack of space, became even more wrong when LOI, OCTOGENARIAN went in and produced COIRECTIN (and ALTBIS). A pretty collection of pinks! Drat! Got 5 pinks in the Concise today as well. Shudda gone to Specsavers. Perhaps I should go back to sleep and forget about the 15×15! 9,16 with 2 errors. Thanks Rongo and Galspray.

  15. I enjoyed solving this and between Rongo and Galspay have learned some new crossword skills such as SONG for AIR and ‘withdrawing’ as a reversal indicator. But will I remember them next week?
    COD to SWAMPLAND for ‘perhaps did butterfly’ which had me completely flummoxed.
    Thanks v much both.

  16. 7:44, so a very fast one. Once checkers starting appearing it became a little too much of a biff-fest. For example the Alexander clue felt like doing the Concise.

    Railway lines together in the POETRY clue: very nice.

  17. 17:42 but had to reveal Sickle – lazy really as I had all the checkers and it was parsable. Biffed many from definition, parsing later or with Galspray’s help.

  18. 16:13 I was all done bar 5d at 10 minutes then stared at it for 6 minutes 12 seconds in a kind of no idea stupor, started to feel very sleepy, yawned had a visceral PDM and the rest is history. Despite having no Swiss German in or before the last three decades I feel confident that today was a QTPi.
    Ta G&R

  19. A good Saturday puzzle from Rongo, with more than just a scattering of tricky teasers amongst the standard fare. Poetry, in particular, took a long time to see. A total of 18mins, with joint parsing inspired CoDs to Swampland and Diagnosis. Invariant

  20. DNF

    Infuriatingly I hit submit without realising I hadn’t answered 5d. 14:39 for the solve, a further 20 seconds or so kicking myself and another 20 to see YAWN.

  21. Darn, first comment lost.
    DNF DIAGNOSIS.
    Otherwise much enjoyed but disapproved of 2d.
    Liked POETRY, RISKY, RAP, SICKLE.
    Thanks vm, Galspray. CNP all. Did butterfly!

  23. 10:44
    I carefully checked the anagram fodder of OCTOGENARIAN before submitting, thus avoiding a spelling mistake.
    COD to ECHO.

    Thanks Galspray and Rongo

  25. Dnf…

    17 mins, but two spelling errors in 2dn “Octogenarian” and 8dn “Discourteous” leading to a couple of pink squares. Should have checked – but these things happen.

    Overall, a good QC from Rongo, with some clever clues.

    FOI – 1dn “Beagle”
    LOI – 8dn “Discourteous” (spelt wrong)
    COD – 14ac “Swampland”

    Thanks as usual!

    1. I bothered to double-check OCTOGENARIAN (which I did by deleting the letters out from online but which also presents the possibility of messing them up when typing them back in!).

      DISCOURTEOUS I made the call that I’d accept failure as could only be bothered to double-check there were a couple of pairs of OUs in the anagrist.

  27. 10:52 for the solve. What a great puzzle, I really enjoyed that. It wasn’t easy per se but I don’t think I ever got stuck, just slowed down by putting together answers. SWAMPLAND for example I somehow built backwards. As Galspray says in his excellent blog intro – there were lots of familiar synonyms and I like to see that in a QC. Too many good surfaces and clues in here to choose between.

    parksolve coming in at 33:54 after a tired leg week. Hope the Vo2 lull will be over for some decent training next week.

    Thank-you to Galspray and Rongo

  28. As an aspiring cruciverbalist myself, I’d agree that this was gently challenging but not brutal, coming in at 13:36. I needed the blog’s help to parse DIAGNOSIS but otherwise no major problems.

    Thank you for the blog!

  29. 36 minutes, but a technical DNF. I did this online, something I never do during the week, and didn’t notice I had typed OCTOnEgARIAN. This took a minute or three to spot as, apart from ALEXANDER (where I didn’t realise ‘Work’ was an anagrind), I had fully parsed and was confident in every clue. POETRY was my second last in and added 3-4 minutes to my time.

    Many thanks to Galspray and Rongo.

  30. 7:38

    No major hold-ups apart from LOI OCTOGENARIAN which required a write-out of all letters. Wasn’t sure where 16a was going until both checkers were in place.

    Thanks Galspray and Rongo

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