Time: A 20:22 DNF
No two ways about it, I found this one hard.
Not even the reward of a comfy seat in the SCC for my troubles. Twenty-two seconds over the cut-off only to find I had put in a C for the second letter of 23a. Some excellent clues though, of which my favourites were the geographically deceptive 6a and the muddled aviator in 19a.
I’ll probably be in a minority in finding this difficult and will be interested to hear how everyone else managed to get on.
Thanks to Joker
Definitions underlined in bold, deletions and letters in wordplay not appearing in answer indicated by strikethrough.
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | Have drug ready for use in kitchen container (8) |
| STOCKPOT – Cryptic hint. To STOCK (‘Have… ready for use’) POT (‘drug’) is, yes to ‘Have drug ready for use’ | |
| 6 | Piedmont’s capital is a city in Italy (4) |
| PISA – P (‘Piedmont’s capital’) IS (‘is’) A (‘a’)
P for ‘Piedmont’s capital’ as in the capital (either upper case or first) letter in the word ‘Piedmont’. Go to the bottom of the class in Italian geography. I looked at this and thought “Brilliant; Pisa must be the capital of Piedmont, so this is an &lit”, but no, I see that Pisa is in Tuscany. If the whole clue were a GK question, the answer would be Turin, again something I didn’t know. |
|
| 8 | Island of Sark you’ve found empty (4) |
| SKYE – S I think this is better than S |
|
| 9 | Cease talking about Dickens’ Barnaby. Dull work (8) |
| DRUDGERY – DRY (‘Cease talking’) containing (‘about’) RUDGE (‘Dickens’ Barnaby’)
Referring to Barnaby Rudge, a work by Charles Dickens. DRY for ‘cease talking’ as a theatrical colloquialism for an actor to forget his or her lines. In a general sense for ‘cease talking’, DRY would usually be followed by “up”. |
|
| 10 | Means of persuading cleaner (4,4) |
| SOFT SOAP – Double definition
SOFT (-) SOAP as an informal term for ‘persuasive flattery or cajoling’ (OED), originally a US colloquialism derived from the second def. Far from being a write-in for me. |
|
| 12 | Large show in former post office (4) |
| EXPO – EX (‘former’) PO (‘post office’)
Phew, a not too difficult one at last. |
|
| 13 | Faster flying in attack from the air (6) |
| STRAFE – Anagram (‘flying’) of FASTER | |
| 15 | Called bird came first (6) |
| TITLED – TIT (‘bird’) LED (‘came first’) | |
| 17 | Big and impressive electronic image? (4) |
| EPIC – E (‘electronic’) PIC (‘image?’) | |
| 19 | Expert pilot circling Paris confused where to fly (8) |
| AIRSPACE – ACE (‘Expert pilot’) containing (‘circling’) an anagram (‘confused’) of PARIS
Very good. Speaking as an expert armchair pilot who has watched too many episodes of the TV series “Air Crash Investigation”, it really can happen you know. |
|
| 21 | Ruin outside of car and take the edge off (8) |
| DIMINISH – DISH (‘Ruin’) containing (‘outside of’) MINI (‘car’)
Neither DISH for ‘ruin’ nor DIMINISH for to ‘take the edge off’ were the first words to come to mind. I didn’t know DISH in this sense which is given as “informal, mainly British English” in Oxford Dictionaries. DIMINISH for ‘take the edge off’ as in to “the poor quality of the opposition diminished / took the edge off the satisfaction he felt from his victory”. |
|
| 23 | Go from side to side of small vessel (4) |
| SPAN – S (‘small’) PAN (‘vessel’)
My wrong one. I still think SCAN sort of works, as in to look from side to side, but yes, PAN is a more convincing ‘vessel’ and SPAN is the better answer for the def. |
|
| 24 | Creature regularly seen in the briny (4) |
| TERN – T The whole clue can also be read as the def, so this would do as a semi-&lit for me. |
|
| 25 | Policeman in Bridgend, armed (8) |
| GENDARME – Hidden (‘in’) |
|
| Down | |
|---|---|
| 2 | Date to make a killing? (4,3) |
| TAKE OUT – Double definition
TAKE OUT as a colloquial term for “to kill”. |
|
| 3 | He is appearing in court case (5) |
| CHEST – HE’S (‘He is’) contained in (‘appearing in’) CT (‘court’) | |
| 4 | Minor lake yielding up new shell (3) |
| POD – PO Another one I found difficult, trying to make ‘up’ a reversal indicator (see 7d), not considering ‘yielding up’ as a deletion indicator and initially thinking ‘Minor lake’ was the def. |
|
| 5 | One praising president over damaged tree (9) |
| TRUMPETER – TRUMP (‘president’) before in a down clue (‘over’) anagram (‘damaged’) of TREE
Another one I was slow to get. At least it wasn’t one of those obscure 19th century US presidents. |
|
| 6 | Colour is good in a lot of red pepper (7) |
| PIGMENT – G (‘good’) contained in (‘in’) PIMENT I don’t think a PIGMENT (a chemical compound) and a ‘colour’ (a perception) as nouns are exactly the same thing, but they can be used interchangeably as verbs. |
|
| 7 | Bind pieces up (5) |
| STRAP – A reversal (‘up’) of PARTS (‘pieces’)
My previous struggles with ‘up’ at 4d bore some fruit with this one. |
|
| 11 | Rope needing right sailor for working (9) |
| OPERATING – ‘Needing’ here as a deletion indicator, which I only worked out after getting the answer. |
|
| 14 | Beware delaying start for sale (7) |
| AUCTION – CAUTION (‘Beware’) with the C (‘start’ (or first letter)) appearing later in the word (‘delaying start’) | |
| 16 | Call former partner with demand (7) |
| EXCLAIM – EX (‘former partner’) CLAIM (‘demand’) | |
| 18 | Quiet trip taken to see lions? (5) |
| PRIDE – P (‘Quiet’) RIDE (‘trip (taken)’)
You could argue that RIDE is ‘trip taken’ here, as there are otherwise three words linking wordplay and def. |
|
| 20 | Father’s thanks for Italian meal (5) |
| PASTA –PA’S (‘Father’s) TA (‘thanks’) | |
| 22 | Female seen in the night (3) |
| HEN – Hidden (‘seen in’) A couple of gentle ones to finish with. |
|
6:52
Straightforward, by and large. But I never figured out POD, and spent some time on it until I decided what the hell and biffed it.
I also found this a bit harder than the average quickie. My first thought for SPAN was sway, go from side to side but it didn’t parse and thought of the correct answer soon enough. NHO ‘dish’ for ruin. Wasn’t familiar with the Dickens novel but it had to be DRUDGERY. LikeD SOFT SOAP. All good in the end but slow.
Thanks BR and setter.
Also started with SWAY for 23A and then changed to SCAN which seems as valid as SPAN
I made a bit of a mess of this and failed on both SOFT SOAP and OPERATING where I couldn’t get my head around what was required. So a DNF in about 15. Thanks BR and Joker.
13:25 with one pink square. Yep: SCAN instead of SPAN. I also went to SWAY first, rejected it and then came up with SCAN and didn’t entertain the possibility that I might need three attempts to find a four-letter word. Ho hum.
Thanks to Joker and BR.
11 minutes. I had a feeling I had seen some of these clues before.
PASTA and TAKE-OUT for sure; EXPO, STRAP and EPIC seem like variations of chestnuts
I don’t mind rehashes as it helps fill out the grid in what is supposed to be a quick puzzle and it reinforces the learning
I used all of December’s willpower to stop myself writing in ‘sway’ for ‘go from side to side’ – huge relief when SPAN finally arrived. I’d previously struggled on DIMINISH, STOCKPOT and POD on the way to being all green in 14.29.
Seemed to be going ok at about 14 minutes with a good 3/4 done then struggled mightily in the NW before taking about 6 minutes to get soft soap after several alpha trawls. Did put in sway too but not happy with way so thankfully removed.
Liked trumpeter once I got away from a president starting T?U having to be Truman!
Thanks joker and BR
I enjoyed this one until hitting 23a where I went from sway to scan to SPAN – not the best of clues as there do seem to be two plausible answers.
I spent an embarrassing amount of time trying to think of five letter US presidents beginning with ‘t’, but other than that no major hold ups.
Started with PISA and finished with SOFT SOAP in 7.07.
Thanks to Joker and BR
24:35 Operating without Right (and North of the Pond) and throwing Caution to the wind (well its first letter to be precise) didn’t Diminish the Drudgery.
Ta BRAJ
Thanks, BR, glad I’m not the only one. Yet another where the hardest is 1a!
Yes it had to be DRUDGERY but agree, cease talking is “dry up”, doesn’t work without “up”.
NHO ruin = DISH. Yes I too went from sway to scan … and Mrs M came up with SPAN, bless her.
Golly minor lake and shell = POD also beyond me. Two to the bad.
40ish secs into this clip … use of “dry” … https://youtu.be/A6C_MBSU4bk?t=21
Thank you so much! It’s absolutely brilliant – I want to see the whole thing. I’ll try and work out whether the title is “A Guilty Man” or whether “About Time” is also part of the title. Thanks and best wishes. And I stand corrected, well done. Wasn’t aware of “dry” as a noun, but it’s totally effective of course.
Have to say I’ve never heard of “dry” outside of that line and it never quite made sense to me.
The film is “About Time” from about 2013. Another of those Richard Curtis (Four Weddings, Love Actually) films – it’s one of my favourites – always enjoy watching it if it’s on.
Hadn’t seen the film but thanks for the link – very good.
Well AFAIK the verb to dry does not require “up” in the theatrical world. I’m not an expert but my mum’s cousin was an actress (Hilda Fenemore) and she used dry without up.
Really hard for a QC but fairly normal for a Joker puzzle. Not fun for me
Ditto. Some really easy ones didn’t make the whole QC palatable.
I found that tough but a bit short of sleep today. COD STOCKPOT, which made me smile. LOI OPERATING, parsing which pushed me over target.
Fortunately scan didn’t occur to me!
All done in 10:10 for a Slow Day. Many thanks Joker and Bletchers.
PS I see that the Quitch already has 23 reference solvers excluded with errors, so I think “scan” has claimed a lot of victims.
DNF. Submitted at exactly 8 minutes, but with SWAY for 23a, despite not being convinced about way=vessel. I assumed that a blood vessel could be an arterial way, and failed to see the more sensible SPAN.
Thanks BR and Joker
I think SWAY is at least arguable. Yes, you have to squint quite a lot, but our setters seem to be champion squinters so I don’t see why that one should bother them.
If I squint that much, I don’t see anything.
Poor puzzle imo. Scan is just as valid an answer. A scanner goes from side to side and can is in the synonym lists for vessel.
20:12
Thought I was doing well, until I wasn’t.
As others, SWAY was stuck firmly in my head but it was the NW corner that secured my SCC seat. In particular, my last two – OPERATING and SOFT SOAP.
Pleased I had the confidence not to give in and, all parsed bar PIGMENT.
FOI: PISA
LOI: SOFT SOAP
COD: OPERATING
Thanks to Joker and BR
My response to this Joker puzzle is pretty much summarised by others above. Quick start and then stuck on the poor clue for SWAY/SCAN/SPAN (finally) on the way to a slow finish with STOCKPOT, SOFT SOAP, and OPERATING (on 23 mins with a sigh of relief).
Some good clues but this was tough (and harder than today’s SNITCH implies).
Thanks (through gritted teeth) to Joker for the usual tussle and to BR for confirming/augmenting my parsing.
5:43
Glad I thought of SPAN before SCAN as mentioned above, but had to drag myself away from SWAY before reaching that point. Everything else fairly parsed, though took a while to come up with LOI SOFT SOAP.
Thanks BR and Joker
Hard, taking 25:50 to scrape home. Several unparsed and agree about SCAN/SPAN. I usually find Joker’s puzzles to be on the difficult side.
I was not on Joker’s wavelength with this puzzle and shared our blogger’s puzzlement at various points: the OED may think dish for ruin “informal, mainly British English”, but as a very British speaker of the language I have never heard the usage, and “needing” as a deletion indicator in 11D is just weird – it is not the same as “lacking”. I also don’t really see call and EXCLAIM as synonyms. Add in the sway/scan/span clue where I started with sway like so many, saw that it did not work, thankfully did not see scan (which by contrast I think clearly does work) and only after some time alighted on SPAN, and this was not a straightforward solve. Thankfully there were enough clues that were more straightforward to help speed the solve, so my overall time of 12:28 was not too bad, but it is not a puzzle I will remember with much enthusiasm.
Many thanks BR for the blog.
15:07 with the perfectly good ScAN – you scan the horizon from side to side. Was really enjoying this QC when answers were flying in but then had the STOCKPOT/POD pairing and SOFT-SOAP/OPERATING/DIMINISH to deal with. While I was fairly sure of the latter NHO dish=ruin. The flipside is I very much enjoyed the clues for SKYE, AIRSPACE and TRUMPETER.
Thanks to BR and Joker
I think the secret to a quick time today was getting 1ac early. I didn’t, so another 25min Joker solve was not a great surprise. On the other hand Span was, as I was fairly confident that Scan parsed.
Other hold-ups along the way included the Soft Soap, Operating and Diminish trio. I don’t think I have ever come across Dish for ruin, but the checkers left little doubt.
CoD to the stubborn Stockpot. Invariant
DNF Defeated by NW corner and gave up on STOCKPOT and POD. Before that a mostly enjoyable struggle.
Very slow but steady. Also had sway. I needed two alphabet trawls for 10a last one in. Still nothing dreadfully difficult. Thanks Joker and BR.
The brief feeling of enjoyment I felt yesterday (7 mins) was destroyed by this puzzle. I had everything bar one clue within 10 mins, but then got stuck on 10ac and threw the towel in at 23 minutes. I would not have got SOFT SOAP if I had all day.
Frustrated, angry, fed up!
PS Just realised I had SWAY for SPAN. My misery is complete. Every time I think that I am progressing, something like this happens to remind me that I’m not!
Looking at some of the times posted, I was clearly on The Joker’s wavelength to finish in 7.02. I would have been a good deal quicker if I hadn’t spent over a minute on my last two, namely STOCKPOT and finally POND.
My position of 87th out of 156 at time of writing with one error would suggest there are rather a lot of SCANs out there!
DNF
I was left with 23A after fairly racing through the rest of the puzzle. Luckily I dismissed “sway” because it fitted the definition but not the wordplay, and “scan” because I could only see a can as a container rather than a vessel – and THAT’S why it isn’t an adequate answer.
FOI STOCKPOT
LOI SPAN
COD SOFT SOAP
TIME 4:39
Right – left for me today: starting with PASTA and HEN I worked steadily upwards and mission accomplished, I got the STOCKPOT and worked down from there. Enjoyed TRUMPETER. Having dried many times in amateur thesp days, DRUDGERY seemed apposite! Took a moment to choose between CAUTION/AUCTION but STRAFE solved that one. Close to SCC but scraped in 18 minutes. Thanks setter and blogger
16 minutes with one error.
After a fast start I was becalmed, stuck on several clues. I eventually worked out STOCKPOT which led to the very difficult POD. I had LAD pencilled in. SOFT SOAP took a while -good clue that.
I had left 23a blank but in the end could not improve on SWAY (could Way somehow = Vessel?). I did try to find alternatives.
Message to self: must try harder.
Glad to see a reference to Dickens’s Barnaby Rudge; a great novel which very few people seem to admire. I’ve hardly met anyone who has read it.
David
My difficulties were in the NW corner. I struggled with all the S words, TAKE OUT and POD. Having slowly pieced together the NW I then failed on the wordplay for my LOI TERN thinking the creature began with the regular se from seen. 10:12 Thanks BR
Struggled with this one because I took a couple of wrong turns. Also DNF 21:34 with a DPS for SCAN at 23a (which does kind of work) and MAKE OUT for the longest time at 2d (which also kind of works – as in make a killing financially – though I was uneasy that the other def was a little risqué for The Times and the word MAKE was also in the clue). I should have listened to my misgivings as it took a very long time to see LOI STOCKPOT. Thanks B & J
From CHEST to SPAN, (via SWAY) in 8:19. Some serious thinking required in this one! Thanks Joker and BR.
Eight in 10 minutes, 12 total, mostly east side. Void in the north west.
My thanks to Joker and BletchleyReject.
DNF as I had put in a C for the second letter of 23a as did our esteemed blogger. I think it is close between scan and span, with span the better. BOTHER! I imagine that if scan had occurred to Joker (or the editor) they would have reworded it. I was tempted by SWAY but it does not pass the test.
In general I found it as hard as any QC I can remember. Without a few gimmes I would have got stuck, as well as DNF.
I was helped on 5d Trumpeted by a remark on the 15*15 blog even though it had been deleted by the time I got there.
Oh well tomorrow is another QC.
5 clues solved in 30 minutes. At least my inexperience correlates with the experts!
I warm up with Coffee Break Cryptic
DNF SOFT SOAP and needed hint for SPAN. I began pretty well with few hold-ups until the last two. Oh dear. Liked TRUMPETER, STRAFE, STOCKPOT, & PISA, among others.
Thanks vm, BR.
12.16 DNF with a biff of SWAY at the end. STOCKPOT needed the checkers and I wasn’t confident about DIMINISH. Thanks BR and Joker.
Another to fall victim to SCAN.
Didn’t like POD. Did like SOFT SOAP and STOCKPOT.
Thanks both
I thought there was some nice stuff in this one, a bit chewy but good when you spot it. Needed a nudge from Mr P to get my last 2 – soft soap and diminish. He also flagged the span/scan controversy – which was the only reason I thought again about that one. Span is clearly better, but I’ve seen looser clueing than is needed to justify scan.
FOI Pisa
LOI soft soap
COD Strafe
thanks Joker and BR
Hard but fairly fair, although some of the literals were, as Cedric says, not the most obvious. An enjoyable tussle with Joker although I fell for the SCAN scam. Never contemplated that there could be another S*AN word to fit even better and given the slightly loose vibe in clueing elsewhere, it looked good. Had this been an Izetti I might have paused and reviewed? Hmm.
This took me 50 minutes or 3h 50m if I include the 8 mile hike during which SOFT SOAP finally came to mind.
Also got into a terrible mess trying to work STRING and R and TAR or AB into 11d before realising the first three letters were in the clue and it was another sailor altogether.
Didn’t really like the definitions of DRY or DISH, or DIMINISH for that matter.
Thanks Joker and BR and congratulations to all the finishers.
You have described my journey to arriving at OPERATING perfectly! 🙂
Dnf…
The NW corner was impenetrable to start with, so went south and had more luck. However, I couldn’t get 1ac “Stockpot” (I thought “Saucepot” – but couldn’t see the homophone) and 10ac “Soft Soap” and 13ac “Strafe” wouldn’t come. Definitely tricky, with some harder clueing elements (“needing” and “dry” for example). A good test, albeit one that I failed.
FOI – 12ac “Expo”
LOI – Dnf
COD – 9ac “Drudgery”
Thanks as usual!
Well into the SCC at 24 minutes. The right hand side seemed much easier than the left although it took me a long to see what was going on at 6dn and 15ac turned out to be deceptively simple. I spent about 5 minutes puzzling over my last three before going away for a couple of hours, coming back and filling them straight in. Never considered either sway or scan luckily.
FOI – 6ac PISA
LOI – 10ac SOFT SOAP
COD – 1ac STOCKPOT
Thanks to Joker and BR
I was progressing swiftly until around the halfway mark …. and then I wasn’t. Several clues held me up, including STOCKPOT, SOFT SOAP, TITLED, DIMINISH, SPAN, CHEST, POD, TRUMPETER, PIGMENT, OPERATING and AUCTION. So, a possible SCC escape turned into a 38 minute grind. Not sure why, really. Those clues just didn’t gel with me.
Many thanks to BR and Joker.
P.S. I warmed up for this with a 14 minute finish for yesterday’s Trelawney. That’s very fast for me, but I might have posted a PB if I had started with the Down clues, rather than the Acrosses. I solved only one of the first seven Across clues during my first pass, but I was successful with all of the first seven Downs despite the lack of checkers. Drat!
DNF – another SCAN which still seems perfectly valid even though I now know the answer. otherwise an enjoyable but tricky puzzle!
7.42.
Well we finished in 10:40 only to find that we also were victims to SCAN, our LOI which we had been nervous about. I agree with BR that SPAN fits rather better but we just hadn’t seen it and SCAN was better than SWAY. We hadn’t been 100% confident about POI DIMINISH either though there seemed to be no other choice. Like Kevin we had no idea how POD ought to be parsed so thanks to BR for clearing that one up. Thanks also to Joker.
SWAY, never mind.
If a ship or vessel YAWS, then it moves from side to side. And of course sway means to move from side to side, but it began with an S, so in went sway without any further thought.
DNF
Beaten by SPAN. I also thought scan worked perfectly well, but there it is. Would have been well into the SCC in any case. Struggled with STOCKPOT and LOI POD.