Quick Cryptic No 170 by Tracy

Author   piquetPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic
Easier than Wednesday’s Juno puzzle, I thought (I generally only do these quick cryptics if I’m blogging them); no exotic GK needed except for a town in Nottinghamshire.

Across
1 CHOW – Double def; breed of dog, and slang word for food.
4 OFFSHORE – OFF (rotten), SHORE (sounds like ‘SURE’, = firm); def. operating abroad.
8 MAINLINE – MAINE (US State) with L (lake) IN (popular) inserted; def. situated on a major route.
9 LATE – L (50) ATE (had meal); def. long delayed.
10 STRIKE – S (small) TRIKE (three-wheeler); def. collide with.
11 SEESAW – SEES (watches) A, W (wife); def. yo-yo. A loose definition, but I guess acceptable as a verb meaning oscillate?
12 TONGUE TWISTER – TONGUE (point of land), TWISTER (tornado); def. it’s hard to say.
16 BEETLE – BEET (crop plant), LE (French ‘the’); def. insect.
17 SWEDEN – S(candinavia), WE, DEN (study); def. country.
19 FACE – F(emale), ACE (expert); def. confront.
20 ABATTOIR – A BAT (a racket), RIOT reversed; def. where animals are slaughtered.
21 WORKSHOP – WORKSOP (town in Notts) with H (held initially) inserted; def. intensive course. Worksop (pop. approx. 45,000) existed before 1066, and was referred to as Werchesope in the Domesday Book.
22 REEL – Sounds like REAL (authentic); Scottish dance.

Down
2 HEART – HEAR (listen to), T(rombone); def. organ.
3 WINNING STREAK – Double definition?
4 OPINE – Def. express a point of view, hidden in sh(OP IN E)dinburgh.
5 FRETSAW – FRET (fog, as in sea fret), SAW (spotted); def. cutter.
6 HELTER-SKELTER – Another double definition.
7 RAT RACE – RA (artist), TRACE (suspicion); def. fiercely competitive struggle.
10 SET – Another double definition.
13 OREGANO – (O ORANGE)*; def. seasoning; for the anagram O = duck.
14 EYEWASH – E(lm), YEW, ASH (two other types of tree); def. rot.
15 RUN – RUN(G) = step (of ladder), short; def. ladder, as in a stocking.
17 SWAMP – SWAP (exchange), with M (millions) inserted; def. inundate.
18 ELITE – E(nglish), LITE (as in Miller Lite, Coors Lite); def. best.

17 comments on “Quick Cryptic No 170 by Tracy”

  1. I found this one quite hard and nodded off so I have no time to report. 4ac and 5dn were the ones that did for me though I got them eventually.
  2. I’ve never heard of Worksop, so I couldn’t do anything with 21ac until I had some checkers, or maybe all of them. 6d also took some time; it’s only within the last few years that I’ve known the slide meaning of HELTER-SKELTER.And FRETSAW went in on checkers, although I afterwards vaguely recalled coming across the fog sense of ‘fret’. I liked RAT RACE. 7:10.
  3. I think 3d is more of a straightforward cryptic rather than a double definition – and not one of the better ones either. “Winning” was straightforward for me, but it took a while (and some checkers) to get the second word.
    Unusual to see two clues (crossing at that) containing the same word (saw).
    But still a nice ending to the week with one of my quicker times. A satisfied smile on my face (OK – in truth, a smug look instead).
    Thanks for the blog, Pip.
    1. 3dn has both definition and wordplay. The def. is “successful run.” The answer is made up of “up” ie winning, and “to race,” ie streak.. so not just a simple cd.
      1. Hmmm – on reflection I think you’re probably right, it’s that “up” for “winning” that’s the clincher. I doff my hat to you.
  4. Very straightforward although I did get hung up for a little while on 16A trying to think of an insect beginning with Le. LOI 18D! In fact coke light spells the word properly (I drink gallons of the stuff when in Europe. Even though it tastes wrong (they kept the ‘new coke’ formula whereas we and the U.S. never veered from the true path of proper diet coke)).
    1. I never drink the stuff although do buy it at the golf club for pals – here in France at present the bottles all have silly labels with different first names on so no idea if it is Light or Lite! In lite of your comment I have amended the example… Pip
  5. The usual time, and it was a pleasant QC, IMHO. SEESAW was my LOI after the OFFSHORE/FRETSAW crossers.
  6. 22 mins with a couple of mind-opening chats with Z8 towards the end.

    A lovely good-natured puzzle, if a little imprecise in spots – I felt at home. Many thanks to Tracy and to Pip for a super blog.

    My COD was TONGUE TWISTER – the double-meaning addiction strikes again.

    LOI was EYEWASH: partly positional, partly scratching head for a definition of rot; I was thinking along the lines of ‘decay’.

  8. About 15 minutes, which for me is lightning but then the best bit which is dashing here to find how I got them right. Just three today, including one I’m not going to own up to. 3 d I failed twice. Did not translate ‘up’ (clever that!) and I struggled to associate ‘streak’ with ‘race’ though in fairness I have to admit to seeing (and enjoying) bobbies race to catch a streaker.
    ‘See Saw’ and ‘yo yo’ do have physical movement in common but not enough alike for me to connect them.
    1. Cricket. “Out for a duck” = 0 (zero), no runs scored. Essential knowledge for any type of Times crossword. Some of us have no interest in the game but we’ve learned to live with it!
  10. Just under the half hour so a decent time for me. Didn’t think Worksop was exotic (in either sense) but Fret and Fretsaw were both new to me – that was the last one in.
  11. Another enjoyable puzzle that seemed to me to be of medium difficulty. Didn’t know FOG=FRET, but couldn’t think of what else the answer could be. LOI was EYEWASH, had the start E and ASH, but just couldn’t think of the final answer or the first tree. Resorted to going through the alphabet for the second letter – shame Y is the 25th letter 🙁

    Pipkirby, Worksop exotic GK!!! Djibouti maybe, but surely not Worksop 🙂

Comments are closed.