Very Teazy from Teazel today with plenty of trickery. I got a bit stuck in the SE corner until I saw the Q, taking 7:30 – well over par for me. Some great clues, though, including a lesser-spotted quadruple definition. Thank-you Teazel! How did you all get on?
Fortnightly Weekend Quick Cryptic. This time it is Sawbill’s turn to provide the extra weekend entertainment. You can find the crossword here. Can you spot the Nina? If you are interested in trying our previous offerings you can find an index to all 153 here.
Definitions underlined in bold italics, (Abc)* indicating anagram of Abc, deletions and [] other indicators.
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | Support letters after appointment (4) |
| POST – A four word quadruple definition. Nice one! | |
| 4 | Birds wrangle with noisy arguments (8) |
| SPARROWS – SPAR (wrangle) + ROWS (noisy arguments). I spotted the ROWS first and then the birds, then “spar” =”wrangle”… well I suppose so, but I needed the answer to the clue to see that. | |
| 8 | More enthusiastic man painting? That is right (8) |
| HEARTIER – HE (man) + ART (painting) + I.E. (id est; that is) + R. You need to see you have to split “man painting”, which I didn’t at first. | |
| 9 | Creep along in church (4) |
| INCH – IN + CH (Church). Phew! An easy one. | |
| 10 | In two brief months, boil (6) |
| DECOCT – DEC (December) + OCT (October) – two brief months. I knew of decoct meaning “extract”, but not that it also meant “boil”. | |
| 11 | Preserved vegetables for cheeky child (6) |
| PICKLE – Double definition. The second definition was a new one on me, but what else could the answer be? | |
| 12 | Terrible war starts — a GP’s to seek desperate salvation (5,2,6) |
| GRASP AT STRAWS – [Terrible] (war starts a GP’s)*. | |
| 16 | Charlie no winner, but not so far behind (6) |
| CLOSER – C (Charlie in the phonetic alphabet) + LOSER (no winner). | |
| 17 | Friend beginning to recover after earth tremor (6) |
| QUAKER – QUAKE (earth tremor) + first letter of , [beginning to], Recover. Ah. That sort of friend… “Quakers, or members of the Religious Society of Friends, are a faith group founded in 17th-century England by George Fox. They believe in a direct, personal connection to the Divine, often called the “Inner Light” or “that of God in everyone”. Known for their commitment to equality, peace, truth, and simplicity, they worship in silence without clergy.“ | |
| 19 | Pheasant, for example, unable to walk properly (4) |
| GAME – Double definition. The dictionary says of the second definition “origin obscure”. It’s a synonym of “lame”. | |
| 20 | Beloved park in holy surroundings (8) |
| PRECIOUS – REC (park) in PIOUS (holy). Did anyone else get hung up on trying to get a P for “Parking” in the middle? Wrong trees and barking spring to mind. | |
| 21 | Methodist’s awful news about destruction of Yale (8) |
| WESLEYAN – [awful] (news)* about [destruction of] (Yale)*. A double anagram and inclusion – wordplay that’s perhaps a little tricky for a QC, but the definition and crossers should lead you to the answer. | |
| 22 | Crazy star taking time to make a comeback (4) |
| NUTS – Not any old star but our own… SUN (star) including T (time) all reversed. | |
| Down | |
|---|---|
| 2 | Some robes evidently far too heavy (5) |
| OBESE – Hidden in , [some], rOBES Evidently. | |
| 3 | Reptiles, huge nuisance for cat (13) |
| TORTOISESHELL – TORTOISES (reptiles) + HELL (huge nuisance). | |
| 4 | Splashed front of parka in river mud (5) |
| SPILT – First letter, [front of], Parka in SILT (river mud). No it doesn’t begin with R for river with 3 letters meaning “mud”. | |
| 5 | A rugby player’s eating nothing suitable (7) |
| APROPOS – A + PROP’S (rugby player’s) including, [eating] O (letter that looks like 0; nothing). | |
| 6 | New form of an incinerator following refurbishment (13) |
| REINCARNATION – (an incinerator)* [following refurbishment]. | |
| 7 | Why candle almost out in Irish town? (7) |
| WICKLOW – WICK LOW (why candle is almost out). | |
| 10 | Ultimately unsuited to cycling, one walked (3) |
| DOG – Last letters, [ultimately], of unsuiteD tO cyclinG. Lovely definition! | |
| 13 | Free to take another contract (7) |
| RELEASE – RE-LEASE (take another contract). | |
| 14 | Degenerate American going to pot (7) |
| ATROPHY – A (American) + TROPHY (pot). “going to” here is a juxtaposition indicator I’ve not seen before. It took me a while to see this one. | |
| 15 | Aristocrat turning up conceals title (3) |
| SIR – Reverse hidden in [turning uop conceals], aRIStocrat. | |
| 17 | Almost strange name for band (5) |
| QUEEN – QUEE{r} (strange) without the last letter, [almost], + N (name). No, not a belt or a stripe, but a differnt sort of band. It took me a while to see QUEER, which then helped me complete the SE corner quite quickly. | |
| 18 | Perfect climbing over base of Everest, go up? (5) |
| ERUPT – PURE (perfect) [climbing] -> ERUP + last letter, [base], of EveresT. Another tricky one, I think, to finish. | |
Tough, lengthy (25m) but good fun. My wick running low by the end. As schoolboys we referred to ‘gammy leg’ when we had sports injuries, so GAME it had to be. Religious theme with QUAKER and WESLEYAN, and REINCARNATION? DEC**T had to be a decoction, but I didn’t know the verb. Quite a challenge Teazel – I now need an early evening drink! Thanks, and to an excellent blogger.
Like others, struggled a bit with DECOCT and LAME and SHAKER but finished with a bit of help from my friends!
Total nightmare.
Finished but I’m not going to disclose my time as it is too embarrassing.
One DNF and 4 SCCs this week. Utterly deplorable performance given my experience.
It’s just never going to happen for me. I do not have the brain for this and never will.
Don’t reply.
Could have been worse – you could have been me and DNFd on multiple fronts!
I’m sure you would have finished had you spent the same amount of time on it as I did. I was back to the days when most clues seemed impossible and I could time myself on a sun dial. 🤣
Ouch! 35 minutes to finish this beauty, my longest time in a long while. I was terribly stuck in the SE corner, mostly because I forgot “rec” for park, not part of my personal vocabulary. And yes, I kept trying to put (another) P in the middle. PICKLE for the bad child was new to me, and I wanted either “pickled” (because “preserved”) or “pickles” (because “vegetables”). The rugby player eluded me too, although I’ve seen it recently, must install in memory. Trophy for pot also difficult. POST, what a fabulous clue, don’t know if I’ve ever seen a quad before. Hmmm, post, prop, pickle, park, precious, pot it’s a P sort of day, or in my case a not-P sort of day. I didn’t really know the meaning of DECOCT so needed all the crossers. TORTOISESHELL another fine clue.
Thanks Teazel and John.
Rec is slang for recreation ground. Not a word I use either🙂
As kids we used to say “We’re going down the rec” but that was the 80s.
Oddly I did know GAME as the word meaning eg damaged for a leg, pronounced ‘Gammy’, but I thought it was an adjective, so I don’t see the clue works quite right. I have known a few ‘Hearties’ and steer well clear of them . My friendly Pocket OED has ‘Decoction’ which I believe I’ve heard before, but not DECOCT and I’m not surprised! ‘Rec’ for Park isn’t that a bit regional, I’ve never used it, I’ve heard it before but no idea when/where. 22A, 14D didn’t get but do like, ERUPT do not like. Very surprised to be having a moan about my most admired TEAZEL but it’s Friday, why not, enjoy weekend.
Sometimes I finish and find a nice seat in the SCC. Today I did precisely 3 clues.
I read them all, struggled, looked at the SNITCH, gave up.
Late to this after golf.
I got very stuck on LOI PRECIOUS where I wanted to use P for Park. And I had immediately thought of QUAINT for strange and assumed QUAIN might be one of the many alternatives for Band (sash/obi etc.).
Anyway I finished all correct. Have seen GAME before in puzzles and it came to me quickly.
Teazel had us clutching at straws.
David
DNF. My struggles were in the NW with heartier and tortoiseshell in particular. No excuses, had fixated on reptile being the answer so even when I’d been prompted by Mr P to the right word was grumping that a tortoiseshell isn’t a reptile, its a bit of a dead one before the light dawned. Enjoyed this one despite my blockheadedness – a quad def, groan worthy pun at 7d and good anagrams adding to the mix
FOI Queen
LOI Dnf
COD Atrophy
Thanks Teazel and John.
I had braced myself for a hard Friday Teasel but found it very accessible. Really don’t understand the squeals of protest. Happily, I am not a speed-merchant, and just enjoy the challenge. I did struggle with the NHO 10a Decoct and also with 20a Precious/18d Erupt but the rest were all pretty straightforward, with some downright easy ones eg obese/dog/sir/inch/game/wesleyan/wicklow/nuts. Had no problem with 12a ‘Grasp’ – esp with the checkers in place. All in all, I thought this an excellent puzzle and happy to see more like it.
FOI 1a Post – I first considered this a triple but of course it’s more than that!
LOI 18d Erupt
COD 4d Spilt, but lots to choose from.
In the SCC again. A toughie, didn’t quit, much enjoyed. Thanks both.