Quick Cryptic No 402 by Bob and Margaret

Author   nick_the_novicePosted on Categories Quick Cryptic
A warm welcome to yet more new setters – this time Bob and Margaret, the cartoon couple! And a fine debut, if I may say – thanks for an elegant puzzle with a slightly quirky, whimsical feel to it.

I do enjoy a good surface, and there were several on show here today – particularly liked 3dn, 8dn, 13dn and 16dn. Also some inventive wordplay to enjoy – e.g. 9ac. For me, though, COTD was 17dn. All jolly good fun…

Definitions underlined, anagrams indicated by *(–)

As of posting, the puzzle is not showing up online: you should be able to access it here http://feeds.thetimes.co.uk/timescrossword/20150923/9732/

Across
1 Mr Laurel’s recited a bit of verse (6)
STANZA – STANZ (sounds like – ‘recited’ – Stan’s as in Laurel of the Laurel and Hardy double act) + A
4 Run off with Civil Engineer’s warm coat (6)
FLEECE – FLEE (run off) + CE (Civil Engineer)
9 State embargo, inter alia (7)
ALBANIA – BAN inside (inter) ALIA. Excellent clue I thought – quite novel with the playing around with inter alia
10 I start to gasp, overcome by vehicle’s smoke (5)
CIGAR – I + G (start – i.e. first letter – to Gasp) inside (‘overcome by’) CAR (vehicle). Smoke being used here as a noun rather than a verb
11 Reflective piece of music: (orchestral): short snappy one (4)
CROC – Reverse hidden (indicated by reflective piece of) – muisC ORChestral, with a nice cryptic definition (CROCodile)
12 More compassionate to offer Emergency Room (8)
TENDERER – TENDER (to offer) + ER (Emergency Room)
14 After organising election, bar party, maybe (11)
CELEBRATION – *(ELECTION BAR) with ” After organising” as the anagrind
18 Extremes in soup: coldest and hottest (8)
SPICIEST – SP (extremes – i.e. first and last letters – in SouP) + ICIEST (coldest)
20 East End couple: their problem after seven years? (4)
ITCH – Amusing cryptic based on the seven year itch and the H dropping of the East Ender’s rendition of HITCH (On edit: get married “couple” – thanks to Kevin for the tighter parsing)
22 Loud noise from family beginning to grate (5)
CLANG – CLAN (family) + G (beginning – first letter of – ‘grate’)
23 Touring USA, feel relaxed (7)
EASEFUL – *(USA FEEL) with “touring” as the anagrind. Not a word I’ve come across before, but clear enough from the definition and wordplay.
24 Take to excess, using more than one delivery note (6)
OVERDO – On edit – thanks to Setters for putting me straight here! OVER (more than one delivery – as in the cricket term) + DO (note – musical term as in do ray me etc.)
25 Seafood starters on one’s yacht, sometimes to eat raw (6)
OYSTER – First letters of (starters on) One’s Yacht, Sometimes To Eat Raw
Down
1 Examination: one needed to listen in school (6)
SEARCH – EAR (one needed to listen) inside SCH (abbreviation of School)
2 In the morning, brothers meeting English fellow (7)
AMBROSE – AM (In the morning) + BROS (brothers) ‘meeting’ E (English) giving this (somewhat unusual, admittedly) boy’s name. I knew of the Saint, which was enough for me to understand the definition. However, I also took the opportunity to hunt for other famous chaps with the given name Ambrose, and came across one Ambrose Burnside, a US military man after whom sideburns were named – he did indeed sport a spectacular set of whiskers, although his wife does not look overly impressed (see pictures and learn more than you ever wanted to know about this dude here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ambrose_Burnside )
3 Last letter by a New York eccentric (4)
ZANY – Z (last letter) + A + NY (New York) – not hard, but neat clue and great surface
5 Girl retaining identity: it shows clear headedness (8)
LUCIDITY – LUCY (girl) including (retaining) ID (identity) and IT
6 Seeing bear regularly in this Alpine landmark (5)
EIGER – Answer constructed from every other letter (indicated by ‘regularly’) in sEeInG bEaR
7 Dreads losing head, making mistakes (6)
ERRORS – TERRORS (dreads) losing its first letter (head)
8 Barged in after midnight, helped oneself to food and fell asleep (11)
GATECRASHED – G (middle letter in niGht) followed by ATE (helped oneself to food) + CRASHED (fell asleep)
13 Shaken up, engineers danced in delight? (9)
REJIGGED – RE (our old friends the Royal Engineers) + JIGGED (danced in delight). Another lovely surface
15 Toot if upset about university under influence of drugs? (3,2,2)
OUT OF IT – *(TOOT IF + U) with “upset” as the anagrind and the U coming into the mix through University
16 Shy cop rubbished in film (6)
PSYCHO – *(SHY COP) with “rubbished” as the anagrind. Very neat
17 Maybe Ahab‘s wife in better health (6)
WHALER – W (wife) + HALER (in better health), with Captain Ahab of course being the doomed whaler in Moby-Dick. Loved this clue – amusing and neat
19 Bob or Margaret, perhaps, tear about, furious (5)
IRATE – In this context, ‘Bob or Margaret’ as our joint setters give us I + *(TEAR) with “about” as the anagrind
21 One’s always producing surprised exclamation (1,3)
I SAY – “One’s” gives us IS (i.e. I’s – as in “my wife and I’s…”) + AY (always)

27 comments on “Quick Cryptic No 402 by Bob and Margaret”

  1. I wondered about this when I solved, thinking it was AL (state)+ BAN+ IA; but of course then there’s no definition. But I thought ‘inter’ was ‘between’ not ‘in’. Pity the boy named Ambrose these days; but for me the name conjures up (besides the saint) Ambrose Bierce, author of “The Devil’s Dictionary”. ITCH is the verb meaning (to) ‘couple’, no? as in ITCH your wagon to a star. I struggled with 8d and 15d, and biffed 19d from checkers, while wondering who the hell Bob and Margaret were–didn’t even notice the names of the setters (the print is awfully small). 10:30.
    1. Thanks for the tighter parsing around ITCH – blog amended accordingly.

      Re. INTER, I had parsed it on the basis of inter alia meaning “amongst others”, with inter being the “amongst” bit, in which case it worked for me. Sorry, just also seen Ulaca’s comment – did not intend to repeat his point…

  2. Yes, nice addition to the solving stable. 11a was made a little harder by the line break, while 14a was a good anagram.

    Inter- can mean among, so I think that’s okay. A tad faster than the Gregg for once!

  3. Once again I tipped over my 10 minute barrier to finish in 11 (I don’t do seconds unless I’m sub-5 minutes, which is a very rare happening). I haven’t achieved sub-10 since Orpheus #394 on 11 September which ended a splendid run of 7 consecutive puzzles within that time. I don’t know whether this is down to the puzzles being harder or my brain seizing up.

    I wonder if having three new setter names all beginning with B is of any significance. Anyway we have an old friend back tomorrow.

    Edited at 2015-09-23 03:35 am (UTC)

  4. Another tricky one. Liked this a lot even though I used aids to get GATECRASHED. Joint favourites CROC and WHALER.
    1. D’oh! There’s a lesson for me not to look at the comments before I’ve completed the whole puzzle. LOI was 8d, and I think I would have got it eventually if I hadn’t seen it in your comment!
  5. I very happily surfed this wavelength – with relish. 10 minutes (and I usually trail in the wake of the great jackkt) of great enjoyment. Lots of clues had smooth and relevant surfaces – many have already been mention but my COD is 25ac – seafood starters eaten raw on a yacht – the clue has everything except the crisp Sauvignon blanc to go with it!
    Thanks to Nick for the blog although I have reservations about springing the photo of the noble
    Ambrose on us!

    Edited at 2015-09-23 10:16 am (UTC)

    1. Mate, think you are being a bit harsh there – a splendid set of whiskers which should give us all a lift, I reckon!

      The amateur psychologist in me can’t help wondering whether the whiskers caused the incredibly sour face on Mrs. Ambrose, or whether the whiskers were some kind of act of rebellion by a disappointed man… Either way, a comi-tragedy…

      1. Well, now that it’s a bit later in the day and I was more prepared for him, I see your point about the magnificence of the foliage. It was obviously not a tragic accident but must have required a deal of commitment and attitude. I would venture that, in the same vein as a handlebar moustache, that he was the inventor of the parallel bar sideburns. As for Mrs Ambrose – your psychology sounds reasonable – I would go for the former – no lady can like being upstaged in the coiffure department by her husband – especially when her hair looks like a flattened down version of his sideburns.
  6. Having started to get a handle on the quick puzzles, I have found the last 3 or 4 very difficult. So much so that I am about to pack it all in. It is quite dispiriting to go backwards. Even with the blogs some of the clues seem a real stretch. Maybe time to accept I don’t have a crossword brain. Oh well stick to the killer suduka,s much easier.
    1. Sorry to hear that. Before you finally move away, can you say what the difficulties are that you are encountering?

      Many (most) in my experience can be addressed through specific practice / knowledge acquisition, although it is probably also true to say that some people just do not have the required general knowledge / thought patterns to do these things – just like me with Physics (and Science in general) – at age 13 I knew I would never “get” science and would always be an Arts type – just the way my brain was wired…

      1. Not the anonymous above – but I sympathise as I have found the last few more difficult. There are ‘standard’ crossword bits of shorthand (like RE for engineers, TA for army/volunteers etc.) but I think ‘DO’ for delivery order is an obscurity too far. Also how does ‘AY’ equal always? It will always be subjective as to how difficult any puzzle is and though some answers can be got from using checkers and a sensible guess, if the parsing remains a mystery until consulting this (very useful!) blog then there is still a sense of failure. There were some excellent clues today and in the previous couple of days but, for me – and ‘anonymous’ above presumably – there were some insurmountable difficulties. I will persist and I hope anonymous above will too, since we have this blog to help us and one day we may be able to boast about our ‘less then 10 minutes today’ solving time!
        1. This is an old usage for most (though still current for Scots), derived, I just note, from the Greek word aeon ultimately. It crops up in Haydn’s Creation quite a bit, prompting debate about how it should be pronounced often enough (two pronunciations are possible), and I always think of the old hymn ‘Let us with a joyful mind praise the Lord for he is kind’, which contains the line ‘For his mercy ay endures, ever faithful, ever sure’.

          Quite common as a helpful filler in crosswords along with EC (city), UR (ancient city) and OR (men) among other 2-letter words. Plus all the musical notes, which pop up regularly in both their 2- and 3-letter incarnations, as well as the U.S. states (ditto).

  7. The blogger has misread the OVERDO clue slightly:
    It’s “more than one delivery” = OVER (cricket) and “note” for DO

    The setters

    2. Aha! Thanks B & M. Must confess I was grasping at straws with the parsing of this answer, hence my rummaging around in the obscurities of shipping industry acronyms!

      Blog will be duly edited in a moment. Apologies to all for taking you down the wrong road, and for the lateness in the (UK) day in fixing this up – it’s 7am here in Sydney and have just woken up and checked in to field any comments…

  8. This one felt more at my level than the previous 2 this week and I solved and parsed all bar 8d, where I thought the definition was ‘fell asleep’ and was trying to find a word ending in rested. I was interested that the mid from midnight indicated a letter later in the same word – not something I’ve seen before.

    As others have commented plenty of excellent clues, personally I found 18a very enjoyable for some reason with a mention in dispatches for 17d.

  9. Liked it. Took me 30 minutes, which is standard. 25a is a gem: did the setter know that Oyster is also a manufacturer of yachts?
  10. I hate the last two quick cryptics. Do not agree they are great new setters. I was really getting in to learning with this format and these last 2 are too abstruse. It is meant to be fun. I know a lot of you guys time yourselves in minutes but for the rest of us lowly mortals we have to think a little. I am annoyed I could not finish these last 2. I know one is meant to stretch oneself but these are too enigmatic.
  11. The third hard slog in a row for me, but some nice clues all the same. Couldn’t parse my LOI 8d, and having read Nick’s blog I can see why. I did at least parse 24ac the same way as B&M, which is some comfort. Invariant
  13. It took me a long time to learn how to do cryptics, starting from success with one or two clues per day. But the rewards are mighty once they start. Petronella.
    PS I would have liked to start a Livejournal account, having happily lurked for years, but I’ve never seen that kind of captcha and I can’t make it work on my iPad even though I am human.
  14. I think the setters are starting to miss the point here – i.e. that this is not the full cryptic puzzle! Notably harder and more obtuse this last week…QC is supposed to bring people into the fold not turn them off!
    1. I agree! However, some excellent, tricksy-but-getable clues today.
      I am less than convinced that new names mean new setters, or that the existing list of setters’ names indicate different people. After all, it’s a cryptic puzzle.
      1. Interesting theory re. changes of names! Of course you might be right, but certainly with B & M the “style” seemed somewhat different to the other setters with whom we are familiar.

        Hard to define the “style” of a setter (or in this case, a pair of setters), but somehow you just seem to sense it…

  15. As a guy that really struggles with the 15×15, I found this much more in my comfort zone, got everything bar 3. Good job setters!
  16. Late night solve for me last night and only now catching with the blog. I must sympathise with those who have found the last few hard…. my third in a row over average. Almost a DNF for me until I finally saw 8d. A good puzzle though, with some lovely clues…. 11a, 20a and 19d my favourites.

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