Quick Cryptic Number 254 by Flamande

20 comments on “Quick Cryptic Number 254 by Flamande”

1. Agree with William’s comments re smoothness of this one, which didn’t offer up its secrets on the first read-through. My inability to spell MAYONAISE caused a few further problems, as I finished with REPROACH, which might make me unique on the board, but you never know.

   Ticks against 11 and 13a and 15d. 11’30”.

2. Smooth indeed; and a couple (like 11ac) only parsed post hoc. Somebody (jackkt?) has pointed out on a number of occasions that EROS is not the actual name of the statue, but what the hell. I was slowed down a bit by ‘steals’ in 9ac; didn’t know what to make of it.COD to 17ac; 15d was lovely, too, but a bit too easily gettable from checkers–at least, that’s how I got it. 4′.
3. Good start for me with 1a going straight in. Found this puzzle easier than the last 2 days but was held up at the end by 5d and my last in REPROACH. ANDERSEN & YVES were my favourites.
4. 8 minutes, so a return to form for me after a testing week or more of Quickies.

   I’m resigned to the fact that because so many people call the statue “Eros” that de facto IS its name now, however the pedant in me finds it hard to let this pass and not point out that the character portrayed is actually Anteros.

   Edited at 2015-02-27 07:44 am (UTC)

   1. 😊
5. I think I set a PB today at 9 mins. If I keep this up I might have to try the main puzzle.
6. By coffee time, nice surfaces I thought but I’m getting more write ins now thanks to the blogs
7. The pedant in me combined with my extensive experience of hot wet tropical countries drives me to be grumpy about the definition of monsoon here. It has here come to be used to indicate heavy or extensive rain. In reality though the monsoons in the regions where they occur are really more of a change of wind direction and a different pattern of precipitation not necessarily more and certainly not necessarily heavy….pedant back in box..

   Edited at 2015-02-27 11:23 am (UTC)

   1. To be fair to the dictionaries, they reflect that but give ‘rainy season accompanying the wet monsoon’ (or equivalent) as the second/extended meaning.
8. Went off like a train and would have had a new PB but then got completely stumped by 11ac. Even with all the checkers in place still couldn’t get the first word because I had convinced myself that sailors = hands, and ‘sad north’ made no sense (probably even to the southerners amongst you out there). I still can’t believe I was so stupid. Invariant
9. I really enjoyed this puzzle, much better trash last two days which I found difficult and unable to finish. As the last comment my last entry was 11 across. Got stuck with ab or tar for sailors. Husband got far even though he can’t do cryptic crossword. He said it was common sense!!
10. Whoops sorry, meant than not trash!
11. Zipped through this at a good pace mostly. Slightly held up in the south, but once I twigged MILLION and realised I had spelt FLEA as flee, quickly finished it off. Thought there were a good number of enjoyable clues, 11ac, 14ac and 12dn spring to mind.

    As there’s a bit of a pedantic tone today, I thought I’d put my oar in with IN HOT WATER. I’d have thought that if you’re IN hot water than you are no longer expecting trouble, you’re actually right in it 😉.

12. Nice to finish the week with a completed puzzle after a few near misses this week. Thanks for the explanation of the second part of 17a, as that had me completely baffled. 8d jumped out at me as it was the answer a while back, which I spent ages on before giving up – it seems I do learn from my mistakes!

    1. Despite my deliberate mistake in mispelling it earlier! Apologies to ulaca fo the confusion.

13. Note –> N
    Perhaps because NB –> Note Bene ?
14. ODO gives “used in a book’s index to refer to a footnote”

    1. Thanks mohn,

       I’m always interested to know the origins of these crossword conventions; I often dismiss them as ‘things you need to learn’ without appreciating that they have a root in some field. I think that if it’s relatable, it’s more interesting and easier to remember, so thanks again.

       1. I have the same interest. It’s not obvious where some of these abbreviations have come from, and some letters can be abbreviations for so many different words that it might appear (especially to a beginner) that the compiler has simply picked any old word with that initial letter. For example, for the letter n, Chambers gives: name, neuter, neutron, new, nominative, noon, note, noun, number, ninety (medieval Roman symbol), Newton (SI unit), nitrogen, knight, naira (Nigerian currency), national, nationalist, navy, new, ngultrum (Bhutanese currency), Norse, north, northern, Norway (vehicle registration), nuclear, etc. Granted, not all of these will be used in even the main cryptic, let alone the Quicky, but there must exist circumstances in which each particular abbreviation can be found. Collins and ODO tend to be best for example usage – Chambers doesn’t really go in for it.
          1. There is (or was) allegedly some sort of policy or convention on the use of single letter abbreviations in Times crosswords. It was mentioned by some of the old hands when I first started coming here 7/8 years ago, but I’ve never managed to get hold of further details despite asking on several occasions. From experience though I’d say there’s probably something in it because the setters certainly don’t throw new or obscure ones at us every day, or even every week or month.

             Edited at 2015-02-28 03:25 am (UTC)

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