Quick Cryptic Number 307 by Mara

Author   william_j_sPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic
I was slow to get into the SE corner having been held up slightly by 6dn and 13ac. Overall, a puzzle of average difficulty, I thought. For a favourite, it was difficult to choose between the aforesaid 6dn, the chuckle-inducing 21ac (was it just me?), and the fiddly 9dn.

Definitions underlined.

Across
1 Badge — one clashing, by the sound of it? (6)
SYMBOL – homophone of (by the sound of it) “cymbal” (one clashing).
4 Quickly buy drink having grabbed forty winks (4,2)
SNAP UP – SUP (drink) grabbing NAP (forty winks).
8 Mess left with knife around? (7)
CLUTTER – CUTTER (knife) around L (left).
10 Atmosphere within company is capital (5)
CAIRO – AIR (atmosphere) around CO (company).
11 Different parent’s heading off (5)
OTHER – mOTHER (parent) without the head.
12 Top seen swirling in dance (3-4)
ONE-STEP – anagram of (swirling) TOP SEEN.
13 Safe or in trouble, charity named previously (9)
AFORESAID – anagram of (in trouble) SAFE OR, plus AID (charity).
17 Empires crumbling? That’s the hypothesis (7)
PREMISE – anagram of (crumbling) EMPIRES.
19 European root (5)
SWEDE – double definition.
20 Practice that’s owned by a dentist? (5)
DRILL – double definition; the question mark qualifies the second as ‘definition by example’.
21 Ladies and gents, the remarkable TS Eliot! (7)
TOILETS – anagram of (remarkable(!)) TS ELIOT. Tee hee.
22 Respect judge (6)
REGARD – double definition.
23 Communication for a landlord? (6)
LETTER – double definition.
Down
1 Group taking in city, primarily, or district (6)
SECTOR – SET (group) taking in City (first letter of city), plus OR.
2 Gourmet with an order that’s tasty (5-8)
MOUTH-WATERING – anagram of (order) GOURMET WITH AN.
3 Old train rattling over old Canadian province (7)
ONTARIO – anagram of (rattling) OLD TRAIN over O (old).
5 Henry in French resort for recess (5)
NICHE – H (Henry) in NICE (French resort).
6 A medley of deep red tints, a part of Arizona (7,6)
PAINTED DESERT – anagram of (a medley of) DEEP RED TINTS A. Outstanding clue!
7 Quick reminder (6)
PROMPT – double definition.
9 Number having been cut, fifty in search for US president (9)
ROOSEVELT – SEVEn (number having its last letter removed) with L (fifty), inside ROOT (search).
14 Golden flavouring, a favourable omen (7)
AUSPICE – AU (gold is Au on the Periodic Table of Elements) plus SPICE (flavouring).
15 Creepy-crawly, coloured one, pet shop initially raised (6)
SPIDER – RED (coloured) + I (one) + PS (pet shop initially), all raised.
16 Difficult problem for a flirt (6)
TEASER – double definition.
18 Lazy type, horribly riled (5)
IDLER – anagram of (horribly) RILED.

15 comments on “Quick Cryptic Number 307 by Mara”

  1. Easiest one for weeks, I’d say. Took me 12 minutes including interruptions. LOI Swede which I had no idea about until I twigged my penultimate answer, 14D, which gave me the necessary starting point. COD 14D. I hadn’t heard of painted desert either but the checkers and a scrap of paper to work out the anagram helped there.
  2. Certainly I was on Mara’s wavelength here – a shade under 6 minutes, though I confess to not being able to parse a couple, so thanks William for enlightening me.
    It was fortunate I knew of the Painted Desert (it was also the name of a Clark Gable film of the 30s).
    I’ve only ever come across the ONE-STEP in crossword-land, does anyone know how to dance it these days?
    COD for me was 2d – an nice elegant anagram.
  3. I found this on the tricky side and had to hop around the grid to keep up momentum when it became apparent things would not be flowing smoothly. Not knowing PAINTED DESERT was probably my main drawback as it delayed progress on the RH side. 14 minutes.
  4. Difficult for me. With about 6 oustanding put the puzzle aside for 20 minutes and when I came back they went in pretty much straight off. AUSPICE my last in, favourite TOILETS.

    Also did not know 6d but knowing it started with P solved the anagram quickly.

    William, thanks for parsing 9d.

  5. Only 9d unparsed today so an improvement on yesterday’s effort.
    I also hadn’t heard of 6d, but once I’d got the desert bit it was just a case of ordering the letters until they made sense. LOI was 13a as it took me an age to see the anagram for the first bit.
    Overall I thought this puzzle was a bit anagram heavy.
  6. YESSSSS! for the first time since starting these frustrating ‘quick’ cryptics last September, I have managed to finish one in my lunch hour. Many thanks to all you wonderful blogging people for helping me navigate this weird and wonderful world Mandy
  7. Been attempting the QCs on and off for almost a year and today was my best ever. Answers seemed to flow out of the pen. Thank you to all of you who blog the answers as I would never have got this far without your explanations and help.
  8. I thought this was an excellent QC. A couple of write-ins and some clearly flagged anagrams to get you going, followed by a good range of clue types with varying degrees of difficulty. 6d was wonderful and my favourite today. Well done Mara – another setter of the teasing variety should take note. Invariant
  9. Managed this one with some struggling – it had to be 9d but am very grateful for the explanation as to just how it worked! Thank goodness for the blog and you bloggers….
  10. Hooray – after the frustrations of yesterday I finished this one. Thank you Mara and the blog who explained the parsing.
  11. Finished again, although my slowest this week. Thanks to the bloggers for help with parsing, as a number were beyond me!
    1. But “a medley of” is what indicates the anagram; a medley of the letters DEEPREDTINTSA. “Canvass” would not fulfil this requirement.
  13. After a few weeks of practice, finally filled in whole grid unaided. Nevertheless, challenging and satisfying clues . Thanks Mara and thanks to the blog for guidance towards this point. Woo hoo !

Comments are closed.