Quick Cryptic Number 437 by Tracy

Author   william_j_sPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic
Well, nowhere near as difficult as yesterday’s but Tracy had me stumbling over several clues. Unknowns (golf clubs, plants) aside, even the charades, where all I had to do was put words and synonyms in the right order, seemed tricky today. Perhaps I’m out of practice. Anyway, this is the sort of crossword I look forward to; not too easy, but straightforward once you get the answer. For me, getting stuck on a clue and realising you don’t know the vocabulary is what most feels like training for the big crossword. Not that I’ve made much progress there!

Enjoy.

Definitions underlined.

1 Member holding head of orchid with a distinctive smell (5)
AROMA – arm (member) containing first letter (head) of Orchid with A.
4 Article quite new — not this then! (7)
ANTIQUE – AN (article) plus an anagram of (new) QUITE.
8 Cops out, deployed to find sea creature (7)
OCTOPUS – anagram of (deployed) COPS OUT.
9 Money that is missing from old golf club (5)
BRASS – remove i.e. (that is) from BRASSie (old golf club). Nope, me neither. After some obligatory Googling, I now very much look forward to spade mashie and pitching niblick showing up soon.
10 Form of cricket in Tokyo Olympics year (6-6)
TWENTY-TWENTY – double definition.
12 Last of intake failing to pass (6)
ELAPSE – last letter of intakE, with LAPSE (failing).
13 Stuff about English and their patron saint (6)
GEORGE – GORGE (stuff) around E (English).
16 Candid conversation in centre — try feeding toddler afterwards (5-2-5)
HEART-TO-HEART – HEART (centre), with HEAR (try) inside (feeding) TOT (toddler) afterwards. But a moment to see the answer, an age to parse this tricky charade.
18 Conclude there’s no escaping from hell (5)
INFER – INFERno (hell) without no (no escaping).
20 Turn tide somehow at a plant (7)
GODETIA – GO (turn), an anagram of (turning) TIDE, and A. More Googling!
21 A new girl returned after short time for aerial (7)
ANTENNA -A, N (new), with ANNE (girl) backwards after T (short time).
22 Most unpleasant defeat (5)
WORST – double definition; the first superlative, the second a verb.
1 Simon perhaps having job holding drink? The opposite! (7)
APOSTLE – the opposite of ‘job holding drink’, is ALE (drink) holding POST (job).
2 Seemingly vandalised that one office (2,3,4,2,2)
ON THE FACE OF IT – anagram of (vandalised) THAT ONE OFFICE.
3 An aperitif? A favourite is brought in for each (9)
APPETISER – A, PET (favourite) and IS, inside PER (for each).
4 Dope about fixed property (6)
ASSETS – ASS (dope) around SET (fixed).
5 Bill shot when heading off (3)
TAB – heading off sTAB (a go, shot).
6 Army officer taking pity on merchant ship’s skipper (13)
QUARTERMASTER – QUARTER (pity) on MASTER (one in control of a Merchant Navy ship).
7 Relaxed without difficulty (4)
EASY – double definition.
11 Watch programme that includes ad for beauty aid? (9)
EYESHADOW – EYE (watch), plus SHOW (programme) surrounding AD.
14 Remove from superfluous court (7)
EXTRACT – EXTRA (superfluous) plus CT (court).
15 Heads of stores take in goods, marketing a brand (6)
STIGMA – all the first letters (heads) of Stores Take In Goods Marketing A.
17 Prima donna keen to come over (4)
DIVA – AVID (keen) reversed (to come over).
19 Manage to go (3)
RUN – double definition.

19 comments on “Quick Cryptic Number 437 by Tracy”

  1. I actually knew the old names of golf clubs (you forgot spoon), but could only think of the others for a while. DNK GODETIA, but felt fairly confident given the checkers. Also DNK the cricket term –I don’t know any cricket terms– but was pretty sure of the Olympic year; I’ve already made plans to stay the hell away from Tokyo that summer. Unfortunately, I put in ‘ease’, intended to go back and read the clue carefully (I think I was thinking of ‘eased’ minus the d; which doesn’t work, of course), and didn’t. So 5′, 1 error.
  2. I agree this was more like a typical Quickie than yesterday’s offering, and I completed it in 9 minutes. TWENTY-TWENTY as a form of cricket was only vaguely known to me from previous puzzles as I don’t think it was around in the long-ago days when I was required to take an interest in the game.

    Yes, ‘brassie’ and ‘niblick’ are likely to appear either here or in the 15×15 and again both are known to me only through crossword solving. I don’t recall ever seeing them in conjunction with ‘spade’ or ‘pitching’ though.

    Followers of “Countdown” will know GODETIA as the new ‘leotard’ in that there’s seldom a week passes these days without it turning up.

    The distinction between captains of a merchant ships and naval vessels re MASTER was lost on me as I never knew it existed. I note that MASTER in the Royal Navy is, or perhaps was, a separate rank below a lieutenant. All I knew was that ships can have someone called a ‘master’ on them.

    1. Master in the RN is short for Master-at-Arms (a kind of Warrant Officer who is usually the senior ‘Naval policeman’ is the nearest I can get to describe it. Like a Chief Petty Officer will invariably be addressed as ‘Chief’ and a more senior commissioned officer will be addressed as ‘Sir’, the Master-at-Arms will be addressed as Master – another piece of Naval tradition, like calling a meeting a ‘muster’. This led to one very amusing moment when I was a thrusting young Naval Officer at Dartmouth where my class attended a lecture about the Queen’s Regulations for the Royal Navy, given by a real-life Master-at-Arms. One of the cadets from a middle eastern country was late in arriving, and his absence was questioned by the ‘Master’, leading to one wag replying “Mustapha must have missed the muster Master”. It still amuses me.

      Back to the Quickie – about 10 minutes for me.

      Edited at 2015-11-11 12:28 pm (UTC)

  3. Anyone who doesn’t know the old names for golf clubs has a treat in store. Read PGW’s golfing stories, Heart of a Goof and the Clicking of Cuthbert, wonderful! The best of thelot is tucked away in Lord Emsworth and Others. Much easier today than yesterdays. COD 15d
  4. Much more straightforward than yesterday! Like others DNK Godetia, or the golf club. Came here for parsing of 9a and 16a.
  5. A nice gentle one from Tracy… quite 7d I thought and my first sub-5mins for a while. I too took a while to remember the golf club, thinking MASHIE at first, but that was cleary wrong. 15d my favourite too.
  6. Knew all the words but 16a went in unparsed, thanks William for that.

    Last in ASSETS and favourite INFER.

  7. Got all of this bar one. Another problem plant beginning with G. I had Geditea (Tide turned plus eg for somehow -weak I know). There was another G plant recently -already forgotten. David
  8. I too struggled with the unknown words in 9 and 20a (my LOI). I spent an age trying to get tide backwards into the plant but it just didn’t look right, then it suddenly twigged that turn often means go in crossword land and the penny dropped.
    16a was unparsed and I didn’t know about the second definition of worst, so thanks for the clarification.
  9. Got all of this bar one. Another problem plant beginning with G. I had Geditea (Tide turned plus eg for somehow -weak I know). There was another G plant recently -already forgotten. David
  10. Bloody hate plant names. Comes from being dragged round gardens by my mother for my whole childhood
  11. Found this tricky and needed help to get 20a; thx for the explanations of several others that went in but poorly understood! However, can someone please explain why 19d RUN and not RAN?
    1. As I understood it, although there are many more qualified than me on here. If you manage something e.g. a business you run it and another way of saying to go is to run.
      Hope that helps
    2. Hi Andrew,

      I suppose for RAN to be the answer, the clue would have to ask for “managed”, in the past tense?

    1. Hi anon. The clue is referring to the out of fashion club, i.e. the thing one hits the ball with, rather the the course!

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