Time taken: 12:47. It is still New Year’s Day here, so Happy New Year from the Eastern part of the USA.
I got off to a quick start, but a lot of answers, particularly on the left hand side of the grid took a lot more teasing out, and I was a little bit outside of my usual time. The usual gang of early solvers are not yet out in force, but there are not many fast times so far. This is a good puzzle – the wordplay for the unusual entries is difficult but fair, and everything makes sense in the end.
Today is a bumper day – I expect most of you checking in here have done it, in case you have not, I got a lot of enjoyment out of today’s Quick Cryptic. Templar should have a lot of fun writing it up.
How did you get along?
Add your introduction here
Definitions underlined in italics, (ABC)* indicating anagram of ABC, {} deletions and [] other indicators.
| Across | |
| 1 | Impression made by Napoleon in the field? (4-4) |
| HOOF-MARK – cryptic definition referring to Napoleon the pig in Animal Farm | |
| 5 | Plant plants killing time in vacated area (6) |
| ACACIA – CACTI(plants) minus T(time) inside the exterior letters of AreA | |
| 9 | Stevie perhaps bored by nasty mean barbs? (9) |
| NICKNAMES – Stevie NICKS (best known as a singer with Fleetwood Mac) containing an anagram of MEAN | |
| 11 | Brazilian capital essentially dynamises province (5) |
| REALM – REAL(Brazilian currency, pronounced “hay-is”) then the middle letter of dynaMises | |
| 12 | Best flirt organised rescue if all routes blocked? (7) |
| AIRLIFT – AI(best), then an anagram of FLIRT | |
| 13 | Charlie installing electrical unit in satire (7) |
| LAMPOON – LOON(Charlie) containing AMP(electrical unit) | |
| 14 | Queen’s beloved pop icon meets with Italian group (6,7) |
| PRINCE CONSORT – PRINCE(pop icon), CON(“with” in Italian), SORT(group) | |
| 16 | Factories circling island anger small flush person (13) |
| MILLIONAIRESS – MILLS(factories) surrounding the island of IONA and IRE(anger), then S(small) | |
| 20 | Studio had story right (7) |
| ATELIER – ATE(had) LIE(story), R(right) | |
| 21 | Dubious naked maiden by meadow recalled prophet (7) |
| ISHMAEL – FISHY(dubious) minus the external letters, M(maiden), then LEA(meadow) reversed | |
| 23 | Paradise for the large part is swell (5) |
| HEAVE – HEAVEN(paradise) minus the last letter | |
| 24 | Garment left poor Colin hot (9) |
| LOINCLOTH – L(left) and an anagram of COLIN,HOT | |
| 25 | Musical replacing opening with another key line (6) |
| CREASE – the musical GREASE with the C replaced by G(another musical key) | |
| 26 | Most tiny powerless lights put back in case (8) |
| SMALLEST – remove P(power) from LAMPS(lights) and reverse, then LEST(in case) | |
| Down | |
| 1 | Exhibit artist mounted for BA workshop? (6) |
| HANGAR – HANG(exhibit), then RA(artist) reversed. BA referring to British Airways | |
| 2 | Take place of wretch bolstering bare rock (5) |
| OCCUR – CUR(wretch) under the internal letters of rOCk | |
| 3 | American topless in tiny bathing suit (7) |
| MANKINI – YANK(American) minus the first letter inside MINI(tiny) | |
| 4 | After depression it gets you hopping from the chair (6,7) |
| REMOTE CONTROL – cryptic definition referring to pushing a button | |
| 6 | Lug wax from odd space below church (7) |
| CERUMEN – RUM(odd), EN(space) under CE(church). Not sure how well known this medical term for earwax is. | |
| 7 | Noisy fool leaves lesson in love (9) |
| CLAMOROUS – remove ASS(fool) from CLASS(lesson), then AMOROUS(in love) | |
| 8 | Warm Sea periodically laps second egg fossil (8) |
| AMMONITE – alternating letters in wArM sEa surrounding MO(second), NIT(louse egg) | |
| 10 | Circles ‘misfit’ sadly in judgement of one’s worth (4-9) |
| SELF-CRITICISM – anagram of CIRCLES,MISFIT | |
| 14 | Theft of extremely fine cloth hidden by mansion? (9) |
| PILFERAGE – external letters of FinE, RAG(cloth) inside PILE(mansion) | |
| 15 | Sensitive way to stop Mickey’s horde cycling? (8) |
| EMPATHIC – PATH(way) inside MICE(Mickey Mouse’s horde) cycled | |
| 17 | Parisian’s here with head cold that’s severe (7) |
| ICINESS – ICI(“here” in French) then NESS(head) | |
| 18 | Fabric hoisted across tops of the hips isn’t proper (7) |
| ETHICAL – LACE(fabric) reversed surrounding the first letters of The Hips Isn’t. I’d give this the hat tip for COD based on the clever use of isn’t as part of the wordplay | |
| 19 | Most of English town ultimately felt dated (3-3) |
| OLD-HAT – OLDHAM(English town) minus the last letter, then the last letter of felT | |
| 22 | Solitary marine creature abandoned by sailor (5) |
| ALONE – ABALONE(marine creature) minus AB(sailor) | |
30:25
Enjoyably chewy tussle. CLAMOUROUS saved me from putting PRINCE CONCERT . A slight pause because of trotters v hooves. REMOTE CONTROL is my clue of the year so far.
CERUMEN sounds Tolkienish. An aunt once told me it tastes like chicory. I’ve never verified this.
Thanks to George and the setter.
Cerumen, the deaf wizard?
I’m v new to this & have a NY resolution to do (or try to!) it every day .
Please could someone explain why EN means space in 6D (lug wax from odd space below church). Would be most grateful.
EDIT: cross posted and see has been answered above
The remote control one made no sense to me because if you depress the button then you don’t need to be hopping from the chair at all!
Good luck! Once you’ve been doing these for a while, you’ll catch on to the tricks – some of which pop up so often that I don’t always put a full explanation in the blog. Printing spaces (and dashes) come in two flavors, en and em.
Hopping refers to channel hopping. Cryptic definitions are my least favorite type of clue, but this is a particularly good one as everything in the clue has meaning in more than one direction, but as a whole is a description of the answer.
Finally finished in two sittings. Untimed but about 45 mins. Pretty tough I thought, the SW holding out til the last.
I had a dodgy patch half way through until I opened up the middle with REMOTE CONTROL & PRINCE CONSORT.
Some very clever clues it has to be said..
Thanks G and setter.
65 minutes of the usual nowadays struggling, especially in the NW corner. I missed the Napoleon-Animal Farm link and thought “these wretched CDs, you just never know”. Never heard of Stevie Nicks (and I agree that NICKNAMEs are hardly barbs). Couldn’t understand ‘naked’ in 21ac, being an -ish thinker, until George explained, nor the hopping from the chair in REMOTE CONTROL. Sort = group (PRINCE CONSORT) doesn’t seem right until you realise that they are both verbs.
10:28. Felt like I was slightly off the wavelength but as others have said I thought this was a good puzzle.
Nicknames = barbs? In which dictionary?
Collins: “a familiar, pet or derisory name given to a person”
Chambers: “a name given in jocular or fond familiarity, or in contempt”
Collins is usually the go-to for a definition in the Times.
The problem I still have with that is it’s not the way the clue is written, i.e. barbs = nicknames. Maybe as has been suggested it’s supposed to work as a DBE, but even then to me it seems tenuous in the extreme
– Took a while to think of Napoleon the pig, and even then HOOF-MARK wasn’t exactly obvious despite having all the checkers
– Didn’t fully understand how REMOTE CONTROL worked, and only now do I see what meaning of ‘depression’ was needed
– NHO CERUMEN so had to construct it from wordplay
Thanks glh and setter.
FOI Realm
LOI Cerumen
COD Ethical
25 mins. Fleetwood Mac fan here, so I got NICKS but was trying to put it at the end of the word. As often happens, I did most of it in 20 mins, got a bit stuck, then came back to it couple of hours later and it was easy….
Managed to get through with a longish solve on paper. Came here to check CERUMEN as I didn’t know whether it was that of cHrumen. Opted for the former just as it sounded better.
19:00. Good fun, on the whole. I got all the way to 24A on my first read through the clues before I got an answer, but the downs got me going. Held up at the end by taking a while to see HANGER/HOOF-MARK. I’m another who couldn’t equate NICKNAMES with “barbs”, but the wordplay was clear once I thought of the right Stevie. CERUMEN unknown but derived from the wordplay. Clever stuff but I thought a number of the surfaces rather unconvincing. I liked ATELIER and ICINESS, though. Thanks George and setter.
36 mins. Nice puzzle. Like others I was and am still dubious about nicknames = barbs, but – like others – thought of Barbs (in the Royle Family?).
Some checking here and there but otherwise really enjoyed plugging away and ultimately finishing this one. Couldn’t parse ISHMAEL and had to remind myself what an ‘en’ was but I did at least know CERUMEN. Really liked HOOF-MARK and REMOTE CONTROL. Many thanks all.
43:35
Last two in were HOOF MARK and CREASE. CERUMEN was unknown.
I missed the Fishy parsing of 21a, seeing ish=dubious and not working out how naked fitted.
Thanks glh and setter
Couldn’t do any!
Liked this one apart from HOOFMARK – pigs have trotters, and barbs, as others have mentioned. Some good obscure clues all of which I nailed. Maybe a 40-minute job ( I use pen and paper).
Pretty average time (for me) [probably around 25 minutes. I didn’t know CERUMEN and like others considered CHRUMEN but checked and my preferred guess was correct (I’d have counted it a DNF if it had been wrong).
44 minutes. First one I’ve finished this week. I’m surprised to learn that pigs have hooves. CERUMEN surfaced after 35 minutes which helped complete the NE and I finished off with EMPATHIC and CREASE, having had GREASE for a while.
Another Fleetwood Mac fan here (up to Rumours but not beyond), so no problem with the beautiful Nicks. Interesting group. I like to obsess about the “lost” middle period in between departure of Peter Green and arrival of Nicks and Buckingham. Danny Kirwan and Jeremy Spencer and then Bob Welch and Christine Perfect (as was) and a couple of others. They’d definitely run out of inspiration by the last album (Heroes are hard to find) but there was some good stuff on the way. 25 minutes wrecked by a misprint.
30.29
Struggled a bit with stuff going on around me (ie everyone was being normal and I was trying to find some peace to do the crossie). Eventually got some of the longer ones and the rest came with a rush, the penultimate letter of CERUMEN causing a hovering of the final finger tap at the end
Thanks setter and George
Did it but one hell of a struggle in the nw corner. First one over an hour for an absolute age. NB 20 mins is quick for me. I cant seems to keep my log-in details.
28.29 but with one fat finger error on my iPad.
49 mins. Glad to finish with LOI cerumen. A toughie but fair. Unbeaten so far this year!
Enjoyable puzzle, once I got going; and that was only after looking up to correct PRINCE CHARLES! My biggest problem is impatience, I think (bit of SELF-CRITICISM here!). Loved HOOF MARK, once I twigged, and most of the rest – especially OLD HAT, CREASE and EMPATHIC.