Times Quick Cryptic 1307 by Hurley

Author   william_j_sPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic
Anagrams abound, which makes for an accessible grid. And nothing really obscure either (except possibly 8ac and 4dn), so I hope to see some satisfied customers today. There are some nice, cryptic-y, sideways definitions to enjoy here, my favourite being 11dn – thanks Hurley.

Definitions underlined

Across
1 Competitive activity could yield cigar — grand! (4,6)
DRAG RACING – anagram of (could yield) CIGAR GRAND.
8 Noticed spades, multi-coloured (5)
SPIED – S (spades) and PIED (multi-coloured, like a horse, magpie, etc.).
9 Supply to the full at sea, it’s fantastic (7)
SATIATE – anagram of (fantastic) AT SEA IT.
10 Fiddling taximeter — that could lead to penalties! (5,4)
EXTRA TIME – anagram of (fiddling) TAXIMETER.
12 Baking stolen (3)
HOT – double definition.
13 Mike leaving wood finds river (5)
TIBER – take M (mike) away from (leaving) TImBER (wood).
15 Have same opinion: an excessive desire must be cut (5)
AGREE – A GREEd (an excessive desire) without the last letter (must be cut).
17 Criticise sleep on return (3)
PAN – reversal of (of return) NAP.
18 Principal lecturer‘s claim disheartened Oscar (9)
PROFESSOR – PROFESS (claim) then OscaR without its inside letters (without its heart, disheartened).
20 Plain about account for ham (7)
OVERACT – OVERT (plain) surrounding (about) AC (account).
21 Gave talk, producing part of wheel (5)
SPOKE – double definition.
22 Revised rent decree that puts people off? (10)
DETERRENCE – anagram of (revised) RENT DECREE.

Down
1 It could hold sweet drops one’s set to move around (7,5)
DESSERT SPOON – anagram of (to move around) DROPS ONES SET.
2 Boxer on street celebrity roll (1-4)
A-LIST – ALI (boxer) then ST (street).
3 One might make catch, some hero, dashing? (3)
ROD – hidden in (some) heRO Dashing.
4 Showcase, industrial, displaying dairy product (6)
CASEIN – hidden in (displaying) showCASE INdustrial.
5 Written comment about king made after upset in Cathedral (5,4)
NOTRE DAME – NOTE (written comment) surrounding (about) R (Rex, king), then an anagram of (after upset) MADE.
6 Long way off about the originator (6)
FATHER – FAR (long way off) surrounding (about) THE.
7 Be lent geezer at work — no fast mover! (6,6)
GENTLE BREEZE – anagram of (at work) BE LENT GEEZER.
11 A loan peer arranged, one moving up? (9)
AEROPLANE – anagram of (arranged) A LOAN PEER.
14 In poem bishop replaces second hat (6)
BONNET – sONNET (poem) but with B (bishop) replacing ‘s’ (second).
16 German author‘s attempt overlooks English theory, half completed (6)
GOETHE – GO (attempt), E (English), and the first half of (half completed) THEory.
19 Reject with contempt ultimately useless banal stuff (5)
SCORN – last letter of (ultimately) uselesS then CORN (banal stuff).
21 Title seems ideal, respectful first of all (3)
SIR – first letters of (first of all) Seems, Ideal and Respectful.

39 comments on “Times Quick Cryptic 1307 by Hurley”

  1. Seven anagrams did seem like a lot. Does EXTRA TIME lead to penalties? I would have thought the reverse, but I don’t know from soccer, if that is the source of the wordplay. 6:33.
    1. The clue has ‘could lead to penalties’. If no deciding goal has been scored after EXTRA TIME has been played a game might be decided by a penalty shoot-out.

      [Amazing myself that I could answer a query about football!]

      Edited at 2019-03-13 05:56 am (UTC)

      1. Thanks, Jack. I was going to say something about how extra time is hardly what a 90-minute soccer game needs, but then an American football game takes around 3 hours. And where in soccer the ball is being moved pretty much for all the 90 minutes, in American football the ball is in play for an average of 11 minutes. In 3 hours.
  2. 16 minutes. I may have thought myself into difficulties here because yesterday I reviewed my recent QC solving times and noticed I had not gone into the red (i.e. exceeded 15 minutes) since 26th December last year. Time was lost today in writing out anagrist, or rather crossing off what had been used up by checkers and writing down the letters that remained. Not even one of the long ones jumped out at me, and at 7dn – by that time my LOI – I became fixated on the first word being BEETLE, although on reflection beetles DO move fast so it was never going to work.
  3. SCC for me today at 3 Kevins. Like Jack I made heavy weather of most of the anagrams, and was convinced I was looking for an animal at 7dn. Thanks to Hurley for a good work out and to William for the marvellously clear blog.

    Templar

  4. Long time since I’ve posted here so hello all again. Am I being really dense but 9ac “at sea it’s” is 8 letters not the 7 required? I presume the final s after the apostrophe is not meant to be part of the anagram?
    1. If you read it as “At sea it is fantastic” it works.

      Didn’t stop me falling into the trap though

  5. Couldn’t agree less with blogger today, for my part (though thanks, of course). SCC 21.55. Found some of the anagrams thorny and had to write out four (SATIATE, DRAG RACING, DESSERT SPOON and EXTRA TIME) before they revealed themselves. Didn’t help that I initially wrote in EXTRA ITEM for the last. NHO CASEIN, LOI and a prime example of the rule that you should always seek a hidden word when stuck. Is pied really ‘multicoloured’? Or bicoloured?
    1. I think it was originally black and white but Collins and the Oxfords allow two or more colours.
      1. Yes, interesting. I initially thought of pied as black and white – in particular, birds: pied wagtail, pied crow. Then, of course, there is the Pied Piper who is multicoloured.
      2. I just Googled ‘Pied Piper illustration’, and I’d say maybe a quarter of the ones I looked at were multicolored, maybe none black and white (except in black-and-white illustrations).
        1. My dictionaries suggest the derivation is from pie as in magpie which in England is a black and white bird, the word appearing in the 14th century, probably from the French (la pie). When it became used for multicoloured, my brief research didn’t reveal. As you say, the Pied Piper is definitely multicoloured and he first appeared in a stained glass window in Hamelin c. 1300 but the first English version of the story, with the term “pied” or “pyed”, was not until 1605.
  6. I was well over my target at 29 minutes, due to the difficulty of solving anagrams on my phone (probably too many!).
    LOI was DETERRENCE, FOI was EXTRA TIME – most football fans have been through the agony of a penalty shoot-out at some time.

    Brian

    Edited at 2019-03-13 08:56 am (UTC)

  7. Maybe it was just my anagram-blindness carrying on from yesterday (really not helped by the large number of them), or just general slowness on my part, but I didn’t find this one that easy.

    Indeed, I ended up only 11 seconds slower on the 15×15 than I took on this.

    Another one that was in the BEETLE club for a while, before the “D’Oh” moment hit, but overall no real excuses.

    8.56

    Edited at 2019-03-13 08:59 am (UTC)

  8. 20 mins, stuck on scorn.
    Dnk casein or pied.

    Cod tiber or extra time. I’m hoping there is no extra time tonight in the liverpool game as it kicks off midnight here.
    Thanks

  9. 22m with tricky anagrams being the cause – usually one of my strengths! With FATHER in the grid and the possible Nina in the 8th column, is Hurley celebrating some event? Thanks to him and William for puzzle and blog.
    1. See what you mean, therotter. That was not intended and has no significance though I’m indeed a father and have been one for quite some time. Thanks, William, for the excellent blog and to all who commented. Hurley
  10. This was properly difficult I thought. I was meant to be at the dentist right now but the appointment was cancelled and so I was possibly not in the best frame of mind, but this took me 24:59 of hard work. I agree with Sonofjim.
    FOI was HOT and LOI was SATIATE.
    I was struggling at times to find the definition (e.g. 20a) and the anagrams weren’t easy. One unknown CASEIN.
    Bonnets off to the setter, a proper test.
    David
  11. I’m with Jim’s lad, Rotter and David above in the SCC. I found it a slog. Didn’t get the rhythm and, like Rotter, my normally good anagram-solving skills seemed to go awol. An unsatisfying solve that I nearly put aside but, with effort, finished in just under 23 mins. Looking back, Hurley gave us some nice clues but I didn’t really appreciate them in the heat of the moment. John M.
  12. 15 x 15 might be worth a go today. I managed it in a very SCC equivalent of 42 odd minutes.
    1. I agree. I’ve got one clue left to solve and most were no harder than this QC.
      David
    2. Thanks for the tip. I counted 5 words I DNK (3 in the SE corner) but I diligently followed the wordplay and got the green light on submission.
    3. Thanks for the tip. I finally got round to looking at it and took just under an hour (with a few biffs and a typo). Not at all bad for me! John
  13. I found this a real slog, and like others had trouble with all the anagrams, but refused to resort to pen and paper. Without the hiddens I would have been in trouble even starting.
    FOI ROD
    LOI AEROPLANE
    COD DESSERT SPOON
    PlayUpPompey
  14. I thought this was a tough one today. I finally finished it in 12:58, held up by my last two clues, 9a and 7d. Another vote for the 15×15 today, which is worth a go for QC fans. Thanks to Hurley and William.

    Adrian

  15. 17 mins today. I had only one entry after two minutes….21d SIR following my decision to work the grid backwards. DNK 4d CASEIN or 16d GOETHE but once a few checkers were in place the clues were doable. My last two in were 20a OVERACT and 14d BONNET. I’m so glad to see from the comments that I am not the only one struggling with this Hurley QC.
  16. ….a GENTLE BREEZE, but then a large number of anagrams in a puzzle suits me. I parsed NOTRE DAME after completion. 20 seconds spent on my LOI.

    FOI DRAG RACING
    LOI BONNET
    COD EXTRA TIME
    TIME 3:58

  17. As usual with Hurley puzzles, I had to engage more neurons to make progress and was a bit slower as a result. I tried to BEETLE along at 7d too. Got there eventually. 11:49. Thanks Hurley and William.

    1. It’s the most abundant protein in milk, used as a nutritional supplement, and found in many dairy products.

    1. The colour of my car is black. My daughter’s car is white. What colour is yours?
  20. Like most of you I found this difficult today with the main hold up being unravelling the anagrams. Once I’d accepted it was going to be a slow solve and stopped worrying about the time I actually rather enjoyed the challenge (there’s probably a lesson in that) and thought the surface of 10a was particularly good. Finished in 17.34 with SPIED.
    Thanks for the blog
  21. My target is 20 minutes and recently I’ve come in under that quite often, but this one took me more than double and in two sittings. William seemed to think it quite easy, so I was relieved to find that that was not the general opinion. Looking back I can’t see why I struggled quite so much, though splitting 1a erroneously into 5,5 definitely didn’t help!
    Having said all that, finishing a crossword that proves difficult is VERY satisfying so I am glad that I persevered. MM
    FOI ROD
    LOI OVERACT
    COD NOTRE DAME

    1. Well… I said it was accessible, not easy. What I mean is that the large number of anagrams provide checking letters, and even if they are hard to resolve, it is only a matter of permutation (rather than obscure GK or weird crosswordese) before a significant number of cells are filled. Writing my blogs, I’m thinking of a tenacious beginner, prepared to slog it out just to finish and expecting all clues to be fair, rather than more expert solvers (20 minutes! Yes you are!).

      Perhaps I ought to have said that your solving time might depend (more than usual) on whether or not anagrams are your thing. In any case, it’s very hard to make a judgement on the difficulty of a puzzle before reading your comments, so thanks to all.

      I *did* say that our regulars would find this puzzle satisfying to solve, and I’m glad you agree!

      1. I really wasn’t criticising your judgement – it is all subjective! I am in awe of you and all the bloggers and so grateful to you for teaching me the cryptic skills. I can now parse (almost) everything in the QCs due to having assiduously studied the blogs. Thank you!

        I am just bowled over to be told that I am pulling myself out of the SCC and teetering on the edge of expert solver… even if I can rarely make any inroads on the ‘big boy’ puzzle… including on the apparently easier days. MM

      2. The trouble with anagrams is that you have to spot that’s what the clue is. I couldn’t see 8ac as one as the number of letters didn’t fit. Doesn’t help that I find anagrams hard in any event, so answers don’t jump out at me. I often have to resort to aids to solve them, if I’m short of checkers.

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