Times Quick Cryptic 1416 by Mara

Author   ChrisPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic
I wasn’t at the races with this one or if I was, backed all the wrong horses. When I eventually finished (rejoining the SCC with 19 minutes), I still struggled with some parsings. 14dn was the main culprit but I think I’ve got that straight now. 7ac (another struggle) earned COD when it eventually clicked (just beating the surface of 2dn). Given my past experience with judging difficulty, I now expect everyone to say how easy this was – but I do hope you fared better than I did.

ACROSS

7. Fashion house, we hear? (6)
MANNER – homophone of manor.
8. However difficult, hospital included (6)
THOUGH – difficult (TOUGH) including hospital (H).
9. Guffaw unrefined, by the sound of it? (4)
ROAR – homophone of raw.
10. Inside winter vehicle, poor journalist tied up (8)
SHACKLED – winter vehicle (SLED) containing poor journalist (HACK).
11. Sad to shed feathers (4,4)
CAST DOWN – shed (CAST – cast aside), feathers (DOWN).
13. Ready, remove first from trash (4)
RIPE (in the sense of fruit) – trash t(RIPE).
15. French bread suffering (4)
PAIN – double definition.
16. Comprehensive school’s head emotionally upset (8)
SWEEPING – (S)chool, emotionally upset (WEEPING).
18. Ultimately jubilant welcome with Asian country (8)
THAILAND – jubilan(T), welcome (HAIL), with (AND).
20. Twelve, not a soul short (4)
NOON – not a soul short (NO-ON)e.
21. Before end of sale, object reserved (6)
DEMURE – object (DEMUR) before end of sal(E).
22. Battle with ninjas oddly in European city (6)
VIENNA – battle with (VIE), in which is (N)i(N)j(A)s.

DOWN

1. Country hoarding gold, all there is to see? (8)
PANORAMA – country (PANAMA) hoarding (holding) gold (OR).
2. Humble pensioner dancing with tutu! (13)
UNPRETENTIOUS – anagram (dancing) of PENSIONER with TUTU – excellent surface.
3. Finger finally entering sauce quickly (6)
PRESTO – finge(R) inside sauce (PESTO).
4. Separate and distinct group (6)
STRAIN – double definition.
5. Bird touring Spain mistaken for dog (6,7)
COCKER SPANIEL – bird (COCKEREL) touring an anagram (mistaken) of SPAIN.
6. Giant tucking into burrito, greedy (4)
OGRE – in burrit(O GRE)edy.
12. Success that may rise or fall (3)
WOW – the same up and down. From Collins – noun US, Slang a remarkable, successful, exciting, etc. person or thing.
14. Identify flag and goal (8)
PINPOINT – flag (PIN – after much processing, I think this may be the golf term – aim at the pin/flag), goal (POINT – took ages to get to the proper solution of this which is – in the sense of end – the purpose of an action – e.g. another policy designed to achieve the same end – Synonyms; purpose, point, reason, goal, design, target, aim, object.
16. Diggers passed, juddering (6)
SPADES – anagram (juddering) of PASSED.
17. Tip I have cut for salad plant (6)
ENDIVE – tip (END), I have (IVE).
19. Pay attention, River Humber’s opening up (4)
HEED – river (DEE) and (H)umber all upwards.

26 comments on “Times Quick Cryptic 1416 by Mara”

  1. This was a tough one, all right, with very little forthcoming at the first pass. I biffed THAILAND, only parsing post-submission. I finally took PINPOINT to work as Chris suggests, although I just biffed it and thought about it later. Chris, you’ve parsed VIENNA the way I did at first, but it’s VIE+NNA. 8:34, a little under 3 Verlaines.
  2. I finished all but three answers within my target 10 minutes but then struggled to finish off.

    At 14dn in the SE I was distracted by first thoughts of ‘pennant’ then ‘pennon’ for ‘flag’, the second of which was not easy to dismiss from my mind given that the checkers in place were P,N,O,N.

    In the SW I was missing the two intersecting answers at 19dn and 21ac and for a long time could only think of ‘hear’ or ‘hark’ for the Down clue, but neither of these would parse. Eventually I came up with DEE as the ‘river’, probably only because I’d seen it in a puzzle somewhere within the past couple of days. Having cracked that one I still took a while think of DEMURE as a word to fit the checkers at 21ac.

    19 minutes, giving me 3 solves in the red (15+ minutes) out of the last 8 QCs. Prior to the first of these I had gone for 28 consecutive solves without seeing red, so either I am going through a slower patch or the puzzles are marginally harder at the moment.

    Edited at 2019-08-13 05:23 am (UTC)

    1. Like you, I’ve been going through a slower than usual patch, being over my target time in 5 of the last 6, so I think you may be right about recent puzzles being a bit more difficult.
  3. Another enjoyably tricky puzzle from Mara. Nearly all my biffs were wrong:RADISH,SIENNA ,STANDARD. However one that survived was Thailand,parsed post solve -thanks for that.
    I finished in 15:47 which looks quite good based on early comments.
    Nearly LOI was PINPOINT, COD and tough.
    LOI was 7a MANNER which I had forgotten to fill in!
    David

    Edited at 2019-08-13 06:45 am (UTC)

  4. I found this a little harder than average too. I was held up at the end by my last two, RIPE and PINPOINT, with a bit of a frown at POINT for “goal”. I liked the dancing pensioner and NOON. 6:46
  5. Tricky indeed. Most went in fairly quickly but I needed to jump around the grid. A few were really testing for me, especially PINPOINT, RIPE, and NOON (strangely – the last two are not hard). WOW was the only possibility for 12d but I didn’t like it. DEMURE was my COD. I ended up taking slightly over 2K which is not so not too bad in the context of the comments above. Thanks to Mara and to Chris for a helpful blog. John M.

    Edited at 2019-08-13 07:55 am (UTC)

    1. I agree with WOW – ‘to wow the crowd’ is fine but I didn’t like it as a noun and had to dig down to the American and slang section of Collins to find it.
    2. I agree with WOW – ‘to wow the crowd’ is fine but I didn’t like it as a noun and had to dig down to the American and slang section of Collins to find it.
  6. I spent at least 3 minutes and 3 alphabet trawls before I finished with my LOI 7a MANNER in 15:24. I didn’t like the cluing for 12d WOW but what else could it be and I biffed THAILAND but parsed it before I read the blog. Thanks Chris and Mara.
  7. The wrong side of 20 minutes for me – tough though! It was the HEED DEMURE what got me finally, although nothing came too quickly. Enjoyable challenge from Mars and thanks to Chris for the blog, which reminded me that I hadn’t fully parsed PINPOINT.
  8. I had all bar RIPE and PINPOINT in around 14 minutes, but those two held me up for ages and I eventually submitted at almost 25 minutes. Glad it wasn’t just me! Thanks Mara and Chris.
  9. I know it’s fashionable when you struggle with a crossword to say that it’s the hardest one you have come across for ages, but I really can’t think of a recent one that has been more difficult than today’s ‘offering’ from Mara. A very empty looking grid after the first pass, and eventually, as the hour mark ticked by, I had to resort to aids for the last few. Invariant
  10. I was all set to give up and read the blog after half a dozen clues. Had no idea what was going on for many of them. Biffed heed and Thailand – checked they were right on my phone but had no idea how to parse, so thanks Chris.

    Eventually spotted a couple more which gave me some letters to put into an aid and eventually managed to finish. LOI noon

    A bit of a cold shower after feeling better yesterday!

  11. Wow. Recently I have been struggling with the QC but today was a wavelength day as I had only one problem, namely the first word in 11a which required an alphabet trawl.

    COD 5d.

    Probably down to earth tomorrow.

  12. Took me 3 attempts to finish this, so no idea what the overall time was but long. For me, some of the definitions were obscure to say the least (eg flag = pin, WOW = success – really?) There certainly seem to have been a number of real toughies recently.
    PlayUpPompey
  13. 7A reminded me of a member of senior management who in his written feedback to new teachers wrote that they had a ‘good manor with the pupils’
  14. ….oh, VIENNA (cue ULTRAVOX earworm). I almost entered “Sienna” but then stopped myself in time.

    Certainly not a walk in the park, but at least two of last week’s were harder in my book. I might have scraped inside my target if I hadn’t had to alpha-trawl in the same finishing corner as The Rotter.

    FOI THOUGH
    LOI DEMURE
    COD COCKER SPANIEL
    TIME 5:07

    1. Normally, if I’m struggling (more than usual) I stop and have a cup of tea. For whatever reason today I stuck with it, and consequently endured a very long and ultimately unsuccessful solve. Invariant
  15. Definitely a tricky day today with the usual suspects causing me a headache; PINPOINT, DEMURE, MANNER and ROAR. Got there in the end though, finishing in 19.10. CoD to 2d.
    Thanks for the blog
  16. Another in a recent slew of DNF, alas. 13A and 14D the culprits, the latter inexcusable as I had PIN! Not wild about trash and tripe — not disgruntled, but not exactly gruntled (WC Fields) — but COD to COCKER SPANIEL.
    Tim (not that Tim).
  18. For beginners like us (we have taken up the QC so as to stop thinking about Brexit) a crossword as tough as this makes Brexit seem easier.

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