Times Quick Cryptic 1821 by Breadman

Author   ChrisPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic

A pangram and a tricky grid layout (not many crossers for first letters) from Breadman today. It felt like hard work at the time but the pace kept up, so the cluing must have been OK, and I finished in 9 minutes. I worked my way down the RHS before being able to get a grip in the LHS which I then worked down until LOI 16dn. COD to the definition in 11ac.

Definitions are underlined.

Across
7 Landing-place is crucial, we hear (4)
QUAY – homophone (we hear) of crucial – key.
8 Arranged index on a couple of pages: it may be at back of book (8)
APPENDIX – anagram (arranged) of INDEX sitting on/after a (A) couple of pages (PP).
9 Vehicle turned into the ancient region (6)
THRACE – vehicle turned car – (RAC) inside the (THE).
10 Hairpiece lifted on Owen’s head in part of golf course (6)
TOUPEE – lifted (UP) on/after (O)wen all inside part of golf course (TEE).
11 Grounded bird no longer parties (4)
DODO – parties (DO DO). Lovely definition given that the dodo was a flightlesss bird and is now extinct.
12 Expression of hilarity from female offspring showing different face (8)
LAUGHTER – female offspring d(AUGHTER) showing a different face/first letter – in this case L.
15 One who eats everything, having drunk more vino (8)
OMNIVORE – anagram (drunk) of MORE VINO.
17 Mother concerned with horse (4)
MARE – mother (MA), concerned with (RE).
18 Noted a tailless rodent after initially following (6)
FAMOUS – a (A) taless rodent (MOUS)e after (F)ollowing.
21 Shade during excavation nil (6)
INDIGO – during (IN), excavation (DIG), nil (O).
22 Asian involved Sean in joke (8)
JAPANESE – anagram (involved) of SEAN inside joke (JAPE).
23 Casual geezer repeatedly showing heart somewhere in Egypt (4)
SUEZ – the hearts of ca(SU)al and ge(EZ)er.
Down
1 Fungus problem around hotel pantry perhaps (8)
MUSHROOM – problem around/backwards sum – MUS, hotel (H), pantry perhaps (ROOM).
2 Andy repositioned second live wire (6)
DYNAMO – anagram (repositioned) of ANDY, second (MO).
3 Battle station (8)
WATERLOO – double definition.
4 Father interrupts street quarrel (4)
SPAT – father (PA) interrupts street (ST).
5 In French, Hugo managed adequately (6)
ENOUGH – ‘in’ in French (EN), anagram (managed) of HUGO.
6 Conceal British identity somewhat (4)
HIDE – this one DOESN’T begin with ‘B’ – somewhat means part of the clue – Britis(H IDE)ntity.
13 University study about diet strangely not corrected (8)
UNEDITED – university (U), study about/backwards den – NED, anagram (strangely) of DIET.
14 Sort of tea regularly gorged inside ahead of time (4,4)
EARL GREY – regularly (G)o(R)g(E)d inside ahead of time (EARLY).
16 Line on certain maps represents old pub (6)
ISOBAR – think weather charts/maps – represents old pub (IS O BAR).
17 Simple poem in manuscript ending in basket (6)
MODEST – poem (ODE) inside manuscript (MS), baske(T).
19 First male attorney to stand up in the morning (4)
ADAM – attorney to stand/upwards – da – AD, in the morning (AM). The surface wouldn’t have worked as ‘attorney in the morning’.
20 Look for king buried under religious grounds (4)
SEEK – king (K) buried under religious grounds (SEE – as in the usual favourite – ELY).

74 comments on “Times Quick Cryptic 1821 by Breadman”

  1. Mostly straightforward for me, but some dodo moments for me as well. I always forget that QUAY is pronounced like ‘key’ and not like ‘cay’ or ‘kway’. SUEZ also took a long time, and I’m embarrassed to say that until now I didn’t even know in which continent we would find the Suez Canal. I guess it’s one of those things like mixing up Catalonia and Caledonia?
    1. Technically the Suez Canal isn’t in any continent, so don’t feel too bad?
      1. It wouldn’t surprise me; I’m surprised it didn’t register with me at the time. I just now checked to make sure I’d reported my time accurately, and find that I’m 28 on the leaderboard. No. 1 is mohn (he’s real, too) at 1:41.
  3. 13 minutes.

    I didn’t find this easy and struggled to find some of the answers on the LH side, ISOBAR being my LOI.

    Edited at 2021-03-02 04:13 am (UTC)

  4. My Suez Crisis accounted for 6 minutes and an eventual DNF. Just could not unpick this fair but novel clue type. And distracted by Giza which is a homophone for geezer. It’s good to have a totally new clue type, so well done Breadman. DODO also felt fresh.

    COD: DODO

    1. It’s not ‘a totally new clue type’. It’s been used many times before, although only occasionally in the Quick series. The most recent example I can find is 1a in 1732 by Joker last October: Dish: take hearts of some eels, feta and stew (8) Breadman indicated the device a bit less obviously.

      —AntsInPants

  5. 6:07 which is fast for me. No holdups at all. A 4-letter place in Egypt well-known enough for the quickie is going to be Suez (and just seeing the “z” in the clue was enough for me…I decoded how it worked after submission).
  6. Completed without error in 14 minutes, a PB and the first time I’ve come in under quarter of an hour.

    A typical solve for me is at least 20 minutes, with the occasional DNF when I pull the plug at 30 minutes, so very happy with this evening’s effort.

    I found everything fairly straightforward with the exception of THRACE, which I’m tempted to claim NHO, but it rang a very faint bell – and nothing else plausible fit the crossers after I rejected the options in the title of this post!

    WB

  7. Couldn’t work out why ‘boy’ meant crucial but never paused to think that no one lands at a buoy either, just saw the U and Y and in it went as LOI. A surprise to get the pink squares followed by a groan at seeing it should have been QUAY. Another reminder not to quit the alphabet trawl too soon. Earlier troubles included forgetting once again that shade can mean colour, panicking about not knowing ancient regions or types of poems, both of which were unnecessary. A good puzzle that got me in the end. Most satisfaction came from DYNAMO which was my last correctly entered answer.

    Edited at 2021-03-02 07:25 am (UTC)

  8. A nice workout without too much difficulty but no speed (about 35 mins in 2 goes) I found myself working clockwise down the right hand side and guessed it was a pangram once the X, Y, Z and J were in place.
    Couldn’t parse MUSHROOM but obvious and LOI and my COD 7A which was simple when I spotted there had to be a Q in the grid.
    Thanks Breadman and Chris.
  9. … but ground to a painful crawl with 9a THRACE, 16d ISOBAR and 23a SUEZ. I managed to avoid any pink squares so overall I’m pleased with today’s effort. That’s two clean sweeps in a row this week. I’m on a roll! Not much lit my fire today, however my favourite was 17d MODEST.

    Edited at 2021-03-02 07:45 am (UTC)

  10. My time of 15:48 surprised me since I don’t normally like this grid. Started in top left corner and worked my way around. DNK THRACE but biffed it eventually after a few checkers went in.
    Enjoyable.
  11. Well, we absolutely raced through this today until we got stuck in the Suez Canal. So, after a great deal of head scratching, we eventually completed this fun puzzle in 11 minutes.

    FOI: quay
    LOI: Suez
    COD: omnivore

    Thanks Breadman and Chris.

  12. A top to bottom solve with a brief pauses over THRACE and the parsing of TOUPEE and SUEZ, which just pipped DODO to COD. Finished in 6.18 with LOI SEEK, which just happened to be the last clue I looked at.
    Thanks to Chris
  13. A PB following one on the 15×15 yesterday. Finished digging over the allotment yesterday. If we put one over the Bees tomorrow it’ll have been a good few days. OTBC.
      1. You wait for ever for one canary to show up then two come along at once – with me making that three! A big crowd in these days.
        1. I can’t pretend to be a Canaries supporter but I’m definitely a fan of the lovely city of Norwich 😊 Got to know it when my son was at UEA. In fact, he used to work at the pie stand at Carrow Road from time to time!
          1. It is lovely, but us (as once were) locals, would prefer ‘fine’. Rather a shame about the concrete nature of UAE I’ve always thought.
            1. Sorry only just seen this. Fine is good too! The Ziggurat was rather dramatic in its own way, I guess 😊
  14. Knew THRACE; very much liked OMNIVORE (a chestnut?); ended with SUEZ.

    Thanks all

  15. I rather enjoyed this, despite the slightly strange mixture of very easy and very difficult clues. I had all but 3D, 17D and 23A after just 17 minutes but that PB was not to be! Waterloo took an age to come to me for reasons unknown and the crossover of Modest and Suez took nearly 10 minutes to drag out, despite Suez seeming obvious now I reread the clue.

    COD to 11A Dodo – such a perfect surface!
    FOI 1A Mushroom, though I hesitated and pencilled it in because I couldn’t parse it at all.
    LOI 23A Suez

    Many thanks to Breadman and to Chris for the blog.

  16. … as I came to my LOI, 23A Suez. A clever clue, and if I had not been looking for how to get a Z into the grid I might have struggled far longer. As it is, a 12 minute solve and possibly one of the few times I have not only spotted a pangram ahead of completion but actually used it as an aide. Thank you Breadman.

    Thought 10A Toupee also a tough clue for a QC, and I was momentarily put off by not thinking a tee is not part of the course — it is part of a golfer’s equipment, like his clubs. But I suppose fair enough to extend the meaning from the little stand for the ball to the piece of ground one sticks it into.

    Many thanks to Chris for the blog
    Cedric

    1. A tee is the place where you tee off from – as well as the wooden/plastic stand. Hence white/yellow/red tees.

      Edited at 2021-03-02 09:17 am (UTC)

        1. I think that the place is actually called the teeing ground, with the tee being the bit of useful equipment, but the general usage allows reference to the first tee, etc. so I wouldn’t die in a ditch over it.
      2. Some years ago a Scottish woman joined our University department. Keen to be hospitable I asked if she played golf as we had access to the local golf club. She said she did and after extolling the delights of the club I asked her if she had a handicap. “Three” she said. I gasped. “Och it’s easy for me, I play off the ladies tees”. Speechless.
  17. I didn’t like the look of the grid at first but started with WATERLOO and moved steadily clockwise around the grid without leaving any gaps until I finished in the top left with SUEZ, MUSHROOM, and DYNAMO. I’ve never managed that before and was very pleased to see that I came within 9 seconds of our esteemed blogger’s time at 9.09. It makes a nice change to know my grey cells can still work — I used to manage sub-10 times quite often.
    A good puzzle which I parsed as I went along but, as usual, the Nina passed me by…. Some very neat clues but I think DODO is the one for me. Many thanks to Breadman and Chris. John M.

    Edited at 2021-03-02 09:37 am (UTC)

    1. I don’t always put my exact time – often going to the nearest minute. So an extra pat on the back is due to you – I’ve looked up and my time was 9:17
  18. I found this tricky but a bit like chrisw91 it did come together. I should have got Suez from s?e? in Egypt but that would have been using general knowledge. I think the clue itself is clumsy for a quickie but overall enjoyable – thanks Breadman and Chris of course!
  19. 14 minutes and inside target despite looking at SUEZ blankly for the last couple of minutes. I had suspected a pangram might be on the cards much earlier, but by LOI had misremembered that thought, so it didn’t really help me to spot the answer. Finally, it was an alphabet trawl for the second letter that brought SUEZ to mind, and reminded me of the likely pangram. Thanks both!
  20. Despite staring at my LOI QUAY for what seemed like a long time, I was still home in under 10 minutes.
    A brief hold-up with SUEZ.
    A clever and original puzzle; my favourite was OMNIVORE.
    David
    1. I understood “mo” to mean second as in “Just a second” – “Just a mo”.

      Shade = indigo. I guess indigo can be classed as a shade of the colour blue.

      Edited at 2021-03-02 10:28 am (UTC)

  21. A nice steady solve for me, although I did waste a little too much time on the first few clues for no gain other than APPENDIX. That probably cost me a sub-20 as I ended up on 21:50. Overall a good mix of clues and it’s always satisfying to have a pangram. If only I’d noticed it. FOI APPENDIX, LOI and COD SUEZ, although I also liked MUSHROOM a lot. Thanks Breadman and Chris.

  22. FOI: 17a MARE
    LOI: 23a SUEZ

    Time to Complete: 1hr 28 mins

    Clues Answered Correctly without aids: 22

    Clues Answered with Aids (3 lives): 23a, 2d

    Clues Unanswered: Nil

    Wrong Answers: Nil

    Total Correctly Answered (incl. aids): 24/24

    Aids Used: Chambers, Google

    Started off poorly, only seeing one obvious answer (MARE) on my first go round the grid. As I persevered, I started to have more answers pop into my head. Some answers I got were because of the intersecting letters already present. I then looked at the clue again to see if I could find how the answer was obtained.

    There were some real tricky ones that took me for ever to answer, both of which I needed help to find.

    2d. DYNAMO – Needed Chambers to answer this, though I was annoyed with myself for not spotting it before turning to the aid.

    9a. THRACE – I understood that I needed a three-letter word for vehicle, and it put into THE. This told me that the answer must start with a T, and end with an E. I was not immediately sure where the H would go, but it made more sense to place it immediately after the H, rather than before the E. I now needed a three-letter vehicle. All I could think of was VAN, CAR, CAB. Mixing the letters about, the only one that seemed possibly be a word was THRACE. Never heard of it, but I put it in. Yay.

    23a. SUEZ – This one had me stuck for ever, and was my last one in. In the end I Googled places in Egypt and saw SUEZ, which fits. It was the word REPEATEDLY in the clue that threw me, and it still does. I cannot see what purpose it serves in the clue. If it is a surplus word, then I feel that the setter was wrong for including it. Can anybody enlighten me as what purpose REPEATEDLY serves in this clue?

    So, and enjoyable solve, with some tricky clues. Number 8 for me.

    Edited at 2021-03-02 10:30 am (UTC)

    1. Oh, I think I have just clicked why the word repeatedly was used in this clue. It was trying to tell me that I needed to take the heart from BOTH (repeat) the preceding words.
      1. I agree, “repeatedly” put the clue out of reach for me, if the setter has used “both” I might have had a chance. Ah well.
  23. Seventeen minutes. Only five across clues on the first pass, but the down clues went in much more easily, providing openers to the acrosses on the way. Not sure why it took so long. Against my usual procedure, I found myself hesitating, certain the answer was just within reach, instead of cracking on to new ground which might have been more fertile. FOI appendix. LOI omnivore, so that gets my vote for COD, too. All parsed for once. Thoroughly enjoyed this but I suppose that goes without saying since I have the habit. Thanks Chris and Breadman. GW.
  24. Thank you for the blog. I biffed “mushroom” from the definition and checkers but couldn’t parse, so was grateful for the explanation. Favourite clues were dodo and suez, which I thought were very clever – and different.
  25. At 6:17 I sit on the leaderboard between Jeremy and Plett which is a good place to be. I cannot remember the last time I managed a solving time near the 6 minutes mark but everything fell into place today with the exception of my LOI THRACE which was a guess. Thanks Breadman. Thanks Chris.
  26. I enjoyed the variety of clue types and some fun surfaces. Funnily enough the pangram passed me by until very late on, whilst the 15×15 wasn’t quite a pangram, but I assumed it was and tried to invent a word to make it so… 15×15 is again worth a punt, some harder bits but rewarding when it clicks.
    1. Thanks for the hint. I managed the 15sq in under an hour (actually 50 mins) so it has been a good day for me. Hope my progress lasts the week. Yes, there were some satisfying ‘clicks’ for me, too. John

      Edited at 2021-03-02 05:19 pm (UTC)

  27. I agree with some comments from fellow solvers that there were some very straightforward clues mixed with some very tricky ones indeed.

    I biffed JAPANESE but have never heard of a ‘jape’. Frustrates me when obscure definitions are used, truth be told.

    Liked the cleverness of TOUPEE clue, as well as INDIGO.

    My problem clues:
    Missed ISOBAR — stumped on that one.
    As a relative newbie (less than a year!) didn’t know that MS can be a short form of Manuscript in 17D
    Failed to see that ‘sum’ was a ‘problem’ in 1D

    1. Jape is indeed an old-fashioned word but MS for manuscript is common usage, I’d say. Though nowadays publishers talk about a TS (typescript). Sounds as if you are doing pretty well if you only started a year ago, though.
    2. I grew up (I use the words in a broad sense) reading inter alia the books of Frank Richards, which related the doings of boys at fictional public schools such as Greyfriars. In these stories, practical jokes were called “japes”. They were usually relatively harmless, e.g. leaving a mixture of gum and ink on the seat of an armchair or a bag of flower on the top of a door. Of course, the fun started when, instead of a member of one’s own form, usually the Remove, the victim turned out to be Coker of the Shell, or a form master.

      “Frank Richards” was one of the pen names of Charles Hamilton, who was thought to have written about one hundred million words in his lifetime.

      Edited at 2021-03-02 02:56 pm (UTC)

  28. Definitely on the right wavelength today as I managed to rattle through this in 12 mins — although I also agree there was a mix of very easy, biffable clues with some head scratchers.

    Whilst 3dn is obviously a standard chestnut, it still took me a couple of looks until the penny dropped. Funnily enough, 23ac “Suez” didn’t cause me any issues.

    FOI — 7ac “Quay”
    LOI — 13ac “Famous”
    COD — 1dn “Mushroom” 🍄 — lovely surface and it made me chuckle.

    Thanks as usual.

    Edited at 2021-03-02 11:28 am (UTC)

  29. Zoomed through most of this then ground to a halt: just could not see SUEZ and needed help to get ISOBAR and FAMOUS, although obvious afterwards!

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