Times Quick Cryptic 1837 by Wurm

56 comments on “Times Quick Cryptic 1837 by Wurm”

1. Like William, I had a similar experience to yesterday when I solved all but one clue within my 10-minute target and was then stuck for another 10 minutes before the missing answer came to me. Today wasn’t quite so bad in that I was stuck for only 5 minutes making a quarter-of-an-hour in total. The stumbling block was OTOSCOPE, a word I’m perfectly familiar with and I had made the connection between ‘lug’ and ‘ear’ so I am somewhat at a loss to explain my brain-freeze; perhaps it was a psychological reaction to yesterday’s debacle.

   Lots of nice clues here with the one to CANAL BOAT perhaps my favourite.

2. No problems for me today. I spotted “lug instrument” immediately and just glanced at the rest of the clue to make sure it was OTOSCOPE. I wasted time on CANAL BOAT trying to think of things to do with hair (locks).
3. Enjoyed this. CANAL BOAT has set the bar very high for anyone entering the clue-writing competition this week for NARROW BOAT. COD to AEROSOL Hans (sic) down.

   I have been distracted recently as my first novel The Collation Unit is published this week. If you like Mick Herron I’m hoping that you might enjoy it.

   1. Recommendations from this blog are well favoured in our house at the moment. The bathroom light is now turned on by a cord with a new spelted birch handle after someone’s excellent rant about ‘conical white things’ complete with link. So I’ll give the book a go — I like Mick Herron and I really like the Hans down joke so I’m in!
   2. Congratulations – I hope it’s really successful.
   3. Congratulations hope it’s a great success
      1. And I’ve just read the synopsis — it sounds right up my street so I’ll definitely give it a go
         1. Thanks to everyone for their support.
4. The aids had to come out for OTOSCOPE, I rumbled what ‘lug’ was doing and what ‘books’ was up to but still couldn’t get it, so resorted to crossword solver in desperation. I’ve never heard of an OTOSCOPE but all the information was there. I ended up with pink square anyway because I also couldn’t parse ‘barbecue’ which has ‘bar’ in it (and you can almost see crab in there too) and means ‘cook’ and which fitted so I bunged it in and then the C let me get CANAL BOAT — which I thought was a brilliant clue, rare to get two such good ones in a single puzzle because as William notes AEROSOL was a cracker too. So it all ultimately ended in failure but I enjoyed the ride a lot.

   Edited at 2021-03-24 07:10 am (UTC)

5. Like our blogger I raced through most of this and then came to a grinding halt with 15d and 20a still to solve. Much head scratching and a couple of alphabet trawls ensued the before AEROSOL revealed itself and with all the checkers in place I was able to piece together the NHO OTOSCOPE to finish in 13.00.
   COD to AEROSOL, which was so good I’ll forgive Wurm for using this dreadful grid, with an honourable mention to CANAL BOAT.
   Thanks to William

6. FOI 4D: EMU
   LOI 20A: OTOSCOPE

   All in just under 10′ but with typos: BRRNACLE and CANNL BOAT.

   Thank you to william_j_s and the setter.

7. Thought I’d tackle this early when my brain is fresh, but it was still a slog. I had “fare” instead of “fair” in which held me up a fair bit at the NW corner. I also didn’t spot the anagram so neurosis was my LOI. Also struggled in the SE with the Yangtze & Otoscope. I did know Banker for river but it didn’t come readily and when took a while to realise what type of “lug” it was. My time was mid 20s, think this was on the trickier side with some of the vocab.

8. I found this a lot easier than yesterday (which took 32 minutes and resorted to aids) and finished in under 15. Seems like dynamo has come up a few times before. Thanks again

9. DNF for the third time in a row. Spent over half the time on OTOSCOPE and I had never heard of it. I saw OT for books, but had it with the available O at letter 6. Did not know lug=ear, some schoolyard slang that missed me by like nut, conk, gob. There were plenty of rooms and musical instruments to check as well. So would never have got it.

   BARBECUE for 1a was a great effort with the checkers, mendesest.

   ‘Banker’ for river is a bit of crosswordese I could do without. A river is a ‘flower’, because it flows, a flower is a ‘bloomer’ because it blooms, but a river doesn’t bank, it has banks, so why is it a ‘banker’?

   I didn’t see CANAL BOAT as COD, differing with many on this blog. Each to their own. But AEROSOL was great.

   COD The Monday/dynamo anagram at 13a

10. Phew. Back to an on the money QC. Smiles all round today. Nothing too difficult but some clues to hop around. Spotted OTOSCOPE straightaway from lug, probably helped by the presence of one rusting in a drawer, never used in earnest (sic). NHO the goddess ATE but will remember for future.
    Must rush, big meeting day ahead. Thanks Wurm and William. Pip pip.
11. I was on for a record time today until I came up against OTOSCOPE. I twigged that ‘lug’ probably related to ‘ear’ but spent a good ten minutes trying to parse it before resorting to aids. How disappointing.

    CANAL BOAT went straight in as I still have nightmares about when I got one wedged between the banks of the Avon and Kennet last year while trying to impress onlookers with my (rookie) piloting skills. Applause all round as the real owner leapt back on board and expertly managed to retrieve the situation.

    1. You need to track that chap down and send him to Suez!
12. Started and ended with struggles! The first was of my own making – even though I’d thought of BARNACLE straight away, I became fixated on 1ac being an anagram of “pub clean” and wasted minutes at the start trying to make that work. Durr. Then at the end like others I had to work hard to unpick AEROSOL (bravo) and then finally the unknown OTOSCOPE.

    In between it was plain enough sailing, with a bizarre feature of the grid being that since I’d started by doing the downs I solved 11ac without ever looking at it! (And also all of 16ac bar one letter.) Had a chuckle at the topical nature of 3dn given events in Suez!

    FOI BOBSLED, LOI OTOSCOPE, COD AEROSOL, time 11:42 for a Good Day.

    Many thanks Wurm and William.

    Templar

    Edited at 2021-03-24 09:10 am (UTC)

    1. I did the same with 1a and just assumed that it was something obscure until the ‘b’ from bobsled (on edit it must have been the r from ruminant) pointed me in the right direction.

       Edited at 2021-03-24 10:23 am (UTC)

13. I found this particularly hard, and must be very out of practice! I got to 20 minutes with just three left, but couldn’t find any of those without resorting to aides.

    Pleased that other people also didn’t know 20A Otoscope, but why 22A Pins and 24A Retriever wouldn’t come to me I do not know! Having Googled Otoscope, I’ve definitely seen one, but never knew what it was called.

    Interestingly, no problem on 15D Aerosol, but then I more than made up for that elsewhere! That gets COD for me, lovely surface!

    Thanks Wurm and William

    Ruth

14. Beaten by the AEROSOL / OTOSCOPE crossers although I did have most of the bits to solve it, even if I have never heard of the device. Thought of some form of misting device but somehow aerosol didn’t come to mind. Thought of ear for lug but was trying to work in an instrument as well. Ho hum. Clever crossword, not quite clever enough solver today.
15. I thought this was a good puzzle. thanks Wurm and William. There were a couple of clues where if you buy three you get the fourth free!

    Edited at 2021-03-24 09:31 am (UTC)

16. 
    FOI: 5a. FAIR
    LOI: 1d BOBSLED

    Time: DNF

    Clues Answered Correctly without aids: 22

    Clues Answered with Aids (3 lives): 1a, 24a

    Clues Unanswered: 20a, 15a

    Wrong Answers: Nil

    Total Correctly Answered (incl. aids): 24/26

    Aids Used: Chambers

    I enjoyed this puzzle, though two clues stumped me for long enough to call it in as a DNF.

    20a. OTOSCOPE – Just could not work this one out. Now I see it.

    15d. AEROSOL – As above.

    1d. BOBSLED – This one frustrated me somewhat. I got BOBS_ _ _, but after that all I kept thinking of was BOBSLEIGH. Obviously, that was not the answer as it did not fit. It took me forever and a day to finally work out BOBSLED.

    24a. RETRIEVE – I used a life for this one and was so annoyed with myself when I saw the answer.

    14d. YANGTZE – Took me a while to realise that “banker” referred to river. But I got there in the end.

    Yes, an enjoyable puzzle that defeated me, but with no hard feelings.

    Edited at 2021-03-24 09:35 am (UTC)

17. Yesterday others were tripped up by URBANE and MANGER. I think today’s will be the intersecting AEROSOL and OTOSCOPE. I got AEROSOL relatively quickly with an audible ‘aha’ but OTOSCOPE refused to yield after 5 minutes of staring. 14 minutes to record a DNF.
18. I found most of this refreshingly straightforward and was set to be under target. I got AEROSOL & CANAL BOAT with no trouble, spent too long on PINS, and wasted half a minute on SOLSTICE (because I had stupidly biffed Samuel instead of SAMOSA). I was then left with OTOSCOPE and failed dismally despite spending over 5 mins trying to get my head around it.
    Some very good clues but 20 was a killer so I had to resort to an aid for my first DNF ever. Thanks to Wurm and William. John M.
    P.s. I do think the QC is gradually getting harder. Even the ‘easier’ ones (like today’s) have one or two stings in the tail. A lethal sting today.

    Edited at 2021-03-24 09:48 am (UTC)

19. … one I almost managed to complete.

    I put BARBECUE for 1a, but otherwise it was a good day.

    Thank you, Wurm and William.

    Diana

    1. I think you can be forgiven for BARBECUE (which fitted all the crossers) if you managed to get the dreaded OTOSCOPE! 😄
       1. Better watch out, there are innumerable configurations of ‘scopes; some are a lot more dreaded than others!
          1. I said it was a good day, I didn’t say I’d completed it!

             OTOSCOPE was not in my vocabulary, and as it’s very unlikely to appear again for some time I guess it’ll defeat me again in the future.

             Diana

20. I knew 20 ac must be an ear instrument beginning with OT and ending in SCOPE so I did just check the spelling, though I now see round was in the clue.
    AEROSOL made me smile when the penny dropped. Those last two held me up for a while.
    Oh no, I see I have made a mistake – shd have gone back to check TRAIN SET. Moral: do not pencil in answers you know to be wrong, even if Real Life interrupts crossword solving at times.
    What a pity, but I did enjoy this one.
    Liked SAMOSA and obviously RETRIEVE (see my pic). Not keen on SLED for sleigh though.
    Thanks, William, vm.
    1. Goose barnacles are very much edible … a local speciality in Galicia!
21. Back inside target today at 14.20, despite delays on the AEROSOL / OTOSCOPE pair. Some lovely stuff here, and a helpful, if slightly strange grid. Thanks both.
22. Really enjoyed this puzzle as it contained a range of puzzles and indicators.

    Didn’t get OTOSCOPE at all — knowing ‘lug’ has to do with ‘ear’ would have helped. Also unfamiliar with ‘ness’ for ‘head’ but biffed it.

    Liked the challenge of a ‘banker’ being a river and ‘mister’ being an aerosol.

    12D SOLSTICE wouldn’t have come to mind had we not just gone into spring a few days ago.

    Thank you to Wurm and William

23. NHO OTOSCOPE – had to use aid to find this. Took time to get RETRIEVE and TRAIN SET after zipping through the rest. Loved AEROSOL and CANAL BOAT clues.
24. I was held up by PINS, and also by trying to use (pub clean)* at 1a. However, the rest of it wasn’t too taxing. I saw AEROSOL quickly once DYNAMO and ATE were in, and was familiar with OTOSCOPE. 9:25. Thanks Wurm and William.
25. What fun – and what a relief after yesterday, especially as it was a Wurm, who, as we have discussed before, can be very wriggly! i came in a minute under target.
    I did have a minor quibble with 22a – as PIN stands for personal identification number, I felt the clue gave too much away, and taking an R off the dog was was very simple too. But these are small details – I thought there were some fab clues with great surfaces, and all sorts of clever devices. Ticks and smiles everywhere – I really liked DYNAMO, HELL and RUMINANT 😊

    FOI Bobsled
    LOI Otoscope
    COD Aerosol

    Many thanks Wurm, and thanks William too – the grass was definitely green on this side of the fence today!

26. Like yesterday, I ended up short by one. DNK Otoscope, though lug/ear was familiar enough. I would like to think I could have worked the answer out, but I’m not at all sure as I was fixated on an —ote ending. Other than that, a pleasant 21min solve with the same issues as others. CoD to 15d, Aerosol. Invariant
27. Needed aids to crack the dreaded ear instrument …
    … but that apart, all done, parsed and enjoyed in 12 minutes.

    A first-rate crossword, with some lovely clues. I have rarely seen a day when contributors to this blog are so in unison — it seems almost everyone enjoyed 3D Canal boat, tipped their hat at the clever 15D Aerosol and struggled with 20A Otoscope. Which I like many had NHO but will now never forget.

    Many thanks to William for the blog
    Cedric

28. Like many above, I raced through most of the grid in 20 mins until I ground to a halt on the 20ac and 15dn pairing. DNK 20ac, so was always going to struggle, but unfortunately as I waited for the penny to drop on 15dn I realised it must have got stuck somewhere — even after working out the “aer” at the beginning and the majority of the other checkers I still couldn’t get it. Having “Napolean” Solo floating around my head didn’t help either, although after the “banker” for 14dn I should have known the definition would be somewhat cunning.

    Some great clues all around though.

    FOI — 1ac “Barnacle”
    LOI — dnf
    COD — 15dn “Aerosol”

    Thanks as usual.

29. 11 minutes to get to my last two. I had read the first word of 21a as BLAZE. Once I slowed down and looked carefully it went straight in. That just left 20a. I always try to solve without aids and eventually I worked out what the clue was looking for -OTOSCOPE. Very satisfying to get there in the end. About 16 minutes in all.
    Lots of good clues. My favourite was TESTAMENT.
    David
30. 12 minutes, a good time for me. Loved OTOSCOPE.

    Edited at 2021-03-24 12:13 pm (UTC)

31. Such a relief to manage an unaided DF (if that’s a thing?) after a series of DNFs (even, on occasion having deployed my full arsenal of aids).

    Like others today, I got stuck at 15d/20a. I did think of ear for lug, wondering about some variation on ‘ear ‘ole.. However, instead of immediately resorting to aids, I took my own advice and put the QC down for a while. When I came back, I managed to unpick 15d from the initial wordplay (a little hesitation) and the crossers, and then twigging scope for some sort of instrument and OT for books gave me otoscope. I’d either heard of it or, more likely, worked it out from otalgia (earache).

    I was beginning to think that my brain was deteriorating with a recent series of real stinkers (to me at least), compounded by struggles with the some that I’d been working through in Book 4 of the QC series – the ones in there come from 2017 and, even though I’ve clearly done them before, I have been finding some quite tricky.

    Thanks, Wurm, for a boost to my cryptic confidence! And to William for the blog.

    Edited at 2021-03-24 01:36 pm (UTC)

32. We really enjoyed this QC. Lots of excellent clues that really challenged us – we tried unsuccessfully to solve a couple of nonexistent anagrams and we were determined that 15D was linked to Napoleon Solo in some way. After a great deal of pondering in the SW corner we came in at 16 minutes.

    FOI: fair
    LOI: otoscope
    COD: we loved canal boat, aerosol and otoscope

    Thanks Wurm and William.

33. ….at least one 15×15 clue to enable newer solvers to appreciate what lies in store farther down the road. Here we had three of them, and the fact that two of them crossed might have made things a tad difficult.

    Like John Dun I spent awhile playing around with “pubclean” at 1A, and it delayed my start. I thoroughly enjoyed this — thanks. thanks Wurm !

    FOI FAIR
    LOI OTOSCOPE
    COD CANAL BOAT
    TIME 5:05

34. Worked on this around a Zoom conference, to my advantage, as I had done two thirds on the first pass but was stuck. Then along came Zoom. A second session at the QC then solved all but aerosol/otoscope. Had to resort to an alphabet trawl for otoscope. Got the lug bit, didn’t see what the room had to do with it. FOI Fair. LOI Otoscope. COD barnacle, but there were others for me today as well – emu,neurosis, ass. Liked train set. Biffed Ate – NHO. Thanks, William, for the blog, and Wurm for the puzzle. GW.
35. CANAL BOAT wasn’t really going in, and didn’t know what a ‘lock’ was in the required sense. Thanks to William for explaining SCOPE = ‘room’.
36. 15 minutes with just Those Two to get — very annoyed at myself for not getting Aerosol, clever clue, but Otoscope would have been ootq (NHO)
    But, like the cursed Millrace that is still smarting, I will not forget Otoscope.
    I looked up ‘Lug synonyms’ and there is an extraordinary array of choices. It made me feel a right numptie.
    Thanks all,
    John George
37. Kind of knew OTOSCOPE, and had “books” and saw room = scope quite quickly. Clue of the Year to AEROSOL, CANAL BOAT would probably have been COD but for that.

    7:42

38. Much like jackkt below I spent forever looking at otoscope and could not drag it up. Also like humid worked out the lug / ear connection yet still it evaded my brain so aDNF for me.

    10 minutes for the rest — some lovely clues, aerosol and canal boat in particular.

    Thx William and wurm.

    Good luck to our adoring novelist sawbill — hope it’s a great success for you. I’ll add it to my extensive kindle reading list. My friend who has also had novels published says he does not mind me taking a long time to read them so long as he has the royalties😊

39. Enjoyed this puzzle, like others we were held up by 20a, eventually decided it was something to do with ears, although mis spelt it. Thanks Wurm, and for the blog.
40. Much better than the rest of the week for me. Should have got BARNACLE quicker, but like some others was trying to unravel an anagram of “pub clean”. Loads to admire. I thought DYNAMO was going to be my COD until I worked out the answer to 15d. Simply brilliant; one of the best of the year so far I’d say. NHO of the goddess ATE or an OTOSCOPE, but neither caused a particular problem once I had some checkers. I got CANAL BOAT from the L and seeing the second word was BOAT, but I can’t see why it’s such a clever clue. I guess it’s too wide to turn in a lock and it’s also not a key, but am I missing something else? FOI 5a, LOI RETRIEVE, COD AEROSOL, WOD OTOSCOPE, Time: 25:26. Thanks Wurm and William
    1. … its a play on two very different meanings of ‘lock’
41. I really enjoyed this, lots of lovely clues, and I went at a good pace. However after just under 15 minutes I still had 15d and 20a to do. NHO of Ate as a goddess so I wasn’t 100% sure of the E in 15d. I knew lug could be ear or drag/carry but there are two many possible instruments, musical or tools, and I would never have thought of scope for room. Aids gave me both answers but I still didn’t understand 15d as I was thinking of Mr (Sheen?) Still very enjoyable.
    FOI bomb
    LOI aerosol
    COD The canal boat made me think of the tanker stuck in the Suez Canal and I liked ici in 6d but I’ll go for SOLSTICE which is also topical.
    Thank you to Wurm and William
    Blue Stocking
    1. Mist-er = one that mists, viz an aerosol
42. 25 clues solved in just 18 minutes – unbelievable!
    Final clue (OTOSCOPE) took another 14 minutes – the norm!
    Overall time: 32 minutes – Very good for me, so I’m happy!

    I was late to the game today, but enjoyed the puzzle very much (even including the struggle over 20a at the end). Very relieved to (eventually) work out the parsing for OTOSCOPE. It really had me foxed, as I had never heard of the word – even though I had my lug’oles de-waxed prior to a hearing test a few few weeks ago.

    After the de-waxing, I think the audiologist was able to see right through and out of the other side well enough. I also suspect that Mrs R contacted the audiologist prior to my appointments to make sure that the mechanism that selectively screens out some of what she has to say is properly connected and working.

    Many thanks to Wurm and to william_j_s

43. Did like banker for river and mister for aerosol
    Got barbecue wrong
    If that was the turn from the river to the canal lock by a pub on the canal it is a right sod. Applause given if you get it right.

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