Times Quick Cryptic 1946 by Joker

Author   ChrisPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic

I wonder how many others will be caught out by 3dn. I’d very much enjoyed this solve and I was getting right uo to my 10 minute target when I rather rashly plumped for an asnswer I’d already rejected as not parsing properly. You can’t win them all, so well done Joker – the joke was on me.

Definitions are underlined.

Across
1 Where one rides a rollercoaster? Just stop from flying off (10)
FAIRGROUND – just (FAIR), stop from flying off (GROUND).
8 Gatecrash home, beginning to turn abusive (7)
INTRUDE – home (IN), (T)urn, abusive (RUDE).
9 Part of the body needing some doctor’s opinion (5)
TORSO – hidden inside doc(TOR’S O)pinion.
10 Uncovered cyan and navy thread (4)
YARN – c(YA)n – uncovered, navy (RN).
11 Vast financial deficit in output from colliery (8)
COLOSSAL – financial deficit (LOSS) inside output from colliery (COAL).
13 Article concerning on that issue (5)
THERE – article (THE), concerning (RE). There as in ‘lockdowns are difficult – I agree with you there’.
14 Anger some when accepting refusal (5)
ANNOY – some (ANY) accepting refusal (NO).
16 Rubbish a Conservative’s spinning (8)
ROTATORY – rubbish (ROT), a (A), Conservative (TORY).
17 Landing stage ripe for redevelopment (4)
PIER – anagram (for redevelopment) of RIPE.
20 Philosopher one found in short supply (5)
STOIC – one (I) found inside short supply (STOC)k. I was worried we we after a four letter enamel of a specific philosopher but the general term came easily enough. For your information and, I hope interest, here’s where the term came from:
A member of the ancient Greek school of philosophy founded by Zeno of Citium, holding that virtue and happiness can be attained only by submission to destiny and the natural law.
21 Saw wanderer is in lead (7)
PROVERB – wandered (ROVER) inside lead – the metal – PB.
22 Firmly-established intense ocean trend regularly observed (4-6)
DEEP-SEATED – intense (DEEP), ocean (SEA), (T)r(E)n(D). Tried and failed to get the regular letters out of OCEAN as well as TREND.
Down
1 Elf-like creature, fine and insubstantial (5)
FAIRY – fine (F), I substantial (AIRY). Elves and fairies seem to be pretty similar with the former being mischievous. Any experts in our ranks care to add more detail?
2 End outside review regularly taken for bank’s action to support currency (12)
INTERVENTION – end/aim (INTENTION) outside (R)e(V)i(E)w. The BoE/a national bank must be the reference.
3 Stick with left internally disheartened (4)
GLUM – stick (GUM) with left (L) inside/internally. Nothing to do with GLUE, then.
4 Cat English see in October (6)
OCELOT – English (E) and see (LO) inside October (OCT). You don’t get many ocelots around my way (except in crosswords):
A feline mammal, Felis pardalis, inhabiting the forests of Central and South America and having a dark-spotted buff-brown coat.
5 Major newspaper owned by the state (8)
NATIONAL – double definition.
6 Ominous feeling now chaps are trapped in it (12)
PRESENTIMENT – now (PRESENT), chaps (MEN) inside it (IT.
7 Very cowardly over avoiding the last round of fire (6)
VOLLEY – VERY (V), cowardly avoiding the last (yello)w – backwards/over w(OLLEY).
12 Magical symbol — place ten around (8)
PENTACLE – anagram (around) of PLACE TEN. Another word for pentagram – a star shape formed by extending the sides of a regular pentagon. Used as a magical symbol by black magicians and Pythagoreans. Well, I didn’t realise Pythagorus was into all that – but what do I know?
13 Bird not finishing off the fly (6)
THRUSH – not sinishing off (TH)e, fly (RUSH).
15 Conclude with rebuke having finished (4,2)
WRAP UP – with (W), rebuke (WRAP), having finished (UP) – as in ‘the game is up’.
18 Fanatical incursion capturing British (5)
RABID – incursion (RAID) cobtaining British (B).
19 Policeman with energy to get through (4)
COPE – policeman (COP), energy (E). So we’ve got through another QC – and a fun one it was.

64 comments on “Times Quick Cryptic 1946 by Joker”

    2. Strangely enjoyable to watch you complete a puzzle I’d only just solved — thanks. I would have liked the sound on to hear you solving THRUSH and THERE to see if you went through the same hoops as I did!
    3. I find it very interesting to watch these twitch videos of the QC. I always imagine you “super-solvers” look at the crossword and just fill in all the answers without hesitation. I imagine you all solving the QC without even looking at the screen, like those ridiculous super-hero movies where the hero points a gun behind them, without even looking, and still manages to hit the target.

      As I watch I can see where you are thinking about the clue, sometimes skipping one and coming back to it, or adding the odd letter here or there as you solve part of the clue.

      I couldn’t do a Twitch of my solving. You’d get bored staring at the screen in which nothing seems to be happening for long periods of time.

      I’d love to watch a video of the QC being solved, with audible commentary, so that I could listen to your train of thought.

      1. I’ll do that this morning. Normally I have sound on but my wife was working in the room.

        Edited at 2021-08-24 12:45 pm (UTC)

        1. Thank you so much for doing this. I really did find it most helpful, and I picked up some nice tips as I watched. I like the idea of typing in bits of the clue as you solve them, which really does help with the final answer.

          We had a Language Lab at my school. It was a classroom with lots of individual booths in it. Each boy would sit at a booth and put on a headset that also had a microphone. We would then listen to whatever is being said and repeat it, or answer the question we heard. The teacher could select a booth from their control desk and listen to any individual boy. Often I’d hear the teacher’s voice in my headset correcting me, or telling me well done.

          Thank you again for taking the time to do this. I really do appreciate it.

          Edited at 2021-08-24 01:44 pm (UTC)

          1. My pleasure — I like to do this every now and again, though I don’t know how to advertize it.
          2. I do try to stream the daily puzzles each day, but it’s after midnight in the UK.
  2. I found this one quite tricky in places and I only just made it home by a few seconds within my 10 minute target. VOLLEY was my LOI.
  3. All green in 16 after a titanic struggle in the SW. The inclusion of ‘bank’ in the clue for INTERVENTION caused me to doubt myself until I finally saw that only a little bit of the clue needed to be ‘regularly taken’. I needed all the checkers for STOIC and then had to work backwards to get ‘stock’ for supply — would have taken a while otherwise. Enjoyed working out the instructions and then following them to get DEEP SEATED. Every now and then I feel like I can do crosswords — I got that today by solving VOLLEY without any checkers! THERE was LOI, the cryptic fitted but I needed Chris’s help to make the definition work — thanks!

    Edited at 2021-08-24 06:36 am (UTC)

  4. 17:08 and was relieved with a sub-20 solve as several clues were awkward.

    Did not parse VOLLEY, seems a bit complex to me with a synonym-reversal-truncation to get the “OLLEY”.

    I banged in THRUSH and OCELOT as they often appear in crosswords, but did experiment with see=Ely, which has been used before. Was not too troubled by GLUM, although tried to get CLUB to work.

    LOI was PROVERB which was the only word that fitted and I recall “saw” for proverb from some previous puzzle.

    Did not really parse THERE, as “on that issue” seemed unlikely for “in that place”. I guess “Don’t go there” as a conversation stopper is a good example.

    COD INTERVENTION

    1. There may mean ‘in that place’ but it’s being used as ‘on that issue’. Do you agree with me ‘there’?
  5. VOLLEY was a clever clue. I had NHO PENTACLE. Quite tricky I thought, for a QC
    BW
    Andrew

  6. I thought this was tricky and was firmly over my 20 mins. I was searching for a word for cowardly for a long time before realising volley fitted, and then working out why. I also bunged in proverb for saw without really understanding it so thanks Chris. As an EFL teacher in a previous life, I don’t really agree that some=any. I spent a long time teaching my students when to use each one!

    1. What an interesting comment. I hadn’t really thought about this before. It seems to me (being a mere mortal who has never been within a mile of being an EFL teacher) that some seems to indicate more than one whereas any indicates one or more. This is when referring to single entities – e.g. matches – ‘do you have any matches’ where one could be the answer, ‘do you have some matches’ where one would be a disappointing answer.
      I wonder if they are synonymous in the case of something which isn’t denoted in single entities like chocolate/cash. ‘Do you have any/some chocolate’ – seems to work?

      Edited at 2021-08-24 07:38 am (UTC)

      1. My daughter was asked by some Polish students to explain the difference between scarcely, barely and hardly. She prevaricated and said that English was a difficult language.
        “Oh no,” she was told, “Polish is the language of heaven because it takes an eternity to learn.”

        PPJS

      2. Yes, that works –
        Here are the chocolates: help yourself to some of them.
        Here are the chocolates: help yourself to any of them.
  7. FOI: 9a. TORSO
    LOI: 1a. FAIRGROUND
    Time to Complete: DNF
    Clues Answered Correctly without aids: 21
    Clues Answered with Aids: 2
    Clues Unanswered: 1
    Wrong Answers: 0
    Total Correctly Answered (incl. aids): 23/24
    Aids Used: Chambers

    I struggled with this one. I found some of the clues very hard, and 2d (INTERVENTION), I was unable to answer. The clue was just utter gibberish to me. I enjoyed the puzzle but just could not finish it with 2d eluding me.

  8. ….glue trap. I obviously haven’t learned from yesterday’s failure. I think this is the first time I’ve failed on successive QC’s ☹️

    COD PROVERB

    1. Well, I sympathise with your frustration – but thank goodness it wasn’t just me! Thanks!
    2. Me too. I couldn’t parse it but, if I rejected every answer I couldn’t parse, I’d hardly ever finish a QC!
  9. A quick start and a slow end in the SW. Both the 1s and their offshoots went in straight away, which is always a confidence boost, stuck in VOLLEY from the checkers and never did manage to parse it and then got horribly stuck on INTERVENTION and WRAP UP. Enjoyed the process of constructing PRESENTIMENT and DEEP SEATED from their constituent parts. Finished in 8.14.
    Thanks to Chris
  10. A smooth run, I thought, until my screen showed an error. Yes, it was 3dn so I join Chris in the doghouse (at least I’m in good company!). Well done Joker for a QC containing some nice touches. Thanks to Chris for a good blog — well worth reading again to savour some of the fun and clever clues. John M.

    Edited at 2021-08-24 07:36 am (UTC)

  11. Hesitated about LOI STOIC as I couldn’t parse it, but had to be from the checkers. So I am far from GLUM. Couldn’t parse THRUSH or VOLLEY either. Former now seems obvious but Volley still obscure.
    I found the SW the hardest corner to WRAP UP.
    Liked ROTATORY, TORSO, PROVERB.
    NATIONAL and FAIRY seemed too easy.
    Thanks for helpful blog, Chris.

    Edited at 2021-08-24 08:04 am (UTC)

  12. Not good/quick enough to fall into the GLUE trap.

    Plenty of gentle clues and the long clues didn’t hold me up for too long this time.

    Couldn’t parse VOLLEY but the literal was v helpful.

    WRAP UP LOI — the W escaped the alpha trawl but fortunately the answer popped up from sonewhere

    Nice puzzle — thanks Chris and Joker

  13. 22 mins that felt longer. Just dodged the glue trap although it was my first thought, took a while to parse VOLLEY although it was clearly the answer, NATIONAL seemed so obvious I thought it might be something more obscure.
  14. One minute outside target of 15 minutes, but with an interruption so I may excuse myself. Some tricky stuff here though, and I count myself among those tempted by glue-sniffing, but couldn’t bring myself to enter it unparsed, and then finally saw the light. Thanks both.
  15. Fell into the sticky trap at 3d as well. Immediately saw what it should have been when the pink square was revealed.

    It didn’t feel that easy either – coming in over target at 7:04.

    Well done Joker, and thanks Chris.

  16. I started quickly and finished slowly. FOI YARN. I also started with GLUE but it felt wrong from the start so I deleted it and went back at the end.
    My problems at the end were WRAP UP and 22a where I wasn’t sure of the definition. WELL TESTED was my glue candidate.
    LOI DEEP SEATED after finding GLUM – but it needed quite a bit of time.
    16:07 for me. Not easy today with some tricky parsings. But all fair.
    David

    Edited at 2021-08-24 09:39 am (UTC)

  17. twenty minutes. FOI torso. After reading the blog I realised I had a DNF on my hands. For the LOI I had interjection instead of intervention, injection of capital the false lead for me here. It didn’t parse either, as there was no part of the clue for the ter bit, so I should have known it was wrong. Did not see the intention part of the clue. Others not fully parsed were proverb and deep-seated. Enjoyed all the clues. Nice to have the ocelot in there. I cuddled one once, an almost full-grown one, whilst its enclosure was being cleaned. It sucked my finger the whole time. Thanks, Chris, for the blog, and Joker for the entertainment.
  18. I thought I might be on for a good time on this one as the first five went in straight away, but things slowed considerably after that, especially in the SE and up the east coast. I eventually stopped the clock on 27:26, but thankfully decided to go back and try to parse the first four downs, all of which I had biffed or half-biffed. When I got to 3d I realised that GLUE should actually be GLUM, so my proper time was nearer 30 minutes, but better that than a DNF. FOI FAIRGROUND, LOI (apart from GLUM) ANNOY, CsOD to DEEP SEATED and RABID. Thanks Joker and Jeremy.
  19. Twenty enjoyable minutes, followed by at least another five trying to get my loi, the nho 6d. I could see Present for now, but i kept on trying to insert a five letter word for ‘chaps’ The pdm eventually came once I decided to follow what the clue actually said. Glue/Glum was another hold up, but a determination to parse saved the day. CoD to the nicely disguised 21ac, Proverb. Invariant
  20. A 25 min dnf for me. I’m afraid I did become unstuck on 3dn (no pun intended), but also didn’t get 7dn “volley”. I could see it was had something to do with yellow backwards but misread the pasting and ended up with something quite literally “woolly”.

    Overall — a good puzzle that was sneaky in places and had lots of other potential traps to fall into. I’d also NHO 6dn “presentiment” nor “saw” = present for 21ac, although at least the latter I managed to complete.

    FOI — 1dn “Fairy”
    LOI — dnf
    COD — 3dn “Glue”

    Thanks as usual!

  21. Good puzzle, tricky in places. The acrosses seemed easier than the downs.

    I entered “glue” at first but knew it wasn’t right and came back to it to chew my pencil, eventually getting there.

    FOI FAIRY, LOI WRAP-UP, COD ROTATORY, time 10:45 for a Decent Day

    Many thanks Chris and Joker

    Templar

  22. … which kept me thinking and pushed the time out to nearly 12 minutes; until then I had been on for a very fast time, perhaps even approaching a PB. Found 22A Deep-seated difficult, took an age to see 21A Proverb, and never parsed my LOI 15D Wrap-up at all, so something of a biff to finish with. But luckily all green.

    OTOH 2D Intervention was a very early entry — but then having worked for many years at the Bank of England , and in the Foreign Exchange Division itself no less, I know all about intervention! The events of September 1992 (Black Wednesday, sterling’s exit from the ERM and all that) are still seared in my memory …

    Many thanks to Chris for the blog
    Cedric

  23. 4:54 this morning. This wasn’t easy, with a series of excellent clues from Joker, and I felt my time flattered me.
    LOI 3d “glum” which I fortunately changed at the last minute, having struggled to parse “glue”.
    COD 21 ac “proverb” with a couple of misleading elements.
    Thanks to Chris for an entertaining blog and to Joker for a top notch QC.
  24. Luckily I didn’t think of glue so I wasn’t caught out be 3d. I was delayed by the two long down clues. I didn’t parse INTERVENTION and PRESENTIMENT was my LOI. I also wasn’t aware of the STOIC-Philosopher definition so thanks for the explanation Chris. Off to catch some rays now – I’ve returned to Mallorca. My stoicism with the grey skies of the UK lasted 3 weeks. 9:14
  25. Well I finished it in about 25 mins. So good for me. And it is by Joker whose puzzles normally fox me. So I am happy. Fred
  26. Another DNF … and all of the progress I thought I had made during the past year has simply disappeared. My success rate over the past month (60%) is no better than it was last August.

    Joker is rapidly joining Orpheus and Teazel as one of my most challenging setters. This time I failed on GLUM (I had GLUE), ROTATORY (ROTATING) and WRAP UP (SNAP UP) and, whilst correct, I was very unsure of THERE, STOIC, PROVERB, PENTACLE (NHO) and VOLLEY (my LOI). Does anyone else feel as though they’ve gone backwards recently, or is it that I might have been getting over-confident?

    Fortunately, Mrs Random restored some family pride, by completing yesterday’s Hurley (22 minutes) and today’s Joker (29) in less time than I spent on my DNF today. Enough said really, except “roll-on tomorrow”!

    Many thanks to Joker and chrisw91.

    1. I tend to find things go in phases. I kind of oscillate around 20 minutes, with periods of thinking I’m getting better and then the crash to reality as I have successive dnf’s.

      Whilst I have personally improved in terms of solving and understanding some of the tricks etc (I can probably complete the majority of QC puzzles now, rather than 50% from a few years back) — my time trend stubbornly refuses to shift and I think I may have found my natural limit.

      2. Thankyou for your comments. My goal is to complete “the majority”, as you say, not really to get ever faster. In fact, rattling it off too quickly would spoil the enjoyment and relaxation.
    2. I’m convinced that there is a such a thing as crossword form, similar to sport, which comes and goes seemingly at random. Sometimes it all clicks into place and at others it’s all a struggle.
      1. I think you may be right. My “form” has improved significantly since I started these infernal puzzles early last Summer, but it still irks me when I endure a period with too many DNFs.
    3. The best advice I can offer, is to always make sure your answers parse. Rotating (16ac) certainly means spinning, but a ‘ting’ isn’t a Conservative, whereas a Tory is (there are well known six letter alternatives 😉). Your solving time will lengthen, but you will have fewer wrong answers (today’s Glue/ Glum is a good example). Plus you will have the bonus of enjoying the setter’s art!
  27. I parsed stoic, but feel it was a poor clue. Although stoicism comes from the school founded by Zeno, there is no philosopher called stoic. If the clue had said philosophy it might have been better. But what do I know.

    This was a trick puzzle I thought.

    Tim

  28. FOI was YARN, LOI WRAP UP. Didn’t manage to parse VOLLEY. 9:23. Thanks Joker and Chris.
  30. Found this tricky falling with others in th glue trap. Very slow in sorting out 7d volley, played around with yellow far too long. Did not know presentiment although the anagram was helpful. Thanks Joker for the challenge.
  31. Hats off to all you above. I found this impossible – my worst ever since the Quick Cryptic began. Could only solve 6 clues. Hopeless. Way beyond my level.
  33. Somehow managed to finish this — but couldn’t parse INTERVENTION
    Short words with a long definition eg end/ intention is a new one to me — will look out for it.
    Thanks Joker and Chris
    Nick
  34. I parsed stoic, but feel it was a poor clue. Although stoicism comes from the school founded by Zeno, there is no philosopher called stoic. If the clue had said philosophy it might have been better. But what do I know.

    This was a trick puzzle I thought.

    Tim

  35. I love reading all your comments….I am hopeless at these, although I did get three in one sitting! So in awe of your personal goals…10 to 15 minutes. I like saving these and spending days on them 🙂
    1. With that attitude and sense of fun then I think you’re on the road to become a solver yourself. The SCC is a very welcoming place (I visit there myself sometimes). Keep having a go and then seeing the answers in the blog and working out how it all works – and you could become a sub-ten minute-r! It’s not magic – it’s fun!

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