Times Quick Cryptic 2080 by Breadman

70 comments on “Times Quick Cryptic 2080 by Breadman”

1. ….as both Beverley and swiz are like to give difficulty to non-UK solvers. I didn’t want to put in ice beer either – what sort of church worker is a cebee? Then, of course, I saw it. For swiz, I could definitely rule out Y, and Z seemed a bit more likely than X. So there you go – time 10:56.
   1. I learned SWIZ(Z) from Olivia, who has commented, “Wot a swizz!” here a couple of times.
   2. As a non-UK solver I had no real problems until I ground to a halt on my penultimate clue, the NHO SWIZ.

      Considered SWIN more likely than my other options (SWIX or SWIY) after convincing myself it was a derivative of ‘swindle’.

      Wouldn’t have helped if I’d got it anyway as I had NHO the Yorkshire town either, so my experience was as described above!

2. 26 minutes
   FOI: AKITA Wordplay helped here although the dog was in distant memory.
   I did enjoy this tricky puzzle and marked OBSERVER as COD also ENDURE.
   Thought Aye-Aye as I read the clue so that wasn’t a problem also Roy of the Rovers.
   ICE BEER went straight in as ‘worker’ is normally BEE or ANT.
   Last in the BORDEAUX CORFU cross
3. FOI ‘Ariga’ so the next 12m were wasted (but fun). I don’t know what the lemur is either — I’ve spent the rest of my coffee looking for six letter lemurs with ‘aye’ at the front or back. I’m now none the wiser but I do have a cuteness overload.

   EDIT: Aye aye! Just like is says in Alf’s post! And it was on the list I thought I’d checked. Oh dear.

   Edited at 2022-02-28 07:52 am (UTC)

4. Crikey that was a stiff one, not helped by being tackled on a early train without coffee. No wonder the stars did not align. Long struggles with AYE, BEVERLEY, BORDEAUX (do people actually say “doh” for “oops”? Is that a thing?), SERENADER (where I thought I was looking for a composer’s name) and that spelling of SWIZ.

   FOI ICE BEER (nho), LOI BEVERLEY, COD OBSERVER, time 13:08 for an estimated 2K and a Poor Day.

   Thanks Breadperson and Jack.

   Templar

   1. Well they both have the same meaning, things people may say when they realise they’ve made a silly mistake or overlooked something that might have been obvious. They’re possibly not interchangeable in every circumstance but few synonyms are. For crossword purposes one would be enough.
      1. I see. I confess I’ve never heard anyone say “doh” so I’ve obviously led a very sheltered life

         Edited at 2022-02-28 08:18 am (UTC)

         1. Obviously you don’t watch The Simpsons!

            Neither do I as it happens (I’ve never seen even one episode) but ‘Doh!’ is one of the catchphrases and it’s hard to avoid.

         2. Homer Simpson famously says “D’oh”, so I think it has slipped into fairly common usage.
         3. I have only watched a few episodes of The Simpsons but d’oh (or doh) stuck in my mind.
            I, and many others, have used the expression on previous blogs to admit to a ‘slap ones forehead with lower palm of hand’ moment.
         4. I’ve not heard anyone say it, either, TR.
5. …stumped by AYE (-aye) although should have biffed it from ‘certainly’ and so could not suppress a‘Doh!’ when I came here for the answer … thus responding to Templarredux’s question in the affirmative: indeed they (I) do.

   Thanks Breadman and Jackkt

6. Having derived much pleasure from this series of puzzles and the blogs, I would like to suggest that the comment for 22d should refer to Ely the diocese (and its see) rather than Ely the cathedral city.
   1. I think I get the point you are making but I wouldn’t agree that it makes what I wrote incorrect.

      SOED defines ‘see’ as: a city regarded as the seat of authority of a bishop or archbishop

      And Collins has: the diocese of a bishop, OR the place within it where his or her cathedral or procathedral is situated.

      Edited at 2022-02-28 10:14 am (UTC)

      1. Thanks for your answer, and maybe I am being overly pedantic. However there are cathedral cities which don’t have a diocesan bishop and a see; Ripon would be an example.
         1. Well I’ve learned something there re Ripon. Thank you that’ll be valuable here at some stage I’m sure. However while maybe not overly, surely in this case you were unnecessarily, pedantic – because the clue referenced Ely and not Ripon?
7. Some tricky stuff in here but my biggest delay was with LOI TALE, where I missed that it was a hidden until I’d completed an alphabet trawl. Also failed to parse the ‘very’ part of BEVERLEY, but I knew the town so the answer was clear and was very tempted to biff APE at 3d but managed to resist.
   Finished in 9.16 with COD to BORDEAUX.
   Thanks to Jack
8. But one of those where you look back and you can’t really see why, which I always think means the setter got it right.

   I couldn’t remember the actor’s union, so QUIT was my LOI, I think I knew SWIZ(Z) from reading my dad’s old Jennings books when I was a boy — it was definitely the sort of thing he would say — “Coo, what a swizz”. Come to think of it, I think the grumpy teacher Mr Wilkins used to say “Doh” before referring to Jennings as a “silly little boy”.

   Knew AKITA, NHO ICE BEER though have heard of ice wine, or eiswein.

   7:59

   Edited at 2022-02-28 09:15 am (UTC)

9. Managed the bottom half but struggled with the top. Last year I read a book about the AYE-aye by Gerald Durrell, good in parts.
   Put ICE BEER but NHO. Am staring to biff BORDEAUX every time a wine clue appears.
   Now I see all the answers, it doesn’t seem so tricky. Brain fog this chilly morning huddled next to the stove.
   Thanks, Jack.
   1. It was a nay-neigh from me I’m afraid. Glad to see you are back on your network although it seems your power is not.
      1. Thanks for concern – main boiler people coming tomorrow, as locals couldn’t fix it. Have various fires so not quite frozen. Anyway can’t make a fuss in view of world events.
10. Twelve minutes,doubting ice beer and that spelling of swiz (LO’sI). Molesworth may have used it I suppose. Chiz chiz. FOI marathon. Did not see the scrub in scruff, the Companion of Honour in epoch, the s or ere for before in the musician, how ice beer was clued except it couldn’t be anything else and just because I NHO it didn’t mean it wasn’t a thing, and I didn’t see the set in amusement. Not a bad time for me, but the whole thing left me with a furrowed brow. It’s worth looking up the aye-aye. They used to be thought very rare, but it was discovered that they live high up in the trees and are seldom seen, and were more common than we thought. Still, lemurs in general are all endangered. Thanks, Jack, for unclouding my brow, and Breadman for this maze of a puzzle.
    1. Very good! “A chiz is a swiz or swindle as any fule kno.” (“Down with Skool!”, 1953).
       1. If it have a rebore and new piston rings it would be a snip.
11. Slipped over my target by erroneously putting “Ending” for 16ac and then having to unravel everything when I got stuck on 7dn. I also thought 6ac was “Swizz”, but it couldn’t be anything else other than the one “z” version.

    Think there’s quite a few River Ure’s — but I thought of the one near Ripon, which then helped with knowing Beverley (albeit the opposite side of Yorkshire).

    As a youngster, I regularly got Roy of the Rovers along with The Beezer.

    FOI — 4dn “Epoch”
    LOI — 7dn “Ice Beer”
    COD — 19dn “Mayor” — just for the comic reference.

    Thanks as usual!

12. I just couldn’t get on the wavelength today. DIME was my FOI and CORFU my last and biffed. I also biffed QUIT and AYE and I was unsure of the spelling of SWIZ. 11:41
13. 18 minutes, so 3 over target after a fastish start. My L2I were QUIT and TALE, where, like Hopkinb I couldn’t remember the actor’s union (although looking for a pangram helped with my alphatrawl), and also failed to spot the hidden for TALE a la Plett11, (where my determination to find a G for the pangram was no help at all). Otherwise, no problems with SWIZ, AYE, BEVERLEY or BORD’OH. Thanks Jackkt and Breadman — very entertaining.
14. … over the hour. If my friend hadn’t sent a text as I struggled with BEVERLEY, I might have scraped out of the GC.

    Apart from TALE the grid was blank for the first 12+ mins until I spotted FAN CLUB.

    As a runner disappointed I couldn’t even see MARATHON to begin with as was trying anagram new-hat-on, instead of just biffing it in.

    Just couldn’t get on the setter’s wavelength. A lot more abbreviations and initials building answers than recently, no major anagrams.

    Couldn’t parse lots of it. Wanted SWIZ but X has always been the unknown to me, not Z.

    FOI TALE
    LOI BEVERLEY
    COD OBSERVER
    BIFD SWIZ, ICE-BEER, AYE, ENDURE, CORFU, SEE, MAYOR, BEVERLEY, AMUSEMENT, SERENADE, CHATEAU, BORDEAUX
    NHO AYE-AYE, River URE

    Noticing the corners have got the tough Scrabble letters.

    By the time I’d managed to fill the grid, it was just hit and hope with all that biffing.

    Edited at 2022-02-28 09:45 am (UTC)

    1. You’ll find “x”, “y” and “z” can all be used as potential unknowns – as all are used commonly as variables in mathematical equations.
       1. Good point when you put it like that – I did Maths ‘A’ level (badly) a long time ago. Really needed to be well-versed in the language of cryptics today.
15. I will be kind and call this ‘quirky’. I was slow to start and did my usual wander round the grid with a few d’oh moments on the way, e,g. SWIZ, AYE, CORFU (biffed — didn’t see cor as gracious). I didn’t like ICE BEER (iced beer, maybe, but what is an ice beer?). ESSENCE had to be but the CE was unknown to me. I think some of the clues were beyond quirky when I go back over the blog (thanks, jackkt). I finished with JAPANESE, BEVERLEY and strayed into the SCC. Not a happy start to the week. John M.
    1. I think Jack explains in his blog. I’d NHO, so I looked it up, make beer, partially freeze it, remove ice crystals; stronger and more flavourful beer results. I don’t think it’s at all common in the UK.
       1. Thanks for that. Perhaps I should avoid ‘skim reading’ of blogs. 🙄
          Like you, I have never heard of it.
16. Don’t like to criticise but this was poorly pitched in my opinion. Obscure cluing throughout and often for even more obscure answers. Thanks though!
17. I found this on the trickier side too. I was taken over my target by failing to see the hidden TALE and wasting time doing a alphabet trawl with an H at the front. D’oh! Took a moment to parse BEVERLEY although I know the town well. JAPANESE was FOI and TALE LOI. 10:37. Thanks Breadman and Jack.
18. A recent debate about WHIZ/Z meant that SWIZ went in with a bit more confidence. I had this done in 11 minutes except for AYE. I spent two minutes trying to find a letter that made it work; not the lazy APE which might have been biffed.
    So all done in 13:31.
    A visit to BARNSLEY was avoided; that was tricky for all I think, let alone non-UK solvers.
    Not an easy Monday but a good challenge.
    David
    1. BEVERLEY was certainly tough for a soft southerner like me.

       Was deeply in love and heartbroken by a Beverley at the turn of the millennium. Back then I’d have got that answer in an instant as she was always on my mind. Pleased to see, it didn’t even register when I was searching the recesses of my Yorkshire knowledge.

    2. A visit to Barnsley should always be avoided.
19. Tough going, did not get AYE, TALE or AMUSEMENT. I had heard of Beverley, but don’t see how VERY=Same. The phrase “the very same” doesn’t do it for me, since “very” is just an instensifier.

    I knew a man called Beverley, It was at one time a common masculine given name, but is now almost exclusively a feminine name. Women keep taking mens names, see also Everlyn, Meredith and more recently Robin.

    ,

    1. Sidney too!
    2. The writer Beverley Nichols was a household name for decades up to his death in 1983. He wrote plays and novels, books about gardening and many an article for newspapers and magazines.
       1. Aha. Very erudite. Beverley sisters was a household name for me.
    3. “The very one” is an expression that I would associate with “the same”…tenuous perhaps, but I think it works.
20. By the time I arrived in the club (32:25) breakfast was over and the coffee was cold, so not a good start to Monday, not helped by a call to arms over the weekend and not much sleep. Sun is shining in the West but grim in the East.
    Thanks Breadman and Jack
21. DNK SWIZ with one Z. Guessed ICE BEER. Bit dodgy, this puzzle.
22. Didn’t know Aye…. (Or aye-aye is it)
    I guessed Beverley — but didn’t see how very = same — similar thoughts to another’s comments.
    It felt a bit stilted somehow.
    I liked Observer once I got that.
    Ice beer in Alex anyone?
    Oh no it was Ice Cold in Alex!
    Thanks all

    Edited at 2022-02-28 11:29 am (UTC)

    1. Aye-aye – the lemur with the very long middle finger. Persecuted as thought to be unlucky at one time.
23. Surprised to come here and see others found this tricky. I whizzed through it in the fast time (for me) of 11 minutes. Didn’t fully parse a couple (SCRUFF, CHATEAU) and NHO of ICE BEER but it had to be. Dimly remembered the dog at 2dn, so that didn’t hold me up, and managed to remember the nocturnal lemur after a short pause. All in all a good day.

    FOI – 1ac JAPANESE
    LOI – 21ac BEVERLEY
    COD – 24ac BORDEAUX

    Thanks to Breadman and Jackkt

24. A “nearly pangram” …
    … which for those of us who do not swoon even at complete pangrams really does seem the definition of pointlessness! But I believe Breadman has done this before.

    A puzzle which largely went straight in, albeit with a few minor queries, for an 11 minute finish. I had NHO 7D Ice beer, and had not seen 6A Swiz with one Z before (nor has my spellchecker) — this is the archetypal “odd answer” simply to fit the setter’s desire for a near pangram (swig or swim would have been so much better if Breadman was not chasing a Z), and confirms my view that cleverness (pangrams, NINAs, themes) often comes at the expense of elegance.

    LOI 21A Beverley needed all the checkers and even then a moment to see same = very.

    Many thanks to Jack for the blog
    Cedric

    1. Yes, some setters do it to tease solvers. The full pangram could easily have been accommodated today by having GALE instead of TALE at 17ac had the setter wished to do so.

       I don’t think anyone “swoons” at pangrams but they and ‘nearly pangrams’ are features of crosswords and are likely to be discussed in places where people discuss crosswords.

       Ninas and themes may be a hindrance to construction of elegant puzzles but elegant puzzles come easily to some setters so one can’t really blame them for adding interest to their work by trying to construct elegant themed puzzles or Ninas even if they sometimes fail in the attempt, at least in the eyes of some solvers.

       Edited at 2022-02-28 01:35 pm (UTC)

25. Like Peregrineflyer I seem to have had a different experience. 8 minutes, with the first 10 or so going in one after the after. I never get excited when that happens, because inevitably it doesn’t work out, but I did cross my fingers (briefly) for a clear run. It wasn’t to be, but things went in pretty smoothly anyway.
    The lack of a G in a puzzle by Breadman amused me – I wondered if it might be Gluten-free!
    I had the same MER regarding very = same in 21a and didn’t know ICE BEER but otherwise no particular problems.
    AKITAs were originally a breed of JAPANESE mountain dog so I liked the cross there. My daughter has just fostered a second Romanian rescue dog – she now has two large, fluffy shepherd crosses churning up the garden. At least they’re very useful for keeping the wolves, bears and lynxes away!
    FOI Japanese
    LOI Beverley
    COD Bordeaux
    WOD Swiz
    Many thanks Breadman and Jack

    I totally messed up one long anagram in the biggie today, so got myself in a terrible pickle, but did note that, yet again, the same word appeared in both crosswords. I don’t do the concise, but wonder if the same word has ever featured in all three on the same day?

26. Knew Aye Aye and Akita definitely looked more correct than Ariga, but swiz? Most definitely a new one on me. Wrote it in. Took it out and finally put it back in as my loi following a check it existed. In my online Chambers dictionary swizz doesnt even seem to be an alternative.

    All v strange. Wasn’t aware of the recent discussion about whiz and whizz but would have had the same CER (colossal eyebrow raise)

    Anyways not complaining with an all correct sub-10 time

    Thanks all

27. We got SWIZ but, should the need arise, would never spell it that way. We also knew BEVERLEY having once lived a few miles from it. Overall, we just sneaked into the SCC with a time of 20.20 — slow brains today.

    FOI: JAPANESE
    LOI: AYE
    COD: BORDEAUX

    Thanks Jackkt and Breadman.

28. ….BEVERLEY, which is home to a beautiful minster, a fine racecourse (flat only), and a fair few excellent pubs — which don’t, as far as I remember, specialise in ICE BEER.

    This was a tricky start to the week, and my target was not met.

    FOI DIME
    LOI TALE
    COD FAN CLUB
    TIME 5:28

29. Amusement, by ‘slow’ single figure times. Still, habits Endure. Aye. No Swiz today, excellent time 24 min.
    1. Congrats on the good time!

       8 mins is 33% over my target/par time, and twice as slow plus a minute slower than my fastest last week (albeit that was close to a PB).

       Edited at 2022-02-28 06:34 pm (UTC)

       1. Thanks for encouragement and thoughtful reply. My, what stats! My instinct is there are several tiers of QC solvers, the capable, the reasonable, and the totally confounded, let’s say. I do think the jargon is off-putting. There is a sort of feel that speed is key. I wonder if this has been imported from other circles. In the QC, I believe, it sits very uneasily. Solving comes before speeding, I think, for everyone who’s trying to begin, learn, and improve their own skills.
          1. Whether or not times should be mentioned comes up periodically, and I don’t think there is a ‘right’ answer. I do however completely agree that getting the answer, and understanding why it is right is more important than the time taken.
          2. You’re quite right.
             I started doing the main Times cryptic maybe 15 years ago, there was no quick cryptic. I don’t think I completed a puzzle for 3 years. By the time the 1st QC arrived, what is it now, 8 years ago I was a 15-20 minute solver of the QC, and a once or twice a week solver of the 15×15. I only discovered this blog after the QC began, and used it to understand how to solve. Now the QC target is 6 mins (2-3 times slower than the real speed solvers), and the 15×15 varies from 10 to 45 minutes to a miserable DNF depending on difficulty. I also do the Guardian quiptic/cryptic/everyman, so maybe 15-20 puzzles per week.
             The more I do, the quicker I get, but it never takes the enjoyment away.
             The site is called “Times for the Times” after all, but as far as I can tell, people are only really “competing” against themselves or those they know complete in similar time.
             It’s a pretty friendly place, with room for everyone.
30. A half an hour gone, 14 (yes, fourteen!) clues still to solve, and precious few ideas about any of them. So, I decided to heed the advice of several of you – to take a break and come back to it later. Some housework, a shower, a late lunch, some clearing in the garden, and a cup of tea later – and I got back to the task. A couple of clues (incl. JAPANESE) then went straight in and, bit by bit, I made it to the end. Total time = 56 minutes. A little slow for me nowadays, but very satisfying in the end.

    My LOI was AMUSEMENT (a bit too convoluted for me), but ESSENCE, SWIZ, SERENADER and ENDURE all held me up for a very long time. As for AYE, I had absolutely no idea how that worked – and still don’t really, unless AYEAYE is some sort of Lemur (I will look it up).

    Many thanks to Breadman for the almost impenetrable challenge, and to jackkt for the explanations.

31. Was on the wavelength today perhaps, and I would have probably come in at around 16 minutes or a bit under, but I forgot I hadn’t revisited 16a. I’d originally put in HALTER, thinking a last might be some kind of horsey equipment, and although I soon found out it wasn’t, even my faint letters gave me the impression of a full grid when I got what I thought was my LOI AMUSEMENT. I stopped my watch on 14:57, pleased with a sub-15 and only discovered my error when I saw ENDURE on here. So a big fat D’OH from me. Like others, I wasn’t sure of the SWIZ spelling, and not 100% about AKITA, but no problem with anything else. The aye-aye is well worth looking up by the way. A really nightmarish beast with huge eyes and a specially adapted middle finger that’s very thin and elongated so that it can probe into holes in trees and skewer any grubs that may be lurking within. COD to SIRE. Thanks Jack and Breadman.
32. Can’t decide whether this was extra hard or I was slow because of a very long day working at my daughter’s house (my plastering skills have improved from ‘it just needs a good sanding’ to ‘not bad’.) Either way, 30mins is borderline missed the coach, so not a great start to the week. My last pair, Aye and Essence were responsible for quite a few at the end, lemurs not being a strong suit, and engineers usually being RE or REME (Chartered Engineers are CEng, though Civil Engineers — brickies — could conceivably be CE in polite circles.) Invariant
33. I’m a proud Yorkshireman who was born in Beverley and worked as a solicitor in Ripon (on the River Ure) for 10 years! This took me 30 mins or so, and was just the right mix of straightforward and tricky.

    D’oh I’d probably now seen as coming from Homer Simpson, but I will always associate it with Peter Glaze on ‘Crackerjack’.

    GaryA

34. Quite a bit of thought needed for many of the answers and really wasn’t sure of my spelling for LOI BEVERLEY, but just sneaked under my 20 minute target.
35. No particular problems, just took me a while and lots of PDMs. Could not fully parse a couple: DNK CE=Chartered Engineer, and guessed AYE, forgetting that I have of course heard of the Aye-aye. Temporarily invented a new word FANBOMB until I spotted BEVERLEY… LOI ENDURE, FOI SWIZ, COD CORFU 😆 Many thanks Breadman and Jack
36. Way back at the beginning, was Templar winding us up with his NHO D’OH? It’s one of ours. It’s in the Glossary
37. In the grand scheme I’m sure it doesn’t matter but why do some write d’oh and others doh? What is the function of the apostrophe there? Thinking of apostrophes , I would have put one after asses a few days ago in asses’ bridge.(Not in the grid of course but in our discussion of the clue).
    1. It’s been years since I’ve heard Homer, but I think he aspirates the [d], or inserts a glottal stop; to me, anyway, it sounds different from ‘dough’.
38. All done apart from Beverley. Got the Be and the Le but same=very was beyond my understanding. You might say “the very same” but if you say very it’s surely used as a shortening of a phrase not a substitute for the word same. Very dubious clue — and spoilt a nice puzzle.

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