Hello everyone. This took me over my outer target time, so I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that you found it tough. If you in fact did well then well done!
The treatment in 11a will be familiar to many, but I do like it. Though on the complex side for a Quick Cryptic I really rated 1d, and I also liked 8d. Thanks Teazel.
[A little personal milestone: this is my 100th post for TfTT. I think the breakdown is 47 Quick Cryptics plus 53 Jumbos – I can’t believe I’ve been doing those since 2019! – but the QCs are fast catching up. Thank you all for being such good company.]
Definitions are underlined in the clues below. In the explanations, quoted indicators are in italics and I’ve capitalised and emboldened letters which appear in the ANSWER. For clarity, I omit most link words and some juxtaposition indicators.
| Across | |
| 6a | Place to sleep I’ll put in punt (6) |
| BILLET — I’LL put in BET (punt) | |
| 7a | One abandoning girlfriend in truck (6) |
| DUMPER — Two definitions | |
| 9a | Nervous of conflict with unknown (4) |
| WARY — WAR (conflict) with Y (unknown) | |
| 10a | Republican welcomed by dissident group in part (8) |
| FRACTION — R (Republican) in (welcomed by) FACTION (dissident group) | |
| 11a | Banter OK when you are young? (8) |
| BADINAGE — Ok when you are young? BAD IN AGE | |
| 13a | Garden where partners had a fall (4) |
| EDEN — Cryptic definition | |
| 15a | Whip the Spanish horse (4) |
| LASH — LAS (the, Spanish) + H (horse) | |
| 16a | Cut off from place a colleague is holding (8) |
| AMPUTATE — PUT (place), which A MATE (a colleague) is holding | |
| 18a | Latin mass (not the last) arranged, one thought to bring good fortune (8) |
| TALISMAN — An anagram of (… arranged) LATIN MASs without the last letter (not the last) | |
| 20a | Unable to feel end of arm, roll over clutching it (4) |
| NUMB — The final letter (end) of arM, with BUN (roll) reversed (over) around (clutching) it | |
| 21a | At home, nurse is mean (6) |
| INTEND — IN (at home) + TEND (nurse) | |
| 22a | Frequently visits relatives after hours (6) |
| HAUNTS — AUNTS (relatives) after H (hours) | |
| Down | |
| 1d | That man had position in club associated with driving range (8) |
| HIMALAYA — HIM (that man) + LAY (had position) in AA (club associated with driving) | |
| 2d | Take a risk in drama of burning intensity? (4,4,4) |
| PLAY WITH FIRE — A literal interpretation of a PLAY WITH FIRE as a fiery drama | |
| 3d | Man, a British isle (6) |
| STAFFA — STAFF (man, verb) + A. Staffa is a Scottish island, one of the Inner Hebrides | |
| 4d | Knowing about daughter selling apps (6) |
| ADWARE — AWARE (knowing) around (about) D (daughter) | |
| 5d | Principal figure in novel wanting woman’s love (4) |
| HERO — HER (woman’s) + O (love) | |
| 8d | Run to get home, tricky for most of us English (6,6) |
| MOTHER TONGUE — An anagram of (… tricky) RUN TO GET HOME | |
| 12d | Stick from tree (3) |
| GUM — Two definitions | |
| 14d | Guess the car I’m in (8) |
| ESTIMATE — ESTATE (the car) with I’M in. “The car” might prompt the same comments as in my previous QC blog | |
| 16d | A jolly woman in invasion force (6) |
| ARMADA — A + RM (jolly, slang for a Royal Marine) + ADA (woman) | |
| 17d | Vigorous check in very small housing (6) |
| PUNCHY — CH (check) inside (in … housing) PUNY (very small) | |
| 19d | One card bearing any number of spots (4) |
| ACNE — ACE (one card) holding (bearing) N (any number) | |
I can’t believe this made it through the editing process as a QC. It was nothing of the sort.
My first pass through all 23 clues took 10-12 minutes (I always give each clue some thought before moving on), but only WARY, NUMB and HERO had been written in by then. Little did I know at that point, however, that my (desperately slow) rate of solve had already peaked. I eventually crossed the line, feeling battered and bruised, just a few seconds short of 100 minutes (my absolute outer limit). Even Mrs Random took 58 minutes, 2-3 times as long as normal. And because of the obtuseness of many of the clues, I didn’t even enjoy the chase – a rare thing for me.
The worst offender was BADINAGE. I DNK the meaning of the word, so I had to rely on the wordplay to arrive at the answer. However, neither Kitty’s blog nor any of the subsequent posts have come close to explaining why ‘OK when you are young?’ = BAD IN AGE. Also, HIMALAYA (LAY for position?), STAFFA (NHO), GUM and ADWARE – difficult clues in their own right – all depended on BADINAGE. Throw in jolly = RM (in ARMADA), the cumbersome use of housing (in PUNCHY) and the unnecessary use of Frequently (in HAUNTS) and the challenge became more of an SAS assault course than a pleasant jog in the park.
Message to Teazel: Please keep in mind that many (the majority, perhaps) of your QC solvers are simply not equipped to tackle crosswords of this level of difficulty.
Many thanks to Kitty.
Bloomin’ eck Mr Random – thought I had a tough day.
FWIW We had BADINAGE in a Wurm puzzle on 23rd Aug this year (#2467) clued then as teasing. But you don’t seem to have commented, I know it was a busy time for you.
As for explanation … if “banter feels bad in old age” then perhaps it’s okay when you young. Bear in mind, the question mark doesn’t guarantee it being okay. This style of clue suggests you are looking for the opposite of “okay” and “young” i..e “bad” and “age”
Agree with your comments to Teazel about the QC. If you take people posting on this site as generally the top end solvers – geez, I’m not sure how anyone else is going to be encouraged.
35:51
Well that took an eternity. Target is 20 mins and usual cutoff 30 but persevered. Struggled with BADINAGE, ARMADA and LOI FRACTION.
Very hard today and yet another horrible grid. Is that 3 in a row?
DNF. Didn’t know Staffa. Googled how many island islands in the British Isles and when it came up with 6000 I gave up. J
Well, I thought this was a great puzzle. Loved the slightly off centre thinking that sometimes seemed a wry humour. Took ages, but was worth every minute!
You know what’s coming…
42 mins (of sheer hell).
Only four on first pass and many unparsed. Spent a long time on LOI -ADWARE.
Thoroughly depressed, disillusioned and demoralised – and it’s only Monday!
Confirmation – as if it was needed – that I am pretty hopeless.
Another week when I can wave goodbye to my target.
Did comparatively well again on Quintagram, which just drives me round the bend when I make such a meal out of the QC.
☹️
Thanks for the blog
Hi Gary. As I said below, this was a chewy one. There’s no shame in making a meal out of something if that something is a meal! Hope the rest of the week serves up some puzzles you can enjoy.
Thanks Kitty
51.34 … inappropriate pile of 💩 for the QC
Got to this after a long day out.
Very hard and needed lots of time.
I had to wear my 15 x 15 hat and did finish.
ADWARE LOI after DUMPER.
David
Thanks for the comments all. 🙂
You have confirmed my initial feeling that this was perhaps a bit hard for the brief. Some QC’s have taken me longer (my time of 11:40 was short of the 15 minutes after which I start to really harrumph) – but that’s usually down to one or two clues which hold out on me, whereas this felt sticky (or gummy, perhaps) all the way through. All I can say to those who are feeling demoralised is please just be assured that this was definitely a tough one, so don’t beat yourself up.