Times Quick Cryptic 2740 by Izetti

70 comments on “Times Quick Cryptic 2740 by Izetti”

1. 12:40 for me today – took me longer than the regular puzzle

   1. Same here, 10:17.

      1. inspired by your two comments I tried the 15×15, and not only finished it in 15 minutes, a PB, but beat Mrs S to the line – this is unprecedented! I am now seriously concerned that she might be unwell.

         On edit – no, not unwell I am pleased to say, but did not know the word at 17D, or at least with that meaning

         1. Same here: that’s one of the only two I didn’t get (my record by far).

   2. Thanks for the heads-up! Just had a rare successful stab at the 15×15.

2. My time for the Quickie and the regular puzzle were the same. I liked this one, but solving requires more than slapping cryptic cliches together as rapidly as possible. There are some disguised chestnuts, such as abandon, minute, and season, but documentation and consultations were difficult anagrams that cannot be solved at a glance, at least by me. Since I was listening to a 10,000 Maniacs CD as I solved, merchants was a write-in!

   Time: 15 minutes

3. OK, so when I get around to the 15×15 later today the pressure will be on! This one was 13.03, a struggle in places as others have noted. Will pay ACCLAIM. Was held up by SALOONS and PASSIM, the former because the references to car and bar were both too antique and the latter because it was too hard. The Lancaster would be well-known to anyone of the Airfix generation. I’ve never read TIMON but he seems like a regular in these parts so I feel I sort of know him. Thanks Izetti and Jack.

   1. I recently saw a reconditioned Lancaster at East Kirby in Lincolnshire. At the moment it can taxi, and they’re hoping to get it to fly at some point.

4. Is ‘beside’ needed in 23A. Does not ‘lapping’ do the same job and “waves maybe=sea”?

   1. I don’t think the surface would make much sense without ‘beside’ but in terms of wordplay you may be right about it being redundant. Whichever way one reads the clue it seems a little unsatisfactory to me and might have benefited from a rethink before publication.

5. Only four on the first pass of acrosses and three of those in the bottom half. The first few downs were gentler and I was off. Wanted SENNA to be Sonia at first glance and getting to the right answer added quite a few seconds at the end. Enjoyed LANCER once I’d abandoned ‘pifire’. All green in 12.51. Back at work after a good week camping – but not before the car gets dropped off for its MOT.

   1. I’m another “pifire”!

   2. Another pifire here!

6. A similar experience to others in that I was slow to get going. But the down clues came more readily – I had my best anagram hat on for DOCUMENTATION and CONSULTATIONS and with those two in place the grid opened up nicely. LANCER LOI and not parsed, and SENNA something of a “fingers crossed” as I was not 100% sure whether it was a plant, but despite that all complete in just under 13 minutes. COD to ACCLAIM; nice to see Izetti refer to himself by name not as “the setter”.

   Many thanks Jack for the blog
   Cedric

7. Found this hard going and really struggled with the two long down anagrams which didn’t help.
   As usual with Izetti there was nothing unfair and the wordplay was clear which led to much forehead slapping as the pennies dropped.
   Can we assume from 8a that this is Izetti’s 250th QC?
   Started with RAPTURE and finished with the unknown PASSIM in 12.44.
   Thanks to Jacckt

   1. Indeed it is Izetti’s 250th QC! Congrats to him, and well done for spotting the hint in the clue which hadn’t occurred to me.

      1. Well done Plett, and well done Jack for knowing the answer!

8. 17:05

   NHO LANCER, PASSIM. Only heard of SENNA when it came up in yesterday’s Guardian Quiptic which was set by Izetti so that was a write-in except I put it as ANNES and slowed myself in the NE. SPICA and TIMON on the edge of knowledge too. Classic Izetti.

   Wondering whether this was Izetti’s 250th puzzle given the ACCLAIM clue? I seem to recall when I started a couple of years ago most of the setters were reaching their 200th puzzles and at 25 per year that would put them around the 250 mark now. (Edit: just noticed Plett1 asked the same)

   1. thanks, just looked at the guardian which has 2 quickie types, are the quiptic and quick crossword similar in difficulty?

      1. The quick cryptic over there is a learner’s crossword – they list out the clue types at the top as a hint. The Quiptic is meant to be the next step up, but can vary depending on the setter. The main cryptic is again very setter dependent, but can seem utterly impenetrable, with cross references aplenty.

         1. Interesting, thanks.

            1. I think their Quick Cryptic is Monday only. It was when it started.

               1. It’s published on Saturday only. It’s an 11×11 grid with only four types of clue – which as HopkinB suggests makes it for beginners. That said, it is not a write-in, at least for me.

                  The Quiptic is published on Sunday only (having been displaced from the Saturday slot by their QC). It is meant to be full of puns and quips as the name suggests. I’m usually a little slower on that than The Times QC but it is a good stepping stone to the main cryptic.

                  They also have the Everyman puzzle published on Sundays – which has a prize attached (or used to) so you don’t get the answers until a week later. Again that is achievable at my level although it went through a very rough patch earlier this year.

                  1. thanks ND.

                  2. Thanks for the correction.

   2. Thanks New Driver for also spotting the milestone. I have now duly marked it in my intro to the blog.

      1. Jackt – am I right in recalling you keep details of all the puzzles set, and if so, we must have some other setters coming up to celebrate their 250th?

         I recall we had one about a month ago, possibly Joker, who celebrated by including words with CCL in all the down clues. I’d be guessing Orpheus, Teasel and Mara are closing in too.

9. I started falteringly, and finally took almost two minutes sorting out the anagrist for my LOI. I can’t remember the last time an Izetti puzzle caused me so much head-scratching. I’m not enamoured of NORTHEAST as a single word, but maybe that’s just my normal level of pedantry.

   FOI RAPTURE
   LOI DOCUMENTATION
   COD SALOONS
   TIME 7:01

10. 18:39. Train solve (on way back from Olympics opening weekend) on phone.

    Loved the self reference to Izetti, not seen that before.

    DOCUMENTATION and CONSULTATION detecting management consulting lingo today.

    NHO SENNA as a plant, only as the F1 driver, which might have been easier. Always panic when plants are needed in this puzzles.

    Knew Spica but never knew what PASSIM meant, but that opened up the troublesome SW corner.

    I recalled the rhyme for finding these two bright stars from The Plough : “ Arc to Arcturus, then spike to Spica”

    1. SENNA is a gentle laxative, small brown tablets as I recall.

11. Four acrosses missing on first pass but all went in after the downs provided checkers. Longest struggle was LOI DOCUMENTATION, because my brain was insisting that there was another D somewhere. All done in pretty reggo 08:29 for a Very Good Day. Many thanks Izetti and Jack.

12. Hard to get going, but sped up gradually. NW first (FOI ACCLAIM), NE last (LOI POPS IN). NHO SPICA but it had to be. Wouldn’t have heard of Lancaster, but have just finished proof-reading for a friend the wartime reminiscences of a Lancaster bomber pilot (well, navigator actually) which will soon be published. To those who have NHO SENNA I say: count yourselves fortunate!
    And thanks for the tip-off: ventured to try the 15×15, and managed all but two, a PB (by far).

13. 13:59
    dnk senna, passim, or spica.
    Liked documentation, acclaim, NE, but COD to saloon.

14. Always a pleasure to test my mind against Izetti, and despite some pauses for inspiration taking me well into the SCC, I was all green as 2D went in. I don’t do enough to know “chestnuts” very often, but I feel I have seen ABANDON clued similarly before, but still smiled. PASSIM was a bit obscure but generously clued, ditto SENNA and SPICA. Liked LANCER. A good start to the week. I may even go and dabble with the Biggie given the comments above.

15. I hit pretty much the same time (22m vs 26m) on the QC and the CC today, and I enjoyed the QC much more. Thanks Izetti! And thanks jackkt! I found Izetti’s QC mercifully free of my own pet-peeves and cliches. I saw only one example (3d) of that lowest form of clueing in which a single letter is derived “ultimately” or “finally” or “initially” from some deadweight word; I was delighted to see some unusual but not improbable words as answers (eg 2d, 15d, both of them crisply defined); I saw no “yank”, or “eton” or “e”; one bishop is forgivable; and if 8a was a deja vu then I am happy to see it again.

16. 12:07. Slow start, with only three of the across clues on first pass. Liked LANCER. NHO SPICA. LOI was SALOONS.

    Thanks Izetti and Jack

17. 7:11. Oh dear. Stuck for well over a minute at the end by DOCUMENTATION trying to find a word ending in ….NUATION, failing to see the answer from the definition. Forehead slap ensued when I finally replaced the U with the T and saw the answer. I liked ACCLAIM best. Thanks Izetti and Iackkt. P.S. The 15×15 took me less than a minute longer.

18. Back to my normal position in the comments.

    Did more or less as expected according to SNITCH.

    LANCER LOI, needed all the checkers for DOCUMENTATION. I quite liked CONSULTATIONS – good anagram and surface. The self-referential and milestone-celebrating ACCLAIM gets COD though. Congrats to Izetti.

    6:45

19. 9 minutes. At least I kept my QC and 15×15 times in the proper proportion. A few of the expected not so common words such as SPICA and PASSIM from Izetti, but generally not too difficult. I liked LANCER for the Lancaster reference and the surface for ABSOLVE.

    Thanks to Jack and thanks and congrats to Izetti on his 250th – an ace he is indeed.

20. A satisfying solve today. Did not know SPICA but obvious. Thanks to those who commented on the accessibility of today’s 15×15. I think there was some discussion a week or two ago about mentioning the CC in the QC blog. As I hate starting something I can’t finish, particularly with answers I’ve NHO, and just being a fairly average solver, I really appreciate the heads up – the CC is definitely in my ability range today! Thanks Jack and congratulations to Izetti on a great milestone.

21. First of all, congratulations to Izetti on reaching such an impressive milestone.
    As to the puzzle, I have to say it proved a bit of a struggle with just seats at the rear by the time I finished. It was only once I had spotted that 6d was an anagram, that I even considered the idea that 2d might be one as well. Up to that point I was convinced there was a dictionary (A to Markworthy) type connection. Passim, Spica and Senna all went in on trust, and loi Season was a belated pdm. CoD to 4ac, Lancer, a memorable clue to get, even though it didn’t open the floodgates 😉 Invariant

    1. Agree with 2dn – I thought this was must be one of those “alphabet type” riddles that occasionally come up.

22. 24 mins…

    Agree with everyone above – a tough start. In fact, it wasn’t until 22ac “Minute” that I actually put anything into the grid, so I was expecting a toughie – however, it didn’t end up as difficult as I first feared, and solving the two large anagrams helped significantly.

    FOI – 22ac “Minute”
    LOI – 10ac “Senna”
    COD – 8ac “Acclaim” – a little clunky, but worthy of the celebration.

    Thanks as usual!

23. My first pass through gave me four answers. The rest came slowly, but I did need Pumpa’s help with several clues.

    24:30

    My verdict: 👍
    Pumpa’s verdict: 🐈

24. Comfortably in the SCC before I completed this tough but fun workout: I trusted the wordplay for SPICA (NHO) and then I chanced my arm with SENGA at 10a, a plant of which I have never heard, but Agneses I have known. Grr – looking again, I should have heeded the apostrophe in girl’s for Anne’s. Another lesson learned. I wrote out the long anagrams and spotted the answers quickly: funnily, AESOP took me much longer (4a LANCER being my LOI). 15d held me up for a while: LASS seemed likely for the young lady until MISS suddenly made sense. In my limited time with Quick Cryptics I’ve only done about a dozen Izettis (out of 250 – wow!) and they’ve all been challenging and enjoyable: many thanks to Izetti and to Jack for an excellent blog.

25. Nice mix of clues. As usual had to write out the long anagrams but they jumped out straight away. Trusted the wordplay for SPICA and PASSIM, both VHO. Enjoyed working out LANCER which gets COD. Many thanks Jack and congrats Izetti.

26. Very slow today finishing in 14.00. The two long anagrams at 2dn and 6dn cost me a lot of time, particularly as I didn’t twig for quite a while that the latter was an anagram. It was a bit unusual as well to have some unknown terms as answers, and I don’t recall coming across PASSIM and SPICA before. Although the answer to 21ac looked like being SALOONS, I couldn’t parse the second half of the clue. Eventually I got the message that’s been hammered into us motorists ‘Don’t drink and drive’.

27. Slow! With the long anagrams and 4 unknowns I had to wait for checkers. My unknowns were SENNA, TIMON, SPICA and PASSIM. FOI FEASTS and LOI DOCUMENTATION in 13:39.

28. 9:09

    Jolly good puzzle I thought.
    LOI SEASON
    COD ACCLAIM for its reference

    Thanks Jack and Izetti.

29. 6:02

    Another here that wasn’t overly confident with SENNA and PASSIM, and assumed SPICA to be correct, though hadn’t heard of it. Failed also to spot the anagram for LOI 2d, but with all checkers in place, it had to be. Otherwise, after a slowish first pass on the acrosses, this was pretty smooth.

    Thanks Jack and congrats Izetti on your milestone

30. Given the comments above, I’m not sure how I managed 7 minutes for this one. There were unknowns but they were all carefully clued. I was fortunate that the two long downs went in almost straight away. Really liked ACCLAIM – Izetti has always been ‘ace’. Thanks all.

31. 12:48 which by my standards is pretty good for an Izetti. Congratulations on reaching 250 puzzles, and I look forward to many more of his challenges. FOI and COD ACCLAIM, LOI SEASON. Luckily I’m an amateur astronomer so Spica was a write-in for me. Thanks Izetti and Jacktt.

32. A slightly interrupted 26 minutes for me today, with everything parsed. I had a slow start like pretty well everybody else but didn’t really pick up speed much after that. NHO SPICA and had to look it up after entering it just to check. I recognised PASSIM as a word but couldn’t have said what it meant.

    FOI – 8ac ACCLAIM
    LOI – 15dn PASSIM
    COD – I had marked 17ac ABANDON as my COD but now that, thanks to this blog, I fully understand ACCLAIM I think its got to be that.

    Thanks to Izetti and Jack

33. Another lovely puzzle from Izetti. It took me 48 minutes for a DNF thanks to SENGA instead of SENNA.
    I used to construct Lancaster bombers from airfix kits as a youngster which helped parse LANCERS.
    Useful to know what PASSIM means after years of seeing it in footnotes and never bothering to find out.
    Congrats Izetti on 250 puzzles and thanks Jack for the blog.

34. 16.17 I was slow to spot that the two long anagrams were anagrams. SPICA was new to me, I was vague on the meaning of PASSIM and LOI LANCER was tricky. A good challenge. Thanks Jack and Izetti.

35. 30ish mins. LOI Documentation, couldn’t parse but thanks Jack. Should have got Senna a lot quicker, it’s pretty much my surname and my wife is Anne! Thx Izzetti

36. I consider myself quite lucky to finish this QC unscathed … and in a roughly average time (31 minutes) for me.

    First, I didn’t get started until I’d reached 17a (ABANDON) and very little else went in until my second pass through the grid. Second, I had NHO the Shakespearean character (TIMON), the star (SPICA) or the plant (SENNA). Third, whilst I had heard the word, I DNK the meaning of PASSIM.

    Fortunately, I have learned to trust Izetti’s meticulous wordplay and I was still fairly confident of my answers when I put down my pencil and came here.

    Many thanks to Izetti (and well done on the landmark) and Jack.

37. 13:20. Finally got LANCER when I stopped thinking of just fighters and remembered bombers. I could accept PASSIM as “in many places” or “in more than one place” but think “everywhere” is a definition a bit too far.

38. Congratulations to Izetti on the milestone! I found this one challenging but just managed to come in under target. Remembered SPICA from a fairly recent puzzle and PASSIM rang a faint bell, although I had no idea of its meaning. Had to write out the anagrist for POI, DOCUMENTATION, then LOI FIDDLE dropped into place. 9:34. Thanks Izetti and Jack.

39. I was familiar with all the problematic terms, except that I’d thought, from many references in Private Eye, that PASSIM meant past editions. Happy to be put right, and though this crossword took me longer than the main one, it was a fine example of its type, thanks Izetti, and congratulations on the milestone. LOI LANCER, as I couldn’t think of the required WWII plane (also briefly considered SPIFIRE!)

40. 12:16 – quite a slow start for me too. Got confused as I don’t typically see the setter’s name (solving on the app), and so not sure who/what Izetti is/was (ref ACCLAIM). Many congratulations to Izetti (and apologies for not recognising them), on the setting milestone! Nice puzzle, quite tricky today I thought. Thanks to Izetti and Jack.

41. A slow start for us too but it all came together in an enjoyable 13:12. I couldn’t have told you what PASSIM meant but at least I’d heard of it. Thanks, Jack and Izetti.

42. Great puzzle from Izetti! I had completed the biggie at lunchtime (rarely attempted, but saw it was recommended; only the second I have completed and then with plenty of pencil). From the comments there I anticipated a struggle here but trusted Izetti’s precision. The East went in first with a few in the West to get started. Didn’t parse 4a Lancer but couldn’t see what else it could be. Having jumped at the chance to fly in a Lancaster a few years back, I’m looking forward to a taxy in a Mosquito next month.
    FOI 11a Timon
    LOI 14d Absolve – was looking for something starting arr….
    COD has to be 8a Acclaim – well done and thanks to our setter!

43. My astrology not too good so SICA was a non-starter. Fished BLEST for same clue out of ‘ despicable star’ on same principle, but it didn’t really seem to work although could have ‘star’ as a linkage,and once I got PASSIM and DRAFT I was still non the wiser. Finished up apart from that.

44. Always happy to finish an Izetti 😁 especially in the heat

45. 19:29 today, not a super time, but given everything that’s been happening (oh my car!) I’ll take it!

    What a lovely Izetti we had today, I can’t even choose a COD among ACCLAIM 👏👏👏, ABSOLVE, SALOON, and RAPTURE. FOI FEASTS, LOI SEASON (why? I can’t say).

    Thanks to the Don for much happy puzzling time even in my short QC “career” (lol) and to jackkt for the entertaining blog! (cars and bars, good one!)

46. I’m very happy with my 14:44 for an Izetti, must have been at least somewhat on the wavelength for once. Struggled with LANCER but finally decided that it was the only thing I could think of that fit.

    Thank you for the blog, and congratulations to Izetti!

47. An enjoyable QC today.

    I’ll keep the time to myself for the moment.

    Thanks for the blog.

48. Hard, but do-able. NHO Timor, Spica and Passim, but they really couldn’t be anything else. Liked Acclaim while solving it, and like it even more now I know about Izetti’s milestone.

49. Worked through fairly steadily, with 4 or 5 still outstanding. After biffing SPICA and SENNA managed to get the others. A good puzzle, a well targeted QC.

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