Hi all. I hope 2026 is treating you well.
Oink typically provides smooth and not too difficult puzzles, and I found this to be such. We have to wait for the final clue before the expected 21d reference, but it’s hard to miss. I expect a wide selection of favourite clues today. Thanks Oink!
Definitions are underlined in the clues below. In the explanations, most quoted indicators are in italics, specified [deletions] are in square brackets, and I’ve capitalised and emboldened letters which appear in the ANSWER. For clarity, I omit most link words and some juxtaposition indicators.
| Across | |
| 1a | Cerebral game some coaches study (5) |
| CHESS — Some coaCHES Study | |
| 4a | Campaigner possibly bitter about Mail (7) |
| APOSTLE — ALE (possibly bitter) around (about) POST (mail) | |
| 8a | Introduce contemporary (7) |
| PRESENT — A double definition | |
| 9a | Suggest nothing is stored in apartment (5) |
| FLOAT — O (nothing) is stored in FLAT (apartment) | |
| 10a | Gory evidence of Oslo bandit being shot? (10) |
| BLOODSTAIN — OSLO BANDIT being anagrammed (shot) | |
| 14a | Pay no attention to letters from sovereign or emperor (6) |
| IGNORE — Letters from sovereIGN OR Emperor | |
| 15a | Second revolutionary joining me in plot (6) |
| SCHEME — S (second) + CHE (revolutionary) + ME | |
| 17a | Uncertain where you might see UFO? (2,2,3,3) |
| UP IN THE AIR — Two meanings | |
| 20a | Walk quietly behind passenger vehicle (5) |
| TRAMP — P (quietly) following (behind) TRAM (passenger vehicle) | |
| 22a | General on top of everything (7) |
| OVERALL — OVER (on top of) + ALL (everything) | |
| 23a | Digger up of dirt, one advancing warily on doctor? (7) |
| DREDGER — EDGER (one advancing warily) by (on) DR (doctor) | |
| 24a | Nessie finally found in lake? Spooky! (5) |
| EERIE — The last letter of (… finally) NessiE found in ERIE (lake) | |
| Down | |
| 1d | Surpass old Mafia boss (4) |
| CAPO — CAP (surpass) + O (old) | |
| 2d | Not once going topless under any circumstances (4) |
| EVER — Without the first letter (… going topless), nEVER (not once) | |
| 3d | Suspect something large getting inside set alarm off (5,1,3) |
| SMELL A RAT — L (large) getting inside an anagram of (… off) SET ALARM | |
| 4d | Director’s instruction: female must leave group (6) |
| ACTION — F (female) must leave [f]ACTION (group) | |
| 5d | Idiot absent after change of heart (3) |
| OAF — OfF (absent) having changed the middle letter (after change of heart), in this case to A | |
| 6d | Duplicitous duo confronted (3-5) |
| TWO-FACED — TWO (duo) + FACED (confronted) | |
| 7d | Strung out, as family may be (8) |
| EXTENDED — A double definition | |
| 11d | Grace lies about profanity (9) |
| SACRILEGE — GRACE LIES anagrammed (about) | |
| 12d | Statue I’d foolishly positioned (8) |
| SITUATED — An anagram of (… foolishly) STATUE I’D | |
| 13d | Imply prisoner’s covering it up (8) |
| INTIMATE — INMATE (prisoner) is around (covering) IT going up in the grid | |
| 16d | Frenchman who painted Mr Bean regularly upset port (6) |
| RENOIR — Alternate letters of (… regularly) mR bEaN + reversed (upset) RIO (port) | |
| 18d | Pale American consumed by never-ending passion (4) |
| FAIR — A (American) in (consumed by) FIRe (passion) without its last letter (never-ending …) | |
| 19d | Escape from bloodsucker, might one say? (4) |
| FLEE — Sounds like (… might one say?) FLEA (bloodsucker) | |
| 21d | Self-righteous chap steering clear of Republican swine (3) |
| PIG — P[r]IG (self-righteous chap) omitting (steering clear of) R (Republican) | |
4:37
I haven’t been this fast in ages; but then a QC hasn’t been this easy in ages.
11:43. Must be one of my fastest times ever.
Just one QC clue after another with no breeze blocker at the end.
Thanks Oink and Kitty
Yes, easy for us too, 12.16 is lightening in these parts. But what a great puzzle. Oink really is a master of the smooth surfaces. As Kitty suggests there are too many for an outstanding favourite but we do like bloodstain.
There’s also that “Mornington Crescent” style cheer when the piggy reference turns up, hurrah!
Thanks Oink, and Kitty
Lovely puzzle to start the week, and all done in 8:24. Only real hesitation was in parsing my LOI FAIR – took longer than it should have to see Fire for passion.
Many thanks Kitty for the blog.
I fine puzzle that didn’t put up much resistance until I randomly got breezeblocked by my LOI.
Started with CHESS and finished with PRESENT in 5.25.
Thanks to Kitty and Oink
8 minutes. No real problems though I was slow to see UP IN THE AIR and (like Cedric) the not difficult FAIR. Pleasant to solve and I appreciated not having to do an alphabet trawl or being delayed by a couple of answers at the end.
Thanks to Oink and Kitty
13 min solve for a first time under 15! Kept waiting for the blocker and stumbled a bit over parsing LOI FAIR but got there happily.
COD INTIMATE.
Thanks Kitty and Oink. Heigh ho it’s off to work I go, after a nice break. Hope you all are well rested.
Congratulations on your PB!
Excellent work, well done!
Congratulations on the PB!
Thanks for the congrats!
I didn’t find it that easy, especially in the NW where CAPO had to wait until the end and didn’t fall until PRESENT made it clear. Also held up by EXTENDED. Rapid elsewhere. All green in 10.44. Good one.
Apart from having to pause to work out FAIR , I found this very straightforward and a lovely change from some very tricky QCs recently. Some great surfaces. Thanks Oink and Kitty.
That’s the way to do it! I wish some other recent setters could understand the term ‘quick cryptic’ as well as Oink does.
A good QC. I enjoyed many of the clues, especially APOSTLE. I wasted time with a couple of typos but still finished in 12.20. Much more importantly, I enjoyed the solve.
Thanks to Oink and to Kitty for the blog and for parsing FAIR which I glossed over.
3:20. My fastest for quite some time. Very gentle, but a fine puzzle. Thank-you Kitty and Oink.
13:35 – one of my fastest times ever, ironically after moaning about the difficulty of recent offerings. No problems at all.
Enjoyable and genuinely quick. LOsI OAF (because I had nearly forgotten it) and FAIR. I didn’t notice it was an Oink until I came to PIG. Liked ACTION, SCHEME, & INTIMATE among others.
Many thanks, Kitty. Don’t forget to take down your Christmas decorations today, folks.
I usually wait until the 6th for taking them down, then I’m tempted to start all over again with Old Christmas. (There are quite a few Orthodox churches around here.)
15 mins…
Not as quick as some on here, but still an enjoyable start to the week.
FOI – 1ac “Chess”
LOI – 4ac “Apostle”
COD – 16dn “Renoir”
Thanks as usual!
I put Renoir for 16 down, but couldn’t work out the Mr
Bean and upset port connection..? Help?
mR bEaN regularly he’s just there for the random letters. Followed by an anagram of RIO (the usual port – unless, of course, it means LEFT).
Good puzzle, terrible typing. AACTIN at 4d + PLEE at 19d (how?) = 4 errors, position 147 out of 147 on the leaderboard and a Terrible Day. COD RENOIR.
Many thanks Kitty and Oink.
Next!
[PS I had a difficult time posting that – every time I tried to post it would tell me I wasn’t logged in, so I’d hit the log in button and it would tell me that I was logged in. Round and round that buoy we went, including changing my password. In the end I posted as a guest … and it promptly logged me in …]
Grr: had TRAin (= walk quietly behind? no, maybe I was thinking of trail) for TRAMP, so no chance of getting PIG which was otherwise easy, how annoying. Otherwise all good, thank you Kitty.
A bride’s train was originally the people, not the dress, so assuming they were reasonably quiet it would work.
Re pictures not appearing, I am on Windows 11, for me I went to “Account Settings”, “My Account”, “Profile Details”, “Change”, “Save changes”. (You dont actually have to make any changes). Not only did my picture re-appear, so did everybody else’s
Solving on paper I often start with the bottom right clue which today was PIG.
Smooth from there and finished in 10 minutes with LOI FLEE which, with POI FAIR, held me up a tad.
Very enjoyable QC.
David
Would have been 4:51 but had OFF instead of OAF. OFF works just as well from the reading of the clue, the only reason why it might not work is that its definition (absent) is not at either end of the clue, which is something of an unwritten convention. Clues should always CLEARLY point to the correct answer, even with some mischievous misdirection – I think this one was simply too ambiguous.
Thanks Kitty
I agree with you! I had OFF as the answer too although not as quick as you in 7:07.
Nice stroll in the park admiring the roses. Thanks Oink and Kitty.
An enjoyable QC
Thanks kitty and Oink.
My thanks to Oink and Kitty.
Pretty much top to bottom solve except 18d Fair where I was trying to shoehorn in “wan” with something. Silly me!
Only 4 clues withstood the first pass, and I’d say it was TOO easy, as 11 times below 3 minutes on the Qsnitch bears out.
FOI CHESS
LOI ACTION
COD BLOODSTAIN
TIME 3:37
Lovely gentle offering from Oink today. No great hold-ups.
LOI and COD: RENOIR
Thanks Oink and Kitty
Pretty straightforward from our porcine friend today, although I did have to revisit the nw corner to finish the puzzle. A respectable 8.13 to start the week.
A pb for me 28:19. I found that easier than usual. NHO of Capo but had to be. Needed the blog to parse fair.
Thanks Oink and Kitty
Re Capo – Thank goodness for the Godfather films! (From another Bristolian!)
I didn’t find this as easy as a lot of you, but nevertheless finished well under my target time. LOI, RENOIR held me up a little. 6:54. Thanks Oink and Kitty.
I’m beginning to think I’m on the wrong coach, because this one is still practically empty. I do wish Oink would learn to lift and separate, as loi Action took a very long time to see. CoD to the almost Donish Apostle clue. Invariant
Mostly straightforward but I was held up by a couple, leading to a 15 minute solve. It took far too long to see ACTION, FAIR and the final word in UP IN THE AIR. Like Mike I was a little doubtful about 5dn – it wasn’t clear to me which was the definition although I correctly plumped for OAF after some consideration.
FOI – 1ac CHESS
LOI – 17ac UP IN THE AIR
COD – 10ac BLOODSTAIN
Thanks to Oink and Kitty
Much easier than of late. LOI FAIR. Thanks all.
9:20, which I think is my first sub-10 for a while, and very welcome it is too.
Thank you for the blog!
7.09 PRESENT required an alphabet trawl and I finished with FAIR. Thanks Kitty and Oink.
Nothing too difficult today but still a long way from a PB. RENOIR took longer than it should have done and then LOI FIRE. 8:28 by the end. Thanks to Kitty and Oink.
I was very quick except for my LOI. Does fair really mean pale? Can’t one have a fair complexion, but be tanned? I also couldn’t parse it – FIR_ didn’t suggest anything. I finally put it in anyway.
Time: 6:30
6:56 and a lot of fun. Only delayed a little on LOI FAIR, trying to think of synonyms for passion. Not helped by having peeked at the time and seen a new PB for 2026 coming at me. Which did happen, but really, just don’t look at the time! EVER! (my COD) SMELL A RAT is also superb.
Thanks Oink and Kitty.
Very enjoyable and, despite just missing out on an SCC escape, jolly quick (for me).
My FOsI were CHESS, SMELL A RAT and FLOAT and my progress was relatively untroubled until the pairing of CAPO and PRESENT held me up for around four minutes at the end. I’m not well up on Mafia bosses and was fooled into wracking my brains for an old one. Also, double definitions frequently delay me and PRESENT did just that today.
COD: CHESS as, despite being rubbish at it, I love the game.
Many thanks to Kitty and Oink.
10:13
Nothing too scary, LOI EXTENDED
COD INTIMATE
13 clues solved in 30mins. It would appear that any word can be abbreviated by its first letter! This multiplies the number of associations one can make with any clue, which in my case leads rapidly to creativity fatique!
What a splendid start to the week – a perfectly pitched QC ! 👏👏👏
10:57 here, with the only hold-up being FAIR, which needed an alphabet trawl and then a second, more careful alphabet trawl. Ah well. COD to IGNORE for hiding the instructions in plain sight.
Thanks to Oink and Kitty.
12:56
A very happy New Year to all.
Having not engaged with a QC since 19 Dec 25, I was very please with Oink and his gentle reintroduction to them.
A NHO CAPO and, as others, FAIR caused a delay. But no explanation for my LOI being my LOI.
A very nice start to my QC New Year!
FOI: CHESS
LOI: EXTENDED
COD: ACTION
Thanks to Oink and Kitty
Incidentally, I kept getting logged out when entering the QC comments link – had to input my details after writing my comments to post.
5.23
Also held up a bit at the end by FAIR.
Oink delivers again – and thanks Kitty.
11:15. A gentle but enjoyable start to the week after two consecutive visits to the SCC.
CoD RENOIR
Thanks to both.
Brain slowly engaging for another year. Happy to enjoy this one. All ok but struggled to find the proper passion for FAIR, thanks for Fire which I did not see.
I was really rather slow with this one and can’t say why, but I enjoyed it all the same. Ticks next to BLOODSTAIN, TWO-FACED and SACRILEGE.
10:59 FOI Chess LOI Action COD Pig
Thanks Oink and Kitty
Another piece of idiocy from me. Thought I’d finished in 11 mins, but then found that I had overlooked 18dn when going through the blog.
That means it’s a DNF and another week ruined. Don’t know how long it would have taken to get FAIR from -A-R, but that is immaterial. A DNF is a DNF.
I also failed by two on 15 x 15. I spent 75 mins on this and still couldn’t finish it.
What an awful start to the week.
PS I had similar issues with the website to those mentioned by other posters.
Re 5d OAF – if definition is required to be first or last, this means the answer is defined as idiot (as here) or as (change of) heart. Or can the definition wander about?