Times Quick Cryptic No 1979 by Mara

Author   JohninterredPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic

A great Quick Cryptic from Mara today to end the week if you are a fan of anagrams. Blimey! No less than 10 of them (if I can count that far correctly)! Nothing obscure or too difficult, I think, but I found I didn’t know how to spell the country at 5D and there are a couple of tricky clues that might give some a bit of head-scratching. Thumbs up or thumbs down to the homophone? (I won’t spoil it by naming the clue). Thumbs up from me for eliciting a groan when I saw it. A little over average time of me of about 5 1/2 minutes. Nice one. Thank-you Mara! How did you all get on?

Fortnightly Weekend Quick Cryptic. This time it is my turn to provide the extra weekend entertainment. You can find the crossword, entitled “Berried” (based on the horrible pun that is my username and a related homonym) here. Enjoy! And if anyone is interested in our previous offerings you can find an index to them here.

Definitions underlined in bold italics, (Abc)* indicating anagram of Abc, deletions and “” other indicators.

Across
1 Some finish — with two languages? (6,6)
FRENCH POLISH – FRENCH (a language) POLISH (and a second).
8 One going wrong about newspaper, regularly (5)
OFTEN – (One)* “going wrong”, “about” FT (Financial Times; newspaper). Sneaky attempted deception here. Did anyone look for alternate letters in ‘newspaper’ (regularly)?
9 Roughly at three, drama staged here (7)
THEATRE – (at three)* “roughly”.
10 Coordinate race (3)
RUN – Double definition.
11 As the role is complicated, despair (4,5)
LOSE HEART – (as the role)* “complicated”. Our 3rd anagram already.
13 Smart operation involving deception (5)
STING – Double definition. The first like what my legs did from walking through nettles this week.
14 Person feeding furnace possibly losing head (5)
EATER – hEATER (furnace, possibly) “losing head”. A bit of a tricky definition and one of those where you have to find a word that fits the defintion in the wordplay and then lose the first letter. I often find those hard to think of, but not today.
16 Fashion range used casual garment (9)
DUNGAREES – “Fashion” (range used)*.
17 Maybe, crude, offensive idiots laughing, initially (3)
OIL – First letters, “initially” of Offensive Idiots Laughing. The “maybe” helpfully signifies this is a definition by example.
19 Beef for the champions? (7)
TOPSIDE – TOP SIDE (champions). The “?” flags that the wordplay is a cryptic hint.
21 Author seen looking to the left in photo, I learned (5)
ELIOT – Reverse hidden, “seen looking to the left” “in” phoTO I LEarned, reversed -> ELIOT. That’ll be George the author.
22 One ruminates about those on the way up, perhaps? (12)
MOUNTAINEERS – (One ruminates)* “about”. “Perhaps” and another “?” to hint there is something cryptic about the definition.
Down
1 Reportedly, imperfection in lower surface (5)
FLOOR – Sounds like, “reportedly” FLAW (imperfection). Scores highly on the homophone groanworthy index for me.
2 Sixteen working on annex (9)
EXTENSION – (sixteen)* “working” ON.
3 Fire Tory: identify allowance (13)
CONFLAGRATION – An ikean assembly… CON (Tory) FLAG (identfy) RATION (allowance).
4 Salt container has broken (6)
POTASH – POT (container) (has)* “broken”. What salt is that? “Potash refers to potassium compounds and potassium-bearing materials, most commonly potassium carbonate.” So now you (and I) know.
5 Country’s silence, then it’s erupting (13)
LIECHTENSTEIN – (silence then it’s)^ “erupting”. I found I didn’t know how to spell it when I came up one letter short, missing the first T initially.
6 Group ready (3)
SET – Double definition.
7 Well, someone having a flutter? (6)
BETTER – Double definition, the first being well after recovering from an illness, I think. Hmm. Tiny twitch of the eyebrows at that one. Shouldn’t there be some indication that the person in question wasn’t well before?
12 Fudge I share out, OK (9)
AUTHORISE – “Fudge” (I share out)*.
13 Seated after assembly, calm (6)
SEDATE – (seated)* “after assembly”.
15 Up in heaven, egalitarian city with large lake (6)
GENEVA – Reverse hidden, “up” (this is a down clue) “in”, heAVEN EGalitarian, reversed -> GENEVA.
18 Item auctioned with American flower (5)
LOTUS – LOT (item auctioned) US (American).
20 In favour of person getting paid (3)
PRO – Double definition

48 comments on “Times Quick Cryptic No 1979 by Mara”

  1. Very slow start until we got our anagram hats on. Tried toker for 14ac, which did not help one bit. Eventually finished at 35m, so quite pleased with that, although over our target.
  3. I seem to have committed all the errors that others have noted. I tried alternate letters of newspaper at 8ac and then both (s)toker and (b)oiler at 14 ac before I realised that both 5dn and 12dn were anagrams. Took me 20mins to finish with everything parsed. Thanks to Mara for an enjoyable puzzle and thanks to John for the blog.

    FOI – 9ac THEATRE
    LOI – 22ac MOUNTAINEERS
    COD – 4dn POTASH for the surface, closely followed by 1ac FRENCH POLISH.

  4. A solid puzzle, a steady solve …
    … and a 12 minute finish which won’t trouble the league tables much but satisfied me. Apart from the slight surprise at the number of anagrams, and a very minor grumble at well = better in 7D, I thought this was very enjoyable and very fair.

    Many thanks John for the blog and I look forward to the Saturday Special. A good weekend to all.
    Cedric

  5. A steady solve for me, coming in at 18:23 after initially stopping on 17:36 and then seeing I hadn’t filled 15d in. On re-looking at it, I quickly saw it was a hidden and filled in that well known city Venega. Thankfully I then saw the “up” bit and corrected it. Lucky I wasn’t solving on the computer I suppose or I’d have got a DNF. FOI THEATRE, LOI GENEVA, COD TOPSIDE. Thanks John and Mara.
  6. Time 12 minutes dead. I had a real struggle with today’s 15×15 so glad to be in Premier coach after suffering in steerage or lack of it!

    Any road up, FOI 1ac FRENCH & SAUNDERS

    LOI 14ac EATER

    COD 22ac MOUNTAINEERS

    WOD 16ac The onomatopoeic DUNGAREES

    I have never been to LIECHTENSTEIN where the Nazi party held its last conference.

  7. The anagrams were trickier than usual with cleverly hidden indicators. But it was sedate and topside that threw me. With S _ D_ _ _ already in I wanted to put sadled for seated despite the spelling error. Gave up at 30 mins.
  8. We love anagrams and we loved this puzzle. We finished in 15 minutes.

    FOI: RUN
    LOI: TOP SIDE
    COD: FRENCH POLISH

    Thanks John and Mara.

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