Times Quick Cryptic No 218 by Joker

Author   macavity123Posted on Categories Quick Cryptic
Solving time: Intermediate (due to a couple of self-induced problems).

Happy new year everyone. Back from my week away and redy to carry on the battle with the evil masterminds Mr Rogan keeps locked in a cellar and fed on scraps.

A nice puzzle today from Joker which would probably have not held me up as much as it did under other circumstances. The shade of green was tricky and I needed crossing letters. I had another (not very plausible) answer for 19 across and I got a couple and had to work backwards from the answer to try and understand the clue, not a helpful thing in my book.

As usual, I look forward to your comments.

Thanks to Joker for today’s challenge.

Across
1 PREACHER – The definition is Minister. P (power) + REACH (TO MAKE CONTACT) + E.R. (Queen).
5 EAU DE NIL – Definition is (a shade of) pale green. An anagram (crash) of ALIEN DUE TO, not an easy one if you haven’t heard of the shade.
9 KIWI – NZ bird is the definition. Homophones (Hearing sound) of KEY (crucially important) and WEE (small).
11 SLEEP – Some shut-eye is the definition. PEEL’S (old PM’s) reversed (retiring). Note the use of the apostrophe S, which is essential to the clue working.
12 AMADEUS – Film about Mozart is the definition. MADE (created) inside AUS (Australia).
13 PAST IT – Over the hill is the definition. PA’S (Father’s, another essential apostrophe S) + TIT (bird).
15 WILLOW – Tree is the definition. WOW! (exclamation) around ILL (diseased).
18 SCALLOP – Definition is seafood. CALL (demand) inside SO + P (quiet). Without is often used in puzzles to mean enclosed by or outside.
19 SPIKE – I went a bit wrong here at first. I entered SCARP ( S + CARP) for a sudden increase (as in a small slope). Whoops! Checking letters revealed I was wrong, so went back and thought. It’s a small increase (often used as in temperature) and S + PIKE!
21 EVIL – Very wicked is the definition. DEVIL (demon) minus its first letter (never started).
22 FLORENCE – Double definition. The Lady With The Lamp’s first name and a city in Italy.
23 PALL – An enveloping air of gloom is the definition. PAL (friend) + L (left).
24 DOG-EARED – Turned down (as in the pages of a book) is the definition. DOGE (Magistrate in Venice) + A + RED (socialist).

Down
1 PRESS-UP – A move in keeping fit is the definition. An anagram (reviewed) of SUPPER’S.
2 ELUDE – Avoid is the definition. The alternate letters of rEaL mUdDlE.
3 CAERPHILLY – British cheese is the definition. An anagram (crumbling) of RICHLY PALE. Which reminds me, how do you cross a Welsh road? I’ll get my hat.
4 ELIJAH – Prophet is the definition and it’s the first letters (starting) of Early Life In Jericho And Hebron.
6 UNIDEAL – Imperfect is the definition. UNI (University) + DEAL (agreement). Didn’t help as I read it as UNI-DEAL & thought I was wrong, rather than UN-IDEAL.
7 DRIES – I saw this one and then had to work back as to how I got it. Gets the moisture out is the definition. SUNDRIES (various items) minus SUN.
10 PATISSERIE – Probably my clue of the day. Lovely surface reading here. The whole thing is a definition of the answer. An anagram (newly-made) of PASTRIES + I.E. (that is). Bravo!
14 SPANIEL – Dog is the definition. SPIEL (sales patter) around A + N (new).
16 WEEKEND – Saturday and Sunday is the definition. KEN (know) inisde WEED (cannabis).
17 APOLLO – Sun God is the definition. A POLL (a test of opinion) + O (old).
18 SHEEP – One easily led is the deifnition. SHE + EP (the middle of kEPT).
20 INNER – Part of dartboard is the definition. WINNER (successful competitor minus its first letter (misses top).

20 comments on “Times Quick Cryptic No 218 by Joker”

  1. I spent some time wondering if there were a fish called a purt; checkers disabused me. (There probably is, though; if you can have an id, why not a purt?) I think I thought EAU DE NIL was a kind of toilet water, but anyway. UNIDEAL was my LOI, probably because I simply forgot about it. Just under 6′.

    1. I also considered for urge until I had the middle checker. Thought fish might have been a verb I’d not heard of!

  2. A very enjoyable puzzle as usual from Joker, but at the slightly harder end of the spectrum. It took me 15 minutes with UNIDEAL as my last one in.

    I thought 12ac was particularly good. As a matter of interest very little of ‘Amadeus’ was actually filmed in Austria (not that this affects the working of the clue in any way) as in all but a couple of shots Prague stood in for Vienna. That didn’t bother me, but I have never forgiven the makers for not casting Paul Scofield who created the role of Salieri on stage at the National Theatre. Simon Callow who played Mozart in that production made it to the film but only in a very minor role.

    I knew EAU DE NIL but still needed most of the checkers before it came to mind.

    Edited at 2015-01-08 03:09 am (UTC)

  3. Another cracking puzzle which I found a bit harder than yesterday. Knew the pale green at 8a which was my first one in. Last in was UNIDEAL which held me up for some time as I thought university was going to be just U.

    Liked 24a and 10d but my favourite was WEEKEND.

  4. I was slightly worried when I had E_U for the first word of 8a – not Rod Hull and his blasted emu again! (see yesterday’s 15×15) But fortunately I saw sense.
    I thought this one of the easier offerings of the week – sub 10 minutes, with nothing to carp (or pike) about.
    Interestingly Mozart was never christened “Amadeus”, rather it’s the Latinised version of one of his baptismal names “Theophilus” (lover of God in Greek)and he called himself “Amade”.
    Thanks Macavity for an entertaining and lucid blog.
  5. Easiest of the week so far for me, once the crossers started appearing I saw several answers without needing to parse them. COD dogeared, mainly because I haven’t seen doge in a crossword till today but I knew the word anyway so was pleased about that. Was also pleased I didn’t get caught out by winner or evil, removing first letters has been a weakness of mine up to now.
  6. 25 minutes to complete. Was held up by 8a but the middle word _E suggested a French answer and ‘water of nothing’ sounds like an insipid colour. Couldn’t understand why ‘dog-eared’ meant ‘turned down’ so thanks for the explanation.
      3. Yes.. apparently the Nile is pale green. There is an impressive range of English eau-de-x words, not just eau de nil, eau de cologne and eau de vie but also eau de portugal, eau de javelle, eau de luce and so forth… an interesting etymological backwater.
  7. Seemed to be on form today and ploughed steadily through in 13 minutes – rare to be in sub-Jack territory. NE caused the most difficulty – it took some time to realise that small didn’t describe the bird in 9ac but was another homophone. Once that was in, it was a case of cudgelling the brain to put something after ‘uni’ which meant agreement but 6dn both LOI and COD. Thanks for the blog macavity – you might like to check the typo in your preamble.

    Edited at 2015-01-08 10:04 am (UTC)

  8. A harder-than-average Quickie with some clues worthy of the main paper cryptic. Between 13 and 14 mins for me.

  10. A surpisingly swift solve for me, LOI EAU DE NIL. Certainly the most enjoyable puzzle of the week so far. Great blog, macavity.

  11. 23 mins for 15×15…10 mins for quick cryptic…9 mins for super fiendish sudoku…not a bad combined time of 42mins
  12. Another enjoyable offering from Joker, which seemed at the trickier end of the Quickie spectrum and with quite a few very nicely constructed clues. Made steady progress through the grid, but sadly one wrong today. Never heard of EAU DE NIL, but worked out that it had to be either EAU DE LIN or EAU DE NIL. Unfortunately chose the wrong option 🙁

    Thanks for the blog macavity and making sense of DRIES, which went in without proper parsing.

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