A crossword for anagram fans from Mara today, with 7 full anagrams and one part-anagram clue. It seems like too many to me, but they are all good clues. It took me 5:38 so above target but not too far from my average time. My COD was 18D for the amusing surface. 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 “X squared” here. Can you spot the Nina? If you are interested in trying our previous offerings you can find an index to all 100 here.
SAVE THE DATE – Saturday 15th June at The George, Borough High St from 12 noon. After we had such fun with a summer get-together last year, attended by some TimesforTheTimes old hands, bloggers and commenters, we thought we would have another one. Read about last year’s here.
Definitions underlined in bold italics, (Abc)* indicating anagram of Abc, {deletions} and [] other indicators.
| Across | |
| 1 | Remove accompanying tie (8) |
| WITHDRAW – WITH (accompanying) DRAW (tie). | |
| 5 | Flower in hair I see (4) |
| IRIS – Hidden in haIR ISee. | |
| 8 | Obscene imperial measure (5) |
| GROSS – Double definition. I did wonder about the second definition, but being a dozen dozens it’s clearly not a decimal quantity. | |
| 9 | Affair of party of S Africans in Italian city (7) |
| ROMANCE – ANC (African National Congress; S African political party) in ROME (Italian city). | |
| 11 | Side by side, kiss twice? (4,3,4) |
| NECK AND NECK – NECK (kiss) AND NECK (kiss). | |
| 13 | Districts around northern stadia (6) |
| ARENAS – N (northern) in AREAS (regions) | |
| 14 | Don’t stop transmitting semaphore signals in jug (6) |
| FLAGON – FLAG (transmit semaphore signals) ON (carry on; don’t stop) | |
| 17 | Comic hating smart stooge (8,3) |
| STRAIGHT MAN – (hating smart)* [comic]. Nice surface. | |
| 20 | Are inclined to enter knockout competition to make a lot of money (5,2) |
| CLEAN UP – LEAN (are inclined) in CUP (knockout competition). | |
| 21 | Doctor tries second test (5) |
| RESIT – (tries)* [doctor]. Another nice anagram surface. | |
| 22 | Some obstacle, a sticking point (4) |
| EAST – Another hidden. This time in obstaclE A STicking. | |
| 23 | NY hotels refurbished in an inconspicuous manner (2,3,3) |
| ON THE SLY – (NY hotels)* [refurbished]. | |
| Down | |
| 1 | Regular payment heading for worker on time (4) |
| WAGE – First letter of Worker, AGE (time). | |
| 2 | Whip messing up recount (7) |
| TROUNCE – (recount)* [messing up]. More shambles in the House of Commons. Lol. | |
| 3 | Impious act remarkably considerate! (11) |
| DESECRATION – (considerate)* [remarkably]. | |
| 4 | A comprehensive in another country (6) |
| ABROAD – A, BROAD (comprehensive). | |
| 6 | Sweep sounded out bottom of flue (5) |
| RANGE – RANG (sounded out), last letter of fluE. Nicely deceptive surface. | |
| 7 | Communication technologies ultimately coming to the summit? (8) |
| SPEAKING – Last letter of technologieS, PEAKING coming to the summit). You have to separate “communication technologies” to get the definition. I didn’t at first and bunged in SPEAKERS without testing the wordplay, which held me up later. | |
| 10 | Moderate month for Eliot’s work (11) |
| MIDDLEMARCH – MIDDLE (moderate) MARCH (month). I’ve neither read the book nor watched the costume drama. Have I missed much? | |
| 12 | Butcher provides service with care, surprisingly (8) |
| MASSACRE – MASS (church service) (care)* [surprisingly]. | |
| 15 | See and sign new book (7) |
| GENESIS – (see, sign)* [new]. | |
| 16 | Maestro cut in (6) |
| CHOPIN – CHOP (cut) IN. Frédéric Chopin was a distinguished performer not just a composer, hence a maestro. | |
| 18 | Flightless birds share a dog’s dinner (5) |
| RHEAS – (share)* [dog’s dinner]. Nice anagrind and lovely surface. | |
| 19 | Visit state, taking in first of temples (4) |
| STAY – First letter of Temples in SAY (state). | |
I wasn’t really up to it today, so just filled in clues here and there. Thanks to all that wished me a smooth recovery
I also wrote in SPEAKERS then wondered if there was was some FLAGON/PITCHER vessel in England I hadn’t heard of before correcting the error
Is that South African political party well known?!
Today I learnt that I have been confusing Middlemarch by Eliot with Middlesex by Eugenides for the past twenty or so years. I cannot imagine the books are very similar.
ANC turns up regularly in cryptic crosswords so is worth remembering.
A belated get well message, Tina. Hope you’re now beginning to feel a bit better.
First, my apologies for not wishing you well yesterday. Best wishes for a speedy and complete recovery!
The ANC is best known as the party of Nelson Mandela.
Oh gosh pls don’t apologise!
Nelson makes it very reasonable that people would know that then. I’ll try to commit it to memory.
Get well soon!
You may have heard of its full title – African National Congress.
Have a speedy recovery, Tina.
Get well soon, Tina! First the tooth, now the procedure 😫 The only upside i can imagine is that it usually rains if you go camping in Victoria over Easter, so hopefully you missed out on that!
It was glorious weather 🙁 one of the reasons my health got so bad was because my kids were having such a good time I thought it’d be a shame if we went home and maybe I could sleep off the pain
Spoiler: I could not
Joining all the others with get well soon messages, Tina 💐 Sounds like you had a rough time.
Looking forward to your full recovery, may it be rapid!
Best wishes Tina 🌷🌼🌺🌻
(Can’t believe you’ve never heard of the ANC. They were all over the news when you were about 10 years old!)
Hope you’re feeling better soon!
18:18. I had most trouble with ABROAD and RANGE. COD to FLAGON. I read MIDDLEMARCH at university and although I think I enjoyed it at the time I can’t remember a thing about it now. Henry James, Margaret Drabble, John Fowles have a similar effect on me-seems like great writing at the time but no lasting impact.
I too finished with ABROAD/RANGE – not the most obvious of defs.
Chalking up my April victory early. I can relax knowing my work is done 🤪
Well done, ND- gosh, I see it’s already the weekend again, have a good one!
It was fairly easy, but I got in a little trouble by putting in rise instead of iris, and this time I did not erase it immediately. I didn’t see the obvious neck and neck for some reason, and I just couldn’t remember straight man, even though it was on the tip of my brain – no wonder the younger chaps are faster solvers. Middlemarch can probably be best described as overly Victorian, with a lot of themes that are no longer a concern, compared, say, to Trollope and Dickens.
Time: 7:23
Enjoyable puzzle by Mara which I completed at a pleasant amble, finishing in 13.59 let’s say 14. There were no major hold-ups, some clever anagrams and many fine surfaces to appreciate for those of us taking the scenic route. I too started with speakers and at MIDDLEMARCH (no John, you have not) I was delayed by concentrating on the wrong Eliot. FOI WITHDRAW, LOsI GENESIS and FLAGON.
11 minutes for this one. No problems. I’ve had only one faster solve since 22nd March.
Unusually for Mara this a was a tricky one, but I eventually came in all green in around 35 minutes – so a very satisfying 1 hour 25 minutes under my target time.
As there were so many anagrams I had to resort to writing some of them down, which speeded things up a little, but it was Very Hard Work. One of the toughest in a long time, for me at least if not for the boys at the front.
So I end the week with another victory and my self belief a little restored.
AGE, DESECRATION and CHOPIN, (who’s normally lovely Raindrop Prelude I happened to be massacring on the piano just last night while Mrs ITTT was out with her tennis coach), slowed me down the most. There were no real stand out clues for me this morning but I did like ROMANCE.
Thanks to Mara and John.
ITTT
I reckon you’ve improved enough to bring that target time down to 1hr55, maybe even stretch yourself with 1hr50…
An unusually early start fortified by hot brews led us to a, for us, very pleasing sub-30. FOI WITHDRAW started us off nicely and but for a bit of a pause to get LOI ABROAD might well have set a PB. For once, no grizzles from us about tenuous or arcane combinations… An enjoyable start to the day, thank you Mara.
A very similar experience to LindsayO’s – 12 minutes, no real hold-ups, much to enjoy. I spent most time puzzling over Straight man, as at first I thought the anagrist was “comic hating” with the indicator being “smart”, before the S checker from Massacre put me right.
Many thanks John for the blog
Cedric
11 minutes. I had an attack of the usual “NW-itis” so I took far longer than I should have to get WITHDRAW and WAGE. RANGE didn’t immediately come to mind for ‘Sweep’ and I too was thinking of the wrong ‘Eliot’ for 10d which was my LOI. Favourite was the not so obvious def for the now simple looking RESIT.
Thanks to John and Mara
No major dramas and much to enjoy. Started with IRIS and finished with ABROAD, where I spent short time wondering what country would fit with those checkers, in 7.22.
Thanks to John
My actual FOI was “withhold” and backing out the latter half, plus the last three letters of “speakers” stopped me from breaking the 4 minute barrier.
FOI (correctly) IRIS
LOI EAST
COD GROSS
TIME 4:10
Just outside the SCC when I finished, albeit whilst mildly distracted by breakfast and watching the bird feeder – could easily have knocked off, ooh, 30 seconds if I had concentrated.
Anyhow, an enjoyable selection of anagrams wrapped in other clues, nice surfaces everywhere. 18D gets my vote.. I too assumed the wrong Eliot initially, so needed some crossers before the PDM.
I was going to put “a nice end to the week” then realised I have the double delight of the Saturday QC, and our esteemed blogger’s Nina puzzle to look forward to. Hurrah!
For some reason I had Withhold for 1 across so I was left puzzling over 3 down and 4 down. 3 down was easy once I corrected. 4 down I needed a thesaurus for a comprehensive synonym – been a long week !
10:07 (Æthelred the Unready pays Danegeld of 36000 pounds of silver)
Wasted time on 10d running through everything from the Wasteland to Cats before realising I had the wrong Eliot.
MASSACRE and EAST were my last two in.
Thanks John and Mara
Ha! I feel your pain!
I followed in your tracks at about half speed, thinking alluding to TSE in April was clever, hah!
I meant in simjt’s tracks. I’m not fit to use the internet.
As you’ll see below we were all on the same tracks … and I too had the April thought, and even tried to work out something based on the cruellest month!
Little minds think alike!
I think you’ll find that we were just on a loftier plane than Mara.
😎
And I don’t think over the many centuries since those Danish bullies have shown the slightest inclination to return any of that silver.
We should demand reparations.
I was absolutely nowhere on that, merrily going up every garden path laid by Mara. Had the wrong Eliot in mind and before checkers (I was doing the downs first) cycled through Prufrock, Wasteland, Agonistes, Quartets, Ash Wednesday … nothing would work but I kept trying! Failed to remember that RHEAS have an H in them and so missed the anagram first pass, needed checkers for STRAIGHT MAN (where were you today, Anagram Hat?), failed to spot GENESIS was an anagram and was running through the Zodiac, hadn’t come across the ANC device before so was trying to work in DO/SA … basically I was all over the shop. Mara 1 – 0 Templar.
COD to LOI FLAGON. Collapsed over the line in 13:46 for a Terrible Day. Excellent puzzle and blog, many thanks Mara and John.
Templar
I like the concept of an Anagram Hat. I envisage a mad Heath Robinson amalgam of topper, boater, fedora etc, incorporating a bow and a bunch of cherries as trimmings, all somehow forming a (semi) coherent whole. Any milliners amongst the blogging community?!
That’s a wonderful image!
Very enjoyable QC. Particularly liked the surfaces of 17A and 18D. There was a very good BBC Middlemarch with Juliet Aubrey and Rufus Sewell which encouraged me to read the book (a bit wordy and not my favourite GE). Hope you’re feeling much better Tina. Thanks John for good blog.
I failed to fall into any of the traps set by Mara, but my LOI RANGE did take some headscratching as I wanted to parse it.
I liked FLAGON.
5:27
All green in 23 mins, so happy with that. Took a while to see RANGE and ABROAD – not sure why. I was another to have bunged in WITHHOLD rather than WITHDRAW, which made DESECRATION hard to see until the penny dropped.
Happy Friday, all. And get well soon, Tina. Sounds like you’ve had a rough ride.
Pi
👏👏👏
Enjoyable. Finished with NECK AND NECK and WITHDRAW. A bit slow there. FOI IRIS.
Liked SPEAKING, FLAGON, MIDDLEMARCH, among others. Studied the latter at A Level – a lot of the characters annoyed me at the time. Must have missed the TV version because I would certainly have remembered Rufus Sewell. Later: I see it was 1994 so we were abroad. I also see it is still available on iPlayer.
Thanks vm for blog, John.
I hope you’re feeling better. Shingles can be debilitating as well as painful.
Thank you for kind words. Am fine but unexpectedly tired. Glad to look less scary!
I feel for poor Mara as his offering yesterday in The Grauniad (where he sets as ‘Paul’) was not well received by many at Fifteensquared. Haters of dodgy homophones, puns and themed puzzles with lots of cross-references would be advised to steer well clear. I kind of enjoyed it but in a masochistic sort of way!
Yes, that was an interesting one. I hope you got all the outrageous puns as you solved. That one took me quite a while, and I didn’t think I was going to finish….until I did.
A steady solve, no great hold ups, although hesitation over GROSS as an imperial measure.
Fairly speedy with this one today crossing the line in 8.43. Lost a little bit of time checking the spelling of DESECRATION which turned out to be worthwhile, as in my haste the second E had become an A. I loved the clue for RHEAS, and don’t recall seeing ‘dogs dinner’ being used as an anagram indicator before.
My total time for the week was 42.16, giving me a daily average of 8.28. So all in all a pretty good week.
7:56
Feline kerfuffles notwithstanding (twice causing me to pause, deal with the issue then re-compose myself), I found this to be in the medium range of QCs (the Quitch bears this out, currently 97). Had to write out the letters of DESECRATION and finished up at the start i.e. with GENESIS.
Thanks John and Mara
10 minutes for me and a smooth, quick solve.
LOI DESECRATION held me up a bit as I had assumed it would start DIS…
Good clues, a nice QC; COD to FLAGON.
David
9:58
Held up NE with ABROAD, ROMANCE and LOI RANGE. Too long looking for a country.
Thanks all.
Couldn’t do this one at all. Got both the long downs, plus seven, and that was it.
NHO STRAIGHT MAN (context?) or RHEA.
Thank you both (below) but all this means absolutely nothing to me – NHO “comedy duo”, NHO Abbott nor Costello, never watched any such thing. Oh well, merely means there’s a great hole in my GK!
I think the reason why I never watch these things is that (like many on the “spectrum”) I never, ever see the jokes, so it’s pointless.
Like Ernie Wise was the straight man to Eric Morecambe?
Think Abbott and Costello… and other comedy duos. See here.
Not on Mara’s wavelength today and really needed to persevere. With hindsight, not sure why I created so many problems for myself 🤪
STRAIGHT MAN, RANGE and MASSACRE held me up for ages. LOI CHOPIN (doh). Couldn’t parse RHEAS so left it out initially. COD ROMANCE – this was a ‘what on earth is this about?!’ surface, so very rewarding to solve. Many thanks John and Mara.
Not too sure what happened today. I started well, with 1d/1ac and fairly rattled off the top third of the grid (including Speaking), but for some reason I just couldn’t see Neck and Neck 🙄, had no idea what the Flagon clue was driving at, and to cap it all choose the wrong anagrist for Straight Man. Gave up in disgust (with myself) after 20mins, but picked it up again an hour later and managed to crawl to the finish line, albeit well north of 30mins. This has been a strange week. Invariant
Glad you think it’s been a strange week as well Invariant. After today’s puzzle (which I at least completed), I started to wonder whether I’d totally lost it.
I think I’ve had one good time and four shockers, so not my best week. No idea what I would have thought if I was new to this game (or perhaps I do!) Invariant
Easy in parts, decidedly chewy in other areas. It took me 18 minutes with all parsed except STRAIGHT MAN which was biffed from the checkers. I had to write out the anagram at 3dn and even then it took me a long time to see DESECRATION. It was however the key to unlocking the NW which up to then had been mostly empty.
FOI – 5ac IRIS
LOI – 1ac WITHDRAW
COD – 14ac FLAGON. Also liked NECK AND NECK
Thanks to Mara and John
Apart from FOI, WAGE, it took me a while to get going. First thought for 1a, WITHHOLD, didn’t yield any danglers, so I left it out until I got TROUNCE and then thought of DRAW. Once again I had to hop around the grid to get crossers to help me along. Eventually ABROAD was LOI and I just exceeded my target time. 10:18. Thanks Mara and John.