Times Quick Cryptic No 44 by Flamande

Posted on Categories Quick Cryptic
Solving time: Straightforward

After a couple of days of slightly trickier puzzles, we have a nice straightforward one that should make the newer solvers a little more comfortable.

When talking to the newer solvers at my bridge club (I was set upon by a certain setter for calling them ‘grannies’, but that’s what they call themselves), one of the ideas I suggested was a small A-Z type notebook where they can build a little glossary of devices and phrases used in crosswordland that mean something slightly different to the norm, for example flower and banker for river. There were a couple of things in today’s puzzle that I would suggest stashing away for future reference if you haven’t encountered them before.

Clue of the day is the lovely and clever 6 down, which I hadn’t seen before!

Incidentally there’s a nice bonus crossword in today’s Times to celebrate the publication of a new Agatha Christie novel. There’s also a gathering next Wednesday in London at the Town of Ramsgate following the Times Setters’ Lunch. I hope to be there. It would be nice to see some of you!

Across
1 PRETTY – A double definition to start. Quite, in the sense of qualifying something and a word meaning good-looking.
4 CEDRIC – The definition is is ‘this fellow’, which indicates that you are looking for a man’s name. C (cold) + an anagram (sparkling) of CIDER.
9 CHIANTI – A word sum. CHI (Greek character) + ANTI (not in favour) = the name of an Italian wine, beloved by Hannibal Lecter.
10 TAMPA – TA (soldiers, the Territorial Army) with A MP (a politician) inside gives you somewhere in Florida.
11 LYRE – A type of musical instrument is a homophone (mentioned) of someone who tells stories.
12 CHUCK OUT – An expression that means dismiss or reject is a type of steak (CHUCK) plus a word meaning ‘away’ (out)
14 HARDY ANNUAL – The name for a type of plant is found by taking the name of a (yearly) book that was written by the partner of film actor Oliver Hardy.
18 HUSBANDS – Something that means ‘mates’ is found by taking HANDS (helpers) and inserting (includes) US (American) and B (British)
20 MOOR – The nationality of the Shakespearean character Othello is a homophone (speaking) for extra.
22 CHOSE – The definition here is selected. C (a hundred) + HOSE (socks).
23 ARMENIA – The name of a country is found by taking MEN (folk) and placing it inside ARIA (operatic song).
24 ASTUTE – The definition is ‘perceptive’. AS (like) + TUT (half of ‘tutors’) + E (head of Eton).
25 SADDLE – DD (theology student – one for the little A-Z book, abbreviation for doctor of divinity) inside SALE (auction). The definition is ‘cycle accessory’.

Down
1 PICKLE – A double definition clue. A word that means a type of preserved vegetable is also the name of a difficult situation or jam.
2 ERITREA – An African country is the definition. E.R. (our Queen) + an anagram (terribly) of IRATE.
3 TONY – The common name for an American acting award (properly named the Antoinette Perry Awards for Acting Excellence is the same as the first name of an actor called Curtis.)
5 ENTICING – Something that means attractive. ENT (abbreviation for part of a hospital) + ICING (topping).
6 RAMBO – My Clue of the Day! Hidden backwards (indicated by ‘rewind part of….’) inside BOB MARLEY is the name of a famous film associated with Sylvester Stallone.
7 CHASTE – An anagram (reformed) of CHEATS is a word that may be said to mean exactly the opposite!
8 NIGHT AND DAY – A title of a famous song by (Cole) Porter. A description of a period of 24 hours NIGHT AND DAY.
13 ADJACENT – A DJ (a record player) + A CENT (a small coin) gives a word meaning near.
15 ADORNED – N (rear, the last letter of KITCHEN) goes inside (keeping) ADORED (loved) to give something meaning decorated.
16 CHA-CHA – More than one -CHA(P) (fellow fails to finish) gives the name of a dnace.
17 CREATE – Inside CRETE (Greek Island) goes A to give something that means forge or make.
19 SHOOT – Probably the most difficult clue today. The name for (the making) of a film is also an attempt to score a goal in soccer or other sports.
21 EMMA – A girls name is EM (No heart of E(XA)M) + MA (a degree).

31 comments on “Times Quick Cryptic No 44 by Flamande”

  1. 6 mins, and for me this was another puzzle which felt slightly trickier than some of the QCs. There were some smiles along the way, including the thought of the HARDY ANNUAL and the excellent spot by the setter of the reversed RAMBO in Bob Marley. I almost made a pig’s-breakfast of the SW by carelessly entering an unparsed CAN-CAN for 16dn when I only had the C checker from 22ac, but I decided to give it a little more thought. The NIGHT AND DAY/CHUCK OUT crossers were my last ones in.
  2. Just under 30 minutes. Made this more difficult by also putting in CAN CAN and deciding that the last two words of 8d would be ALL DAY. Both errors corrected when I got the elegant HUSBANDS.COD ENTICING. LOI SADDLE as did not see DD as a student of theology.
  3. 15 puzzles have passed since I last achieved my personal target of 10 or <10 and today I just scraped home by a second or two. I enjoyed the Porter reference but less so the one to Rambo.
  4. Found this one easy going until l was distracted by the thought of can-can. My favourite was ADJACENT for the (new to me) abbreviation of record player.

  5. 19 mins with about 3 Z8eries. I’m almost at the point of saying ‘OK, be brave and lose the old man!’
    I’m not overfond of the use of ‘sparkler’ as an anagram indicator & took ages to get 6dn while Z8 was sat next to me chuckling in delight. Hence 6ac was my LOI.
    My COD was 14ac – very nicely constructed!
    Many thanks to Macavity for a lovely, clear blog.
  6. For me, the easiest one so far, with most clues, except 8d, being write-ins, but I forgot to log my start time so I can’t say how long this took me overall but it felt it had to be around 8mins. RAMBO came easily but the Cole Porter clue was my favourite. I liked your opening comments, Macavity; I think the use of a notebook for new solvers is a very good idea.
  7. Was heading for a very fast time until I hit a brick wall with 1ac and 3 dn. No accounting for 1ac – should have seen it quickly, but for some reason did not. As for TONY, woefully ignorant of such awards. Ah well.

    Thanks for clear blog macavity. Share your enthusiasm for RAMBO, also enjoyed NIGHT AND DAY.

    Edited at 2014-05-08 01:59 pm (UTC)

    1. The Tony clue is quite appropriate as the nominations were announced last week and the ceremony is on June 8.
  8. Would have thought a saddle was an essential rather than an accessory. I
  9. I don’t want to labour the point as it doesn’t really matter when the checking is 5/11, but 8dn is the first clue I’ve ever seen in any version of The Times which has less than 50% checking.
    1. I’m really sorry but I’m new here and I don’t understand what you’re saying. 5/11? 50% checking? Could you enlighten me?
      1. Less than half the letters in the clue can be checked by crossing clues……in this case 5 of the 11 letters in the clue intersect other clues.
        1. Further to what bermudadoc said, Ximenes (D.S. Macnutt) wrote a famous book about crosswords (Ximenes on the Art of the Crossword (1966)) in which he laid down various rules that some people ignore and say don’t matter but for others are set in stone. One thing he said was that in a grid every answer should have at least 50% of its letters checked (i.e. crossed by other words). The Times is very Ximenean. That’s one of the reasons why so many people like it.

          Edited at 2014-05-08 09:58 pm (UTC)

          1. I also think that it is counterproductive for people to use “jargon” in the Quick Cryptic postings. These puzzles are not aimed at the people who solve the main Times puzzle, and indeed many of the solvers here will probably never graduate upwards (although I would hope they would).

            I feel using jargon gives the impression that there is almost elitism around here, and I would not wish to encourage that sort of behaviour on the blogs that I write.

            1. You’re quite right. I’m new to this and today was the closest I’ve ever come to completing. I got the HARDY part, but have never heard of HARDY ANNUAL unfortunately and couldn’t guess it by the ‘checking’. Out of curiosity, while COD would seem to mean ‘clue of the day’, what does LOI stand for?
          2. Thanks for the replies guys. Crossword Statistics – a field I didn’t even know existed! So, I can now spot that 14a similarly has <50% checking too. Intriguing!
            1. Oops. The Anonymous person post above was me.

              Edited at 2014-05-09 07:40 am (UTC)

  10. Really enjoyed this one as found it more straightforward than recent days, which helps keep the motivation going for a novice like me.
    Actually managed to finish all except 2 (CREATE and MOOR), which I then managed with a bit of prompting from my other half reading from Macavity’s guide.
    Very pleased! – Particularly after doing appallingly yesterday.
    NIGHT AND DAY held me up a bit – I was pretty sure that was the answer but had no idea how to relate it to “Porter”. COD 23ac.
    Thanks Macavity.
    1. I’m so glad you can see real progress!

      I had exactly the same problem as you with MORE but when I tried MOOR it all worked out. Hey, experts out there, is there a trick to knowing which sense of a word is the right one to use or do we just have to try it and see?

      I finished the puzzle (two days on the trot!) but have to declare I had a little bit of help in the form of a couple of suggestions *blushes*. I struggled for ages with LIMBO instead of RAMBO — it made sense to me BM (part of Bob Marley, rewound) combined with OIL (film). I only changed it when I got CEDRIC.

      1. I am not an expert but my view of the clue is as follows:

        Perhaps Othello is the defintion and he was a Moor.

        Extra speaking is the word play. A synonym for extra is more which sounds like Moor.

      2. I got there eventually with MOOR, but here in Scotland moor is certainly not a homophone of more!
  11. Mrs Deezzaa usually has a bash at the Quickie until she gets fed up (which is usually after about 10 clues) but she managed all bar 3 today (she put in the wrong MOOR which threw her) so by that reckoning it must have been a pretty good puzzle today.
  12. Armenia! What’s wrong with Austria? ‘folk taking part’ = us+t!

    1. us hardly = folk and t is certainly not = taking. Furthermore ‘part’ is no indication that something fits into something else.

      So you’re stuck with Armenia I’m afraid.

  13. DA-DA! At last this newbie has finished one. Just the 44 goes then….! But I couldn’t have done it without the help of this blog, which I’ve read religiously every day since you’ve started. So a massive thank you to all who have taken the time to write it: your efforts are much appreciated. Curiously, ‘Rambo’ was my 2nd one in – the mind works in mysterious ways…….
    1. Many congratulations from one who used to measure the time to complete a cryptic crossword with a calendar rather than a watch.
      May it be the first of many.
      Why don’t you now register with the site so that we don’t have to know you as “anonymous”?
    2. Congrats!
      I’m on the same path (newbie, reading the blog religiously) so can totally imagine the sense of triumph!
  14. Found this one really hard – no idea why. Rambo and night and day seemed obvious but many others defeated me!

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