Guardian Quiptic 885 / Hectence

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I think this one meets the remit for a Quiptic, nothing too obscure and entertaining along the way.

My only reservation was with 24ac (see below) but this was offset by the novelty of 20ac, some good surfaces and the overall pleasant solve.

Edit: reservation withdrawn (see below)

Across
7 One’s got to go abroad for Dad’s game (8)
PASSPORT – PA’S (Dad’s) SPORT (game)

9 Broad Street has top notch concert hall (6)
AVENUE – A (top notch) VENUE (concert hall)

10 Oddball‘s unknown to some (4)
ZANY – Z (unknown) ANY (some)

11 Hang about miserably with poor man due to be sacked (4,6)
MOPE AROUND – an anagram (to be sacked) of POOR MAN DUE

12 Drive off with 500 mince pies left (6)
DISPEL – D (500) plus an anagram (mince) of PIES plus L (left)

14 One hearing story about good man has points to ponder at the end (8)
LISTENER – LIE (story) around (about) ST (good man) N E (points {of the compass}) [ponde]R (ponder at the end)

15 Parking in city terrible with a large model (7)
TYPICAL – P (parking) in an anagram (terrible) of CITY plus A L (large)

17 Nowadays church is behind forefront of progress (7)
ADVANCE – AD (nowadays) plus CE (church) after (is behind) VAN (forefront)

20 x + (2-w) + 2 = 1.50 (3,2,3)
TEN TO TWO – TEN (x) T[w]O (2-w) TWO (2)

22 Force commercial gain from device (6)
GADGET – G (force {gravity}) AD (commercial) GET (gain)

23 Head after more nuts in rough country? (10)
WILDERNESS – NESS (head) after WILDER (more nuts)

24 Aftermath of funeral (4)
WAKE – cryptic (?) def. – this is a difficult one to describe. Whilst the solution is obvious, the additional indicator ‘of funeral’ doesn’t work for me because a wake is held before a funeral since the corpse needs to be present. Edit: from Collins under ‘wake’ – “(in Ireland) festivities held after a funeral”

25 Oddly unable to follow chap’s instructions (6)
MANUAL – U[n]A[b]L[e] (oddly unable) after (to follow) MAN (chap)

26 Expecting working parent to get hold of good nanny, initially (8)
PREGNANT – an anagram (working) of PARENT around (to get hold of) G (good) N[anny] (nanny, initially)

Down
1 Set a limit on a town’s size (8)
CAPACITY – CAP (set a limit on) A CITY (a town)

2 Smiley, perhaps, after Italy’s game (1,3)
I SPY – SPY ({George} Smiley, perhaps) after I (Italy)

3 Proper stuff or malware component? (6)
FORMAL – hidden in (component) ‘stufF OR MALware’

4 Difficult to keep a ship’s bearing, when flustered (8)
HARASSED – HARD (difficult) around (to keep) A SS (a ship) E (bearing)

5 Previously in favour of cutting worker’s assistance (10)
BEFOREHAND – FOR (in favour of) in (cutting) BEE (worker) HAND (assistance)

6 Fruit is one of five issues key at the heart of diets (6)
QUINCE – QUIN (one of five issues) C (key {music}) [di]E[ts] (heart of diets)

8 Favourite drink? Hint — half please! (6)
TIPPLE – TIP (hint) PLE[ase] (half please)

13 Indicated Pinot due to be bottled (7,3)
POINTED OUT – an anagram (be bottled) of PINOT DUE TO

16 Despite everything, time student put into flat’s wasted (5,3)
AFTER ALL – ERA (time) L (student) in (put into) an anagram (‘s wasted) of FLAT

18 Making sure revolutionary’s caught before monarch arrives (8)
CHECKING – CHE (revolutionary) C (caught) KING (monarch)

19 Company has European politician contain union’s rise (4,2)
COME UP – CO (company) MEP (European politician) around (has … contain) U (union)

21 Prophet put priest on short pilgrimage going north (6)
ELIJAH – ELI (priest) plus HAJ[j] (short pilgrimage) reversed (going north)

22 Went on for ever about some fungus he discovered (6)
GUSHED – hidden in (some) ‘funGUS HE Discovered’

24 Turn a blind eye to wife’s criminal kin! (4)
WINK – W (wife) plus an anagram (criminal) of KIN

16 comments on “Guardian Quiptic 885 / Hectence”

  1. Thanks Hectence and Gaufrid
    Very nice Quiptic. I took WAKE to be a double definition – the wake as an aftermath of something passing (e.g. a ship), and also a synonym for “funeral”.
    The only quibble is with 1d – I think that although a city could jokingly be referred to as a town (“London Town”), it doesn’t work the other way round – a town can’t be referred to as a city.

  2. Thanks both. Good puzzle
    I think that these days “WAKE” is used (maybe wrongly) as the food & drink provided AFTER a funeral, so the clue works for me

  3. muffin
    Thanks for prompting me to look further than Chambers (my customary first port of call). Whilst I have not been able to find confirmation of wake and funeral being synonyms, I have found a definition of wake in Collins that fits the clue, so I will go with a (not so) cryptic def. rather than a double def.

    All the usual references define ‘city’ as “a large town” so I think the clue for 1dn is fair.

  4. Thank you Hectence and Gaufrid.

    A pleasant Quiptic. I think it is only in the UK, and perhaps in some former British colonies, that a city has to have a cathedral; St David’s in Wales is the UK’s smallest city with just 1,800 inhabitants.

    The clue for TEN TO TWO was great!

  5. Cookie @4
    Even in the UK a city doesn’t have to have a cathedral. A town can have city status conferred upon it. A local example is Preston, which recently became a city but doesn’t have a cathedral whereas a few miles away Blackburn, which does have a cathedral, is only a town.

  6. Gaufrid @5, that is interesting, my COED is the 1995 edition and it gives city b Brit. (strictly) a town created a city by charter and containing a cathedral.

  9. For what it’s worth, I also thought of 24d as a dd.

    Some dictionaries list HAJ as an alternative spelling of HAJJ (not surprising, for a transliterated word), so I suppose that the word “short” could have been eliminated from 21d, but of course, its perfectly correct, and probably preferable, to include it.

    Although the clue was clear, I did find myself wondering what meaning of “bottled” justifies its use as an anagram indicator. Is it, like so many other words, slang for “drunk”?

  10. Ted @9
    “Is it, like so many other words, slang for “drunk”?”

    Yes, Chambers does give “drunk (slang)” under ‘bottled’, presumably derived from the term ‘hit the bottle’ when one starts to consume excess alcohol.

  12. If I’m correct this is just an “X” short of a pangram. I wonder why Hectance didn’t work one in.

  13. To me too, a WAKE is a social occasion held after a funeral for the purpose of reminiscence and mutual emotional support, so that left the clue as an odd sort of double definition with one being the first word and the other being the whole thing. Does that make it an extended definition? I get confused about clue typology. I greatly enjoyed TEN TO TWO, though I wonder if it is a little tricky for a Quiptic.

    Thanks, Hectence and Gaufrid.to

  14. I liked TEN TO TWO but was struggling to see how the maths added up to 1.5 before realising it was not a fraction but instead a time 1:50. Doh! Lots of fun from Hectence today. Thanks!

  15. matrixmania @14
    I thought “1.50” was cheating slightly. Are times ever written that way rather than using a colon? I forgave that, though, as a colon would have given away the word play(or in this case, number play).

  16. Thanks guys I got TEN TO TWO but couldn’t see where 1.5 fitted. Perhaps 1350 would have been better. (or 1:50 though I see the objection to that)

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