UKC

The Guardian quick crossword today appears to have ‘expire’ as the answer for ‘Become invalid (6)’. I’ve always taken it to mean rather more than that! i.e. a synonym for dying. Literally, ‘to breathe out’ or breathe one’s last. Yet most dictionaries seem to have this alternative meaning that I’ve never heard before. It’s as if the original meaning of the word has been quietly forgotten. Very odd - to my ears anyway. Because you can be an invalid and recover, but you can’t if you expire.

Invalid as in, not valid. Your library ticket is invalid as it has expired?

I'd assume it means become not valid, as in past expiration date. Rather than invalid, as in infirm.

Could be 'expire' as in 'expiry date'? The multiplicity of the English language being part of it's charm (and a driving force behind cryptic crosswords too possibly, although I'm as thick as two short planks when it comes to cryptics!)

Oh I see.

I imagine you would have got upset by BASIC interpreters telling you your program had "Invalid Syntax"...

Surely you've had some licence, voucher or membership with an expiry date?

It's the joy of the English language, multiple meanings and interpretations of words. But I think you knew that... But very frustrating when it doesn't click.

The guardian quick is getting more and more cryptic IMHO

GTE

One of those strange, but not rare words that often have multiple meanings.  Sometimes they are spelt the same and pronounced differently and sometimes spelt differently but pronounced the same.

Bow, (when you see the king) bow of a ship, Bow you fire arrows from, The Bow - you can make in a rope.  

Yes to all that. I was just being very dim.

Yes, and all the better for it I think.

This is why "quick" crosswords are more difficult to complete than cryptic crosswords!

I don’t find them so. Most quick crosswords I can do in under ¼ hour, whereas the cryptics take me many times longer - in fact I now avoid them as such enormous timewasters.

I always give quick crossword clues some slack - it's the nature of them. With a good cryptic clue it is very clear that the answer is right. Not so, often, with quick crossword clues.

Not for me! Although I did start to get my head around the easier cryptic clues a couple of years ago but it took a lot of practice, and I was still completely baffled by a lot of them even after revealing the answer

Yeah, sometimes…..

But the Guardian quick online has a Check This button. Doesn’t reveal the answer, but tells you what you’ve done wrong.

My days of doing cryptics are behind me to a large extent. Used to love some of the old setters like Araucaria and Logodaedalus, but most of the ones I could tackle have expired (see above), and the newer ones are not on my wavelength. The Everyman on Sundays I can occasionally still complete. I try to do the Guardian Quick within 10 minutes, but rarely achieve that. Did it once in 7min. I think this must all help to hold off the aphasia which I seem to be developing (undiagnosed).

More or less the same with me - except the aphasia (very sorry that you appear to be getting that.) I find the quick crossword, codeword, and sudoku good mental exercises to keep the brain functioning/‘warm up’ in the morning. 

I've been pondering over this one....it's gobbledygook 

'We hear that former church pinnacle ceases to exist.' (6)

I think you have to approach the clue not in terms of death but in terms of lottery tickets, book tokens or supermarket coupons. Then it makes perfect sense?

It should be "expire" (sounds like ex spire) but there's a problem with a missing s on the end.

We hear = sounds like 

I agree.. the clue would have been better with the two halves reversed and starting "cease to exist"