Independent 6983/Dac
Posted by John on March 4th, 2009
The usual excellent crossword from Dac, but when is he ever less than excellent? I found this unusually easy apart from two clues, one of which I got wrong. After doing 4ac and 9ac I thought that there might be a rare Dac Nina connected with Darwin, but this wasn’t supported by anything else. No doubt someone will point out what I have missed.
Sorry this is so late — I’ve unwittingly set up my anti-virus software to do a check at midday and am trying to find a way of avoiding the concomitant dreadful slowness at this time. Clearly to switch on before midday and then start work at around 12.20 is no use — it’s still just as painfully lethargic.
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | ISA AC |
| 4 | GALA PA GO S |
| 9 | F IT TEST |
| 10 | TANG {m}ELO{n} — as all Countdown-watchers know, a cross between a tangerine and a grapefruit |
| 11 | RE(QUIRE ME)NT |
| 13 | KOS — SpOoKy rev. |
| 14 | SHAFT — (has)* FT |
| 15 | C(LAMMED)UP |
| 17 | W(A)Y F A RING |
| 19 | BAND A — Hastings Banda of Malawi |
| 21 | LAG — 2 defs |
| 23 | SINGLE-TRACK — 2 defs |
| 24 | OSMANLI — OS “manly” — old-fashioned term for Ottoman |
| 26 | SU(MA)TRA |
| 27 | FRAILNESS — (infer lass)* |
| 28 | SH RED |
| Down | |
| 1 | IN FORMS |
| 2 | ANTIQUARY — (quaint)* a(r)y — nice semi &lit. |
| 3 | CHEMIS{e} T{ire} |
| 4 | GUT REACTION — (to urge in cat)* |
| 5 | tabLE Tennis |
| 6 | PINETUM — (mute nip)rev. — I had PANSTUM here, which would be splendid if the word existed |
| 7 | {creatin}G REEK — my first thought was that it was {creatin}G {stin}K, an abbreviation for Greek, but I think Dac would somehow indicate that the ‘finally’ applies to two words |
| 8 | SHOW’S UP |
| 12 | E(VAN)G ELI STS |
| 16 | DON(CAST)ER — this seems a bit odd: when you think of Doncaster its soccer team is hardly the first thing that comes to mind, regardless of the fact that anyway it’s really Doncaster Rovers |
| 17 | WELL OFF — (fellow)* f |
| 18 | ARSENAL — 2 defs |
| 19 | BETIMES — bet (semi)rev. |
| 20 | A WK WAR D |
| 22 | G EMMA |
| 25 | {s}IRE |
March 4th, 2009 at 2:10 pm
More unfamiliar words than usual for me – OSMANLI, PINETUM and TANGELO, which I thought was a bloke who lived high on a mountain in T’Mexico. Maybe I don’t watch enough Countdown. Good clues though, so I got all those and only fell down on SHRED – bah!
March 5th, 2009 at 7:58 am
3d: OK, ‘chemist’ commonly means ‘pharmacist’ but not in terms of hospital staff, where a pharmacist is a pharmacist is a pharmacist. As a chemist (not a pharmacist) I tend to get a bit uptight about this.