Independent 6963 by Glow-worm

by

*=anag, []=dropped, <=reversed, hom=homophone

I found this extremely tough. There was a lot of quite obscure stuff and quite a few that I didn’t follow.

Across
1,14 Monday Morning Feeling: Mon + hom. “dame awning” + fee + ling. A perfect clue to sum up how I felt trying to struggle through this first thing Monday.
9 Perm: Double def. I think it must be referring to perm being used in expressions like “perm any two from four”.
10 Cloisonne: Conn[i]e around Lois. Connie Francis is an American singer and Lois Lane is Superman’s love interest. Not sure what a cloisonne is, but it seems to be something ornamental.
11 Bereft: ref in bet.
13 Llanelli: ([w]ell all in)*
17 Mediant: Didn’t understand this – the clue is “Old Iranian artefact ultimately given to me”. It looks like me + dian + last letter of artefact, but I’ve never heard of Dian as an Iranian and mediant is a musical term, so I can’t see what it’s got to do with the clue.
18 Diarist: hom. of dire wrist.
20,28 Leave No Stone Unturned: “Waste no opportunity to reverse every Roller?” I’m not entirely sure about this, but I think it might be a cryptic reference to the Rolling Stones.
23 Telemann: Teleman + n. George Philipp Telemann was a composer. I’m not sure about teleman for TV personality. Wouldn’t it be “telly man” ?
24 Teresa: Easter* (Mother Teresa of Calcutta).
26 Sterilise: I think this is an anagram of “tree s” + i l (first letters of in Latin) + is.
27 AWOL: Even letters of Larwood + l.
Down
2 Oxeye: X in OE + ye[t].
3 Dam: double def.
4 Yucatan: Cat in Yuan.
5 Otoole: Too in [r]ole – Peter O’toole
6 Nastase: (an asset)*. Ilie Nastase was a tennis player, hence court.
7 Non-believer: (Nobel I)* in never.
8 Bed linen: B.Ed. + line +n[ot].
12 Enlargement: (Angler meant)* with a changed to e.
15 Epilepsy: Pile in EPs + y.
16 Gut: “String theory”. I presume this is a double def. String for gut seems reasonable, but I’m struggling a bit with theory. Perhaps it’s in the sense of “gut instinct”.
17 Mel: “One over the moon over a girl ?” It might be “One over the moon over” = Lem reversed, but I don’t know who or what Lem is.
19 Sea Lion: Seal + ion. I think it means cork as a verb i.e. if cork a bottle, you seal it.
21 Entreat: Entre[e] + [aspir]at[ional].
22 In situ: Odd letters of “pianist in tour”.
25 Spoke: double def. It seems as if you can use rung to refer to the spoke of a wheel, although it’s more commonly associated with ladders.
27 Air: [Ma]ria<.

11 comments on “Independent 6963 by Glow-worm”

  1. 16D GUT Grand Unified Theory – the TOE, Theory Of Everything, that will no doubt involve String Theory.
    17D LEM Lunar Excursion Module The Eagle that landed the first men on the moon was a LEM.
    (TLAs – we gottem)

  2. Thanks for the post, NealH.

    I think 17 across is that MEDIAN was an old Iranian language, T is “artefact ultimately” (as you say) and the definition is “me”, that being the third note of the solfa or the MEDIANT of the scale.

  3. It must be ‘old Iranian’ (adj.) here as in ‘relating to the people of Media’: they were Medes (Medic, Medism, Medise etc.)to Greeks, and I’m pretty sure Median isn’t generally used as a noun.

  6. NealH: with regard to 9 across, Chambers does indeed give “perm” as a short form of “permutation” (and it says it can be verbed :))

  8. The third line of the Chambers entry for “Median” gives “also n” in brackets, so I felt pretty safe whichever way solvers wished to read it! Paul B’s right, though, that the adjectival use is predominant and that’s what I had in mind.

  11. Wotcher Glow-worm, Eimi.

    Sorry about the noun, guys. I went (in Collins Lite, which is the desktop version they give you when you buy the paper dick) to Media and associated entries, which doesn’t give the noun. Annoyed now.

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