Beelzebub 1,086 (12/12/10)

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Perhaps a shade tougher than last week, but things fell into place relatively smoothly. There are a couple (5dn and 23dn) where I can see roughly what’s going on, but haven’t quite nailed the wordplay.

*=anag, []=dropped, <=reversed, hom=homophone, cd=cryptic definition, dd=double definition.

Across
3/9 CUISENAIRE RODS – (RECURSION IDEAS)*.
11 OAHU – (A in OH) + U.
12 DOLLOP – DOLL + OP.
13 GLEAMS – G + LEAMS. Think “group” as in G7, G20 etc.
14 JIHADI – J + I HAD + I.
15 ALAMO – A LA + MO.
18 STRAP-GAME – (TRAP + G) in SAME.
20 EBOR HANDICAP – (ARCHBI[sh]OP + DEAN)*.
21 LEOPARDESSES – (PLEASED + ROSES)*.
25 LAVA LAMPS – LAV + (M in ALAPS).
29 HEATH – HEA[l]TH.
31 ULNARE – ([yo]U + LEARN)*.
32 SEMPRE – (P + R) in SEEM*.
33 REINED – DENIER<.
34 VIOL – I in VOL.
Down
1 YOGA – YO + (A + G)<.
2 GALLABEA – GALL + A + BEA[r].
3 CHEAPO – HEAP in CO.
4 IO MOTH – I.O.M. + HOT*.
5 SASERARAS – one of two that I can’t quite parse: Blows getting comment from fencer (artist with a point). It’s the fencer’s comment that I can’t place, and there do appear to be several alternative spellings of this word, so I may have the wrong one.
6 NOIL – NO + IL[l].
7 ALHAGI – A + L + HAG + I.
8 ILANA – AN ALI[as]<.
10 EPILEPSY – (PI in SLEEP*) + Y.
16 SAND MASON – S AND M + A SON.
17 WELL CURB – WELL + (R in CUB).
19 MAESTROS – (SORT + SEAM)<.
22 PAHANG – PA + HANG.
23 EPHEBI – there seem to be several ways of parsing this, none of which feels quite right to me: Letter to Hebrews, one from men in Greece.
24 SEA-PIG – (AP in SEI) + G.
26 VANIR – VAN + I + R.
27/35 PLEA BARGAINING – PARABLE* + GAINING.
28 AREA – AREA[d].
30 HELL – [s]HELL.

1 comment on “Beelzebub 1,086 (12/12/10)”

  1. Hi Simon
    As usual I haven’t done this puzzle but 5dn is SASARARAS – SA SA (comment from fencer) RA (Artist) RAS (point {headland}).

    It looks to me as if there is an error in 23ac since the wordplay only gives HEBI. Perhaps the clue should have been “Record letter to Hebrews …..”.

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