Independent 7,869/Dac

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[If you’re attending York S&B please see comments 32&33] - here

A new year, but the same old Dac. Which of course means consistently elegant clueing and lovely surfaces. Here’s to another 51 of these before the year’s out!

He’s got one over on me with 13A though.

Across
1 AIR FORCE – AIR FOR C(of)E
5 BRUGES – (BU[-r]GERS)*
9 MEGATON – GAT + O(ver) in MEN
10 SECONDS – S(on) on SECOND (tick)
11 NERVE – (NEVER)*
12 ELABORATE – E(uropean) + LAB. + ORATE
13 HIPPOPOTAMUS – I can’t quite get this one – “Animal in river shot by two Americans”
17 HARROVIAN – HAR[-d] + IVOR rev. + AN
20 STONEMASONRY – (ONE MANS)* in STORY
22 SAUDI – S(mall) AUDI
23 WALOON – LAW rev. + LOON
24 STORING – OR (gold) in STING
25 DASHED – SHE in DAD
26 ATTENDER – TENDER (nurse) by A T(emperature)
Down
1 ALMOND – Hidden in sALMON Dishes
2 REGARD – RAGE rev. in RD.
3 ON THE SIDE – (HOT ENDI[-v(ery]ES)*
4 CONTEMPLATION – TEMPL[-e] in CO. + NATION
6 RECTO – Hidden in diRECTOry
7 GENDARME – Double def.
8 SUSPENSE – PEN in SUSSE[-x]
10 SHAMPOO AND SET – (HOPES TO SAD MAN)*
14 TURNSTONE – TURNS TONE
15 ESCHEWED – SCH(ool) in [-w]EE[-k] + WED(nesday)
16 NO FRILLS – “No thrills”, Cockney style!
18 BUSIED – BUS + I.E + D[-epart]
19 SINGER – Hidden in songS IN GERmany
21 OZONE – [-b]OZO + N(orth) E(ast)

13 comments on “Independent 7,869/Dac”

  1. Thanks Ali and Dac, the usual great fun.

    I think 13 is: HIP = in, PO = river, POT = shot (as in snooker), AM US = two Americans.

  3. Thank you, Ali. Like you, I’m looking forward to my weekly fix of Dac in 2012.

    It’s funny how different solvers see different clues. I got HIPPOPOTAMUS from a couple of crossing letters and parsed it straight away; but I couldn’t see SINGER at all.

    Unless I’m missing something, I thought BRUGES was very un-Daclike: how are we supposed to know that the it’s the R needs taking out of BURGERS before we do the anagram? And I can’t find the second definition of GENDARME in my SOED, if someone could oblige.

  5. I haven’t got access to any paper dictionaries, but dictionary.com has “a sharp pinnacle of rock on a mountain ridge, esp in the Alps” for gendarme.

  6. Thanks Dac, Ali and other commenters. A good puzzle but I needed help with parsing some of the clues. NealH@5: my Chambers confirms this meaning of GENDARME – very much a new one on me!

  7. Thanks, both. That makes BRUGES a really clever clue. And the GENDARME definition is in my old Collins, but not in my newer SOED, which is where I normally look stuff up.

  9. Hi togo
    r is the abbreviation for recipe, a Latin word meaning ‘take’. It was (is?) used on medical prescriptions etc.

  10. Thanks for the pointers on the HIPPO clue. I could see PO and US, but couldn’t piece the rest of it together.

    R for take is an advanced puzzle staple, but you don’t often see it in the dailies, least of all with Dac. A fine clue though.

  11. Thanks Ali and Dac, didn’t know the rock for gendarme but it couldn’t really be anything else and a quick internet search confirmed it when I got in the office. Sorry to hear you’re leaving our little crew Ali but I completely understand – i’m in a similar position and a tricky one could cause me problems.

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