Prize puzzle from the Weekend FT of March 19, 2016
I found this a bit more difficult than the typical Mudd. My clue of the week is Mudd’s Spoonerism clue, 10d (CUT THE MUSTARD).
| Across | ||
| 1 | DOSAGE | Quanty of drugs required to operate on guru (6) |
| DO (operate) + SAGE (guru) | ||
| 4 | ADRIATIC | Sea air acid, pollutant finally dispersing (8) |
| Anagram of AIR ACID [pollutan]T | ||
| 9 | LEARN | Pick up king and knight (5) |
| LEAR (king) + N (knight, as in chess) | ||
| 10 | CRUMPLING | Holding seat, grip is failing (9) |
| RUMP (seat) in CLING (grip) | ||
| 11 | VAGRANT | Bum an allowance for Virginia? (7) |
| VA GRANT (an allowance for Virginia?) | ||
| 12 | LEATHER | Hide article finally inside bubbles (7) |
| [articl]E in LATHER (bubbles) | ||
| 13 | ROTA | Register of tasks allocated, primarily? (4) |
| R[egister] O[f] T[asks] A[llocated]. And an &Lit I believe. | ||
| 14 | CHOP-CHOP | Quickly put sack on meat (4- 4) |
| CHOP (sack) + CHOP (meat) | ||
| 17 | RUSHMORE | Quicken as Mount? (8) |
| Double definition | ||
| 19 | SAGO | Oxygen and hydrogen, for example, recalled in starch (4) |
| O (oxygen) + GAS (hydrogen, for example) all backwards | ||
| 22 | ARTEMIS | Diana, smartie pants (7) |
| Anagram of SMARTIE. Artemis in Greek mythology corresponds to Diana in Roman mythology. | ||
| 24 | ITALIAN | European capital I anticipated, captivates (7) |
| Hidden word | ||
| 25 | CHAIN GANG | Workers bound to be changing a dynamic (5,4) |
| Anagram of CHANGING A | ||
| 26 | PLUTO | Two-dimensional hound in hell (5) |
| Double definition referring to (1) the Disney character and (2) the god of the underworld. | ||
| 27 | OVERRIDE | Reverse up drive (8) |
| OVER (up) + RIDE (drive) | ||
| 28 | INTEND | Plan to care after elected (6) |
| IN (elected) + TEND (care) | ||
| Down | ||
| 1 | DELIVERY | Consignment received in shop, then jolly (8) |
| DELI (shop) + VERY (jolly) | ||
| 2 | SLAUGHTER | Butcher beginning to scream, shrieking (9) |
| S[cream] + LAUGHTER (shrieking) | ||
| 3 | GUNMAN | Leader in generalissimo has to dispirit criminal (6) |
| G[eneralissimo] + UNMAN (dispirit) | ||
| 5 | DOUBLE-PARKING | Blocking manoeuvre contained by opposition, or scrapped? (6-7) |
| DOUBLE P (contained by opposition or scrapped?) with ‘P’ expanded to PARKING. This wordplay is clever but I hold two reservations about it. Firstly, for the cryptic reading, ‘and’ would be better than ‘or’. Secondly, the unclued indirectness involved in shifting ‘P’ to PARKING is something I understand to be generally frowned upon. (Thanks to Bob for collaborating on this one.) | ||
| 6 | IMPEACH | Charge dime after peeling fruit (7) |
| [d]IM[e] + PEACH (fruit) | ||
| 7 | THIGH | Body part visible as bottom of skirt raised up? (5) |
| [skir]T + HIGH (raised up) | ||
| 8 | CIGARS | Those smoked fish south of Jersey etc (6) |
| CI (Jersey etc, i.e. the Channel Islands) + GARS (fish) | ||
| 10 | CUT THE MUSTARD | Spooner’s dog with the sauce to come up to scratch? (3,3,7) |
| Spoonerised as “mutt the custard” | ||
| 15 | PLATITUDE | Power play that’s banal (9) |
| P (power) + LATITUDE (play) | ||
| 16 | DOWNLOAD | Internet file not working a lot (8) |
| DOWN (not working) + LOAD (a lot). Does ‘Internet file’ decently clue DOWNLOAD? It seems close but not quite right to me. | ||
| 18 | SEMINAR | Marines worked out in training session (7) |
| Anagram of MARINES | ||
| 20 | GAUCHO | Not entirely clumsy, old cowboy (6) |
| GAUCH[e] (not entirely clumsy) + O (old) | ||
| 21 | DAMPEN | Stop marker getting wet (6) |
| DAM (stop) + PEN (marker) | ||
| 23 | TEASE | Kid, the seventh in correctional facility (5) |
| [correc]T[ional] + EASE (facility) | ||
I’m glad it wasn’t just me who found this Mudd harder than usual. I failed on the SE corner, and on1ac, 10ac, 3dn and 23n though looking at the answers i ought to have solved some of these. Had to look hard at the explanation of 5ac to get it though I’d guessed the answer. Thanks Pete
Thanks Pete and Mudd.
Shame about the typo in the clue for 1ac.
I looked at 5dn for ages after I’d got the answer without twigging the two double ‘p’s. Doh!
I too thought that CUT THE MUSTARD was tip top.
Keep up the good work.
Defeated by 5d -never heard of unman, 17a, 19a ,15d and 16d .
Thanks Mudd and Pete
Must have toughened up on some of his harder alter ego (Paul) puzzles in the Guardian and got through this one pretty quickly in three short sessions grabbed during the day. Having said that, I did miss the PP representation of double-parking, which was very clever !
Thought THIGH at 7d was another &lit that was well done – firstly because I wasted time trying to make TRUNK or TORSO fit in initially and secondly the wit involved with the definition ! Liked the Spoonerised ‘dog sauce’ at 10d also.
Finished in the SE corner with DOWNLOAD (Collins has it defined as ‘a file transferred onto a computer from another computer or the internet’ – so fair enough for me), PLUTO (obvious after getting it – but tricky to get) and PLATITUDE (surprisingly, since I’ve seen this construct several times before) as the last few in.
Thanks, Pete, for explaining 5d. Mudd is one of my top favourites, and I always complete (after a long battle) — but I never spotted the PP as the explanation. Stupid of me, really, as we’ve had shopping centre quite recently