A difficult challenge from Alberich today that I bushwhacked through for a better part of this afternoon. Thanks Alberich for a really good challenge.
FF: 9 DD: 9
| Across | ||
| 1 | MOGADISHU | Cat food you picked up touring a city in Africa (9) |
| [ MOG (cat) DISH (food) U (sounds like you)] around A | ||
| 6 | BIGHT | Bay or elder needing to gain height (5) |
| BIG (elder) HT (height) | ||
| 9 | CHEAP | The man wears beret? That’s vulgar (5) |
| HE (man) inserted in CAP (beret) | ||
| 10 | CREAM SODA | Drink a lot? A doctor will have a turn about that! (5,4) |
| A DOC (doctor) reversed around REAMS ( a lot) | ||
| 11 | ON THE LOOSE | Nothing in one’s hotel unfortunately is free (2,3,5) |
| O (nothing) in ONE’S HOTEL* – i was briefly misled into thinking it was ‘on the house’ as it nearly fit but found out otherwise when it came to parsing. | ||
| 12 | FLEE | Run fast when short of time (4) |
| FLEEt (fast, without T for time) | ||
| 14 | PREMISE | Assumption of power is secured by soldiers (7) |
| P (power) [ IS in REME (soldiers, Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers) | ||
| 15 | LEATHER | Allowed the woman to cuddle a kid? (7) |
| [LET (allowed) HER (the woman)] around A | ||
| 17 | ERRATIC | Unreliable fellow cuts grass? On the contrary (7) |
| RAT (grass) in (cutting) ERIC (fellow) | ||
| 19 | PRELUDE | Du Pré oddly abandoned cello playing musical piece (7) |
| [ DU PRE EL (cElLo, oddly abandoned)]* | ||
| 20 | DAMP | Check Mother’s parking (4) |
| DAM (mother) P (parking) | ||
| 22 | DEFILEMENT | Germany provided backing to stop eg lead pollution (10) |
| D (germany, Deutschland) [FI (provided = IF, reversed) in ELEMENT (lead, say)] | ||
| 25 | NANTUCKET | Island in North America needing fishing equipment to catch food (9) |
| NA (north america) [ NET (fishing equipment) catching TUCK (food) ] – NA doing double duty, the clue works well with just ‘Island’ alone but is a weak clue that way. | ||
| 26 | PHOTO | Penny needs passionate love still (5) |
| P (penny) HOT (passionate) O (love) | ||
| 27 | MOSES | Receiver of tablets of drug in Stirling? (5) |
| E (drug, ecstacy) in MOSS (stirling, F1 driver) | ||
| 28 | PARTRIDGE | Bird having split crest (9) |
| PART (split) RIDGE (crest) | ||
| Down | ||
| 1 | MACHO | Butch Cassidy’s first house south of Massachusetts (5) |
| [ C (Cassidy’s first) HO (house) ] after (south of, in a down clue) MA (massachusetts) | ||
| 2 | GREAT BEAR | Some stars regret a bad day out dancing (5,4) |
| REGRET A BAd* (day out – without ‘D’) | ||
| 3 | DEPRECIATE | Ultimately decrease in price, deteriorating in time? (10) |
| &lit, [ E (decreasE, ultimately) PRICE*] in DATE (time) | ||
| 4 | SUCROSE | Copper’s shown up with flower – it’s sweet (7) |
| SUC (copper’s = CU’S, reversed) ROSE (flower) | ||
| 5 | UTENSIL | Consumed by endless guilt, sent out vessel (7) |
| SENT* in gUILt (endless, i.e. without the first and last letters) | ||
| 6 | BUMF | Can fellow produce official papers? (4) |
| BUM (can) F (fellow) | ||
| 7 | GROWL | Surlily grumble “Get lost!” (5) |
| GROW (get) L (lost) | ||
| 8 | TO A DEGREE | Where some university courses lead, partly (2,1,6) |
| double def | ||
| 13 | GAMEKEEPER | Estate employee is willing to look around? I’m not sure (10) |
| GAME (willing) KEEP (look = PEEK, reversed) ER (not sure) | ||
| 14 | PSEUDONYM | Could be nom de plume setters use primarily to keep unknown (9) |
| [NOM DE PSU (Plume Setters Use, primarily)]* containing Y (unknown) – brilliant ! | ||
| 16 | HOUSEHOLD | Common flower planted in capital for Horatio Nelson? (9) |
| OUSE (flower, river) in [H (Horatio, capital) HOLD (nelson, from wrestling)] | ||
| 18 | CHECK-UP | Excited after oral language examination (5-2) |
| UP (excited) after CHECK (sounds like CZECH, language; oral is the homonym indicator) | ||
| 19 | PAINTER | Playwright entertains amateur artist (7) |
| PINTER (playwright, harold) holding A (amateur) | ||
| 21 | MINUS | Objects to needing uniform for daughter less (5) |
| MINdS (objects, with U-uniform replacing D-daughter) | ||
| 23 | TROPE | Figure of speech in English – French too, previously (5) |
| TROP (too, in french) E (english) | ||
| 24 | FUSS | Endless suffering conceals mounting trouble (4) |
| hidden, reversed in “endlesS SUFfering…” | ||
*anagram
Thanks Alberich and Turbolegs
Some small points:
25ac: I would acquit Alberich of double duty here and take “Island” as the definition.
3dn: I think the cryptic reading has to be taken as three layers: E in EPRCI in DATE. Otherwise the first “in” is not doing anything.
14dn: By contrast to 25ac, here I would take the whole clue as the definition and call this a complete “& lit” to join 3dn.
21dn: I think the indicator for MINDS is “Objects to”, not just “Objects”.
Thanks TL. Agree with your FF but thought it was on the easier end of the spectrum. Agree with PB’s parsings. Thanks of course to Alberich.8
Thanks Alberich and Turbolegs
Must agree with both the FF and DD ratings here – took three sittings to get through – the last on the train home after a number of liquid refreshments late on Friday night !
Made the same error with ON THE HOUSE instead of ON THE LOOSE at 11a, but only discovered the reason that it wouldn’t quite parse when I came here to see the true answer. Also didn’t properly parse DEFILEMENT or TROPE although both answers were obvious. Hadn’t seen ‘can’ as a reference to the buttocks before.
Some excellent clues, including PSEUDONYM, GAMEKEEPER and NANTUCKET.
Finished in the SE corner with that DEFILEMENT, PAINTER and TROPE the last few in.