Financial Times 15,626 by Redshank

12 comments on “Financial Times 15,626 by Redshank”

1. Thanks Pete and Redshank.
   Quite enjoyable.

   Didn’t know the Balmoral ref to REEK, though I had the answer. Needed parsing for 1a as well.

   22a is still not clear to me.

2. Didn’t get 22a and, like Ilippu@1, still don’t.

3. Ilippu & Hovis
   For 22ac see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diet_of_Worms

4. I had a complete off-week as I struggled with this one; didn’t even get half. Interestingly though I did manage both 16dn and 27ac. 16dn Gat came to me from the Gatling gun and I assumed this to be an abbreviation. REEK came to me from “Auld Reekie” a name for Edinburgh no doubt from the days of coal fired smoke. And I was fooled by the Diet of Worms (which I know of but didn’t put two and two together; a clever clue!)

5. Thanks Redshank and Pete

   This one took the morning train ride into work on Tuesday plus another quarter hour session over lunch to get out. My holdups were slightly different – had a hard time with AGEIST (initially going for a weaker EGOIST until I couldn’t parse it) and ACCURATE (with the ‘recidivist’ bit – had trouble with the same word in the Dante puzzle from the same weekend with different word play).

   I thought that COURTHOUSE was very clever – especially liking the 500 bit of it and the tricky misdirection with ‘track suits’. Also liked the clue for BIG TOE.

6. My apologies to all for not giving a more complete explanation of 22ac (DIET) and thanks to Gaufrid for adding what he did.

7. Thanks Gaufrid, for the link.

8. Thanks for these solutions, but I still don’t understand 6 down. Would anyone mind helping me out?

9. Jeremiah @ 8

   My reading is

   500 = half of 1000, so THOUsand

   wearing = being inside (if you’re wearing a shirt, you could be said to be inside it)

   COURSE = track (racecourse/racetrack)

   So COUR – THOU – SE = COURTHOUSE = where (law)SUITS are heard.

   hth

10. After getting the easy ones, I bailed on this. I don’t like clues that depend on abbreviations (such as S.P.) that are not common (to me at least).

    Also explain: I = current, IRIS = flag, TT = races, EE = drugs. Clearly not for me.

11. Ah, I am getting sloppy. Sorry.

    I fancy that ‘I’ as an abbreviation for electrical current is not widely known and is not even very common in crosswords although I have seen it before. When one studies electronics (as I have a little) one learns equations such as V = I * R where V stands for volts, I for current and R for resistance.

    ‘Flag’ is another name for the flower that is commonly called iris. In general usage, one rarely encounters the word used in this sense but in crosswords it is common. ‘Races’ cluing TT is also frequently seen in cryptics and refers to yearly motor-cycle races held in the Isle of Man and called TT Races. Here TT stands for Tourist Trophy.

    ‘E’ is an abbreviation for the drug Ecstasy so ‘drugs’ can clue EE (ecstasy and more ecstasy).

    All these are well worth remembering.

12. Tricky. Failed on most, but diet was first in. Thanks Pete.

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