Everyman 3146/Jan 14 – do you know the way to San Jose?

by

Two American cities. Perhaps that qualifies as a theme?

Across

1 MINNEAPOLIS – (pile, mansion)*. “Gothic” is somehow the anagrind.
7 S,CREW,UP – Really an Americanism – at least I only learnt it in the states. But I guess it’s been exported.
8 FLANNEL – double meaning: also means the verb: to “soft-soap”.
10 OS,MAN – OSMAN founded the Turkish Empire in the 13C.
11 L(EAVES) OUT – pretty meaningless surface. “Yobbo” is Britslang for LOUT – derived from reverse of boy.
12 TRADE WINDS – nice charade with “craft” shifting from its nautical surface to TRADE.
16 HAKE – hidden in “…locH, A KElt”. By the way, “kelt” is a kind of salmon so the surface is quite elegant.
21 IDEN(TI)CAL – Iceland* contains rev(“it”). “Brewed” is a better anagrind than gothic.
24 T[asted],ANGELO – TANGELO (tangerine,grapefruit) cropped up recently in a similar charade: this one works a little better since it doesn’t involve a boxing trainer!
25 B,APTISM – B[ishop] followed by (is at, PM)* — though I don’t think it’s surprising that bishops show up for baptisms, is it? So not quite an &lit.

Down

2 NO W,ON,DER – Not much cryptic German is needed other than DER (“the”) and the occasional number.
3 E(X,P)EL – symbols for unknowns (“indefinite”) are typically X, y, z.
4 PUFF (A,DD)ER – a PUFFER is in fact a “steam-engine”. Another common abbreviation is DD for Doctor of Divinity.
5 LOADED – double meaning: I actually like this clue because “tight” in the drunk sense is a Britishism and LOADED in the same sense is originally American.
6 SAN J(OS)E – the other American city: jeans* contains OS: more cryptic shorthand for a sailor (“ordinary seaman”). Others are tar, AB.
7 SHORT SH(R)IFT – charade: “neat” is SHORT (as in “concisely”) and SHIFT for “move” contains R[ook].
9 LET OFF S,TEAM– where “LET OFFS” is the noun for “being allowed to go free”.
13 IRON CROSS – The German military award that kind of went out of style in 1945.
15 CRACK,POT – Nice to see this clued without reference to CRACK cocaine.
17 KEEP,NET – rev(peek=”look”) , rev(ten=”number”). KEEPNET is a Brit term for a net to keep your catch alive while you’re still fishing.
19 P(ANNIE)R – A secondary meaning of the definition: “dosser” is simply PANNIER according to Chambers. (see the comment below). Collins supports this as well.
20 ST(R)EAM – definition is “fly” as in STREAM a banner in the wind: to STEAM ahead is to go quickly.
22 L[ose],I,BRA – Popular cryptic “supporter” the BRA is.

2 comments on “Everyman 3146/Jan 14 – do you know the way to San Jose?”

  1. #1 - Mon 22nd Jan 07, 08:56

    19D a dosser is a pannier

  2. #2 - Mon 22nd Jan 07, 12:33

    yeah — just checked Chambers (which I should have done last week!). I’ll update… thanks!

Comments are closed.