Mephisto 2436 / Chris Feetenby

Author   petebiddlecombePosted on Categories Mephisto
Solving time: about 45 mins, with C used for 2D and a daft blind spot on 21A. One or two hazy areas below where others may be able to improve on my understanding.

Across
9 W,HILLY – Edinburgh being one of those cities that claim to be built on seven hills.
14 FEE(d) – I think this is feed=provide with “short measures” as “most of” indicator.
15 COBALAMIN – a cobalt-based molecule found in Vitamin B – cob=horse, alamin=animal*
18 TEN,BY – two interpretations of X
20 OBAS – I confuse these chiefs with obeah = some kind of African magic.
21 RAMA(n) – Rama as in “Hare Rama” – chanted by those blokes in orange who used to go up and down Oxford Street.
26 SCLEREID – (dries,cel(l))*
27 AT,TACKERS – I think this one is wrong. Tackers are people who change direction, which leaves ‘at’. Chambers reveals that the at and the kip are monetary units in Laos. But it’s 100 ats to the kip, so I can’t see that at = kips, though I can see that kip = ats.
29 NOW – must be right as all letters are checked, but I don’t understand the clue unless “brought to your party” means the “now” used to introduce a topic,a s in “Now, about this crossword of yours …”
30 FROTHED – for*,the,D=depth
31 FORT(if)Y
 
Down
2 LINE=railway,ARM=branch,O= o’ = on,TORS=hills
3 FLOC – hidden in ‘chief location’
5 SWEAR=curse,BY=times. “You have” = linking phrase
8 LEVI,RATION – the old custom of compulsory marriage to a childless brother’s widow
11 NENE – A Hawaiian goose and a river in the east of England.
12 PERI,ASTRON=(no star)* – almost identical to perihelion (just different word roots, I guess)
17 SYNERGID = syringed* – just the kind of cell described
19 N(A,C(oo)K)ETS – light lunches – a net is a difficulty if you check C
22 ABA,T(u)TU – a word for downcast – Joseph’s coat of many colours might have been an aba rather than the curious quilted things in the current Lloyd-Webber selection show.
24 AD,WARD – Ed. Spenser’s way of spelling ‘award’
25 F(AF)F – F=fellow and AF = Associate Fellow.
28 SUNI – (U,N) in is<= another of those xwd antelopes

One comment on “Mephisto 2436 / Chris Feetenby”

  1. 29ac: NOW is ‘won round’, i.e. brought to your party (as in your way of thinking). This took me a while to see! I didn’t solve this puzzle for some reason, so can’t add anything else.

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