Mephisto 2601 – Paul McKenna

Author   petebiddlecombePosted on Categories Mephisto
Much of this puzzle was fairly easy by Mephisto standards – I had all but 7 A/D, 12, 15, 1D, 22, 29, 32 and 26 filled in after about 80 minutes. But this set defeated me and I ended up doing some “cheating” in the form of searches with the Chambers CD-rom. There are a few clues I don’t understand, or possible minor mistakes, which combined with the tail-end difficulty to make me a bit grumpy about this puzzle.

Across
1 MAKO,MAKO = a couple of sharks, mako being one shark – a makomako is a New Zealand tree with red berries, also known as the wineberry. And wineberry is also an obsolete term for ‘grape’. As this is a different kind of wineberry, it seemed unfair to call the makomako a source of wine, but a Google search found “… small red berries that turn black at maturity and are used for making wine”.
7 I,MAP=link (in computing) – IMAP = Internat Message Access Protocol
10 FARAWAYNESS – RAW=cruel in (fans easy)*, with ‘barking’ as the anagram indicator
11 RORIC=dewy – reversal of (cir. = circa=about, O, R(eflect))
12 S=singular,KITE=”mere paper credit” – a skite is an Aussie boaster
14 REYNARDS = foxes = wild animals – I think, but can’t quite make the wordplay work. The clue is “Farmer finally, you heard among artfully snared wild animals”. If “Farmer finally” gives us the initial R and “artfully snared” gives us most of the rest, I can’t equate “you heard” with the remaining Y.
16 ESC=key,APE=mimic,D=departs
18 A=accepted,UT=as (Latin),EUR.
19 ESCUDO – currency (= “smash”) in pre-Euro Portugal, so doubtless in Cape Verde too. Wordplay: (prosecuted – pert)*
21 SLYPES=passages – hidden word
23 SCENIC – CEN.=central, in SIC=thus=so
24 APPEACH=censure – “appalto” is an Italian term for a contract or monopoly – replace its ALTO with EACH
28 REAR=rump,O=old,USE=custom – to knock up is to rouse by knocking.
29 REDLY=in embarrassed fashion – (reportedly – toper)* – although RED/LY is the beginning and end of ‘reportedly’, this seems not to be used in the wordplay
30 (th)E,B.L.,IS – eblis=a devil – familiar from one or two other barred-grid appearances
31 INCUNABULUM = “Aldine Aristotle, say” – an incunabulum being a book from the early days of printing (esp one printed before 1501), and “Aldine” being from the press of one Aldus Manutius of Venice, who was alive at the right time for his books to qualify. That much you can confirm from Chambers, and looking him up confirms that he printed a version of Aristotle.
32 GOSS – 2 defs – gossip, and a type of souvenir china which I remember one set of grandparents having a few examples of
33 TRAPESES = slatterns – RAPES=subdivisions of Sussex (origin obscure), in SET*. An easy clue for me – I’m pretty sure I picked up this meaning when we moved to Eastbourne and I went to the same school as Paul McKenna.
 
Down
1 MERRY AS A GRIG – (arsy mare)*,G,RIG=romp – not knowing the necessary meaning of RIG or the expression, the back end after (arsy mare)* was pretty much impossible as Chambers only lists the answer under grig (a cricket or grasshopper)
2 KARYOTYPED = (perky today)* – a clue where being married to a hospital lab scientist probably helped – I think I’ve heard about “karyotyping” at some point
3 O-RING = seal (the kind that failed in the Challenger space disaster) – O=over,then GRIN with the first letter moved to the end
4 MAC! = “Oi mister!”,A,QU.,E
5 A=about,WAR=defeat or excel,ER = “electronic resource primarily”
6 K=kwacha=Malawian currency,AIDS=assists – KAIDS are African chiefs
7 IN=belonging to,KSA(r)=despot,C=caught – a squid’s ink is used for propulsion or escape, so “where to find get-away vehicle” is the def
8 ASTI – reversal of IT=sex,SA=sex appeal
9 PSEUDOCYESIS = a condition causing false impressions about pregnancy – (odysseus’ epic)*
13 IMPUNDULUS = mythical birds with magical powers in S Africa – IMP,UNDUL(o)US
15 PULP = nonsense – another where I don’t understand the clue – “Nonsense in short he had entered, e.g. preposterously”
17 EDIT = change – I guess DIT is “such as Pierre named”, but than I can’t make E from “one without regular income” – (ac)E seems possible but I can’t equate ac or account with ‘regular income’ from Chambers defs
20 SCARE UP = make a quick meal from – CARE=charge replaces O=nowt in SOUP
22 PEPLUS = a robe worn by ancient Greek women – PEP=go=energy,LUS(h)
23 SHAMBA = plot (of land) in Swahili – SHAM=pretences, B.A. = national carrier
25 CEDAR = “ceder” – I’m not keen on the wordplay here – “We hear I could be one to yield”, as it combines “I could be …” as a description of the answer and “We hear” in a way that doesn’t make logical sense to me
26 COBLE = a boat – the wordplay is “satellite’s circling left” – I can see L = left, but not COBE = satellite, so I suspect I’ve misunderstood this one.
27 MEN=chaps,O=ring – meno is “less” in musical instructions, opposite of “piu” = more – the example I remember from band practice years ago is “meno mosso”, but I still have to look up “mosso” to find that it’s “animatedly”, so “meno mosso” just means “a bit slower”.

10 comments on “Mephisto 2601 – Paul McKenna”

  1. 26 across. You are right about the satellite: COBE = COsmic Background Explorer.
  2. It’s not like you to be grumpy Peter. I thought I was going to be alone in having a little moan about parts of this but now see that I’m in good company.

    I can help with 17D where E is socio-economic group E defined in C as “in advertising one who has no income”. I don’t understand either 14A REYNARDS (but often have problems with homophones) or 15D PULP (which I guessed had to be correct based on the supposed definition “nonsense”).

    1D I solved by solving “merry as a” from the obvious anagram and checking letters, obtaining the last 3 checkers “rig”, looking that up to see it meant romp and then using g=good as the most likely final letter, eventually finding the answer in C as you say under “grig”

    I agree with you, the whole thing was somehow a trifle irksome

  3. Sorry, that comment should refer to should 26 down.

    32 across.My parents still have some pieces of GOSS: they were very popular around the time of WW1 and carried the names of towns, often seaside resorts, together with their coats of arms. My grandmother used to refer to the pieces simply as as “Coats of Arms”.

  4. 14 across. Chambers gives y’all as a contraction of you-all. So y might be “you heard”, do y’ think?
    ( I’ve only just recovered last week’s paper from the recycling box, hence the comments by instalment.)
  5. Hmmm, the Y from REYNARDS appears to be brainstorm… I suspect I wrote ‘you’ knowing that it sounded like a letter but didn’t make a mental check of which letter that was! Apologies.

    ‘he had entered’ is an example of a pluperfect (hence the ‘eg’) which is then shortened ‘in short’ to ‘plup.’ and reversed ‘preposterously’ to ‘pulp’.

    E as ‘one on Income Support’ or similar is a favourite vehicle for indicating the most common letter.

    I think the other Qs have been cleared up.
    Paul McK

    1. Thanks Paul, but is the reversal indicator “preposterously”? Surely an anagram indicator? The clue reads “Nonsense in short he had entered e.g. preposterously”. All a bit abstruse if you don’t mind me saying.
  6. Anagram or reversal equally Jim.

    One person’s abstruse is another’s cleverly hidden, I suppose, and an ‘easy’ four-letter word with a blatant def is bound to have an SI where the gloves are off. That said all the parts are there to be had.
    P

    1. I’d never realised exactly where “preposterous” comes from (see C) – now that I know, the reversal/anagram role is perfectly clear.
      1. Yes, we live and learn. Wait for that to come up in the daily!!

        Thanks Paul

  7. Sounds like I had the same experience solving as the rest – got most of it out from definitions over a cup of coffee and a hangover with no dictionaries, and then hunt-and-peck in Chambers (and word wizards) to fill in the gaps. A lot of times it was “that fits the checking letters, shrug, move on”. Thanks for explaining SCARE UP, that was one that definitely went in from definition with no clue of wordplay.

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