Mephisto 2707 – Tim Moorey

Author   glhPosted on Categories Mephisto
I hope you were all close by a dictionary when you started this. I was a long way from home and didn’t have my Chambers or Bradfords and did not get far at all on a first few readings through. Tricky wordplay and many many unfamiliar words, especially on my plane of learning.

In the end I think I’ve got it all worked out.

Away we go…

Across
1 HEASTE: Take the beginning letters away from CHE(revolutionary), CASTE(class)
5 ROOF,1,E: Rohypnol, a date rape drug. Don’t let your drink out of the sight of Mr. Moorey!
9 ACTUARIALLY: ARI(a) in ACTUALLY
11 PRUSSIATE: RUSSIA in PTE(private) – a chaser for your roofie perhaps?
12 TRIPS: SPIRT(fine jet reversed) – more chasers for your roofie?
13 AT(standing by),A(soldier),MAN(general)
14 MISES: replace the O in Grandma MOSES with an I
18 MUDS,TONE
19 LIEGEMAN: GEM,A in LIEN
21 F,RAGS: meaning 2 for RAG in Chambers
22 ANTI,AR: AR for Army Regulation was a new one to me, but it’s in Chambers
24 WONGA: AG(silver), NOW all reversed. Chambers has “Money, origin unknown”. Wonder who uses WONGA for money?
26 STILLIONS: STILL(without moving), then take ON from ONIONS(heads) – definition is just STANDS
27 FLAT-EARTHER: (TALE)* in FARTHER
28 AZERIS: (ZAIRE’S)*
29 BAYERN: AYE in BR,N
 
Down
1 HA’IT: HABIT with the middle removed
2 ECCRISIS: or an EC(European Community) CRISIS
3 SUPPE(r),AGO
4 (p)ERU,V
5 RISALDAR: anagram of RR(two rules),AS,LAID
6 OASTS: every third letter in scOtlAnd SorTieS
7 FLAMBOYANT: anagram of F,NOTABLY around A,M(asterly)
8 E,VENTERS: VENT for publish was new to me but it’s in Bradfords
10 BISSEXTILE: anagram of (IS,EXTENDIBLE,SO – ONE,D) and this year is a leap year
14 MALVASIA: MAL(sickness),ASIA(continent) catching V(small number)
15 DUM(b),FRIES(chips)
16 STAROSTY: (SORT)* in STAY(temporary residence)
17 S,NIGGLER(fusspot)
20 BALTI: Take the C from the end of BALTIC(cold)
23 JOAB: A in JOB. My last in, figured that would be it from wordplay, but had to google to confirm that JOAB was the prince of the army
25 AIR,N(nationalist)

7 comments on “Mephisto 2707 – Tim Moorey”

  1. An excellent Mephisto I thought with plenty to get ones teeth into. Always good to see mention of those statistical wizards the actuaries.

    Wonga is now the name of one of these “salary advance” lenders which have replaced pawn brokers and some of which are attracting some bad publicity for usurous practices and lax overall management.

    1. As well as the loan company that you can’t miss in UK commercial TV at the moment, wonga is slang which I’ve heard in real life. When I ran for North London AC (now absorbed by merger), you were expected to pay 20p or so for a shower in the changing rooms after cross-country training on Hampstead Heath. The club official responsible for reminding you about this always called it “water wonga”.
      1. Accorging to this WONGA is a London term. It was certainly familiar to me.
        Apparently the most popular terms for money in the UK are: 1. Dosh, 2. Dough, 3. Readies, 4. Brass, 5. Bread, 6. Wad, 7. Lolly, 8. Wedge, 9. Wonga, 10. Moolah.
  2. Chambers dictionary has three numbered headwords for “rag”. The second one is the one that matches “rag week”, and this one also has an intransitive verb meaning – “ to wrangle, argue”.

    Peter Biddlecombe, Sunday Times Crosword Editor

  3. Solving without aids, I made rather heavy weather of this, and eventually had to give up on 1ac (HEASTE), which was annoyingly obvious once I resorted to TEA and Chambers. I was amused by 27ac, writing down FLATEARTHER from the checked letters and wordplay and thinking “surely that’s not a word, let alone a type of dinosaur”, before light dawned.

    This was my first Tim Moorey Mephisto, indeed my first Mephisto for quite some time, and I enjoyed it despite finding it tough. How long do we have to wait, though, before the Times Crossword Club allows members to solve Mephisto online? (If they also allowed members to submit Mephisto prize entries online, that would at least overtake the Guardian’s website which allows online solving, but not submission, of Azed puzzles. BTW, I see that I can e-mail my solution to [email protected], but I’m not sure what form it should take.)

    1. Online Mephisto is on a list of desired changes. E-mail entries can contain the answers in text, or any attachment in a common format – a photo or scan of the completed grid, or a hand-made grid in Word or Excel.
  4. Not much to say about this, other than that I enjoyed it and didn’t find it unusually difficult. Just very difficult as usual!

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