Mephisto 2821 – Tim Moorey

Sorry for being tardy in posting this one – I was in rehearsals all of last week and didn’t get a chance to solve this until after opening night. There’s a matinee today so I have a little bit of time to write this up.

I found this trickier than recent Mephistos but I was my own worst enemy, being convinced that the parsing of 5 made HUMMOCK instead of BUMMOCK that 35 across was S,TRAINING, and that maybe Scottish was some form of amusing anagram indicator and it was MEERKAT instead of MEERCAT. If there’s a trap ahead, I will gleefully leap right on into it!

Away we go!

Across
1	OSNABRUCK: CURB,A,N,S(series) all reveresed in OK
11	M1,URUS: the definition begins at “lines”
12	S,LILY
13	OTTO: MOTTO(device) without the M(medium)
14	MESHUGGA: HUG in (GAMES)* – I live in a part of the US where you don’t hear much Yiddish and it’s a pity, there’s some great Yiddish phrases
15	CHASMY: AS in CH and M(ostl)Y, an all-in-one
16	ATMAN: VAT MAN without V
17	D,(g)IZZARD
19	ANTACID: A,(CANT)*,I.D.
24	MEERCAT: E(cologists) in MERCAT
26	DECRYPT: CRY in DEPT
28	LATED: anagram of (wil)L,DATE
30	PA,LATE
31	EVANGELY: VAN in EG, then ELY
32	E,MIT: that’s Cambridge just outside of Boston
33	RONIN: R(take) then ONION(crown) missing an O
34	SEA BAT: AB in SEAT
35	CHA,PER ONE
Down
2	SITHENCE: anagram of CHINESE,(restauran)T
3	NUT,A,N(u)T
4	A,ROSE(tea)
5	BUMMOCK: B for H in HUMMOCK
6	UN,SPIDE(r): the last part coming from the spider rest in pool/snooker – there’s a rather offensive term for it in Australia
7	KLUTZY: LUTZ in KY(Kentucky)
8	GIGMAN: anagram of MANAGING without A,N
9	OLGA: AGLO(w) reversed
10	WYANDOTTE: (N,WAY)* then DOTTE(d) – never seen HIT meaning DOTTED but it’s down as a slang term in Chambers
15	CHANDLERY: HANDLER in CY
18	RHAETIAN: R,(IN,A,HEAT)*
20	I’M PRES,A
21	FEDAYEE: FED then AYE over E(base)
22	OCT,ANS
23	IRE,NIC(Nicaragua)
25	CRAM,BO(w)
27	BLEAR: B then EARL with the L raised
29	(d)AVOS: oh, great, just after I’ve figured out KLOSTERS as a resort there’s also a DAVOS KLOSTERS?