Times 25826 - Off to an easy start....

Solving time: 58 minutes

Music: Resphigi, Ancient Airs and Dances, Dorati/HPhil






This puzzle should not have taken as long as it did. I put in most of it in twenty minutes, only to get most thoroughly stuck. It was mostly the SW corner that did it, where I could not get a single thing until I realized Caliban must be an 'islander'.

This is my second week in a row on the Monday blog, as I will not be around for the holiday weekend and so have swapped with Ulaca, who gets the next two. I will be out of town, and probably out of touch with the puzzles and that sort of thing, for about a week.

Across
1	PARISIAN, PARIS + IAN, quite easy if you know who Priam's son is.
5	SLEAZE, S + L(E)AZE.
9	FAD, every other letter in F[r]A[u]D[s].
10	SATISFIABLE, anagram of BASE, IT FAILS.
12	LOCKER ROOM, LOCKE + R[un] + MOOR backwards. I can never remember Locke, and he pops up quite often.
13	ITCH, [d]ITCH. I couldn't parse this for the longest time, then saw it.
15	BEHALF, BE HALF, or on someone's BEHALF.
16	THEOREM, THE(O[ld] R.E.)M. At first I thought the soldiers were O.R., but that doesn't work.
18	SPECIES, SPEC(I E[xtolled])S.
20	EGOIST, E.G. + O + anagram of IT'S.
23	ARCH, A(R.C.)H, an surprisingly elaborate clue for such a short word.
24	DISPOSSESS, D.I.'S POSSE + S, S.
26	DUAL CONTROL, sounds like DUEL + CONTROL, which is not actually spelled out on your CNTL key, is it?
27	AXE, EXA[m] backwards.
28	REMAND, RE(MAN)D. 'In the red' for owing or in debt is a common trick.
29	ADHERENT, A D[uke] HERE N.T. A compendium of cryptic cliches.
Down
1	PIFFLE, PI(F,F)LE, my first in.
2	RADICLE, R.A. DIC(L)E. I tried to use 'dare' for a while, then saw the answer from the literal.
3	SYSTEMATIC, anagram MESSY ACT, IT.
4	AFTER A FASHION, double definition, one rather literal-minded. It took me a long time to think of this, although it was on the tip of my brain.
6	LAID, DIAL upside down.
7	ARBITER, A ([c]R[ufts] BITER. Crufts is the UK dog show.
8	EYE RHYME, cryptic definition by example. My last in after going through the alphabet, and I've blogged it before! Same sort of clue, too. See puzzle 24515, April 19, 2010.
11	SHORT-TEMPERED, SHORT + TEMPERED in different senses.
14	DEMOISELLE, DE MO(I)SELLE, where 'single' = 'I'. A very clever clue that was tough to crack.
17	ISLANDER, anagram of IN LEAR'S + [moul]D. Better Caliban than a goalie, I suppose.
19	EXCLAIM, EX-CLA(I)M.
21	SEEPAGE, SEE PAGE ??.
22	ASSERT, TRESS + A, all upside down
25	ICON, double definition.