Saturday, August 1, 2009 - Who's missing?

Introduction

Today's puzzle by Cox and Rathvon has poets, spies, Greeks, actors, soldiers, royalty, seamstresses, musicians, and parliamentarians among others - so, who's missing?

Commentary on Today's Puzzle

13ac Letter penned by Greek apparently (5)

A clue having a very nice surface reading, with "penned by" actually serving as a hidden word indicator. However, I initially missed this wordplay and my first choice of ALPHA as a solution considerably delayed me in completing the bottom left-hand corner.

5d Choose what a chipper uses (4)

While not entirely confident with my interpretation, I have concluded that "chipper" may refer to someone who chips ice (as with an ice pick).

13d Vocally criticize lousiest sausage (10)

If the solution to this clue were KNOCKWURST, it would be an excellent homophone. However, my ear finds the actual solution, KNACKWURST, to be just a bit iffy.

25d Something sweet in the extremes of kinkiness (4)

While "the extremes of a (word)" often indicate the first and last letter of the word, the setters today use it to indicate the first two and last two letters of the word.

On the subject of candy kisses, although Hershey's chocolate kisses seem to be ubiquitous on the Internet, I tend to think of the candy kisses that I received as a young trick-or-treater at Halloween which were a molasses candy having a toffee-like consistency.

Solution to Today's Puzzle

Legend:	"CD" Cryptic Definition; "DD" Double Definition
	"*" anagram; "~" sounds like; "<" letters reversed
	"( )" letters inserted; "_" letters deleted

Across

9ac K_|HAY|YAM - debut (first letter) of [K]eats

10ac _IKE|BANA_ - somewhat l[IKE BANA]nas

11ac {SO TO SPEAK}* - {SPOOKS EAT}* {bananas}

12ac SKI|FF - obviously water skiing

13ac _KAPPA_ - penned by gree[K APPA]arently

14ac SICK LE|AVE

16ac ALA(SKA)N - Mr. Thicke: Canadian actor Alan Thicke

18ac B(ASK)ETS - hoops: the game of basketball

20ac KNOTHOLES~ - in conversation (sounds like) NOT WHOLES

22ac A|R|KIN - acting family: American actor Alan Arkin and actor sons Adam, Anthony and Matthew

24ac U(MIA)K - Umiak: Inuit boat; MIA: Missing In Action

25ac K(VETCH)ING

27ac S(K)EWERS - fourth (letter) of hocKey

28ac K(ITCH)EN

Down

1d _UKES - d[UKES] except for the first (letter)

2d RA(GTO)P

3d E|YES|TALK

4d IMPERSONAL* - {PRISON MEAL}* unfortunately

5d PICK

6d W|EASEL

7d KAMIKAZE~ - sounding (sounds like) COMIC OZZY; Osbourne: English singer-songwriter Ozzy Osbourne

8d {HALF NELSON}* - {ON SHELL FAN}* excitedly; half nelson: wrestling hold

13d KNACKWURST~ - vocally (sounds like) KNOCK WORST (maybe)

15d {CUBE STEAKS}* - confused {BEE SUCKS AT}*; cube steak: a thin slice of beef tenderized by cubing (tenderizing by breaking the fibers with superficial cuts in a pattern of squares)

17d ATOMIZER* - cured {MAIZE ROT}*

19d SCAR|CITY

21d H(OKIE)R - homer: home run (HR); Okie: originally a name for a resident of Oklahoma, in the 1930's it came to be applied generally to migrants fleeing the Dust Bowl

23d KNIGHT~ - speaker's (sounds like) NIGHT

25d KI_SS - the extremes of [KI]nkine[SS]; kiss: a type of candy

26d G|ONE

And now I'm gone for today - Falcon