Friday, May 28, 2010 (DT 26160)

This puzzle, by Jay, was originally published Wednesday, February 10, 2010 in The Daily Telegraph

Introduction

Oh, I came so close to completing today's puzzle unaided. I finally had to flip open the Tool Chest with only one clue left to solve. It turned out that one little snag stymied me - a snag in a pair of nylons.

Today's Glossary

Some possibly unfamiliar abbreviations, people, places, words and expressions used in today's puzzle

Used in Clues:

form - noun 6 chiefly Brit. a class or year in a school

queen - an unspayed female cat

Used in Solutions:

free house - noun Brit. a public house not controlled by a brewery and therefore not restricted to selling particular brands of beer or liquor

ladder - noun 2 chiefly Brit a long narrow flaw, especially in a stocking, tights or other knitted garment, where a row of stitches has broken; also called run

pence (abbreviation p) - Brit. plural of penny (used for sums of money)

RA - abbreviation 1 (in the UK) Royal Academician or Royal Academy

U² - adjective Brit colloq said especially of language: typical of or acceptable to the upper classes

Today's Links

Prolixic's review of today's puzzle may be found at Big Dave's Crossword Blog [DT 26160].

Commentary on Today's Puzzle

28a Provide food for a couple of queens (5)

The online version of Chambers provides, as one definition of queen, "a large fertile female ant, bee or wasp that lays eggs". Apparently, the unabridged version extends that definition to include cats - although presumably not ones that lay eggs!

8d Means of raising one's pace on a run? (10)

I used a wordfinder to ferret out words matching the checking letters and then needed to undertake further research to figure out why a ladder is a run. Although I have encountered that term before, it seems to have been buried so deeply in my subconscious that the association never popped to mind until I found the meaning in a dictionary. The definition is "means of raising one" with the solution being STEPLADDER. The "'s (apostrophe-s)" is a contraction for "is" and serves as a link-word between the definition and wordplay which is STEP (pace) + (on) LADDER (a run, as in a pair of stockings).

It would appear that where the term ladder is virtually non-existent in North America (we would call it a run), the British may use both terms (with ladder perhaps being the more commonly used).

Signing off for today - Falcon