Saturday, October 28, 2017 — Trick or Treat

Introduction

Today's puzzle from Cox & Rathvon has an appropriate seasonal theme. While it was a treat to solve, it contains a couple of tricky solutions. After deciphering the guide at 10a from the wordplay, I recalled having encountered him on a previous journey through Crosswordland. It seems that the old cat at 26a was new to most of us. While I was able to correctly guess the correct arrangement of letters, I needed to consult my dictionary to confirm that my solution was correct.

As we are also in the midst of the World Series, it is only fitting that the puzzle also contains one hit and at least one error — maybe more.

I invite you to leave a comment to let us know how you fared with the puzzle.

Solution to Today's Puzzle

Falcon's Experience ┌────┬────┬────┬────┬────┬────┬────┐ ███████████████████████████████████ └────┴────┴────┴────┴────┴────┴────┘ Legend: █ - solved without assistance █ - incorrect prior to use of puzzle solving tools █ - solved with assistance from puzzle solving tools █ - solved with aid of checking letters provided by puzzle solving tools █ - solved but without fully parsing the clue █ - yet to be solved

Legend:	"*" anagram; "~" sounds like; "<" letters reversed
	"( )" letters inserted; "_" letters deleted; "†" explicit in the clue
	Primary indications (definitions) are marked with a solid underline in the clue; subsidiary indications (be they wordplay or other) are marked with a dashed underline in semi-all-in-one (semi-&lit.) clues. All-in-one (&lit.) clues and cryptic definitions — including whimsical and vague definitions — are marked with a dotted underline. Explicit link words and phrases are enclosed in forward slashes (/link/) and implicit links are shown as double forward slashes (//).

Across

1a   Lose sight /of/ Halloween creature at onset of dusk (2,5)

GO BLIN|D — GOBLIN (Halloween creature) + (at) D (onset [initial letter] of Dusk)

5a   Device for dispensing family/’s/ Halloween item (7)

PUMP|KIN — PUMP (device for dispensing) + KIN (family)

9a   Candy // we put into collection (5)

S(WE)ET — WE (†) contained in (put into) SET (collection)

10a   Guides // witches carrying diamonds (9)

C(ICE)RONES — CRONES (witches) containing (carrying) ICE (diamonds)

A cicerone^*[5] is a guide who gives information about places of interest to sightseers.

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^* The word cicerone — which comes to English from Italian — derives from the name of  Roman statesman, orator, and writer Marcus Tullius Cicero (106–43 BC), apparently alluding humorously to his eloquence and learning.

11a   Witch’s heart kept in dreadful, // secret places (8)

HIDEOU(T)S — T (witch's heart; middle letter [heart] of wiTch) contained in (kept in) HIDEOUS (dreadful)

12a   Maid // blocks the course of pair of elves (6)

DAMS|EL — DAMS (blocks the course of) + EL (pair [initial two letters] of ELves)

Before getting my hands on the right maid, I will admit that I checked the dictionary to see if BARSEL might possibly be a word.

14a   Big // heads of lizards and rats grinning evilly (5)

L_|A_|R_|G_|E_ — initial letters (heads) of Lizards And Rats Grinning Evilly

16a   Candy // medicine comes back in circular shapes (9)

LO(LLIP<)OPS — reversal (comes back) of PILL (medicine) contained in (in) LOOPS (circular shapes)

18a   Rita strangely captivated by skeleton // choir voices (9)

B(ARIT*)ONES — anagram (strangely) of RITA contained in (captivated by) BONES (skeletons)

19a   Mafia boss, or // angel? (5)

DON|OR — DON (Mafia boss) + OR (†)

21a   One wizard’s // representations (6)

I|MAGE|S — I ([Roman numeral for] one) + MAGE (wizard) + S ('s)

23a   Spook // directly inside swamp (8)

F(RIGHT)EN — RIGHT (directly) contained in (inside) FEN (swamp)

26a   Cat /or/ mink: a girl in disguise (9)

GRIMALKIN* — anagram (in disguise) of MINK A GIRL

Grimalkin^*[5] is an archaic term for a cat (or a spiteful old woman).

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^* This term from the 16th century derives from grey + Malkin (pet form of the given name Matilda).

27a   Black-clad warrior // among children in jackets (5)

_N|IN|JA_ — hidden in (among) childreN IN JAckets

28a   Colour /of/ mint Peg chewed up (7)

PIGMENT* — anagram (chewed up) of MINT PEG

29a   Notice the scarecrow’s face // is angry (7)

SEE|THE|S — SEE (notice) + THE (†) + S (Scarecrow's face [initial letter])

Down

1d   Young lady collecting part of London/’s/ fuel (7)

GA(SOHO)L — GAL (young lady) containing (collecting) SOHO (part of London)

Soho^*[7] is an area of the City of Westminster and part of the West End of London. Long established as an entertainment district, for much of the 20th century Soho had a reputation for sex shops as well as night life and film industry. Since the early 1980s, the area has undergone considerable transformation. It now is predominantly a fashionable district of upmarket restaurants and media offices, with only a small remnant of sex industry venues.

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^* The name Soho^[5] dates to the mid 17th cenury and probably derives from the old word soho, used as a hunting cry: the area was a royal park in Tudor times.

The setters could just as well used "... part of New York ..." in the clue.

SoHo^[5] is an area of Manhattan, New York City.

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^* SoHo is an abbreviation that derives from SOuth of HOuston Street.

2d   Money // raised by word of mouth (5)

BREAD~ — sounds like (by word of mouth) BRED (raised)

3d   Pirate covered in bizarre tint /is/ someone shy (9)

INT(ROVER)T — ROVER (pirate) contained in (covered in) anagram (bizarre) of TINT

Rover^[5] is an archaic term for a pirate.

4d   Lend cash to sports /for/ Olympic events (10)

DECATHLONS* — anagram (sports; verb meaning 'frolics') of LEND CASH TO

5d   Select // miner’s tool (4)

PICK — double definition

6d   Broadcast in the morning brought back // West Side Story song (5)

{MA|RIA}< — reversal (brought back) of {AIR (broadcast) + AM (in the morning)}

"Maria"^[7] is a song from the Broadway musical West Side Story. The music was written by Leonard Bernstein and the lyrics are by Stephen Sondheim. The song was published in 1956. "Maria" is sung by the male lead Tony when he learns the name of the girl he's fallen in love with is "Maria". The name "Maria" is spoken or sung in the song 27 times.

7d   Know Sting swirled // West Indian port (9)

KINGSTOWN* — anagram (swirled) of KNOW STING

Kingstown^[7] is the capital, chief port, and main commercial centre of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines.

8d   Settles comfortably // in greenest Lesotho (7)

_NEST|LES_ — hidden in (in) greeNEST LESotho

13d   Outside shed, crackpots // unite defensively (5,5)

C(LOSE) RANKS — CRANKS (crackpots) containing (outside) LOSE (shed)

15d   Again perusing // note in city on the Thames (9)

RE(RE)ADING — RE ([musical] note) contained in (in) READING (city on the Thames)

Reading^[5] is a town in Berkshire, southern England, on the River Kennet near its junction with the Thames.

17d   Popular gambling activity maintains general // poverty (9)

IN|DI(GEN)CE — IN (popular) + DICE (gambling activity) containing (maintains) GEN (general; abbrev. for military rank)

18d   Mention // second-rate telephone (5,2)

B|RING UP — B (second-rate) + RING UP (telephone)

20d   Antlers all over // some vacation cabins (7)

RENTALS* — anagram (all over) of ANTLERS

22d   Delete // Times error (5)

ERAS|E — ERAS (times) + E (error; abbrev. used in baseball)

Scratching the Surface
In the surface reading, the capitalized "Times" could refer to any of a number of newspapers around the world bearing this name, some of the more prominent being those published in London, New York, and Los Angeles.

24d   Camp dwelling hit at the end /of/ a decade? (5)

TENT|H — TENT (camp dwelling) followed by (at the end) H (hit; abbrev. used in baseball)

A decade is a group or series of ten, but none of my dictionaries define it as meaning a tenth. Might the setters have confused decade with decile^[5] which, in statistics, is each of ten equal groups into which a population can be divided according to the distribution of values of a particular variable ⇒ the lowest income decile of the population.

25d   Sketch // small set of tools (4)

S|KIT — S (small; abbrev.) KIT (set of tools)

Epilogue

Enjoy your trick or treating.

Key to Reference Sources: 

^[1]   - The Chambers Dictionary, 11th Edition
^[2]   - Search Chambers - (Chambers 21st Century Dictionary)
^[3]   - TheFreeDictionary.com (American Heritage Dictionary)
^[4]   - TheFreeDictionary.com (Collins English Dictionary)
^[5]   - Oxford Dictionaries (Oxford Dictionary of English)
^[6]   - Oxford Dictionaries (Oxford American Dictionary)
^[7]   - Wikipedia
^[8]   - Reverso Online Dictionary (Collins French-English Dictionary)
^[9]   - Infoplease (Random House Unabridged Dictionary)
^[10] - CollinsDictionary.com (Collins English Dictionary)
^[11] - TheFreeDictionary.com (Random House Kernerman Webster's College Dictionary)
^[12] - CollinsDictionary.com (Webster’s New World College Dictionary)
^[13] - MacmillanDictionary.com (Macmillan Dictionary)

Signing off for today — Falcon