This was a pretty gentle, pleasant offering from Viking with plenty of starter clues (17A, 23A, etc.) to give you a foothold in the puzzle. The vocabulary was on the easy side too with only FLIC needing a look up. An enjoyable workout.
Favourite clues: 25A, 2D, 8D
Across
9 EXEMPLARY MP (politician) in (EARLY)*, after EX (letter i.e. ‘X’).
10 LIEGE EG (for example) in LIE (press, as in “these things lie upon my mind”)
11 UNITISE (TUNE IS)* around I
12 LECTURE E (English) CT (court) in LURE (enticement)
13 NOD DON (fellow), reversed
14 EXTRAPOLATE EXTRA (more) (OP)< LATE (most recent)
17 CACAO Initial letters of ‘Chocolate And Cocoa Are Obtained’, a nice and simple &lit.
18 EMU DEMUR (object) without ‘wings’ i.e. end letters. The emu also happens to be a flightless bird.
19 CADET CA (accountant) DE[b]T (liability, with third letter removed)
21 GROUNDSWELL G (government) ROUNDS (turns) WELL (fortunate). ‘Government turns fortunate’ forms an apt charade for the word.
23 AIR regular letters from ‘AvIaRy’
25 OPEN-AIR (IN OPERA)* &lit. The city of Verona, Italy is home to Verona Arena, the Roman amphitheatre which hosts grand open-air opera performances.
27 BRIGAND RIG (swindle) in BAND (gang)
28 ELATE ALE (long drink) reversed, TE[a]
29 ELECTRIFY ELECT (chosen, as noun), Y (unknown) FIR (tree) reversed
Down
1 RETURN dd
2 PERIODIC (ERIC IPOD)*. Great use of anagrind “shuffle” to go with “iPod”. I admire how Viking has used “See” before “X with Y shuffle” to maintain the grammar.
3 UPSIDE-DOWN DOWN (reversal of fortune), after UP (winning) SIDE (team)
4 RAVE GRAVE (solemn) – G (good)
5 MY PLEASURE MY PLEA (one’s request) SURE (firm)
6 FLIC FLIC[k] (The Pink Panther works as definition by example)
7 BELUGA LUG (drag) in BEA[m] (most of support). Beluga is highly prized for beluga caviar.
8 VEHEMENT HE-MEN (macho types) in VET (check)
15 TREASURIES (A SURE)* in TRIES (attempts)
16 OCCULTISTS CULT (sect) in (STOICS)*
17 COGNOMEN NO MEN (only women) below COG (important person in organization?). Isn’t COG an unimportant person in organization?
20 DRAMATIC (ADMIT CAR)*
22 ONE-MAN ON (against) NAME (celebrity), reversed
24 RED-EYE E[radicated] in RE-DYE (further tint)
26 AVER SAVER (depositor) – S
27 BRED sounds like ‘bread’ (money)
Thanks shuchi, as you say, a bit of a stroll.
If you remove a cog, the whole machine can stop, hence I always understood the meaning to be a small but important part?
Solved 6D from the shortened film, but like you had to look up a reference to an obscure 70’s film I’d never heard of?
Hi Ferret
17d: I checked Chambers to confirm, the definition is “an unimportant person in a large organization”.
6d: I thought The Pink Panther was quite popular, especially after being remade recently with Steve Martin playing Clouseau. At least, the film is well-known in India as the actress Aishwarya Rai has a role in it :).
Thanks shuchi, for blogging this friendly crossword.
My brains don’t really hurt after solving it.
Although it doesn’t make any difference at all, I had BEA (in 7d) as short for BEA[r] (support).
The ‘long drink’ in ELATE had to be ‘ale’, but I have always thought that a ‘long drink’ was non-alcoholic [which Collins Online seems to confirm], although Cambridge Dictionaries Online says: “a cold drink served in a tall glass, often mixed with alcohol” – which is still not the same as a glass of beer.
But then (my) Chambers: ‘long’ = “said of a cold drink: large and thirst-quenching”.
Maybe, I have been wrong all my life?
[I don’t think Viking means ‘long’ from a construction POV as opposite to ‘short’ (= missing the last letter (in ‘te[a]’) – or does he?]
Sil
A drink doesn’t come much longer than a yard?
I apologise for the “cog” issue, which was a mistranscription. I suspect it may have been Freudian, since it makes the rather unconvincing surface reading a little stronger.
As to the length of a drink, the intended reference was to what is known, here in Scotland, as “a nip and a pint”, the [short] nip a “chaser” for the [long?] pint.
Viking
Thanks shuchi.
I found this easier than a lot of Viking’s puzzles,but no less enjoyable.Some very nice matching of surfaces to answers e.g. emu.Also excellent @lit at 25 across.
Notwithstanding Viking’s explanation for 28 across,I had the same reading as Ferret,which,I think, works pretty well.
Re. 6 down – I knew from the film “Un Flic”(to which I think Ferret was referring).
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0067900/
I thought 6d was the French slang word for a cop – “flic”. Isn’t it a bit unfair to have a French word that is not normally used in Anglophonia