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Diabolically Arcane

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Clue Heaven

5 July, 2013

What a blissful week of British crosswords. Have you been indulging? I’d rate this week’s Arachne and Loroso (FT) as being two of the finest tussles for quite a stretch. In case you’ve lacked the time – or tipoff – then here are X divine clues (to solve) and a handful of spoiler huhs from Arachne (and others) to answer.

ARACHNE

  1. Marvellous Madoff? (5-5)

  2. Transform an annoying person into a B-lister? (9)

  3. Two English animals on the loose in Pacific region (9)

  4. Diplomat’s encouragement of revolutionary? (7)

  5. Altogether fascinated by muscle reflex (2,5)

LOROSO

  1. Moving? What, moving walls? (9)

  2. Plug fitted in upright base (8)

  3. Wicket taken by present bowler? Well? (4,4)

  4. Entering temple, hostage turns as I swear (2,4,2)

  5. Perhaps stripper, fighting back, has to get rid off going topless (3,6)

HUHS

  1. Removing meat from menu, serves exceptional seafood = MUSSEL

  2. Ban is such as to make one fearful = UNMAN

  3. Cap in hand over foreign money, a beast picking over carcasses = HYENA

  4. Relating to heart and – say – club correlation? = CARDIAC

  5. Boring with Mandela in charge? = PROSAIC

Can you answer the golden clues? Can you explain the opaque clues? Can you draft snazzy clues for any of these 15 answers? We shall see.

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Riddledom Rave

If you missed my riddle chat with Richard Fidler, then feel free to slurp the podcast at http://ab.co/1I9t1x5

Text-speak is creeping into Scrabble. Where do you sit?
OBVS I'm fine with it
Entrenched stuff - like LOL and OMG - but no more.
Words With Friends, maybe. Scrabble, no
Let the 'real' dictionaries decide first
Just the handy stuff, like FAQ and EUW
I mean, WTF?! No way
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