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Word Salad.
ACROSS
1 Abusive language in Montana scandal? (12)
8 Ridiculous, absurd, lacking one bit of intelligence! (9)
9 Doctor’s dog at doctor’s workplace (5)
11 Schemer gestures, exhibiting surfaces (7)
12 When you speak, dropping a vowel sound is heavenly (7)
13 Damage demonic appearance? (6)
15 Paid to release South African money, with a portion invested (8)
18 Present exotic tea bowls (8)
19 For example, masculine king from the East! (6)
21 Aiming to get rid of $1000 drug (7)
23 Jar sound equipment at dance (7)
25 500 or 1000 residents, ultimately, in student housing (5)
26 Finally, Martha Washington covered by above-average celebrity tribute on television (9)
27 Hypercritical types—seismologists, perhaps? (12)
DOWN
1 Notice location of ammunition towards the center of a boat (8,5)
2 For instance, plaything almost put up in house (5)
3 In part of machine, a bug: wheel is not readily identifiable (9)
4 Shrinkage seen between the edges of grimy photo (6)
5 “It makes the car go,” Unser said with difficulty (3,5)
6 Sticky and sharp? (5)
7 What slow cowboys do in early Westerns: snack (5,3)
10 Mathematician-philosopher misplaced decent erasers (4,9)
14 Fathers display travel document (8)
16 Very softly, editor interrupted Gertrude and intervened (7,2)
17 Anthropophagus is able to point a laser at first (8)
20 Replay of fastball reveals reduction in force (6)
22 Jamaican, possibly, exalting a once-powerful Russian (5)
24 Love wise Native American (5)
ACROSS 1 hidden 4 A(VAIL)ABLE
9 anag. 10 WOR(R + I.E.)D 11 anag. 12 L + OUD 15 phonetic hidden
16 PATH + ETIC (cite rev.) 18 [p]RESIDENT 20 TRA + DER (rev.)
23 YAM + S (rev.) 24 pun 26 [m]OBS + CURE 27 CHI + ANTI 28 2 defs.
29 hidden
DOWN 1 PEPPERS + P + RAY 2 LEA + FIER (fire anag.) 3 anag. 4 AF + RAID 5 A + SWELL + A’S 6 2 defs.
7 B(AIL)OUT 13 anag. 14 P(HARM)ACIES (I space anag.) 17 2 defs.
19 SIM(P.S.)ON 21 DE[s]IGNED
22 CIRC + US (cric[k] rev.) 25 pun
26 & 8 opposites
Joshua Kosman and Henri PicciottoJoshua Kosman and Henri Picciotto are The Nation’s puzzlers. To read more about Kosman, click here. To read more about Picciotto, click here. Kosman and Picciotto explain what they’re up to in “Solving The Nation’s Cryptic Crosswords” (also available as a PDF). Check out The Nation’s Current Issue page each week for the latest puzzle.