Mini crossword No 261

Very clever and tricksy! Faves: 1a,8a (made me laugh) and 3d

Thanks tpg. Very clever theme which went over my head of course 😄

Very nice, some very neat surfaces and pleasing solves! Tricksy use of elisions (without) is a perfectly valid clueing-style choice. However, I feel that even unelided "walking with out" would be a stretch: if someone wanted to express this sense in the real world, I think there'd need to be commas or brackets around "with out". That said, each ecosystem has its rules, this may be fine in yours! Thanks!

Haha, I twigged the 'trick' before the end (I once did a similar thing with faux-anagrinds) and had fun along the way. 8a surface is hilarious 😆 Nice save on the update to 7a too. One tiny thing: your 1a note has an extra letter mentioned (clue is fine, just the note needs updating)

8a is great! COTD closely followed by 5a! Theme passed me by! Thanks - good fun