Crossword Help Forum
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Plumb
Americans say things like Plumb Crazy when they mean "Quite" mad.
Plum = the best +
B(ook)

Most of your questions answered in my last post above.

To add: LOCK gives me the final L of UPHILL for Jack.

You have cracked it! Brilliant. All finished now. I am assuming PLUMB is correct as what else would fit? So I'm happy. It's been driving me mad. THank you.

that was an "Uphill" struggle but enjoyable.

I thought it was PLUMB early on and checked the various meanings in the dictionary but it was pushed out of the picture with BEETLE which gave a middle E instead of a middle U.

Incidentally, BEETLE is a short mallet-type thing for pounding, BEETLE is a game and BEETLE-headed means simple, stupid etc. So BEETLE seemed to stake a strong legitimate claim. And that was the problem and the obstacle that made the rest impossible to solve!