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Enjoyed this one - and learned a lot! But would appreciate help with parsing three answers
39a. Speaking is a habit that’s lost nowadays - diction, but why?
44a. Unknown person in crazy area that has banned unknowns- anyone? But why?
12d. Hard day cutting leather climber’s item up in a high base - hexadecimal ( new one on us!) but why?
Thanks, everyone.

39 Addiction would be a habit - drop the Ad/AD, nowadays.

44 Z any Z one.

Sorry, and AD = nowadays, Anno Domini, 2019 AD, rather than 123BC.

Brilliant! Thanks so much, Malone.

12 H, hard, D, day, Lam, leather (wallop, hit etc) + Ice Axe (climber's item, those two go up ,( 'up' in clue). H exa d eci mal.


Glad I could help.

H (hard) + [ d (day) in ((lam + iceaxe) reversed)]
Lam (leather as in beat hard).

Hi malone, your post wasn't there when my Homer like big fat finger's slow typing began.

Thanks, both. That was hard!

Philm, glad we could help - what a lot of parsing involved in that one!

Ginge, when I tackled the first two clues, I hoped someone would deal with the third… You'll have to speed up a bit, just so you can make my life easier!