Guardian 27,198 – Imogen

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Seeing Imogen’s name usually signals a tough puzzle to come, and this was no exception. A few less-familiar words, but most of the clueing is fair and straightforward in retrospect, so no complaints from me. Thanks to Imogen.

 
 
 
 
 
 
Across
1. CAT CAFE Perhaps Siamese, but not Thai food, here? (3,4)
Apparently cat cafés are, as they say, a thing. I think this is basically an extended cryptic definition, with reference to the Thai custom of eating dog meat (which you wouldn’t get at a cat café)
5. SOFA BED Very wonderful edition, which can be folded (4,3)
SO FAB ED
9. RAKED Backed at high price to cover kilometres on a slope (5)
K in reverse of DEAR – K (as opposed to km) for kilometres is often used by runners and cyclists
10. CHILLAXED Took a break, having minor illness: sacked! (9)
CHILL (minor illness) + AXED
11. MONTEZUMA Kicking me out, man un­known: his revenge? (9)
Anagram of ME OUT MAN + Z – Montezuma’s Revenge is a bad reaction to unfamiliar food
12. BARRE At first, railway invested in just sufficient rail (5)
R[ailway] in BARE
13. CLOVE Cavern rent by large split (5)
L in COVE – clove is the past tense of cleave
15. AMORALITY Unprincipled position spoken in friendship (9)
ORAL in AMITY
18. DEFERMENT Putting off the calming of excitement? (9)
DE-FERMENT
19. TACET Time after time, winning card one doesn’t play (5)
T + ACE + T
21. WRYLY With dry wit, his life’s said to be carefree (5)
Homophone of “Riley”, as the proverbially carefree Life of Riley, a phrase whose origin seems to be unknown
23. WAKE‑ROBIN Criminal broke into cart, a bloomer (4-5)
BROKE* in WAIN – a name for various flowers
25. RAM‑RAIDER Violent criminal, a sheep rustler? (3-6)
Double definition
26. PATNA Precisely correct article about source of rice (5)
PAT (precisely correct, as in “down pat”) + reverse of AN
27. PANTHER Gasp — that woman not suitable for 1 across (7)
PANT + HER – presumably one wouldn’t see a panther at a cat café
28. SCOURGE Small bottle gets rid of a torment (7)
S + COUR[A]GE
Down
1. CERAMIC Cup perhaps parted from saucer amicably (7)
Hidden in sauCER AMICably
2. TAKING OFF Aristo seizes a head of state in rising (6,3)
A KING in TOFF
3. ADDLE Rotten way to ride, clear of sides (5)
SIDESADDLE (a way to ride) less SIDES. Apparently addle can be used as an adjective
4. ENCOURAGE Stir up anger about stratagem that finally failed (9)
COU[P] in ENRAGE
5. SPICA Nazi thugs arresting film star (5)
PIC (film) in SA – the Sturmabteilung, the original paramilitary wing of the Nazi party, aka the Brownshirts. Spica is a star in the constellation Virgo – rather an obscure clue, I thought, though fortunately the unchecked letters only involve the familiar PIC
6. FULL BLAST Putting in every effort, drunk at party (4,5)
FULL (drunk) + BLAST (party)
7. BOXER Underwear rebellion? (5)
Double definition
8. DODDERY Decrepit stranger has empty day to fill (7)
ODDER (stranger) in D[a]Y
14. EARLY BATH Ancient city destination for one dismissed? (5,4)
EARLY (ancient) BATH (city) – a footballer who is sent of is said to be taking an early bath
16. OUTSKIRTS Fringes dated on ladies’ clothing (9)
OUT (dated) + SKIRTS
17. INCUBATOR Where Guantanamo’s endlessly wrong — it holds a baby (9)
IN CUBA (where Guantanamo is) + TOR[T]
18. DEWDROP Daughter spreading powder, a blob on the end of her nose? (7)
D + POWDER*
20. TONNAGE Torment breaks character — how much can one bear? (7)
NAG (to torment) in TONE – the second “torment” in the clues, perhaps appropriately for this puzzle…
22. YEMEN Subverting enemy country (5)
ENEMY*
23. WIDER American’s teeth so much cleaner, they say, given dentist’s request? (5)
Approximated American pronunciation of “whiter”
24. REPRO Such furniture needs a bit of care, probably (5)
Hidden in caRE PRObably, and perhaps &lit

55 comments on “Guardian 27,198 – Imogen”

  1. Thanks Imogen and Andrew

    I found this very irritating. My FOI was CALVE (as in icebergs) for 13a – a far better answer than CLOVE. I’d never heard of CAT CAFE. MONTEZUMA doesn’t work as “his revenge” isn’t clued. “Rotten” is surely “addled” rather than ADDLE? Why is BLAST = “party”? BOXER isn’t “underwear” – they are either “boxer shorts” or “boxers”. WIDER a homophone of “whiter” – pleeease!

    I loved WRYLY, though!

  2. I parsed 3d as (S)ADDLE(D) but above is much better. And Chambers does list as an adj. CAT CAFE is not in my old edition-is it in new versions?
    I liked WIDER but 17 was my favourite. Tuesday Toughie!Thanks all.

  3. copmus @2
    “CAT CAFE is not in my old edition-is it in new versions?”

    It’s not in Chambers (13th Ed., 2014) or Collins (12th Ed., 2014) but it is in the ODE (2016).

  4. I found this very difficult but almost doable. I failed to solve 1a even though I had the letters CAT-CA?E. I had never heard of cat cafes – I have two cats so I do not need to go to those places!

    I thought that maybe it means that there is a breed named Siamese cat, but not Thai cat. Eating dog meat is not widespread in Thailand.

    Quite a few new words today, so thank you google and dictionary. I learnt WAKE-ROBIN, CHILLAXED, SPICA, RAM RAIDER, TACET, PATNA and in my online dictionary I found
    ADDLE archaic (of an egg) rotten

    My favourites were DODDERY & SOFA BED.

    Thanks Imogen and Andrew.

  5. I thought WRYLY rang a bell. Here’s Philistine from almost exctly a year ago:
    One’s said to live well in a sarcastic way (5)

  7. muffin @1 – Chambers gives ‘addle’ as adjective as well as verb. 21 across works only a bit creakily; ‘said to be’ seems to suggest a homophone of someone’s life whereas it’s the name of the person, Reilly, who has such a life which is phonetically the same as ‘wryly’

  8. Agree with muffin @1. Unlike Andrew I thought this was barely fairly clued with too many obtuse uses of words.

    Loved 17D though

  9. Thanks Andrew for a splendid blog; michelle @4, there is a Thai cat breed, so I think Andrew’s parsing must be correct.

    Thanks Imogen; I know that these Imogen puzzles will always be difficult but I didn’t really enjoy this as there were too many obscurities. Addle as an adjective is either archaic or an Americanism, I think. I thought 1A must have been cat flap, although it didn’t parse. Wider for whiter seems unlikely, even in America unless it is ‘gangsta-speak.’ I agree with muffin @1 that boxer does not equate to underwear. According to Chambers, WAKE-ROBIN is another name for cuckoo pint, but I doubt many would know it.

    On the positive side, I did enjoy SCOURGE and DODDERY.

  11. Thank you Imogen and Andrew.

    CHILLAXED and EARLY BATH were new to me, as was the star SPICA, I only knew the medical meaning.

    I liked the clues for WRYLY and INCUBATOR, Paul could have had fun with WAKE-ROBIN!

  13. Epeolater @7: isn’t it commonly The Life of Riley, as per Andrew? But the spelling hardly matters, given that it’s a homophone, one of two alongside whiter/wider. These homophones always provoke protests, and I look forward to further such grumpy posts… maybe from the US? Meanwhile, Riley evokes happy memories of the collaboration of Alan Ayckbourn with Frenchman Alain Resnais, his last film
    http://www.showfilmfirst.com/life-riley/
    You have to blow the poster up a long way to read the name of Ayckbourn, not untypically.

  14. This beat me. I revealed CAT CAFE, BOXER, AND SPICA pretty early on. Usually revealing clues makes me kick myself, but not today. A boxer is not an item of underwear. Boxers are.
    I liked WIDER, and ADDLE, as to which I am pretty surprised at the grudging concessions that ‘it can be used as an adjective’.
    I’d go with the Siamese = cat, Thai != cat theory, not the dog meat one(despite someone having unearthed a Thai cat), which is a bit of an unnecessary leap, IMO.
    I put CLAVE instead of CLOVE, originally.
    Thanks, Imogen, Andrew

  15. Robi @ 9

    maybe Imogen will explain what she means by 1a

    I am not convinced by Andrew’s reference to “the Thai custom of eating dog meat”. I live in the region and that is just about the last thing that would come to mind when thinking about Thai food.

    As an example, I can say that in Bali (the so-called “Island of the Gods” where I lived for more than twenty years), there are two villages that are known for their peculiarity of eating dog meat, but that is probably one of the last things people will think of when thinking about Bali.

    I am sure there is a simpler way to parse the clue and solution 🙂

  16. Thanks Andrew.

    Muffin @1 and Robi @9. If the dentist asks you to open wider, and you then say “whiter” with your mouth wide open, it will sound like “wider”.

  17. Thanks for the parsing, Andrew, especially of 3D and 5D, both of which I got but couldn’t justify: I’d never come across “addle” as an adjective or heard of the SA (although certainly heard of the star!).

    My parsing of 1A is a lot simpler: you wouldn’t go to a cat cafe for Thai food.

  18. The homophone in 23D is not any more far-fetched as some of the others I’ve seen; as an American from the northeast, I don’t pronounce WIDER and WHITER exactly the same, but they are close (the difference is mainly that the first vowel is longer in WIDER). People who come from the southeast pronounce them identically, to my ear. Very few Americans distinguish WH from W, and probably even fewer pronounce intervocalic T as a T (it’s technically a “flap,” but sounds pretty much like a D). So: since the homophone was indicated as American, no objections here.

  19. On the basis that complaints and grumbles appear to be the order of the day, I would like to add my view that in relation to !2AC “bare” is not an accurate definition of “just sufficient” (though “bare minimum” certainly would be).

    Nevertheless this was an enjoyable puzzle, with some challenging clues and some words which were entirely new to me ie BARRE, SPICA, TACET and WAKE-ROBIN. Fortunately I did know CHILLAXED which was a significant aid to solving the NE corner.

    Thanks to Imogen and Andrew

  20. A hell of a workout, but eventually got everything apart from OUTSKIRTS. Like others I found a few words obscure (e.g. WAKE-ROBIN, blast = party) but there were enough positives to more than compensate: DEWDROP, WRYLY, DODDERY and CAT CAFE. Many thanks to Imogen and Andrew.

  21. lancsolver @ 19: I also wondered about ‘bare’, but my old Chambers does give a definition as ‘just sufficient’ or something like that.

  22. Plenty of obscure words and usages meant that this was pretty tough. I needed the check button and like muffin I thought of CALVE. I did quite enjoy the challenge.

    Thanks to Imogen and Andrew

  24. Glad it wasn’t just me. Very tough going with a few new words/terms including BARRE, TACET, PATNA and WAKE-ROBIN. I thought the WIDER homophone was fair enough as to my ear many Americans – not the sophisticated northeasterners such as Iroquois @18 of course! – do seem to pronounce a ‘T’ as a ‘D’. Enjoyed MONTEZUMA, EARLY BATH and DODDERY in particular.

    Thanks to Imogen and Andrew.

  25. Very tough and we had to check on one or two. Cat cafes must be a joke, surely! Too many obscure ones to make it a fun puzzle but there you go.

  26. Like James @14, I originally had CLAVE for 13a (archaic past tense of cleave), not being aware of “cove” meaning cavern. I thought a cove was just an inlet (or a chap).

    I hadn’t heard of a CAT CAFE and I’m still not sure how the clue works, despite the various theories above.

    Neither had I heard of WAKE ROBIN, but managed to figure it out. It reminded me of the medieval Robin Hood ballad:

    The woodwele sang and would not cease,
    Sitting upon the spray,
    So loud he wakened Robin Hood
    In the greenwood where he lay.

    I wonder if the poem and the plant’s name have any connection?

    Many thanks to Imogen and Andrew.

  27. According to the OED, the ‘robin’ part of wake-robin is (‘apparently’) from robing = “A trimming in the form of a band or stripe on a gown or robe”, rather than from Robin Hood or, as I guessed, from the bird (whose name comes from the personal name – it was originally just called the Redbreast)

  28. I had CLAVE originally as well but CLOVE was obviously right! This setter is usually tough and this puzzle was no exception but I enjoyed doing this despite having never heard of CAT CAFE and WAKE ROBIN. I struggled with BARRE and TACET although I have heard of the latter. I liked WRYLY and DODDERY.
    Nice puzzle.
    Thanks Imogen.

  29. Thanks to Imogen and Andrew

    This was tough – but I think fair – and I enjoyed it.

    Cat cafes originated in Japan, where my daughter lives and where she goes most Fridays. There is a kitten there named after me (though my real name, not my avatar). Many flats are either too small or forbid pets, which is why they are popular, plus the fact that the Japanese go in for all sorts of themed cafes.

    Wikipedia tells me that dog meat is eaten in parts of Thailand, mostly the North East, but it is not mainstream. I presume Imogen wanted the old and new names for the country.

    I thought of “calve” at first, but it felt too close too cavern to work. After chillaxed and Montezuma I thought that a pangram was in the offing.

    Nice coincidence to have “tacet” after “tutti” yesterday.

  30. Marienkafer@29: We had a cat cafe here in Totnes in Devon, but it closed after a few months. Our daughter also lives in Japan, but I think she steers clear of cat cafes.

  31. Yes, this was tough. I thought BOXER was easy enough and I see it more as a CD because of the BOXER/BOXERS objection above.
    New terms/words for me were CAT CAFE, TACET (I bunged in TACIT out of desperation), BARRE (glad I now know what that ballet bar is called), WAKE-ROBIN and ADDLE as an adjective. Cluing an obscure eatery using a cryptic definition seems too unfair to me. Maybe CAT CAFES are not obscure in Imogen’s world!

    Thanks for the workout, Imogen, and Andrew, for the blog.

    Ha! The Captcha was the answer to Life, the Universe and Everything!

  32. drofle @30 – ditto the dog café near us in Muswell Hill. My daughter has always lived with cats, which is why she goes.

  33. Robi @9- I can attest that, at least in my part of America, “addle” is a verb only. I’d also like to say that to my American ears, “whiter” and “wider” differ by at least three phonemes out of five.

    I also had (and prefer) CALVE for 13.

  34. Thanks to Imogen and Andrew. I’m glad to hear that others found this puzzle difficult, for I found it a big challenge. I only got WAKE-ROBIN because I inadvertently hit the Reveal key (the first time that has happened). I remembered RAM-RAIDER from a previous puzzle but new to me were PATNA, CHILLAXED, SPICA, and CAT CAFE – and I too started with Calve, not CLOVE.

  35. Another puzzle in need of editor.

    I did finish it but only when I realised how poor the cluing actually was! Truly awful! IMHO of course 😉

  36. Andrew @27, you are too inocent, as, apparently, the OED seems to be – you should have clicked on Arum maculatum in your reference, this came up as LORDS AND LADIES in an Everyman crossword last year and muffin pointed out that this plant probably holds the record for the greatest number of common names in Britain.

  38. Thanks for the reference, Cookie, but for me, WAKE-ROBIN is Trillium grandiflorum. We have one in flower at the moment, but we can’t compete with the several hundred that we saw at the Queen.s Saville Gardens a few years ago.

  39. muffin @38, that is a North American (or Asian) plant introduced into the British Isles, WAKE-ROBIN traditionally is another name for Lords and Ladies, and predates this introduction.

  40. Although I usually pass on Imogen’s puzzles, not being well suited to them (mainly because of his unique clueing style and my relatively low level of specialist knowledge), I had an opportunity today to ‘give him another go’.

    Of the 32 clues I thought 10 were excellent and 7 others definitely ok. With some of the remaining 15, I found that I had to try and think of what the setter meant to say rather than what he actually said. It may be just me, but I have experienced this before with this setter.

    There was still enough (more than ‘just sufficient’) to appreciate. My favourite, because it was the most rewarding, was 23a WAKE-ROBIN, which I have never heard of, but I worked it out from a sound clue, with 2 crossers, and it was virtually confirmed by other answers crossing it. (I wish I knew more flora, though.) In the same class as that one was 17d INCUBATOR.

    Thanks to Imogen and Andrew.

  42. I did remember “the cuckoo-pint or wake-robin” from flower books of my childhood – but only after I’d cheated it in desperation. Another CALVE here, though I think if it had really been that you’d have needed some indication of the word’s iceberg-and-glacier connotations. COVE is not a cavern in my book, but an inlet or bay, as JimS says.

  43. Along with Muffin and others I had CALVE (and felt it a more satisfying answer, I think cove for cavern is a stretch). I appreciate some semantic issues with BOXER but for my money it was easy enough to get to overlook those. Loved WRYLY and SOFA BED, and actually laughed out loud at CHILLAXED (though it did mean I started looking for a David Cameron theme!). WAKE-ROBIN and SPICA were new on me – you live and learn. A toughie, excellent in parts. Many thanks Andrew and Imogen.

  45. I was part of the CALVE gang too.
    I loved WRYLY and CERAMIC
    RAM-RAIDER, EARLY BATH and CAT CAFE were new to me, so I googled CAT CAFE and found that there is one in my former home town of San Francisco. I’ll have to go there next time I visit.
    I’d heard the words “wake robin” somewhere but had no idea what it was. I thought it might be a town in the South.
    Cookie’s reference got me to a page that told me in French that I had gone past the number of pages I was authorized to look at. Maybe it works in France.

  46. Plenty of “petty nitpicking and nonsense” here. Yes, Imogen is challenging but as a former crossword editor he knows what he is doing!

  48. If you are Siamese you are either from Siam (Thailand) or a cat. If you are Siamese and not Thai, you must be a cat.

  49. beery hiker @46
    A full day later, I’ve cottoned on to where your quote comes from – the following day’s blog!
    To be fair, I don’t think there is much petty nitpicking here, and it’s a credit to all contributors that the general level of comments is as high as it is. What is worth railing against is sweeping put-downs and insults. They do appear sometimes.
    Saying Imogen “knows what he is doing” is of course two-edged. I venture to say that that was the problem with this crossword – in places. I won’t go into any detail here (in case it’s either petty or nitpicking), but for once I’ve kept my rough notes!
    I’m glad you enjoyed this puzzle.

  50. I often agree with Alan B but on this occasion I echo beery@46 (as I invariably do), whose contribution (a particularly interesting one for those new to this site and perhaps unaware of Imogen’s provenance) was neither a “sweeping put-down” nor an “insult” in my opinion.
    A number of contributors were unhappy with “cove” for “cavern” when a quick check in Chambers would have disabused them of this particular example of “petty nitpicking”.
    4904jhenry@48 saw CAT CAFE as I did. A good clue.
    I had to check SPICA, WAKE-ROBIN and PATNA post solve but each was perfectly clued.
    An enjoyable crossword. Many thanks to Imogen and Andrew.

  51. William F P @50
    Thank you for mentioning me!
    However, I never said that beery hiker’s contribution was either a put-down or an insult, and I can’t see anything in what I wrote that prompted you to imply that I did.
    There was a comment of that nature a little further back, if I remember correctly, and it certainly wasn’t by beery hiker.

  52. Hi Alan – Since the other sentences, before and after the one I cited, all refer directly to @46, surely you can see why it looks that way?
    I trust you’re pleased that my gallantry has enabled you to clarify any possible misunderstanding – albeit unintentional.

  54. Neil
    “Why is coup stratagem ?”

    From Chambers under ‘coup’: “4. A masterstroke, clever and successful stratagem”.

  55. William F P
    Sorry it’s taken me 7 hours to see your response.
    In fact I do not and did not see how my remarks could be interpreted in the way you did, but a friend of mine, on reading our dialogue, mentioned that possibility to me, and I have to accept your innocent reading of what I wrote. I can only apologise for inadvertently misleading you with my comment and for the strong words I used in my reply.
    To be clear, I was agreeing with beery hiker’s comment as a whole but picking up on the two-edged nature of the last phrase of his comment.
    Yes, your gallantry is appreciated! I am all for civility on these pages – as well as the avoidance of misunderstandings.

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