Cryptic crossword No 29,754 by Imogen

by

Imogen gets the grey cells working this morning.

After about ten minutes, I had a couple of answers in place and a couple more unparsed possible solutions, and I thought I was going to have to use "reveal" to get things going, but a little perseverence and sorting out the long anagrams gave me the crossers I need to get all bar the SE corner completed. I then hit a brick wall with common crossing letters until I worked out the "just past the point" bit of the clue for TENTHS, which left me with two clues left. I'm not sure where I dragged STABLE from, but that meant that the last solution had to be BAIZE. This was tough, but everything was fair and cleverly clued, although I have to admit to looking up DING as I had never heard of him.

Thanks, Imogen.

ACROSS
1 LIME PIT
Hide here to remove hair, and engage at last in feeble sex (4,3)

(engag)E [at last] in LIMP ("feeble") + IT ("sex")

A lime pit was traditionally used by tanners to remove hair from hides.
5 TIDINGS
News: it’s about former chess champion (7)

'TIS ("it's") about DING (Liren) ("former chess champion")

Chinese grandmaster Ding Liren was the World Chess Champion in 2023-24.
9 GI JOE
Dance around home regularly and grunt (2,3)

<=JIG ("dance", around) + (h)O(m)E [regularly]
10 RHEUMATIC
Aching, distress me with haircut (9)

*(me haircut) [anag:distress]
11 ORGANISED CRIME
Misdoing career, getting involved in this (9,5)

*(misdoing career) [anag:getting involved]
13 SITE
Where to build small unit, a metre short (4)

S (small) + ITE(m) ("unit"), a M (metre) short
14 ENMESHED
Point dropped after men smashed and netted (8)

E (east, so "point") + SHED ("dropped") after *(men) [anag:smashed]
17 REVEALED
Shown to have been given another escalope? (8)

RE- (indicating "another") + VEALED ("given (veal) escalope")
18 STAN
Laurel back in several Asian republics (4)

STAN is first name of the film comedian Stan Laurel and is at the "back" (end) of "several Asian republics" (Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, etc)
21 LARGE INTESTINE
Entire genitals transplanted elsewhere in body (5,9)

*(entire genitals) [anag:transplanted]
23 GUILLEMOT
Seabird’s remorse being wrong to eat most of fruit (9)

GUILT ("remorse being wrong") to eat [most of] LEMO(n) ("fruit")
24 BAIZE
A little concern about a European that’s often on the card tables (5)

(BIZ (short for business, so "a little concern") about A) + E (European)
25 RATIONS
No love for speeches, being issued food (7)

No O ("love", in tennis) for (o)RATIONS ("speeches")
26 SLEIGHT
Cunning insult coming to ears (7)

Homophone/pun/aural wordplay [coming to ears] of SLIGHT ("insult")
DOWN
1 LUGE
Large, commonly very overweight, one goes downhill fast (4)

L (large) + 'UGE ("commonly" HUGE, "very overweight")
2 MAJORITY VERDICT
One arrived at perhaps ten to two (8,7)

Cryptic definition
3 PREFAB
Supposedly temporary accommodation to be great later? (6)

If you're going to be great (FAB) later, you could be described as PRE-FAB?
4 TURNIP
Swede sort of makes to flip a coin (6)

TURN ("to flip) + 1p (a penny, "a coin")
5 THEBEANO
Goddess of youth entertained by dancing not a comic (3,5)

HEBE ("goddess of youth") entertained by *(not a) [anag:dancing]
6 DAMOCLES
One prosecuting spies imprisons a hundred, one with suspended death sentence (8)

DA (district attoney, so "one prosecuting") + MOLES ("spies") imprisons C (a hundred in Roman numerals)

The "suspended death sentence" refers to the "sword of Damocles".
7 NOTWITHSTANDING
Despite marking, brave to slip through (15)

WITHSTAND ("brave") to slip through NOTING ("marking")
8 SUCCEEDING
Following one GCSE dunce struggling (10)

*(i gcse dunce) [anag:struggling] wjere I is "one"
12 ASTROLOGER
Predictably a star analyst (10)

Cryptic definition
15 BAKERLOO
One making rolls (toilet) in a line for London (8)

BAKER ("one making rolls") + LOO ("toilet")
16 PEN NAMES
Under pressure, man seen to rewrite such as Saki and Mark Twain (3,5)

Under P (pressure), *(man seen) [anag:to rewrite]
19 TENTHS
Hospital in wartime facilities perhaps that are placed just past the point (6)

H (hospital) in TENTS ("wartime facilites perhaps")

In a number such as 3.5 the five "tenths" are placed just past the (decimal) point.
20 STABLE
Baby Jesus not getting rocked here? (6)

Cryptic definition
22 VEST
Garment seen in volume over time in New York (4)

V (volume) over EST (Eastern Standard Time), the "time in New York"

57 comments on “Cryptic crossword No 29,754 by Imogen”

  1. Thanks Imogen and loonapick
    Two or three not parsed – I thought there was a mistake in 5d, as it was the G missing from TANGO! – but very entertaining. Favourites ORGANISED CRIME and PREFAB.

  2. I also fell for the TANGO trap. Picaroon has used Ding Liren on a couple of occasions, once as fodder and once in a clue for DINGHIES.
    Good fun, thanks to Imogen and loonapick.

  3. Good puzzle, thanks Imogen!
    Also had to Google DING. DAMOCLES took me a while to get the suspended death sentence reference, wrong wavelength completely … Enjoyed LARGE INTESTINE, also PREFAB and especially TENTHS as my finisher.
    Thanks loonapick for confirming the parsing.

  4. NHO DING either, but was able to get the clue, if not for some time. Similar to loonapick it took a while to find a way in, but felt far more accessible after the first couple of answers dropped. Still challenging but very enjoyable.

  6. Enough easies to reveal the less familiar, like the seabird and the comic (both seen before but not sunk in). Damocles was nice, tho I forgot about DA so it was “suspended” that rang the bell. Enjoyable, cheers Im and loona.

  7. Super puzzle. Found it tough but enjoyed it a lot. Thanks Imogen.
    Great blog. Thanks loonapick.

    ORGANISED CRIME, MAJORITY VERDICT and STABLE were my top faves.

  8. Same as Loonapick I struggled mostly in the SE corner.

    This could have been more difficult but just seemed to be seeing the anagrams today. Really liked the LARGE INTESTINE one.

    Didn’t understand STAN. I just shrugged and hoped it was an acronym for some sort of union or agreement across states. Seems obvious now but they always are when you read the answer.

    Lot of ticks for this but I enjoyed both cryptic definitions which is rare for me. Also a big tick for DAMOCLES.

    Thanks Loonapick and Imogen.

  9. I’m with everybody else so far – not heard of Ding, and knew tango didn’t work, but didn’t see the simple anagram. Otherwise a very pleasant solve. Pakistan and to a lesser extent Kyrgystan also came straight to mind. Living in Cambodia helps. Thanks to Imogen and loonapick.

  10. I’m still confused by 9A. By Imogen standards, working out the (GIJ+hOmE) solution wasn’t too difficult. But what has GI Joe to do with ‘grunt’? The answer, apparently, is that Grunt is a *character* in the GI Joe series? Even had I known that, I wouldn’t have seen ‘grunt’ as indicating GI Joe. Just me?

    Otherwise a tough but enjoyable challenge. Thanks to Imogen and loonapick.

  12. I’m ashamed to say I did not spot the 1p in 4d. Almost unbelievable, I know. I knew what the answer had to be then thought about “pice” and finally, stupidly, resorted to google searching for a Pi coin – and found one (it is some kind of crypto currency). Am administering the traditional self-kicking after reading your blog, loonapick, and still cringing. Did not properly parse 7d either iso not a good solving day for me. The clue that made me laugh loudest was the transplanted genitals. Thanks for the fun, Imogen.

  13. A tough and enjoyable challenge.

    Favourites: LIME PIT, TURNIP, STAN, NOTWITHSTANDING.

    New for me: Ding Liren, chess champion (for 5ac).

  14. Grizzlebeard@10 GI JOE I revealed this, and then had the feeling we had had a similar clue before, but couldn’t find anything from a search.

    I wonder if anyone used the reveal button on 17ac?

    Thanks L and I

  15. I knew Ding but was expecting the usual Tal. I needed all the crossers for MAJORITY VERDICT. I pencilled in Lim in the middle of Guillemot, and forgot to change it to lemo, so a DNF.

  16. I came here thinking that comments would identify this as on the easy side for Imogen, as I seemed to get through this quite quickly. I put this down to the setter’s superb clueing and clear direction. I thought ORGANISED CRIME, LARGE INTESTINE were superb anagrams but my favourite was MAJORITY VERDICT.

    Ta Imogen & loonapick.

  17. (Michael) Tal is/was usually the chess champion used as fodder in cryptics. But good to see a more recent man in Ding. Defeated by the NW corner, as LIME PIT and GI JOE were unknown to me. Struggled in the SE corner too with VEST and TENTHS. Some generous anagrams helped me early on with this, including the excellent ORGANISED CRIME. Tough but fair…

  18. I congratulated myself on remembering GI JOE and DING, both from crosswords.

    I had ticks for THE BEANO, SUCCEEDING, BAKERLOO, PEN NAMES and TENTHS.
    Top favourites were MAJORITY VERDICT and DAMOCLES.

    I thought REVEALED was rather weak and and I think I must be missing something in ASTROLOGER.

    Thanks to Imogen and loonapick.

  19. ASTROLOGER
    Eileen@18
    I also feel the same way. Unable to convincingly link the clue to
    prediction (of future) based on analysis of (movement of) stars.

  20. I thoroughly enjoyed this one. I thought that GI JOE should be (1,1,3), but I expect this has come up before so I won’t quibble. All very entertaining .
    The use of the word “astrology” is a bit of a bugbear for me as an amateur astronomer. Astronomy should really be called astrology (and once was), but the word has been hijacked by woo-woo merchants.

  22. @21 Dave F

    The ‘tents’ part of it came to me pretty quickly but then I disregarded it for ages, perhaps thinking along similar lines to you – it ended up being my LOI.

  23. Eileen@18 For ASTROLOGER, I think we need to take “predictably” as Paul might use it, “something to do with predicting”.

  24. Smooth stuff from Imogen this morning.

    MAJORITY VERDICT is quite brilliant and many other ticks as well.

    I don’t think I’ve ever thought about the spelling of BAIZE. If asked, I’d probably have gone for beize.

    I had Waterloo unparsed for a while until the brown BAKERLOO line drifted in to save the blushes.

    Love this setter.

  25. Lyssian @20 astrology is definitely woo woo but I don’t think you can say it hijacked the word. Didn’t astrology come first and provide the foundations of astronomy?

  28. For me, the NW corner was the last in — only filled it in this morning with a bit of check button. Got the rest in last night.

    I enjoyed the anagrams, which were tasty.

    Thanks Imogen and loonapick.

  29. After my first pass through the Across clues I was ready to throw in the towel, but the Down clues were kinder and I persisted to the end, albeit with a couple unparsed.

    Thank you Imogen for the workout and loonapick for the blog.

  30. Predictably difficult but eventually solved. I liked the wordplays of GI JOE, DAMOCLES and TENTHS, the good anagrams for ORGANISED CRIME and LARGE INTESTINE, and the brilliant cd for MAJORITY VERDICT.

    Thanks Imogen and loonapick.

  31. TENTHS was altogether too clever for me – both the “wartime facilities” (well, I suppose so, sort of) and the things that are placed past the point (which I should have got). But lots to enjoy here, and some splendid anagrams. I did remember Ding the chess champion from previous puzzles. Liked MAJORITY VERDICT, GI JOE, DAMOCLES and BAKERLOO: not impressed by ASTROLOGER.

  32. Ravenrider@25: astronomy was used to drive the demands of astrology before becoming a science in its own right, just as chemistry evolved from all the woo-woo rubbish involved in alchemy and the search for the Philosopher’s Stone.

  33. Like AlanC @16, I expected other commenters to have found this on the easy side for Imogen. On the other hand, I can never confidently take my experience of a crossword at 4.00 am as a reliable indication of its relative ease or difficulty – it depends on how good my sleep has been up to that point, when, tending to be awake for an hour or so, i usually address myself to the daily test. Maybe I was just having a good night, therefore: the excellent longer anagrams fell into place almost immediately, and only GI JOE in the NW held me up because I was damned if I could remember what ‘grunt’ was slang for; but it eventually resurfaced. Good, tractable crossword for midweek, I felt.

  34. A delightful experience – huge thanks to Imogen
    Some wonderful clues: both the long anagrams were joyful, and DAMOCLES would be in my little book of great clues (had I one!) … I could go on
    Marvellous fare
    Many thanks, both and all

  35. Thank to Imogen for a thoroughly enjoyable puzzle. The very clever surfaces and innovative construction, meant there was a lot to enjoy.
    My favourites are 1a LIME PIT, 9a
    5d GIJOE, 11a ORGANISED CRIME,
    18a STAN, 19d TENTHS,
    23a GUILLEMOT and 24a BAIZE.
    Thx to loonapick for the blog.
    [ Do Search for a very funny poem about a Guillemot by John Hegley]

  36. Fabulous fun. Top ticks for PREFAB (supposedly is right – my prefab form room at school had been there for over 30 years) and TURNIP for the sly 1p

    REVEALED made me chuckle. Maybe I’m just easily pleased 🙂

    Cheers L&I

  38. Write-ins spoiled it for me, in cahoots with a couple of long anagrams, can unvaryingly decrypt them quickly, made this one somewhat too easy.

  39. The tents bit tripped me up too (guy ropes?!). Seemed a little bit unfair…but ultimately, is just a just about fair so I won’t whinge.

  40. Re 20a I thought the inn would have been the place of “not rocking”, rather than the stable?

    But otherwise a very enjoyable puzzle. LARGE INTESTINE , MAJORITY VERDICT and ORGANISED CRIME were particularly elegant and satisfying when the penny dropped.

    As to REVEALED, all I can say is that steak puns are a medium rarely well done.

  41. Ended up revealing TENTHS. Like others, ‘wartime facilities’ did not conjure up TENTS – it’s a pretty broad category – and I was not conditioned to think of a fraction as something to follow a decimal point. The two neat anagrams were nice finds by the setter.

    Thanks both

  42. Very nice puzzle! Many favourites. ORGANISED CRIME, MAJORITY VERDICT, NOTWITHSTANDING, ASTROLOGER!

    Thanks Imogen and loonapik

  43. Thanks Imogen and loonapick

    I’m with those who found this on Imogen’s easier side.

    N_s @ 40 I think the reference is that according to the myth Jesus was placed in a manger, which is a trough (in a stable) that doesn’t rock, as opposed to a crib which does.

  44. I also found this on the difficult end.

    I ticked LARGE INTESTINE

    I appreciated the variety in the cluing and different devices. I also found the clues wordy, and demanding general knowledge worthy of a straight crossword. LIME PIT was a complete mystery to me (lacking the requisite GK) and I needed help with biz to parse BAIZE.

    Thanks Imogen and loonapik

  45. Without having read the blog or a single comment, I just wanted to plough in uninfluenced and say that I thought this was excellent; plenty challenging enough for a good workout with some clever and amusing clues. I liked REVEALED and MAJORITY VERDICT, the anagrams were beauties and there was much satisfaction to be had despite the feeble sex.

    Bravo Imogen and thanks in advance to loonapick.

  46. Unlike the recent Enigmatist, this was very tough but in no way beyond Guardian daily level. Satisfying to finish, even though it took hours. Thanks both

  47. I was all set to complain about the lack of anagrind or inclusicator in 5a until I read the excellent blog. Now I just feel stupid. Tis always the way. I did at least know Ding. Rather sad how he lost in the end.
    Struggled with BAIZE, brain being hijacked by Beige for some reason.
    Fine puzzle. Thanks, Imogen and loonapick.

  48. I somehow put minority verdict in for 2D, noting to myself that it was a surprisingly inaccurate clue, it was only when looking at the crossers for my LOI GI JOE I realised how wrong I’d been. ☺️
    As I had a colectomy in May 21A left me nostalgic for the time I could claim I had one “in body”.

  49. Very evenly paced puzzle. Hits the spot for this Belgian puzzler. Enjoyed GI JOE and PREFAB. Thanks Imogen, and loonapick for some missing parsings.

  50. 5a doesnt work for me. About is used twice.
    Also GI should be 1,1 IMO which of course should be 1,1,1 😀

  51. Having solved half the clues, I was pleased with myself, particularly as, on the first few passes, I thought I wouldn’t solve any. To come here and find that several of you found it quite tricky was the icing on the cake for me.
    It really does seem that, between the extremes of “so easy that I can complete it” and “Enigmatist on Friday” it doesn’t make much sense to classify these puzzles as difficult or easy. It really does seem to come down to being somehow on the setter’s wavelength, and being in the right mood on any particular day.

  52. Ade Byrne @50
    It doesn’t need “about” to get from “it’s” to “tis” – it’s very common vernacular.

  54. 20d: “Baby Jesus not getting rocked here?” is, as loonapick says, a cryptic definition, but I think it also works as an &lit clue: as Jesus wasn’t being rocked while in his manger in that stable, it follows that he was stable (ie in a state of stability). All a real treat, Imogen. (And ta too to loonapick for explaining “dancing not a”. Like others, I couldn’t untangle tan(g)o.)

  55. This was just the right level for me, thanks Imogen & loonapick.
    But I was blind-sided by GI JOE – to my mind it should be clued as 1,1,3 as others have mentioned above. This seems to be a convention with initials nowadays, unfortunately.
    And I must join the list of those who were looking for the missing G in tango in THEBEANO.

  56. For TIDINGS, I got as far as TI (it’s about) but then DINGS eluded Mr Google. As for DAMOCLES, I was looking for a prosecutor of spies for ages until I twigged DA.

    As for LIME PIT, I thought it was where they dumped bodies during the various plagues. It hadn’t occurred to me they must have had some other use first.

  57. Tough. Didn’t get very far with this one, maybe a third. Wanted 18a STAN but couldn’t justify it. I’ve heard of BEANO but not THE BEANO. Otherwise too many nho’s to be able to get a foothold. Impressive puzzle

Leave a comment

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.