Guardian 27,796 – Imogen

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A satisfying puzzle from Imogen today; one that seemed impenetrable at first but gradually yielded, with the SW corner holding me up at the end. Thanks to Imogen.

TOBY JUG, SQUAB and XYLOPHONE alerted me early on to the likelihood that this might be a pangram, as indeed it turned out to be, though that didn’t help my solving.

 
 
 
 
 
 
Across
1. WALRUS Run rule over American big beast (6)
Reverse of R LAW, + US
4. TOBY JUG For sale (not united): can and mug (4,3)
TO BUY less U, + JUG (slang for prison, as is “can”)
9. TIPTOEING Cautiously progressing petition about the end of hunting (9)
PETITION* + [huntin]G
10. SQUAB Silly argument over half a small pigeon (5)
More than half of SQUABble
11. END UP Eventually find oneself in satire that’s not succeeded (3,2)
SEND UP less S[ucceeded]
12. BALLISTIC A missile may be basic; it’ll go off (9)
(BASIC IT’LL)*
13. SEXISTS On board ship are people with non-PC views (7)
EXIST (are) “on board”, i.e. in SS (steamship)
15. GUSHER Well woman visits teacher, missing a university (6)
SHE (woman) in GURU less the second U (a university)
17. GLADLY Boy left in empty gallery with delight (6)
LAD L in G[aller]Y
19. DENOTES Means arranged one day for comeback (7)
Reverse of SET ONE D
22. EMPIRICAL Depending on results, group of countries to be reduced by one state (9)
EMPIR[E] + 1 CAL[ifornia]
24. EDGAR Boy not force-fed fish (5)
FED less F (force) + GAR (fish)
26. A-BOMB Muscle holds back mafia killer (1-4)
Reverse of MOB in AB (abdominal muscle)
27. TRAPEZIUM Shape being mature, zip coming undone (9)
(MATURE ZIP)*
28. EVERTON Club gets tennis champion further (7)
[Chris] EVERT (tennis champion of the 70s and 80s) + ON (further)
29. FRUMPY Dowdy female having only half the sex? (6)
F + half of RUMPY-pumpy
Down
1. WITLESS Stupid Spectator has lies for news, primarily (7)
WITNESS (spectator) with L[ies] replacing N[ews]
2. LIPID Fat: apparently good to be inside a covering (5)
PI (apparenty good) in LID
3. UNOPPOSED Stew spooned up without demur (9)
(SPOONED UP)*
4. TAGALOG Without note, go with the others to make speech to Filipinos (7)
TAG ALONG (go with others) less N[ote]. Tagalog is the national language of the Philippines
5. BASSI A Nazi group interrupts sexually ambivalent singers (5)
A + SS (Nazi group) in BI[-sexual]
6. JAUNTIEST Most stylish relative I joke about (9)
AUNT I in JEST
7. GO BACK Withdraw permission to pick up taxi after golf (2,4)
G (golf) reverse of CAB in OK (permission)
8. NIMBUS Students keep a little storage in the cloud (6)
1 MB (a little [computer] storage, at least by today’s standards) in NUS (National Union of Students)
14. XYLOPHONE Hammer this, or use axes to chop and polish (9)
XY (axes, plural of axis, as in coordinate geometry) + LOP (chop) + HONE (polish)
16. SONNETEER Browsing the web, taken in by visionary poet (9)
ON NET (“browsing the web”) in SEER
18. YUCATAN Securing boat, ready for Chinese peninsula (7)
CAT[amaran] in YUAN (Chinese currency, hence “ready [money] for Chinese”)
19. DOLLAR Buck up everyone in staff (6)
Reverse of ALL in ROD
20. SCRUMPY Alcohol in pack, partly empty (7)
SCRUM (pack, as in Rugby) + P[artl]Y
21. MENACE Danger: people shot in court (6)
MEN (people) + ACE (a service or shot in a tennis court)
23. ROBOT Bravo, smashing the basis for one threatening your job? (5)
B (Bravo) in ROOT (basis)
25. GRIMM Serious about married brothers (5)
M in GRIM (serious). Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm, famous for their collections of folk tales. Jacob is also remembered in linguistics for Grimm’s Law

44 comments on “Guardian 27,796 – Imogen”

  1. Very enjoyable, although I could not parse F/RUMPY. I’m not sure if I ever heard of RUMPY-pumpy before.

    My favourites were NIMBUS, MENACE, XYLOPHONE.

    New for me was Everton club, but it was gettable.

    Thanks B+S.

  2. Thanks Imogen and Andrew

    I really enjoyed this – not always the case with Imogen. Favourites were XYLOPHONE and DOLLAR.

    I didn’t parse END UP or TAGALOG.

    Would “old tennis champion” have been fairer in 28?

  3. Enough easies to get going: tiptoeing, ballistic, gladly, trapezium, lipid, jauntiest, etc. Even so, the SW held out a bit, not sure why now, no new tricks there, tho slow to remember the xy one and that are=exist. Great puzzle Imogen, not a single ? really, all wells not being gushers being the merest quiblet. And thanks Andrew.

  4. Could you explain why PI means apparently good?  Sorry if it’s obvious to everyone except me!

  6. A weird mix for me of some absolute gems and some that I just found frustrating – another case of “how many synonyms are there?” which we discussed in the blog last week. Also Imogen (here at least) plays a little more freely with the “grammar” of clues so the (delightful) “over half a small pigeon” doesn’t strictly work. “not succeeded”  – is “s” short for “succeed” or “succeeds”? Not sure. “gets” in 28ac is an odd link word, suggesting am insertion not the break between wordplay and definition. And does anyone say “on net”? “online” surely or “on the net”? “pick up taxi” – isn’t “up” doing double duty? These (and others) combined with some slightly tenuous definitions (“club”, “killer”…) upped the challenge level. Where the outcome was to give a lovely surface, or where it was a case of having to re-read the clue to parse it anew, rather than pick through a number of synonyms, I felt the inventiveness worked, but 2 or 3 of these didn’t quite do it for me.

    Nevertheless, big ticks for the departing state, (f)rumpy made me laugh (pity about the crossing with scrumpy), dollar was clever, as were yucatan, xylophone, nimbus (I remember having 1kB of memory in a computer…) and Tagalog.

    Thanks Andrew for the blog, and Imogen for the run-around…lots to enjoy and challenge and stimulate and if one or two misfire for me (and probably not for others) I’d say that was worth it for the fun and invention we hope for in the Grauniad.

  8. Had to work a bit harder today, but all clearly gettable. 19d ‘buck up’ drew a smile. Also found 16d clumsy, ‘on net’? 27a trapez. a gimme, but  a little hard to hide a ‘z’.

    Re Madeleine @4, I read ‘apparently good’ as ‘as good as (apple) pie’ homophonically, but bow to grant’s @5 comment on pious. An in thing, like ‘abs’.

    Thanks Imogen and Andrew.

  9. Re John@7, there were two phonetics today, ‘bravo’ for b in 23d, should explain, and ‘golf’ for g in 7.

  11. I really enjoyed this, favourites being 22a and 27a, the surfaces of which were great.  I also liked the way that “shot in court” ACE crossed with “tennis champion” EVERT.

    thezed, I’m not sure I understand your objection to 10a?  “Silly argument, over half” (the comma is not wanted for the surface but is implied for the wordplay) seems fair enough to me for more than half of SQUABble.

    “Pi” for pious was an in thing a long time ago!  The SOED gives its earliest known occurrence as 1870 and describes it as “school and university slang”.  It’s very dated and mainly lives on only in crosswordland.

  12. May any letter stand for anything that it begins? Asking for a friend…Thanks to the setter andd the blogger!

  13. Lord Jim @11 to work properly the clue would have to be \”silly argument, over half. A small pigeon.\”. I\’m OK with missing commas but a missing full stop (or a colon would do I guess) is a bit of a stretch. As I said, borderline to my mind, but the surface meant I was OK with it.

  14. An excellent puzzle on the whole, with just a few clues that I thought could have been clearer.
    I rarely see a pangram coming, but I did today, and it actually helped me to get XYLOPHONE (followed by SEXISTS) and WITLESS.
    I missed Imogen’s ‘trademark’ set of four long solutions (usually going round the perimeter), but instead I did appreciate a good challenge with several good clues, of which my favourites were SEXISTS, FRUMPY, GO BACK, SONNETEER and DOLLAR.
    I noted thezed’s comment @6 about ‘on net’ meaning browsing the web, but I have met this before in a Guardian cryptic (in a clue to SCOTCH BONNET) and am happy with it. In fact that was my route to the answer on this occasion.
    Thanks to Imogen and Andrew.

  16. For once I spotted a nascent pangram and it helped finish the SW as there had to be a V there. Loi was MENACE – probably one of the most straightforward clues in the puzzle! As usual the quibbles passed me by and I only had DENOTES needing parsing when I came here. Favourites for me were TIPTOEING XYLOPHONE (feeling smug about remembering “axes”) and YUCATAN (feeling dumb for not remembering “ready”). Many thanks to Imogen and Andrew.

  18. I liked it, though SW was also my Achilles heel, Andrew and grantinfreo@3, with 26a A-BOMB and 23d ROBOT my LOsI. I wrote LOL beside 29a FRUMPY even though it might have put me in the brigade of 13a SEXISTS. I also ticked 5d BASSI (which started out as STASI!),14d XYLOPHONE and 19d DOLLAR. So some favourites in common with other commenters on here. I missed the pangram, which with hindsight was so obvious.

    Thanks to Imogen and Andrew.

  19. Thanks to Imogen and Andrew. I am another who really enjoyed this, and also found it tough going. Interestingly it seems that some people were held up in the SW. I had no reall problem with that, but got bogged down in the NW. Last ones for me were walrus and Tagalog. Missed the pangram of course but liked empirical, sexists and frumpy. Thanks again to Imogen and Andrew.

  20. If the mark of a good crossword clue is that you wonder why it took so long when you *finally* get the answer, this was a classic for me.

  21. PetHay @19
    You’re in good company (he says grandly). I too found the SW ok but got bogged down in the NW, my last four answers going in there only after a pause and a drink.

  22. Pangram! Nice. Didn’t notice. Lots of fun though. Especially as frumpy and scrumpy went in last. 29 a.c. my favourite. 19 down clever. Tagalog new to me. What a great word. Thanks Imogen and Andrew

  23. More than one way to skin a cat – I read pi as being p1 – ie. first place. Mibbe not right but it got me there anyway!

  24. Jeff@12, if your friend is wondering about “s = succeeded” in particular, my online Collins has “S. in British: abbreviation for … 6. succeeded.”

  25. Thanks to Imogen and Andrew. I didn’t know rumpy-pumpy, started with trapezoid (which did not parse), and took a long time spotting MENACE.

  26. I did this last night while nodding off, so I didn’t parse a couple of these. Thanks for that.

    Muffin @2, I don’t think we need to be told that Evert is an old champion–we aren’t always given that help with cricketers and footballers, after all. Plus, Evert has nineteen Grand Slam trophies on her mantlepiece, tied for third all-time on the women’s side, so it’s not like she’s obscure.

    [Over here, she still calls the matches, so she never really went away, either. For the record, I do NOT like her as a commentator. My biggeat complaint is that she calls the match she expects to see, not the match that is happening. Martina Navratilova is way better.]

    I don’t think this is the first time we’ve seen Evert in a clue for EVERTON. Can someone confirm?

  27. Try this one, mrpenney.

    Crossword solvers of my age have no problem with Evert, of course, and she was veru successful, but a long time ago!

  28. Enjoyed this, with many charming surfaces.  Thanks, Imogen and Andrew.

    EDGAR defined as “boy” is too loose for me.

    Did anybody else try to work ASHE in for the tennis champ?

  29. [mrpenney – I meant to add that we have John McEnroe commentating on tennis, and he’s excellent (as is Michael Johnson on athletics)]

  30. I agree that this seemed difficult at first glance, but it gave way steadily with no major hold-ups and all made perfect sense in the end.

  31. A further thought about “on net” in 16d (thezed @6 and Alan B @14).  While in conversation you might say “on the net”, in headline-speak “on net” seems plausible.  (“Transactions on net now safer”).  I was fine with it.

  32. Evert recalled only in the act of solving from crossers, though of my era. [Second muffin re McEnroe commentating, and Connors is pretty smooth too].

  34. Really enjoyed this once I got going, with the NE first to yield – I did like SQUAB and BASSI- and the SW bringing up the rear,as it were. FRUMPY made me smile. A pleasant diversion from the pesky jackdaws in my chimney.
    Thanks Imogen.

  36. Lord Jim @31

    I agree with you that ‘on net’ is more headline speak, as opposed to ‘on the net’ in normal speak.  But this is just an element of the wordplay in the build-up to the answer, and I think liberties like this can be taken as a matter of course when the word or phrase in question is not the solution to the clue.

  37. Alan B: yes, and of course many crossword clues are themselves written in headline-speak rather than the sort of phrasing used in normal speech.  For example “Boy not force-fed fish” and “Club gets tennis champion further”.

  38. Lord Jim

    … and I actually would have preferred headline talk in 2d, where we have ‘inside a covering’ and not ‘inside covering’.  I worked with A LID at first, with thoughts of a wrong answer like ALGID, until I had to use LID, which takes in PI to make LIPID.

  39. On the whole, I think this is the best puzzle we’ve seen in a while, in terms of pleasing clues. If I had any quibble, it would be that the Net is not the same as the Web, as anyone who sent email or transferred files in the 80’s or even the 70’s would know.

  40. The phonetic alphabet is for spelling stuff (phonetically) over a cranky VHF radio in a storm. Has saved many lives!

  41. Is it just possible that Nimbus is also a reference to the computer of that name made by Research Machines in the late 80s which came with 1MB of memory? I managed to negotiate a deal for about 30 with two for the price of one on memory, so 2MB per machine. They ran Windows 3.1 with no problem. Happy days!

  42. Michelle@1 – as you say Everton is new to you for “club”, to be clear it is the name of an EPL football team/club (based in Liverpool – though strangely never in the city’s district of the same name) rather than a synonym for, or type of, club per se.

    BTW Everton the football team is what the black and white striped Everton mint is named after, and their nickname is the Toffeemen.

  43. Good puzzle. LOI 23d. SW corner was a challenge, especially A-BOMB for some strange reason. Thanks to setter and blogger.

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