Guardian 29,210 – Imogen

112 comments on “Guardian 29,210 – Imogen”

1. Unlike Andrew, I didn’t find this a quick solve, but it was very satisfying to complete. Loved PARTHENOGENESIS, EBAY and MACARONI PENGUIN, among several others.
   Thanks to Imogen and Andrew

2. Knew from winks that loi 23ac was to do with sleep, and my mother’s name is Esther, and I dtill stared dumbly at the crossers … it’s a worry! Elsewhere, needed crossers for the four long pillars, which were fun, esp the pasta bird (a nho). Enjoyed it, thanks Imogen and Andrew.

3. still

4. Also, have nevercome across B for barrel before

5. Thank you, Andrew.
   Liked BABY BOOMER. I am one. I wonder if my parents thought of me as tiny explosive device? No, best not go there.

   Liked the wordplay for ASCENT OF EVEREST, but I think more could have been done with the def. EBAY made me laugh.

   Thanks to Imogen for highlighting the plight of the MACARONI PENGUIN. Antarctica has long been on my bucket list, but now I think it’s best to leave what’s left of it to the birds. Huge chucklr the surface ae fond kudos to Imogen for the wonderful 15 letter anagram. Did anyone else, early on, look for something along the lines of ‘two fingers’ or ‘middle finger’, depending where you come from?

   PARTHENOGENESIS was COD for me. Another lengthy anagram, embedded this time. But the clue was so cleverly constructed, making one (me) wonder which end was the def.

6. Well, I learned something about British signalmen today. Also PARTHENOGENESIS, MACARONI PENGUINs, RACLETTE and a Persian queen. [I was reminded of the clue for SIESTA in yesterday’s.] I enjoy expanding my horizons (albeit briefly), so long as the wordplay isn’t too formidable. B for barrel was a surprise.

   I’m not always successful with Imogen’s, but today’s was most enjoyable.

7. Andrew, you’ve left this blog as ‘uncategorised’ and so it doesn’t appear in the Guardian crossword lists. I came across it only by looking into the recent posts column.

8. Unexpected and inventive anagrams in 1d and 7d. A mixed bag for me, on the correct wavelength for a reasonable number, but the remainder took quite a while. The second word in 15 had to be FAIR, but I couldn’t think of the first word until I got the crosser, and whilst SIESTA was the obvious answer I had to Google ‘persian queen ESTA’ to compensate for my biblical ignorance. Liked 13 and 24. Thanks to Imogen and Andrew.

9. Thanks Andrew, and to Imogen for some ingenious definitions, but a fairly steady solve in the end. Dredged PIP EMMA from the depths of my memory but was mystified by the ‘spot’ in the clue, and still am. Never heard of BID FAIR.

   I thought perhaps there was mini-theme from the lifetimes of us BABY BOOMERs – ie events such as ASCENT OF EVEREST; politics (Warsaw Pact), and bands we liked (parthenoGENESIS). But maybe not…

10. Speaking of SCRAMBLING, (eg my post @5, apologies) I found this clue, well, a little bit scrambled. Misdirection aplenty, and that’s okay. Two ”ups”, including ”pick up”, which could have been a reversal indicator in a down clue or a homophone indicator. But this is different. Is the grammar here, in a down clue, that marc reversed, CRAM is picking up the letter below it, B, (all contained in SLING)? If so, it’s not a device I’ve seen before, but I like it.

    Crispy @4, I’ve seen B for barrel before, in crosswords.

11. I think PIP EMMA and its’ counterpart “ack emma” were from a pre-First World War phonetic spelling alphabet, with “Ack-ack” persisting into WW2, as we BABY BOOMERS heard tell from our parents.

12. paddymelon@10
    SCRAMBLING
    CRAM picking up B? The ‘pick up’ is already utilised in reversing ‘MARC’. It’s just (CRAM+B) held in SLING, I think.
    Have I not understood what you said?

    B for barrel: I have seen it before.
    Crude oil price is quoted in USD/b (or some other currency/b).

13. I also found this more on my wavelength than the average Imogen, but that doesn’t mean it was easy. Didn’t parse SCRAMBLING, and I always thought LOOFAS had an H in it. Last in was EBAY which took some time to spot.

    Some very clever anagrams in all or part of PARTHENOGENESIS, HEAVY GOING. and MACARONI PENGUIN. I wonder if the latter got its name not from the pasta but from the macaronis, ultra-fashionable young Regency gents known for sporting rificulous hairstyles.

14. …ridiculous, of course. And I see that the dandy was named after the pasta.

15. Thank you KVa@12. I had that reading of SCRAMBLING and pick up at some stage today, but lost it. The grammar still seems strange to me, though. I think it may be the to pick up

16. Crispy @4 “Also, have nevercome across B for barrel before”… buy yourself a dictionary, preferably Chambers. It will also tell you that never and come are two separate words. 🙂

    Also enjoyed this for HEAVY GOING and the 1953 scent. I also like PARTHENOGENESIS just because it shows that a virgin birth is completely in line with current scientific understanding, and SIESTA for a heroine of the supposedly male Jewish hierarchy. LOL

17. That;s a great thought about the hairstyles gladys @14

18. Is the dandy the one who “stuck a feather in his cap and called it…”?!

19. PIP EMMA was new to me. (Does anyone know if there is there an equivalent for AM?). Everything else slotted into place, eventually. Some lovely clues. I really liked EBAY, PARTHENOGENISIS (clever to have spotted stonehenge buried in there), ASCENT OF EVEREST, and MACARONI PENGUIN (a stylish looking bird). Penguin was pretty clear, but I confess I had to resort to Google for the first part; though I think I could have got it with a bit more thought. With thanks to Imogen and Andrew.

20. paddymelon@15
    Agree with you that the surface reading is somewhat odd.
    Some punctuation jugglery might help…
    Mixing up fruit, (‘you’ implied) refuse to pick up barrel held by strap.
    Maybe this works…

21. I’ve been doing these for years but have never come across pip emma before. Thanks for parthenogenesis. Whenever I see that word I head off to listen to Nemesis by Shriekback, which I should do more often.
    Thanks Imogen and Andrew.

22. Nuh, my brain’s scrambled by SCRAMBLING. I’ve gone back to my original reading. For me, it works in a down clue, the image (vertically) of the MARC picking up the B below it, all held together in a SLING, as a crane, on a construction site.

23. I [eventually] had an alternative parsing for SCRAMBLING. If you take the definition as “Mixing” rather than “Mixing up” then the “up” becomes the reversal indicator for MARC. Possibly we’ll never know what Imogen intended?

24. My first thought about the parsing of SCRAMBLING, had the def as mixing , with the first up as the indicator to reverse.

25. Re 22 no, the ‘to pick up’ is the reversal indicator. The grammar just about functions, but there’s a fair bit of molestation to make the surface work. Also always nice to see the ‘Stonehenge’ idea, but this was generally an enjoyable puzzle. Liked the perfume and the reference to Esther as being Persian (which she was of course, if you go for Biblical biogs).

26. Ahhh, Blaise@ 23. You too! Thanks.

27. Bullhassocks @9. I think the explanation is that the spots on dice and dominoes are also referred to as pips.

28. Another example of smooth, elegant and precise clueing from Imogen. I don’t know if it’s just me but I’m finding his crosswords increasingly enjoyable these days – I used to find him less polychromal

    Many thanks

29. …and, I’d probably have struggled to remember Pip and Emma if their identity wasn’t one of the many red herrings in Agatha Christie’s A Murder is Announced. One of my favourites.

30. Yes Andrew; I also felt that I got onto Imogen’s wavelength from the get-go and so I enjoyed this very much. An interesting solve for me as I got all of the RHS before I filled in any of the LHS. Ticks for 23a SIESTA [Geoff@6, yes we did have a SIESTA (!) but I think it was in Monday’s Vulcan?]. Also liked COME TO A FULL STOP at 6d. As a BABY BOOMER [cf. paddymelon@5] born in 1953, I did like both 13a and 2d ASCENT OF EVEREST. The SCRAMBLING discussion has been fascinating, as it was the only clue I couldn’t parse. Many thanks to Imogen and Andrew.

31. paddymelon @5: re BABY BOOMER 🙂 I also like gladys, thought it was LOOFA with an H and also thought it was ICE FLOE with a W. Back to school for me. Nho of BID FAIR and PIP EMMA but guessed from crossers. Funnily enough, I thought of MACARONI for the cheese dish rather than the PENGUIN. ASCENT OF EVEREST and PARTHENOGENESIS were brilliant.

    Ta Imogen & Andrew.

32. TimC @16. Just because something’s in my 1998 version of Chambers doesn’t mean I’ve come across it before. Nevercome is a result of typing on a smart phone when you have sausage-like fingers.

33. [Agree with you, William F P@28. I used to have trouble with Imogen puzzles (me not him, I’m sure), but more recently have been really liking them and finding them much more accessible. Vlad’s grids, on the other hand, seems to be becoming increasingly tough for me, but maybe my almost 70 year-old brain is getting less sharp – I found yesterday’s solve really really tough. Though as somebody said on Tuesday’s forum, there was a lot to be learned from reading loonapick’s blog and all the discussion that particular puzzle evoked.]

34. Nuntius@19 yes: ack emma is “a.m”, and “ack ack” is “anti-aircraft (fire).

36. Thanks Imogen and Andrew

    Nuntius @ 19: ACK EMMA

37. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allied_military_phonetic_spelling_alphabets
    Second attempt at posting a link, sorry.

38. Crispy @32, One advantage of having a disability that makes touch screens and therefore ‘smart’ phones almost impossible to use for me is that I don’t have to contend with their ‘smartness’ in predicting what I want to say. 🙂

39. TimC @38. I suspect my phone was telling me to split it into two words, but, as usual, I ignored it. Typing this at my PC, and it has already pointed out one typing error which I’ve corrected (hopefully) before sending.

40. Most enjoyable and elegant puzzle from Imogen. Plenty of fine clues but I particularly liked the four long solutions, and BID FAIR is a particularly neat DD with a faultless surface.

    MARC is not only the residue from filtering out the solids from the fermenting pressed grapes but also the French name for the spirit that is distilled from it – equivalent to the Italian grappa.

    [Tim C @16: PARTHENOGENESIS certainly exists in Nature, but it produces a clone of the parent. Jesus must therefore have been female 🙂 ]

    Thanks to S&B

41. Such great fun, and like Andrew this seemed to mostly go in fairly quickly. The four long downs obvs helped a lot. The only one of these that had me scratching my head was the pasta bird (nho).

    PARTHENOGENESIS was was favourite, followed by RACLETTE and BABY BOOMER.

    Thanks Imogen and Andrew

42. [Gervase @40: Why do you mention Jesus? That special case doesn’t take away from the fact that parthenogenesis is generating offspring without sexual intercourse]

43. TimC @38 and Crispy @32. We’ve all probably been guilty of a few typos and, yes, predictive text can drive you insane, especially by inserting unwanted apostrophes. (I know you can turn it off but it keeps coming back!) However, I am of the opinion that anyone able to attempt a Guardian cryptic crossword is pretty well able to cope with English grammar, punctuation and syntax. TimC should apologise.

44. So this is the process of how I crept slowly into this – 8ac must end in S, that helped with foi ASCRIBE…the B in that helped with BABY BOOMER…the third B in that gave me the supporter, Bra – no, not this time, BACK instead…and so on. To eventually reveal what I thought was a bit of a tour de force from Imogen today. Stunning anagram for the unknown bird at 1d, and lucky that first guess for the European capital for the anagrind at 7d was indeed correct with Paris. Loved this, last one in PIP EMMA, after I wondered about BID FAIR for quite some time…

45. …oh, and by the shortest of winning distances COTD for me today was HEAVY GOING, which at first I thought this excellent puzzle might turn out to be…

46. I Had to reveal PIP EMMA. I am now wondering why one needs a military signal for PM when the military uses the 24 hour clock (as in 1300 rather than one pip emma). Maybe this question is because I am nor, in fact, a Boomer, so am too young for this.

    The MACARONI PENGUIN anagram was truly impressive.

47. Apparently Sir George Everest after whom the mountain was name di pronounce his name EVE-REST

48. Thanks to Meandme@34/37 and SimonS@36. I had the same thought as mrpenney@46. It made me think of Captain Mainwaring in Dad’s Army who could never quite get to grips with the 24 hour clock.

49. I’m another who must have been more on Imogen’s wavelength today, for I found this much much easier than the last one of his that I struggled through. Like Julie in A @ 30, I filled in the right-hand side fairly quickly, but took longer over the left. Mind you, it helped that I saw/guessed 6D straightaway, and PARTHENOGENESIS is a really brilliant anagram. As is the pasta penguin (which I’d never heard of, but that’s par for the course with me and crosswords.)
    LOOFAS was sweet – though I, too, have always spelled them with an H – BABY BOOMER & MANDOLIN made me grin.
    My Biblical knowledge is decidedly limited – I was unaware there’s a book called Esther – so many thanks to Andrew for the help completing the parsing of SIESTA (a CFE, crossed fingers entry) and also SCRAMBLING. Lord knows I’ve downed enough wine in my time, but had never heard of marc.
    So, the fun of completing an Imogen with relative ease, plus learning 3 or 4 new facts. What larks eh pip?
    Thank you Imogen!

50. According to the OED, ACK for A stems from the Signalling Instructions issued by the British War Office in 1898, when presumably the 24-hour system wasn’t in use. It was from the then equivalent of the NATO alphabet. It was replaced by ABLE in 1942 (the Able, Baker, Charlie… alphabet), and subsequently by ALPHA.

    I think the three most remembered usages currently are ACK EMMA, PIP EMMA, and TOCK EMMA for Trench Mortar.

51. After nearly being impaled yesterday, this one flowed surprisingly (for an Imogen) well.

    I liked the wordplays in FAVELA and ASCENT OF EVEREST, the good cd/dd for BABY BOOMER (some definitions seem to include the latter part of 1945 after the end of WWII), and the craftily hidden EBAY.

    Thanks Imogen and Andrew.

52. It’s more usually TOC EMMA, though TOCK is not disqualified by Chambers. Wiki also allows TOCH.

    Collins doesn’t seem to include it at all.

53. Thanks for the blog, I like the grid with four long Down entries and the setter used them very well . Good set of clues but I do prefer Imogen being more challenging, this is the second Spock puzzle in a row.

54. Thoroughly enjoyed the RHS; LHS not so much. Remembered “Ack Emma”, but even with the girl in place, couldn’t dredge up PIP. It was a similar story with the pasta penguin and I don’t remember ever coming across BID FAIR. As for many others, the parsing of SCRAMBLING was a closed book. Nevertheless, I thought this was a lot of fun, so many thanks to Imogen and to Andrew for illuminating the dark corners.

55. A very quick solve for an Imogen for me; I must’ve been right on the wavelength.

    In chapter one of Adam Hall’s Quiller novel “The Tango Briefing”, Quiller is instructed to attend a briefing at the Air Ministry, at “nine ack-emma mañana”, which has always stuck in my head. The novel was published in 1973, so presumably “ack-emma” was still a reasonably recognisable phrase back then.

56. Norfolkdumpling@43 and TimC @ various. I’m not offended in any way by TimC’s post, it came across as tongue in cheek, so I don’t feel the need for an apology.

57. Eileen hasn’t visited yet, but she will no doubt recollect PIP EMMA from a Pasquale puzzle she blogged on March 2nd 2021. That’s where I remembered it from, although in my memory it seemed much more recent until I checked.

58. Another one here, who had never heard of Pip Emma.

    I’m also wondering why (presumably grown up) people spend their time on such snark as demonstrated in a certain comment above. They must be fun at parties.

59. Thanks to Imogen for another puzzle packed with the usual combination of elegance and ingenuity.
    Favourites:
    AGGRIEVE
    BABYBOOMER
    MACARONI PENGUIN
    PARTHENOGENESIS
    EBAY
    Thanks to Andrew for a couple of parsings I couldn’t manage on my own.

60. Ui Imair @25, it’s an apt clue to repeat itself – it’s nice to share, isn’t it?

61. mrpenney @46: I’m a boomer and I can confirm that PIP EMMA was archaic even when I was born (although I knew the term). The military didn’t always use the 24 hour clock, at least in the UK. And don’t US airlines still list times as am/pm, unlike their European counterparts?

62. An enjoyable steady solve, and happy to learn of the pasta penguin, PIP EMMA (or was it in the Biggles books? In which case re-learn). Favourites were ASCENT OF EVEREST and my LOI EBAY. Thanks Imogen and Andrew.

63. Balfour @57

    I do remember PIP EMMA cropping up in more than one puzzle that I’ve blogged – indeed, as I commented on the Pasquale puzzle that you quoted, I first met it in a puzzle that I blogged at least ten years before that – and it stuck.
    I see that Blaise made the same comment re ‘A murder is announced’ on the Pasquale blog, too. 🙂
    And, interestingly, I saw the play just last month, when it opened my local Little Theatre’s current season.

    I’ve been out all morning and wasn’t going to comment but, while I’m here, I’ll just add my praise for ASCENT OF EVEREST, PARTHENOGENESIS and SIESTA in particular.

    Thanks to Imogen and Andrew

64. Thanks Imogen and Andrew
    Very nice puzzle. Lots to like – favourites BABY BOOMER, ICE FLOE, OYSTER, and PARTHENOGENISIS. I too knew PIP EMMA from the Christie story.
    I took the Persian queen to be a cat, so had CATNAP @23 as FOI! Eventually disproved by 1d.
    I really can’t understand why people refer to LOOFAS as “sponges” – they differ in origin, properties, and function!

65. Good puzzle, easier end of Imogen (demonstrated by my being able to finish it). Favourites were PARTHENOGENESIS, an ingenious long anagram with a clever surface, and OSYTER for the surface and definition. Honourable mention to the very neat and tidy AGGRIEVE. I agree that PIP EMMA (and ack emma) pre-date the boomer generation – both were beloved terms of my first boss, who was born in about 1935. While he was a complete pompous arse, if it hadn’t been for him I’d have had a DNF on my hands today!

66. muffin @65; Chambers: The fibrous network of its fruit, used as a hard, rough spongeCollins: The fibrous interior of the fruit of the dishcloth gourd, which is dried, bleached, and used as a bath sponge or for scrubbing; ODE: The fibrous interior of a fruit that resembles a marrow, dried and used as a sponge for washing the body.

67. Robi @66
    Pace dictionaries, the defining property of a sponge is that it is absorbent; a loofa isn’t. It also isn’t used for washing as such; it’s used for gentle exfoliating. The dictionaries are making the same mistake as the people misusing the term sponge. I suppose you could argue that they are just being descriptive, but I still don’t like it!

68. Thanks both.

    Badly beaten again. ( I’m expending my available solving capacities on Boatman’s books so dis-improving elsewhere – ah well.) Enjoyed this in spite of copious reveals and would have had nothing to say were it not for that a MANDOLIN, while it may be plucked, is invariably picked – a paltry differentiation (perhaps on a par with a loofa(h) not being a sponge (which it isn’t (regardless of how many people – and hence dictionaries – perceive it))) you might say but while you could pluck a violin it mightn’t meaningfully be clued as a plucked instrument.

    muffin@64: Another CATNAP…

69. Did anyone else make my mistake of putting an unparsed OUSTED for 22A, as it fits the definition “Being forced out” well? I do hate to miss the clues where the answer is written out for you, but I do it often.

70. I keep forgetting that “cloakroom” is a euphemism for “loo” over there. In the US the only thing I’ve ever heard called a cloakroom was the little room behind the classroom in my tiny rural two-room elementary school, where we hung our coats. I don’t recall anybody ever having a cloak.

    In 10ac, does “American” modify FAVE (American expression) or LA (American city) or somehow both?

    I don’t quite think of Esther as a Persian queen, since she wasn’t a Persian, though she did become queen of Persia.

    In SCRAMBLING I didn’t think of either marc or B for barrel, though I’ve heard of both.

    Loved the anagram of Stonehenge in PARTHENOGENESIS! And the other clever anagrams as well.

    Blaise@29 I’d remembered Pip and Emma from an Agatha Christie novel and googled to see which one it was. The trick was that someone had left two children known as Pip and Emma and everyone assumes that Pip is a man, but she’s Philippa. ( I actually know a woman who goes by Pip, don’t know her actual name but it may be Philippa.)

    Thanks to Imogen and Andrew.

71. I was born 10 years after the ASCENT OF EVEREST but I am inexplicably grouped in with BABY BOOMERS despite the fact that both of my parents were born during WW2!! I can’t begin to describe how resentful that makes me even though I know it’s a meaningless description. I demand membership in Gen X!!

72. Valentine @70
    Christie spoiler? 🙂

73. Wooden_tree: Yup – and the boy was TED

74. muffin @70. I wouldn’t call that a spoiler… more painting a red herring a deeper shade of crimson.

75. Super puzzle, really enjoyed the long anagrams especially. Thanks, Imogen and Andrew.

    muffin @67 – dictionaries aren’t making a mistake, they’re accurately recording how people use the word. That’s what dictionaries do.

76. Widdersbel @75
    Yes, they are being descriptive, but they could also add “incorrectly”. After all, a descriptive dictionary could define “whale” as “large fish”. Would you accept that?

77. JinA@30, here’s how I parsed 3d SCRAMBLING: I filled in the letters from the definition and crossers, then read Andrew’s excellent blog and the many lively comments. 🙂

    My favourites, BABY BOOMERS, ASCENT OF EVEREST, and PARTHENOGENESIS have already been mentioned several times, so I won’t.

    Not a single complaint from rhotic speakers about the aural wordplay in 23a SIESTA, so the campaign must be working.

    Thanks Imogen for the fun, Andrew for unscrambling 3d.

78. muffin @76 – you’re mistaking the purpose of dictionaries. If you want accurate taxonomy of sea life, ask a marine biologist not a lexicographer.

79. B for barrel new to me as was BID FAIR. Not a quick solve for me…not helped by the answers not being saved online which sometimes happens for me. Apparently not a Guardian bug so maybe safari?
    Thanks Imogen and Andrew (see you Friday for quiz I hope)

80. Whales were called fish for a long time , certainly up to Moby Dick and beyond.

81. That’s my point, Roz – would you be happy if one of the definitions in a dictionary for whale was large fish? I doubt it…

82. Thanks both,
    Is a loofah a sponge? I’m with Muffin. The cited definitions all say ‘used as a sponge’ rather than ‘is a sponge’. I could use a piece of dried cod as a sponge but it wouldn’t make it a sponge.

    One of the purposes of some dictionaries is to record usage, eg OED, but they also purport to provide facts and some try to prescribe usage. I also agree with Muffin that the dictionaries are factually incorrect. Sponges and loofas are used differently.

83. Thanks to Imogen for the puzzle, but I saw the same clue for Parthenogenesis not long ago, maybe in the i? And thanks to Andrew as well.

84. [Thanks Tyngewick]

85. Lexicographers and dictionaries record usage from the academic to the vernacular: that’s an objective process.

    Thinking the lexicographers and dictionaries are wrong is a subjective opinion.

    It’s unlikely the twain shall ever meet.

86. Simon S @85
    Surely dictionaries should be allowed to report a usage, then say “incorrect”?

87. Favourites: PARTHENOGENESIS, PIP EMMA, MANDOLIN, LOST (loi).

    New for me: MACARONI PENGUIN.

    I did not parse 3d.

    Thanks, both.

88. muffin @ 86 Per my post, ‘incorrect’ is an opinion. If that’s how people use a term / phrase, in their view it’s correct. Usage changes, and dictionaries record those usages objectively.

    As I said, it’s unlikely that the twain shall meet, and you prove my point.

89. Simon
    Many people have said that the moon is made of green cheese, but it isn’t!
    Similarly, a loofa isn’t a sponge. This isn’t a matter of opinion, but fact.

90. muffin

    As far as I know, ‘green cheese’ and ‘moon’ aren’t recorded as synonymous in dictionaries, as it’s opinion, not common usage, vernacular or otherwise.

    ‘loofa’ as ‘sponge’ may be factually incorrect but is common usage, so it’s recorded.

    Dictionaries are descriptive not prescriptive, so don’t record opinions (with possible humorous exceptions such as Chambers’ definitions of ‘mullet’ and ‘eclair’).

91. Simon S@85 – lovely clarity in your statement – thank you. Roz@80 has a nice example though – I think you’d need to date ‘whale’ as ‘fish’ in a clue, preferably without being clunky. ‘Misuse’ is one of the most misused concepts in lexicography.

92. Crispy @56, My comment was definitely tongue in cheek and no offence was intended, so I’m glad that you didn’t take any. 🙂

93. Paul8hours@83 – https://www.fifteensquared.net/2019/11/02/independent-10314-by-klingsor/ – Reproduction of Stonehenge repositioned in capital (15)
    The i recycles four-year-old independent puzzzles.

94. Before that there was – https://www.fifteensquared.net/2018/09/27/financial-times-15974-by-neo/ – Reproduction Stonehenge assembled in capital (15)
    And since then – https://www.fifteensquared.net/2021/08/08/independent-on-sunday-1641-tees/ – Reproduction Stonehenge assembled in capital (15)
    Neo is Tees. Klingsor is Alberich. Imogen is Vulcan.

95. Impossible if you’ve never heard of “pip Emma” before.

96. Re 94, at approximately four-and-a-half thousand years, surely this is one of the oldest clues ever to have been lifted. And one of the heaviest.

97. …unless it’s the one in This Is Spinal Tap(1984) – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pyh1Va_mYWI

98. I think at a certain point, somewhere around the 90 minute mark, my brain just says “that’s it, whatever’s left remains unsolved”. And I often discover that the remaining solutions are really no more difficult than many I have unraveled. How can I spot “OYSTER” but not “EBAY”? Similarly, how could “LOST” escape me while “BLOC” was instantaneous…? Anyway, I learned a new word (RACLETTE), so thanks for that.

99. RACLETTE is a type of cheese as well as the cheese dish. The cheese is melted and poured over potatoes, pickles, and charcuterie. We had it when we were in the Vercors (near Grenoble), and liked it so much we bought and brought home a cheese melter!

100. Re dictionaries and sponges. What’s been ignored in this discussion is not the purpose of dictionaries but the purpose of crossword clues. Which is to help the solver think of the answer while not making it too easy, or too difficult, if possible. I think Imogen hit the nail on the head with this clue

     Or perhaps I have misjudged. Hands up anyone who didn’t think LOOFAS when seeing ‘sponges’! 😉

101. SH @100
     That doesn’t resolve the problem of having unindicated incorrect definitions in respected reference works. It used to be said that you couldn’t believe everything on Wikipedia; now it seems you can’t believe everything in Chambers!
     As I said earlier, reporting word usage descriptively would be OK if the label “incorrect” were to be added. As far as I remember, the closest we get to that in Chambers is “informal”.

102. Never seen loofah spelt without the h , but was one of the first in .

103. muffin @91 – as Simon S said earlier, “incorrect” is a subjective judgment, and such editorialising is not the business of dictionaries. The full OED qualifies many of its entries with extensive notes about usage; Chambers is somewhat hampered in this respect by the brevity of its definitions. Caveat lector.

104. Widdersbel @103
     Going round in circles, I know, but it’s not subjective that a loofa isn’t a sponge!

105. Chambers does occasionally note that a usage is erroneous. Eg octopi is given in bold, i.e. as a word, but with the qualification ‘is wrong’.
     For loofah, it looks to me like both Chambers and Collins have gone to uncharacteristic length in order to avoid defining a loofah as a sponge. If there was to be an ‘incorrect’ inserted, it would have to be ‘used incorrectly as a sponge’. While there’s obviously something not quite right about that, perhaps it would satisfy Muffin because it could include crossword compilers as people who use it ‘incorrectly as a sponge’.
     I am with Muffin on this one, because (a) it’s not a sponge, in fact or use (b) it’s not defined as a sponge (c) if you’ve got one, you don’t call it a sponge. As far as I am aware, crossword compilers are the only people to do so.
     As for sheffield hatter’s point that the job of the clue is to make us think of the answer, yes, but that is the very lowest bar that a clue must get over; it’s not a good test for whether there’s anything wrong with a clue.

106. Chambers 2: the fibrous network of its fruit, used as a hard, rough sponge.

     Collins (British English): the fibrous interior of the fruit of the dishcloth gourd, which is dried, bleached, and used as a bath sponge.

     So, really, well, it’s a pretty tough definition to complain all that much about, I’d say. And if you buy the verb (as some sources do), even more so.

107. In my view the clue works well; I’m not going to say if there’s anything wrong with the clue or not, James@105. It works, doesn’t it.

     Looking at the dictionary definitions quoted by paul b@106, I think the clue might well be vindicated.

     For those who don’t like what the dictionaries say about LOOFAS and sponges, your gripe needs to be discussed on a dictionary forum, of which I reckon there must be a few, rather than on a forum dedicated to crosswords.

108. paul b @106
     That’s my point – those definitions are just wrong. The only thing that loofas and sponges have in common is that they might both be found beside baths. You wouldn’t use a loofa as a sponge, but as a gentle exfoliant.

109. Very slow start, came back a day later and quickly filled in the rest — all but EBAY. Shame on me.

     I have great sympathy for those complaining that loofas are not sponges, but that ship has sailed. We are at the mercy of how people actually speak, not how they ought to speak. The problem is not that loofas are not biological sponges, but rather that loofas are nothing like actual sponges in form or function — and yet idiots do call them “bath sponges”. We can’t fix that.

110. muffin @ 108 you are right, as discussed by many above, but a quick look round some historical clues reveals that ‘sponge’ is incredibly popular as a definition for loofa(h). I mean really popular. ‘Scrubber in Bath’ gets a mention here and there, though such misogyny is now eschewed by most editors.

111. [Julie in Australia @ 33 – I don’t think it’s just us, I do feel Imogen is becoming brighter of mood and lighter of touch, and generally more creative (poetic, innovative). I also agree with you that Vlad is more chewy again (as when he first appeared) and I don’t mind that but I prefer to know (so that, like Enigmatist and Boatman, I may save for a more lingering Saturday morning solve). Good to read your thoughts, Julie, as ever]

112. dear muffin et al (and on this, I’m inclined to take your part), talking of sponge usage I recall so well, as a very very little fella, how much I enjoyed sucking the bath water from my sponge …. I’m unsure whether a loofah would have worked so well! My earliest “Chambers 20th Century Dictionary” (with illustrations, from first decade of century or possibly printed late 1890s; I’ve several different editions) starts with “see Luffa” which doesn’t mention sponge at all, describing it as being “used as a flesh-brush”! How about that for precision – do you approve, muffin?

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