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The puzzle may be found at https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/cryptic/29767.
A first-rate puzzle with an excellent variety of ingenious constructions. Perhaps not as difficult as Imogen can sometimes be, but that is no drawback, given the good surfaces throughout without a dud in sight. My last parsing (but not entry) and tea-tray moment was 3D BUNDLE OF NERVES (BUND gang? LEO lion FNERVES gsnurfltzr).
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | SIDEBURNS |
Transformative sun dries black hair on head (9)
|
| An anagram (‘transformative’) of ‘sun dries’ plus B (‘black’). | ||
| 6 | PSST |
A call just for you from ship in port (4)
|
| An envelope (‘in’) of SS (‘ship’) in PT (‘port’). | ||
| 10 | LIVEN |
Pep up to be a knight (5)
|
| A charade of LIVE (‘be’) plus N (‘knight’ in chess notation). | ||
| 11 | ABSOLVING |
Freeing muscles, really enjoying putting pounds back (9)
|
| A charade of ABS (‘muscles’) plus OLVING, which id LOVING (‘really enjoying’) with the L moved one place toward the end (‘putting pounds back’). | ||
| 12 | DELILAH |
Strongman’s betrayer summoned back, left imprisoned (7)
|
| An envelope (‘imprisoned’) of L (‘left’) in DELIAH, a reversal (‘back’) of HAILED (‘summoned’). The definition is a reference to the Bible story of Samson and Delilah in the Book of Judges. | ||
| 13 | ADAPTOR |
Right to end fuss about suitable plug-in (7)
|
| An envelope (‘about’) of APT (‘fitting’) in ADO (‘fuss’) plus R (‘right’), with ‘to end’ placing the R at the back. | ||
| 14 | FOR GOOD AND ALL |
Absolutely manage without add-on, changing a couple of lines (3,4,3,3)
|
| A charade of FORGO (‘manage without’) plus ODAND, an anagram (‘changing’) of ‘add-on’ plus ‘a’ plus L L (‘couple of lines’). | ||
| 17 | MANSFIELD PARK |
Two pitches perhaps player’s first going to book (9,4)
|
| A charade of MAN’S (‘player’s’) plus FIELD and PARK (‘two pitches perhaps’), for the novel by Jane Austen. | ||
| 21 | CHAGRIN |
Mortification as horse racing scrapped (7)
|
| An anagram (‘scrapped’) of H (‘horse’) plus ‘racing’. | ||
| 22 | ARAGORN |
Ring character has a scrap of cloth, gold fused with navy (7)
|
| A charade of ‘a’ plus RAG (‘scrap of cloth’) plus OR (heraldic, ‘gold’) plus N (‘navy’), with ‘ring character’ referring to Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings.
Alternatively, and perhaps better: ORN is OR (‘gold’) ‘fused with’ RN (Royal ‘Navy’). |
||
| 24 | WHITEHALL |
Centre of government, a little bit – what, the lot? (9)
|
| A charade of WHIT (‘a little bit’) plus EH (‘what?’) plus ALL (‘the lot’). | ||
| 25 | GIMME |
In golf, a very short distance, principally excused (5)
|
| A charade of G (‘golf’, NATO alphabet) plus I MM ( 1 millimetre, ‘a very short distance’) plus E (‘principally Excused’), with an &lit definition for a putt so short that the golfer is excused from executing it. | ||
| 26 | SIGH |
Sound disappointed as vision finally fades (4)
|
| A subtraction: SIGH[t] (‘vision’) minus its last letter (‘finally fades’). | ||
| 27 | ELDERSHIP |
Church office that may require an operation to replace? (9)
|
| ELDER’S HIP. | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | SOLIDIFY |
Note, top provided to cover base of cookery set (8)
|
| A charade of SO (‘note’ of sol-fa) plus LID (‘top’) plus IF (‘provided’) plus (‘to cover’) Y (‘base of cookerY‘).
Missing element added. |
||
| 2 | DEVIL |
One’s dead wicked? (5)
|
| A charade of D (‘dead’) plus EVIL (‘wicked’), with an extended definition. | ||
| 3 | BUNDLE OF NERVES |
Gang meeting lion suggests a very anxious state (6,2,6)
|
| In anatomy, a ganglion (‘gang meeting lion’) is a bundle of nerves. | ||
| 4 | REACHED |
Got to have felt hurt again? (7)
|
| A whimsical coinage: RE-ACHED (‘felt hurt again’). | ||
| 5 | SUSTAIN |
Pollution traps American bear (7)
|
| An envelope (‘traps’) of US (‘American’) in STAIN (‘pollution’). | ||
| 7 | SCINTILLA |
Spark from fault with steering mechanism, say (9)
|
| As the C is silent, this sounds like (‘say’) SIN (fault’) plus TILLER (‘steering mechanism’). | ||
| 8 | TAGORE |
Nobel author of old volunteers blood (6)
|
| A charade of TA (Territorial Army, ‘old volunteers’) plus GORE (‘blood’). Rabindranath Tagore was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1913. | ||
| 9 | CLOAK-AND-DAGGER |
Cover with sticker that describes an intriguing novel (5-3-6)
|
| A charade of CLOAK (‘cover’) plus AND (‘with’) plus DAGGER (‘sticker’ – stick as pierce). | ||
| 15 | RAMPAGING |
Storming around calling for stuff to be brought over (9)
|
| A charade of RAM (‘stuff’) plus PAGING (‘calling for’), with ‘to be brought over indicating the order of the particles, in a down light. | ||
| 16 | SKIN-DEEP |
Understand about gentle power being superficial (4-4)
|
| A charade of SKINDEE, an envelope (‘about’) of KIND (‘gentle’) in SEE (‘understand’); plus P (‘power’). | ||
| 18 | FANFARE |
Display of enthusiasm for food provided for football crowd? (7)
|
| FAN FARE. | ||
| 19 | EMAILED |
Sent message to put me up, having gone sick (7)
|
| A charade of EM, a reversal (‘up’ in a down light) of ‘me’ plus (‘having’) AILED (‘gone sick’). | ||
| 20 | SCOWLS |
Lowers small hood over son (6)
|
| A charade of S (‘small’) plus COWL (‘hood’) plus (‘over’) S (‘son’). ‘Lower’, verb, or lour: to look sullen. | ||
| 23 | OOMPH |
Doubled round one sitting with husband, showing vigour (5)
|
| A charade of O O (‘doubled round’) plus MP (‘one sitting’ in the House of Commons) plus H (‘husband’). |
Thankyou PeterO. Agree. Excellent puzzle. I had similar first takes and final delightful revelation of the ganglion in BUNDLE OF NERVES. Needed your help with the GIMME. Not a gimme for me, not knowing the golf term.
A slowish start but with crossers things started to flow. Very fair, something in every clue to build on.
Shoulda got the gimme. i tried different measures, but not that one.
Did anyone try cattle first for “lowers” and another meaning of “hood” in SCOWLS? Made me laugh at myself..
On first read-through I only solved one (DEVIL) and I was about to chuck it in, but I’m glad I persevered as there were some great clues. My biggest smiles were ELDERSHIP & BUNDLE OF NERVES.
Thanks Imogen and PeterO.
BUNDLE OF NERVES: my fave too.
Also liked FOR GOOD AND ALL, DEVIL and SCINTILLA.
SCOWLS: paddymelon@2, of course, ‘lowers’ triggers ‘cows’ first.
GIMME: Liked it….a minor point: the ‘in’ in the clue fits well in the def, but sticks out in
the WP. Falling short of an &lit by half in-ch?!
When I guessed the answer to 12a after reading the clue’s first two words I felt pretty good about myself, but then I only solve one more across clue on my first pass. Luckily I found the downs to be easier. I was also distracted by LEO when trying to understand 3d, and I laughed when I finally worked it out.
I don’t think it really matters, but in 22a I thought ‘gold’=OR and ‘navy’=RN are ‘fused’ to make ORN.
Thanks, PeterO and Imogen.
Matthew@5
ARAGORN
I think your parsing is more apt.
Yes, Matthew@5, I tend to agree regarding ARAGORN.
Indeed, KVa @4, not knowing about the very short putt thing, I was left thinking htf does gimme = in? D’oh!
It being Imogen, I was expecting to be properly duffed up, but was surprised to receive only some gentle pummelling. Not complaining though – a very nice crossword with a few gems. Thanks PeterO for saving me a day trying to parse the gang lion, and thanks Imogen.
I thoroughly enjoyed this. NHO the expression “for good and all” but it was clearly clued so didn’t hold me up. Another vote for BUNDLE OF NERVES as a favourite.
My experience was similar to other solvers—maybe 10 fills on the first pass, but then slow and steady progress. In the states I have heard the expression “For once and all”, but never have heard “For good and all”. However, it was clearly clued so no problem. Thanks Imogen for a great puzzle and PeterO for the usual stellar blog.
Thanks PeterO for explaining BUNDLE OF NERVES and GANGLION.
Great puzzle.
I really enjoyed this puzzle. Thank you, Imogen, and thanks to PeterO, for explaining the bits I couldn’t. I’d never have parsed BUNDLE OF NERVES, having solved from the crossers and a lot of serious staring. For others, I followed directions and, hey presto, the answer appeared- TAGORE, MANSFIELD PARK, ARAGORN, were favourite pdm. A really satisfying workout.
Yes, nice puzzle.
PeterO, I like your concise descriptions of parsing, but you’ve omitted IF (‘provided’) from SOLIDIFY.
ARAGORN very clearly clued and vaguely familiar, but I wasn’t quite sure if he was from Tolkien or from Wagner.
Like others, my favourite was BUNDLE OF NERVES.
Thanks Imogen and PeterO.
Thanks Imogen and PeterO
I’ve never heard the expression FOR GOOD AND ALL, or ELDERSHIP. Otherwise very enjoyable, GIMME favourite (I wish I had more!) Gang Lion also very good.
[I meant to add that SIDEBURNS were named after the Civil War General Ambrose Burnside, who sported impressive ones.]
Excellent crossword and blog, thankyou. What’s a tea tray moment please?
Didn’t manage very much first time round but eventually it all came together nicely.
A couple I didn’t manage to parse – once it’s explained, BUNDLE OF NERVES = GANGLION is one of the cleverest “hiding in plain sight” clues I’ve seen for ages. And while there’s probably a decent clue to be fashioned out of RAGING about A MP (my local one is currently being investigated for allegedly “calling for stuff to be brought over” to his bank account) it wasn’t the one in this puzzle.
Thanks to Imogen for, as always, an excellent puzzle and to PeterO for, as always, an excellent blog
SueB@17 a tea-tray moment is where you look puzzlingly at a clue for ages but are unable to parse it. Then, suddenly, out of the blue, you see how it works and it then seems ever so obvious and you wonder why you didn’t get it sooner. Had you been carrying a tea-tray you would have dropped it at that point. A ‘ha-ha’ or ‘of course’ moment.
Superb stuff. Hard to make space on the podium for all my favourites but medals for B of N, GIMME & PSST
Glad to see I’m not alone in saving the ganglion until last 🙂
Earworm? Has to be Tom Jones’s DELILAH
Never knowingly undersung
Cheers P&I
SueB@17. A.tea tray moment is a lot louder and more dramatic than a penny drop moment, when you think of dropping either of them. . Both from an era when tea trays and pennies were more common.. And from an earlier time of cryptics but the terms have survived…
There’s a funny video of tea trays that’s often posted when this question comes up. It’s British of course and I can’t recall, but maybe someone here can oblige.
Brilliant for all the reasons people have said, but aren’t SIDEBURNS on your face rather than your head?
[I thought the tea tray moment involved bashing yourself on the head with it? Spider Stacy of The Pogues demonstrates the technique on Waxie’s Dargle albeit for percussive rather than cruciverbal reasons]
P@22 if a cake’s on a plate on a table I think it’s fair to say the cake is on the table?
I’ve also always imagined the tea tray moment involving hitting yourself on the head with it… like this!
Did anyone else get misdirected by thinking that the gang and the lion were something to do with Narnia?
Thanks to Imogen and PeterO for a very entertaining crossword and blog.
PeterT@22 Aren’t sideburns on the temple, which is “the flat part of either side of the head between the forehead and the ear”? And anyway, the face is “the front part of a person’s head from the forehead to the chin, or the corresponding part in an animal.”
Brilliant as ever from Imogen, this was immaculate clueing throughout. Nho of TRAGORE or ARAGORN but the instructions were crystal clear. My favourites were SCINTILLA, CHAGRIN, DELILAH, BUNDLE OF NERVES and MANSFIELD PARK but I am still bemused about ABSOLVING as it seems to ask you to put the O rather than the L back?
Hoping for a few GIMMEs this afternoon.
Ta Imogen & PeterO.
Thoroughly enjoyable.
Bodycheetah @20: I’m staggered to learn that the Welsh correctness police have decided that Delilah is too misogynistic and we are not allowed to sing it any more. I despair.
I was unsure of the spelling of FORGO and was surprised to learn that forgo and forego are two quite different words.
Gotta luvva crozzie, doncha?
I had the same confusion with 3d which ended up going in unparsed and had to come here for illumination. I should have been more patient.
It’s interesting to see the two camps regarding tea tray moments. We’ve all read or even used the expression for many years yet two different interpretations have existed side by side quite happily. There ought to be some sort of a etymological/grammatical term for such! I was of the bashing oneself on the head persuasion…
A satisfying solve, one that left me feeling just a little clever. Thanks to Imogen and PeterO
Thanks for the tea tray explanations. Interesting differences. Jay @24: ouch!!
I found this a surprisingly steady solve for once, apart from BUNDLE OF NERVES whose parsing completely eluded me, so thank you PeterO.
I had never heard of TAGORE, but worked it out from the clue and crossers and then googled for confirmation.
Thank you Imogen, a very pleasant solve.
I found myself looking at a list of Wagnerian characters for 22a before the penny dropped. Aragorn would more properly be called a Rings character.
I wondered about h=horse in 21a as it’s not in Chambers. Possibly from hp=horsepower? If so it seems weak.
Needless to say the TILLA in 5d set my teeth on edge.
I had GAMME (yes, it’s an actual word), not knowing the golf term, but without much confidence.
Good puzzle all the same.
Very tough puzzle. Upper half was easier for me. I failed to solve 17,21ac and 15,18d.
New for me: ELDERSHIP; FOR GOOD AND ALL.
I could not parse 11ac apart from ABS = muscles; 14ac; 3d; 23d apart from OO + H bits, I forgot about MP = one sitting.
I solved it but I was unsure about the def for 25ac.
poc @32
H and horse are both street-names for heroin. I know that this doesn’t fully justify the equivalence,
Completed but couldn’t see how BUNDLE OF NERVES or SCINTILLA worked so cheers for the blog. One of those I got very few on the first pass but seemed to get easier (but never easy) as I worked my way through.
Enjoyed ELDERSHIP and GIMME amongst others
Cheers PeterO and Imogen
Poc@32 I had horse = heroin = H
W@28 that kind of wokery used to be quite rare, but now it’s not unusual 🙂
poc @32: I parsed it as horse = heroin = H. I agree with you about TILLA.
Bodycheetah @36 🙂
poc@32 In the first volume of Lord of the Rings, Aragorn is a member of the ‘Fellowship of the Ring’ (singular). He is also the direct lineal descendant of Isildur, so technically the rightful owner of the ‘One Ring to Rule Them All’. I think that justifies ring being used in the singular in the clue.
Thanks Imogen and PeterO
It’s not that Delilah is misogynistic, it’s a song extolling murder.
Thanks Imogen and PeterO for super puzzle and blog.
I too tried to rationalise ‘cows’ in 20d before the pdm.
Sadly, I failed to see ‘ganglion’, went with LEO and a shrug, so missed the tea tray moment.
I completely missed the “ganglion” and assumed 3d was just a Wizard of Oz reference. It’s a very clever clue.
Thanks PeterO and imogen
And thanks to Kva@4 for the ‘half an inch” joke 🙂
Rather challenging for me; for a while stared at an empty grid with only OOMPH in. BUNDLE OF NERVES is really really smart – agree with all (mulled over FNERVES, too…) Didn’t parse quite a few; thanks a lot PeterO for the explanations and Imogen for the puzzle!
Simon S @39: Nonsense. Perhaps you haven’t listened to it properly. It does not extol murder in the least. If anything, it’s a cautionary ballad warning of the consequences. If your mindt is set on finding something politically incorrect, you could probably find it in many songs – some religious ones spring to mind…
Bodycheetah @36: groan…
You missed off the provided=IF in SOLIDIFY.
Completed with several unparsed.
It’s 40 years since I read Lord of the Rings so had to google a list of characters.
Thanks both.
[Three-in-ten on today’s Popmaster was Tom Jones!]
I didn’t know TAGORE but it was a reasonable guess from the crossers; looked him up. And GIMME as a golfing term was also a new one: to me it merely suggests a very rude child demanding something.
Couldn’t parse BUNDLE OF NERVES – went totally astray. I completely missed that ‘ganglion’ reference and was trying to work from BUND (Gang in Gerrman?) + LEO – but could make nothing of “FNERVES”. But the definition was obvious enough.
Everything else fine. Liked SOLIDIFY, ABSOLVING, DELILAH, CHAGRIN, ELDERSHIP (not me! not yet! plenty of back pain though 🙁 ); SCINTILLA (I can forgive the non-rhotic ‘r’), RAMPAGED. And others.
Thanks to Imogen and Peter.
muffin@46: how wonderful!
Beaulieu @14
The missing IF has been added.
poc @32 etc
Way back when, I wrote a blog involving what I explained as H = heroin = horse, and was informed by a commenter who knew about these things that in racing circles, the abbreviation H = horse the animal directly is common.
Matthew @5
Agreed, your parsing of ORN in 22A ARAGORN gives a purpose in life for ‘fused with’ (but would sit better with a capital Navy if truth in capitals is important to you).
As usual, Imogen has me largely beaten as soon as I read his name. However, with copious help I did eventually complete this. I really should have seen the GANG LION; it’s a very good clue. When I Googled ‘nerves lion’ the helpful AI said this: The term “nerves lion” most likely refers to the book The Invisible Lion: How to Tame Your Nervous System & Heal Your Trauma by Benjamin Fry. So now you know! I liked ABSOLVING, MANSFIELD PARK, ELDERSHIP, CLOAK AND DAGGER, and FANFARE.
Thanks Imogen for the torture and PeterO for resolving it FOR GOOD AND ALL.
I never use a tea tray (too risky?) but I do remember once puzzling for hours over a single unparsed clue in what must have been a prize crossword (so no blog to enlighten me). The explanation suddenly flashed into my head in the late afternoon as I dropped a pack of pasta into the supermarket trolley… quite literally a penne drop moment.
This was really good, challenging enough to make me feel I’d achieved something. It looked so hard to start off with. I’m always pleased when I get the likes of GIMME and PSST that don’t look like words. I was seeking a blood group – A or O – on the end of NHO TAGORE , but after emerging from my speed awareness course, I had some gore inspiration (just in case – don’t worry, the course isn’t gory at all).
I’m not sure I’d ever have parsed the Bundle of Nerves. Sheepishly, I pencilled in the correct crossers very early off the back of just B-N—. It reminds me of that Pictionary round on Friends. I hadn’t heard of For Good and All either.
Thanks Imogen and thanks PeterO for parsing 3D.
For SUSTAIN I would have thought ‘Mark’ offers a stronger indicator for STAIN than does ‘Pollution’, whilst also offering a smoother surface (suggesting a hunter called Mark). I must get out more.
Due to erratic sleep pattern, I found myself addressing this about half an hour before my normal solving hour begins at 3.00. Struggled a bit until 3.00, when the solving part of my brain woke up and thereafter it went pretty smoothly and quickly. I have never so much played even pitch-and-putt, and I never watch golf, so how on earth did I know instantly that a very small distance in golf was a GIMME. I sometimes wish that pieces of GK came tagged with the date on which they were first acquired.
No one else has mentioned it so I must be missing something but why in 2d is One a definition of Devil?
An excellent and entertaining puzzle. Mrs LJ and I were discussing MANSFIELD PARK last night, having just booked tickets for a talk and discussion about it at Harewood House. So that one rather jumped out at me.
(Re 3d: many years ago when I’d not long moved up north, I developed a lump on my wrist and went to the doctor about it. He said what I heard as “I think you’ve got a gangly ‘un”, which I naturally assumed was a Yorkshire expression meaning that there was something wrong with it. Some talk at cross purposes ensued before things became clear.)
Many thanks Imogen and PeterO.
WearyB @55: as Peter says in the blog, it’s an extended definition — the whole clue is the definition.
I belong to a denomination whose churches do sometimes have Elders, but it still took a long time to work out whose HIP needed the operation. However, the strongman’s betrayer was my first in (is Mr. Jones still allowed to sing it now it’s Politically Incorrect? Has anyone told him?)
Never did parse BUNDLE OF NERVES (misled by Leo), and like others I was looking for cattle in what turned out to be SCOWLS. I’m always happy to see an Imogen – they may be hard but they are worth the effort.
[Lord Jim @56 – the folk cure for a ganglion on the wrist used to be to hit it hard with a heavy object – often the family Bible. I hope yours went away without such drastic measures!]
Gladys@58 – or a tea tray? Blaise@51 – you forgot your coat. And for what it’s worth I agree with KVa on the not quite @littishness of 25a and with William on Delilah – hear also, if you are minded, Slayer‘s „Angel of Death“. Also thanks Jay, I now realise 14a must be approx equivalent to „once and for all“ which is the only variant with which I am familiar. Needed GK to get a start ( eg Tagore was the first non-European literature laureate) but loved it all, thanks PeterO and Imogen.
Nobody else seems to picking it up much except kVa@4, but I think for 25A, “In” is simply a perfect definition, and the rest of the clue gives the parsing, as we expect. The point about a “Gimme” is that it is thus assumed to be in without the need to actually go through with the actual putt. So it is “in”. I prefer that to the &lit idea, which is not signalled with a question mark anyway.
Whereas, WearyB@55, 2d is signalled with a question mark, which generally indicates that the clue goes slightly beyond “definition/parsing” or “parsing/definition” which is the natural order of things in a cryptic crossword.
Strange that the song ‘Delilah’ should be proscribed because of its homicidal theme, but not the dozens of current ‘entertainment’ shows on TV, and countless popular books, factual or fictional, where murder is the almost obligatory subject.
Thank you, Bullhassocks @61, you made my point rather more eloquently than I.
Haha Blaise @51! Pasta-related joke of the day, orzo we thought…
I parsed 25 across as a cryptic definition/double meaning. In golf, gimme is a putt a very short distance from the whole. The player doesn’t need to take the putt but is granted it by their opponent and so is “principally excused” the bother of taking the shot.
Aha, thanks Andy Luke @60. Perhaps my @8 was not a d’oh after all!
Enjoyed this. Parsed 90% all told. The remaining I didn’t know. But very nice. Ganglion, that I got (light bulb!) after the blog was my favourite among many close runners.
Thanks Imogen and PeterO
Thanks Imogen. A bit easier than usual.
Last week I got half of Imogen’s clues. Today I wrote in DELILAH and DEVIL. And then that was it. Thanks PeterO for making sense of it.
Onwards and sdrawpu I guess…
PSST and SCINTILLA held me up at the very end of this lovely, elegant Imogen puzzle. SueB@17 et al…on the contrast between tea tray and penny dropping moments, may I relate a story that happened before decimalisation in 1971 in the UK. I worked as a bank cashier at the time and helmeted people used to come in to collect cash to pay the employees of some big companies near by, usually on a Friday. Often they wanted “shot” coins rather than neatly bagged up denominations. So in those days a blue linen bag containing £5 in pennies meant 1200 coins loose in the bag. The bag I handed to the Securicor man that day must have had a frayed bottom, for as soon as he had grasped it all those large pennies shooshed in a mighty cascade onto the floor of the bank. On that occasion a penny dropping moment equalling the sound of many tea trays being bashed against heads or whatever…
I’m always pleased to complete an Imogen in good time, and then inevitably disappointed to find the consensus is that the puzzle is at the easier end of their oeuvre. Nothing not to like here, a very good set of clues indeed. Favourite was WHITEHALL, as it’s the first time a solution has been my precise location at the moment of solving it.
My favourite setter. As usual stared and stared at it until it all started to fit. Wonderful stuff!
Is it just me that finds with ‘to be brought over indicating the order of the particles, in a down light.’ that doesn’t understand what this means?
Apologies for my own bit of gibberish. I’ll try again.
Is it just me that finds ‘to be brought over indicating the order of the particles, in a down light.’ incomprehensible?
[Good story, ronald@69. Brings back memories of when a penny was worth something.
I thought it was the sound of the tray and the China tea service and glass milk jug and sugar bowl and silver spoons all crashing to the floor, in a moment when the tea tray carrier is surprised.
I don’t know why anyone would want to bash themselves over the head in a moment of twigging to a crossword clue, albeit a bit belatedly, unless.a kind of self-flagellation?
But tea trays crashing and pennies dropping are very graphic, sensory representations of the aha moments in solving crosswords, which flood us with pleasure and keep us addicted, scientists say ]]
Barry Mason tells a story of going to the gents during a dinner and finding himself alongside a man humming Delilah. “I wrote that”, Mason couldn’t resist saying. “No you didn’t” the man said, “Les Reed wrote Delilah”. “Yes, but I wrote the lyrics”. “I wasn’t humming the lyrics”.
igtretd @72 &73
It might have been clearer if I had not omitted the single quote after over. The convention is that single quotes such as ‘to be brought over’ indicate a quote from the clue, and in this case the quoted phrase serves as instructions to place the word for ‘stuff’ before the word for ‘calling for’.
I thought GIMME was outstanding, an inspired &lit. Thanks Imogen (and PeterO for parsing B of N)
I thought of GIMME, but forgot the golf term, and settled on GAMME as in the French haute gamme, meaning top class, hot, or “in” at a stretch – not knowing how the world of fashion borrows such terms these days.
I didn’t spot the ganglion stroke of cleveration – a new device for me.
Thanks one and all.
Couldn’t get a single clue on first pass. Gave up.
I guessed BUNDLE OF NERVES, not knowing what a ganglion is. Otherwise fine, so thanks to setter and blogger.
Same as two days ago — one third of the puzzle completed fairly quickly, then brick wall. Great set of clues, though. On to the next!
Re DELILAH, I looked it up, and it seems the problem is not with the song per se, but that it had become a rugby anthem. Being surrounded by thousands of rowdies in a stadium singing the song could be really unsettling for many. If that’s the case, why not let go of it? There are a lot of other great songs out there that could be used instead