Crossword Help Forum
Forum Rules

Lumen, for 29 D, you need a two-letter 'this writer' (ie the person who's written what you're reading) inside a three-letter 'spread', verb, as in colours perhaps, spoiling your laundry. The meaning, paunch, wasn't known to me, but Chambers confirmed that. I hope this helps.

I see that now, and should have got the stomach connection.
I did have 37 wrong then, so don't see how terminates works as definition?

Chambers gives "to i***e" as "to terminate"

Lumen, glad I could help.

As usual, I'm way behind everyone else. I'm stuck on 28d and 30d even though I have a full row below the grid. I can't find any reference to anyone having trouble with either if these so it's probably me being thick. Any hints gratefully received!

28d now sorted. Maybe putting it down and coming back to it later will help with just the unch missing in 30d.

I now have an almost-complete grid, which I think is missing only a single letter from 18d. I know which letter must be missing, and I have a word involving that letter that meets a potential definition very cleanly, but I just can't figure out whether it can be justified with wordplay.

Any nudges welcome!

Chrisremo - a word meaning an excursion with a very short word meaning 'before' being moved down the word ('going south'). Def is 1st word of clue.
It's rare for me to be able to help someone on here - I'm usually the recipient of the hints!

Chrisremeo, a five-letter 'excursion' has one letter 'going south' in crossword terms to give a 'meeting' (an official kind of meeting). Again, this was a word I knew, but not with that meaning.

Ahh, thanks much Malone. That's actually the answer I had, but I just couldn't get a handle on the wordplay.