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Bleak. Very bleak.

I have managed a gran total of one solution all day.

I just cannot see how to solve anything!

Could I get a helpful nudge please?

8a Mistake to put “male” after only matching gender observed at birth (8)
IM GUESSING’M’ IS SOMEWHERE IN THE CLUE FOR MALE

Hi druh
I would advise you to throw this one away and hope for a more entertaining one tomorrow!
If you do want to continue, the key clue, 28a, has SWIFTIES as the solution.

As chris said, this is an idiosyncratic puzzle, heavily themed on a subject I know nothing about. Likely will take a long time to solve.
Maybe best to simply read the postmortem coverage on 225.

8a was my FOI but not easy and took a lot of thought. Definition "mistake", a fun but not-so-common word. Parses as 4, 3, 1 where the 1 is indeed M. The 4 is "only", and the 3 is an abbreviation for "matching gender observed at birth" that I only became aware of in the past few years (gender politics and all that).

Today's (Matilda) is much easier, and also much more fun!

Thanks ChrisE.

It feels and looks to me like it should be easier, yet all I can get are 6 answers!