Cryptic crossword No 3,511

A big thank you to Catnip for helping to keep me on the path!

Hi Sisyphus, another excellent effort here. Despite not having heard of 8a it was fairly obvious from the clueing and once that went in your special instructions made sense and helped ease the rest of the solve. I especially enjoyed 10a, 11a, 7d, 17d, 21d, 24d, and while I thought 16a v clever it took me far longer than it should have to parse. A couple of observations...

Deleted

Thanks and well done under some tough constraints. Favs include 10a, 11a, 21a (works nicely with the short words; 4d less so), 2d, 24d.

Well that was difficult and fun, thanks! I couldn't complete two (16a and 24d, the latter because I mistakenly put an E at end of 26a). Favourites 12a, 3d and especially 7d. Little bit uncomfortable with (at any rate, perplexed by) parses of 16a and 15d. Thank you!

Thanks Sisyphus, a very nice gridfill and the 'thing' became apparent early on, enabling a fairly swift solve despite some of the more unusual entries. Faves 27a & 15d ... Spoilers ...

Thanks Sisyphus for a Sisyphean effort. Most of this went in without much angst (once I saw the 'thing') but I still had to reveal 27a. Nonetheless I enjoyed many of the clues including 9a, 17a, 22a, 2d, and 4d. Overall I thought this was an impressive production.