set fast
noun
Roget 704: difficulty; hardness etc. adj.; impracticability etc. (impossibility) 471; tough work, hard work, uphill work; hard task, Herculean task, Augean task†; task of Sisyphus, Sisyphean labor, tough job, teaser, rasper†, dead lift. dilemma, embarrassment; deadlock; perplexity etc. (uncertainty) 475; intricacy; entanglement, complexity etc. 59; cross fire; awkwardness, delicacy, ticklish card to play, knot, Gordian knot, dignus vindice nodus [Lat.], net, meshes, maze; coil etc. (convolution) 248; crooked path; involvement. nice point, delicate point, subtle point, knotty point; vexed question, vexata quaestio [Lat.], poser; puzzle etc. (riddle) 533; paradox; hard nut to crack, nut to crack; bone to pick, crux, pons asinorum [Lat.], where the shoe pinches. nonplus, quandary, strait, pass, pinch, pretty pass, stress, brunt; critical situation, crisis; trial, rub, emergency, exigency, scramble. scrape, hobble, slough, quagmire, hot water, hornet's nest; sea of troubles, peck of troubles; pretty kettle of fish; pickle, stew, imbroglio, mess, ado; false position. set fast, stand, standstill; deadlock, dead set. fix, horns of a dilemma, cul de sac [Fr.]; hitch; stumbling block etc. (hindrance) 706. [difficult person] crab; curmudgeon. ... show more
adjective
Roget 704: difficult, not easy, hard, tough; troublesome, toilsome, irksome; operose†, laborious, onerous, arduous, Herculean, formidable; sooner said than done; more easily said than done, easier said than done. difficult to deal with, hard to deal with; ill-conditioned, crabbed, crabby; not to be handled with kid gloves, not made with rose water. awkward, unwieldy, unmanageable; intractable, stubborn etc. (obstinate) 606; perverse, refractory, plaguy†, trying, thorny, rugged; knotted, knotty; invious†; pathless, trackless; labyrinthine etc. (convoluted) 248; intricate, complicated etc. (tangled) 59; impracticable etc. (impossible) 471; not feasible etc. 470; desperate etc. (hopeless) 859. embarrassing, perplexing etc. (uncertain) 475; delicate, ticklish, critical; beset with difficulties, full of difficulties, surrounded by difficulties, entangled by difficulties, encompassed with difficulties. under a difficulty; in a box; in difficulty, in hot water, in the suds, in a cleft stick, in a fix, in the wrong box, in a scrape etc. n., in deep water, in a fine pickle; in extremis; between two stools, between Scylla and Charybdis; surrounded by shoals, surrounded by breakers, surrounded by quicksands; at cross purposes; not out of the wood. reduced to straits; hard pressed, sorely pressed; run hard; pinched, put to it, straitened; hard up, hard put to it, hard set; put to one's shifts; puzzled, at a loss, etc. (uncertain) 475; at the end of one's tether, at the end of one's rope, at one's wit's end, at a nonplus, at a standstill; graveled, nonplused, nonplussed, stranded, aground; stuck fast, set fast; up a tree, at bay, aux abois [Fr.], driven into a corner, driven from pillar to post, driven to extremity, driven to one's wit's end, driven to the wall; au bout de son Latin; out of one's depth; thrown out. accomplished with difficulty; hard-fought, hard-earned. ... show more
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