0801-12: New York Times Crossword Answers 1 Aug 12, Wednesday

Today’s Wiki-est, Amazonian Googlies
Across
11. Kind of nut : LUG
A lug nut is a nut on which one side is tapered. Lug nuts are used to secure wheels to a vehicle.

14. Falcon-headed Egyptian god : HORUS
Horus was one of the oldest gods in Ancient Egyptian religion. Most often, Horus was depicted as a falcon or a man with a falcon head.

15. Central Florida city : OCALA
The city of Ocala was founded near a historic village with the same name. In the local Timucua language “Ocala” means “Big Hammock”. Thoroughbred horse farming in Florida started in Ocala, back in 1943. Some folks today call Ocala the “Horse Capital of the World”, but I bet that’s disputed by others …

16. Bargain bin abbr. : IRR
Irregular (irr).

17. Persian mathematician known for his poetry : OMAR KHAYYAM
Omar Khayyam was a Persian with many talents. He was a poet as well as an important mathematician, astronomer and physician. A selection of his poems were translated by one Edward Fitzgerald in a collection called “Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam”.

19. Hoops org. : NBA
Basketball truly is an American sport. It was created in 1891 by a James Naismith at the YMCA in Springfield, Massachusetts. His goal was to create something active and interesting for his students in the gym. The first “hoops” were actually peach baskets, with the bottoms of the baskets intact. When a player got the ball into the “net”, someone had to clamber up and get it back out again in order to continue the game!

20. Big name in lexicography : WEBSTER
Not only is Noah Webster’s name inextricably linked with his series of dictionaries, but he is also renowned as an advocate for English spelling reform. He argued that “traditional” English is hard to learn and that it should be simplified and standardized. He published spelling books that were used in schools, and from edition to edition he changed the spelling of words in order to simplify the language. Examples are the use of “s” over “c” in words like “defense” (in Ireland we have defence and defense depending on usage), “-re” became “-er” as in “center” instead of “centre” (reversing the influence of French), and he dropped one of the Ls in words like traveler (I learned “traveller”). Mind you, he also spelled “tongue” as “tung”, but he didn’t get very far with that one.

21. They’re made to be destroyed : PINATAS
Piñatas originated in Mexico, probably among the Aztecs or Mayans. Today piñatas are usually made from cardboard that is brightly decorated with papier-mâché. Traditionally a piñata was made out of a clay pot, adorned with feathers and ribbons and filled with small treasures. During religious ceremonies the clay pots would be suspended and broken open so that the contents would spill out onto the ground at the feet of a god as an offering.

23. Exit-the-program key : ESC
The escape key was originally used to control computer peripherals. It was a key that allowed the computer operator to stop what the peripheral was doing (cancel a print job, for example). Nowadays the escape key is used for all sorts of other things, especially in gaming programs.

25. Java servers : URNS
Back in 1850, the name “java” was given to a type of coffee grown on the island of Java.

26. Ukrainian-born actress who was a Bond girl in “Quantum of Solace” : OLGA KURYLENKO
Olga Kurylenko is a Ukranian actress and model. Kurylenko played the Bond girl Camille Montes in “Quantum of Solace”.

31. Giamatti of “Sideways” : PAUL
Paul Giamatti is a very, very capable actor from New Haven, Connecticut. Giamatti has being getting some very high-profile roles in the past ten years, my favorite of which is the title role in the excellent HBO drama series “John Adams”.

“Sideways” is a wonderful comedy-drama movie released in 2004. Starring Paul Giamatti and Thomas Haden Church, the film is based in a novel of the same name that was released not long before the film adaptation. If you’ve seen the film, you’ll know that one of the lead characters speaks very passionately of Pinot noir wines. Soon after the film’s release, sales of Pinot noir wines rose 16%.

33. Long Island town : ISLIP
The town of Islip is on the south shore of Long Island. It is home to Islip Airport, now known as Long Island MacArthur Airport, used by many as a viable alternative to JFK and LaGuardia.

37. Spot for a summer nap : HAMMOCK
A hammock is a length of canvas or netting slung perhaps between two trees and used as a bed. Apparently “hammock” comes from a Haitian word meaning “fish nets”.

40. Baton Rouge campus, for short : LSU
LSU’s full name is Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College.

Baton Rouge is the capitol city of the state of Louisiana. The name “Baton Rouge” is French for “red stick or staff”. The exact reason why such a name was given to the city isn’t really clear.

41. Chocolate source : CACAO
Chocolate is made from the seeds of the Thobroma cacao tree. The seeds are very bitter and the traditional drink make with the seed was called “xocolati” by the Aztecs, meaning “bitter water”. That’s how our “chocolate” got its name.

43. Lupino of “High Sierra” : IDA
Actress Ida Lupino was also a successful director, in the days when women weren’t very welcome behind the camera. She had already directed four “woman’s” shorts when she stepped in to direct the 1953 drama “The Hitch-Hiker”, taking over when the original director became ill. “The Hitch-Hiker” was the first film noir movie to be directed by a woman, and somewhat of a breakthrough for women in the industry.

“High Sierra” is a 1941 movie based on a novel by W.R. Burnett. It’s a gangster piece, starring Humphrey Bogart as “Mad Dog” Roy Earle, a bad guy with a heart. Bogie’s love interest is played by the very talented Ida Lupino.

44. Boilermaker component : BEER
A boilermaker is a beer cocktail, a serving of beer mixed with a shot of whiskey, or sometimes a shot of tequila or vodka. If the whiskey is still in a shot glass when it’s dropped into the beer, then it’s known as a depth charge.

45. Noted conductor whose son played TV’s Colonel Klink : OTTO KLEMPERER
Otto Klemperer was a conductor and composer from Germany. Klemperer was a friend of the noted composer Gustav Mahler and assisted Mahler in the first production of his “Symphony of a Thousand”, one of the largest scale choral works in the repertoire. Otto’s son was Werner Klemperer, the actor who played Colonel Klink on the TV show “Hogan’s Heroes”.

On “Hogan’s Heroes”, Colonel Klink was the Camp Commandant, played by Werner Klemperer. Klemperer was born in Cologne in Germany, and fled the country with his family in 1935 due to Nazi persecution of Jews. Later, Klemperer joined the US Army and ended up using his show business talent to entertain the troops in the Pacific.

49. Film villain with prosthetic hands : DR NO
“Dr. No” may have been the first film in the wildly successful James Bond franchise, but it was the sixth novel in the series of books penned by Ian Fleming. Fleming was inspired to write the story after reading the Fu Manchu tales by Sax Rohmer. If you’ve read the Rohmer books or seen the films, you’ll recognize the similarities between the characters Dr. No and Fu Manchu.

59. TiVo, e.g. : DVR
TiVo was introduced in 1999 and was the world’s first commercially successful DVR (Digital Video Recorder). If you don’t have a DVR, you might want to consider getting one. For those who enjoy television, it’s very liberating …

64. Japanese menu item : SUSHI
Sushi is a Japanese dish that has as its primary ingredient cooked, vinegared rice. The rice is usually topped with something, most often fish, and can be served in seaweed rolls. If you want raw fish by itself, then you have to order “sashimi”.

65. Designer inits. : YSL
Yves Saint-Laurent was a French fashion designer, actually born in Algeria. He started off working as an assistant to Christian Dior at the age of 17. Dior died just four years later, and as a very young man Saint-Laurent was named head of the House of Dior. However, in 1950 Saint-Laurent was conscripted into the French Army and ended up in a military hospital after suffering a mental breakdown from the hazing inflicted on him by his fellow soldiers. His treatment included electroshock therapy and administration of sedatives and psychoactive drugs. He was released from prison, managed to pull his life back together, and started his own fashion house. A remarkable story …

67. “Cómo ___?” : ESTAS
“Cómo estas?” is Spanish for “how are you?”

Down
2. “Quo Vadis” setting : ROME
“Quo Vadis” is an epic drama made in 1951, an adaptation of the 1896 novel of the same name written by Henryk Sienkiewicz. At the top of the bill were Robert Taylor and Deborah Kerr, with Peter Ustinov playing the Emperor Nero. There was also an uncredited extra making her first appearance on the screen, a young lady by the name of Sophia Loren.

3. Fine steed : ARAB
The Arab (or Arabian) breed of horse takes its name from its original home, the Arabian Peninsula. Like any animal that humans have over-bred though, the horse falls prey to genetic diseases, some of which are fatal and some of which require the horse to be euthanized.

4. Flippered fish-eater with a double coat : FUR SEAL
Fur seals are actually closer related to sea lions than true seals. Fur seals have dense underfur, which was unfortunate for them as it made them prey of commercial sealers who clubbed them to death to support the fur trade.

8. E-commerce site owned by eBay : PAYPAL
PayPal has been around since the year 2000, born out of a merger of two older companies: Confinity and X.com. PayPal was so successful that it was the first of the beleaguered dot.com companies to successfully complete an IPO after the attacks of 9/11. Then in 2002, PayPal was bought by eBay, for a whopping $1.5 billion.

9. “Idylls of the King” maiden : ELAINE
“Idylls of the King” is a cycle of twelve poems by Alfred, Lord Tennyson that retells the tale of King Arthur. One of the “idylls” is the story of Lancelot and Elaine.

10. Butler’s expletive : DAMN
In Margaret Mitchell’s novel “Gone eith the Wind”, when Rhett Butler finally walks out on Scarlett O’Hara he utters the words “My dear, I don’t give a damn”. Most of us are more familiar with the words spoken by Clark Gable in the film adaption of the story, “Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn.”

18. Priam’s wife : HECUBA
Hecuba was the wife of King Priam of Troy in Greek mythology. Queen Hecuba had 19 children with King Priam, including Hector, Paris and Cassandra the prophetess.

22. Arctic seabirds : AUKS
Auks are penguin-like seabirds that live in cooler northern waters including the Arctic. Like penguins, auks are great swimmers, but unlike penguins, auks can fly.

26. Crude acronym : OPEC
The OPEC cartel (the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries) was formally established in 1960 and has been headquartered in Vienna since 1965. The US is actually the third largest oil producer in the world (after Russia and Saudi Arabia). One reason America isn’t in OPEC, even though we are a big producer, is that we import a lot more than we export. But you probably knew that already …

27. “Doctor Zhivago” role : LARA
Olga Ivinskaya was the mistress of the writer Boris Pasternak. As such, she was the inspiration for the famous Lara character in Pasternak’s novel “Doctor Zhivago”.

28. Million Mom March issue : GUN CONTROL
The Million Mom March was a rally held on Mother’s Day 2000, taking place mainly in Washington, DC to promote legislation to tighten gun control. The publicity surrounding the event attracted a counter-demonstration by a group that called themselves the Second Amendment Sisters who advocated protection of gun rights.

29. St. Louis pro : RAM
The St. Louis Rams have won the Super Bowl only once, in 1999 against the Tennessee Titans. The Rams were based in Cleveland from 1936-45, Los Angeles from 1946-94 and St. Louis from 1995 to the present day.

30. Suffix with beat or neat : -NIK
The term “beatnik” was first coined by journalist Herb Caen in 1958 when he used it to describe the stereotypical young person of the “beat generation”, oft associated with the writer Jack Kerouac. That stereotypical beatnik would be playing the bongos, rolling his or her own cigarettes. Male beatniks tended to sport goatees and wear berets.

44. Its capital is Minsk : BELARUS
The Republic of Belarus is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe, located east of Poland and north of Ukraine. Belarus didn’t exist as an entity until the Russian Revolution when it was created as one of the Soviet Socialist Republics (SSR) that made up the USSR. The Republic of Belarus was formed soon after the USSR dissolved in 1990, but unlike many of the former Soviet Republics, Belarus has retained many of the old Soviet policies. Alexander Lukashenko is the country’s president and he believes in state ownership of the economy. Belarus and Russia have formal agreements in place that pledge cooperation.

46. White House family : OBAMAS
By tradition, the Secret Service code names used for the US President and family all start with the same letter. For the current First Family, that letter is R:

– Barack Obama: Renegade
– Michelle Obama: Renaissance
– Malia Obama: Radiance
– Sasha Obama: Rosebud

47. Obi-Wan ___ : KENOBI
Obi-Wan Kenobi is one of the more beloved of the “Star Wars” characters. Kenobi was portrayed by two fabulous actors in the series of films. As a young man he is played by Scottish actor Ewan McGregor, and as an older man he is played by Alec Guinness.

54. Costa ___ : RICA
Costa Rica is in Central America, bordered by Nicaragua in the north, and Panama to the South. Costa Rica is remarkable in my opinion, a leader on the world stage in many areas. It has been referred to as the “greenest” country in the world, the “happiest” country in the world, and has a highly educated populace. In 1949, the country unilaterally abolished its own army, permanently …

55. New Year’s Eve word : SYNE
The song “Auld Lang Syne” is a staple at New Year’s Eve, the words of which were written by Scottish poet Robbie Burns.

57. Qatar’s capital : DOHA
Doha is the capital city of the state of Qatar located on the Persian Gulf. The name “Doha” translates from Arabic as “the big tree”.

Qatar is a sovereign state in the Middle East occupying the Qatar Peninsula, itself located in the Arabian Peninsula. Qatar lies on the Persian Gulf and shares one land border, with Saudi Arabia to the south. Qatar has more oil and gas reserves per capita of population than any other country in the world. In 2010, Qatar had the fastest growing economy in the world, driven by the petrochemical industry.

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For the sake of completion, here is a full listing of all the answers:
Across
1. Stealth : CRAFT
6. Bird or human : BIPED
11. Kind of nut : LUG
14. Falcon-headed Egyptian god : HORUS
15. Central Florida city : OCALA
16. Bargain bin abbr. : IRR
17. Persian mathematician known for his poetry : OMAR KHAYYAM
19. Hoops org. : NBA
20. Big name in lexicography : WEBSTER
21. They’re made to be destroyed : PINATAS
23. Exit-the-program key : ESC
24. Certain decree : BAN
25. Java servers : URNS
26. Ukrainian-born actress who was a Bond girl in “Quantum of Solace” : OLGA KURYLENKO
31. Giamatti of “Sideways” : PAUL
32. Petting zoo sound : BAA
33. Long Island town : ISLIP
36. It may follow directions : -ERN
37. Spot for a summer nap : HAMMOCK
40. Baton Rouge campus, for short : LSU
41. Chocolate source : CACAO
43. Lupino of “High Sierra” : IDA
44. Boilermaker component : BEER
45. Noted conductor whose son played TV’s Colonel Klink : OTTO KLEMPERER
49. Film villain with prosthetic hands : DR NO
51. Blossom visitor : BEE
52. Wriggler in the water : EEL
53. Base for some muffins : OAT BRAN
55. Pearl sets : STRANDS
59. TiVo, e.g. : DVR
60. What 17-, 26- or 45-Across might say upon meeting 17-, 26- or 45-Across? : I’M OK, YOU’RE OK
62. Prefix with politics : GEO-
63. Frontier abode : CABIN
64. Japanese menu item : SUSHI
65. Designer inits. : YSL
66. In reserve : ASIDE
67. “Cómo ___?” : ESTAS

Down
1. Food, colloquially : CHOW
2. “Quo Vadis” setting : ROME
3. Fine steed : ARAB
4. Flippered fish-eater with a double coat : FUR SEAL
5. “Shame on you!” : TSK TSK
6. Male swine : BOAR
7. Less than cordial : ICY
8. E-commerce site owned by eBay : PAYPAL
9. “Idylls of the King” maiden : ELAINE
10. Butler’s expletive : DAMN
11. Accessory for the fastidious dresser : LINT ROLLER
12. Music genre : URBAN
13. Green stuff : GRASS
18. Priam’s wife : HECUBA
22. Arctic seabirds : AUKS
24. With much room to spare : BY A MILE
26. Crude acronym : OPEC
27. “Doctor Zhivago” role : LARA
28. Million Mom March issue : GUN CONTROL
29. St. Louis pro : RAM
30. Suffix with beat or neat : -NIK
34. “Interesting …” : I SEE
35. Run smoothly : PURR
37. Sweltering : HOT
38. Rhyming tribute : ODE
39. Began stirring : CAME TO
42. Get from ___ (advance slightly) : A TO B
44. Its capital is Minsk : BELARUS
46. White House family : OBAMAS
47. Obi-Wan ___ : KENOBI
48. Examine carefully : PERUSE
49. Evasive : DODGY
50. Carries on : RAVES
54. Costa ___ : RICA
55. New Year’s Eve word : SYNE
56. One out on a limb? : NEST
57. Qatar’s capital : DOHA
58. Sports equipment that doesn’t fit in carry-on luggage : SKIS
61. Jest with : KID

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