0131-13 New York Times Crossword Answers 31 Jan 13, Thursday

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CROSSWORD SETTER: Mike Buckley
THEME: T-Shapes … today’s grid is replete with black squares arranged in T-shapes. In addition, each of the clues starts with the letter T, the answers across the center of the grid sound like T:

31A. Tetley products : TEAS
32A. Twit : TEASE
34A. Tiger’s bagful : TEES

23. This puzzle’s theme : T-SHAPES

COMPLETION TIME: 31m 54s
ANSWERS I MISSED: 2 … FARON (Feron), AGENA (Agene)

Today’s Wiki-est, Amazonian Googlies
Across

1. Toon/live action film of 1996 : SPACE JAM
“Space Jam” is a 1996 movie that is a fictional account of the retirement of Michael Jordan from the NBA. Michael Jordan himself stars in the film, along with a whole host of “Looney Tunes” cartoon characters.

17. “Three Sisters” playwright Chekhov : ANTON
Anton Chekhov was a Russian writer of short stories and a playwright, as well as a physician. Chekhov wrote four classic plays that are often performed all around the world, namely “The Seagull”, “Uncle Vanya”, “Three Sisters” and “The Cherry Orchard”. While Chekhov was advancing his writing career, he continued to practice medicine. He is quoted as saying “Medicine is my lawful wife, and literature is my mistress.”

The title characters in Anton Chekhov’s play “Three Sisters” were inspired by the English authors, the three Brontë sisters.

18. Torpedo detector : SONAR
The British developed the first underwater detection system that used sound waves. Research was driven by defence demands during WWI, leading to production of working units in 1922. This new sound detection system was described as using “supersonics”, but for the purpose of secrecy the term was dropped in favor of an acronym. The work was done under the auspices of the Royal Navy’s Anti-Submarine Division, so ASD was combined with the IC from “superson-ic-s” to create the name ASDIC. The navy even went as far as renaming the quartz material at the heart of the technology “ASDivite”. By the time WWII came along, the Americans were producing their own systems and coined the term SONAR, playing off the related application, RADAR. And so the name ASDIC was deep-sixed …

19. Trademarked Intel chip : CELERON
Intel’s Celeron microprocessors are aimed at the low end of the market, the budget machines.

Intel is the world’s largest manufacturer of semiconductor chips. The company was founded in 1968, and the name “Intel” is a derived from the term “int(egrated) el(ectronics)”.

21. “This Little Girl of Mine” country singer ___ Young : FARON
Faron Young was a country singer who was nicknamed the Hillbilly Heartthrob. Young started performing in the fifties and continued until the mid-nineties. Some believe that a waning career and failing health led to his suicide in 1996 at the age of 64 years.

24. Telegraph suffix : -ESE
“Telegraphese” is the clipped form of language that was used in writing a telegram.

26. Tripp’s rank on “CSI: Miami”: Abbr. : SGT
Detective Sergeant Frank Tripp is a character on the television show “CSI: Miami”. Tripp is played by actor Rex Linn. I’ve seen the show a few times, and to me Tripp is the least annoying character in a very annoying cast.

31. Tetley products : TEAS
Tetley was founded by Joseph Tetley in Yorkshire in 1837. Joseph and his brother used to sell salt door-to-door from a packhorse and started to distribute tea the same way. They became so successful selling tea that they relocated to London. Notably, Tetley’s was the first company to introduce tea bags in the UK, back in 1953.

32. Twit : TEASE
“To twit” is to tease someone for making an embarrassing mistake.

34. Tiger’s bagful : TEES
By now, everyone must know everything there is to know about Tiger Woods. But did you know that Tiger’s real name is Eldrick Tont Woods? “Tont” is a traditional Thai name.

35. Taoism, e.g.: Abbr. : REL
The Chinese character “tao” translates as “path”, but the concept of Tao signifies the true nature of the world.

42. TV channel with “Style Report” and “Beauty Report” : HSN
The Home Shopping Network (HSN) was the first national shopping network, and was launched locally as the Home Shopping Club in Florida in 1982. The whole concept just scares me …

44. Tsars and others : MONARCHS
The term czar (also tsar) is a Slavic word that was first used as a title by Simeon I of Bulgaria in 913 AD. “Czar” is derived from the word “Caesar”, which was synonymous with “emperor” at that time.

45. Tide’s ebb, e.g. : OUTGO
Tides of course are caused by the gravitational pull of the moon on the oceans. At neap tide, the smaller gravitational effect of the sun cancels out some of the moon’s effect. At spring tides, the sun and the moon’s gravitational forces act in concert causing more extreme movement of the oceans.

49. Texas hold’em action : RAISE
The official birthplace of the incredibly popular poker game of Texas Hold ‘Em is Robstown, Texas where the game dates back to the early 1900s. The game was introduced into Las Vegas in 1967 by a group of Texan enthusiasts including Doyle Brunson, a champion often seen playing on TV today. Doyle Brunson published a poker strategy guide in 1978, and this really helped increase the popularity of the game. But it was the inclusion of Texas Hold ‘Em in the television line-up that really gave the game its explosive surge in popularity, with the size of the prize money just skyrocketing.

51. Text you might R.S.V.P. to : E-VITE
RSVP stands for “Répondez s’il vous plaît”, which is French for “please, answer”.

56. Trig functions : SINES
The most familiar trigonometric functions are sine, cosine and tangent. Each of these is a ratio, a ratio of two sides of a right-angled triangle. The inverse to these three functions are arcsine, arccosine and arctangent. The inverse functions are simply the inverted ratios, the inverted sine, cosine and tangent.

58. Toboggan : SLED
“Toboggan” came into English from the French Canadian “tabagane”, the name for a long sled with a flat bottom. The French Canadian word is probably from the Algonquian word for a sled, “tobakun”,

Down
3. Titan booster : AGENA
The RM-81 Agena was an upper-stage rocket designed and built by Lockheed, first used in 1959. After 365 launches it was retired in 1987.

4. The Café Carlyle and others : CABARETS
The Café Carlyle was located in the Carlyle Hotel in New York City. The Café is noted as a venue for jazz performers and has hosted many of the greats. Woody Allen plays there with his jazz band almost every week.

5. Times to start new calendarios : ENEROS
In Spanish, we start years (anos) in January (enero) as noted on a calendar (calendrio).

6. “The ___ is up!” : JIG
Back in Elizabethan times, a “jig” was a trick or game. So, the expression “the jig is up” has for some time meant “the trick or game is exposed”.

7. Type of dye : AZO
Azo compounds have very vivid colors and so are used to make dyes, especially dyes with the colors red, orange and yellow.

8. Target audience of Maxim : MEN
“Maxim” is an international men’s magazine featuring revealing photo spreads (non-nude in the US) of female celebrities and models.

9. Ten-spots and such : DINERO
Lettuce, cabbage, kale, dinero, dough and moola (also moolah) are all slang terms for money.

11. Traveled by Vespa : SCOOTERED
Vespa is a brand of motor scooter originally made in Italy (and now all over the world) by Piaggio. “Vespa” is Italian for “wasp”.

12. Ted and others : KENNEDYS
Ted Kennedy was the youngest boy in the family that included his older brothers: Joseph Jr. (killed in action in WWII), John (assassinated) and Robert (assassinated). Ted went into the US Senate in 1962 in a special election held after his brother became US President. He remained in the Senate until he passed away in 2009, making Ted Kennedy the fourth-longest-serving Senator in history.

15. “The House of the Seven Gables” locale : SALEM
I had the pleasure of visiting the charming House of Seven Gables not so long ago in Salem, Massachusetts. The core of the house was built in 1668, for one Captain John Turner, and overlooks Salem Harbor. After a couple of generations, the house had to be sold by the Turners and it was purchased by the Ingersoll family. The author Nathaniel Hawthorne was a relative of the Ingersolls and often visited the house growing up. It was of course this house that gave Hawthorn the title for his famous Gothic novel “The House of the Seven Gables”.

22. Tadpole’s later form, perhaps : NEWT
Newts wouldn’t be my favorite animals. They are found all over the world living on land or in water depending on the species, but always associated with water even if it is only for breeding. Newts metamorphose through three distinct developmental stages during their lives. They start off as larvae in water, fertilized eggs that often cling to aquatic plants. The eggs hatch into tadpoles, the first developmental form of the newt. After living some months as tadpoles swimming around in the water, they undergo another metamorphosis, sprouting legs and replacing their external gills with lungs. At this juvenile stage they are known as efts, and leave the water to live on land. A more gradual transition takes place then, as the eft takes on the lizard-like appearance of the adult newt.

26. Turn a blind eye, say : SEE NO EVIL
The old adage “see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil” originated in the 17th century. The phrase comes as an interpretation of a wood carving over a door in a shrine in Nikko, Japan. The carving depicts the “Three Wise Monkeys”:

– Mizaru, covering his eyes
– Kikazaru, covering his ears
– Iwazaru, covering his mouth

27. Turkey or chicken dish served cold : GALANTINE
A galentine is a dish usually made with poultry or fish that has been deboned. A galentine is often elaborately decorated, partially because it’s a lot of work getting all those bones out and a fancy garnish isn’t that much extra work!

34. Trumpet blares : TANTARAS
A tantara is a fanfare from a trumpet or a horn.

40. Touchdowns : football :: ___ : rugby : TRIES
In the game of rugby, a try is scored by grounding the ball behind the opposition’s goal line. A try is similar to a touchdown in American football, although in rugby the ball must be manually placed on the ground by the player making the score. The term “try” is used as originally that act of touching the ball to the ground simply qualified a team for a “try at goal”, an opportunity to kick the ball at goal to make the score.

43. Tec group in old France : SURETE
The French National Police Force used to be known as “La Sûreté Nationale”. The National Police force operates in cities and large towns. The military Gendarmerie is the second national organization tasked with law enforcement in France, and it has jurisdiction in smaller towns and rural areas as well as at the country’s borders.

46. Terri with the 1980 country hit “Somebody’s Knockin'” : GIBBS
Terri Gibbs is a country music singer. Gibbs had thirteen singles that made the Billboard country singles charts in the eighties. Gibbs was born blind.

47. Tenor standard “___ Mio” : ‘O SOLE
“‘O sole mio” is a famous Italian song from Naples, written in 1898. The song’s lyrics are usually sung in the original Neapolitan, as opposed to Italian. The title translates from Neapolitan into “My Sun” (and not into “O, My Sun” as one might expect). It’s a love song of course, sung by a young man declaring that there is a sun brighter than that in the sky, the sun that is his lover’s face. Awww …

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For the sake of completion, here is a full listing of all the answers:
Across
1. Toon/live action film of 1996 : SPACE JAM
9. Typewriter’s spot : DESK
13. Tool for the scatterbrained : ORGANIZER
15. Thereafter : SINCE
16. Tragedy-stricken : WOEBEGONE
17. “Three Sisters” playwright Chekhov : ANTON
18. Torpedo detector : SONAR
19. Trademarked Intel chip : CELERON
21. “This Little Girl of Mine” country singer ___ Young : FARON
23. Take : TOLERATE
24. Telegraph suffix : -ESE
25. Told to come : SUMMONED
26. Tripp’s rank on “CSI: Miami”: Abbr. : SGT
28. True: Ger. : WAHR
30. Tear up : CRY
31. Tetley products : TEAS
32. Twit : TEASE
34. Tiger’s bagful : TEES
35. Taoism, e.g.: Abbr. : REL
36. Technical work requirement : SPEC
37. Total : ADD
38. Tense, maybe : IN A STATE
42. TV channel with “Style Report” and “Beauty Report” : HSN
44. Tsars and others : MONARCHS
45. Tide’s ebb, e.g. : OUTGO
48. Threaded across and down : NETLIKE
49. Texas hold’em action : RAISE
51. Text you might R.S.V.P. to : E-VITE
52. Thing that’s highly explosive : TINDERBOX
56. Trig functions : SINES
57. Treating all fairly : EQUITABLE
58. Toboggan : SLED
59. Taxed : STRESSED

Down
1. Tosses, as seeds : SOWS
2. Theorem work : PROOF
3. Titan booster : AGENA
4. The Café Carlyle and others : CABARETS
5. Times to start new calendarios : ENEROS
6. “The ___ is up!” : JIG
7. Type of dye : AZO
8. Target audience of Maxim : MEN
9. Ten-spots and such : DINERO
10. Taken : ENTRANCED
11. Traveled by Vespa : SCOOTERED
12. Ted and others : KENNEDYS
14. Third way, maybe : RECOURSE
15. “The House of the Seven Gables” locale : SALEM
20. Towering tree : ELM
22. Tadpole’s later form, perhaps : NEWT
23. This puzzle’s theme : T-SHAPES
26. Turn a blind eye, say : SEE NO EVIL
27. Turkey or chicken dish served cold : GALANTINE
29. Taste authority : AESTHETE
31. Toned quality : TRIMNESS
33. Tunnel effect : ECHO
34. Trumpet blares : TANTARAS
39. Treated for preservation, maybe : SALTED
40. Touchdowns : football :: ___ : rugby : TRIES
41. “That’s terrible!” : ACK!
43. Tec group in old France : SURETE
46. Terri with the 1980 country hit “Somebody’s Knockin'” : GIBBS
47. Tenor standard “___ Mio” : ‘O SOLE
50. Took (out) : EXED
53. Test figs. : IQS
54. Tough ___ : NUT
55. Theater head: Abbr. : DIR

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