0813-15 New York Times Crossword Answers 13 Aug 15, Thursday

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CROSSWORD SETTER: Jim Hilger
THEME: Breaks … there is a note with today’s puzzle:

When this puzzle is done, four squares will remain empty. Which ones and why are for you to determine.

So we have four squares in today’s grid that are “BREAKS” (small squares in my grid). Each answer that includes a BREAK, needs that BREAK to make sense:

17A. 12:05 to 12:20 p.m., maybe : SHORT L-UNCH (short lunch break)
34A. Bit of misfortune : B-AD (bad break)
36A. A couple weeks off partying in Florida, say : SPR-ING VACATION (spring break vacation)
58A. Series of ads on TV or radio : COMMER-CIAL (commercial break)
6D. Daring escape : JA-IL (jail break)
22D. It might include the line “You’re listening to WABC” : STA-TION (station break)
23D. Turning point in a tennis match, maybe : SER-VICE (service break)
46D. Lover’s hurt : HEA-RT (heartbreak)

BILL BUTLER’S COMPLETION TIME: 12m 35s
ANSWERS I MISSED: 0

Today’s Wiki-est, Amazonian Googlies
Across

1. Israeli city on the slopes of Mount Carmel : HAIFA
Mount Carmel is actually a mountain range, found on the coast of northern Israel. Haifa, the country’s third largest city, is located on the northern slope of Mount Carmel.

11. “___ La La” (1964 hit) : SHA
“Sha La La” was a hit for the British band Manfred Mann in 1964. It was a cover version of a song released earlier in the same year by the Shirelles over in the US.

15. Redolence : AROMA
Something that is redolent is aromatic, emits a fragrance. Redolent is an Old French word.

16. Beldam : HAG
A “beldam” is an old woman, especially an ugly one. The term was originally used for a grandmother. In Old English, the prefix “bel-” is used to express a relationship (as in “grandmother”), and “dam” is used in the sense of “mother”.

19. Kind 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. The term “azo” comes from the French word “azote” meaning “nitrogen”. French chemist Lavoisier coined the term “azote” from the Greek word “azotos” meaning “lifeless”. He used this name as in pure nitrogen/azote animals die and flames are snuffed out (due to a lack of oxygen).

21. Bit of letter-shaped hardware on a door : H HINGE
H hinges have an h-shape that is particularly evident when the door is open. H hinges are commonly found on kitchen cabinets.

22. Nordic name meaning “young warrior” : SVEN
Sven is a Scandinavian name. “Sven” is derived from the Old Norse word for “young man” or “young warrior”.

29. Biddy : OLD BAT
We use the term “biddy” to mean an “old woman”. Back in the mid-1800s, the term was developed over here in America and applied to an Irish maid-servant. Biddy is a nickname for a woman called Bridget.

31. Caleb who wrote “The Italian Secretary” : CARR
One of Caleb Carr’s novels is a latter day Sherlock Holmes mystery called “The Italian Secretary”. The novel was written as a homage to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (using the Holmes character with the permission of the Doyle estate). I am a big fan of Sherlock Holmes stories so I must put this one on my reading list.

32. European river whose tributaries include the Wigger and the Emme : AARE
The Aar (also called the “Aare” in German) is the longest river entirely in Switzerland. A famous spot along the Aar is the Reichenbach Falls in the center of the country, actually a series of waterfalls near the city of Meiringen. These falls are renowned in the world of literature as it was here that Sherlock Holmes fell to his supposed doom with his nemesis Professor Moriarty (in “The Adventure of the Final Problem”).

36. A couple weeks off partying in Florida, say : SPR-ING VACATION (spring break vacation)
The phenomenon that we now call “spring break” really took off in Fort Lauderdale, Florida in the fifties. It started with a 1958 novel called “Where the Boys Are” by Glendon Swarthout, which was made into a movie of the same name in 1960. The theme was college girls and college boys meeting in a vacation setting. Right after the movie was distributed, the number of students hitting Fort Lauderdale more than doubled.

40. Any singer in the lead role of 41-Across : DIVA
“Diva” comes to us from Latin via Italian. “Diva” is the feminine form of “divus” meaning “divine one”. The word is used in Italy to mean “goddess” or “fine lady”, and especially is applied to the prima donna in an opera. We often use the term to describe a singer with a big ego.

41. Its final scene is set in a tomb : AIDA
“Aida” is the famous opera by Giuseppe Verdi, actually based on a scenario written by French Egyptologist Auguste Mariette, who also designed the costumes and stages for the opening performance. The opera was first performed in 1871 in an opera house in Cairo. In the storyline, Aida is an Ethiopian princess brought into Egypt as a slave. Radames is an Egyptian commander who falls in love with her, and then of course complications arise!

42. “Casablanca” role : ILSA
Ilsa Lund was played by Ingrid Bergman in the 1942 movie “Casablanca”. I love the words of one critic describing the chemistry between Bogart and Bergman in this film: “she paints his face with her eyes”. Wow …

47. The Bat-Signal, e.g. : BEACON
Batman is an ally of Police Commissioner Gordon of Gotham City. Gordon orders the shining of a searchlight into the sky, known as the Bat-Signal, to summon Batman when he is needed.

49. “Très ___” : BIEN
Très bien! Very (très) good (bien), in French.

51. Where Bethesda, Md., and Alexandria, Va., are : DC AREA
The community of Bethesda in Maryland lies just northwest of Washington, D.C. The original settlement in the area was called “Darcy’s Store”. a reference to the original store that drew settlers to the location along the toll road between Georgetown and Rockville. The community’s name was changed to Bethesda in 1871 by a local postmaster, after a Presbyterian church called the Bethesda Meeting House. Bethesda is home to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and to the National Naval Medical Center. During WWII, Bethesda also hosted the Norwegian Royal Family while their country was occupied by German forces.

The city of Alexandria, Virginia lies on the west bank of the Potomac River and is just six miles from Washington, D.C. Alexandria was actually ceded to the US Government to form part of the District of Columbia in 1791, but the city was returned to her home state in 1846.

54. One of the Bushes : JEB
I always thought that Jeb was an American nickname for James or Joseph but I must be wrong, because George and Barbara’s son John Ellis Bush is called “Jeb”. A kind blog reader has suggested the the name “Jeb” may have been chosen as JEB are the initials of John Ellis Bush.

57. Prefix with code or color : UNI-
ASCII (American Standard Code for Information Interchange) lists codes for 32 “control” characters, as well as the 95 printable characters. These binary codes are the way that our computers can understand what we mean when we type say a letter, or a number. Unicode is a more contemporary standard, and is like “Ascii on steroids”, encompassing more characters.

60. The Black Keys of rock, e.g. : DUO
The Black Keys are a rock band, a duo from Akron, Ohio. Dan Auerbach on guitar, and Patrick Carney on drums, formed the Black Keys in 2001.

63. “Some rise by ___, and some by virtue fall”: Shak. : SIN
“Some rise by sin, and some by virtue fall” is a line from William Shakespeare’s “Measure for Measure”.

“Measure for Measure” is one of William Shakespeare’s plays, ostensibly a comedy. The title “Measure for Measure” is actually a quotation from the Bible found in the Gospel According to Luke.

64. Decaf option : SANKA
The first successful process for removing caffeine from coffee involved steaming the beans in salt water, and then extracting the caffeine using benzene (a potent carcinogen) as a solvent. Coffee processed this way was sold as Sanka here in the US. There are other processes used these days, and let’s hope they are safer …

Down
1. Padlock holder : HASP
The “hasp” of a lock might refer to more than one thing. The u-shape loop protruding from a padlock is often called a “lock hasp”, for example.

2. Queens stadium eponym : ASHE
The Arthur Ashe Stadium in Queens, New York opened in 1997 and is the largest outdoor, tennis-only venue in the world. The stadium is sometimes criticized for not having a retractable dome to protect the playing surface from inclement weather.

3. Chain with links : IHOP
The International House of Pancakes (IHOP) was founded back in 1958. IHOP was originally intended to be called IHOE, the International House of Eggs, but that name didn’t do too well in marketing tests …

Link sausages are so called as they can come in chains, with each sausage being a link in that chain.

4. Sword: Fr. : FER
“Fer” is French for “iron”. The term is used to mean “sword, blade” in phrases such as “to cross swords” (croiser le fer) and “”prise de fer” (taking the blade), which is a phrase used in fencing.

5. Flower part : ANTHER
The stamen is the male reproductive organ of a flower. The part of the stamen known as the anther carries the pollen, which is picked up by the bee and transferred from flower to flower. The pistil is the female reproductive organ, and it accepts the pollen.

8. “The World of Suzie ___” (1957 novel) : WONG
“The World of Suzie Wong” is a novel first published in 1957, written by Richard Mason. The story was adapted for the stage in 1958, when it starred William Shatner who was later to gain fame on the original “Star Trek” series. The male lead was played by William Holden in a 1960 adaptation for the silver screen.

9. Like an awards ceremony : EMCEED
The term “emcee” comes from “MC”, an acronym standing for Master or Mistress of Ceremonies.

10. Morse T : DAH
Dahs and dits are the sound equivalents of dashes and dots in Morse Code.

11. Rookie officers, in slang : SHAVETAILS
In military organizations, a “shavetail” is a junior officer, often a second lieutenant. The term comes from the old practise of shaving the tails of newly broken mules to distinguish them from the experienced animals.

12. One being rough on plebes : HAZER
Plebe is a slang term for a freshman in the US military and naval academies. Plebe is probably short for “plebeian”, the name given to someone of the common class in Ancient Rome (as opposed to a Patrician). “Pleb” is a shortened version of plebeian, and is a term used outside of the military schools.

18. Like the Potala Palace of Tibet : LHASAN
The Potala Palace in Lhasa, Tibet was the residence of the Dalai Lama until he fled the former country in 1959 during the Tibetan Uprising. The building is divided in the White Palace and the Red Palace. The White Palace made up the Dalai Lama’s private living quarters. The larger Red Palace comprised halls, chapels and libraries devoted to religious study.

22. It might include the line “You’re listening to WABC” : STA-TION (station break)
WABC is a New York City AM radio station that broadcasts from studios above Pennsylvania Station in midtown Manhattan. WABC was a popular Top 40 station from 1960 to 1982, but switched to a talk radio format in 1982. Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh started their radio careers with WABC, and the station is still home to Don Imus.

25. Group whose first U.S. hit was “Waterloo” : ABBA
We have a big event across Europe every year called the Eurovision Song Contest. Each nation enters one song in competition with each other, and then voters across the whole continent decide on the winner. That’s how ABBA got their big break when they won in 1974 with “Waterloo”. In 1973, Spain’s entry was “Eres tú” (the Spanish for “You Are”) sung by the band Mocedades. “Eres tú” came second in the competition, but should have won in my humble opinion.

27. Pacific force, for short : LAPD
The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) is the third largest local law enforcement agency in the country, after New York PD and Chicago PD. Among other things, LAPD is famous for creating the first Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) team in the US, in 1965.

28. The pea, in “The Princess and the Pea” : IRRITATION
“The Princess and the Pea” is a fairy tale from the pen of Danish author Hans Christian Andersen. The essence of the story is that a prince’s mother tests the royal blood of an apparent princess by placing a pea under a pile of mattresses on which the young girl sleeps. The girl complains of a restless night, demonstrating a physical sensitivity that can only be attributed to a princess. And they all live happily ever after …

29. Big purveyor of fishing gear : ORVIS
Orvis is a supplier of fishing gear and related products that was founded way back in 1856, by Charles F. Orvis of Manchester, Vermont. The Orvis mail-order business is the oldest mail-order business in the whole country.

30. Heavy metal : LEAD
“Plumbum” is the Latin for lead, explaining why the symbol of the element in the Periodic Table is “Pb”. It also explains why the original lead weight on the end of a line used to check vertical was called a “plumb line”. And, as pipes were originally made of lead, we call in a “plumber” if one of them is leaking.

33. Chef’s thickening agent : AGAR
Agar (also “agar-agar”) is a jelly extracted from seaweed that has many uses. Agar is found in Japanese desserts, and can also be used as a food thickener or even as a laxative. In the world of science it is the most common medium used for growing bacteria in Petri dishes.

37. Plotter with Roderigo : IAGO
Iago is the schemer in Shakespeare’s “Othello”. Iago is a soldier who fought alongside Othello and feels hard done by, missing out on promotion. He hatches a plot designed to discredit his rival Cassio by insinuating that Cassio is having an affair with Desdemona, Othello’s wife. By the end of the play it’s Iago himself who is discredited and Othello (before committing suicide) apologizes to Cassio for having believed Iago’s lies. Heavy stuff …

39. “If I Ruled the World” rapper : NAS
Rapper Nas used to go by another stage name, Nasty Nas, and before that by his real name, Nasir bin Olu Dara Jones. Nas released his first album “Illmatic” in 1994, and inventively titled his fifth studio album “Stillmatic”, released in 2001. Not my cup of tea, I would say …

44. Witch on “Bewitched” : ENDORA
In the television sitcom “Bewitched”, Endora was Samantha’s mother, with both mother, daughter and indeed granddaughter having the magical powers accorded to witches. Endora was played flamboyantly by Agnes Moorehead.

47. Transmission-related units : BAUDS
In telecommunications, the “baud” unit represents pulses per second. The higher the baud rate of a modem, the faster information can be transferred. The baud unit is named for Émile Baudot, a pioneer in the world of telecommunications.

48. Yawns might suggest this : ENNUI
“Ennui” is the French word for boredom, a word that we now use in English. It’s one of the few French words we’ve imported that we haven’t anglicized and actually pronounce “correctly”.

49. Dutch city where Charles II lived in exile : BREDA
Breda is a Dutch city in the southern part of the country. One of Breda’s former residents was Charles II of England, who lived there in exile for nine years while Oliver Cromwell was virtual dictator of England, Scotland and Ireland.

53. Uncontrollably : AMOK
The phrase “to run amok” (sometimes “to run amuck”) has been around since the 1670s and is derived from the Malay word for “attacking furiously”, “amuk”. The word “amok” was also used as a noun to describe Malay natives who were “frenzied”. Given Malaya’s troubled history, the natives probably had good reason for that frenzy …

54. Saying “There’s no way we can lose now,” say : JINX
A jinx is a charm or a spell, and the word “jinx” comes from an older word “jyng” from the 17th-century. A “jyng” was another word for the wryneck, a type of bird much used in witchcraft.

58. ___ Sports : CBS
CBS used to be called the Columbia Broadcasting System. CBS is the second-largest broadcaster in the world, second only to the BBC in the UK. CBS introduced its “eye” logo in 1951.

59. World Factbook publisher, for short : CIA
“The World Factbook” is a publication produced by the CIA. It is intended primarily for use by government employees but, as it is in the public domain, it is now used by just about anyone. The first edition of “Factbook” came out in 1962 and, as it was classified, it had limited distribution. It was decided to make “Factbook” public in 1975, and it has been freely available on the World Wide Web since 1994.

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For the sake of completion, here is a full listing of all the answers:
Across
1. Israeli city on the slopes of Mount Carmel : HAIFA
6. Gossiped : JAWED
11. “___ La La” (1964 hit) : SHA
14. Visibly terrified : ASHEN
15. Redolence : AROMA
16. Beldam : HAG
17. 12:05 to 12:20 p.m., maybe : SHORT L-UNCH (short lunch break)
19. Kind of dye : AZO
20. Jazz (up) : PEP
21. Bit of letter-shaped hardware on a door : H HINGE
22. Nordic name meaning “young warrior” : SVEN
23. Approval indication : SEAL
24. Diner : EATERY
26. Electrician’s tool : PLIERS
29. Biddy : OLD BAT
31. Caleb who wrote “The Italian Secretary” : CARR
32. European river whose tributaries include the Wigger and the Emme : AARE
34. Bit of misfortune : B-AD (bad break)
36. A couple weeks off partying in Florida, say : SPR-ING VACATION (spring break vacation)
40. Any singer in the lead role of 41-Across : DIVA
41. Its final scene is set in a tomb : AIDA
42. “Casablanca” role : ILSA
43. Real go-getters : TIGERS
45. Haunting presences : GHOSTS
47. The Bat-Signal, e.g. : BEACON
49. “Très ___” : BIEN
50. Start to fill a pot : ANTE
51. Where Bethesda, Md., and Alexandria, Va., are : DC AREA
54. One of the Bushes : JEB
57. Prefix with code or color : UNI-
58. Series of ads on TV or radio : COMMER-CIAL (commercial break)
60. The Black Keys of rock, e.g. : DUO
61. Nestful : BROOD
62. Mouthwash instruction : RINSE
63. “Some rise by ___, and some by virtue fall”: Shak. : SIN
64. Decaf option : SANKA
65. Under stress : TAXED

Down
1. Padlock holder : HASP
2. Queens stadium eponym : ASHE
3. Chain with links : IHOP
4. Sword: Fr. : FER
5. Flower part : ANTHER
6. Daring escape : JA-IL (jail break)
7. Give ___ for one’s money : A RUN
8. “The World of Suzie ___” (1957 novel) : WONG
9. Like an awards ceremony : EMCEED
10. Morse T : DAH
11. Rookie officers, in slang : SHAVETAILS
12. One being rough on plebes : HAZER
13. Hell : AGONY
18. Like the Potala Palace of Tibet : LHASAN
22. It might include the line “You’re listening to WABC” : STA-TION (station break)
23. Turning point in a tennis match, maybe : SER-VICE (service break)
25. Group whose first U.S. hit was “Waterloo” : ABBA
26. Windows can be found on them : PCS
27. Pacific force, for short : LAPD
28. The pea, in “The Princess and the Pea” : IRRITATION
29. Big purveyor of fishing gear : ORVIS
30. Heavy metal : LEAD
33. Chef’s thickening agent : AGAR
35. What cometh after thou, maybe : DOST
37. Plotter with Roderigo : IAGO
38. Displaying more craft : CAGIER
39. “If I Ruled the World” rapper : NAS
44. Witch on “Bewitched” : ENDORA
46. Lover’s hurt : HEA-RT (heartbreak)
47. Transmission-related units : BAUDS
48. Yawns might suggest this : ENNUI
49. Dutch city where Charles II lived in exile : BREDA
52. “Hurry up!” : C’MON!
53. Uncontrollably : AMOK
54. Saying “There’s no way we can lose now,” say : JINX
55. No trouble : EASE
56. Drained : BLED
58. ___ Sports : CBS
59. World Factbook publisher, for short : CIA

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4 thoughts on “0813-15 New York Times Crossword Answers 13 Aug 15, Thursday”

  1. A pleasant romp. Not as hard as some Thursday puzzles, though I tried to put some of the "breaks" where they seemed to belong in their respective phrases and then had to go back and correct them.

  2. This one was tough!!!! But there was a payoff for the "dirty trick"; at least they tipped you off ahead of time! 46 minutes, and 5 errors, all in the top left (HAIFA would not come to mind, nor would ASHEN)

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