0203-23 NY Times Crossword 3 Feb 23, Friday

Constructed by: Barbara Lin
Edited by: Will Shortz

Today’s Theme: None

Bill’s time: 21m 33s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1 Finishing-line cry? : BINGO!

Our game Bingo is a derivative of an Italian lottery game called “Il Giuoco del Lotto d’Italia” that became popular in the 16th-century.Our game Bingo is a derivative of an Italian lottery game called “Il Giuoco del Lotto d’Italia” that became popular in the 16th-century.

6 Guinness with an Oscar : ALEC

Sir Alec Guinness played many great roles over a long and distinguished career, but nowadays is best remembered (sadly, I think) for playing the original Obi-Wan Kenobi in “Star Wars”. He won his only Best Actor Oscar for playing Colonel Nicholson in the marvelous 1957 WWII movie “The Bridge on the River Kwai”. Guinness did himself serve during the Second World War, in the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve. He commanded a landing craft during the Allied invasion of Sicily in 1943.

10 Thigh muscle, informally : QUAD

The quadriceps femoris is the muscle group at the front of the thigh. It is the strongest muscle in the human body, and is also the leanest. The “quads” are actually a group of four muscles in the upper leg, hence the use of the prefix “quad-”.

14 Beginning to happen : AFOOT

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, in writing the “Sherlock Holmes” stories, had his hero use the phrase “the game is afoot” on more than one occasion. Holmes first uttered the expression in “The Adventures of the Abbey Grange”. However, the phrase was used long before Conan Doyle put pen to paper. In William Shakespeare’s “King Henry IV Part I” there is the line “Before the game is afoot, thou let’st slip”.

15 Result of a normal distribution : BELL CURVE

A bell curve graph is more correctly known as a Gaussian function. The frequency with which many phenomena occur in nature results in a bell curve shape.

23 Outbuilding that’s sometimes converted into a dwelling : OAST

An oast is a kiln used for drying hops as part of the brewing process. Such a structure might also be called an “oast house” or “hop kiln”. The term “oast” can also apply to a kiln used to dry tobacco.

24 Capacious : ROOMY

Something described as “capacious” is spacious, capable of holding much.

30 Some bonds, for short : MUNIS

A municipal bond (“muni”) is one that is issued by a city or local government, or some similar agency. Munis have an advantage over other investments in that any interest earned on the bond is usually exempt from state and federal income taxes.

31 Tiny messenger : RNA

Ribonucleic acid (RNA) is an essential catalyst in the manufacture of proteins in the body. The genetic code in DNA determines the sequence of amino acids that make up each protein. That sequence is read in DNA by messenger RNA, and amino acids are delivered for protein manufacture in the correct sequence by transfer RNA. The amino acids are then formed into proteins by ribosomal RNA.

34 Award quartet : EGOT

The acronym “EGOT” stands for “Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, Tony”, and is a reference to performers who have won all four awards. Also known as the “Showbiz Award Grand Slam”, there are relatively few individuals who have been so honored. The first five to do so were:

  1. Richard Rodgers in 1962
  2. Helen Hayes in 1977
  3. Rita Moreno in 1977
  4. John Gielgud in 1991
  5. Audrey Hepburn in 1994 (posthumously)

37 Onetime Swedish exports : SAABS

“SAAB” stands for Svenska Aeroplan AB, which translates into English as Swedish Aeroplane Limited. Although we usually think of SAAB as an auto manufacturer, it is mainly an aircraft manufacturer. If you take small hops in Europe you might find yourself on a SAAB passenger plane. The SAAB automotive division was acquired by General Motors in the year 2000, who then sold it to a Dutch concern in 2010. However, SAAB (automotive) finally went bankrupt in 2011. The assets were acquired in 2012 by NEVS (National Electric Vehicle Sweden), a new company that used the SAAB name on its vehicles for several years.

41 IBM component: Abbr. : INTL

Tech giant IBM was founded as the Tabulating Machine Company in 1896. The company changed its name to the Computing Tabulating Recording Corporation (CTR) in 1911 and was listed on the New York Stock Exchange in 1916. The name “International Business Machines” (IBM) was given first to the company’s Canadian subsidiary, and then to its South American subsidiary. In 1924, it was decided to adopt the International Business Machines name for the whole company. Good choice …

42 Midweek milestone : HUMP DAY

The phrase “hump day” is very North American. It refers to Wednesday, which is the middle day (the hump) of a typical work week.

49 Perseverance, e.g. : MARS ROVER

There have been several rovers sent to Mars from Earth. The Soviet Union’s Mars 2 landed in 1971, and failed. Mars 3 landed the same year, and ceased operation just 20 seconds after landing. NASA’s Sojourner landed in 1997 (what a great day that was!) and operated from July through September. The British rover Beagle 2 was lost six days before its scheduled entry into the Martian atmosphere. NASA’s Spirit landed in 2004, and operated successfully for over six years before getting trapped in sand and eventually ceasing to communicate. NASA’s Opportunity also landed in 2004, and operated for over fourteen years. And then NASA’s Curiosity made a spectacular, hi-tech landing in 2012 and is continuing to explore the planet today. Based on the Curiosity design, NASA’s Perseverance rover landed in 2021, along with the Mars helicopter named Ingenuity. The China National Space Administration landed its first rover, named Zhurong (“Rover” in English), five months after Perseverance started its mission on the planet.

50 ___ Gandhi, longest-serving president of the Indian National Congress : SONIA

Sonia Gandhi is a politician, the President of the Indian National Congress party. Sonia is the widow of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, who was assassinated in 1991. Interestingly, Sonia Gandhi was born and raised in Italy. She met her future husband while they were both studying in Cambridge, England in the sixties.

53 Name written with an accent in Irish English : SEAN

The name “John” translates into Scottish as “Ian” or “Iain”, into Russian as “Ivan”, into Italian as “Giovanni”, into Spanish as “Juan”, into Welsh as “Evan”, and into Irish as “Seán”.

Down

1 Some striped strips : BACON

“Bacon” is an Old French word that we imported into English. The term ultimately comes from the Proto-Germanic “bakkon” meaning “back meat”.

5 Extra play opportunities, in brief : OTS

Overtime (OT)

6 Hoffman who wrote “Revolution for the Hell of It” : ABBIE

Abbie Hoffman was the founder of the Yippies, an activist group that had violent clashes with the police during the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago. Hoffman, along with six other defendants, were eventually brought up on charges related to the protests and became known collectively as the Chicago Seven.

7 Island rings : LEIS

“Lei” is a Hawaiian word meaning “garland, wreath”, although in more general terms a lei is any series of objects strung together as an adornment for the body.

9 Flowering plant such as “old man’s beard” : CLEMATIS

The genus of flowering plant known as clematis is in the buttercup family. The name of the genus comes from an Ancient Greek word for “a climbing plant”.

10 Participates in a bee, maybe : QUILTS

Back in 18th-century America, when neighbors would gather to work for the benefit of one of their group, such a meeting was called a bee. The name “bee” was an allusion to the social nature of the insect. In modern parlance, a further element of entertainment and pleasure has been introduced, for example in a quilting bee, or even a spelling bee.

11 Language that’s mutually intelligible with Hindi : URDU

Urdu is one of the two official languages of Pakistan (the other being English), and is one of the 22 scheduled languages in India. Urdu partly developed from Persian and is written from right to left.

12 Opposite of “sans” : AVEC

In French, “avec” (with) and “sans” (without) are opposites.

22 Quick notes, quickly : IMS

Instant message (IM)

25 Good, in Guadalajara : BUENO

Guadalajara is a populous city in the Mexican state of Jalisco. The Mexican city is named after the city of the same name in the center of Spain.

27 Mined compound in the “Avatar” universe : UNOBTANIUM

2009’s epic “Avatar” is a science fiction film from James Cameron, who was the director, writer and producer. It was an expensive movie to make and to promote, but was destined to become the highest-grossing film in the history of cinema. 20th Century Fox made a deal with Cameron to produce four “Avatar” sequels.

28 Ink spots, for short : TATS

The word “tattoo” (often shortened to “tat”) was first used in English in the writings of the famous English explorer Captain Cook. In his descriptions of the indelible marks adorning the skin of Polynesian natives, Cook anglicized the Tahitian word “tatau” into our “tattoo”. Tattoos are sometimes referred to as “ink”.

30 “Where’s the beef?” inquirer? : MEAT LOVER

“Where’s the beef?” was a slogan used by the Wendy’s fast food chain in 1984. The actress most associated with the phrase was Clara Peller, who appeared in 1984 Wendy’s advertising campaign when she was 81 years of age. Famously, the phrase “Where’s the beef?” was picked up by presidential candidate Walter Mondale during the 1984 presidential campaign when he used it to argue that his rival Gary Hart had policies that lacked substance.

36 Greasy spoons : DINERS

“Greasy spoon” is a familiar term describing a restaurant, usually a diner, that is less than pristine and that serves cheap food.

37 Word with dim : SUM

Dim sum is a Chinese cuisine made up of small portions of various dishes. The tradition of serving dim sum is associated with the serving of tea, when small delicacies were offered to travelers and guests along with tea as a refreshment. The name “dim sum” translates as “touch the heart” implying that dim sum is not a main meal, just a snack “that touches the heart”.

40 Part of an urban fleet : BUS

We use the term “bus” for a mode of transportation as it is an abbreviated form of the original “omnibus”. We imported “omnibus” via French from Latin, in which language it means “for all”. The idea is that an omnibus is a carriage “for all”.

42 Sofia’s husband in “The Color Purple” : HARPO

Alice Walker is an author and poet. Walker’s best known work is the novel “The Color Purple”, which earned her the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize. “The Color Purple” was adapted into a very successful film of the same name, directed by Steven Spielberg.

43 Poet who wrote “I have spread my dreams under your feet / Tread softly because you tread on my dreams” : YEATS

Irish poet and dramatist William Butler Yeats won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1923 for “inspired poetry” that gave “expression to a whole nation”. Yeats was Ireland’s first Nobel laureate.

44 Some pickups : GMCS

GMC is a division of General Motors (GM) that was established in 1901 and started out as “GMC Truck”.

45 Like a Buffalo nickel : RARE

The Buffalo nickel is also called the Indian head nickel, and was minted from 1913 to 1938. The coin is so called because the obverse bears the profile of a Native American male, and the reverse an image of an American bison.

46 Maisie Williams’s role on “Game of Thrones” : ARYA

Maisie Williams is the English actress who plays the tomboyish young girl Arya Stark on the hit HBO series “Game of Thrones”.

47 Edges of a diamond? : DEES

The edges of the word “diamond” are letters D (dees).

Complete List of Clues/Answers

Across

1 Finishing-line cry? : BINGO!
6 Guinness with an Oscar : ALEC
10 Thigh muscle, informally : QUAD
14 Beginning to happen : AFOOT
15 Result of a normal distribution : BELL CURVE
17 Tickets : CITES
18 Long ones can be measured in centuries : BIKE RIDES
19 Is short : OWES
20 “Fingers crossed!” : WISH ME LUCK!
21 Recruit : NEW HIRE
23 Outbuilding that’s sometimes converted into a dwelling : OAST
24 Capacious : ROOMY
25 Minds one’s own business : BUTTS OUT
29 Things a mysophobe is afraid of : GERMS
30 Some bonds, for short : MUNIS
31 Tiny messenger : RNA
32 Ending with electro- : -LYTE
33 Quack grass and others : WEEDS
34 Award quartet : EGOT
35 “Wow!” : OOH!
36 College figures : DEANS
37 Onetime Swedish exports : SAABS
38 Begins to believe : BUYS INTO
40 Extra-crispy, to put it nicely : BURNT
41 IBM component: Abbr. : INTL
42 Midweek milestone : HUMP DAY
44 Crush cans, maybe : GRAPE SODAS
48 Give an edge to : HONE
49 Perseverance, e.g. : MARS ROVER
50 ___ Gandhi, longest-serving president of the Indian National Congress : SONIA
51 In science fiction, suspended animation of a body at a very low temperature : CRYOSLEEP
52 Kind of office tray : IN-OUT
53 Name written with an accent in Irish English : SEAN
54 Estimating words : OR SO
55 Heading in a contract : TERMS

Down

1 Some striped strips : BACON
2 Lead-in to some unsolicited advice : IF I WERE YOU …
3 Striking : NOTEWORTHY
4 Ends a vacation : GOES HOME
5 Extra play opportunities, in brief : OTS
6 Hoffman who wrote “Revolution for the Hell of It” : ABBIE
7 Island rings : LEIS
8 National dogs of Norway : ELKHOUNDS
9 Flowering plant such as “old man’s beard” : CLEMATIS
10 Participates in a bee, maybe : QUILTS
11 Language that’s mutually intelligible with Hindi : URDU
12 Opposite of “sans” : AVEC
13 Secretary, e.g. : DESK
16 Families and waves might have them : CRESTS
20 Tongue-in-cheek : WRY
22 Quick notes, quickly : IMS
25 Good, in Guadalajara : BUENO
26 Driver’s license designation : ORGAN DONOR
27 Mined compound in the “Avatar” universe : UNOBTANIUM
28 Ink spots, for short : TATS
29 Lump : GLOB
30 “Where’s the beef?” inquirer? : MEAT LOVER
33 Broke up a band, say : WENT SOLO
34 Modern meeting aid for many : EARPHONE
36 Greasy spoons : DINERS
37 Word with dim : SUM
39 Nurses : SIPS ON
40 Part of an urban fleet : BUS
42 Sofia’s husband in “The Color Purple” : HARPO
43 Poet who wrote “I have spread my dreams under your feet / Tread softly because you tread on my dreams” : YEATS
44 Some pickups : GMCS
45 Like a Buffalo nickel : RARE
46 Maisie Williams’s role on “Game of Thrones” : ARYA
47 Edges of a diamond? : DEES
50 Pose : SIT