Day: August 13, 2023

Bill’s time: 22m 10s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1 Drinks named after a city in Yemen : MOCHAS

Mocha is a port city in Yemen on the Red Sea and was once the principal port for the capital city of Sana’a. Mocha was the major marketplace in the world for coffee until the 1600s, and gave its name to the Mocha coffee bean, which in turn gave its name to the mocha brown color, and the flavor of coffee infused with chocolate.

7 Remove, as a cap : DOFF

One doffs one’s hat, usually as a mark of respect. To doff is to take off, with “doff” being a contraction of “do off”. The opposite of “doff” is “don”, meaning “to put on”.

11 Bloody Mary ingredient : TABASCO

Edward McIlhenny created Tabasco Sauce in 1868. He recycled old cologne bottles as a container for the sauce so that he could present it to friends, and when he went into business he ordered new cologne bottles for the commercial product. Even today, the Tabasco Sauce bottle bears a striking resemblance to the bottle used to distribute 4711 cologne.

The Bloody Mary is one of my favorite cocktails, perhaps because it seems to taste so differently depending on who makes it. It has numerous ingredients above and beyond the requisite vodka and tomato juice, and has been described as “the world’s most complex cocktail”.

22 Cookbook for rotelle lovers? : MEALS ON WHEELS

Rotelle is a type of pasta with a shape resembling spoked wheels. The term “rotelle” comes from the Italian for “small wheel”.

25 Play lists? : ROSTERS

Our word “roster”, meaning “list, register”, actually comes from the same root as our word “roast”, would you believe. “Roster” came into English from the Dutch “rooster”, meaning “table, list”. An alternative use of the Dutch “rooster” was “gridiron”, from the “roosten” meaning “to roast”. The connection is that a roster of names is often listed on a sheet of paper that has grid lines resembling the marks left by a gridiron on roasted meat. Quite interesting …

26 Creature thought to inspire mermaid legends : MANATEE

Manatees, also known as “sea cows”, are very large marine mammals that can grow to 12 feet in length. The manatee is believed to have evolved from four-legged land mammals and probably shares a common ancestor with the elephant.

27 Olive oil for a macaroni salad? : ELBOW GREASE

In many cases, the name given to a type of pasta comes from its shape. However, the name macaroni comes from the type of dough used to make the noodles. Here in the US, macaroni is usually elbow-shaped, but it doesn’t have to be.

36 Gate listing, for short : ETD

Estimated time of departure (ETD)

37 Bit of high jinks : CAPER

Our expression “high jinks”, meaning “prank, frolic”, was once the name of an 18th-century Scottish drinking game, would you believe? A bad score on a dice and you had to take a drink, or do something undignified.

41 Best-selling personal finance guru : SUZE ORMAN

Suze Orman is a financial advisor who has gotten her message out on television, in books and on the speaking circuit. She often appears on PBS, and indeed is the most successful fundraiser public television has ever had.

45 Advice for saucing a lasagna? : GET BETWEEN THE SHEETS

“Lasagna” was originally the name of a cooking pot, but the term came to mean a dish that was cooked in it. “Lasagna” also became the name of the flat noodle used in the dish. If you order lasagna on the other side of the Atlantic, you’ll notice the “lasagne” spelling, the plural of “lasagna”. The plural is used as there is more than one layer of pasta in the dish.

50 Region of ancient Palestine : JUDEA

Judea was the southern part of the historic Land of Israel.

53 Martin Scorsese and Spike Lee, for 67-Across : ALUMNI
[67A Where Ross taught paleontology on “Friends,” for short : NYU]

Movie director Martin Scorsese is very much a New York City native, and is well-known for directing movies set in the Big Apple. Among the list of great Scorsese films are “Taxi Driver”, “Raging Bull”, “Goodfellas”, “Cape Fear”, “Casino” and “The Departed”.

Film director Spike Lee was born in Atlanta, Georgia but has very much made New York City his home and place of work. Most of Lee’s films are set in New York City, including his first feature film, 1986’s “She’s Gotta Have It”. That film was shot over two weeks with a budget of $175,000. “She’s Gotta Have It” grossed over $7 million at the US box office.

55 Running fettuccine dough through the pasta machine? : RIBBON CUTTING

Fettuccine is a popular type of pasta in Italy, particularly in Rome. It is a flat noodle similar to the smaller tagliatelle that is more popular in Bologna. The most common dish made with fettuccine in North America is Fettuccine Alfredo.

61 Concealed field, for short : BCC

A blind carbon copy (bcc) is a copy of a document or message that is sent to someone without other recipients of the message knowing about that extra copy.

62 Cacao bit : NIB

The seeds of the Theobroma cacao tree are cacao beans. The beans can be dried, and crushed. The resulting pieces are sold as cacao nibs.

67 Where Ross taught paleontology on “Friends,” for short : NYU

Ross Geller is the character on “Friends” played by David Schwimmer. The role was actually written with Schwimmer in mind, and so Ross was the first of the “Friends” to be cast.

Paleontology is the study of prehistoric life. My favorite “paleontologist” is Dr. David Huxley played by Cary Grant opposite Katharine Hepburn in the wonderful 1938 comedy “Bringing Up Baby”.

76 Butch Cassidy, famously : OUTLAW

The Old West train and bank robber Robert Parker was better known by the name Butch Cassidy. His partner in crime Harry Longabaugh was known as the Sundance Kid. Famously, the exploits of Butch and Sundance were reenacted in the marvelous 1969 film “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid”.

77 Astronaut Jemison : MAE

Mae Jemison was a crew member on the Space Shuttle Endeavour on a 1992 mission, and as such became the first African-American woman to travel in space. She is also a big fan of “Star Trek” and appeared on an episode of “Star Trek: The Next Generation”. That made Jemison the first real astronaut to appear on any of the “Star Trek” shows.

79 Baked, so to speak : ON POT

“Potiguaya” is the Mexican-Spanish word for “marijuana leaves”. The slang name “pot” comes from “potiguaya”.

80 Kitchen disaster with rotini? : SPIRALS OUT OF CONTROL

Rotini is a corkscrew-shaped pasta that is often used in pasta salads. Even though “rotini” sounds like it comes from a word meaning “twist, rotate”, the word “rotini” doesn’t exist in Italian other than as the name for the pasta.

92 Hummus brand : SABRA

Sabra Dipping is a company that specializes in the production of hummus and guacamole. If I can’t get homemade hummus or guacamole, then Sabra is the way to go …

96 Big news for a co. : IPO

An initial public offering (IPO) is a significant event for a company as it marks the first time it becomes a publicly traded company. IPOs are often accompanied by a so-called “lock-up period.” This is a period of time, typically 90 to 180 days after the IPO, during which company insiders, such as executives and early investors, are not allowed to sell their shares on the open market. The purpose of the lock-up period is to prevent a flood of shares from hitting the market and potentially driving down the price of the stock.

97 Singer Bareilles : SARA

Sara Bareilles achieved success with her 2007 “Love Song” with the help of the iTunes online store. In one week in June of that year, iTunes offered the song as “free single of the week” and it quickly became the most downloaded song in the store, and from there climbed to the number spot in the charts.

99 Sets of mathematical points : LOCI

“Locus” (plural “loci”) is Latin for “place”, and is used in English with the same meaning. The term can also be used to describe a center of power or activity. In mathematics, a locus is a set of points that satisfy some property. For example, a locus might be a straight line, part of a line, a surface, or perhaps a curve.

100 With 108-Across, aftermath of a farfalle dinner? : BUTTERFLIES … 108 See 100-Across : … IN YOUR STOMACH

Farfalle is commonly referred to as bow-tie pasta because of its shape. The name comes from the Italian “farfalla” meaning “butterfly”.

107 Asanas in a sauna, say : HOT YOGA

Hot yoga is performed under relatively hot and humid conditions. The actual temperature and humidity levels are often chosen to resemble those found in India, where yoga originated.

“Asana” is a Sanskrit word that translates literally as “sitting down”. The asanas are the poses that a practitioner of yoga assumes. The most famous is the lotus position, the cross-legged pose called “padmasana”.

113 Like O. Henry’s “The Gift of the Magi” : IRONIC

O. Henry’s short story called “The Gift of the Magi” was first published in 1905. It tells of a relatively poor, newly-married couple who want to buy each other a gift for Christmas. The wife’s pride and joy is her long blonde hair, while the husband’s most treasured possession is his grandfather’s gold pocket watch. The wife sells her hair to buy her gift, and the husband sells his watch to buy his gift for his spouse. The wife is given a set of combs, hair accessories that are useless now that her hair is short. The husband gets a platinum fob chain for the watch that he no longer owns.

115 Jungian topic : SELF

Carl Jung was a Swiss psychiatrist, and the founder of analytical psychology. Jung was very much associated with the analysis of dreams, and also introduced us to the psychological concepts of introversion and extroversion.

116 Some party lines : CONGAS

The conga line is a dance that originated as a Cuban carnival march. It became popular in the US starting in the thirties. The dance is apparently named after the Congo region of Africa, and it was originated by slaves who were brought from there to Cuba.

Down

1 “___ Dearest” (1981 film) : MOMMIE

“Mommie Dearest” is a 1978 memoir written by Christian Crawford, the daughter of actress Joan Crawford. The book did not paint Joan in a good light, with claims of alcoholism and neglect of her four children.

2 Like the musical “Come From Away” or “Six” : ONE-ACT

“Come from Away” is a 2013 musical that is based on the true story of what happened when 38 planes were ordered to land on the island of Newfoundland following the 9/11 attacks in the US. After the planes landed at Gander airport, the small town of Gander had to cope with almost 7,000 stranded passengers, a number that was about double the town’s population.

“Six” is a musical that tells the story of the six wives of King Henry VIII of England written by Toby Marlow and Lucy Moss when they were both students at Cambridge University. Each of the six wives has her own unique style of music. Anne Boleyn’s songs have a rock and pop feel, while Catherine of Aragon’s songs have a Spanish influence.

4 Hip things to do in Hawaii? : HULAS

The hula is a native dance of Hawaii that uses arm movements to relate a story. The hula can be performed while sitting (a noho dance) or while standing (a luna dance).

5 Part of T.A.: Abbr. : ASST

Teaching assistant (TA)

7 Texas metroplex, to locals : DFW

Dallas/Fort Worth (DFW)

12 “La Bohème” subject : AMORE

Giacomo Puccini’s 1896 opera “La bohème” tells of a love affair between a poor poet named Rodolfo, and an even poorer seamstress named Mimi. There isn’t a happy ending …

13 The “x” in x2 : BASE

We use a base-ten numbering system, with ten digits (0 – 9). The binary system, or base-two, uses just two digits (0 & 1). The binary system is used at a fundamental level in computing, because the number 0 and 1 can be represented by microcircuits being switched “on” or “off”.

14 Roti flour : ATTA

Atta is a whole-wheat flour used to make flatbreads in South Asian cuisine, such as chapati and naan. “Atta” is the Hindi or Urdu word for “dough”.

16 Things that snake oil salesmen sell : CURE-ALLS

There is actually a real snake oil, a Chinese medicine made of fat extracted from snakes. You can buy snake oil at traditional Chinese pharmacies and it is supposed to be very efficacious in the treatment of joint pain. Snake oil was introduced into the US by Chinese laborers working on the construction of the Transcontinental Railroad. Medicine salesmen started to ridicule the snake oil as it competed with their own remedies, and in time the term “snake oil” became associated with any cure-all potion.

20 Cardinals’ org. : MLB

The St. Louis Cardinals Major League Baseball team plays at Busch Stadium. Busch Stadium is the third stadium in the history of St. Louis to have the Busch name. The first two were named for Gussie Busch, the brewing magnate and former Cardinals team owner. The current stadium is named for the brewery though, and not Gussie per se.

23 Early 2000s virtual animal companion : NEOPET

Neopets.com is a website where one can own a virtual pet. I wouldn’t bother if I were you …

28 “All Quiet on the Western Front” setting, for short : WWI

“All Quiet on the Western Front” is a 1928 novel by German WWI veteran Erich Maria Remarque. In the book, Remarque describes the awful trials experienced by German soldiers during the war, and then after the war as they try to return to civilian life. The book was adapted into a Hollywood movie of the same name in 1930. The film won Oscars for Outstanding Production and for Best Director (Lewis Milestone).

31 Tom callin’s? : MEOWS

A group of cats can be referred to as a clowder or a glaring. A male cat is a tom or tomcat, and a neutered male is a gib. An unaltered female cat is a queen, and a spayed female might be referred to informally as a molly. A young cat is a kitten.

35 Cardinals’ org. : NFL

The Arizona Cardinals were founded in 1898 as the Chicago Cardinals. That makes the Cardinals the oldest, continuously-run, professional football team in the whole country.

37 Ham-and-cheese sandwich : CUBAN

A Cuban sandwich almost always includes Cuban bread filled with roast pork, glazed ham, Swiss cheese and sliced dill pickles. The Cuban was designated the city of Tampa’s signature sandwich in 2012.

39 Word with fire or red : … ANT

Fire ants are stinging ants, and many species are known as red ants. Most stinging ants bite their prey and then spray acid on the wound. The fire ant, however, bites to hold on and then injects an alkaloid venom from its abdomen, creating a burning sensation in humans who have been nipped.

41 Education acronym : STEM

The acronym “STEM” stands for the disciplines of science, technology, engineering and mathematics. An alternative acronym with a similar meaning is MINT, standing for mathematics, information sciences, natural sciences and technology.

42 Dynasty name in Italian history : MEDICI

The House of Medici was a dynasty from the Italian Republic of Florence. The Medici family went into the world of finance and built the largest bank in Europe in the 15th century. Significantly, the Medicis produced four Popes around this time, and then the family moved from the status of common citizens to become hereditary Dukes of Florence. By the middle of the 18th century the family ruled the Grand Duchy of Tuscany, but ended up fiscally bankrupt.

44 Bulk : HEFT

The heft of something is its weight, its heaviness. The term “heft” is derivative of the verb “to heave” meaning “to lift, raise”.

47 “Barry” airer : HBO

“Barry” is a dark comedy TV series starring Bill Hader as an Ohio hitman who questions his life of crime. Veteran actor Henry Winkler plays an award-winning supporting role as the teacher of an acting class that the hitman joins.

48 Rubik who created the Rubik’s Cube : ERNO

What was originally called the “Magic Cube” became better known as “Rubik’s Cube”, and was named for its inventor Ernő Rubik. Rubik’s Cube is the world’s biggest selling puzzle game, with over 350 million sold in just over 30 years.

54 Photo-sharing social media accounts, for short : INSTAS

Instagram (often abbreviated to “Insta”, or “IG”) is a photo-sharing application, one that is extremely popular. Instagram started in San Francisco in 2010. Facebook purchased Instagram two years later, paying $1 billion. The billion-dollar Instagram company had just 13 employees at the time of the sale …

57 Snappy quip : BON MOT

“Bon mot” translates from French as “good word”. We use “bon mot” (and sometimes just “mot”) to mean “quip, witticism”.

59 Bedtime brand : NYTOL

“Nytol” is a brand name for the drug diphenhydramine which is primarily used as an antihistamine. The drug also has a strong hypnotic effect and is used by some people as a non-prescription sleep aid.

75 Legal memo header : IN RE

The term “in re” is Latin, and is derived from “in” (in) and “res” (thing, matter). “In re” literally means “in the matter”, and is used to mean “in regard to” or “in the matter of”.

78 Flair : ECLAT

“Éclat” can describe a brilliant show of success, as well as the applause or accolade that one receives for that success. The word “éclat” derives from the French “éclater” meaning “to splinter, burst out”.

86 Weight-to-height meas. : BMI

The body mass index (BMI) is the ratio of a person’s height to his or her mass.

89 Pearl units : CARATS

The carat is a unit of mass equal to 200 mg (0.2 grams). It is used in sizing gemstones.

91 Third-largest city of Colombia : CALI

In terms of population, Cali is the third-largest city in Colombia (after Bogotá and Medellin). Santiago de Cali (the full name for the city) lies in western Colombia. Apparently, Cali is a destination for “medical tourists”. The city’s surgeons have a reputation for being experts in cosmetic surgery and so folks head there looking for a “cheap” nose job. Cali has also been historically associated with the illegal drug trade and money laundering.

93 Japanese board game also called Five in a Row : GO BANG

Gomoku (also called “Gobang” and “Five in a Row”) is a strategy game played on a board or with pencil and paper. The game originated in Japan, and the name “Gomoku” translates as “five pieces”. It sounds like tic-tac-toe but with the goal to get five of one player’s marks/pieces in a row.

94 Tree that yields gum arabic : ACACIA

Acacia is a genus of trees and shrubs that is also known as thorntree, whistling thorn and wattle. The acacia is the primary food source for the giraffe in the wild, with the animal eating the leaves high in the tree, leaves that are inaccessible to competing species. The natural gum from two species of acacia tree is known as gum arabic, which is used in the food industry as a stabilizer.

101 Beginner : TYRO

A tyro (also “tiro”) is a beginner or a novice. “Tyro” comes into English from Latin, in which language “tiro” means “recruit”.

103 Gerund end : -ING

A gerund is a form of a verb that can be used as a noun. For example, the gerund of the verb “to solve” is “solving”, as in the phrase “we really enjoyed the solving of the crossword”.

106 Fatty tuna, on a sushi menu : TORO

In a sushi restaurant, the dish called “toro” is the fatty tissue from the belly of the bluefin tuna.

109 Link letters : URL

An Internet address (like NYXCrossword.com and LAXCrossword.com) is more correctly called a uniform resource locator (URL).

110 One making calls, informally : REF

Back in the early 17th century, a referee was someone who examined patent applications. We started using the same term for a person presiding over a sporting event in the 1820s. “Referee” is a derivative of the verb “to refer”, and literally describes someone who has the authority to make a decision by “referring” to a book, archive etc.